Honey let out a squawk as the half eaten cake before him vanished and all the golden dinner plates became perfectly clean. Dumbledore stood up again. The Beauxbatons girls returned to the Ravenclaw table. An expectant tension now filled the hall, different from what had been at the Gryffindor table only seconds before. Some of the girls seem to think Tamaki was kidding, others weren't so sure. But all of that was forgotten as Dumbledore begin to speak. Several seats down from them, Fred and George were leaning forward, straining with great concentration to catch every word, so they could take every advantage.
"The moment has come," announced Dumbledore. "The Triwizard Tournament is about to start. But first I should inform you of a few procedures that will be followed. One champion will be chosen from each school and this person will face three tasks spaced throughout the school year to give the champions time to recover from any injuries that may be sustained during the previous challenges - and make no mistake, these are dangerous challenges. They will test to the full the champions' talents, intellect, cunning, skills, strength, fortitude and courage. The competitors will be marked on how well they perform each of the tournament tasks. The judging staff will consist of Mr. Bartemius Crouch, Head of the Department of International Cooperation, Mr. Ludivine Bagman, Head of the Department of Magical Games and Sports, and one representative from each of the participating schools. The champion with the highest total after all three tasks will win the Triwizard Cup, the thousand galleons prize money and a place in magical history. Mr. Filch, if you please..."
The grey, scraggly caretaker shuffled forward carrying a very old jewel encrusted chest and placed it on a pillar beside Dumbledore. The headmaster took out his wand and tapped the top three times. The lid swung open revealing a large cup filled to the brim with dancing blue-white flames. "Behold the Goblet of Fire that will choose the champions from each school. Any student wishing to enter must write his or her name and school clearly upon a slip of parchment and drop it into the flames. However, in the interest of safety, no one under the age of 17 will be permitted to enter. To guarantee this, I will draw an Age Line around the Goblet of Fire. Be aware that placing your name into the goblet constitutes a binding magical contract so the tournament is not to be entered into lightly. The champions are not permitted to ask for or accept help of any kind from the teachers to complete the tasks in the tournament. So think carefully."
"He sounded like a demon when he said that," Haruhi said quietly.
.
Karkaroff started to round up the Durmstrang students to lead them back to the ship. The Beauxbatons girls and a fair number of the Ravenclaw girls with whom they had been dining swarmed around the Ouran boys, giving Harry and Ron the chance to scoot away from elitist foreigners. Neville, figuring he'd never get this close to that many good looking girls again, stayed where he was. Haruhi slipped away to admire the architecture in the Great Hall. The girls' and boys' uniforms at this school didn't look terribly different. Haruhi wondered if any of them would figure out that she was a girl. She was honor bound not to tell them, but if they figured it out on their own, that wasn't her problem.
Hermione walked up to her. "Did those guys mean what they said? About commoners, I mean?"
Haruhi let her breath out slowly. "I don't know if you'll understand this, but have you ever seen how people raised in the magical world treat non-magical people? What do you call them in English, No-Mags? Muggles?"
"Muggles," Hermione said.
"A lot of people in the wizarding world don't know what to do with muggles. So they often say very stupid things, even insulting things. It's kind of like that. These guys have been raised not just in the magical world but in a very rarefied corner of it. When they say they think it's a good thing that commoners can go to a fine school like Mahoutokoro, they mean it, and their families donate a lot of money and resources to making sure it is one of the great wizarding schools in the world."
"But not as good as Ouran," Hermione said.
"There's no place as good as Ouran," Haruhi said. "Not even Ouran."
"If you think it's overrated, then why go?" Hermione asked.
"Because when you get to the upper grades, they teach things no one else does."
"Like what?" Hermine he couldn't help but recall Malfoy lauding Durmstrang, where instead of teaching Defense Against the Dark Arts, they actually taught the Dark Arts. Was Ouran another school like that?
"Magical Research, Wizarding Law, Magical and Muggle Governments, how to run a company, finance. I'm mostly there for the law. My mom was a lawyer. I mean, don't get me wrong. No one thinks this tournament is going to be a cakewalk. We are all well aware that Hogwarts trained two of the three most powerful wizards of the last century, and that Durmstrang trained the third."
"Do you learn about the dark arts at your school?"
The Japanese kid considered. "The Combat Magic class has a unit on Curses and Counter-Curses. But magic is a tool. Whether it's used for good or evil depends on the wizard not on the spell."
"Combat magic?"
"It's a dangerous world Miss Granger. Better to have a skill you never use than one you need and do not have."
Before the conversation could go farther, Karkaroff's voice cut through the hall. "Polikov! Can't you even eat dinner without humiliating all of us in in front of the other schools? You have food dribbled down your front, disgusting boy! Come, before you embarrass us further."
And awkward silence filled the hall. At length, Tamaki looked sideways. "He sounds like my grandmother."
"He sounds like my grandmother," Neville said.
Their eyes met. "Bet mine is worse," Neville said.
"You'd lose that bet," Tamaki replied.
Karkaroff led his troop to the door, arriving at the same time Harry and Ron did. The Gryffindor boys stepped back to let them past. The Durmstrang headmaster gave him a dismissive glance then did a double take. A grizzled old man came up behind the boy. "Yeah, that's Harry Potter."
"Harry Potter?" Haruhi said. "I had dinner with Harry Potter?"
~oOo~
Ron dropped into his bed with a flump. "Can you believe how snobby those Ouran guys are?"
"I dunno, they seemed ok to me," Neville said. "That blond guy's got the only grandmother in the world that's even close to being as bad as mine is. It just depends on whether you think it's worse to be ignored or get howlers all the time."
"But dude," Seamus threw in, "You totally smoked him when it came to the way your grandmothers dress."
"Yeah I did," Neville said pleased by this weird victory.
~oOo~
Even though it was Saturday, everybody was up early the next morning, obviously or surreptitiously watching the Goblet. Hikaru and Kaoru watched as a Hogwarts boy went up, egged on by his friends and put his name in. A Hogwarts girl sauntered across the line casually as if just passing by and tossed her name in hoping no one would notice. The Durmstrang students marched up and with sharp, deliberate movements put their names in one by one then went off to their breakfasts. The Beauxbatons students gracefully glided up and offered their names as though doing the Goblet a favor, but the girls' nervous titters afterwards undermined much of the confidence they projected. A pair of Hogwarts boys - red headed twins - approached the age line with identical smirks.
"You're not old enough," said a smaller red headed boy.
"Watch and learn little brother," said one, pulling out a crystal vial.
"Is that an aging potion?" the younger boy gasped.
"Think we should tell them a girl tried that an hour ago?" Kaoru said to his brother.
"What? And spoil the fun?" said Hikaru. They leaned back to watch.
"We only need a couple weeks. What do you think, two or three drops?" said the first twin.
"Should do," said the other.
They swallowed the drops, smiled at each other and stepped across the age line. For a moment, it looked like it had worked, but then the line flared bright blue and threw them across the room. Each of them sprouted a bread that grew three feet and turned white.
Hermione, the girl Haruhi had dined with last night, looked up from her book, bored. "Don't you think Dumbledore would have thought of artificial aging?" She picked up her pumpkin juice and walked out of the hall.
The Hitachiins grinned at each other. "You really think this will work?" Kaoru asked.
"Nah," Hikaru answered. "It'll probably combust at the age line, but watching Haruhi squawk will make it worth it."
They imagined the amusing scene in their minds for a second.
"But what if it does work?" Kaoru said. "This competition is dangerous and she has nothing to gain from it."
"Be serious. Honey-senpai, Mori-senpai, Kyoya-senpai, Tamaki-senpai. The top two students from both Class 2 and Class 3. The cleverest, most skilled students in the school. There's no way the Goblet would pick Haruhi. Someone would have to place a seriously powerful Confundus charm on it, one big enough to screw up all the choices."
.
The crowd started to thin out as breakfast time ended so the hall was thinning out by the time their favorite toy arrived.
"Hey Haruhi, come here. You have the sign this."
"Sign what?"
"It's an honor pledge not to cheat while we're here. Since we'll be taking classes at their school and all."
"That's kind of offensive," Haruhi said as she sat down.
"They're making all the visiting students sign one," Hikaru said, handing her a quill. She signed the parchment and slid it back.
"You have such pretty handwriting," Kaoru said.
"And you're going to make such a good champion," Hikaru said waving his wand over the parchment. The top half with the writing separated neatly, leaving a small square with "Haruhi Fujioka, Ouran Academy" written on it. He waved his wand again and the paper began to fold itself up.
"What?" she shrieked. It was everything they imagined.
"You can't get over the age line," she said frantically. "Several students have tried. Nothing under the age of seventeen can get across."
"That's why we used eighteen year old parchment," Hikaru said.
"And twenty year old ink," Kaoru said.
The parchment square meanwhile had folded itself up into an origami crane and begun flapping its wings. She lunged for it and missed as the startled bird took flight. The twins were holding their sides with laughter as she ran around the room, jumping on tables and benches trying to catch the thing before it soared right past her, over the age line and into the fire. An enormous flare went up and settled back down.
"You jerks!"
The twins at least had the decency to look astonished.
"We didn't think it would work."
"Well it did!"
"Don't worry Haru. There's no way it'll pick you over the others," Hikaru said.
~oOo~
Tamaki had declared at breakfast that the castle was magnificent but he was sure he would get lost which immediately resulted in six girls offering him a complete tour. "Three of those girls are Beauxbatons, they don't even go here," Haruhi muttered.
"They are probably hoping to ditch the others and get lost with Tamaki." Kyoya eyed her with some amusement. "You're being uncharacteristically sour. Should I tell our king that you are jealous?"
"No!"
By the time lunch rolled around, their entourage of girls had more than doubled, there was barely room at the table for Harry and Ron. It wasn't just the Gryffindor girls, it was the Beauxbatons girls and the Ravenclaw girls and… Ron nudged Harry. "Isn't that Malfoy's girlfriend?"
Sure enough, Pansy Parkinson was sitting next to one of the Ouran twins. Instead of her customary sneer, she had a smile that almost made her look attractive.
"D'you reckon Malfoy's noticed?" Ron said. They looked around the hall.
"Oh yeah," Harry answered. There at the Slythern table sat Draco Malfoy, glaring at the Gryffindor table, lips compressed, the purple slowly building up on his face.
He got up and stalked over. "You're at the wrong table, Parkinson. The Gryffindors don't want you here. The better table is over there."
Tamaki looked up with those violet-blue eyes of his. (Where the hell did a Japanese kid get blue eyes from, anyway?) "Is there a problem, young man? Surely a lady as lovely as Miss Parkinson is welcome anywhere...?" He looked over at his Gryffindor hosts.
"Oh... absolutely, yeah," said Ron just to annoy Malfoy.
"Professor McGonagall told us that we should get to know all the visiting students. Didn't Professor Snape tell you the same?" Harry said with a straight face.
"And it would be rude to try to hog your guests all to yourself," Ron glanced meaningfully over at the Slytherin table and the Durmstrang students and Krum.
Malfoy didn't miss the meaning, but he still felt he had the prize and wasn't about to give it up. He turned a sneering smile to Ron and Harry and said "Of course. I just wanted to be sure that Miss Parkinson was being well treated over here. The Gryffindors have such poor manners."
Tamaki looked from Katie to Alicia in surprise. "I have found them to be utterly charming."
When Pansy made no move to leave the table, Draco gave a curt nod. "As I said, just checking."
He started to walk off when the short blond Japanese student grabbed his arm and said in a quiet voice, " You might want to be cautious where you give insult little boy. Tama-chan is slow to take offense, but that is not the case with everyone."
" 'Little boy,' " said Ron to Harry savoring the look of Draco's wounded pride. "I just forgave them everything last night."
Malfoy slunk back to his seat and glared back at the Japanese students. "Who do those Ouran guys think they are anyway?" Draco said.
"You do not know?" Krum answered him. "They are the sons of the richest, most powerful families in Japan. Ouran is one of the most famous schools in Asia. The Ouran Quidditch captain Takashi Kuze is also first alternate chaser for Japanese national Quidditch team. I play against him last year after one of their chasers vas knocked out by a bludger. We talked after. So I owl him when I hear Ouran coming. He say he not chosen but tell me about the ones who were. He say the one with glasses is quick and clever; a noble opponent and a complete jerk. He thinks the tall blonde is probably an empath because he always seems to know what everybody is feeling. The very tall black haired one can communicate with animals and might be a seer because he always seems to know what's going to happen even though he does nothing to stop it. The short blond one may be the most dangerous combat wizard living, but nobody knows for certain because he only spars with his family. In competitions he does only enough to beat his opponents and nothing more."
~oOo~
Dinner that night was a tense affair, with everyone excited or nervous or, in the case of one Japanese student, still furious. The twins sauntered in, took one look at Haruhi and moved to sit on the other side of Kyoya and Mori just to be safe. Which put them in proximity to another pair of red-headed twins.
"You looked better with the beards," Hikaru said.
"At least we had beards," Fred answered back. "Did you guys even try?"
The Hitachiins looked at each other guiltily. "Um..."
"You guys are so dead," Haruhi muttered down the table.
"Haruhi," Kyoya said in that patronizing voice of his, "it's rude to speak in Japanese when our hosts do not."
"But they ... I ... if you knew ..." Kyoya merely raised an eyebrow. Her shoulders slumped. "Yes Kyoya-senpai."
"What's this 'senpai?' " the Weasley twins wanted to know.
"It's a term of respect that younger students use to address their older, wiser and more experienced fellows."
The Weasley's looked at each other. "Excellent! Hey Ron! From now on out you have to call us Fred-senpai and George-senpai."
"No way," said Ron.
"You gotta," said Fred. "It's part of our cultural exchange with the Japanese students."
"You gonna make Harry do it?"
" 'course not," George said. "Harry's cool."
Whatever rejoinder Ron had been about to come up with was silenced when Dumbledore rose. "The time has come. The Goblet of Fire will make its selections momentarily. I will remind you all that entering your name into the Goblet constituted a binding magic contract and dire things will befall anyone who tries to get out of it. I hope you all thought about it most carefully." The Goblet picked that moment to flare dramatically, as if emphasizing Dumbledore's words. It settled back down and Dumbledore continued. "Once selection has been made, each champion will go to the side chamber there where he or she will receive further instructions." He gestured to a door just off the staff table.
Dumbledore stepped to one side leaving the Goblet the center of attention. He waited patiently while the cup took its sweet time. Then the blue flames turned scarlet, a stream of sparks flew outward pushing a small piece of paper with it. Dumbledore caught it mid air and read aloud. "The champion for Durmstrang will be Viktor Krum."
Krum pumped his fist in victory and rose as several of his friends clouted his shoulder in congratulations. He walked forward, past the teachers and visiting judges and went through the door into the room beyond.
After another dramatic pause, the blue flames again turned red and a second scrap of parchment flew out and into Dumbledore's waiting my fingers. "The champion for Beauxbatons will be Fleur Delacour."
The girl with the shimmering blond hair rose gracefully from her seat, graciously bowed and moved to the small room.
Again the Goblet paused as if considering before turning red once more. "The champion for Hogwarts will be Cedric Diggory!"
The Hufflepuff table erupted in cheers, so loud only Harry and Ron heard Fred say "You don't think hosting a foreign school disqualified us, do you?"
"What do you care," said Ron. "Your names never even made it in."
The Japanese students alone were left filled with tension until the Goblet turned red one more time. "The champion for Ouran will be..." Dumbledore said as the paper fluttered downwards. He opened the paper and froze "Harry Potter."
The Japanese students turned to Harry. Their headmaster rose and angrily demanded "what insult is this? He is not a student of our school. Nor even of age to complete! Did you invite us here to insult us?"
Even Karkaroff and Maxime were appalled at the treachery.
"Please, please," said Dumbledore. "If we adjourn to the other room, we can attempt to sort through this." As he gestured to the door the Goblet again turned red. One more piece of parchment emerged and when it settled into Dumbledore's hand, the flame in the Goblet went out.
"Haruhi Fujioka, Ouran Academy."