Harry Potter and the Triwizard Gambit - Chapter - 15

The days following the Second Task were bitterly cold, and the grounds of Hogwarts were often coated in a thin, icy sheen. But inside the castle, a firestorm of anger brewed that had nothing to do with the weather.

It began with a headline.


"Potter, Krum, and the Girl Between – Love Triangle or Cold-Blooded Ambition?"
By Rita Skeeter


The Daily Prophet had taken a nosedive into the gutter. The article sprawled across the entire front page, complete with a charmed illustration that showed Hermione Granger smirking between Harry Potter and Viktor Krum, both glaring at each other with crossed arms like lovesick rivals. The image kept repeating every few seconds, no matter how often one tried to fold the paper or look away.

Hermione nearly ripped the newspaper in half when she first saw it.

“She’s gone completely mad!” Hermione shouted, storming into the Star Club room. Her cheeks were crimson, her curls frazzled, and the Daily Prophet was clenched in her fist like a cursed scroll.

“She’s saying I’m some two-timing schemer who flirts with international Quidditch stars and manipulates Harry to get attention!”

Harry looked up from the table where he was reviewing the next batch of club submissions. “Let me guess,” he said calmly. “Sources say I kept you from being Viktor’s hostage so I could have you to myself?”

Hermione’s nostrils flared. “Exactly that! And she even quoted Pansy Parkinson—Pansy of all people—saying that I’ve been stringing Harry along for years!”

Fred and George, seated nearby, shared a grimace.

“Blimey,” Fred muttered. “She’s not even pretending it’s journalism anymore.”

“Honestly,” George said, “at this rate, she’ll be claiming Dumbledore’s growing a second beard just to hide a goblin girlfriend.”

There were snorts and chuckles from the other students gathered around, but Hermione wasn’t laughing.

“She called me The Witch Who Can’t Choose!” Hermione snapped. “She even hinted that I’m practicing love potions on the both of you!”

“I’d say she’s projecting,” Luna said dreamily from the corner, flipping through The Quibbler. “Only someone desperate for attention would think like that.”

“But people read this trash!” Hermione said, exasperated.

Harry folded his hands, his emerald eyes calm but unreadable.

“She’s doing it on purpose,” he said. “She knows she’s losing credibility. So she’s doubling down. And she’s using you to stir the pot.”

“And me,” added Dumbledore’s calm voice from the doorway.

Everyone turned as the Headmaster stepped into the room, his long robes trailing behind him. He held another Daily Prophet in his hand—this one with a different title.

"Dumbledore’s Decline – Is Hogwarts Still Safe?"
By Rita Skeeter


“She’s calling me a relic,” Dumbledore said with a faint smile. “Says I’ve lost control of the school, that I’m favoring you, Harry, and that I’ve allowed dangerous inventions—like the enchanted screens during the Second Task—to distract from the ‘true horrors’ lurking within the castle.”

“That woman’s insane,” Hermione muttered.

“She’s clever,” Dumbledore said gently. “But too clever for her own good.”

Harry narrowed his eyes. “She keeps quoting Slytherins. Always anonymous, always vague. But it’s always Pansy, or Nott, or someone else whispering rumors.”

“And no one sees her in the castle,” Hermione added. “

Dumbledore’s blue eyes sparkled behind his spectacles. “Miss Skeeter may be bending more rules than she realizes. And I suspect… she’s close to making a very big mistake.”

There was silence for a moment.

Then Harry stood up.

“I think it’s time we end this,” he said. “Not just the articles. Not just the rumors. But her access to the castle.”

“I’m with you,” Hermione said at once.

Fred raised a hand. “Do we get to use magical traps?”

“Subtle ones,” Harry smirked.

Dumbledore chuckled softly.

“While I cannot condone violence,” he said, “I will not stand in your way. Hogwarts belongs to all of us. And no one—no one—should be able to walk its halls unseen and uninvited.”

Harry looked around the room.

“Stars club,” he said. “Get your notebooks ready. We’re going animagus hunting.”



The trouble began two mornings after Rita Skeeter’s infamous article hit the front page.

At first, Hermione tried to shrug it off. She buried herself in the club work, editing articles, reviewing parchment drafts, and helping with magical formatting for their enchanted issue. But she couldn’t ignore the stares.

Or the whispers.

Students in every corridor would glance at her and then quickly look away, pretending to be engaged in something else. A group of third-year Ravenclaws giggled openly when she passed by the Astronomy Tower steps. Even a few younger Hufflepuffs, who had once admired her for her quick mind and kind assistance, now avoided eye contact entirely.

And then the letters began to arrive.

Hundreds of them.

Some were curious.
Some were mocking.
Many were… cruel.

“You’ve got to read this one,” Fred said grimly, holding up a violet-colored envelope as the morning mail fell in heaps across the long Star Club table. “It smells like perfume and—wait, is that a poem?”

Before Harry or Hermione could stop him, the letter burst into song:

“Oh, Hermione, cruel and sly,
Two brave hearts you made cry—
One from Hogwarts, one from the East,
But in your arms they both found peace!”

Fred instantly dropped it like it was cursed.

Hermione’s face had turned white. Harry reached over and yanked the letter, tossing it into the common room fire.

“That's enough,” he growled.

But it wasn’t over.

That afternoon, while Hermione was sorting through another stack of mail beside Neville, she screamed—a loud, sharp cry of pain that echoed through the Star Club room.

“Her hands!” Neville shouted.

Dozens of students stood up as Hermione dropped the open envelope, her palms seared with shimmering hot silky sapnans, a rare magical ink used for branding letters—but when triggered incorrectly, it burned. Thin golden threads glowed across her skin, like liquid wax that hissed upon contact.

“Hospital wing—now,” Harry snapped.

Neville nodded, guiding a trembling Hermione quickly out of the room.

Fred clenched his fists. “Who in their right mind sends cursed letters to a schoolgirl?”

George was already scanning the envelope. “No sender. Just a scent charm and a line of poetry. Skeeter’s riling them up.”


Hermione stayed in the hospital wing overnight. Madam Pomfrey applied a balm brewed from powdered moonstone and frost lilies, but the burns would take time to fade. Though not permanent, they would ache when touched by magic for a few days.

When Harry came to visit her that evening, he found her sitting stiffly on the bed, bandaged hands in her lap, her face calm—but her eyes stormy.

“They’re all turning on me,” she said softly.

Harry sat beside her. “No. Some of them are. But the Club’s with you.”

“I got a howler this morning,” Hermione whispered.

Harry blinked. “From who?”

She looked up at him. “Molly Weasley.”

The name hit Harry like a curse.

“What?” he said sharply. “Why would she—?”

“She said I should be ashamed of myself,” Hermione said bitterly. “For toying with you. That I’ve broken your heart. That I’m ruining your name.”

Harry stood up.

“That’s ridiculous. First of all, it’s not her place. Second, She didn't even know you. The only Weasleys I talk to are Fred and George—and Ginny sometimes. What gives her the right?”

“I’ve never even met her,” Hermione muttered. “And ever since the Yule Ball, Ron’s been staring at me in a way that makes my skin crawl. I’ve kept my distance.”

She exhaled sharply. “I’m not sending her a howler. I’m sending Arthur one.”

Harry paused, then slowly grinned. “Now that’s an idea.”


The next morning, a crimson howler with shimmering golden ink arrived at Arthur Weasley’s desk at the Ministry of Magic.

Several stunned Ministry clerks stopped working as the letter opened itself and Hermione Granger’s voice bellowed across the Department of Magical Transportation.

“MR. WEASLEY!
Kindly tell your wife to keep her ill-informed opinions to herself!
I have done NOTHING to deserve her slander,
and unless you would like every future edition of the Stars Magazine
to feature an editorial on ‘Improper Howlers and Parental Meddling,’
I suggest you PUT A STOP TO IT!
Also, Ron’s stares are not charming.
Please remind him I am not interested.
GOOD DAY!”

The envelope shredded itself into glittering pieces, fluttering harmlessly to the ground.


Back at Hogwarts, Hermione finally smiled again.

Harry handed her a warm cup of pumpkin tea.

“I’m proud of you,” he said.

She smirked. “Thanks. That actually felt… really good.”

“And when this tournament is over,” Harry said, “we’ll deal with Rita. Properly.”



The Marauder’s Map lay sprawled across the central table of the Stars Club room. Dozens of ink footprints moved in real-time across the parchment surface, labeled with names of students, professors, and the occasional house-elf. Harry stood hunched over the map, his wand gently tapping one corner to refresh it every thirty seconds.

“Nothing,” he muttered. “Still nothing.”

Fred let out a groan as he flopped into one of the enchanted beanbags conjured for lounging.

“Are you sure her name would show up? I mean, what if it just says ‘Lizard’ or something?” he asked.

“It didn’t say ‘Fox’ for you,” Harry replied. "Animagi don’t trick the map.”

“Maybe she’s not even here anymore,” George muttered, tapping his quill against a copy of the Daily Prophet. “Rita’s probably off in Diagon Alley, sipping firewhisky and making up our next scandal.”

Hermione stood by the window, her arms folded tightly.

“She’s here,” she said quietly. “She’s been here. No one outside Hogwarts could’ve gotten those information of me—or seen me leaving the common room the night before the second task. She’s inside these walls. We just need to wait.”

And so they did.

For seven long days, the Stars Club took turns monitoring the map. They skipped breaks between classes, rotated night shifts, and timed it with prefect rounds to avoid suspicion. Fred enchanted the map to emit a soft chirp if any unknown or suspicious name appeared near restricted locations. Still, no sign of Rita Skeeter.

Until the eighth morning.

Neville had just finished his two-hour rotation when he blinked at a name that suddenly materialized on the lower corner of the parchment:

Rita Skeeter – Edge of Forbidden Forest

His voice rang out like a trumpet.

“She’s here!”

Everyone scrambled into motion.

Harry was first to grab his cloak. “Where?”

“Here—by the greenhouse and just past the edge of the courtyard path. She’s moving slowly… maybe crawling?”

Fred looked at George and grinned.

They ran.


The outskirts of the castle were quiet, the early afternoon sun muted behind gray clouds. In the distance, the Forbidden Forest loomed with its whispering trees. Birds chirped overhead, and wind tugged at the edges of their robes.

And there, on the gravel path, stood Draco Malfoy.

He wasn’t alone, not exactly—but he looked like he was. Draco was talking animatedly to something in his hand. He laughed once, tilted his head, and then nodded at the air as if receiving advice.

Fred squinted. “Either Malfoy’s finally gone mad, or he’s talking to his pet cockroach.”

Hermione narrowed her eyes. “That’s no ordinary bug.”

Harry raised the Omnioculars he’d brought from the Quidditch World Cup. The lenses zoomed in with a soft whirr, focusing on the tiny golden beetle perched on Draco’s palm.

“There she is,” Harry whispered. “That’s her.”

“Too risky to catch her now,” George muttered. “She’ll fly off the moment we move.”

Hermione sighed. “We need to wait. She’s probably too cautious to be caught in the open like this.”

“Then we make her think she’s safe,” said Harry.


Back in the Stars Club room, Hermione pulled out a clear glass jar and set it on the table. It glowed faintly with protective enchantments.

Harry arched an eyebrow. “What's with the jar?”

Hermione gave a small, innocent smile. “Just thinking about bug collecting. A hobby I might want to pick up.”

Fred snorted. “You always were full of surprises, Hermione.”

She stared at the glass with a glint in her eye. “Oh, you have no idea.”