Jane was sitting in a rather stiff wooden chair, in the chamber off the Dining Hall. Her skin was sickly white, and she was trembling with nerves. Her glasses kept slipping down her nose with the cold sweat that was coating her body. However, she was determined. This was just the first step, like the first step in a difficult potion. She reminded herself why she was doing this, thinking of her sister. Jane closed her eyes.
She was back in the playroom with her sister, before she left to go to school. The windows were open, and golden sunlight was streaming in, giving the room a dreamlike quality. Jane was imagining what house she was going to be in when she got to school. She had spent every walking hour dreaming about Hogwarts, and telling her five-year-old sister about how wonderful it was there. The game they were playing was the 'Sorting Hat Game', where one person would be the student, and the other the disembodied voice of the sorting hat. Today, Jane was being sorted.
"You are very kind," Mary said, in her high-pitched little girl voice. "Maybe you should be a Hufflepuff."
"No!" Jane said, playfully angry. "Ravenclaw! You said Ravenclaw!"
"Shush, I'm not done yet." Mary giggled. "You are also very cunning and mean, I see, maybe Slytherin,"
"No I'm not!" Jane answered indignantly.
"Didn't you steal one of your sister's wooden eggs the other day? Hmm?" She said, trying to sound like their tutor, Madame Princelar. They both giggled.
"I told you, it wasn't me!" Jane blushed guiltily, but Mary ignored her.
"No, I think you're a Ravenclaw," She said finally.
"YES! Jane yelled, the hat slipping off her head as she jumped out of her chair.
"You're too nerdy to be anything else!" Mary exclaimed, and both girls collapsed giggling.
"Girls!" their mother strode in the room, wearing a ridiculously tight corset and a pink dress. "What are you doing?" She said, aghast as she spotted the mess. Both girls got up and stared at the floor, their mother surveyed their guilty faces, both so different, one pale as a sheet, with dark, straight hair, the other a healthy olive, with beautiful wavy locks. She was so disappointed with how both of her daughters had turned out.
"Mary, you know you are not to play any games or other silly things relating to magic. You know you will never have magic or be magic, so you ought not to interact with it. Jane, you know better than to encourage your disappointing little sister to play with things that are above her. Mary, get out and go and clean around the house, the maid will instruct you, maybe do the basement since you belong below all of us." She watched as Mary walked out of the room, tears spilling out of her sky-blue eyes.
"Jane, I want to talk to you." Jane scowled at her mother as she kneeled down to Jane's height. "Your sister is a squib. You know she is below you, and all of us, even the maid. Her blood is dirty, and she is useless to the world like all of the other stupid muggles."
"No!" Jane protested, tears filling her eyes.
"Jane," her mother said sternly, her cold blue eyes meeting Jane's. "You know it's true. I want you to stop playing or even talking to your sister. You father and I have decided that you will eat separately, so that you can have the least amount of contact possible. We don't want her to influence you and make your magic less than satisfactory. Now, go to your room, and if you see your sister on the way there, ignore her."
Jane sobbed, and pushed her mother away, making her stumble in the short heels she was wearing. Ignoring her shouts, she ran to her room and slammed the door, knowing this was not fair and there was nothing she could do.
The flashback faded as the second champion entered the room, and Jane quickly opened her eyes to see a small, very beautiful girl from Beuxbatons with very old robes and tattered shoes. She couldn't have been more than fourteen. They nodded at each other, and Jane proceeded to curl up on her chair and try to calm herself down. The Beuxbatons champion was leaning against the cold brick wall, looking shellshocked.
Finally, the boy Jane had met putting his name in the Goblet walked in to the room, with an air of supreme confidence. Jane managed to give him a small, weak smile, which he returned.
The three heads of the schools walked in to the room next, led by Professor Aleksandrov, who addressed the champions.
"Congratulations, you three, for being chosen as champions in the Triwizard Tournament. For those who did not hear, this is Jane Haversham Smythe, of Hogwarts, Marcelle Alix of Beuxbatons, and finally, Pyotr Poliakoff of Durmstrang. I trust you know that you can not pull out of the Tournament now that you have been selected as champions, you must compete until the end," All of the champions nodded with varying degrees of nervousness.
"The first task will take place on November the 23rd, and you will be given instruction prior to the event as where to go and when. You will not be aware of what the task consists of, in order to test your quick wits in the face of danger. All three of your Headmasters, and headmistress," he said, acknowledging Madame Maxime. "Will be on the judging panel and will give you a score out of 100 for your performance in each of the tasks.
"As you know, the winner's reward is 1000 galleons and immeasurable bragging rights. You may now all go back to your sleeping quarters, where I am sure your friends and housemates will be waiting to celebrate. Good luck, and goodnight." He said, with an awfully dull learned-by-heart tone.
Jane shakily stood up and left the room with the other champions, her Headmaster bowing his head at her. Pyotr nodded goodnight to her on the way out, and she waved back, trotting exhaustedly back to her carriage. Caroline was waiting for her with a smug sneer on her face, but Jane simply ignored her taunts as she changed and collapsed in to bed, exhausted.