Italics mean Cleo is speaking!

It was Monday. Tomorrow was Tuesday. The first task, it was tomorrow, and Harry was finally starting to panic. He'd been carrying Cleo everywhere, to each lesson, meal and activity, she was always with him, whispering next to him. She was surprisingly sarcastic, constantly making snarky jokes at everyone else's expense, not too harsh, but funny enough to make Harry strain to hold laughter in. She clearly unsettled Ron and Hermione was clearly rather uncomfortable around her but was better at hiding her distaste than Ron. Every time Harry began speaking to her, he saw Ron physically recoil. Harry didn't know whether to be upset about it or not but he decided to suppress those feelings.

Harry was now heading to the Room of Requirement, Cleo, of course, wrapped around his left arm, as he went to meet with Marissa and Draco to do one final run through of the task. As the door formed Harry had barely opened it before hearing shouting from inside.

"Draco you must!" Marissa was clearly exasperated.

"Why must I?" Draco said mocking her, the argument clearly wasn't too serious as there was some playfulness to his tone, but Mary still seemed a little put off.

"Because Draco, Harry is our friend an-"

"Your friend."

"No Draco. I don't care what you say, it might only have been a couple of weeks but you two are friendly around each other. It was all the school could talk about, the great rivals of Gryffindor and Slytherin coming together on the eve of this god-forsaken tournament or whatever ridiculousness they're spouting off now."

There was silence for a moment and then "Alright, fine. We're friends-ish, what does that have to do with Weasley and Granger?"

"They are Harry's best friends and if we want to remain friends with him then you have to apologise to them.

"Why should I apologise to them? Why not the other way?"

"Because you always start everything, Drake. You call Granger a mudblood, you've always started things with Weasley, put your damn pride away for a second and pick up the courage to apologise."
"Did you just tell me to stop being a Slytherin and start being a Gryffindor?" Draco said in mock-offense. There was another silence. "Fine! I'll apologise."

"Good," Marissa said as Harry finally decided to come out from behind the door, noticing that Marissa had hugged Draco, apparently because he'd finally agreed. "Ok, great we're all here now," she said turning to Harry with a smile. Harry wanted to cry. He wasn't sure why he felt so overwhelmed with emotion but it meant a lot to him that she wanted to maintain her friendship with him however she needed to, including putting Draco's ego in it's place. He held back his tears, it was probably just the nerves of the tournament messing with his head, or at least that's what he told himself.

"Yeah, everything alright?" Harry asked. Clearly not, you seem to have interrupted a rather.. intimate moment.. perhaps we should leave them be. Harry's cheeks began to burn red, worried that he had, as Cleo had put, 'interrupted an intimate moment.'

"What did she say?" Marissa said eyebrow arched, clearly expecting an answer.

"Nothing, let's just start," Harry said quickly, hoping to move away from the topic of Marissa and Draco's... relationship.

It was the final dinner before the first task and Harry was finding it surprisingly easy to eat. He was constantly fluctuating between moments of extreme panic and sudden calm about the next day's event, he was sat half listening to Hermione listing off a bunch of protective spells he could use and Cleo giving less useful commentary in the background. He was thinking about the dragon and the next day, but wasn't worrying over it. It was odd, Harry wasn't really sure what he was feeling.

He was brought out of his musings by Hermione suddenly stopping her tirade and most of the Gryffindor table suddenly turning towards him as two Slytherin robed students sat in front of him calm as could be. "We thought we'd come and sit with you now that you've abandoned our table," Draco said with a smirk.

"No, that's not what it is at all, I haven't abandoned anyone," Harry began, worried that he'd offended the snakes by spending so much time with Ron and Hermione, he'd missed having them around.

"We know, Harry," Marissa said with a laugh, "this tournament must be flipping you over if you couldn't tell he was messing. If we were truly angry with you, you wouldn't be walking right now." Harry laughed as the rest of the Gryffindors tried to brush off the new arrivals, aware of Harry's newfound relationship with them.

Hermione however was slightly different. "You are aware that this is the Gryffindor table, correct?"

"No, actually that's incorrect," Marissa shot back.

"Sorry?" Hermione was slightly taken aback, "If you've read Hogwarts: A History, or at the very least been at this school for a week, you'd know that there are different tables."

"Oh no. I am very much aware that there are different tables, but none of them are owned by any one house. See if you'd read more than just Hogwarts: A History, you'd realise there are a ton of other books about the way Hogwarts is built up and the way it works. The tables are only grouped into houses at the Welcome and Leaving feast, besides, where was the problem when Harry came and sat at our table?"

Hermione felt her face grow hot and grow hotter still as Ron came out with a laugh, "Wow Hermione, never thought we'd find one who knew more about Hogwarts than you."

"Yes, well," Hermione trailed off playing with her food and quietening down.

"Well, we did worry for a while about you when you went to sit over with them, mate," Ron said with a smile, "Thought you'd gone all evil on us, sitting with the snakes, carrying around a snake, heck, you can even talk to snakes." Marissa looked slightly offended for a moment, before realising that Ronald had been joking and gave a slight smile at his odd humour. "Well, it isn't like he could bring a lion in now, is it?" She looked pointedly at Ron.

"Say that to Hermione, she brought in Crookshanks, didn't she?" Even Hermione let out a small giggle at that one, and she was so defensive of her little beast she rarely let a slight at Crookshanks go unpunished.

Suddenly Draco put his fork down, clanging it loudly against the table. Harry was confused, in the past four years he'd never seen the boy look so flustered and awkward. "Granger, Weasley," Draco began, turning to the two Gryffindors, "I would like to apologise for the attitudes that I have shown you, it was wrong and kind of stupid and I didn't really mean any of it, I just said what I felt I have to say. And now I'm saying this, because you're both kind of smart and in an odd sort of way I have envied the two of you, especially - "

"Draco, you're babbling," Marissa said with a laugh. When he gets going, he gets going, doesn't he? What had started off as a coherent and script-like apology, had turned into a babbling mess of flattery as Draco seemed to get more and more embarrassed as he spoke.

"Right," Ron said, eyes narrowed, "And what brought this on?" Finally composed, Draco shrugged, "Would you prefer it if I kept insulting you, Weasley?"

"No, you're good, I guess," Ron said, before turning back to his plate. Hermione said nothing, simply staring at Draco for a little while, which he tried to ignore and continue the meal until at least 5 minutes passed and nothing had been said. "If you've got something to say Granger, say it. At the very least, stop the goddamn staring, it's getting odd."

"We'll see." Really? 5 minutes of thought and the best she could come up with is "We'll see."?

"We'll see what?" Draco turned to her.

"Whether you mean it, then I'll decide whether or not you are 'good' as Ron so eloquently put it."

"I did put it eloquently, didn't I?" Ron said, earning a laugh from both Harry and Marissa.

The next chapter will finally be the first task! As always, thank you for reading ~ Please remember to favourite, follow and review !