This was promised to Angie (thetourguidebarbie) ages ago, and it has grown into a monster ever since. I'm planning this story to be four parts long and hopefully it'll stay at that.
I hope you enjoy!
"The Durmstrang champion is… Katerina Petrova!" exclaimed professor Silas and a group of people sitting at the Slytherin table erupted in cheers and applause as the brunette girl stood up, a devious smile on her face as she made her way across the hall.
Caroline knew that if anyone from Durmstrang deserved a chance to compete in the tournament, it was Kat, that she was better than anyone from that school. So she clapped enthusiastically for her friend, watching as she disappeared into a side chamber, accompanied by her headmistress, Qetsiyah.
The goblet of fire turned red once more and all eyes returned to it. Caroline felt her insides turn cold as anxiety took over her.
Beauxbatons had claimed that the last tournament had been a fraud, that they'd had been robbed of their victory and, therefore, would not be participating this year… That had led to Ilvermorny getting an invitation to join the Triwizard Tournament, which was why she was now at Hogwarts, sitting at the Ravenclaw table with her hands trembling just a little.
She wasn't really expecting to be chosen — that would probably be Elena or Bonnie or even Stefan — but the idea of being the one for once, of being recognized for the things she did… She wanted it more than anything.
Which was why she was so nervous when the headmaster of Hogwarts began saying, "The champion of Ilvermorny…"
Get over it, Caroline. It won't be you. Don't get your hopes up. Don't get your hopes up. Don't get your-
"Caroline Forbes!"
Her brain completely shut down in that moment. She wasn't sure it was processing any information.
Thankfully, her body reacted appropriately, standing up and smiling. Enzo gave her a bright smile and congratulated her, the rest of her friends just looked surprised, though they were cheering with the rest of their classmates.
She wasn't hurt by their reaction; she barely even paid attention to it.
No, she was too busy looking at Klaus Mikaelson and fighting not to blush at how he held her gaze and at the smirk on his face.
Her father had moved to London with Steven when she was 12 and she'd been spending some holidays and part of her summer vacations with them ever since. It was in their house and in the parties they took her that she'd met and befriended Kat, it was where she'd come to hate Klaus with all of her strength until… Well, until last summer when they'd kissed.
Caroline fought to keep those memories out of her mind as they tried to flood her. No, she wouldn't think about how soft his lips had felt against hers, wouldn't think about how he had held her close as his tongue explored her mouth and how she'd missed his heat the moment she had pulled back and ever since she went back to America the next day.
She let professor Saltzman guide her to the same chamber Katerina had gone to, and she found the girl there with her headmistress, a smile on her face. "Good for you, Forbes."
Their friendship was a little strange. They'd write sporadically over the year and whenever they met, they would always have the craziest adventures and then talk about their plans and boys and their hatred for Klaus — Kat didn't know about her betrayal yet and Caroline would like to keep it that way.
She nodded in acknowledgement, returning the smile her friend was giving her as they waited for the last champion to be announced.
And, of course, it was just her luck that Klaus Mikaelson out of all people would be the one to compete for Hogwarts. Granted, she had heard that he was the best at everything he did — first in all of his classes, ten O.W.L's, captain of the Slytherin quidditch team, Head Boy — but after how she had carefully avoided him ever since she'd gotten to Hogwarts, it seemed like the universe was decidedly trying to screw things up for her.
Silas got into the room first, though the headmaster stared at the ground to avoid Qetsiyah's hateful gaze. She still resented him for his affair with Amara… Even people back in America knew about that scandal.
Klaus followed him close behind, looking very pleased with himself… Arrogance had always been his thing, really. He gave Katerina a disdainful look before he turned to her, his eyes surprisingly warm.
"So I guess you'll have your chance to prove you are more than just a pretty face, love," he teased, and she saw it for what it was — an attempt to make things somewhat normal between them, to remind her how easy it was for them to keep bickering.
Caroline took the bait, huffing and crossing her arms in front of her body. "I don't have to prove anything to you, Mikaelson."
Qetsiyah coughed pointedly before he had the chance to reply, and Silas was quick to say, "Champions, you will have the honour to defend your institutions, to bring them glory and prestige. We all expect you to play by the rules and respect the name of the schools you represent. Your first task will take place on the last week of November, I advice you all to prepare yourselves for the challenges that are to come."
"You won't tell us what's the first task?" Katerina questioned with a frown.
"For you to be deserving of the Triwizard Cup, Miss Petrova, you must be ready to face whatever task we prepare, despite of the element of surprise. Now, I'm sure you would all like to go back to your friends and celebrate tonight's events."
At the clear dismissal, Kat and her headmistress quickly left the room, followed by Silas and Alaric. Caroline hurried to the door as well, but Klaus held her by the arm, keeping them alone in that room.
She gave him an unimpressed look as she pulled her arm free, "What is wrong with you?"
"You didn't write," he said, looking at her with more vulnerability than she'd ever seen him display."You said 'we'll talk later' and then you left and I didn't hear from you again. You came to Hogwarts and somehow always found somewhere else to be whenever I got near you… I want to know why."
"Well, you didn't write either!" Her words came out as an accusation and she snapped her mouth shut, taking a deep breath as Klaus looked at her slightly shocked. "Look, we kissed. It didn't mean anything, just let it go."
Liar, Caroline thought. She hadn't been able to stop thinking about him for the rest of the summer, and she'd written many letters she'd never sent, but… He was Klaus, he'd always been an asshole and chances were that it truly hadn't meant anything to him, and as the weeks passed and she didn't receive any word from him either, she had convinced herself that was the truth. She was even more certain of it when Rebekah had written to her bitching about Aurora, this girl that Klaus had been seeing.
But now he was questioning her about it, and looking at her like he was hurt by her words as he nodded. "If it really didn't mean anything, then why were you avoiding me?"
"Just… Just let it go, Klaus. I have to go back to my friends. Uh, congrats… For being chosen as champion."
She left before he could say anything else.
Klaus stayed away from her after that and she pretended not to mind, but part of her had been hoping that he would go after her. Clearly he had seen through her lies and known that their kiss had meant something to her, but maybe she was overestimating what it had meant to him.
So she focused on the tournament, practicing jinxes and enchantments with Enzo and Bonnie, trying to prepare herself for every possible scenario her mind could come up with — and, honestly, Caroline found out that she was quite creative and probably should be in charge of organizing the tasks, because she would create some impressive challenges.
Her friends still looked very surprised that she'd been the one chosen — they had this bad habit of underestimating her —, but she wasn't going to let them ruin this opportunity for her. She was very determined to win and anyone knew that when Caroline Forbes put her mind to something, she damn well accomplished it.
However, she knew that was true for Klaus and Kat as well. They were both extremely competitive and very talented; she knew that neither of them would go easy on her and that she'd have to fight hard not only to fulfil the challenges, but to get a better score than they did. Which wouldn't be simple, she was sure.
It was why she knew how her adversaries would do everything in their power to win that she was most surprised when Klaus came to her.
The task would happen in five days and it was the first he had approached her ever since they'd talked after the champions had been chosen. Her heart had skipped a beat as she thought of what he wanted to talk about, part of her wondering if he'd be low enough to toy with her feelings to distract her from the task — which she would never let happen, anyway.
But that wasn't at all what he wanted.
"Dragons," Klaus said simply. "I'm afraid I don't know the details, but there will be one for each of us and we'll have to face them. Surely they wouldn't ask us to kill them, so I assume there will be something else we have to do."
She frowned at him. "Are you serious right now? Or is this your plan… To make up a task so that I will prepare for something other than what is happening?"
"Do you really think that low of me?" he asked, sounding slightly upset as he sighed. "When I win this tournament, sweetheart, I will win it fairly. I have no need to use schemes and plots to defeat you."
Caroline rolled her eyes, "When… Very confident, Mikaelson."
She winced as she remembered those had been almost the exact words he had used when he had discovered her application letter for a muggle beauty pageant — she had to explain to him what exactly that was, and it had been mortifying — from her hometown in her father's house.
He smiled, his eyes telling her that he very much remembered it, but he chose not to comment on it. "I have no reasons not to be confident, love."
"Well, thanks for letting me know. Does Kat- Yeah, she probably does. She's Kat. She wasn't even going to tell me. Ugh. How did you find out, by the way?" she questioned amusedly.
Klaus gave her his trademark smirk. "I have my ways, don't worry about it."
She shook her head, unable to not to smile. "Well, thanks again. I really appreciate it," she said and she was about to leave, but—
"Wait, Caroline," he called and she waited for him to continue, a puzzled look on her face as she took in how uncomfortable he looked. "Rebekah mentioned that she talked to you about Aurora… I just wanted you to know that we broke up at the beginning of the summer. I wasn't with her when we kissed and I didn't get back together with her after that, either. My sister was annoyed because she wouldn't stop showing up at our place, saying that she wanted me back, but it was over."
Caroline fought really hard to keep herself from grinning. "That's good to hear. I'll see you around, Klaus."
The champions and their headmasters were waiting in a tent for the task to start. The instruction had already been given, and what they had to do was worse than any of them had predicted — they would have to retrieve a golden egg that was being guarded by a dragon along with its real eggs.
Katerina would have to face the Hungarian Horntail, and she didn't blink an eye at the fact that she'd been assigned the most dangerous dragon; Klaus would have to get past the Swedish Short-Snout and Caroline, the Chinese Fireball.
"Miss Petrova, you will go first," instructed Silas, "then you, Miss Forbes, and you'll be our last competitor, Mr Mikaelson. When they fire the cannon, you'll know it's time to go."
The professors left to take their places at the judges' table, and it wasn't long before a loud sound echoed, making the entire tent tremble. Kat took a deep breath as she made her way to the exit.
"Don't wish me luck, Forbes. I don't need it," she said when she saw Caroline open her mouth, and the blonde rolled her eyes at her friend's rudeness.
And then she was gone.
Caroline had never dealt well with awkward silences and staying quiet when she was alone with Klaus was a difficult think to manage… Especially as she worried for what was happening to her friend and about what she would have to do in just a few moments.
"Why didn't you write to me?" she asked before she could stop herself, biting her lower lip as she waited for his answer.
He chuckled. "Do you really want to do this now?"
She simply shrugged, because she was nervous and facing him didn't seem so scary when she compared it to facing a dragon. So he continued, "Very well, then. I was waiting for you take the first step. I didn't want to make assumptions as to where we stood, so I thought it would be better to see how you wanted to deal with it. When you didn't write me, I thought that you weren't interested."
"I thought that you weren't interested because you didn't write," she admitted. "And then when Rebekah started talking about Aurora, I just thought… That it hadn't meant anything to you."
Klaus stared at her, wanting to ask if she was insane. How couldn't she have realised how much it'd meant to him? How much she meant to him.
"It seems we have been making a lot of assumptions about each other, haven't we? For instance, I was sure that you were well aware of my feelings for you, sweetheart. Everyone else seems to be."
She felt her heart skip a beat… Feelings, he had feelings for her.
Of course, everyone had teased them about it. His siblings — especially Kol — made many jokes at their expense, but she'd always shrugged it off as if they were just that, she'd never thought them to have any deeper meaning.
"I didn't know you had feelings for me," Caroline confessed and added jokingly, "We really need to sit down and talk one of these days."
And then she cursed herself, because guys never wanted to talk. Not the guys she had dated anyway. But Klaus smiled before she'd had a chance to make any excuses. "Yes, we do."
The cannon was fired again and she stood up abruptly, anxiety coming back to her as she remembered what she'd have to face. And blame it on the fact that she was nervous, but Caroline impulsively strode up to him, pressing a quick kiss to his lips, pulling away before he'd even had the chance to truly respond. "For good luck," she explained with a smile to a dumbfounded Klaus.
And then she left.
Her dragon was seriously beautiful.
Its scarlet scales shone beneath the sun, though not as much as the golden spikes on its back. It was impressive, magnificent. Those creatures had always fascinated Caroline and she wanted to take the time to admire it, but she had a job to do.
The egg was rather visible to her, but finding it wasn't the hard part. She had to get it without becoming a pile of ashes and she knew just how to do it… She just had to attract the dragon away from the eggs first.
Throwing a pebble at a dragon guarding its clutch wasn't on the list of things Caroline wanted to do, but it ended up happening anyway and, as beautiful as the beast was, it looked perfectly intimidating as it made its way towards her.
She had to throw herself behind a rock to keep the fire from hitting her, but her plan worked as the dragon moved away from the eggs. Now it was only a matter of getting it into a good position so she could cast a spell.
It was hard and frightening to keep dodging the creature's attempt to kill her, but she managed not to get burned and she finally got the chance to stand in front of it, using the seconds she had before it attacked her to use her wand, "Conjunctivitis!"
Caroline knew that a dragon's weak point was its eyes and blinding was, therefore, her best way to defeat them so she could get the egg.
She ran as fast as she could before the disorientated dragon could start breathing fire in all directions or learned to listen for her, and relief flooded through her as her hands grabbed the golden egg, the crowds cheering loudly and making her smile. She quickly headed towards the exit, a few wizards already entering the arena to contain the beast.
A nurse dragged her to sit beside Katerina, who was being treated for a burn in her arm, though the golden egg rested beside her. Caroline knew her friend enough to know that she didn't want to talk.
Her score was rather good — Professor Saltzman gave her a 10; Silas a 9.8 and Qetsiyah 9, but she knew that the other headmasters were most likely only taking points away from her due to the fact they wanted their own students to win. She had been perfect.
And then the cannon sounded again and her happiness was replaced by something that resembled worry as she watched Klaus make his way out of the tent.
His dragon was stunning too: it had silvery blue scales that matched the blue fire it breathed. A fire that got really close to hitting Klaus, making a collective "Oh!" echo from the audience, and Kat hissed at her when she grabbed her arm as reflex, touching her friend's wounds by accident.
Caroline muttered a quick apology, but never took her eyes off him, watching as he dodged and ran and saw that he was trying to get the dragon away from the eggs same as her. And he succeeded too, but used a different spell than her as he put the dragon to sleep, carefully walking past it while being mindful of the flames that it could still accidentally breathe as it slept.
He got the golden egg in a shorter time than her and she cursed herself for having pretty much rooted for him… Complicated feelings towards him or not, he was her opponent. She had to remind herself of that.
It was hard when he offered her a charming smile as he approached her.
"I guess it worked," Klaus said pointedly, and she blushed remembering how she had kissed him again. "Apparently, Katerina didn't have such luck."
Kat simply gave him the finger and snapped at the nurse to work faster.
So, let me know what you think! Did you enjoy Klaus and Caroline's dynamic? Their flirting + their rivalry + their confused feelings? Did you enjoy reading the task? I'm not creative enough to come up with whole new challenges, so they will stay basically the same. Also, how do you feel about Katherine being the third champion? Did you like her dynamic with KC? I can't wait to hear your thoughts!