Distantly, she heard a voice calling out behind her.
"Do not fly too high!"
Suddenly, she was at sea, overlooking the water from the side of a ship.
Shouting caught her attention, and she turned to see a lion terrorising rough-looking sailors, snarling and chasing them. Oddly enough, the ship was overrun with vines and vegetation that was growing as she looked on. Soon enough, several men fell over the edge into the water. With a roar from the lion, the men turned into dolphins upon impact.
She made to run in the other direction as the lion bounded closer to where she was standing, but then—
She was flying again, this time riding on the back of a giant eagle owl, soaring through the clear blue sky toward an old, ivy-covered house set high on a hillside. Lower and lower they flew, the wind blowing pleasantly in Heri's face until they reached a dark and broken window in the upper story of the house and entered.
Now they were flying along a gloomy passageway, to a room at the very end . . . through the door they went, into a dark room whose windows were boarded up . . .
Heri was suddenly on her own two feet . . . she was watching, now, as the owl fluttered across the room, into a chair with its back to her. . . . There were two dark shapes on the floor beside the chair . . . both of them were stirring . . .
One was a huge snake . . . it was oddly familiar . . . the other was a man . . . a wiry, tall man, with sharp features and tears streaking down his face . . . he was wheezing and sobbing on the hearthrug . . .
"You are in luck," said a cold, high-pitched voice from the depths of the chair in which the owl — four legs; was that Hedwig? — had landed. "You are very fortunate that this vessel was created in time. Your blunder has not ruined everything."
"My Lord!" gasped the man on the floor. "My Lord, I am . . . I am so pleased . . . and so sorry. . . ."
The snake hissed. Heri could see its tongue fluttering.
"Now," said the cold voice. Voldemort. "Perhaps one more little reminder why I will not tolerate another blunder from you . . ."
"My Lord . . . I beg you . . ."
The tip of a wand emerged from around the back of the chair.
"Crucio!"
There was a scream, a scream as though every nerve in that person's body were on fire. The screaming filled Heri's ears as the scar on her forehead seared with pain; she was yelling too. . . Voldemort would hear her, would know she was there —!
"Heri! Heri!"
Heri's eyes flew open. She was lying on the floor of Professor Trelawney's room with her hands over her face. Her scar was burning so badly that her eyes were watering. The pain had been real!
The whole class was standing around her, and Professor Trelawney was kneeling next to her.
"Are you all right?" said Sally-Anne, looking thoroughly shaken.
"Of course she isn't!" said Professor Trelawney, looking thoroughly excited. Her great eyes magnified by her glasses loomed over Her, gazing at her. "What was it, Potter? A premonition? An apparition? What did you see?"
"I . . . I don't . . ." Heri stammered. She sat up. She could feel himself shaking. She couldn't stop herself from looking around, into the shadows behind her; Voldemort's voice had sounded so close . . .
"You were clutching your scar!" said Professor Trelawney. "You were thrashing on the floor, clutching your scar! My dear, you were undoubtedly stimulated by the extraordinary clairvoyant vibrations of my room!"
Heri shuddered and clutched at her forehead.
"If that's what happened, professor, maybe I need to get some fresh air. That was horrible."
"If you leave now, you may lose the opportunity to see further—!"
"Please, professor!" said Parvati Patil, her eyes watery. "We should at least get her something for her headache! My mother gets awful migraines and she can barely think without some sort of pain relief!"
"Of course, of course," replied the professor. "Let's get you up, dear."
Heri was helped back into her seat. As Professor Trelawney went to fetch a Headache Relief from her cupboard, the window was thrown open wider and someone began fanning her with a handkerchief.
"Now, Miss Potter," said the professor when she returned. She handed Heri the potion. "Let's discuss your vision."
Heri chugged the potion and sighed as the throbbing in her scar lessened immediately.
"Honestly, professor, I don't know what to make of it. First I was flying above the clouds, headed towards the sun; then I was standing on a ship with a lion that was attacking people and turning them into dolphins, and then I watched as someone was put under the Cruciatus."
Heri was eventually given permission to leave early to visit the Hospital Wing. Since Professor Trelawney was convinced that the burning incense caused her visions, Heri resolved to wear her air-filtering scarf over her nose to divination lessons from now on.
Heri was not having a good time of it. First, there had been that bloody cop-out of a Third Task, then she was attacked by an acromantula far larger than what would have been allowed to live by the Forbidden Forest herd, and now she was tied to a gods-be-damned headstone in some sodding graveyard.
And it was fucking raining.
She couldn't think of any way to make this shitty day any shittier.
When Mr Bagman had announced that there'd be a huge free-for-all in which they'd be set loose on a labyrinth to fight their way to the Triwizard Cup, Heri had been expecting something exciting like a battle royale in an underground cavern. Instead, she got a hedge maze out on the Quidditch Pitch with some of Hagrid's pets to play with.
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