Update: There was just this little reference I made in this chapter to a character I just added a name to in chapter 2, her name is Britanny and I am so sorry if that is your name, seriously I love you guys and I don't want to offend you guys. You can ignore this bold stuff from here: I am so sorry I haven't updated I feel like a despicable human being! And also I am sorry this story is going a bit slow, I PROMISE it shall get better as the story goes on, I just REALLY suck at intros! Anyways, I loves you guyys!-Alex3
The entire school was abuzz. Today was the day the other schools competing in the tournament were due to arrive. It was fairly obvious that no one, not even the teachers, were truly paying attention to the lessons, making the day stretch out. The day seemed especially long to Avery. As excited as she was to see the students from Durmstrang and Salem, she was dreading tonight's supper for many reasons: one, they weren't going to serve chocolate pudding tonight; two, Albus would probably be even more furious at them once they started accepting names for the Tournament; three, after tonight, James would able to put his name in the Goblet. And there was absolutely nothing Avery could do to stop him.
At first, Avery thought of trying to talk Albus into convincing James to not enter, but seeing as she couldn't even talk him out of finding a way to help him enter underage and still wasn't talking to her, she quickly dismissed the idea. Then she even contemplated trying to talk him out of it herself, but couldn't think of any reasons that he would actually listen to. Or at least not any she liked. So it was safe to say she had made absolutely no progress.
Jessica barged into their room and threw a pillow at Avery from her bed. "Come on you inactive sloth, it's tiiiiime! Let's go there are FOREIGNERS coming!" She said excitedly before pulling Avery off the bed.
"Wait, how did you get in the Gryffindor House? How did you even get up the stairs without them caving in?"
"Rose let me up and frankly, Lionheart isn't the hardest password to figure out."
"You damn Ravenclaws."
"Oh please, It's like the Slytherins having Pureblood as thier password. Now come on we're going to miss it!"
Avery groaned, "Fine, let's get this over with."
"Oh come on, there'll be Americans there. Maybe you'll know someone." Jessica said in a sing song voice as she started to drag Avery to the Great Hall.
"Wait, wait, why would I know someone?"
"Well...they're American...and...you're American.." Jessica said shyly
"...So I take it you know the queen?" Avery asked.
"...Point taken."
"Ravenclaw, my arse." Avery scoffed.
"Hey, in my defense-" Jessica's insulted voice died out when she spotted Albus who was walking to the Great Hall with some of his friends. You could literally feel the awkwardness in the air when they both looked at each other. She tried waving, but Albus merely walked on, not even turning around to look back at the pair.
"Okay, so maybe Albus won't get over it in a week." Avery said
"You think?" Jessica said dejectedly.
Avery tried distracting her, "Hey, I'll meet you after dinner okay? We can go practice quidditch!"
"Yessh!," Jessica perked up at the mention of quidditch, "Perhaps we can ask the Gryffindor team captain for some pointers?.." She asked slyly.
Avery glared,"Please shut up."
"Oh, look, it has manners." Jessica said in mock surprise. Avery laughed as she shoved her to her table,"Just go sit down, child.
Avery plopped in between Rose Weasley and Lily,"Thank you for letting that she-devil into the girl's dorms, it's not like anyone was enjoying their peace and quiet." Avery said pointedly at Rose.
"You're lucky I didn't send James."
"And you're lucky I don't get Scorpius to-"
"Students and Staff," Headmaster Longbottom's voice boomed over the Hall," The moment we all have anxiously awaited has come. I would first like to proudly like to present our Brothers from the North, the Sons of Durmstrang." No sooner than he was done speaking did the Doors of the Great Hall burst open.
At first, no one walked through, but them perhaps two dozen or so puddles of fire ignited between the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff tables. The flames grew and grew until they erupted in a sea of warmth and colors. When the fire died down, in each place where there had been an inferno, there now stood an athletic looking young man. They all started simultaneously to stalk to the High Table. A few steps into their march, the teenagers started doing an intricate dance consisting of gymnastics and fighting. Avery looked around to see about 90% of her fellow female population ogling and practically drooling at the students from Bulgaria. She started to roll her eyes, not seeing what al the hype was about, when suddenly the chestnut-haired(and immensely attractive) boy closest to her had come to a quick stop in front of her, coming so close she thought he would run into her.
Instead, he held out a rose to her before winking his green eyes at her and carrying on with his performance. "So that's why everyone is so impressed." Avery thought as she admired the flower, her hair turning green from the awareness of the glares coming to her from all over the hall. While the stem of the flower seemed to be normal, the petals seemed to be made of actual fire, the reds and oranges constantly swirling to make beautiful patterns. Avery looked back, only to see that the guy with green eyes had already made his way to the front where him and some other students were performing an impressive trick. The boys conjured staffs that was alight on both ends which they then started twirling and twisting, the flames dangerously close to the boys' bodies, the rod seeming like an extension of their arms. Suddenly, the boy with the emerald-coloured eyes swallowed the flames from his wand and spewed a stream fire from his mouth which which changed from red and orange to a sapphire blue. After the last of the flames died out, everyone started clapping.
Once the applause died down, Professor Longbottom went back to the podium, "Now that we have welcomed our old friends, I would like to introduce our new friends from across the pond, The Daughters of Salem."
A few seconds of silence passed before the sound of a single set of footsteps could be heard. A majestic, almost ethereal, white tiger with ebony stripes padded into the room. A couple of students started in fear, until the tiger lifted its head, its blue eyes radiating intelligence. It continued to walk to the High Table, with each step, it was slowly morphing into a different form. By the end of the creature's transformation, willowy, fair, young girl in a full length, iridescent blue dress with transparent sleeves stood in the tiger's place, the only thing alike was the girl's white hair and her aqua blue eyes. As she continued her walk to the front table, small, dainty, glass-like flowers formed in her wake. Avery's attention was completely on her until she noticed that the clusters of ice were forming human-like shapes, as the tiger had. As each shape and color in the statues became more distinguishable, Avery could see each was a girl, all around the white-haired girl's age, had slight differences from each other, but were all dressed identically in crystal blue dresses that glimmered every time they moved and extended to their knees, making them slightly less grand as the Tiger Girl. As the girls completed their metamorphosis they bounded off in a graceful assortment of leaps, twists, and spins, making their way into a circle around the Tiger Girl. They all somehow were bending orbs of water, directing it with their hands to form various shapes, even changing it from water to ice and shooting flurries of snowflakes into the air.
Simultaneously, the entire circle of girls shot their water at the Tiger Girl, looking as if they were meaning to attack her. The girl threw her hands up, almost like a shield, and stopped the water in its path, forming a ring around her. The circle of girls started to spin the circle and the blue-eyed girl started to spin with it, her arms still outstretched like a ballerina's, as if she meant to keep up with it, as the ring started to enclose on her. When the water was within inches of her body, the Tiger Girl flung her hands up, her palms facing upward, the water following the direction of her arms while turning into ice. The ice formed a magnificent, snow-white, dragon that continued flying to the sky-like ceiling of the Great Hall, its scales iridescent like the girl's dresses and its body looked made up of icicles. When it reached the top, the beast turned its great head back to face the bewildered students, opened its mouth, and spewed a blast of frost before shattering into tiny pieces of crystal ice, making the Great Hall appear as if it were snowing on the inside
The entire hall was silent as the group of girls walked up and stood next to the Durmstrang students, even the teachers looking at them with wide eyes. The girls continued standing there, shifting uncomfortably under everyone's awed gazes. Avery giggled quietly,"Well, I guess they outdid themselves a bit. Go hard or go home, I guess." She thought to herself. Mercifully, she started clapping, nudging Lily and Rose to clap to. Slowly, everyone started clapping, much to the American students' relief. Professor Longbottom seemed to snap out of his stupor. " Well, welcome, Students of Salem and Durmstrang and thank you for those amazing performances. Please feel free to sit wherever you like, I am sure our students would be more than happy to welcome our guests." At this, the Bulgarians students started to look around hesitantly, however, the American students immediately flocked out to different tables without so much as a blink of an eye. Evidently, these girls weren't shy. Most of the Durmstrang students Ravenclaws and Gryffindors while most of the Salem students sat with the Slytherins. The Tiger Girl,surprisingly, chose to sit at the Hufflepuff Table.
Just as she was beginning to enjoy a mice peaceful meal (despite the lack of chocolate pudding), Avery felt an arm sling around her shoulders, "Move the arm or you lose the arm." She threatened, not even turning around, still managing to sound intimidating even with her mouth full of food.
"Well, that isn't exactly how I imagined that going." A heavily accented voice came from beside her. Avery silently cursed to herself before turning around. "Nice going, Avery. At this rate your hair is going to become permanently pink."
"Oh, uh, H-hi, I thought you were someone else." Avery said to the jade-eyed boy from Durmstrang.
"Oh thank Merlin, I was looking forward to meeting such a pretty girl without cocking it up and I thought I was failing at it already.
Rose interjected,"Well, for the record, I think you are doing a fabulous job. You know, despite her threatening you off the back"
"Why thank you," He said in mock reverence, "I'm Dimitri Aleksandrov. May have the pleasure of knowing the names of such lovely ladies."
"Well, I'm Avery, this is Rose and this is-Hey where is Lily?" Avery looked around for her roommate,"I swear, I'm not crazy, there was just a little ginger right here. " She said when she saw the confused look on his face.
"I think I saw her go over to talk to her brother." Rose said,nodding in James's direction.
Avery turned to look at the Potter siblings. Despite her small frame, Lily had an intimidation factor that would put even her grandmother to shame. And it looked like she was putting it to good use as James and her appeared to be arguing back and forth...for the fifth time today. Avery could tell, even from a distance, due to the stubborn set in Lily's jaw and James's wild hand gestures, this wasn't going to end well. Guess who is going to have to break them up after dinner instead of taking a nice long nap? Seriously, someone was going to get stabbed with Brittany's eyeliner for interfering with her sleep.
"So are either of you going to be entering the Triwizard tournament?" Dimitri asked, drawing their attention back.
Avery laughed,"I'm sorry, did you just ask me if I had a death wish?
"So, I take that as a no?..." Dimitri teased.
"Don't mind her," Rose said,"She just isn't overly fond of 'students being paraded around and put in life threatening events for the viewing pleasure of others' as she puts it. We're not old enough to enter anyway, we're in sixth year. So I take I you are entering?"
"Please," He scoffed,"Going to a foreign school, entering in a contest with a small chance of being chosen, and a possible yearlong endeavor of life threatening tasks? I wouldn't miss this for the world." He said, grinning mischievously," That is the only way we could come to this school, if we were to enter the tournament."
"Well there is one upside to entering yourself in an incredibly atrocious competition, you get to stay an entire year at Hoggywarts. It's pretty hard not to enjoy yourself here."
Professor Lovegood stood up at the podium. "Thank you, students, for this lovely evening of celebration," She said in her dream-like voice,"Sadly, we must end the festivities for tonight. All students may follow their Head boy and Girl to their Common Room. We will start accepting names into the Goblet of Fire tomorrow at midday. Thank you and have a pleasant evening."
"Oh, I guess we better be off." Rose said. They both bid him good night.
"Good night Avery, Rose. And you're right, by the way, I'm already enjoying my time here at Hogwarts." He said shyly before following the rest of the Durmstrang students to their ship outside.