Chapter 5
"Oh my god." Rebecca gasped, falling into the empty compartment dramatically. "Why is it so crowded this year?!"
Ginny threw her backpack on the bench above Rebecca's performance. "It's as crowded as it is every year. I'll be back later."
Ginny didn't wait for a response and was out the door in seconds. Rebecca pulled herself up onto the bench before sighing. "They grow up so fast." Standing up and leaving her own backpack, Rebecca gave Harry, Ron, and Hermione a smile before heading towards Fred and George hanging around the door. "And with that, I take my leave."
Hermione grinned, slipping up enormously. "Last night wasn't enough?"
Harry's head snapped up. "Last night? What happened last night?" Rebecca continued her exit, ignoring Harry and prompting him to repeat her name. "Rebecca?"
"Harry?" Rebecca said, poking her head back into their compartment. "If it was any of your business, I would have told you. But it isn't, so I'm not." She closed the door behind her and heard Harry begin to demand that Hermione tell him what happened.
Hermione knew that, while she had accidentally betrayed a facet of the trust between best friends entirely by accident, the punishment of Harry was more than enough. "Harry?" She asked intermittently, Harry not pausing to hear her speak or take a breath. "Harry, I-"
"I thought that they went out last night to-I don't even know, then they were so-There was this morning and the-I don't want to but I-Hermione, they didn't-"
Hermione raised her hand up to silence Harry, giving him a cold look at the insinuation and prying into the privacy of both their friend and his sister. "She's right, actually. It's none of your business what she does or doesn't do and I'll not tell you a word about any of it."
George eyed the door as Rebecca hurried away from it, hoping none of the other students lingered in the hallway immediately outside and heard anything being said inside. "Everything alright back there?"
"Oh yeah, brilliant." Rebecca patted Fred's shoulder. "Should be a spectacular supper, Harry's losing his mind." She looked down the hallway to where Lee said he would be. "Now, let's go get these orders."
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Lee had accumulated quite the list of people who had shown interest in a snackbox and were willing to preorder for the first day of delivery. "It's bonkers! Especially the mystery snack--Every person on that list buggered me for hints.:
Fred nodded, reading through the list. "Really?" He asked, only half-listening. Rebecca nudged him and looked to Lee so that he gave his friend the proper attention. "Sorry mate, I was just running numbers. This is quite a lot more than we expected-"
"Which is absolutely amazing!" George interrupted.
"Yes, it is absolutely amazing." Fred looked George pointedly. "But we didn't plan for such a mobbing. We don't have enough ingredients for half of these and we can't sell to some and not to others. We'll have to think of something else."
"Or...maybe we have more than we expected." Rebecca said quietly, offering a sheepish smile. "Whoops."
"You didn't." Fred asked without asking, crossing his arms.
"You did!" George whooped, jumping in the air.
"We said no loans." Fred said, his face blank to mask his shame.
"It's not a loan then!" Rebecca was speaking quickly now, trying to end an argument before it could really begin. "Think of it as an early, early birthday present! Christmas present too!" Rebecca waved at the list in front of him. "Look at the list and don't be cross, there's got to be nearly thirty orders."
"Twenty-six, to be exact." Lee motioned for them to sit in his compartment with other fifth years. Fred and George sat down and leaned forwards so that their elbows were on their knees and their hair fell forward. Rebecca had the most haunting feeling that things were not okay between them.
"I'm going to go make sure Hermione doesn't read herself into a coma." She said before sitting down, not wanting to intrude on the older students conversing. "We're all sitting together at supper, right?" Rebecca glanced at the top of Fred's head, erasing her visible anxiety at their answer as he looked up at her.
"Where else would we sit?" He gave her a sly smile, as if the question itself were one of the most ridiculous he had ever heard. Fred turned back to George and began to help with the estimates as to how many batches of each treat they would need for the numbers Lee had collected.
Rebecca closed the door behind her, his smile engraving itself into her mind. Stuck behind the candy trolley, Rebecca had plenty of time to think about it. After the third call for anything from the trolley, one of the compartments opened and Draco stepped out into the corridor. "One chocolate wand." He said plainly, counting out the coins easily before doubling it and correcting his order. "Make that two."
Draco left the second wand on the trolley, closing the door between he and Rebecca before words could even be exchanged.
The sweets woman sighed. "I remember you both, you know. Bought him the same last year, you did."
Rebecca took a bite of the wand the woman gave her and continued to follow the cart down the length of the train, taking a bite as she thought over the different sides she had seen of Draco. Perhaps, she wondered, his aggression at the match might have had something to do with his parents having been there.
Ron opened the door to the compartment Rebecca was heading for, fumbling for coins in his pockets. "A packet of Drooble's and a licorice wand." He found his coins and grimaced. "On second thought, just the Drooble's."
"It's alright." Harry said, seeing the dilemma. "I'll get it, don't worry."
"Just the Drooble's, thanks." Ron told the woman, taking the small pack of candy before finding his seat once more. Hermione looked up from her copy of the Prophet but turned back to it when she saw that Harry was still browsing the trolley.
"Two pumpkin pasties, please." Harry's head turned at the melodic voice, the sound echoing in his ears. Harry stared at the source, the Ravenclaw seeker. He returned the smile she sent him, forgetting what he had been doing entirely.
"Anything for you today, dear?" The trolley lady asked gently, Harry staring after Cho without moving.
"He'll have a chocolate frog and two licorice wands." Rebecca answered for him, knowing Harry's favourites. "And a napkin, perhaps."
Harry nodded, not hearing her tease included in the sweets as his mind was still occupied. Rebecca unwrapped the second of the licorice wands before cursing. "Oh damn! Ron, you like licorice, don't you?" Ron nodded before opening his mouth to argue the handout. "I found this chocolate in my bag and can't save this for later, it'll go stale."
"Licorice doesn't go stale." Ron said.
"It does, quickly I might add." Rebecca held the wand out to him. "If you don't take it, it'll just go to waste."
Ron couldn't help but a little smile. "Well, no one likes waste, I guess." He bit into it happily.
Harry looked at Rebecca, remembering how he'd behaved not an hour earlier. She looked up as she felt his eyes on her, meeting his with a steely gaze. "Done being a prat?" She mouthed, knowing he could read lips.
"For now, at least." Harry mouthed back, knowing she couldn't. "We're alright?" Harry whispered softly.
Rebecca nodded as Hermione turned her page in the Prophet once more. "How horrible!" Crookshanks turned a corner next to Hermione at the sound of her irritated voice, prompting Hermione to reach out and scratch the top of his head gently. "How can the Ministry not know who conjured the Mark?"
"It's really bad." Ron said, swallowing his very-full end of licorice so that the others could understand him. "That's part of the reason he was so cross in the days right after the match, why the Ministry is in such a fit. It happened right under their noses."
Harry reached up and scratched his forehead absent-mindedly, worrying Hermione. "It's hurting again?" She asked.
Rebecca looked up from looking at Crookshanks, confused. "Again? When'd it bother him the first time?"
Harry shook his head, not wanting her to worry. "I'm fine. It hurt for a moment at the match, when Ireland made their second-to-last goal. I think you were already gone at that point, Rebecca. It hasn't hurt since."
Rebecca remembered what had happened in the bathroom--the flashes of violence from the evening coming. "You didn't see anything?"
"Like you see?" Harry asked bewildered. "No, I've only ever had that dream I called you about--the one in the house. Why?" He narrowed his eyes in suspicion. "Did you see something and not tell me?"
Rebecca's silence was an answer in itself.
"Rebecca?" Hermione prompted, not demanding but worried for the welfare of her best mate. "Did you see something?"
"It wasn't bug or anything and we don't even know where it came from." Rebecca said quickly.
"We?" Harry interjected. "Who knew?!"
"I'd simply gone to the bathroom for a moment to get away from the shouting because my head hurt. Fred went too." Rebecca avoided every single set of eyes on her. "I only saw a few dark flashes and then the headache went with it--It meant nothing!"
"Flashes of what?" Harry asked, his tone growing darker.
"I told you, they were dark flashes."
"So you didn't see anything." Ron said, giving an out to the tension building in their small compartment.
"Hardly anything." Rebecca said, standing and grabbing her bag as Harry's hardly-contained anger grew too much to handle.
"Sirius will want to hear about this." Hermione warned, her maternal tone the final straw. "What you saw at the World Cup--even if it was 'hardly anything'--which I don't believe."
Rebecca exploded at the door, her hopes of a silent exit forgotten. "It doesn't matter what any of you believe, does it?" She shook her head, trying to calm herself with the sight of the lake they were passing outside the window to no avail. "All of you have gotten upset with me at one time or another with how much time I spend with Fred and George but then you pull this shite! I don't have to tell you anything--Not what I see, not what I've asked, and certainly not permission for anything!" Rebecca took the final word and closed the door behind her, wandering towards the farthest edge of the train as she simply wanted to be alone until they arrived.
"Did she say 'what she's asked?'" Ron asked in the silence that filled the compartment after her exit. "What's she mean by that?"
Harry glowered out the window, finding that that was one of his questions as well. "I never said she needed permission."
Hermione turned to back to the Prophet a moment before thinking on what Ron had said. "She did say that, didn't she? But she...she wouldn't have."
Harry turned and glared across the bench. "Would have what?" His scowl fell as it dawned on him exactly what she risked. "Oh she absolutely would have! That damn wager!" Harry hopped to his feet, going to find her and demand to know what she had been thinking.
"Harry!" Hermione scolded. "Sit for a second and think!"
Ron put his legs across the width of the compartment, blocking the door. "I think you need a breather."
Harry looked from Ron to Hermione before doing as they recommended, sitting back down and taking a slow breath. "Okay. Now what?"
Hermione had an answer, as always. "Write to Sirius first. Writing everything out will make you think everything through before doing anything you'll regret." Hermione flipped her paperback open and held it up, leaving Ron to occupy himself as Harry began to scribble angrily.
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The line for the toilets at the front of the train stretched for ages, far longer than Rebecca wanted to wait anyway. Finally passing the end of the queue on her way to the back of the train, the second set of toilets were entirely empty, exactly what Rebecca was looking for: Silence and solitude.
Stripping off her muggle clothes and putting back on the Hogwarts attire she had in her backpack, Rebecca left her tie loose down the front of her dress shirt and tied her black trainers as Harry had taught her to, only reminding her of how upset she was. Sighing as she ran out of excuse to stay in the toilet, Rebecca looked up as the train's whistle went of three times to alert the passengers that they would be arriving shortly.
Rebecca zipped her pack once more and left the loo still upset, continuing farther down the train until she found an empty compartment which she took refuge in and closed the door behind her. Rebecca used her bag as a pillow and stretched out across an entire bench, taking her glasses off and setting them on her stomach before laying her arm across her eyes.
Hardly a few minutes into her thinking, a series of knocks sounded out.
"Occupied." Rebecca intoned.
The knocker knocked again, forcing Rebecca to get up. An unfamiliar face was staring back at her, the face of a blonde girl with iconoclastically decorated glasses.
"Yeah?" Rebecca asked, unsure as to why she was being bothered by a stranger.
"The nargles said there was someone at the back of the train." The girl's voice was light and lofty, almost as if she were sighing or singing.
"The who said what?" Rebecca stepped to the side as the girl let herself into the compartment and laid across the other bench as Rebecca had been moments before.
"Nargles." The girl repeated as if that was the answer to all of Rebecca's questions.
Rebecca grabbed her bag, nodding slowly. "I see. I'm going to go now, okay? We're arriving soon."
The girl mad eno indication that she had heard Rebecca, so Rebecca left the door open so someone else could tell her that they had arrived if she were still laying there. "How strange." Rebecca muttered. The train's whistle went of three times again, they were even closer to the castle now. At least the run in with the strange stranger had provided her with a welcome distraction.
"Oi!" Ginny asked, poking her head out of the compartment she had been in with her friends as Rebecca passed. "What's wrong?"
"You going to get all pissy like the others?" Rebecca asked.
Ginny shrugged. "Maybe, maybe not." Rebecca didn't smile at her joking, telling Ginny that this was more serious than she had thought. "Swear to Merlin I won't."
"Harry and Hermione are flipping out because I hadn't told them some things about-" Rebecca waited until a boy passing them to get out of ear shot. "That thing." Rebecca finished, hoping Ginny would fill in the blank herself.
"The seeing thing?" Ginny asked quietly, to which Rebecca nodded. "Was it a big thing or a little thing?"
"Medium-leaning?" Rebecca shrugged. "What's it matter? I tried something new with it, which did end up working. It shouldn't matter and-"
Ginny looked to the left and pulled Rebecca into a compartment across the way. "What did you try?"
Rebecca paced in the compartment as Ginny sat on the edge of the bench. "I tried to channel what I saw when I went to sleep; Asking a question."
"You asked a question of the future?" Ginny asked, slightly in awe. "And it worked?"
Rebecca appreciated her enthusiasm. "Yeah, it did. There was just...just a few flashes hours after. The day of the match."
Ginny realised what Rebecca could be saying. "You saw that the attack would happen, didn't you?"
"It wasn't like that." Rebecca finally sat down, lowering her head. "They were dark flashes of things that meant nothing at the time. There was fire, people in masks, a snake in the sky--Nothing that I knew anything about until later."
Ginny put her arm around Rebecca's shoulders, laying her head on her shoulder. "The pain though, did they come when you asked?"
Rebecca nodded.
"Was it bad?"
Rebecca hesitated before nodding one more time. Ginny knew she had more of the truth in the momentary pause than she would have gotten from Rebecca's words. "They're mad at me because I didn't tell them, but Harry hadn't mentioned that his scar hurt him at the same time!"
Ginny looked to Rebecca confused. "His scar hurt?"
"That's how this all started, Hermione mentioned something about how his scar hurt when I'd left the box at the match--when I got the flashes of the attack--but only thinks I did something wrong by not telling him. He did the exact same thing!"
Ginny shook her head. "Boys."
The girls stood up and left the compartment, Rebecca finally feeling as if there were someone she knew who didn't hold her at fault. "You think I'm right to be upset?" Rebecca asked in the hall, the train slowing down in a way that meant they were pulling into the station.
"I think you're both wrong." Ginny explained before Rebecca could say anything. "I think they're both wrong for their reaction but I think you're wrong for not telling them. Don't look at me like that!" Rebecca had frowned, retracting her earlier thought of support. "It's different." Ginny lowered her voice again. "Harry's scar hurts him sometimes. Rebecca, you've seen the future and asked a question that got answered. That's a little different than the occasional pain, don't you think?"
Rebecca sighed heavily, hearing the truth in her words. "So you think I should apologise?"
Ginny grinned. "Well, I think you should make him apologise first. He's not allowed to tell you what to do with yourself. But," Ginny grew a little more serious. "I think you should look at this from Harry's side too. I pick on them all a lot--the boys, I mean--but they're a huge part of our lives. And Hermione? She's a worrier by nature, she'd be worrying about not-worrying if she wasn't worried!"
Rebecca nodded, pausing outside their original compartment where Ginny grabbed her bag and ducked away as Rebecca closed the door behind her. The train was still slowing down and it didn't matter if they weren't the first off the train, after all. Harry caught Rebecca's glance and sat down as she did.
"Alright, here's what happened." Rebecca began a brief, uninterrupted summary. "Ludo asked us if we wanted to wager on the match. If we won, Fred and George would have all the money for ingredients that we need. I took a nap before the match and tried to...steer, I guess is the word I want, my visions towards the match's result. I saw that Ireland would win but that Krum would catch the snitch. It just cost a little more."
Harry looked up from his feet. "Cost? The pains, you mean?"
Rebecca blinked and nodded. "It wasn't good, to be honest." Hermione's concern reached her face, Rebecca didn't made such admissions without cause and that meant it had been really bad. "I went to the toilet during the match because I could feel a headache building. I had thought it was from all the shouting, but it wasn't. I saw a few dark images, images that meant nothing until well after the attack had happened. That's all that happened.
Harry spoke next. "When you'd gone to the bathroom, I had one sharp pain through my scar. Just one--Felt like it nearly went through my brain."
Rebecca knew what he was talking about. "That sounds like what it feels like when I come back from seeing something."
Hermione folded her paper over and sat up, reaching for Rebecca's tie and tying it deftly. "I've seen you when you come back, we've all seen you. Those pains last for minutes."
The train shuddered to a stop, Fred and George knocking at the glass of the door and pressing their faces to the surface to make ridiculous faces.
Rebecca couldn't help but smile and wave before her smile fell away and she looked to them all in turn. "So there. I admit that I should have told you."
Harry shook his head, unable to let her take the sole-blame. "I could have asked calmer and I shouldn't have been such a-"
"Wanker?" Rebecca offered, holding a finger up to Fred and George when they motioned to ask what was keeping them.
"A wanker then, I'll admit that." Harry scratched the back of his head. "Are we good again?"
"You did say you were done being a prat for the day..." Harry raised his eyebrow until Rebecca continued. "But I guess I was a bit of a prat myself, so I suggest we go catch a carriage before Ron starves to death."
"Too late." Ron gasped, clutching at his stomach as the rest of the stood.
Fred and George sighed as the door opened. "Finally! Thought you were going to age in there!" They said in unison.
"Oh yeah?" Rebecca asked drily. "I had to deal with Harry learning about our little experiment from the match."
George and Fred's eyes widened as they looked at Harry, seeing how they had dodged a massive bullet. "And?" Fred asked carefully, curious as to how they had ended up resolving such a discovery.
"Rebecca makes her own decisions, that's all." Harry opened his arms for Fred and George to lean down so he could wrap his arms around their necks in an embrace. "But I hope you see how she would do anything for you, and then I would do anything for her. See where I'm going?"
"Yeah, 'course we do." Fred said as George said something similar. The two of them felt strangely threatened by the thin boy they were over a foot taller than.
"Let's go, lads." Rebecca rolled her eyes at how Fred and George looked at Harry, knowing Harry had said something to them. "School awaits." She walked through the three of them and Fred hurried to catch up with her, walking at her side as they were one of the last groups to disembark the Hogwarts Express.
"Have you noticed he can be quite scary when he wants to?" Fred whispered.
"Don't be afraid, Fred." Rebecca smirked. "He can sense fear."
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Peeves, lonely from the summer's lack of students to prank, had a perfectly Peeves' worthy entrance prepared for the students who were the last to enter the castle. The last to enter the castle, unfortunately, was a group comprised mostly of Rebecca and the lot.
"Welcome home, kiddies!" Peeves shouted as the water started to fall from the well-placed buckets he tipped with a wave of his hands. The water fell in great rows, falling faster and faster towards the group and their uniforms. Fred held one side of his robe out and pulled Rebecca into his side, trying to shield her from the imminent soaking they were set to receive while Hermione shielded them all.
"Arresto momentum!" She waved her wand in the proper form, the water stopping instantly.
"Excellent work, Miss Granger!" A familiar voice spoke from the entrance of the castle where she normally seemed to be. "I see you kept your wits about you over the summer." Professor McGonagall smiled at them and waved her wand, directing the water Hermione had stilled to the bubbling fountain in the courtyard.
"What is that?!" A student shouted, pointing over the edge of the wall of the castle towards the Black Lake.
"Is that-Merlin!"
"Oi! Look at that!"
Harry, Ron, and Hermione led the way to the groups looking out and exclaiming, Fred and George behind them.
"Rebecca?" Professor McGonagall called, stopping the last person of the group.
"Yes, professor?" Rebecca stepped away from the group, only one person noting she had stopped.
"Madam Pomfrey is expecting you after supper. Anything notable over the break to report?"
Rebecca looked up to Professor McGonagall, in so many ways more than physical. "Not a one. May I be excused? I do believe I just heard someone shout 'flying horses.'" Rebecca's heart hurt at deceiving one of the people she felt truly cared about her.
McGonagall nodded and waved Rebecca away, sensing the falsehood but knowing that demanding the truth wouldn't result in anything. Rebecca hurried up to Fred, following him as he cleared a path to where Hermione was craning her neck over the crowd.
"Come up through here." Fred said, making a space in front of him. There, above the Black Lake, were in fact flying horses. "What'd McGonagall want?" Fred asked as the crowd began to disperse after watching Hagrid jump off the runway as the horses careened at him in an incredibly bumpy landing.
"Madam Pomfrey wants to see me post-haste post-supper." Rebecca said. "Probably just wants to make sure the bloody tea is still working."
"'Bloody tea?'" Fred asked. "I thought it wasn't that bad?" At the end of the bridge, Fred stepped to the side and let the others walk on a little so they had a semblance of privacy. "I thought it wasn't that far."
Rebecca sighed. "It's not, I guess. I just want to be, you know? Uncomplicated and be."
Fred directed her attention to the water, the beginnings of a ship's masts rising out of the lake's smooth surface to reveal flags emblemed with a red dragon. "Existence is complication, I heard once."
Rebecca looked at him a long moment. "That's really smart. Is that a quote or something?"
"I can't be smart all by myself?" Fred teased her.
Rebecca pushed him and continued on towards the castle beside him. "You know what I mean!"
Fred leaned down, closing the distance between himself and her ear. "It came from a fortune cookie."
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As eager as Ron was to get to supper, their walk to the castle was extended when Harry's bag tore along the bottom where the material had worn thin. Hermione held the empty bag up to the light, pursing her lips. "I think I could fix this. Molly showed me with the worn-through elbow of a jumper. Watch." She took her wand out and tapped the end of the tear on one end and then the other. "Reparum!"
The material sewed itself shut, the tear gone without even a sign that it had been there. Piling Harry's things back inside, they were both some of the last students to exit the train and some of the last students to enter the Great Hall for supper.
Dumbledore raised his eyebrows with a twinkle in his eye at their late arrival and stood from his seat, crossing the distance of the teachers' table to his podium where he cleared his throat and began to speak.
"Now we're all settled in and sorted, I'd like to make an announcement." Dumbledore looked from one end of the Great Hall to the other before beginning again. The students began to whisper to one another as theories as to what Dumbledore's announcement could be ran wild.
"This castle will not only be your home this year, but the home to some very special guests as well. You see, Hogwarts has been chosen-" The doors to the Great Hall squeaked and slammed open as Filch ran in and down the middle, largest aisle in his odd, hopping-skipping run.
Filch and Dumbledore stepped to the side of his podium and spoke to each other softly. Harry looked around the room, seeing how the other students were just as confused as he was. Rebecca was sipping at her goblet, laughing at how George was imitating Filch's panting.
Filch ran back out of the hall as he had entered: Mysteriously. Dumbledore raised his hand for their attention once more. "So...Hogwarts has been chosen to host a legendary event: The Triwizard Tournament. Now for those of you who do not know,"
Fred and George looked at each other over Rebecca's head, thinking the same thing. "Brilliant."
A flash of worry crossed Rebecca's face, though neither of them saw it.
"The Triwizard Tournament brings together three schools for a series of magical contests. From each school, a single student is selected to compete. Now let me be clear...If chosen, you stand alone."
Harry glanced at Rebecca and saw how she chewed on the inside of her cheek, looking between Fred and George before looking back to Dumbledore.
"And trust me when I say these contests are not for the faint-hearted. But, more on that later. For now, please join me in welcoming the lovely ladies of the Beauxbatons Academy of Magic and their head mistress, Madam Maxine!"
The doors to the hall opened once more, every set of male eyes inside turning to oogle the girls that came dancing in. They wore baby blue uniforms that left very little to the imagination, stopping every few table lengths to flourish their arms out and sigh almost musically. Ron and Harry's mouths hung open as the girls stopped directly in front of him; Ron's eyes glazed over.
Hermione, Rebecca, and Ginny looked at each other before looking back at the stupor their friends were trapped in.
"Inferior if every way imaginable." Ginny muttered.
Fred tore his eyes away from the girls when Rebecca looked up to up. "What?" He asked, wiping at his mouth a if that was what she were going to ask. "I'm not drooling." Fred leaned down and lowered his voice. "Though Harry certainly is."
Rebecca directed her attention to what Fred pointed out, a line of drool falling from the corner of Harry's mouth as the Beauxbatons girls continued past their table and Ron's eyes boggled at the sight.
"Bloody hell!" Ron whispered, only growing Hermione's scowl.
Fred whacked George on the shoulder as the girls hit the front of the hall, bringing his twin's brain out of the lavender scented haze the girls brought on. Blue butterflies left their hands, blue paths left behind across the ceiling as they fluttered about.
Seamus leaned over from where he sat on the other side of Harry, motioning towards the head mistress and grinning crudely. "Blimey, that's one big woman!" A girl, the most beautiful, Rebecca thought, stepped in front of the podium and curtsied deeply to the students as Madam Maxine and Dumbledore exchanged greetings.
Rebecca hated that Seamus would insult the head mistress because she wasn't the same cookie-cutter type as the students of the school she thought and was speaking before she could think. "You think so, Seamus? I thought she was as big as your mum." Rebecca tried to stop, she really did. "But I can't remember too well, it was dark in her room."
Seamus' cheeks darkened in shame and embarrassment as the students around them laughed. His hands tightened in the edge of the bench. "Careful, Potter."
Rebecca gave him a wink. "Your mum said that too."
Dean leaned over and put his arm around Seamus' shoulders, holding him in his seat until Seamus was talked off the ledge Rebecca had put him on.
Harry grimaced at the crudeness while George stuck his fist out for a fist bump. The attention of the table was brought back to the doors of the Great Hall as the girls of Beauxbatons applauded the newest arrivals.
Hermione sat up straighter, suddenly quite interested in her silverware.
"And now our friends from the north. Please greet the proud sons of Durmstrang and their high master, Igor Karkaroff!" Dumbledore announced as the lines of boys with shaved heads and brown uniforms marched in formation.
Every few rows or so, the boy leading the next group would have a staff that they pounded rhythmically to keep pace, sparks flying. The boys of Hogwarts felt varying shades of jealousy and unease at their highly-masculine guests while the girls found an allure in their chiseled faces and undoubtedly muscular forms.
The boys of Durmstrang stopped in the middle of the Great Hall, their staffs abandoned after a series of complicated spins to launch into an orchestrated collection of flips and other gymnastical feats that led the girls across the hall to clap and whistle madly.
Two final Durmstrang members entered the hall after everyone else, one in brown and one in white.
"It's Krum!" The students echoed across the room. Hermione's gaze moved from her plate to the new-comer only for a second before reverting back to the table in front of her until she couldn't help but look up again.
Viktor Krum stormed to the podium where the other boys were still flipping and beginning to introduce balls of fire into their routine. Krum's eyes when directly over Ron and landed on Hermione, the corner of his mouth lifting for the shortest, almost unnoticeable moment.
Hermione's cheeks burned brighter than the day Ron had refused sunscreen in Egypt.
The man behind Viktor, the master of Durmstrang, stared at Harry and Rebecca intensely. When Karkaroff gave the sign, the boys crouched to ground and blew on the ends of their wands, fiery dragons taking shape and flying above them.
"We should have something like that." Fred whispered to George and Rebecca. "Shape-taking fireworks."
"I wonder if we could manage coloured firewood too." Rebecca mused. "Logs that look normal but burn different colours."
Harry interrupted their impromptu business meeting with an interesting factoid. "Look, the Defence Against the Dark Arts seat is empty."
Dumbledore tapped his wand to the podium and motioned for the students of Hogwarts to stand as their guests took their seats at the tables set aside for them. "Everyone at your own tune! One and two and three and..." The students started to sing Hogwarts' anthem in every volume and tune imaginable.
(The lyrics, if you want to sing as well-)
Hogwarts, Hogwarts, Hoggy Warty Hogwarts,
Teach us something, please,
Whether we be old and bald
Or young with scabby knees,
Our heads could do with filling
With some interesting stuff,
For now they’re bare and full of air,
Dead flies and bits of fluff,
So teach us things worth knowing,
Bring back what we’ve forgot,
Just do your best, we’ll do the rest,
And learn until our brains all rot.
Unsurprisingly, Fred and George were the last to finish and they took their seats proudly. "Excellent job, all of you!" Dumbledore said before clapping his hands once so that the feast appeared. "May we dine in the presence of new friendships!"
At the staff table, Dumbledore introduced Madam Maxine to Hagrid as he would be taking care of their pegasi. "They only drink single-malt whiskey, Monsiery Hagrid." Madam Maxine warned in a heavy French accent.
Hagrid nodded and blushed, a silly thing to imagine a half-giant doing but what he did all the same. "As I'd like to do, Madam!'
A handful of accompanying staff members carried in a tall item on a platform, setting it where another group had just moved Dumbledore's podium. "Your attention, please." Dumbledore was eager to get the instructions out of the way so that the beginning of the year could truly start. "I'd like to say a few words more." He rest his hand on the shielded item and gazed at it a moment before looking to the students.
"Eternal glory." He paused, letting the term sink in. "That is what awaits the student who wins the Triwizard Tournament."
Rebecca didn't see the glint that overtook Fred and George's eyes, but she did hear them breathe, "Wicked."
"But to do this, that student must survive three tasks. Three extremely dangerous tasks." Dumbledore took a breath as he prepared himself for the pandemonium he expected to follow. "For this reason, the Ministry has seen fit to impose a new rule. To explain all of this we have the head of the Department of International Magical Cooperation, Mr Bartemius Crouch."
Fred's eyes narrowed as they settled on the man who had tried to have he and Rebecca convicted of the crime that was conjuring the Dark Mark in the sky above the wreckage of the World Cup. So focused on his glare, he didn't notice how the staff door opened and a sopping wet man entered.
The enchanted ceiling thundered and flashed with lightning, letting down a shower of rain that was stopped after a few seconds as the new entrant thrust his wand up so that the rain slowed and disappeared to reveal the stars of the enchanted view once more.
"Bloody hell, that's Mad-Eye Moody." Ron said ominously, a hint of awe in his voice.
"Alastor Moody?" Hermione confused, the name familiar from her reading. "The auror?"
Dean turned in his seat and ignored the scowl that came from Seamus as he spoke to them. "Auror?"
"Dark wizard catcher." Ron answered, answering Rebecca's question as well. "Half the cells in Azkaban are filled thanks to him. He's supposed to be mad as a hatter though, these days at least."
The man thumped his large walking stick at Dumbledore's side and greeted him curtly before hobbling back to the empty seat. Rebecca saw at once why he was called 'Mad-Eye,' eh had a bright blue prosthetic eye that bounced from focus to focus madly.
"Don't think that's pumpkin juice." Harry murmured as the Mad-Eye Moody took a swig from the flask on his hip.
Bartemius Crouch cleared his throat for their attention and spoke as if there had never been an interruption at all. "After due consideration, the Ministry has concluded that for their own safety, no student under the age of seventeen shall be allowed to put forth-" Some students around the room figured out what the Ministry worker was saying and began shouting their disagreement. "-their name for the Triwizard Tournament. This decision is final."
"That's rubbish! That's rubbish!" Fred and George shouted, standing and waving their hands angrily. "You don't know what you're doing!"
Rebecca found it easier to think about the tournament with the rule. She knew that Fred and George were forging their own path to eternal glory. If they were able to do so without entering a deadly wizarding competition, she thought that was all the better.
Dumbledore stepped away from Crouch and held his wand level with the top of the goblet's case, the case floating away into tiny particles for the students to watch blow away. When the goblet was fully revealed, blue flames began to dance around the rip at the top. "The Goblet of Fire. Anyone wishing to submit themselves to the tournament need only write their name upon a piece of parchment and throw it in the flame before this hour on Thursday night."
Rebecca looked across the hall and noticed a few of the students eyeing the Goblet hungrily, especially noting Cedric's focus on the item.
"Do not do so lightly," Dumbledore warned, the end of his speech coming quickly. "If chosen, there's no turning back. From this moment forward, the Triwizard Tournament had begun."
Dinner was allowed to begin in full-glory, conversations filling the Great Hall to the brim. Among them, Fred and George hissed back and forth to each other confirming that they were, in fact, going to get their names into that goblet. Rebecca found that even the premise of desert couldn't give her an appetite.
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