Fatal Misstep

"Very well… if you haven't got any questions, we'll go back up to the castle, shall we, it's a bit chilly…" said Bagman with a slight shudder, and then he sidled over to Harry's side, as if to shepherd him personally back to the safety of the castle.

But before Bagman could place another word, Krum tapped on Harry's shoulder, saying, "Could I haff a vord?" in his thick Bulgarian accent. Harry accepted, and they were about to head towards the forest when Oleandra suddenly remembered that Sirius had asked her to keep an eye on Harry.

"Hey, hero," Oleandra called out, jogging lightly over to him. And then, more discreetly, she whispered in his ear, "do you want me to come with? Sirius said—"

"I know what Sirius said," Harry whispered back to her, glancing over his shoulder to check whether Krum was listening in. "We're just having a little talk, okay? I know you're all concerned about me, but honestly, I can take care of myself… We're not that far from the castle."

Oleandra shrugged. It was his funeral if he didn't want her help. Besides, he was right. Apart from all the times Sirius had invaded the castle, Hogwarts was quite safe against external threats. Hold on… this place had more holes than Swiss cheese!

In any case, she didn't intend on leaving just yet; she wanted to commit to memory the layout of the maze by flying overhead. The hedges had already been planted, so unless they picked up their roots and walked away, the correct path to the centre of the maze would remain the same.

"You should not rely overmuch on what you see," Viviane told her, as if she had read Oleandra's mind. "There's no guarantee that the maze's configuration cannot change."

"Even so, it'll give me an idea of the distance I'll have to walk to the centre," Oleandra responded uneasily.

Easier said than done; once she was inside, wandering blindly, fighting against monsters and solving puzzles, she would no doubt lose track of her location relative to the centre. As Oleandra considered the best ways to navigate the labyrinth, a glimmer of shimmering colours caught her attention from the corner of her eye.

"There's something hiding at the edge of the forest, in the direction where Harry and Krum went," she said, her Mystic Eyes opening automatically. "Shall I go take a look?"

"Do so if you must," Viviane said worriedly. "But don't take unnecessary risks."

Oleandra flew over Harry and Krum's heads and landed lightly at the edge of the Forbidden Forest, where she had seen the colours. If there had been something here, it wasn't there any more.

"Lumos," said Oleandra after a moment's thought, and she kneeled in the dusty ground at the foot of a juniper tree, pointing the beam of light emitted from her wand at her feet.

"Footsteps," Viviane observed, leaning down. "Whoever it was, they came from the forest, stayed here for who knows how long, spying on us, before retreating back into the forest."

Oleandra had a bad feeling about this. Perhaps there was some truth in Sirius's words; maybe there really was someone after Harry's life. Or maybe they were after her; it was difficult to tell at this stage.

"Lights out, Oleandra; we're too visible like this," Viviane said. "Either we leave now, or we continue the chase under the cover of darkness. With your eyes, you'll see them before they see you, which they won't be expecting. Regardless, whether to continue is up to you."

"We keep going," Oleandra said, chewing her bottom lip. "We might as well see this to the end. Nox."

The light at her wandtip faded away, plunging Oleandra into darkness once again. But she wasn't blind; her eyes may not be able to see through objects like Professor Moody's fancy eye, but they allowed her to see through the darkness just fine.

Oleandra penetrated deeper into the darkness of the woods, whispering at regular intervals, "Revelio!" to make the outlines of the footsteps more visible against the ground. But eventually, the use of the Revealing Charm became unnecessary, as the footsteps ahead of her had gained a distinctly angry red glow in her Mystic Sight.

"What the?" Oleandra murmured, after following the glowing footsteps. "The footsteps just end here. Did our mysterious watcher fly away here? He couldn't have Disapparated, could he? The Forbidden Forest is still on castle grounds, so it shouldn't be possible…"

"If the footsteps are not imbued with magical residue," Vivian said thoughtfully, "then the only reason why your Truth-Seeking Eyes would perceive them in such a colour would be because they contain falsehood."

Oleandra dropped to her knees and gave the last footsteps a closer look; the boot imprints were rather indistinct and misshapen, almost as if someone had stepped twice in each one.

"They didn't fly away, they doubled back in their own footprints!" Oleandra said, her heart skipping a beat. "But— But that means they knew they were being tracked!"

"STUPEFY!" a man's harsh, unfamiliar voice roared from behind her.

The Stunning Curse caught Oleandra in the back of the head before she could react. Darkness filled her vision as she fell unconscious, crumpling into a lifeless heap. But this was not to be her end; not if Viviane had anything to do with it. If Oleandra's consciousness left her, then Viviane could easily take the helm.

"I ought to just kill this one right now," the man growled. "She's given me enough trouble already, but Dumbledore's likely to cancel the tournament if one of his precious students croaks... Bah, I've wasted too much time."

Viviane slowly breathed in and out, perfectly mimicking the rise and fall of an unconscious person's chest. If the mysterious man had managed to detect Oleandra's presence from so far away, in the dark no less, and found out that she was on his trail, then he likely possessed incredible perceptive abilities. If he thought that Oleandra was still awake, he might just cut his losses and kill her right there and then.

But since the rune of distress had not alerted Oleandra, then this meant that the man had never really intended on killing her, as Naudhiz only gave its warning if she was in mortal peril. Even so, Viviane was ready to reach for Oleandra's wand to fight back, should the need arise…