IX. ANOTHER DAY
After finally having a chat with her friends about what had happened in Moody's class — which just left everyone thoroughly confused — the rest of the week proved to be quite eventful. That Thursday, a large sign had been posted up in front of the marble staircase in the entrance hall that announced that the delegations from the other two schools would be arriving in eight days' time, on Friday, October thirtieth at six o'clock. Sirona's sisters were elated and couldn't stop speculating on what the students from Beauxbâtons and Durmstrang must be like, and Damara was happy to get out of her lessons early that Friday. Sirona was grateful that her sisters had all been through Moody's unorthodox lesson without having the same breakdown that she had; though, Cissonia was a bit miffed at the man for making her cluck around the room like a chicken in front of all her friends.
When the thirtieth of October finally did roll around, Sirona could feel the buzz of excitement in the air, and she'd be lying to say that she wasn't just as excited. Caroline was talking happily about how she'd been working on a section in the school paper to welcome the new students to Hogwarts; though, Sirona would be shocked if any of them picked up a school newspaper. (As it was, hardly any of the students read the paper, and Sirona wondered if everyone even knew the school had a paper; Sirona and Roger only read it because Caroline worked on it.) Roger was happy that he and Caroline were getting to leave off early from their Ancient Runes class because of the other schools' arrivals. Sirona had attempted to take Ancient Runes in her third year, but she'd found the subject boring and had not stuck with it, something that she was grateful for today because she only had one class on Fridays, and that was Herbology first thing in the morning. After that, she had nothing but free periods for the rest of the day.
As she walked to the greenhouses after breakfast, Sirona closed her eyes and enjoyed the autumn sunlight that warmed her skin. She wondered how the other students would arrive and how many of them there would be. Would they be approachable, or would they be standoffish? Would she be required to help them about the castle because of her prefect status? (Almost certainly.) Would she make friends with any of them, and if so, would she keep in touch with them once they went back home?
All of her questions came to a screeching halt when she felt her foot catch on something, and her eyes flew open as she stumbled forward. She did not fall, however, as an arm came around her waist to steady her. She looked down at the offending tree root with contempt before looking into the grinning face of Fred Weasley.
"Don't be all cross with the tree," he chided. "You're the one walking about the grounds with your eyes closed."
Sirona chuckled as he let go of her, and she straightened her robes.
"Where are you off to?" she asked curiously.
"To Herbology, of course," he replied, and Sirona gave him a bewildered look.
"You don't take Herbology; you failed your O.W.L. Where's George?"
"George has found himself unable to attend his Herbology lesson, so I am filling in for him," Fred informed her. "I owe him one. He went to one of my detentions a couple of weeks ago, and besides, none of the teachers can tell us apart. They only ever call us 'Mr. Weasley.'"
Sirona was about to point out that most teachers only called students like that, but she thought of a better point to make.
"What's the point of him sending you anyways? You both skived off Charms just last week," she reminded him. "What does George care about his Herbology attendance record for?"
"Oh, he doesn't, but the school seems to," Fred replied. "It may come as a shock to someone like you, who only ever misses class for logical reasons, but for regular truants like me and George, they will eventually start to send owls home to the folks."
"You act like I've never skived off before," she said, rolling her eyes as they entered Greenhouse Three, "when you know that's not true."
"Skiving off three times in six years does not a skiver make," Fred teased.
"It's been more than that," she defended. "Sorry if I actually semi-care about my education. It's probably why I got more than three O.W.L.s."
"Ouch, low blow, Rone," Fred said in a faux hurt voice.
They both pulled on their dragon hide gloves as the lesson started. Professor Sprout was telling them about Snargaluffs.
"So, no big plans for a Weasley twin prank this afternoon when the delegations arrive?" Sirona asked. Fred chuckled.
"I think McGonagall would hang us by our toenails from the dungeon ceilings if we so much as dared. Besides, George and I are still a bit preoccupied with Bagman at the moment."
"Still no response?"
"Not a single acknowledgement," Fred replied bitterly. "Our life savings, seemingly gone."
Sirona frowned. Bagman was such a twat. Fred and George had won that wager fair and square. If Bagman didn't have the money to pay out, he shouldn't have been taking bets in the first place. At the very least, he should give the twins their money back. She smiled a bit, nudging Fred on the arm, hoping to lighten the mood by saying,
"You could always get Granger to rally behind your cause. I hear from Mara that she's been going around the Gryffindor common room with a collecting tin for — Spew, was it?"
"It's S.P.E.W. actually," Fred said with a grin, and once Sirona was happy at having cheered him up a bit, she returned their conversation to the new arrivals they would be getting that afternoon.
"Caroline's thrilled about today. She's a people person, so she dying to meet someone new."
"Ah, yes, I saw her article in the school paper this morning when I was folding it into an airplane," Fred interjected, causing Sirona to lightly hit his arm.
"I say she's just mostly excited about the boys," she continued. "Ever since she broke it off with Terrance Bradley last year, she's been in a dating slump, but I think she's ready to put herself back out there." Fred rolled his eyes, not interested in Caroline Becker's dating prospects.
"What about you? Any plans to cosy up to the foreign girls?" Sirona teased, and the question brought a smile to Fred's lips.
"Why are you worried about who I choose to cosy up with?" he asked in a faux scandalised tone. "Trying to squirm your way out of going to the ball with me?"
"Quite the opposite, actually," she informed him, "I was planning on reminding you that getting yourself a girlfriend does not absolve you of prior commitments made to yours truly."
"Keeping me all to yourself, are ya?" Fred teased. "Careful, lest someone think that you fancy me."
"Oh, when are you going to let that go?" she asked, the tips of her ears burning red at the insinuation even if it was only a joke.
"I reckon when it stops making you so flustered," he replied.
She merely rolled her eyes, and Fred watched her as she eyed the plant in front of them, that for all intents and purposes, seemed like an ordinary lump of wood. He knew better than to ask her the same question, as she had answered it weeks ago.
". . . I'm far too busy with schoolwork to delve into the frivolity that is the dating world."
The "frivolity that is the dating world," she had said. Sirona had had boyfriends in the past, but they never seemed to last very long. She'd often said that it was too demanding to have a boyfriend, be on the Quidditch team, pass her classes, pretend to be a decent prefect, be a good friend and look after her little sisters all at the same time; something had to give, and that something was boys. Perhaps, another day, after their last year was over . . .
"Are you going to help or not?" Sirona complained aloud, breaking Fred out of his thoughts. She was frowning at him and pointing to the Snargaluff, which they were meant to be collecting pods from. Fred chuckled, rolled up the sleeves of his shirt and got to work helping her remove the pods.
As it turned out, Snargaluff's were particularly protective of these pods they produced. The lump provided thorny vines faster than Fred could catch them once Sirona had stuck her hand into the little log. One of the vines caught his face and neck, leaving him with a few scratches before he could gather them all and hold them down tightly.
After class was over, while all the other students were packing their things away, Sirona produced a salve from her bag and motioned for Fred to sit on a stool. He poked fun at her, saying, "Yes, Mum."
"Oh, shut up," she muttered as she rubbed the salve into the scratches, watching as they started to heal themselves up as she did so. "I'm a big sister; it's my job."
"No," he said pointedly, "it's a mum's job." Sirona shrugged.
"Yeah, well, I supposed somewhere along the way, the roles got all mixed around at the Bordeaux house."
Fred regarded the quiet answer with a sort of sadness that Sirona never seemed to feel for herself, and he wondered if she even realised how twisted her answer had been. She probably didn't; Sirona seemed to enjoy looking after her little siblings; she had been very excited upon receiving pictures from Saegon of their little brother's second birthday party last month — she'd shown them to Fred in a fashion very similar to that of a proud mother. Still, Fred wondered how different Sirona would have been if she didn't constantly have to spend her summers and holidays looking after her younger siblings, if she were allowed to be just a regular selfish teenager.
"You've got the rest of the day off, right?" he asked suddenly, and Sirona nodded as she twisted the cap back onto the bottle of salve.
"What a coincidence. So do I," he said.
"So?" she asked as she turned back to the table to put the salve back into her bag and pack up her belongings.
"So, how about coming with me to Hogsmeade for a few hours? It'll be fun," he assured her, as he always did.
"Why should I?" she asked, giving a cheeky grin that he couldn't see because her back was still turned to him.
Fred stood from the stool, caught a glimpse of someone from the corner of his eye, and a mischievous glint flashed in his eyes. Very suddenly, Sirona felt herself being pulled into a warm embrace as Fred wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her close until her back was flush to his chest. She could feel his breath on her ear as he leaned down to whisper,
"Because Chambers is walking over to talk to you as we speak."
Admittedly, Sirona almost didn't hear the words because she was too distracted by the sudden contact. She swallowed thickly as an involuntary blush creeped up from her neck to her cheeks, warming the skin there. She chalked her body's reaction up to the sudden and unexpected contact, not the fact that it was Fred in particular. She chanced a glance out of the corner of her eye to see that Kevin Chambers had in fact been walking in her direction, but he had stopped now, a look of confusion on his face. She watched as he turned away before realising what it was that he might have been confused about.
"Oh, Merlin!" she said, pushing out of Fred's grip. "He probably thinks you're George!"
Fred's grin only faltered for a fraction of a second before he was laughing.
"I, admittedly, hadn't thought of that." Sirona scowled at him.
"Now he's going to think that I just let you two toss me around like a Quaffle," she said, her blush deepening at the embarrassing thought.
"Oh, who cares what Chambers thinks?" Fred asked, clearly unfazed by her plight. "So, are you coming to Hogsmeade or not?"
Sirona sighed, touching her burning cheeks with her much cooler hands in an attempt to get rid of the blush. She shook her head.
"I told Mona that I'd help her with her Potions essay during her free period after lunch—"
"Oh, we'll be back before lunchtime," Fred assured.
"—and I have an Alchemy project to work on," Sirona continued in a regretful tone, turning to look at him apologetically. "Perhaps another day."
Fred watched her as she shifted the strap of her schoolbag onto her shoulder, brushing away a bit of hair from her face that had fallen out of the ponytail she'd had it in.
"Another day," he repeated, giving her a smile before she wandered out of the greenhouse.
The rest of the day seemed to drag by slowly as Sirona constantly kept checking the clock as she waited for six o'clock to roll around. As promised, she met up with Damona in the Ravenclaw common room after lunch to look over her paper.
"Rona?" Damona had spoken up after a while of Sirona telling her all about dragon blood and its many uses.
"Hm?" Sirona responded, marking out a misplaced comma on her sister's paper.
"How do you know if a boy likes you?"
The question took Sirona off guard, just as it had two years prior when it was Cissonia asking it instead. Sirona blinked a few times, processing the question before looking at her little sister with a small smile.
"What would you want to know the answer to a silly thing like that for?" she asked. "Aren't boys supposed to still be weird at your age?"
"Sirona!" Damona whined in complaint, and the older girl laughed.
"Are we asking about a specific boy or just asking about the topic in general?" she finally asked. Damona shrugged.
"Just in general, I guess," she said, and Sirona knew that she was lying; clearly Damona did not want her sister to know who this boy was just yet.
"Well, let's see," Sirona started, "some boys, when they like you, want you to think that they're funny, so they'll joke with you a lot, and maybe tease you here and there, but not in a mean way. If anyone's ever mean to you, you come straight to me."
Damona rolled her eyes, but Sirona pretended as though she hadn't seen it and continued.
"If a guy likes you, he'll definitely want to be around you a lot, so keep a look out for boys that always seem to be about or that ask to hang out with you," she said. "Then, of course, if he helps you out, like if he helps you out of trouble or wants to carry your bag when you say it's too heavy—"
"I can carry my own bag," Damona quipped indignantly, and Sirona chuckled.
"Yes, well, I know that; I never said you had to let him carry your bag, did I? Now, where was I?" Sirona said, before remembering another thing. "If he seems to always be touching you — which no one should be touching you; punch him on the nose if he does."
"But what if he just touches my arm or something?" Damona asked, quite certain that punching a boy that liked her would almost surely result in the end of the crush immediately.
"Is there a boy that's touching your arm?"
"Ugh, no, Sirona!" Damona whined, and Sirona laughed.
"I'm only joking with you, Mona. All boys are different, so it can be quite difficult to pinpoint, but these are just some things I've noticed," she said to her little sister, who just nodded as she fiddled with the quill in her hand.
"Sonia says you're clueless about boys," Damona admitted in a quieter voice, and Sirona scoffed, offended at the accusation.
"Sonia only just turned fourteen not three weeks ago. She may think she knows everything there is to know about boys, but I can assure you that she does not. Besides, neither you nor Mara should be taking her advice on boys." Sirona pushed her sister's paper back to her and thought for a moment before curiously adding, "Why does she think that?"
"She says it's an embarrassment to watch you try to flirt with someone," Damona started, and Sirona couldn't necessarily disagree with that, "and she says on top of that, you wouldn't know if a boy was flirting with you even if he told you he was."
Sirona made a disparaging noise.
"Sonia's a brat. I know when a boy is flirting with me; it's not that hard to figure out. Besides, what boys has she seen flirt with me? I'd like to know just who she thinks—"
"She says Fred Weasley flirts with you all the time and that you're helplessly oblivious," Damona interrupted. Sirona rolled her eyes.
"First off, that was a rhetorical question. Secondly, I wish people would mind their own business. Fred doesn't flirt with me, he's just — playful," Sirona said, trying to find a different word for the boy's actions. "He only does it to be funny."
"So, he teases you," Damona interjected, "to make you think he's funny."
"Well, not exactly," Sirona said, getting flustered at having her own words thrown back at her in such a way. "Fred's just a funny person in general."
"He does seem to hang out with you a lot."
"Well, we're friends, so—"
"He does seem to be awful helpful when it comes to you. I mean, he's taking you to a dance just so you don't have to reject some other guy."
"Again, we're friends. Besides, how do you even know about—"
"He's always touching you."
"No, he's not!" Sirona denied; though, come to think of it, Fred did seem to be unable to keep his hands to himself sometimes. "Besides, it's not like that. It's different with Fred."
"Why?" Damona asked.
"Because it just is! It's just different with some boys."
Damona threw her hands up in an exasperated way.
"Well, how am I supposed to know the difference between that and a boy who likes me?" she demanded before sighing and gathering her things. "I'll just ask Sonia another day."
Had Sirona's face not felt like a furnace, she might have taken offence at her little sister's words. What was it with people thinking that Fred Weasley fancied her? She gathered her things and walked up to her dormitory.
A few hours later, everyone was gathered in the entrance hall with the Heads of Houses ushering them into orderly lines. Flitwick ran around, squeaking out orders at the first years to stop being so noisy; Sirona could just make out the tip of his hat as he waded in and out of the first years near the front. Then, they all made their way outside to stand in front of the castle to wait, the chilly October air nipping at their faces.
". . . I might need you to translate for some of the French-speaking students if they don't speak English very well," Caroline was saying from beside her; she'd not stopped talking since they'd made their way down to the entrance hall. Sirona rolled her eyes.
"Just because I know some French because of my mum doesn't mean I'm fluent."
"Well, some is better than none. Besides, we both know you're better at French than you claim to be, so stop whining. You're just afraid that they'll make fun of your accent or whatever."
"Wish they would hurry up," Roger said from Sirona's other side. "It's starting to get cold."
Sirona's grey eyes scanned the grounds. She had to agree with Roger. It was getting dark, and the temperature had significantly decreased as the sun set. She pulled her cloak around her tightly, about to make a complaint of her own when Dumbledore spoke up from the back row.
"Aha! Unless I am very much mistaken, the delegation from Beauxbâtons approaches!"
From where? Sirona thought irritably as her eyes scanned the grounds once more.
"There!" yelled one of the Gryffindors as though she had been privy to Sirona's thoughts. The girl was pointing over the forest, and Sirona lifted her eyes to see something very large flying above the forest and hurtling towards the castle.
Some of the first years from the houses loudly shouted out what they thought the shape was at it approached them. They were all wrong, though, because no one could've guessed that the Beauxbâtons students would arrive in a horse-drawn carriage, the size of which eclipsed that of Sirona's own house back in Devon. It was being pulled by giant winged horses that were the size of elephants. She watched as the first few rows of students backed away as the carriage and horses touched down with a tremendous crashing noise; though, no damage seemed to be done to either.
The carriage door opened and out stepped a boy in pale blue robes. They all watched as he unfolded a set of golden steps from the carriage, and out came a giant woman the size of Hogwarts' groundskeeper, Hagrid. Dumbledore started to clap, and the students, including Sirona, followed suit, though she wasn't quite sure what they were clapping for; besides the one boy, none of the Beauxbâtons students had even left the carriage yet.
Sirona didn't have to wait long, though, because as Beauxbâtons' headmistress talked to Dumbledore, a large group of boys and girls all filed out of the carriage, shivering as their silky robes did nothing to protect them from the cold evening air. Luckily for them, their headmistress did not feel inclined to make them wait out in the cold for the students of Durmstrang to arrive, opting to let them warm up in the comfort of the castle. The lines of Hogwarts students parted down the middle, and Sirona now had a front row view of the students and their giant headmistress as they walked up the path towards the castle. She scanned over their faces and accidentally made eye contact with one of the Beauxbâtons boys. She elected to smile at him, trying her best to make their school seem welcoming; whether he saw the smile or even returned it, she did not know because they had all passed so quickly and disappeared into the castle.
Sirona and the other Hogwarts students moved back into the place once the Beauxbâtons students had left them, and they all turned back to the grounds, waiting silently for the other school to arrive. Roger grumbled from beside her, wondering aloud why they couldn't be watching this whole thing from one of the windows, inside the castle where it was warm. She only halfway listened to Caroline telling him to suck it up, their bickering mere background noises to her as she watched the sky, expecting another horse-drawn carriage to pop up at any moment.
However, the students from Durmstrang did not seem to be arriving from the sky, as Sirona pulled her attention to the Black Lake when she heard Lee Jordan's yells of, "The lake! Look at the lake!"
From where they were standing, they had a perfect view of the lake, in which a large whirlpool seemed to be forming, something Sirona had never seen happen during all her years at Hogwarts. Out of the centre of the whirlpool came a black ship mast. A few moments later, an entire ship rose from the water's depths, and the whirlpool disappeared, leaving behind turbulent waters for the ship to glide across toward the bank. The anchor of the skeletal-looking ship was thrown overboard and a plank lowered onto the shore.
Sirona squinted, making out the silhouettes of who she assumed were the Durmstrang students disembarking the ship and walking up towards the castle. While the Beauxbâtons students had worn clothes that were far too light for the chilly October evenings of Scotland, the Durmstrang students wore robes that Sirona thought were far too warm, even for the cold air, their cloaks made of shaggy, matted fur.
Their headmaster wore robes of sleeker fur as he led them up the slope, greeting Dumbledore as though they were old friends. Sirona wouldn't be surprised if they were; Dumbledore seemed ancient and probably knew a vast assortment of witches and wizards from all over the world. The Durmstrang headmaster seemed to be motioning to one of his students as he talked, and Sirona's eyes landed on none other than Viktor Krum.
Roger was hitting her repeatedly on the arm, clearly too excited to say anything, and Sirona slapped his hand away as he finally managed to say, "That's Viktor Krum!"
"I have my own set of eyes, you know," she told him in a teasing voice, and Caroline rolled her eyes.
"Oh, what's the big fuss about anyway? The boy behind him is far more handsome."
Roger let out a disparaging noise at her words.
"Who cares about that?" he asked, clearly offended at Caroline's lack of enthusiasm. "Krum's the youngest in the league; he's the best Seeker there is! Show some respect!"
"Perhaps if you ask nicely enough, he'll take you to the Yule Ball, Rodge," Caroline teased, fuelling another one of their bickering sessions as the Hogwarts students parted once more to let the Durmstrang students pass up to the castle. Sirona pushed her friends along as the Hogwarts students started to file back into the castle after their foreign guests, eager to get back inside the castle where it was warm and where they would be having dinner soon.
Upon arriving in the Great Hall, Sirona noticed that the Beauxbâtons students had taken up residence at the Ravenclaw table. Caroline tugged on Sirona's arm, happily pulling her closer to the still shivering students.
"Let's sit near them!" Caroline exclaimed excitedly.
"What for?" Sirona asked; though, she made no attempt to slow her pace. "They don't seem very happy to be here," she pointed out, observing the glum look on most of the new students' faces as they scanned the Great Hall.
This, however, didn't seem to bother Caroline in the slightest, and she sat down beside a boy who seemed quite surprised by her forwardness. Sirona sat on Caroline's other side and Roger sat across from them, making sure to leave some space in between himself and the Beauxbâtons girl, who was eyeing him with a slight frown.
"Hello," Caroline said to the boy happily. Sirona glanced up at Roger, wanting someone to roll their eyes with her at Caroline's antics, but the Ravenclaw boy was now preoccupied with staring further down the table at one of the Beauxbâtons girls who was clutching a muffler around her head. Sirona turned her head back to the Beauxbâtons boy, who whispered a soft "Hello," back to Caroline, and she noticed that this was the same boy that she'd smiled at earlier. In the light of the Great Hall, Sirona could see him better. He had ash blond hair and sparkling blue eyes that matched his school robes; his fair skin had turned a pale pink around his nose from the cold.
Caroline seemed to take the boy's response as an invitation to conversation, and she opened her mouth to say something else, but the boy was saved by the arrival of his headmistress, as all the Beauxbâtons students had promptly jumped to their feet once they saw her enter the room. A few of the Hogwarts students chuckled at this, but the Beauxbâtons student were unfazed by the laughter and didn't sit back down until their headmistress had. Once they seated themselves, Dumbledore was the only person who remained on his feet.
"Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, ghosts and — most particularly — guests. I have great pleasure in welcoming you all to Hogwarts. I hope and trust that your stay here will be both comfortable and enjoyable."
The Beauxbâtons girl that Sirona had caught Roger staring at earlier let out a scathing laugh, and Sirona scowled in her direction. Who the hell did she think she was? She could have stayed in France if her school was so much better than Hogwarts. Despite this, Dumbledore continued.
"The tournament will be officially opened at the end of the feast. I now invite you all to eat, drink, and make yourselves at home!"
At his words, the dishes before them filled with a vast variety of food, and Sirona busied herself with filling her plate.