Mark Reads ‘Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire’: Chapter 35

In the thirty-fifth chapter of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Harry is thrust into having to deal with the events that just happened to him immediately. In a flurry of activity, Moody takes Harry aside to help him cope and find out what happened. And then everything is just ruined. RUINED. Intrigued? Then it’s time for Mark to read Harry Potter.

CHAPTER 35: VERITASERUM

There’s a large part of me that didn’t want to read this chapter.

I suppose that’s pretty silly, considering this is a BOOK and NONE OF THESE PEOPLE WERE REAL, but having to deal with the horrors of Voldemort and the beauty of Priori Incatatem, I kind of wanted Harry to never return to the “real” world.

But he has to. The Portkey does as his father told him, and he’s transported back to the center of the maze, this time hold the wrist that belonged to the dead body of Cedric Diggory.

  • He did not move. All the breath seemed to have been knocked out of him; his head was swimming so badly he felt as though the ground beneath him were swaying like the deck of a ship. To hold himself steady, he tightened his hold on the two things he was still clutching: the smooth, cold handle of the Triwizard Cup and Cedric’s body. He felt as though he would slide away into the blackness gathering at the edges of his brain if he let go of either of them. Shock and exhaustion kept him on the ground, breathing in the smell of the grass, waiting…waiting for someone to do something…something to happen…and all the while, his scar burned dully on his forehead.

I cannot imagine a lonelier moment: Harry has watched a friend of his die, he’s watched the man who murdered his parents arise again, and he’s now returned to face the reality of all this. And he’s alone, in a maze, with a dead body.

Jesus christ. 🙁 🙁 🙁

  • “Harry, let go of him,” he heard Fudge’s voice say, and he felt fingers trying to pry him from Cedric’s limp body, but Harry wouldn’t let go. Then Dumbledore’s face, which was still blurred and misted, came closer.

    “Harry, you can’t help him now. It’s over. Let go.”

    “He wanted me to bring him back,” Harry muttered–it seemed important to explain this. “He wanted me to bring him back to his parents….”

    “That’s right, Harry…just let go now….”

brb sobbing uncontrollably guys

The scene Rowling describes is chaotic as hell:

  • Girls were screaming, sobbing hysterically….The scene flickered oddly before Harry’s eyes….

    “It’s all right, son. I’ve got you…come on…hospital wing…”

    “Dumbledore said stay,” said Harry thickly, the pounding in his scar making him feel as though he was about to throw up; his vision was blurring worse than ever.

    “You need to lie down now….Come on now….”

    Someone larger and stronger than he was was pulling, half carrying him through the frightened crowd. Harry heard people gasping, screaming, and shouting as the man supporting him pushed a path through them, taking him back to the castle.

First, I thought this might have been Hagrid, but we learn it’s good ol’ Mad-Eye Moody, who surely has to be freaking out about this.

But as he takes Harry into the castle, something didn’t sit right with me.

  • Harry heard a key scrape in a lock and felt a cup being pushed into his hands.

Why is Moody locking a door? Or unlocking one?

  • Moody helped tip the stuff down Harry’s throat; he coughed, a peppery taste burning his throat. Moody’s office came into sharper focus, and so did Moody himself….He looked as white as Fudge had looked, and both eyes were fixed unblinkingly upon Harry’s face.

Why did he take Harry in his office???? I wasn’t too suspicious, though, because Moody always sort of did things his own way. Right?

  • But Harry had suddenly remembered. He should have told Dumbledore, he should have said it straightaway–

    “There’s a Death Eater at Hogwarts! There’s a Death Eater Here–they put my name in the Goblet of Fire, they made sure I got through to the end–“

    Harry tried to get up, but Moody pushed him back down.

    “I know who the Death Eater is,” he said quietly.

    “Karkaroff?” said Harry wildly. “Where is he? Have you got him? Is he locked up?”

    “Karkaroff?” said Moody with an odd laugh. “Karkaroff fled tonight, when he felt the Dark Mark burn his arm. He betrayed too many faithful supporters of the Dark Lord to wish to meet them…but I doubt he’ll get far. The Dark Lord has ways of tracking his enemies.”

what. what is going on. what.

If it’s not Karkaroff, did Snape do it?

  • “No,” said Moody slowly. “No, he didn’t. It was I who did that.”

what. I mean….what. what. what. what

what the fuck

WHAT THE FUCK

HOW DOES THAT MAKE ANY FUCKING SENSE

  • Harry heard, but he didn’t believe.

    “No, you didn’t,” he said. “You didn’t do that…you can’t have done….”

    “I assure you I did,” said Moody, and his magical eye swung around and fixed upon the door, and Harry knew he was making sure that there was no one outside it. At the same time, Moody drew out his wand and pointed it at Harry.

I’m sorry WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON. HOW IS THIS EVEN REMOTELY POSSIBLE. MOODY WAS AN AUROR, FOR CHRIST’S SAKE!

  • “I asked you,” said Moody quietly, “whether he forgave the scum who never even went to look for him. Those treacherous cowards who wouldn’t even brave Azkaban for him. The faithless, worthless bits of filth who were brave enough to cavort in masks at the Quidditch World Cup, but fled at the sight of the Dark Mark when I fired it into the sky.

    You fired…What are you talking about…?”

    “I told you, Harry…I told you. If there’s one thing I hate more than any other, it’s a Death Eater who walked free. They turned their backs on my master when he needed them most. I expected him to punish them. I expected him to torture them. Tell me he hurt them, Harry….” Moody’s face was suddenly lit with an insane smile. “Tell me he told them that I, I alone remained faithful…prepared to risk everything to deliver to him the one thing he wanted above all…you.”

this is not happening this is not happening this is not happening

  • “Who put your name in the Goblet of Fire, under the name of a different school? I did. Who frightened off every person I thought might try to hurt you or prevent you from winning the tournament? I did. Who nudged Hagrid into showing you the dragons? I did. Who helped you see the only way you could beat the dragon? I did.”

I…I just…I don’t know what to see. I did not see this coming. I don’t understand anything.

I liked Moody. A lot. And now I feel…used. And I don’t know what on earth in this world is right and good and ok to believe in.

Just…what the fuck, guys. 🙁

Moody then proceeds to tell Harry exactly how much he manipulated him at every turn throughout this book. He ensured everything, down to Dobby, the gillyweed, and even his headstart into the maze, happened so that he’d touch the Portkey.

Which explains why Cedric was so disposable to Voldemort.

🙁

  • Harry stared at Moody. He just didn’t see how this could be….Dumbledore’s friend, the famous Auror…the one who had caught so many Death Eaters…It made no sense…no sense at all….

It doesn’t. It makes no sense. Which is why it was so hard for me to accept this.

Ugh, this sucks.

  • “Stupify!” There was a blinding flash of red light, and with a great splintering and crashing, the door of Moody’s office was blasted apart–

    Moody was thrown backward onto the office floor. Harry, still staring at the place where Moody’s face had been, saw Albus Dumbledore, Professor Snape, and Professor McGonagall looking back at him out of the Foe-Glass. He looked around and saw the three of them standing in the doorway, Dumbledore in front, his wand outstretched.

OH SHIT YEAH! Dumbledore to the fucking rescue shit yeah.

  • At that moment, Harry fully understood for the first time why people said Dumbledore was the only wizard Voldemort had ever feared. The look upon Dumbledore’s face as he stared down at the unconscious form fo Mad-Eye Moody was more terrible than Harry could have ever imagined. There was no benign smile upon Dumbledore’s face, no twinkle in the eyes behind the spectacles. There was cold fury in every line of the ancient face; a sense of power radiated from Dumbledore a though he were giving off burning heat.

WHAT THE FUCK MAN. Dumbledore is a true badass, guys. Wow.

  • “Moody,” Harry said. He was still in a state of complete disbelief. “How could it have been Moody?”

    “This is not Alastor Moody,” said Dumbledore quietly. “You have never known Alastor Moody. The real Moody would not have removed you from my sight after what happened tonight. The moment he took you, I knew–and I followed.”

WHAT THE FUCK?????????????

Guys. What. What the fuck. What is going on. What the hell does that mean?????

  • Dumbledore walked over to the trunk with seven locks, fitted the first key in the lock, and opened it. It contained a mass of spellbooks. Dumbledore closed the trunk, placed a second key in the second lock, and opened the trunk again. The spellbooks had vanished; this time it contained an assortment of broken Sneakoscopes, some parchments and quills, and what looked like a silvery Invisibility Cloak. Harry watched, astounded, as Dumbledore placed the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth keys in their respective locks, reopening the trunk each time, and revealing different contents each time. Then he placed the seventh key in the lock, threw open the lid, and Harry let out a cry of amazement.

    He was looking down into a kind of pit, an underground room, and lying on the floor some ten feet below, apparently fast asleep, thin and starved in appearance, was the real Mad-Eye Moody. His wooden leg was gone, the socket that should have held the magical eye looked empty beneath its lid, and chunks of his grizzled hair were missing. Harry stared, thunderstruck, between the sleeping Moody in the trunk and the unconscious Moody lying on the floor of the office.

…………………………………………………………..

I don’t know anything anymore. My brain is dead.

  • “Stunned–controlled by the Imperius Curse–very weak,” he said. “Of course, they would have need to keep him alive.”

I’M SORRY. HOW DOES THAT EXPLAIN TWO MOODYS LIVING AT THE EXACT SAME TIME? WTF??????

  • “Polyjuice potion, Harry,” said Dumbledore. “You see the simplicity of it, and the brilliance. For Moody never does drink except from his hip flask, he’s well known for it. The imposter needed, of course, to keep the real Moody close by, so that he could continue making the potion. You see his hair…” Dumbledore looked down on the Moody in the trunk. “The imposter has been cutting it off all year, see where it is uneven? But I think, in the excitement of tonight, our fake Moody might have forgotten to take it as frequently as he should have done…on the hour…every hour…We shall see.”

And then, right then and there, the man pretending to Moody transforms into his orignal form. And basically everything I’d thought up until this point in the book is completely and utterly changed.

  • Harry saw a man lying before him, pale-skinned, slightly freckled, with a mop of fair hair. He knew who he was. He had seen him in Dumbledore’s Pensieve, had watched him being led away from court by the dementors, trying to convince Mr. Crouch that he was innocent…but he was lined around the eyes now and looked much older….

Mr. Crouch’s son. Mr. Crouch’s son is the Death Eater at Hogwarts, pretending to be Moody, making my comments about Mr. Crouch during the Pensieve chapter seem unbelievably immature.

My god. Oh my fucking god.

At that moment, Snape and Professor McGonagall return and they bring a surprise: Winky.

Now, at this point, I’ve had to read through two pretty hefty monologues: one from Voldemort and one from fake Moody/Crouch. This final one, from Crouch, while under the spell of Veritaserum, is perhaps the longest, and it obviously serves a very specific purpose. It’s kind of ridiculous and I’d spend some time complaining about it, but the content of what Crouch reveals is so mind boggling, I’m left not caring the method of his delivery. This is unbelievable.

I’m not going to quote the Q&A session between Dumbledore and Crouch, but if you are like me and have not read this, here’s what he reveals:

– Crouch’s mother switched places with him when she knew she was dying. Mr. Crouch allowed this as a dying favor to his wife. They used Polyjuice Potion to trick the dementors.

– In order to keep his son in line and to prevent him from ever serving Voldemort again, Mr. Crouch used a number of spells to control him. He used an Imperius Curse, an Invisibility Cloak, and Winky was to be with him at all times.

– Bertha Jorkins was the one who discovered that Mr. Crouch’s son was still alive. Mr. Crouch used an intense and painful memory charm on her to make her forget what she learned, but this permanently damaged her brain.

– At the Quidditch World Cup, Winky wasn’t lying about saving the seat next to her for Crouch. Crouch was always right next to her, invisible under the cloak; his father allowed him out in public due to Winky finally convincing him to stop treating his son like a prisoner. Crouch stole Harry’s wand.

– Upon seeing the Death Eaters torturing Muggles, Crouch was sent into a rage, knowing these Death Eaters had not suffered like he had in service of Voldemort. He casts the Dark Mark in the sky, but not before Winky uses magic to bind herself to Crouch as a cautionary measure.

– During the chaos in which Winky was found with Harry’s wand, Crouch was always there, but his father had controlled him with a new Imperius Curse and instead punished Winky for letting his son do such a thing.

– Voldemort, in the arms of Wormtail, visits Crouch at his house. They place Mr. Crouch under an Imperious Curse (explaining his absence and why he was writing letters to Percy instead of being present himself) and set out to enact their plan to turn the Triwizard Cup into a Portkey.

– They visit Moody and subdue him violently, using the Polyjuice Potion to turn Crouch into Moody. This disturbance is what the Muggles heard and why Ron’s father shows up to investigate.

– It was Crouch as Moody who stole the boomslang from Snape, not Hermione.

– Mr. Crouch’s Imperius Curse wears off and he escapes, headed to Hogwarts to tell Dumbledore. This is when he runs into Harry and Krum. Unfortunately for Mr. Crouch, his son had already received word from Voldemort that his father was headed to the castle. So he stuns Krum and then–without a second thought–murders his own father.

– Crouch transfigures his father’s body into a bone and buries it in front of Hagrid’s hut, so no one will ever find him.

My brain.

And then, Rowling writes five sentences that signal the extreme change of tone of this series:

  • “I offered to carry the Triwizard Cup into the maze before dinner,” whispered Barty Crouch. “Turned it into a Portkey. My master’s plan worked. He is returned to power and I will be honored by him beyond the dreams of wizards.”

    The insane smile lit his features once more, and his head dropped onto his shoulder as Winky wailed and sobbed at his side.

This is not children’s bullshit anymore. It’s matter-of-fact: The world is not a pretty place, evil people win, your friends die, and sometimes, there isn’t a single thing you can do about it.

There’s really only one appropriate thing I can say at this point:

Shit just got real, guys.