Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Harry Potter, #4)

by J.K. Rowling

The story had been picked over so many times, and had been embroidered in so many places, that nobody was quite sure what the truth was anymore.

“Wormtail, I need somebody with brains, somebody whose loyalty has never wavered, and you, unfortunately, fulfill neither requirement.”

All Harry knew was that at the moment when Voldemort’s chair had swung around, and he, Harry, had seen what was sitting in it, he had felt a spasm of horror, which had awoken him . . . or had that been the pain in his scar?

but it was like trying to keep water in his cupped hands; the details were now trickling away as fast as he tried to hold on to them. . . .

Privet Drive looked exactly as a respectable suburban street would be expected to look in the early hours of Saturday morning.

Harry had arrived at Hogwarts to find that heads turned and whispers followed him wherever he went.

Yours sincerely, P.S. I do hope we’ve put enough stamps on.

Mr. Weasley was looking around. He loved everything to do with Muggles. Harry could see him itching to go and examine the television and the video recorder. “They run off eckeltricity, do they?” he said knowledgeably.

Harry had always imagined Bill to be an older version of Percy: fussy about rule-breaking and fond of bossing everyone around. However, Bill was — there was no other word for it — cool.

“And that, boys,” yelled Mr. Weasley over the tumult of the crowd below, “is why you should never go for looks alone!”

Durmstrang and Beauxbatons like to conceal their whereabouts so nobody can steal their secrets,” said Hermione matter-of-factly.

They had never yet had a Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher who had lasted more than three terms.

“Saturn, dear, the planet Saturn!” said Professor Trelawney, sounding definitely irritated that he wasn’t riveted by this news. “I was saying that Saturn was surely in a position of power in the heavens at the moment of your birth. . . . Your dark hair . . . your mean stature . . . tragic losses so young in life . . . I think I am right in saying, my dear, that you were born in midwinter?” “No,” said Harry, “I was born in July.” Ron hastily turned his laugh into a hacking cough.

Harry and Ron were deeply amused when Professor Trelawney told them that they had received top marks for their homework in their next Divination class.

She read out large portions of their predictions, commending them for their unflinching acceptance of the horrors in store for them — but they were less amused when she asked them to do the same thing for the month after next; both of them were running out of ideas for catastrophes.

Some of the anger Harry had been feeling for days and days seemed to burst through a dam in his chest.

“Barking mad,” said Ron, shaking his head. “Harry, c’mon, they’ll be putting up your scores. . . .” Picking up the golden egg and his Firebolt, feeling more elated than he would have believed possible an hour ago, Harry ducked out of the tent, Ron by his side, talking fast. “You were the best, you know, no competition. Cedric did this weird thing where he Transfigured a rock on the ground . . . turned it into a dog . . . he was trying to make the dragon go for the dog instead of him. Well, it was a pretty cool bit of Transfiguration, and it sort of worked, because he did get the egg, but he got burned as well — the dragon changed its mind halfway through and decided it would rather have him than the Labrador; he only just got away. And that Fleur girl tried this sort of charm, I think she was trying to put it into a trance — well, that kind of worked too, it went all sleepy, but then it snored, and this great jet of flame shot out, and her skirt caught fire — she put it out with a bit of water out of her wand. And Krum — you won’t believe this, but he didn’t even think of flying! He was probably the best after you, though. Hit it with some sort of spell right in the eye. Only thing is, it went trampling around in agony and squashed half the real eggs — they took marks off for that, he wasn’t supposed to do any damage to them.” Ron drew breath as he and Harry reached the edge of the enclosure.

“What?” Ron bellowed furiously. “Four? You lousy, biased scumbag, you gave Krum ten!”

Hermione gave Ron a don’t-joke-about-things-like-that look,

The article sounded ten times worse when read by Snape.

He did not have his magical eye, but two normal ones.

Six dementors entered this time, flanking a group of four people.

Harry had soon mastered the Impediment Curse, a spell to slow down and obstruct attackers; the Reductor Curse, which would enable him to blast solid objects out of his way; and the Four-Point Spell, a useful discovery of Hermione’s that would make his wand point due north, therefore enabling him to check whether he was going in the right direction within the maze.

“she must really hate that Skeeter woman to risk missing the start of an exam.

“And here we have six missing Death Eaters . . . three dead in my service. One, too cowardly to return . . . he will pay. One, who I believe has left me forever . . . he will be killed, of course . . . and one, who remains my most faithful servant, and who has already reentered my service.”

Voldemort smiled his terrible smile, his red eyes blank and pitiless.

Decent people are so easy to manipulate, Potter.

Numbing the pain for a while will make it worse when you finally feel it.

“You have shown bravery beyond anything I could have expected of you tonight, Harry.

You place too much importance, and you always have done, on the so-called purity of blood! You fail to recognize that it matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be!

“What’s comin’ will come, an’ we’ll meet it when it does.

It is my belief, however, that the truth is generally preferable to lies,

Differences of habit and language are nothing at all if our aims are identical and our hearts are open.