• Chapter IV •

Reflection

The walk across the castle grounds and down the hillslope over to the Quidditch pitch was likely one of the stranger walks that Harry had ever taken, and certainly the most ambivalent one. Sure, he had been rather nervous heading for his first ever Quidditch match three years back, for example, but there had been nothing like the inner strife he was wrestling with during these fleeting minutes as he approached what he usually considered one of his favorite places at Hogwarts, or even in his life in general. He knew exactly where he had to go and what he had to do, which was what gave a distinct tenacity and purpose to his stride, and yet, at the same time, there remained a part of him that in defiance of that very purpose seemed to be constantly pulling at his back, away from his destination.

In the end, it was solely that fierce conviction deep within his heart that this was the right thing to do which kept him marching straight ahead, braving what he dreaded with his hands buried deep in the pockets of his coat and his breath swirling out into the chilling air as the frostily coated blades of grass crinkled softly beneath his boots.

If from a distance Viktor Krum's daring aerial maneuvers had already looked impressive, it was when Harry found himself standing at the edge of the pitch looking straight up at his speeding figure high above, a dark silhouette against the grey-clouded sky, that they seemed outright otherworldly – and not exclusively in the sense that it was a human being whizzing around on an airborne broomstick.

Even though it somehow gave Harry the feeling that he himself should probably never again use a broom for anything other than sweeping the floor so as not to make a fool of himself, making him think that there was, in fact, a considerable difference between actually, truly flying and merely avoiding to fall, he simultaneously felt that he could never tire of watching the Bulgarian's high-flying virtuosity. Harry might still have been something of a newcomer in the world of magical sports, but he simply could not imagine anyone ever flying with a more dazzling combination of ease and alacrity, grace and dexterity, than this young man. There was nothing artificial about it, nothing that did not seem quite right to the human observer on some primitive, instinctual level. It was a spectacle of nature, like thunder, wind and rain, immediately understood as something that simply happens outside of our control. For some reason, however, none of that did exactly contribute favorably to Harry's overall mood in that moment.

How long he stood there in silent admiration despite his latent indignation he could not have said, and since nobody else was around to remind him it was indeed rather easy to lose all track of time. After a while, when Viktor had descended to a lower altitude and his silhouette was more sharply defined, he eventually came to a halt, and hovering in mid-air seemed to be looking right down at Harry, who consequently – and hesitantly so – raised his hand and awkwardly waved it a little.

With no more than a second's delay Viktor went straight for the dive and shot down towards Harry in what might have looked either like an attempt at suicide or murder to an outside observer – and Harry as well, what with being the potential victim of the latter. Had it not been Viktor Krum, Harry might even have considered moving a muscle, but the Bulgarian wunderkind expectably broke his daring dive a couple of meters above ground by pulling his Firebolt's handle straight up to his chest and pushing his legs down into the stirrups, coming to something of a slanted, almost horizontal standing position in mid-air before taking his dive's remaining momentum into a deft, spinning bounce off the broomstick and onto his own two feet, landing almost right in front of Harry with the Firebolt coming to safely rest in his left hand.

Harry would have liked all too much to call him out for showing off, but sadly, that was just his way of landing. Considering that Viktor, as soon as his feet touched the ground, somehow and oddly enough managed to once again look like his ungainly bipedal self, it was surprisingly easy not to resent him for a landing routine that would cause mere mortals among the Quidditch-playing kind to meet their eponymous mortality.

"Harry," Viktor greeted him, plainly surprised to see him, and once Harry had returned his greeting went on to amicably ask with a skyward nod, "Care to join me up there? The winds are fantastic today."

"Thanks," Harry declined with his hands raised up, "but I think I have made enough of a fool of myself these past couple of days to last me for a while."

Confusion took shape on Viktor's sharp features. "How do you mean?"

"Well," Harry explained, "let's just say that watching you fly makes me feel kind of silly for ever thinking that flying was something I'm actually good at."

"Don't say that," Viktor answered with a furrowed brow, disconcerted in earnest. "That is ridiculous. You are a great flier, Harry."

"U2 makes nice music, too," Harry pointed out, "but I sincerely hope that Bono bloke doesn't believe he's Mozart."

"And yet it would be a shame if some nice band would stop playing their music just because Mozart lived before them, yes?"

Harry puffed up his cheeks, then conceded somewhat grudgingly, "Fair enough."

"When was your first time on a broomstick?" Viktor asked him after a pensive pause. "The magical kind, I mean."

"Just about three years ago," Harry answered a bit wistfully, remembering the overwhelming rush of exhilaration he had felt in that moment with a faint smile on his lips. "My first year at Hogwarts. I didn't even know flying broomsticks were a real thing before that."

"I was flying around on a broomstick before I could walk," Viktor affably told him. "At least that is what my mother keeps saying. And I have never gotten the hang of walking quite as good as flying, or so my father keeps telling me."

He smiled the most genuine smile Harry had ever seen on him at that, and Harry was maybe even more astonished to see the difference it made on his stern face. Perhaps every face was really made for smiling after all, in its own unique way, and it was only a matter of finding a reason for it to do so.

"And that is the only difference between you and me that is worth to mention," Viktor then added. "Time. Practice. Erm," he made a spinning motion with his finger, "Repetition! And Quidditch is pretty much the only thing I have to worry about, while from what I have heard it is safe to say that the same is not so true for you, yes? But you could be a great player if you keep doing it. And last time I checked, the English national team was in dire need of those."

They shared an unburdened laugh at that, and it took Harry a second or two to even realize the complete novelty of it, and only then did he suddenly and most inconveniently remember his original reason for coming there in the first place. Refusing to drop into a potentially awkward silence, Harry instead cleared his throat and composed himself to proceed ahead.

"Actually, though," he began as steadily as he could, "Quidditch wasn't what I came here to talk to you about."

When Viktor merely looked at him in wordless anticipation, Harry continued, if clumsily at first, "I mean, I would definitely prefer to just keep talking about Quidditch and your family and—and other… nicer things." He paused and shook his head. "But I came here to tell you something. To confess, frankly. And to apologize."

Viktor furled his considerable eyebrows in response to that and voiced what they already made so unmistakably clear. "I am not sure I understand."

"No," Harry perplexingly enough agreed with him, shaking his head again. "No, of course not. But I…" and now he nodded his head instead, "I mean to change that."

Two rather confused-looking people looked at each other for a moment of general confusion.

"So, uh," Harry carried on, "so I'll do that now. This is probably going to sound a little weird at first, and then it may continue to sound weird for the rest of your life, which is pretty much what Harry Potter is all about these days, but maybe it will eventually make some kind of weird sense to… to someone. So… here it goes."

He softly coughed into his hand once, then rubbed both his hands together as he inhaled some air, held his breath for a moment longer and finally spoke swiftly on its exhalation, "I lied to you, Viktor. On Monday, when you came to ask me about Hermione, I… I lied. I told you she already had a date for the ball and it was a lie and I knew it and I'm sorry. I knew it was wrong as soon as I did, too, but only today did I realize just how much of a mess I've made of things.

"You came to me in confidence, you made all your intentions known and you were ridiculously polite about it and I just flat-out lied to you like a total scumbag. Or an average Slytherin. It was complete bollocks. There isn't even a David Copperfield. I just made that up and I'm sorry. I truly am. And I can only hope that you haven't asked anyone else yet, so that you can ask out Hermione like you meant to and then you can go to the dance together and it'll almost be as if I never messed anything up."

Viktor's eyes broodingly roamed over their surroundings for a couple of seconds, and his silence kept Harry under unremitting tension. Then he fixed his gaze on the anxious boy before him once more, and after another pause finally spoke, "There is no David Copperfield?"

"Well, there… there is a David Copperfield, of course," Harry haltingly replied as soon as he was not too muddled to reply to the one question he could not have reasonably expected, "but he's an American stage magician, old enough to be Hermione's father, entirely unaware of her existence and actually dating Claudia Schiffer, I believe."

"What is a stage magician?" Viktor inquired further, his eyebrows drawn so close together they might as well have been one.

"Uh," Harry gave succinct utterance to his cerebral imbroglio, by now wondering what parts of what he thought he had said he had maybe just imagined saying. "It's, uh, it's a kind of illusionist? They perform physical, mechanical, optical... well, they perform all sorts of tricks for the entertainment of an audience. It's what Muggles actually refer to as magic, comically enough."

"Ah," said Viktor with a slow nod, his eyebrows relaxing only minimally.

Harry waited a moment for anything else to happen, and when it did not and there still seemed to persist a vaguely Copperfield-related contemplation around him, he ventured the forthright question, "So, have you asked anyone else yet? To the dance, I mean."

Viktor took a sharp breath, almost as if he had suddenly been roused from some standing slumber. "No," he said a little absently. "I have not."

"Well, that's—that's great!" Harry opined as cheerfully as he could, and there was even a part of him that fully meant it. The other part for once maintained its silence.

Viktor made some sort of nonverbal agreeing sound, if that was even what it was, and Harry in turn felt increasingly self-conscious about the whole situation, by now wondering if he had somehow managed to do an additional wrong in his attempt to right the first wrong. How many wrongs did it take to make a right, again? A dozen, perhaps?

"I suppose I'll be going, then?" he offered indecisively, making a tentative step backward. "I, uh, I don't know if you can forgive me or anything, but I hope you'll ask Hermione just as you were planning to. I mean, I know that thanks to my stupid meddling it's all a bit messy now and she already knows of your intention and all that, but that doesn't mean it's all ruined, right? It can still all end well, I think. At least Shakespeare said so. I think. You just have to ask her. She knows it's all my fault and I'm sure… I'm sure she'll say yes. So, uh… right."

He made another step away from Viktor, who showed no visible sign of any reaction as his eyes remained fixed on an indistinct spot on the ground, and mumbling one last apology and a, "See you around, then," Harry turned on his heels and proceeded to retreat. As he was walking away, he felt a curious sort of sensation overcome him with intense immediacy, as some kind of obscure affliction seemed to have left his chest that now felt lighter than it had in days. Yet it was with quiet dismay that he also felt that, while maybe his integrity was in part restored, his heart nevertheless seemed lost.

"Wait," Viktor's voice penetrated his discordant rumination, making him stop mid-step, "I am sorry." Harry turned around to face him in puzzlement, and Viktor met his gaze as he continued, "I did not mean to be rude. I was just a little… what is the right word? Overwhelmed, yes?" He made a thoughtful pause. "May I ask you one question?"

Harry hesitated solely out of surprise rather than reluctance, then walked back to where he had left his footprints in the thin but persistent layer of frost just seconds ago, saying, "Of course," and with a shrug of the shoulder added, "Anything." He then regarded Viktor expectantly with what he hoped would look like an encouraging smile, fixed as it felt on his taut features. Four or five seconds passed as Viktor seemed to be busy assembling the syntax of his question.

"Why?" was the strikingly monosyllabic result of aforementioned assembly.

"I can't help but fear that that's the first of your questions not referring to David Copperfield," Harry jokingly answered in an obvious evasion, and he was relieved to see the hint of a smile briefly curl up one corner of Viktor's thin lips.

"I would just like to understand," Viktor went on to explain. "I mean, I appreciate that you came here to tell me all this and I see now with my own eyes why Hermione always speaks so highly of you." When he found Harry averting his eyes in shame, he continued quite emphatically, "We all make mistakes, Harry. What separates some people from other ones is to answer for them and to take responsibility for the actions. Good character is not to do no wrong, but to see it and to try to fix it. And maybe not do it again, perhaps."

Harry gulped, his throat uncomfortably constrained all of a sudden. "Yeah, I… I'm afraid that's another test failed for me." When Viktor gave him a questioning look, he confessed to him with a despondent sigh, "I told the same lie to Cormac McLaggen, sans David Copperfield. Days before you came to me. When I lied to you, I was actually doing it again."

"And clearly you don't regret it at all," Viktor remarked with a telling look, and a nervous chuckle escaped from Harry's lips.

"Well, Cormac isn't even half the person you are," he said, "but that's just an observation, not an excuse. Not for lying to him, and certainly not where patronizing Hermione is concerned, which is exactly what I have done with these stupid lies of mine. She was even grateful when she found out about Cormac this morning, thinking I had so nobly protected her from his bloated ego and blindingly white teeth. Can you believe it?" He scoffed bitterly, shaking his head at no one but himself. "Damn, I think I never messed up this badly, and I have crashed illegally flying cars into ancient trees that are basically under monumental protection before. Passively. Ron was actually in the driver's seat on that one. But still."

"I won't even ask," Viktor quipped with a wave of his hand. "About my actual question, though…"

"Right, right," Harry hastily picked up where he had not even properly left off, which really made him wonder where exactly he was. "Uhm… right."

"The way I understand it," Viktor commendably helped him along, "you lied to that Corbin McLeggings guy because he is not the kind of person you would want to be around Hermione, yes?"

"Well, sure," Harry agreed. "And also, maybe, just to get rid of him in general. I mean, again, it doesn't justify lying to him like that, I suppose, but… he is the most obnoxious person outside of Slytherin."

"What about me then?" asked Viktor.

"About you?"

"Am I… what was the word… obnoxious, too?"

"What?" Harry asked, downright shocked. "No, no. Of course not! That's not what I meant to say here at all!"

"Then why tell me the same thing you told him? Apparently you don't want me around Hermione, either."

"No, that's not at all what… what I…" Harry helplessly trailed off, stranded in his own unavailing train of thought. "I mean, it's not… you're not… I was just—"

"Harry," said Viktor, and it really sounded like a statement of its own, and though calmly spoken made Harry not only stop his aimless stammering mid-sentence, but also prompted him to look up from wherever he had tried to find some much needed coherence. Once Viktor felt assured of his attention, he continued, "It is good of you to apologize for your lies, but I think there is still one person right here that you are still lying to in not so small way, yes?"

"Huh?" Harry breathed, genuinely mystified, and to his credit or not he actually looked around a bit in search for that one particular person. Witnessing that, Viktor pursed his lips – and it may have served to contain a smile that he deemed inappropriate in that moment.

"I am talking about you," he eventually clarified.

"You?" a positively flabbergasted Harry asked. "I mean, me?"

"The same, yes," Viktor confirmed. "I mean, you are also still lying to me a little bit, but I am not taking it personally, because I can see you are really trying to believe it yourself."

"I'm not lying to myself," Harry protested to the best of his ability, limited as it currently was. "That's ridiculous! I mean, how could I ever not know when I'm lying to myself, myself also happening to be me? I tell myself everything."

"Well, if it is all so simple, then surely you can answer this simple question," Viktor portentously declared. "Could it be that you lying to two different people has less to do with the people you lied to and more with the person you lied about?"

Hesitance kept Harry motionless, with the exception of his eyes that darted hither and yon and back again. Then he crossed his arms.

"What does it even matter?" he asked in a slightly peeved tone. "Why are we talking about this?"

Viktor expressed an apology, and strangely enough, no matter how often he did it, it never ceased to sound genuine rather than compulsive. "I did not mean to, er, interrogate you, but you seem to have a hard time figuring this out by yourself. Not so simple after all, yes?"

"Well, there's nothing to figure out, okay?" Harry all but snapped at him, regretting it instantly. Quickly calming himself he added in a softer voice, "I've messed it up. Let's leave it at that and… be done with it."

"That doesn't seem reasonable to me at all," Viktor opined, and Harry was pained to be reminded of Hermione at that. "I am sorry," the Durmstrang champion then said once more. "Maybe this is not my right, but I just think that you really need to speak with Hermione. And if it helps, I really think that she needs to speak with you too."

"I think she's had enough of that for a while, and I can't exactly hold it against her."

"I have the feeling that it would take a lot more to make Hermione refuse to listen to you."

Harry sullenly huffed at the notion, continuously shaking his head, his features hard.

"I'm not deserving of this," he muttered, bile and bitterness permeating his voice. "Any of it. I don't deserve to even have her in my life, and I think I have made that abundantly clear by now. I have taken her for granted for years now. I've gotten so used to her always being there for me that I neglected to take a moment and ask myself if I in turn am also there for her just as much. Does she need me? What do I do for her? But who cares, right? I need her and that's all that matters. I'd be dead by now if it weren't for her, that's for sure. And I haven't learned to truly cherish and appreciate her in over three years and then you come along and do it all in, what, six weeks? You've got it all figured out while I'm standing here lying to people like a bloody oaf because I don't know what to do about it myself. No, you can't ask her, mate, because I'm still pondering whether I should or shouldn't. Queue up, will you? I'm Harry flipping Potter after all. Gotta be good for something. Bugger!"

Viktor listened with no sign of impatience as Harry worked himself into his self-contemptuous tirades. Only when the young Gryffindor had finished and the last forceful puff of his breath had vanished erratically in the cold winter air did Viktor speak up again. "Don't you think it would be interesting to know Hermione's thoughts on some of these things?"

Harry threw him a discontented glance and made as if to speak in objection, yet merely ejected a flimsy sigh instead. "Why are you even doing this?" he asked, sincere in his incomprehension. "I came here, for all intents and purposes, to tell you that Hermione does in fact not have a date for that stupid ball yet and that you can still ask her yourself, and now you're basically telling me how life works and to pull myself together and do it myself instead? That doesn't make any sense!"

"Oh, do not get me wrong," Viktor replied. "I do envy you. I have never met anyone like Hermione before, and I have also not found anyone who is for me what the two of you apparently are for each other."

"Then why do it? Why step back from this and practically cheer me on from the sideline?"

Viktor's lips briefly spread into a transient smile, which this time, however, somehow made him look even sadder than his usual self. "Because it is not a competition," he stated matter-of-factly, then paused as Harry quizzically looked at him. "Hermione's heart is not something that can be won. It is either given freely, or not at all."

Harry blankly stared at him for a second, his mouth slightly agape. "See, you keep saying things like that and I'm left feeling like a little kid who thinks love is when you're holding hands in public."

"We cannot choose the time our hearts speak up."

"Seriously," Harry deadpanned. "Stop it."

Viktor gave a low, throaty chuckle at that and turned his gaze up to the overcast sky. "It is something Hermione said to me once. It is easy to sound smart when you have her to quote."

Harry mutely regarded him for a moment as he rummaged through his tumultuous thoughts, then exhaled an elongated sigh when at last he found what he needed to say. "I'm really sure she'd say yes if only you'd ask her, though."

"Maybe," Viktor allowed with a weak shrug. "I could see that happening, yes. I think she likes me good enough. But one should not forget we are talking about a little dance here, not a marriage proposal. There is maybe small difference there. Nowadays, at least."

With drooping shoulders Harry quietly shuffled his boots in the frosty, evenly cut grass, and when after an absentminded while his eyes briefly flickered up towards Viktor on their own accord and he found him watching him intently with the faintest hint of amusement tucked away in one corner of his mouth, Harry cleared his throat and made his feet stand still.

"I just don't know," he spoke his troubled mind. "I don't see why she would even listen to me after what I've pulled, let alone agree to accompany me to the very dance she has so vehemently condemned at any given opportunity."

It was Viktor's turn to sigh. "Am I correct to assume that you have not told her your real reason for lying to McBaggins and me?"

Harry's sudden interest in the wetly glistening traces his boots had left in the white-coated grass was a tacit admission, yet admission enough.

"Forget about the Yule Ball, then," Viktor told him decisively. "Don't make it about that in your head. Make it about her. Make it about your… heart's honesty, yes? Just tell her the truth and see what comes from it. It does not matter." Harry's eyes shot up at that, a doubtful look in them. "It does not matter," Viktor reiterated. "You do not do it for yourself and some result you are hoping for. You do it for her. Because she deserves nothing less."

Harry gulped, and it almost felt as if it had opened an actual knot somewhere in his windpipe. "You're right," he breathed, running his fingers across his forehead and then through his wayward hair. "Of course you're right. Damn it, why is everybody always right these days except for me?"

"Mind you," said Viktor, "if it turns out I was wrong about all of this after all, then I will be very surprised for one whole second and then I will be standing right in front of Hermione the second after that to ask her out myself."

Harry speechlessly stared at him, a pleasant smile momentarily banishing the shadows on the young man's features.

"Just do not mess it up," Viktor added, half in earnest, half in jest.

A slow and absent-minded shake of the head further emphasized Harry's continuing disbelief. "I don't even know what to say," he said, which evidently was something he knew to say. "A mere thank you will hardly suffice. Ron would probably kill me, but I almost feel like I should ask you to the ball instead of Hermione."

Viktor laughed. "Now that would be something. We would certainly give the pesky press a thing to write about, yes?" Harry ejected a chuckle of his own, though his mental presence was still questionable at best. "Do not worry about it, though," Viktor, aware of Harry's frazzled state, told him in honesty. "I really do not think I have done anything special. I merely told a boy to talk to the girl that keeps talking about him."

Seconds passed in silence as Harry kept shaking his head and gazing into space while Viktor watched him in quiet amusement. "Well," the young man eventually broke the silence, "it is getting dark already, and I wanted to fly a little more, so I hope you will excuse me now."

Already he readied his Firebolt, letting the broom hover freely in the air right next to him and then deftly hopping onto it in one swift and fluent motion, the striking change in his posture once more taking immediate effect.

"Wait," Harry suddenly blurted out, and Viktor looked at him expectantly. "Insufficiency notwithstanding… thank you." The recipient nodded his head in response. "Really. From the bottom of my annoyingly conflicted, agonizingly youthful heart – thank you."

"I would wish you good luck," Viktor answered as he readjusted one of his dark leather gloves, "but I doubt you will need it. Being yourself should do it."

With a wink – a gesture Harry would not have imagined Viktor Krum to be capable of – the Seeker seasoned beyond his years kicked himself off the ground, darting up into the air with such dazzling speed that it was only a matter of seconds until once again no more than a blurry, elegantly moving silhouette remained to be seen of him. Harry watched him soar in quickly resurfacing awe, yet his admiration now had less to do with the maneuvers he witnessed and more with the person he knew to be performing them.

After seeing another succession of speedy loops and corkscrews, deft turns and moves he thought impossible, Harry eventually tore his eyes away from the mesmerizing sight to make his way back to the castle, where his heart's honesty was now awaiting him.

~Ω~