Chapter 6

The Champions

I woke up the next morning still feeling hopeful about Draco. Smiling to myself, I got dressed and headed down to the Great Hall for breakfast. Pansy had already reached the Slytherin table; she was sitting next to Draco talking animatedly.

"I can't believe that he actually entered! I hope we have a Slytherin champion." Pansy said excitedly as I approached the table.

"Who entered?" I asked as I sat down next to Pansy. I gave Draco a glance, but he was looking down at his plate.

"Cassius Warrington! I really hope he gets it!" She gushed.

"Huh, well that's nice we had at least one person from Slytherin enter." I said dismissively. I started to scoop eggs and bacon onto my plate while trying to catch Draco's eye. It seemed like he was completely ignoring me. Again. After failing to get his attention all through breakfast my heart sank. I was disappointed because I seriously thought that after last night maybe the two of us could work things out. I suppose Draco must not be ready for that yet.

Later that evening, just before the Halloween Feast, Harry Hermione Ron and I got together in the library to do some studying. We sat at a table towards the end of the library, by the restricted section, and our homework was scattered all over the place.

"Hermione could you read over my Potions essay?" Harry asked quietly. Hermione gave him a curt nod and took his parchment from him.

"Finally finished?" I asked. I had finished my Potions essay nearly an hour ago. I was currently working on my Defense Against the Dark Arts essay. Professor Moody wanted us to right sixteen inches on how it felt to be under the Imperius Curse. He had been performing the curse on the class for the last few weeks. He kept telling us we weren't trying hard enough to ward off the curse. He always said, "constant vigilance!" and frankly it was starting to get on my nerves.

"I can't believe we have so much homework! Why can't the teachers ever be easy on us?" Ron sulked as he continued writing his essay.

"How can we learn if we don't study or work on classes outside of the actual classroom?" Hermione said as she crossed a few sentences out of Harry's essay.

"Why don't we take a break?" I said sighing. "We could go out to the grounds and take a walk." I suggested.

"I've got too much work to do." Harry said with an apologetic smile. "Ron you should stay and keep working too."

"Hermione?" I asked giving her my best puppy dog eyes.

"Oh, alright. I suppose I could take a break." She said softly as she reluctantly tore her eyes away from the parchments in front of her.

Grinning I took her by the arm and dragged her out of the library before she could change her mind. We walked down the stairs to the Entrance Hall talking about our classes. By the time we made it out to the grounds we had little left to discuss about classes and I really wanted to talk about what happened the night before with Draco.

"Can I confide something to you?" I asked nervously.

"Sure," Hermione replied giving me a curious look.

"You have to promise to not tell Harry. I know he'd be upset if he knew what I'm about to tell you."

"Ok, I promise to not tell Harry whatever you are about to tell me."

"Thank you." I replied before telling her what happened last night.

After I finished giving Hermione as many details as I could we walked in silence for a minute.

"Do you really want to be friends with him again?" She asked softly.

"I miss him." I said with a sigh. "I know you guys don't really like Draco."

"No, none of us do."

"But he was my first friend at Hogwarts. We had a really good relationship, and I ruined it."

"You didn't ruin anything. He did. It is completely his fault for not wanting to be friends with you."

"If I had just told him what I was doing, where I was going to be, maybe things would be different." I gave Hermione a side glance and saw that her mouth was frowning. "What's wrong?"

"I just wish you didn't like him so much. Harry, Ron and I have been trying so hard to make you happy. We want you to realize you don't need those kinds of friends."

"What kind? The kind that tried really hard to make sure I was safe? The kind that didn't care that I spent time with Gryffindors even though our houses have a rivalry?" I asked my temper rising.

"That's not what I—" Hermione started to say but I had stalked off towards the front doors before she could finish her sentence.

I was fuming. I couldn't believe that she didn't understand where I was coming from. I wanted to be friends with Draco again because he accepted me for the way I am. He didn't try to tell me to hold my temper in but to rather find a way to release my anger any way I wanted. He understood me. Harry, Hermione, and Ron had always told me to stop acting like a jerk or to calm down.

When I reached to Great Hall I headed towards Pansy, who was sitting next to Draco like always, and sat down moodily. Even though Pansy tried to talk to me I couldn't bring myself to talk back. All I could do is stare down at the table, eyebrows furrowed, and sit in silence. A few minutes into Dumbledore's Halloween speech I could feel the eyes of Pansy, Zabini, and even Draco on me. Not wanting to talk to anyone I just continued looking at the table, my face flushing a deep red. This was the most attention I had gotten from my fellow Slytherin's since the start of the year.

When the food was finally ready, I ate as fast as I could. I downed my chicken and mashed potatoes in a mere five minutes. Before dessert was served I got up and left the table. Pansy had started to ask where I was going, but I didn't stop to hear her finish her question.

I wanted some alone time, so I went back to the Slytherin common room. It was completely empty, a small fire in the fireplace. Sighing with relief I sat down and closed my eyes. Soon I drifted off into a deep sleep.

"RON!" Harry screamed as a large black dog dragged Ron into the Whomping Willow. The invisibility cloak fell of Harry, Hermione and me as my brother dashed towards the place Ron disappeared.

"Harry! Stop!" I screamed running after him. We had absolutely no idea how to get passed the Whomping Willow, and I didn't want him to get hurt. Out of nowhere Crookshanks darted out, gave us a meaningful look, and pushed a knot on the trunk of the tree. Almost immediately the tree stopped trying to smash us into little pieces.

The three of us, and Crookshanks, slid into a hole and found ourselves in a dark tunnel. Crookshanks led the way and we followed him. After what seemed like forever, we reached the end of the tunnel and Hermione gasped.

"We are in the Shrieking Shack." She whispered to me.

Cautiously I pushed the door Crookshanks was standing by and walked into the room. There we found Ron holding his hurt leg on the bed. Behind us was nonother than Sirius Black.

I woke with a start, sitting upright in the chair I had dozed off in. Someone had gently nudged my shoulder while I had been dreaming about part of last year. Looking around I found myself face to face with Draco Malfoy.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to startle you." He said quietly. He was clearly avoiding making eye contact with me. His face looked a little flushed and his hands couldn't seem to sit still.

"Malfoy." I said with a touch of annoyance in my voice. "What do you want?"

"I just—" his voice trailed off like it did the night before.

"You just what?"

"I just want to talk." He finally got out, still not looking at my face.

"Oh? But you didn't seem to want to talk to me for the last two years." My voice started rising.

"I'm sorry…" He said as he looked passed me.

"If you are sorry about the last two years the least you could do is look at me." I snapped at him. A few seconds later his stormy grey eyes locked eye contact with me. His eyes looked sad, waves of different emotions churned in his grey eyes as I looked into them.

"Why now?" I whispered to him.

"I just have a feeling that we are going to need each other." He said as he reached to grab my head. Unsure what to do I pulled away from him.

"I want to go back to being friends, I really do. But I can't just forgive you for the last two years."

"I understand. But know this, I am going to try extremely hard to win back your friendship and trust." His voice sounded determined. It was almost like he knew that something bad was going to happen this year and he wanted to… protect me?

I gave him an uncertain look, I wanted so badly to be best friends again, to feel accepted for the way I am. I thought back to the conversation I had with Hermione earlier that day, defending Draco. Why can't I just forgive him? He even came to talk to me! Maybe I couldn't forgive him because I don't know exactly why he wants to make up.

"I need to know why you waited two years. I think it is more than a feeling." I said looking deeply into his eyes.

"I—" he started to say before dropping his gaze. "I don't know what you want me to say." He finally whispered to me.

"So there is another reason?"

"Chloe," Draco sighed, "I want to be friends again. Please can we just work on that?" His voice sounded desperate.

"Promise me you will tell me why. Even if you can't tell me now."

"Fine. I promise." Draco gave me a small smile before standing up. "Chloe there is one more thing you need to know."

"What's that?"

"You know the champions were picked right? You missed it when you left."

"Oh, your right! Who is our champion?" I had completely forgotten that the Goblet of Fire was supposed to choose the three champions.

"Cedric Diggory—"

"Seriously?" I exclaimed.

"And Harry Potter." Draco added softly. I was speechless for the next few moments.

"What? You're lying to me." I scoffed. There was no way that was true, it was impossible. Just then the rest of the Slytherins entered the common room, buzzing with outrage.

"I can't believe it!"

"Who would allow such a thing to happen?!"

"Dumbledore is an idiot to allow him to compete!"

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. My brother somehow was entered in the Triwizard Tournament while I sulked in my common room. Why did everything have to happen to Harry and me? Well, mostly Harry. I was the twin that didn't seem to matter as much. However, the last two years we went through almost everything together. The Chamber of Secrets, saving Sirius Black, fighting off demetors, even our first year we saved the sorcerer's stone from Voldemort.

"Chole if there is anything I can do, let me know." Draco said quietly.

"Yeah, ok."

"Goodnight Chloe."

"Night Draco." I replied softly. I watched him stride over to the entrance of the boy's dormitories. My heart felt warm and confused. I wanted things between Draco and I to work out but finding out Harry was in the Triwizard Tournament made this situation very different. I needed to know the reason Draco approached me, and I knew that it wasn't just a feeling. Part of me was thinking he wanted to be friends again because Harry was thrown into a deadly competition with three other, more skilled, champions.

AN: Thanks for reading! Please leave me a review, constructive criticism is always welcomed! Stay tuned to find out how Chloe struggles through her forth year helping her twin brother and trying to fix things with her love interest! Even if she doesn't know Draco is her love interest yet. ; )