Kim Shimmers and the Diviner’s Curse
A Harry Potter Fanfic by me (and sequel to Kim Shimmers and the Screech Owl)
(Art not mine, couldn’t find credits. Let me know if you know them!)
This Harry Potter fanfic will be posted, if all goes well, every weekend.
Chapter 11
Take It
The cannon exploded, and moments later Harry came from the tent and into the rocky arena. Fred and George erupted into applause, as did much of the bleachers, their arms thrown up in the air as they bounced on their toes. Kim clapped and gave a cheer too, but it barely made it out of her throat, and it didn’t look like Harry could hear them at all.
Harry raised his wand and flicked, his mouth moving but the words lost in the cheers of the crowd.
“What’s he doing?” Fred asked excitedly.
“I don’t know!” Kim said, patting him on the shoulder hastily so he would put his arm down and get out of her view.
“I thought you were helping him prepare,” Fred said.
“Shush! Just watch!”
Everyone around them seemed to be having a similar conversation. Watching, waiting in anticipation as Harry shifted his wait from foot to foot and stared down the black dragon. It was at this point that the dragon seemed to have had enough. It dug in its claws and leaned forward, still crouched over its nest of eggs. Its jaws opened.
“Run Harry!” Kim screamed, and though she had no idea if Harry could hear her or not, Harry ran. He ran to the right, slipping a bit on the loose rocks beneath him and scrambling to come behind a large bolder, just big enough for him to crouch behind. Suddenly Kim was watching in a strange state of shock and trance, because it was much like someone had removed her from her body. But she was in her body, she merely felt as though she belonged in Harry’s body at this moment. The dragon opened its jaws even wider and released a great hiss of firry air, blasting the rock Harry hid behind with flame. Kim watched from an aerial view as her dream unfolded before her. It was entirely surreal.
But then the dragon had stopped to take a breath, and Harry had stood out from behind the rock, and the feeling was abruptly over. She had caught up with real time, and she had no idea what was about to happen next. Then a whizzing sound grew from the distance and a brown blur flew overhead. Kim ducked instinctively as a broom shot over the stands and towards Harry. He caught it, just as the dragon opened its fanged mouth once again for another blast, and threw his leg over, shooting into the sky faster than Kim could follow.
“That’s a boy!” Fred cheered.
“Beat him at his own game!” George yelled.
“It’s a she,” Kim said, not able to help herself now that she was smiling at the small victory.
“What?” George said.
“The dragon. They’ve all been she’s. Remember that when you sling woman as an insult,” Kim said, shifting her pointed gaze to Fred. He made a face, though he evidently had no comeback to this, which was both shocking and rewarding in of itself.
Kim turned her full attention back to Harry as he dived at blindingly fast speeds. She held her breath for fear he would crash into the ground, narrowly missing fire being blasted at him before he pulled from the dive and darted back into the sky again. She realized he was trying to taunt the dragon away from her eggs, which she was quite determinedly hovering over without so much as a budge.
“Why won’t she move?” Fred asked, throwing out a hand as if there was a foul on the field.
“Because she’s a Horntail. It’s like I told him, there extremely territorial. It’s going to take more than that to coax her away from her eggs-” Kim gasped and drew her hands to her mouth as Harry dove too near to the dragon’s tail wiping in his direction. He swerved out of the way, managing to stay steady on his broom, but just barely. He went swinging through the air as the jagged tail with its barred razor spikes made contact with his body. Kim gasped again, jumping with horror as she waited for the undoubted moment that Harry went flying from his broom, plummeting to his death for the second time. Her right hand flew down to grab onto something stabilizing in her moment of abandon and landed on George’s arm. His hand shifted as hers slid down, his exposed fingers meeting hers and clasping around her now hot and gloved hand as if by instinct.
Kim grew more and more aware of this as it became clear that Harry was not in fact hurtling to his death. He had stabilized himself and was seemingly trying to puzzle a new way to get past the dragon, soring high into the air out of its reach. Tingling chills of adrenaline and excitement ran through Kim’s body as she looked down at George’s hand wrapped around hers, the tension in both their bodies holding their grasps tightly between them, as if when they let go it might cause them to fall to either side, suddenly destabilized. His fingers were bony and raw, red from the cold and pale, but his hand was large enough to well encompasses hers.
She caught his gaze shifting to her and looked up at him, embarrassed and breathless, and a bit dizzy with confusion too. He released her hand hastily, and she quickly brought hers back to her own lap as they exchanged uncomfortable glances.
“Sorry,” he muttered, frowning a bit, and looking back to the arena.
“N-no it’s-” Kim began but she could feel her feeble words getting lost in the cheers of the crowd, “fine…”
