Chapter Four: Walking and Talking

"It'll be you," Melinda said, her voice full of a confidence Eric couldn't quite comprehend. "If Hufflepuff had one last time, then it'll be you this time. Ellie and I are just coming along for moral support." They were just far enough away from the main school that neither of them were worried about eavesdroppers or propriety, at least for the moment, and that was exactly the way they both liked it. These evening walks, sometimes with his sister and sometimes without, had been a routine since third year.

Looking down at her and trying hard to keep away from thoughts of how soft her hair looked, Eric McGonagall mustered a grin. "Not in this lifetime," he assured her. "Personally, I'm voting for – " Melinda began to smirk as she tried to hold back a smile, clearly thinking she knew whose name he was going to say, and he decided to take her down a peg. "Elspeth," he finished smoothly, as if his sister's name was the one he had meant to say all along. "She's the eldest grandchild of the Hogwarts Head, she's brilliant, she's got everything we don't…"

"Such as?" She didn't look amused now – Eric suspected it was genuine – but she'd laugh when he sprang the joke.

"A sense of humor, for starters," he said, keeping his tone as normal as possible to throw her even further. "And morals. And dignity. And – "

"Oh, shut up," she said, a quick smile to show that she wasn't really annoyed flashing across her face. Eric cleared his throat awkwardly, trying to ignore his reaction to the smile. Melinda didn't give any indication that she'd noticed the reaction or the throat-clearing, but she could make herself hard to read, when she wanted to. "It probably won't be any of us, in all seriousness, though," she continued, sounding resigned to the idea. "Someone would try to say McGonagall tricked the Goblet if it was one of you, and I doubt I've any spectacular character traits to my name."

"You don't need any," Eric said dryly. "You flutter your eyelashes, and people give you whatever you want."

"I," Melinda said primly, "am going to pretend that you just gave me a compliment."

Please Merlin she doesn't realize I really did… "Keep telling yourself that," he suggested, and was rewarded with a rare laugh. He liked to listen to Melinda laughing. She didn't do it often, and rarely in front of anyone but him or Ellie or that other Slytherin girl, but when she did…chimes, maybe. Something musical. Even if she hadn't been Melinda, it would have been a pleasant laugh to listen to.

Of course, if she hadn't been Melinda, best friend of his best friend, he would have regarded her as another Slytherin snot and avoided her like she carried the plague. Grandmother's horror at the discovery aside, Elspeth's Sorting was one of the better things ever to happen to either of them. Not that he could ever aspire to Melinda's level, to being anything other than her roommate's brother and her yearmate and maybe even her friend, but he had this. Whatever this was.

"D'you think they'll carry on with some kind of classes while we're in France?" They were back on the Tournament. Eric suppressed a flash of irritation. It was all anyone thought about, really, even in Ravenclaw. He couldn't see the reason for the obsession, but then, the only reason he was tagging along was because of Ellie and Melinda and the thought of his grandmother's reaction if the heir of the McGonagall family and only of-age grandson she had stayed at Hogwarts while his yearmates went to France. Especially Ellie, the family Slytherin and so the family member most in need of watching.

Sometimes, being a twin seemed like more of a curse than a blessing.

"No doubt," he said, a good deal more cheerfully than he suspected most of the would-be Champions would have done. "Grandmother wasn't happy this summer whenever people mentioned the Tournament. Thought it was too dangerous and too detrimental to our educations. You know," he arranged his face into thin, straight lines in the best imitation of his father's mother he could pull off and tried to mimic her voice. "'Parents send their children to my school to learn, for Merlin's sake, not to get killed at sport! A Quidditch match is all well and good, but shipping them to France for a year…'"

"Sounds like McGonagall," Melinda commented dryly. "So what, then? Is she going to teach us herself in the Hogwarts Express?"

"Dunno. She never said, but I can't see her letting us off easy. I doubt it'll be the train we take, though. I heard Durmstrang used a ship to get here, last time…maybe we'll take a few of those boats Hagrid uses to get the first years across the lake the first time…"

"No!" Melinda said, looking intrigued by the idea. "We'd drown!"

"There are ways around that, you know," he said, trying to remember what that article he'd read had had to say on the matter. "The Bubble-Head Charm wouldn't last us that long, but there are – "

"Other things that don't matter," Melinda interrupted smoothly, clearly disinterested in hearing about various techniques of underwater survival. "Though I'm sure there's a charm to get around every inconvenience of living in those dratted boats, and I'm sure that you've read about it, it seems like too much trouble to go to. I'm sure McGonagall will find another way to get us from point A to point B."

"Probably," he agreed, still reluctant to give up his spiel about charms and transfiguration. He decided to change the topic away from the blasted tournament. "How do you think you did on last week's Potions test? I was all right on the first few steps, but I think I might have added a touch too much asphodel, to tell you the truth, and then there was – " he broke off as Melinda started laughing again. "What?"

"Eric, darling, I adore you," she said, and his stomach lurched uncomfortably. "You're too smart for your own good."

"Hasn't done me any harm yet," he shot back, then gave their rapidly lengthening shadows a dark look. "It's almost sunset," he pointed out, resigned. "We'd better head back to the castle. I wouldn't want people saying I'd compromised your reputation."

Melinda gave him an odd little smile. "No, we wouldn't," she agreed. "Because if I survived my great-grandfather's reaction, you'd have to marry me."

"Maybe compromising your reputation isn't such a bad idea after all," he "joked".

"Oh, shut up."