"Not to worry Minerva, both guest schools assured me they would have no need for any accommodation at our school" - Dumbledore's eyes twinkled as he addresses his deputy's final concerns regarding guests arrival - "They would bring their own… we are after all magical schools, not muggle ones"

Mcgonagall went over her mental list, still worried she missed something, as if realisation struck her, she glanced back at Albus - "How about the food? What if British cuisine does not suit their tastes?"

Headmaster rubbed his glabella, he was already getting a headache from this back and forth - and he could not even complain… He knew the transfiguration professor just wanted what's best for the school. Still it was about time to end this staff meeting.

"Not to worry, a couple of house elves from their schools have already arrived and are currently teaching some recipes to our elves" - he smiled - "They are more than happy for increased workload, and as the ministry is shouldering the extra food costs… We can stop worrying and in fact even look forward to tasting other cuisines ourselves!" - He glanced at the clock and many eyes followed his gaze - realising the guests arrival was fast approaching - in fact Dumbledore himself just felt them pass through the outermost wards of Hogwarts - "Now you should better make sure all students are presentable for the welcome - we do not want some mischievous students making any pranks for our guests are we? " - headmaster glancing at every head of the house, yet lingering longer on his deputy - Gryffindors always were the most troublesome house - "Meeting dismissed"

All the staff hurried back, Minerva taking the lead.

Severus was the last to leave as he caught that gaze from the headmaster during their meeting, surely he would be asked to stay back. And as expected, just as he reached the doorway Albus' voice called him back.

"Severus, stay back for a minute, we have other matters to discuss"

Grumbling, the potions master turned around, his cape doing a dramatic wave - it was in fact charmed to look cool, he just never admitted that in public, never sharing his invented spell with anyone.

"What do you wish to speak about, headmaster?"

Albus glasses twinkled as he interlocked his fingers and gazed at the greasy haired professor.

"Did you observe any… changes to the boy?"

"He seems to spend… a lot of time studying - his grades have risen near the top in most subjects, the potions he makes are actually decent now" - professor silently let out a murmur under his nose, as if cursing - "I actually had to give Outstanding for his last assignment… I sadly could not find any mistakes to bring the grade down. Other than that… his behaviour is annoying as usual"

Dumbledore hummed - it was in line with his own observation - the boy did not display any of dark lord's habits - well apart from studying more and making friends - yet while the dark lord's friends were more like followers, he could tell Potter was making actual friends.

"Perhaps he's just taking studies seriously… He is after all the son of Lily '' - Dumbledore caught a flash of guilt and pain pass in Severus' eyes, before quickly hiding away under occlumency shields - "It is not much different from what I glimpsed during my time at great hall… It's good that he's not spending time with Malfoy, yet that Slytherin girl… Her family is in a grey area, they never picked a side during the war, stayed neutral. In fact they did the same during the previous war as well" - Albus let out a tired sigh - "How is the potion going?"

Snape calmly gazed back at the headmaster - "It is almost ready, Sir. I just need a string of Nundu's hearth, so far I was unfortunately not able to produce one… My connections do have a Nundu, yet they just keep it for selling its hair - a renewable source of immense profit is way more profitable than killing it off for its heart… As only truly skilled potion masters can even use the thing.`

Albus seemed to ponder for a moment, then reassured his subordinate - "Not to worry, I think I have a few hearts left in my personal vault - you know I am still called from time to time to deal with all those dangerous beasts from time to time, I will bring it to you tonight"

Snape's eyes flashed with greed - a whole Nundu's heart! Those things were very rare. The potions he could make of it…

"Thank you, headmaster."

Albus just nodded as Snape walked out of his office, his cape dramatically flashing just behind as the doors closed.

Fleur Delacour was sitting in the room assigned to her at the carriage, gazing out of the window - she had to admit, Hogwarts castle looked beautiful. Soon she heard Headmistress Madame Maxime calling all the students to assemble and she stepped out of her room, then walked to group up with the others. On her way she wondered, would she finally be able to make some friends her age this time around?

The probability was quite slim as her Veela lineage was always getting in the way of that… Most males were just like beasts in heat in her presence - they would not see her as Fleur, but just a beautiful Veela, they couldn't even hold a proper conversation with her! While females were just very jealous of her - seeing their crushes, their boyfriends in daze of the girl just rubbed it in the wrong way - hence she was quite lonely.

It was not like Fleur had no friends whatsoever - her family, some wizards and witches of older age who had proper occlumency shields that kept her allure away. Still she yearned for some friends more her age.

She could hear a loud splash just behind her, quickly turning around she saw a grand ship emerge from the lake - Drumstang she assumed, and soon a bunch of students emerged from inside. Their eyes wandered, yet the boy's eyes seemingly got glued to her and not the castle. She let out a sigh, perhaps making friends is just not meant to happen for her… Before long she started feeling jealous gazes on her increasing as well - female students from Drumstang wondered what their classmates were gazing at and noticed her as well…

Inspecting the other students she noticed one of them was not gazing at her, initially she thought he missed her, yet then he glanced her way, then just a moment later, back to the castle, seemingly not getting caught up in allure. Hope rekindled in her heart.

Madame Maxime was done parking the carriage so her school too was starting to march for the school.

Soon their group walked into the great hall, yet there she was once again met with a familiar sight - all men 's eyes were on her. She even saw one red-head boy almost starting to dash towards her, yet just as she was about to grab her wand for self-defence, another boy, a black haired one, stopped his friend with his arm. He met her gaze shrugging his shoulders - as if apologising for his friends behaviour. Then just casually glanced away. As if she was not of Veela lineage. As if allure did not affect him at all!.

Fleur smiled as she was seated on a table with blue decorations and a raven logo - the one most matching her school uniform.

It seems she can potentially make some friends in here.

It was one of the rare occasions, like the opening feast, that all Gryfindors were at their own table and no other house shared theirs. A lot of students had friends elsewhere and joined their tables occasionally. Harry was someone who changed tables quite often, he even befriended Hannah Abbot and joined Hufflepuffs table a few times too!

Now he was calmly eating a lot of the foreign dishes - as if he knew beforehand which ones he would like. His fellow Gryffindors were less daring, yet on Harry recommending one or other dish they just had to try it out.

Harry had an amused grin on his face as he listened to Ron speak with his full mouth on how Krum greeted him. He exchanged nods with Victor soon after he entered the hall, and that moment just happened to be when Ron was shouting Krum's surname and looking in fascination towards him… while standing just in front of Harry. Harry never bothered to clean up this misunderstanding - he thought it was amusing and wondered what would Victor say to his friend when they met?.

Daphne was eating while occasionally glancing towards her crush. Recently she unknowingly began picking seats in such a way that she could see the boy by just lifting her head, that if she sat at Slytherin table. Often she just followed him along to whatever table Harry chose for the day, unfortunately she was not able to do so today… Damned school regulations.

She was worried seeing so many of her male classmates just get glued to one particular French girl. Even when she felt something clash against her occlumency shields when looking at her, even Malfoy's defences were seemingly broken… So she was worried that Harry would fall too - she knew he had very good occlumency skills, yet Malfoy being a heir should have similar skills to her in this area and he failed to resist… Perhaps it hit harder on the boys? Or Draco was just that… talentless in this area?

Her worries intensified as she saw that french girl walking over to her Harry of all people! Amid her murderous stare she saw more of those french students walking to various other tables, soon one of them reached theirs.

"Excuse me, do you have any bouillabaisse left? It's very well made so we cleaned our table out of it…"

Slytherins were wary of foreign foods - mostly afraid of upsetting their stomachs and losing their image - image was very important in the house of snakes.

Upon receiving permission, the french student quickly picked up a couple of plates of said dish and went back to his table. Daphne watched from afar to see that girl finally leaving Harry's side as she breathed out a sigh of relief she herself did not know she held in. So she just wanted a dish…

Suddenly she heard suppressed chuckles breaking through into a full laughter, looking to her side to her side she saw Tracey with a grin on her face.

In horror she asked - "How long have you been watching me?" - she knew her expressions earlier might have slipped through her occlumency poker face she usually maintained.

Tracey took a moment to regain her composure and stop her laughter, before meeting her bestie's eyes with a smirk on her face- "All of it! I wanted to ask if you tried any bouillabaisse as it was really delicious, but seeing you in such deep concentration… I just couldn't break it could I?"

Daphne felt her cheeks heating up from embarrassment - Tracey was definitely going to bring this up for days now!

The feast recently ended and students were busy walking around - perhaps wanting to catch a conversation with some of the guests. Unfortunately for them Karkaroff and Maxime announced they were tired from the journey and ushered their students back to the carriage and to the ship for some rest. Just from their looks it was easy to tell that while headmasters were indeed tired, students did not look quite as worn out - perhaps it was exhaustion from operating the magical artefacts to reach this place?

To not disturb other students' rest - just for today - the castle doors were closed and students forbidden from going outside - it was in fact quite late so no one hardly complained. Soon everyone just walked back to their dorms. What followed was exciting chats about the tournament and the foreign guests. Harry and Ron also had a quite long match of chess - Harry was seemingly coming up with better strategies every round, yet Ron still managed to squeeze out a victory in the end. Not long after most of the students were asleep, and Harry as usual was donning his cape of invisibility while walking up towards the seventh floor.

Soon he reached the famous troll's dancing decoration and habitually walked three times around it, while thinking of the room he used last time - the magical room was smart enough to understand such short descriptions. The boy stopped in confusion as he realised he was already walking forth time - yet the door still did not appear.

He leaned against the wall, still hidden in the cloak as he took out Marauder's map to check his actual position - it was not beyond Weasley twins to make the sixth floor look the same as the seventh one. In a castle of moving staircases it was usually hard to tell what floor you were on - students mostly relied on common landmarks, like the portraits titles to move around - portraits themselves were not as useful as their inhabitants moved around all the time.

Glancing at the map he saw the seventh floor being empty, with a lonely Harry Potter dot in there. The boy was very confused, just as he was about to put the map away he saw another dot appear just where the room's door was supposed to appear - his heartbeat sped up in panic as he read the name - Albus Dumbledore!

Harry calmed down - he did cast a noise suppression spell before climbing here - his invisibility cloak was also great at hiding things - way superior than the cloaks he saw being sold in various magical stores. Still, he refrained from moving, the boy just remained leaning on the wall, yet his gaze moved to the side - he managed to see the Room of Requirements door outline disappearing and one famous headmaster hummed as he walked past him… Just arms reach away. The old man was carrying a wooden chest encrusted with jewels under his arm.

A minute had passed and one glance later Harry confirmed that the headmaster was already on the fifth floor. Only then he let out a deep sigh of relief, before going towards the room.

He was blaming his own carelessness - if elves used the room, surely the headmaster was aware of it as well! - He would have to check beforehand to see if the headmaster was somewhere in school before entering the room of requirements… And perhaps do the walk while wearing the cloak and further apart from the wall… just in case some elf or a student would suddenly leave.

Curious, the boy changed his thinking to ''the room the headmaster was in' - he assumed it would work, yet the door did not appear.

Somewhat disappointed, he thought of 'room he used last time' and as familiar outline materialised on the wall he entered.

Albus Dumbledore was walking down towards the great hall - tonight he had to set up the Goblet of Fire and the age ward around it. He was just back from his personal vault - whole Nundus heart secure in his pocket.

Initially he felt as if he passed by someone on the seventh floor, yet expanding his magic sense he did not feel a thing - perhaps his old age was getting him more paranoid? It must be he mused - he always gets a bit nervous about onlookers when entering his vault. That one time he nearly butchered Ms Norris when she happened to pass by…

He chuckled at the use of Room of Requirements he discovered. Simply thinking of a room which can only be accessed by one who knew a password was a brilliant idea. Initially he thought of simply making it accessible to only Albus Dumbledore, yet some testing with polyjuice made him realise that with just a strand of hair someone could become him - at least in body, and access the room. While a password was more secure - who would ever think about a combination of letters and numbers even if they knew about the room?

His vault in Gringotts was just for convenience sake, for ease of access - like daily prophet subscription fees. His real treasures - various magical beast parts, rare herbs, other alchemy ingredients, his personal library of rare books, even a dozen or so artefacts were secure in his 'vault' in the room of requirements.

Albus mused, he was getting artefacts out more often lately - just a few years ago he had to take out Mirror of Erisid to hide the Philosopher's stone…. Now the mirror is back inside, same for the remaining dust of Philosopher stone - he did not understand how exactly his mentor made it as not even Fiendfyre could swallow the remaining dust - at least the stone no longer worked after he crushed it to pieces.

He opened the wooden chest he was carrying and pulled out the other artefact he took out today - Goblet of Fire - on the floor. Just for the simple reason that it was Britain's turn to hold the tournament, it was put in Hogwarts safekeeping - hence that's why he placed it in his vault - there was hardly a more secure place in school.

Soon the age line was drawn and he let out a yawn, before walking towards the dungeons - he would pass the Nundu's heart to Severus before going back to sleep.

Harry was busy inside the room, reading a book titled 'Warding for dummies'. The boy was not fond of the name, yet he could not find any other beginner friendly books on warding in the school. The ward he was looking for was a simple surveillance ward - one that would trigger when any movement happened.

He knew wards could easily be detected - especially for ancient monsters like headmaster Dumbledore, hence he had an idea of applying it on Marauders map - on the small circle where the goblet of fire's age wand was placed.

In fact he already applied the ward yesterday, now he was simply reading over the section, looking for any mistakes, as he just felt he overlooked something.

Suddenly he could feel his pocket heating up - unfolding it he saw the words *Albus Dumbledore 0:17am* appearing at the top. He glanced at Marauder's Map and surely, the headmaster just entered the circle - perhaps at the moment he was drawing the age ward or setting up the goblet..

The parchment heat up again as words *Albus Dumbledore 0:18am* appeared on top of the previous line - seven and eight overlapping.

Harry facepalmed - his intuition was correct, he did make a mistake somewhere. He picked the book back up - hopefully he could fix the overlapping words tonight, before others go to throw their names… Before someone threw his name inside. He knew someone in school was Voldemort's minion, yet he did not know who - with this he could at least narrow down the list of suspects.

Another day arrived, and students started mixing up - even some of the foreign guests wandered to other tables to strike up a conversation.

Harry was sitting at Gryffindors table, on his right sat Victor Krum, then a fascinated Ron just after him, followed by Hermione and Sue who both also keenly listened to Krum's school stories with fascination. On Harry's left sat Daphne, followed by Tracey.

Victor was just about done eating as he turned to Potter - "Harry, how about a duel? I have been curious about your skills ever since we teamed up during the riot"

Harry smiled as he responded - "Sure, that sounds exciting!"

"Harry, but casting spells outside of classrooms and dorms is against school rules!" - Hermione was always there to remind of school regulations as needed - even though she herself broke dozens of them each year.

Harry meanwhile just rolled his eyes - "I am sure we can find an empty classroom somewhere"

"Actually the ship of my school has a few duelling arena's inside, why won't we head there?"

There seemed to be no better way to spend the day as it was a day off without classes - to get along and befriend the foreign guests. The group was about to head off to Drumstangs ship as a melodious voice with a bit of a french accent interrupted them.

"Duelling practice? Can I join?"

They all turned around to see Fleur Delacour shyly trying to join their duelling outing - her father was a famous duelist in France and he taught her well so Fleur herself was quite a duellist. She was lurking nearby, wondering how to approach Victor and Harry - she was determined to try befriending at least one of them.

"Of course!" - Ron was the first to puff up his chest and let her join the group. The rest rolled their eyes at red-heads behaviour, clearly the allure was affecting him a lot.

Soon the details were worked out - Harry, Victor, Fleur and Sue would have a series of duels in Drumstangs ship - the rest simply followed as spectators. Both Harry and Sue were just fourth years - they knew their chances of winning were basically non-existent, yet they were excited, simply to experience foreign magics and see what they had to look forward to in the future.

Fleur tagged along in fascination - as a part-Veela she could feel emotions of nearby creatures. The red head boy was clearly head over heels deep in her allure, yet others were different - Sue was simply excited for the duel, Hermione was a bit upset - especially when glancing at Ron, but otherwise simply curious.

Harry and Victor were a mystery - she simply did not know what they felt - she assumed they were either naturally gifted in the mind arts or they practised them a lot to even block this natural Veela ability.

Daphne was clearly jealous of her - not of her beauty - she was clearly one outstanding girl herself, perhaps for the red-headed boy falling for her? No, she never glances his way… Ahh, perhaps it's Harry?

Tracey walking by her side was even more complicated to understand - she was seemingly… amused? While occasionally glancing at her friend?

Fleur pushed her thoughts aside as they finally arrived. She had to admit, the ship was as impressive as the magical Britain school - the inside was a lot bigger, Krum led them along various corridors until finally he found one quite spacious and empty room that looked like a duel arena.

All across the floor, ceiling and walls there were magical inscriptions Ms Delacour recognised on sight - in fact there were a few rooms like that in her school back in France, even one such room in her own house, where her father trained her occasionally.

It was quite an interesting array of runes - which prevented fatal and even severe wands from appearing - the magic of the receiver and the room itself taking the toll instead, which meant you would get very exhausted after a loss, but not otherwise harmed - perhaps a few non-shallow skin wounds or broken eardrums at most - nothing a few spells couldn't fix in a minute.

After a simple coin toss it was determined that Sue and Fleur would go first. Sue excitedly walked towards the arena and bowed to her opponent. She knew her chances of winning were very slim - perhaps non existent even, still she wanted to know what levels she needed to reach to approach the world duelling championships - being an avid duelling fan she knew Fleur almost won the tournament just last year.

Another knut toss and both girls focused on the falling coin. Soon they both started running in circles while various spells were swooshing all over the place.

Fleur had to admit, Sue was very good for her age - almost as good as she was in her fourth year - which was quite an achievement - after all the world duelling champion tutored her at home. Upon more thought she realised that one of the world duelling champions - Filius Filtwick was a professor here at Hogwarts and head of Sue's house to boot, perhaps he taught the girl a thing or two as well?

Fleur smiled as she upped her speed - holding back less, she was still limiting herself to fourth years spells - at least what was covered at her school, yet her speed increased tremendously - not long after Sue was hit by a stunner and collapsed on the floor.

As Fleur undid her stunner the girls chatted about the duelling - it was mostly Sue asking how she learned and if Britain had even been to world championship finals in recent years. The girls seemingly got along surprisingly well, Fleur was happy as it seemed that she finally made a friend. She hoped Sue's partner - or future partner if she was still single - would resist her allure somewhat, or at least Sue would stay understanding and not break their friendship over jealousy - it had happened quite a few times in the past for the french girl.

Soon all conversation paused as everyone in the room focused on the pair of black haired boys in the centre of the arena. The atmosphere somehow got a bit tense and as soon as the knut touched the ground their bodies moved with immense speed - wand waving so fast sometimes only a flicker could be seen.

Fleur's pupil unknowingly stretched vertically - another Veela instinct which allowed her to see the fight better - no longer were there any blurs. She had to admit both of them were good - she even wondered why she never saw Victor in an international duelling championship? Then she remembered that no one actually knew which country Durmstang was in.

Being seekers they both had a build for speed, various beams flew around, initially only red coloured ones - stunners, yet soon Victor started weaving other spells, a bit of dark magic ones in fact.

Drumstang never participated in world duelling tournament - their 'duelling' was more suited to be called 'fighting' - it clearly broke a ton of rules - the only rule they had was a ban on Avada Kedavra - other spells were deemed 'safe' as they did not kill in an instant. Not being tied to a specific country allowed Drumstang to stay in the grey area regarding rules and regulations.

Hermione's face paled as she saw various dark green coloured blobs miss and hit the floor… and the floor slowly melting with smoke rising out - as if it was hit by some highly acidic substance. She was glad that spectators were under a sort of ward - there was seemingly a layer of 'glass' between them and the duel which solidified as soon as the duel began. To her amazement Harry was perfectly dodging every spell, and he too somehow returned back the same dark green shots, forcing Krum to dodge - clearly that particular spell was quite effective at taking down the shields.

"I see you put that book to good use, Harry" - Victor grinned - he was happy to find a fresh partner for duelling practice - he had to admit, Potter was great, perhaps even better than him… at dodging that is, his magical spell power was somewhat lacking - the boy clearly had clever uses of spells - that he could tell of various floor boards being transfigured to life and trying to trip him as he dodged various double shots of dark magic with an occasional stunner mixed in.

Victor decided to exploit the boy's lack of fire-power - he stopped shooting his own spells, just dodging and soon a complicated shield rose in the air around him, a solid one, as if made from rocks.

Harry tried his best to bring it down, yet no spell he knew left more than a dent in it - he knew he would get through the thing with time…. Yet he knew Victor was probably up to something inside.

The boy switched to slower, yet more powerful spells - bone crushers - they worked somewhat better, yet before the dome fell apart it disappeared in dark green particles - he knew that whatever Victor was preparing… would come his way soon.

Various floorboards rose in a circle to shield the boy as he cast a few layers of shields - all varieties he knew so far.

Victor's wand rose high in the air as a single dark green blob shot out - it grew in a horizontal line as if a slash by a sword - Harry furrowed his brows - he recognised it as a severing curse, yet how come it was… so enormous?

Daphne felt colour drain from her face as she saw that humongous spell heading towards Harry, yet she soon regained her composure - the wards around the arena were quite standart and used worl-wide. As a pureblood heir she knew how they worked and understood Harry was not in mortal danger… yet still it was hard to keep her heart from beating faster.

Harry could only watch in frustration as all the shields protecting him fell apart one after the other. He could not even resort to dodging - the curse seemingly grew in size, now stretching to arena ends - there was nowhere to dodge!

Harry braced for impact - yet it never came. Victor cancelled the spell just after leaving a very clean cut on top of his nose - or perhaps it was the wards? Harry felt his magic drain a significant amount. He thanked Victor for the duel as the duo discussed what happened.

Harry had to admit - while he trained his dodging speeds quite well, as well as their versatility, his spell power was not as good as it could be - Victor promised to teach him about overcharging spells, yet warned that it took a lot of time to do so, especially in a duel. He also suggested Harry work on his shields before that - it was possible to strengthen shields by pouring more magic inside. Krum also admitted that his dome was an earth elemental shield - using other elemental spells would be most efficient in breaking it down and while earth shield was a great defence it would only be fast to cast if Harry had sufficient affinity to that element.

Harry was thankful for all the tips - he realised he had so much more to learn, as well as wondering, would Room of Requirements have any books on elemental magic? If not, he did remember seeing a few books about it in the Black's library… He decided to ask Sirius about it later and focused on the upcoming fight instead.

Soon the boy was back in the spectator zone - watching the finale of their small tournament. No one was surprised that both Sue and Harry lost - it was inevitable as they were only fourth years, and also given the fact that both other schools actually had duelling as a regular class…

In fact the surprise came that they lasted that long - especially Harry, who essentially only lost as he had no way of countering whatever Victor had unleashed.

As Fleur and VIctor stared at the coin the room took a more ominous atmosphere as they all gazed at the arena with interest - well except Ron - he was somehow conflicted if he should support his favourite seeker or the Veela from which he could hardly peel his eyes off, still Tracey cheers for Victor seemingly brought him out of confusion and he too gazed at the quidditch star.

The knut hit the ground once again - for the final time for this day as both Krum and Fleur just blurred out of sight. It was hard to make sense of what was happening - various spells and jinxes flying around all other the room.

Before long the familiar earth dome appeared around Krum and Harry watched with anticipation - he wondered how exactly Beauxbatons champion would deal with this unfamiliar spell for him.

Fleur, having seen the previous duel, knew exactly what Victor was up to. Unfortunately earth shields were famously hard to break… And she was most attuned to wind elemental magic - quite a bad matchup against earth. Still the girl smiled and started… singing?

Harry could feel his eyelids growing heavy - yet a moment later the barrier pulsed and he could suddenly no longer hear the noise from inside where the fight took place.

Glancing inside as the smoke subsided he could see Victor out of his dome, unleashing the same cutter curse he saw before. His eardrums bled - perhaps he temporarily poked his eardrums just to prevent falling asleep?

Looking at Fleur she was seemingly…. Drawing runes on the floor? Harry recognized about a quarter of them - releasing she was actually setting up a ward mid duel! Her singing seemingly stopped as soon as she saw the condition of Victor's ears.

Soon the familiar enormous spell blade sped up towards the french girl, yet Fleur just sat on the rune circle she had finished drawing just moments ago - a transparent barrier appeared around her, blocking the spell until it harmlessly disappeared onto the floor.

Victor gritted his teeth, about to go for another round, yet unknowingly to him, a small rock hit the wand in his hand and a large wind rose up and blew it towards the girl.

As the barrier was finally dismissed Harry could hear the part-Veela's words - "Good duel Victor, yet losing your ability to hear in such a barbaric way was not the best idea"

Victor seemingly understood from just her lip movement as he grumbled and cast a spell to heal his ears - "Agreed, I should have transfigured them away temporarily. Who knew you would throw a regular rock around before cancelling the spell? I did not feel the magic then, yet the applied force remained…."

Fleur smirked - "Well that is one way to do it, you could also impact my ability to sing - perhaps rising a cloud of dust to make me cough?" - she extended her thin arm, giving his wand back.

Victor grabbed, then shook hands with the girl - "That makes sense, that was a great duel, thank you Fleur. Let's duel again on the next occasion?"

"Sure!" - Fleur's smile looked very fascinating. Suddenly a loud bump was heard back in the spectators area.

Curious glances looked there only to see Ron lying on the floor, while Hermione glanced at them, her wand in her hand - "Sorry, he was.. About to jump at Fleur…. So I just had to stop him…"

Harry chuckled, soon followed by others as laughter broke out - it looks he would get to know foreign triwizard champions better this time around.