In Shadow and Signal (Book 2)

Harriet Potter's POV

They started building the maze a week before the task.

Massive hedges, tall as towers, sprang up on the Quidditch pitch overnight - thick with magic and humming with curses. Students gathered at the edges during lunch breaks, whispering theories, trying to see past the brambles.

No one could.

It was meant to confuse. To isolate.

And I wasn't afraid of either anymore.

-

I spent the week training.

Not publicly.

Not with teachers.

With myself.

Spellwork. Endurance. Focus charms. Anything I could call on in a crisis. I pushed until my fingers blistered and the air around me sang with magic I didn't fully understand.

The contract hadn't flared again.

But it sat at the edge of every spell like it was watching.

Like it was waiting for the moment when everything changed.

Again.

-

Oliver returned three days before the task.

He didn't sneak in this time.

He came through the front gate with clearance papers, Ministry signatures, and the kind of cold authority that came from loving someone the Ministry didn't deserve.

I met him at the gate.

No words.

Just arms around each other, strong and sure.

He pressed something into my palm.

A folded slip of parchment.

Whatever happens, you don't face it alone.
Even when I'm not beside you, I am with you.

And when the maze turns cruel - which it will - remember who you are.

Not the Champion. Not the girl they cast into the fire.

You're the one who walked out carrying it.

-

The night before the task, I couldn't sleep.

I stood in the common room alone, wand resting on my open palm, breathing slow.

The maze would try to break us.

Twist us.

But I wasn't going in to be changed.

I was going in to win.

And not for glory.

Not for them.

For me.

For us.

For every time I'd been asked to survive something I hadn't chosen - and walked out with more than scars.

This time, I'd walk out with victory.

And I would walk out whole.