Chapter 9: Two outlaws

Harry watched in mounting fascination as Sirius Black somehow managed to consume two chicken legs at the same time. It only took him a blink of an eye and he was left staring at the bones of the chicken.

"You had enough gold to buy me a Firebolt but not enough to buy yourself some decent food?" Harry asked incredulously as he watched Sirius gorge himself up with food on the table.

"The Goblins helped me out with that, for a fee, of course. I can't exactly show my head in the Wizarding world or the Muggle world for that matter. I'm a mass-murdering maniac, remember." said Sirius before stuffing his mouth with slices of fried pork.

"You could have just used a glamour charm."

Harry's suggestion was met with a raised eyebrow from Sirius. "How am I supposed to do that without a wand?"

"You don't have a wand?" Harry asked blinking in surprise.

"Of course not. I was a prisoner remember."

"The Goblins can't procure you a wand?"

"The Ministry prohibits any other creature from possessing a wand, especially the Goblins. They won't even go for buying through a proxy as the Ministry keeps track of every wand that is sold."

"Surely there are wandmakers that sell wands in the black market." said Harry as he thought of the shady parts of Knockturn Alley.

"Sure, but none that would sell to a Goblin. Even if I go myself I'll be most likely handed over to the Ministry. My head is worth a hefty sum of Galleons, I'm told."

"In that case, we might just have to find an old wand for the time being." Harry mused out loud.

"Exactly how're you going to do that?" asked Sirius pausing his impetus in draining the food on the table.

"I have my ways." Harry answered, thinking of the Room of Requirement and the many things that the students and the faculty had hidden away in that room.

Sirius looked at him curiously before shrugging.

"You have changed." Sirius observed, and looked around the Chamber appreciatively. "If you could arrange all this…. Anyway, tell me about the Tournament."

"I have to face dragons in the First Task."

Sirius spit out the pumpkin juice he was drinking hearing about the adversary Harry was about to face in the First Task.

"What? Are they mad?" Sirius asked incredulously with his eyes the size of saucers.

"They locked you up in a hellish place without a trial all these years. You tell me."

Sirius blinked twice before nodding.

"Point taken. How're you holding up?" Sirius asked in concern.

"I have a plan but it is risky. Any advice on the subject is appreciated."

Harry leaned back and took a sip from a warm cup of tea. He could see the wheels behind Sirius's eyes turn.

"Well, a direct attack on a dragon is fruitless. It has a thick hide that can resist most magical spells. It'd take multiple wizards to even have a nominal effect on a dragon. But, there are simple spells that can trick a dragon."

"Trick a dragon?" Harry asked in interest.

"Yes. A dragon's greatest weakness is its eyes. There is the Conjunctivitis curse that can temporarily blind a dragon or there are several illusionary charms that could work. I suppose it depends on what you have to do." explained Sirius as he took in another plate of mutton to his needy stomach.

Harry was quite surprised.

"I searched Hogwarts library for any spells that could handle a dragon and I found very little except for the Conjunctivitis curse."

Sirius shook his head as he drained the mutton down with a glass of water.

"I'm not surprised. Most of the spells that I know to be of any use against a dragon is from the Black library."

"From your family's library?"

"Yes. The Blacks were famous hunters of magical creatures among other things…" Sirius muttered darkly before focusing on his plate full of mutton.

"I have two more days till the First Task. Think you can teach me some of these spells?" asked Harry

"Sure. There are a few easy ones. Just what was your plan in dealing with the dragons anyway?"

"Well, I don't have to 'deal' with dragons. I just have to get past them and retrieve an item I guess. I planned to use transfiguration and elemental spells to distract the dragon."

"Elemental spells are quite hard to master Harry. Not to mention they are quite dangerous." Sirius warned

"I know. Which is why I stuck to water and air."

"Even those elements can be dangerous. The drain on magic is too deep sometimes. People have died trying to use these spells."

"I've encountered few problems so far." said Harry, with a shrug of his shoulders.

"Thank Merlin that's the case." said Sirius

Before anything else could be said Winky appeared with a pop.

"Master Harry's Bucky friend is safe in the Forbidden Forest."

Harry stared blankly at Winky for a minute before he connected the dots.

"Oh, you mean Buckbeak." said Harry, piecing together the garbled House Elf speaking style.

The enthusiastic repetitive nod he received from Winky was proof enough. He had asked Dobby to pick up Buckbeak on Sirius's request, last night. By the absence of Dobby, he just knew his elvish friend had quite a hard time bringing Buckbeak to the Forbidden Forest.

"Hmm… take me there."

Harry managed to stay on his feet as he came out of the unique teleportation used by Winky. House Elves were damn good companions to have. The sheer magical might these beings wield is phenomenal. Very few wards could hold back a House Elf as evidenced by Winky's ability to teleport in and out of the Chamber of Secrets. Even Salazar Slytherin's wards failed to hold back Winky and Dobby from teleporting in and out of the Chamber.

Even with such extraordinary gifts, House Elves remained in servitude to Wizards and Witches. He wondered how that came about.

"Master Harry Potter sir!" called out Dobby excitedly breaking him out of his musings.

His elvish friend was running around Buckbeak trying and failing in containing the erratic Hippogriff.

"Dobby, leave him be."

Dobby immediately teleported by his side muttering about 'mean Bucky'.

Harry on the other hand had his eyes trained on the half-horse half-eagle before him. Buckbeak, Hagrid had named the creature, and Harry felt it was aptly named. Its beak shined under the morning light and he held no notions of testing the sharpness of the beak or the razor-sharp talons.

So, he went for a deep bow keeping his eyes to the ground. A few seconds later he hesitantly looked up and was relieved to see Buckbeak also greeting him with a bow. He slowly reached out his hand once he straightened up and thankfully Buckbeak didn't bite it off. Instead, Buckbeak slowly nuzzled its head on his palm.

Harry ran his hands through the stormy grey feathers of Buckbeak. He was surprised when Buckbeak sort of placed the underside of its sharp beak on his shoulder as if giving a hug.

"I suppose you missed me." said Harry, but Buckbeak shook its head away from him.

"Oh, you missed this place huh. Makes sense I suppose." Harry nodded to himself as he looked around the dark misty forest. He then stared at his avian friend. "You sure you'll be alright?"

A squawk was the answer he got which was neither here nor there. In the end, he decided to just bring Buckbeak into the Chamber. On one hand, Buckbeak could keep Sirius company and he didn't really felt the Forbidden Forest was the safest place for Buckbeak. Hagrid had passingly mentioned how Aragog and his kind were spooked with the arrival of dragons.

Knowing this, he felt it safe to have Buckbeak inside the Chamber. It was a real struggle to get Buckbeak inside the Chamber, though. Thankfully, a lot of fried meat and fish saw Buckbeak's reluctant entrance to the Chamber. Sirius's presence also helped, as Buckbeak turned out to have become fond of his fellow criminal on the run.

When all was said and done, he was late for breakfast. The Great Hall was tightly filled with students on all four tables. Thanks to some harsh efforts from Professor McGonagall the dirty looks directed at him from Hufflepuff were considerably low. Sure, there were a few hostile looks but he could care less what some moron thought about stealing the thunder from pretty-boy Cedric Diggory.

He eyed the Hogwarts Champion discreetly as he made his way towards his spot. Hufflepuff's star seeker and all-around wonder boy was laughing and joking with his friends over the table of Badgers.

'Good for him. Let him laugh all the way to the First Task.' he thought before sitting down between Neville and Katie Bell.

"Hey, Harry." Katie and Neville greeted him as he sat down and helped himself with some food from the table.

"Hey, Neville. Hey, Katie." he greeted back politely.

"Slept in late, huh?" asked Katie

There was a scoff from Ron. Harry guessed Ron had some opinions to share but he didn't even glance at the youngest male Weasely.

"Not exactly. Just had to take care of something." he said with a smile at Katie before digging in into his breakfast.

Harry could hear another snort from Ron but he was adept at ignoring other people especially those who are hostile to him. And there is no doubt about Ron Weasely's hostility. The stare that Ron was directing at him could be seen from his peripheral vision. That's why he remained aloof and totally unbothered.

He had dealt with the likes of Ron Weasely before. The boy was a narcissistic attention-seeker and nothing else. The best way to deal with those types is to ignore their existence to their face while keeping an eye on them from afar. This method had worked in the past and he was sure it was going to work here as well.

He made smalltalk with Neville who was excited for managing to procure a pot of Fluxweed from Dogweed and Deathcap, a Herbology shop in Hogsmeade. Apparently, the plant was difficult to grow and Neville had tried many times to grow the plant unsuccessfully in his garden. Salves from the plant could apparently mend broken bones and skin. Harry also distinctly remembered the magical plant was an essential ingredient in Polyjuice Potion.

As Neville regaled the struggles he went through to grow the plant, Harry discreetly searched the Prophet for any interesting news. Other than a continuation of bashing Snape and reported sightings of Sirius Black in Romania of all places, there was nothing else of note. The front page was all about the speculation of the Tri-wizard Tournament and its First Task.

He assumed Skeeter was just waiting for the inevitable wave of interest in the First Task to settle down before breaking the news. It was a clever ploy and one that would only help him much more if he outperforms every other Champion. Not to mention, Bartemius Crouch was going to be the star of the day when the memory was going to get published. After all, the man was the Head of DMLE when Sirius was thrown into Azkaban without a trial. Harry held no doubt that Fudge will spin the whole situation to put the blame on Crouch.

Speaking of Sirius, he thought of his Godfather's offer to help. While he more than appreciated any help Sirius could bring to the table he was already prepared to manage a dragon. There were two plans in his hand. Plan A called for a 'show' in which he uses his performance to dazzle the crowd and take the egg. Plan B calls for a straight-out attack that neutralizes the threat posed by the dragon and quickly taking the egg without much hype.

Putting thoughts of plans out of his mind he searched for the Durmstrang and Beauxbatons Champions. Both of them were sporting less approachable looks on their faces. In Krum's case, the brooding frown was always a permanent state so no surprises there. Fleur, on the other hand, was easily disturbed and it showed on her face.

Knowing that they were going up against a dragon in two days would do that to anyone, he reckoned.

Even now, he felt goosebumps whenever he thought of the gigantic fire-breathing creatures. If he was feeling like that, despite knowing in advance and preparing all this time, he could sympathize with the others.

It was going to be one hell of an evening on the coming Tuesday. Quickly finishing his breakfast and having half a glass of pumpkin juice he was out of the Great Hall. He mouthed a hasty goodbye to Hermione and whispered 'later' to his friend knowing that she was curious to know about what happened with Sirius last night. He just thought more training was to be the priority before anything else.

Besides, he could fill her in towards the afternoon or the evening when he was going to take a break. Till then, he was busy and he has an appointment with Madam Pomfrey. After all, it'd be remiss of him to expect Sirius would recover his health all on his own.

Some enquiries into health-restoring potions would be useful for Sirius and perhaps himself, he thought, as he looked down on his short and skinny body. The daily exercise and his increased food consumption have done wonders to his physique but he was still in possession of a malnutritioned body.

The First Task was not going to be that much physically taxing but the second one was obviously going to be. While he was confident his current regimen was doing some wonders to his body it was not a bad idea to get a magical boost.