When the full moon subsided and classes resumed again, Rhiannon decided she could put off the prospect of the second task no longer and brought the issue up with her fellow champions when they met in a disused Defence classroomafter classes one afternoon.

“They told us the eggs we took were a clue, didn’t they?” Cedric suggested. “Have any of you taken a closer look?”

Rhiannon shook her head – the thing was heavy and so deeply imbued with magic that it made her hands itch, so she had buried it at the bottom of her clothes-chest and not looked at it since.

“I managed to knock it open at one point and it screamed at me,” Viktor interjected grumpily. “I have not been able to open it since, though, it seems to have a hidden catch.”

Fleur reached into her backpack and drew out her own golden egg. “I have been carrying mine around in case something occurred to me. So far, nothing,” she replied, setting the intricate metal device on the table where all four of them could poke and peer at it.

The egg-shaped device had a slightly flattened base so it sat upright on the table without wobbling, and a cluster of leaves centered around a nub at the top made the whole thing bear a resemblance to a large fruit rather than an egg, though on closer inspection the nub was actually the delicately constructed face of an owl.

As the four of them inspected the device and tipped it back and forth curiously, somebody knocked the unseen catch and the device fell open, its round surface splitting into petal-like quarters to reveal a pale crystal of the same shape as the egg itself only smaller, and vibrating as it emitted a high-pitched shriek. Fleur and Rhiannon reeled away, covering their ears and groaning in pain while Cedric fumbled with the caterwauling device and eventually got it closed.

“If you twist the owl-knob at the top, those three leaves turn out of place,which unlocks the petals so they can fall open and let that racket out,” Cedric explained, once the rest of them had recovered from the shock and the din.

“Well, I suppose knowing how t’ unlock the thing is a step forward,” Rhiannon growled, eyeing the device distrustfully. “But, I d-d-dunno ‘bout you, I’m not gettin’ anythin’ useful out of ear-splittin’ shrieking.”

Fleur frowned, the edges of her lips turning down as she studied the now-silent device. “I feel like we need to listen more to get a better idea of what we’re looking for, let alone find it,” she admitted ruefully.

Rhiannon drew her wand and altered the jinxes on her ears in preparation. This clue was intended for a human to be able to solve it, so she modified the jinx to filter out higher frequencies as well as dull the volume in general, and noticed Fleur doing the same out of the corner of her eye. Cedric turned the knob and immediately covered his ears, scowling intently at the egg as it shrieked again, but after a couple of minutes he closed it again so they could talk.

“Anything?” Cedric asked loudly, evidently a little deafened by the sound.

“I think the sound must be the clue – they have just, encrypted it somehow,” Viktor mused, running his fingers over the surface of the device.

That sparked a memory deep in Rhiannon’s mind, and she turned it over in her head a few times. That kind of high-pitched cacophony... she’d heard it before, but it had been the connection to Viktor specifically that had brought the memory to surface. She’d heard it for the first time not long ago... the very day Durmstrang, and thus Viktor, had arrived at the Castle...

“Merfolk!” Rhiannon burst out, rapidly putting the pieces together in her head. “Th-th-th-they c-c-can speak a sort’ve bridge language, remember Speaker Talori when your ship arrived – but I remember that sound before they started speaking, I th-think that might be what Mérish sounds like above water!”

Cedric slapped his palm on the table and swore loudly while the others made sounds of dawning understanding. “I speak... six or so languages, but none of them are Mérish,” Viktor informed them bluntly.

“I c’n barely speak English,” Rhiannon interjected jokingly.

Fleur snickered, but eventually shook her head. “French, Hungarian and English are the extent of my skills, though I can broadly understand a little Spanish and Italian,” she replied.

They all looked at Cedric, who shrugged. “I can, sort of. I’m just more familiar with how it sounds underwater,” he told them, looking embarrassed. “Well – I’m not very good, but I can understand it well enough to make a translation charm work so we can all understand it.”

“Can you cast it now, then?” Rhiannon asked him, eager to pry the egg’s secrets out so she knew what to expect of the rapidly-approaching second task.

Cedric grimaced. “That would be a no. There’s some sort of magical restriction on it – true Mérish just doesn’t carry right outside of water, it’s why they use the bridge language. The different medium messes up all kinds of things, the translation spell wouldn’t be able to understand it.”

Fleur shuddered, and feathers popped out on her neck and shoulders and bristled with discomfort. “I am not a sea hawk. My feathers are not waterproof, and I am a poor swimmer,” she replied with a grimace. “I do not relish the idea of going swimming to translate a shrieking egg machine.”

Cedric beamed. “Then it’s a good thing we don’t have to,” he announced cheerfully. “The Prefects’ Bathroom has a massive tub – more like a small pool – and we can go and figure the clue out in there. It’s not always private but if I book a time on the door I can get us a couple of hours... call it a pool party or something, we deserve the break.”

Rhiannon suddenly realised that she didn’t own a swimming costume, and told Fleur as much with a wince. “There is a Hogsmeade weekend scheduled for this weekend, is there not? I will take you and find something. We can find you new bras at the same time,” Fleur replied, adding the last as a whispered afterthought.

With that in mind, the four of them decided to meet up again in the evening of the next Sundayshortly after last class, and Rhiannon and Fleur made plans to visit Hogsmeade together that weekend. Rhiannon had been planning to meet Luna and Hermione for a date at the Three Broomsticks, so she made a mental note to tell them that it would need to be a little later than they had initially agreed. And with those agreements made, they headed off to meet their respective friend groups for dinner.

As agreed, Rhiannon and Fleur met up on Saturday to shop for swimming costumes and underwear. Finding something that wouldn’t set off Rhiannon’s bodily dysphoria was a little difficult, but they eventually found something that worked – black with an iridescent shimmer, high-necked and long-sleeved with a skirt just long enough that Rhiannon wasn’t constantly worrying about her genitals being visible. Shopping for bras was a lot more pleasant – the training bras Rhiannon’s dads had bought didn’t quite fit right anymore, and it felt like a little rite of passage to get her first bra with actual fitted cups.

After that Rhiannon’s date with Luna and Hermione went well enough, though the tavern had a number of patrons who had read the disparaging comments in Rita’s article and took it upon themselves to make sure the three teenagers knew that their behaviour was seen and disapproved of. But in all honesty, Rhiannon was used to that attitude by now and didn’t care too much, so she was still in good spirits by the time they had to return to the castle.

On Sunday, Rhiannon found herself pacing and constantly aware that the second task was barely six weeks away. Her friends lured her outside for an informal game of Quidditch over the training yard to pass the time, much to the relief of her cat who was even less patient with the pacing than their roommates, but by the time the sun began to sink Rhiannon was itchy and foul-tempered with nervous impatience as she limped upstairs to meet her peers outside the Prefects’ Bathroom, conscious of the heavy mechanical egg wrapped up in her swimming costume in her backpack as she went.

“You look like someone kicked your cat,” Cedric told Rhiannon frankly when she reached the bathroom. Rhiannon blinked and looked around, briefly wondering if Callie had followed her upstairs before she realised he hadn’t meant it literally and flushed, feeling a little silly.

“Oh, you meant... N-non- no, I just... we’ve got six weeks an’ no idea what we’re up against, no idea what to practice,” Rhiannon replied hastily, twisting her ring back and forth as she fought the urge to bite her nails.Then asoft meep sounded from Rhiannon’s backpack and she twitched, startled. On inspection she found her cat curled around the metal egg, and she just had to stop and stare before she burst out laughing, and by the time she got her breath back under control Fleur and Viktor had arrived on the landing outside the bathroom.

“I feel like you might want to ditch the cat so we can lock the bathroom,” Cedric suggested with a raised eyebrow. “That way we can start making the most productive use of the six weeks we’ve got left... although I have to admit, it bothered me all Christmas that we were basically sitting around doing nothing as February got closer and closer.”

Rhiannon tried to extricate Calypso from her backpack, but the tortoiseshell cat flattened her ears and swiped at her with sheathed claws and she had to give up, setting the pack back on her shoulders with a sigh. “Jus’ lock her in with us and if she whines, so be it... she’s sneaked into the shower while I’m usin’ it b’fore, maybe she’ll like it,” she replied with a shrug. It was something of a testament to how heavy the metal egg device was that her by now rather large cat had managed to stow away in the pack with it without being noticed until now, Rhiannon reflected with a scowl as Cedric gave the door the password – ‘pine fresh’ – and then locked it once all four of them had entered the bathroom.

Cedric hadn’t been exaggerating, the bath really was more like a pool and not even a particularly small one. It looked large enough for all ten prefects, both head students and five Quidditch captains to use the bath together without any crowding, let alone the four Champions. Rhiannon hid in a toilet cubicle to change, an action that required a certain amount of negotiating with Callie to retrieve her swimming costume, but eventually she was changed and she crept out of the cubicle and over to the pool where the other three were already soaking in the water. She set the backpack down on the edge of the pool and slipped into the water, then briefly tried to get the egg out of the backpack before giving up.

“I think Callie owns it now,” Rhiannon told the others with a rueful grimace. There was a loud mraaaaaow from the backpack that she could only interpret as agreement of that statement, and her companions snorted with laughter.

“We have another around here somewhere,” Fleur replied with a shrug. “It would probably be best to check at least two to ensure they contain the same clue, we cannot assume they have given us a level playing field.”

“Th-that was my thought too,” Rhiannon agreed. “Maybe we check th’ others, and do mine last – maybe Callie will’ve given up by then.”

Viktor reached over, fumbled for a moment and then retrieved his own device, which he very carefully then passed to Cedric. Cedric placed the thing underwater and opened it without warning, but the shrieking was muffled underwater and a moment later he shut it off and surfaced, beaming. “Rhi was right – it’s definitely Mérish, I’ll work the translation charm but you’ll have to all hold your breath.

Viktor looked unbothered by the prospect but Fleur made a face and Rhiannon thought she could see the imprints of feathers on her friend’s cheeks, a sure sign she was uncomfortable. Still, they all needed to hear the clue so that as many perspectives as possible were available to solve it, and Fleur eventually acquiesced to the plan.

“Transferendum lingua,” Cedric incanted clearly, before he set his wand back on the side of the pool and with a nod to the others, dove underwater. The other three followed, and Cedric held his fingers up to count down from three. When he had a closed fist again, he undid the catch at the top of the egg device and let it fall open, and at once all of them were transfixed.

The difference between Mérish in air and in water was so pronounced, all four were physically stunned. Instead of shrieking, a beautiful melody radiated from the egg, and once they adjusted to the change they could pick up words, the same rhyme repeating over and over.

Come seek us where our voices sound,
We cannot sing above the ground,
And while you're searching ponder this;
We've taken what you'll sorely miss,
An hour long you'll have to look,
And to recover what we took,
But past an hour, the prospect's black,
Too late it's gone, it won't come back.

Soon Rhiannon ran out of air and surfaced, followed quickly by Fleur, then Viktor. The sound from below was cut off and then Cedric surfaced, spluttering a little from overexertion. “I don’t know about anybody else, but that sounds surprisingly straightforward,” Cedric announced grimly.

Fleur grimaced and shuddered, feathers erupting fully on her face, then on her neck and shoulders. “I would agree... it is not so much a puzzle as a plain warning. Seek us where our voices sound – the rhyme was originally delivered in Mérish, which only carries underwater.”

“Which could only mean the next task is going to be underwater,” Rhiannon agreed with a groan. “And th-th-th-that’d be bad enough, b-b-b-but I think the rhyme’s language is another clue too. There’s-s-s-s-s – only one place you’re gonna find Merfolk on Hogwarts grounds.”

Cedric swore profusely, his expression turning dark. “I think you’re right – there’s lakes and rivers in the Forest, but Merfolk... the only place deep enough is Loch Dubh. The Black Lake.”

And as the four of them realised what they were facing, another realisation struck Rhiannon as hard as any Bludger, and she let out an involuntary wail of panic.

“I don’t know how to swim!”

_____________________________________________________________________

 

There was nowhere on the Hogwarts grounds more terrifying, more mysterious than Loch Dubh. It was so deep that a magical freshwater squid of colossal proportions lurked in the depths somewhere, and students were strictly forbidden from even dipping their toes in without teacher supervision, and from what Rhiannon remembered, the merfolk who lived within were none too friendly to interloping wizards – not without good reason of course, but that made for a barrier nonetheless.

And as she had said, Rhiannon had no idea how to swim. As a child, she had been sent to Mrs Figg’s house whenever the family went somewhere fun like the pool or the beach, and swimming lessons had never been a priority at primary school – that was the responsibility of parents. Sure, since becoming a werewolf she’d paddled in the edge of the lake sometimes – but she couldn’t turn in front of everyone, her wolf form would be no use swimming underwater, and even if neither of those things were true, the task was scheduled during the day – the moon would not rise for another four or five hours after the task was completed.
Now that the champions knew the task involved the lake, they had a number of things to work for in their training regimen, and the first of those was learning to swim. Cedric was a passable swimmer, but Viktor was excellent, sailing being a popular pastime at Durmstrang and swimming being a requirement for anyone wanting to sail. So Viktor took charge of teaching the girls to swim, while all four scoured the library in their free time for ideas on how to breathe underwater. Underwater meant underwater, it was unlikely to just be a surface race – the rhyme stated an hour to look, they needed to figure out how to alter their natural abilities for that time.

The immediate obvious solution was Gillyweed, a relatively rare magical herb but native to magic-imbued Scottish lochs, including Loch Dubh. But after the incident in second year with Polyjuice potion – a story that had the three older champions in stitches – Rhiannon had a strong suspicion that Gillyweed would simply not work at best, at worst it could trigger another partial transformation and get her stuck in that halfway state. And she didn’t have a spare month to put up with puppy brain.

For the same reason, Transfiguration – either full or partial – was rejected as well. Viktor decided to pursue research on the topic, curious about perhaps a transfiguration that might enable greater navigation capabilities without sight, but Cedric was happy with his Gillyweed plan and Transfiguration wouldn’t work for either of the girls.

Eventually they came across a dazzlingly simple solution – the Bubble-Head Charm. It didn’t normally last an hour, but if they combined it with something to scrape oxygen from the water the way a fish’s gills did while expelling carbon dioxide from the bubble... it could work, with some modification.

Swimming lessons and spell practice took up the next six weeks. Even the January full moon period was taken up by training – Rhiannon used the time to scope out the lake shore and familiarise herself with the terrain, wading as deep into the water as she could. Luna’s fourteenth birthday arrived two weeks before the task did and they celebrated with a picnic for just the three of them. And once that had passed, they were approaching the task in earnest.

On the twenty-third of February, a Saturday, Rhiannon was traipsing down to the lake for a last swimming lesson before the task when a surprising character pulled her aside before she could get out of the castle. Professor Moody had a sort of furtive air about him, totally unsuited to the gruff, broad-shouldered figure and he looked around for any onlookers before he pulled her into what looked like an old Transfiguration classroom.

“Potter,” Professor Moody greeted her, immediately prickling Rhiannon’s temper.

“Black,” she corrected him irritably.

“Black, then, whatever,” Moody replied sharply. “Have you got a strategy for the task? I assume you know they’re sending you into the Lake.”

“Yes, I-” Rhiannon began, but the Potions Professor didn’t actually wait for her to say anything before he continued.

“Gillyweed. Ask that friend of yours where to get it, the one that doesn’t speak, it’ll work for an hour,” Professor Moody carried on.

Were she a wolf, Rhiannon’s hackles would be bristling with bad temper. She didn’t like the Professor’s manner at all, and she especially didn’t like being talked over. “Ac-ac-ac-ac-ac-actually,” she stammered, finally managing to get a word in edgeways. “I’ve g-g-g-og- I’ve got it sorted. And uh – isn’ it kinda cheatin’ for you t’ be givin’ me t-t-t-tips?”

It occurred to Rhiannon that it was odd Moody had made the suggestion at all. He knew she was a werewolf, and though he was the Potionsmaster, he had once been an auror – which meant that he had achieved top marks in Defence Against the Dark Arts, and should know that transformation magics and werewolves didn’t mix.

“Eh, cheating, cheating... this whole tournament is built on cheating, and not getting caught is an art of its’ own,” Moody replied cryptically. “And... well, good, I suppose. Glad you’ve got it sorted. You’ve a good head on your shoulders, Po- Black.”

And with that Professor Moody patted Rhiannon on the shoulder in a disconcerting sort of way and stumped off, leaving her with more questions than answers. She shook off her discomfort and headed off out of the castle again, determined to take every spare moment she had to prepare for tomorrow’s task. Forget Professor Moody, she had told the truth – she had a plan, and she was going to beat this just as she’d gotten past the dragon.