Chapter Text
The castle swallowed her.
The moment Estelle stepped out of the Great Hall, the roar of voices behind her became a muffled, distant sea. The corridor ahead was dimmer, the torches seeming to burn lower than usual, the shadows thicker. She could still feel the echo of a thousand eyes on the back of her neck, the image of the Goblet’s last flare seared into her thoughts.
Harry Potter.
A fourth champion.
Her bandaged finger throbbed in time with her heartbeat as she followed Minerva and Severus toward the moving staircase that led to Dumbledore’s office. Her glove felt too tight; the skin beneath it was hot and swollen. Each step sent a little spike up her arm, but she gritted her teeth and ignored it.
One catastrophe at a time.
They climbed in a small, tense knot—Dumbledore at the front with Madame Maxime and Karkaroff, Crouch and Bagman trailing, Moody clunking somewhere behind. Severus walked just in front of her, his robes whispering against the stone, shoulders rigid. Minerva’s mouth was a sharp line; Vector and Flitwick had peeled off somewhere else, shepherding confused students, while Hagrid, enormous and anxious, had lumbered toward the grounds to do… something with the Beauxbatons carriage and the Durmstrang ship.
For once, Estelle was content to be the quiet shadow in the group.
The gargoyle leapt aside at Dumbledore’s murmured password. The spiral staircase carried them upward, stone grinding softly under their feet.
Dumbledore’s office was already full.
The circular room seemed smaller than usual with so many bodies inside—shelves crammed with spindly instruments humming faintly, portraits of past headmasters and headmistresses pretending to sleep with varying degrees of success, the great claw-footed desk piled with parchment.
And there, clustered near the center, stood the champions.
Cedric Diggory—still a little dazed, but holding himself straight. Fleur Delacour—chin up, arms folded, anger and worry warring visibly in her eyes. Viktor Krum—expression thunderous, gaze glued to the stone floor as if it had personally betrayed him.
And Harry.
He stood slightly apart, shoulders hunched, hair even more of a mess than usual. He clutched his wand in one hand like it was an anchor. His eyes flicked to Dumbledore as the headmaster stepped in, then darted to the others—Karkaroff’s sneer, Maxime’s glare, Severus’s keen dark stare, Estelle’s own wide gray eyes—before dropping to the floor.
Moody was already there, leaning against the wall with a kind of coiled, restless energy, his magical eye whirring and ticking as it spun in its socket.
Estelle slipped into a spot against the wall near the door, just to the right of Severus. The stone was cool at her back. The air smelled faintly of lemon and woodsmoke and the metallic tang of magical instruments.
She realized she was breathing too fast and forced herself to slow it down.
Dumbledore crossed to the center of the room, blue eyes moving from one champion to the next.
“Good evening,” he said quietly.
No one answered.
The portraits on the walls pretended not to lean closer.
“Now,” he went on, still gentle but with steel folded into his tone, “we are here to address a matter our Goblet has… complicated.”
“That is one word for it,” Karkaroff snapped. “I can think of others.”
“Indeed,” Dumbledore said calmly. “But let us begin with what we know. Four names have emerged from the Goblet of Fire. Four champions have been chosen.”
“Three champions,” Madame Maxime corrected sharply, folding massive arms over her chest. “Three schools. The boy is an error.”
“Is he?” Moody rasped from the wall. “Funny sort of error, spitting out a fully-legible name and school.”
Harry flinched at the word *boy.* Estelle saw it, that little dip in his shoulders.
“Regardless,” Dumbledore said, holding up a hand before Maxime could retort, “we must determine how this occurred. Harry…”
He turned to the boy, and the room seemed to tilt just slightly around that pivot.
Estelle’s stomach tightened.
“Did you put your name into the Goblet of Fire?” Dumbledore asked.
His voice was calm, but there was a latent urgency in it that hadn’t been there at dinner. He moved closer as he spoke, white beard trailing, eyes locked onto Harry’s face as if he could read truth there the way others read books.
Harry swallowed.
“No, sir,” he said. “I didn’t.”
“Did you ask an older student to put it in for you?” Dumbledore pressed.
“No,” Harry said again, more firmly.
“Are you sure you have not… forgotten?” Karkaroff drawled, a thin smile twisting his mouth. “A moment of excitement, perhaps? A lapse?”
Harry’s face flushed. “I didn’t,” he repeated. “I swear. I didn’t put my name in. I didn’t ask anyone to do it.”
Estelle’s bandaged hand twitched at her side.
She didn’t know Harry well—not in the way she’d known James, not yet—but she knew enough. The terror in his eyes, the stunned confusion, the stubborn honesty were all painfully familiar.
She believed him.
Beside her, Severus shifted, the fabric of his sleeve brushing hers. She glanced up at him. His expression had settled into something unreadable—a carefully blank mask he wore when his mind was moving too fast to show on his face.
Their eyes met for a fraction of a second.
You see it too, she wanted to say.
I see something, his gaze answered, though the words never left his mouth.
“Headmaster.” Barty Crouch’s clipped, precise voice cut through the air. “Whether the boy entered himself is, at this point, immaterial. The Goblet has named him. The binding magic is not concerned with… intent.”
“You can’t be serious,” Madame Maxime said, outraged. “’E is a child.”
“A child who somehow circumvented the Age Line,” Karkaroff added smoothly. “If he did not do this himself, someone did it for him. Someone powerful. Someone who seeks to undermine the Tournament.”
Moody let out a harsh, barking laugh. “And that’s what we should be worrying about, isn’t it? *Who* put the boy’s name in. Not whether he’s old enough to play.”
His magical eye whirred wildly, settling on Harry for a moment so intense that Harry took a step back.
“We’re looking at a plot, Dumbledore,” Moody went on, ignoring Maxime’s offended huff. “Someone got past your Age Line. Someone wanted Potter in this mess.”
Estelle shivered.
The word plot sent her mind spiraling backward—war councils, whispered plans in Order safe houses, names written and scratched out on parchment, the cold knowledge that sometimes a boy or girl was a piece to be moved onto a board.
Harry looked up at Dumbledore again.
“I don’t want to compete,” he said.
The quiet desperation in his voice made Estelle’s throat ache.
Dumbledore’s eyes closed briefly.
“I know,” he said softly.
“Regardless,” Crouch interjected, “the rules are clear. The Triwizard Tournament carries with it a binding magical contract. Those whose names emerge from the Goblet are compelled to compete.”
“He is fourteen,” Minerva snapped, her composure beginning to crack. “You cannot seriously expect—”
“It is not a matter of expectation,” Crouch said coldly. “It is a matter of law. International law, Professor McGonagall.”
“Surely we can—” Estelle began, the protest slipping out before she could stop it. *Surely we can find a way around a bloody cup.*
Dumbledore glanced at her, and the look in his eyes was apology and resignation and something like grief.
“If there were a way to undo the Goblet’s decision, Estelle,” he said, gently but firmly, “I would take it.”
That shut her up.
Fawkes, perched high on his golden stand, ruffled his feathers and let out a low, mourning trill.
Cedric spoke for the first time.
“Professor,” he said, looking at Dumbledore rather than Crouch, “if… if there’s another Hogwarts champion… does that mean Cedric isn’t…” He trailed off, flushing. “I mean—I got picked fair. I put my name in. That’s not… that doesn’t change, does it?”
There was no arrogance in his voice. Only concern—for fairness, for the meaning of this moment.
“Your selection stands,” Dumbledore said. “You are still the Hogwarts champion.”
“And Potter?” Karkaroff demanded. “What is he, then? A spare? An extra?”
“The Goblet named him as representing Hogwarts as well,” Crouch said, steepling his fingers. “We must regard him as a fourth champion.”
Maxime made an angry, inarticulate noise.
“This is an outrage,” she said. “If ’Ogwarts has two champions—”
“The boy is not my doing,” Dumbledore said sharply, for once allowing a hint of temper into his tone. “And whatever advantage Hogwarts might seem to gain from this, I assure you, I take no pleasure in it.”
“You expect us to believe that?” Karkaroff sneered.
Severus’s voice slid into the conversation then, smooth and quiet and dangerous.
“Are you suggesting, Igor,” he said, black eyes narrowing slightly, “that Albus orchestrated this? That he somehow tampered with his own protections and risked the Tournament’s collapse for the sake of… what? House pride?”
Karkaroff flinched, just slightly, at the way Severus said his name.
“I am suggesting,” Karkaroff said, tone cooling just a fraction, “that Hogwarts has a reputation for trouble. And that wherever this boy goes, it follows.”
Estelle’s hand curled into a fist inside her glove. Pain flared; she welcomed it.
“Trouble follows those who seek it,” she said coldly, unable to keep quiet any longer. “Harry Potter did not ask for a Dark Lord as an enemy. He did not ask for a scar or a prophecy or a place in this Tournament.”
Karkaroff’s gaze flicked to her. He looked like he would very much like to snap something venomous back, but Moody spoke first.
“She’s right,” Moody growled. “Whether you like it or not, the boy’s been a target since he had barely learned to walk. Imagine what someone could do with him in a competition designed to test the limits of what a student can survive.”
The room went very still.
Harry’s face had gone a shade paler with every sentence. He stood very small in the circle of adults, shoulders drawn in, as though trying to make himself a harder target.
“Enough,” Dumbledore said, the word quiet but carrying more weight than a shout.
He looked at Harry again.
“Harry,” he said, and this time the steel in his voice was tempered by something deep and sorrowful, “I must ask you once more, for the record and for the sake of those gathered here: did you put your name into the Goblet of Fire? Did you ask an older student to do so on your behalf?”
Harry met his gaze.
“No,” he said. “I didn’t.”
Silence followed, thick and heavy.
Dumbledore held his eyes a moment longer, then nodded.
“Very well,” he said. “I believe you.”
Some of the portraits murmured in alarm; Phineas Nigellus snorted audibly.
“Albus—” Crouch began.
“The Goblet’s magic stands,” Dumbledore said. “The contract binds him, whether he wished it or no. That is a fact. Another fact is that Harry did not choose this. We will proceed, but we will do so with that knowledge in mind.”
He turned to the champions as a group.
“You four,” he said, “will face three tasks, spaced throughout the school year. They will test your courage, your intelligence, your resourcefulness. They will be dangerous.”
Fleur’s jaw tightened. Cedric straightened. Krum’s eyes darkened.
Harry swallowed again.
“You will receive information about the first task in due course,” Dumbledore continued. “For now, you will return to your dormitories. Rest. Try to ignore the gossip, as much as that is possible. You will all be given time to prepare.”
“’Ow generous,” Fleur muttered under her breath in French.
“I beg your pardon, Miss Delacour?” Maxime said sharply.
“Rien,” Fleur said quickly, though her eyes flashed.
“Professor Snape, Professor McGonagall, Estelle,” Dumbledore said, glancing to where they stood by the wall. “Please see that your houses are… calmed. Or at least contained.”
“Of course,” Minerva said.
Severus inclined his head, his expression becoming that familiar blend of disdain and reluctant responsibility.
Estelle nodded once. Her throat felt tight.
“Champions, you are dismissed,” Dumbledore said.
They filed out slowly.
Cedric went first, offering a brief, apologetic smile toward Harry as he passed. “See you in the common room,” he murmured.
Harry nodded mutely.
Fleur went next, shoulders stiff, chin high, quick French spilling under her breath in what Estelle suspected was a string of curses. Krum trailed after, hands in his pockets, jaw clenched.
Harry lingered for half a heartbeat, as if wanting to say something—perhaps to Dumbledore, perhaps to someone else—and then moved toward the door.
As he drew level with Estelle and Severus, Estelle couldn’t help it.
“Harry,” she said softly.
He glanced up, startled.
“If you need… to talk,” she said, fumbling for words that wouldn’t sound patronizing or intrusive, “about anything—the Tournament, the plants that might not kill you, the ones that might—it doesn’t have to be tonight. But I’m here. All year.”
His eyes searched her face, as if trying to determine whether this was some kind of test.
“Thank you, Professor,” he said quietly.
Severus said nothing, but his gaze on Harry was sharp and measuring. Harry’s eyes flicked to him briefly—tight, wary—and then he was gone, swallowed back into the stairwell, off to face a common room full of shouting Gryffindors.
The door closed with a soft snick.
For a moment, no one moved.
Then Dumbledore exhaled, looking suddenly, profoundly tired.
“Thank you all,” he said to the assembled staff and guests. “We will speak more in the morning. For tonight, I suggest sleep, if you can find it.”
“Sleep,” Maxime repeated with a scoff. “You expect me to sleep when my girl is in this mess?”
“I expect you to rest enough to be of use to her,” Dumbledore replied mildly.
Bagman and Crouch murmured about regulations as they departed. Moody gave Dumbledore a long, hard look, then stumped out with less clatter than usual, as if deep in thought rather than blustering.
Karkaroff lingered a moment longer, eyes drilling into Severus’s profile.
“This place,” he said in a low, unpleasant tone, “is a magnet for catastrophe.”
“Then feel free to leave,” Severus replied without turning.
Karkaroff bared his teeth in something not unlike a smile, then swept out, fur-lined robes whispering against the floor.
The office emptied by degrees.
Minerva gave Estelle’s arm a brief squeeze as she passed. “Get some rest,” she said briskly. “We’ll need our wits tomorrow.”
Estelle nodded.
Soon, only a few remained: Dumbledore behind his desk, staring at nothing; Fawkes, preening mournfully; and at the back of the room, the two of them—Severus and Estelle—still standing with their shoulders almost, but not quite, touching.
“You should both go,” Dumbledore said at last, looking up.
Severus frowned. “Albus—”
“I know,” Dumbledore said. “Believe me, Severus, I know.”
Their gaze held.
Estelle felt very much like she was intruding on something older and sharper than her.
“I will be here,” Dumbledore went on, “should anything… develop tonight. For now, the best thing we can do is watch, and prepare. And try to sleep after failing at both.”
A corner of Severus’s mouth twitched.
“As you wish,” he said.
“Goodnight, Estelle,” Dumbledore said, his voice softening when he turned it on her.
“Goodnight, Headmaster,” she replied.
They left together.
The spiral staircase carried them down in silence. The castle’s ambient noise felt muffled now, as if someone had thrown a blanket over the whole place.
It wasn’t until they were halfway back to the dungeons, feet echoing on a quieter corridor, that Estelle realized her hands were shaking.
She curled her bandaged one tighter against herself. Pain radiated out from the finger—hot, insistent—but it felt almost distant compared to the buzzing in her skull.
“Stop,” Severus said suddenly.
They were in a stretch of hallway just before the turn toward the Slytherin entrance, a lower torch sputtering overhead.
Estelle blinked. “What?”
“Your breathing,” he said. “You’re about two seconds from hyperventilating.”
She hadn’t even noticed.
She dragged in a breath. It stuttered.
“I’m fine,” she lied.
“You are a terrible liar,” he said quietly.
She let out something between a laugh and a gasp.
He regarded her for a moment, then tipped his head toward the deeper corridor.
“Come,” he said. “You’re not going to manage sleep like this. And if you faint in the hallway, I’ll be obliged to explain you to Slytherin students, which I refuse to do.”
“I should go to my rooms,” she protested weakly. “I should… check on… plants. Things.”
“Your plants are not about to fling themselves into mortal peril for the sake of inter-school sport,” he said. “Potter is. Cedric is. And you’re trembling like a bowstring. My chambers are closer.”
“I don’t—”
“Estelle,” he said, very softly but in that tone he rarely used—gentle, but brooking no argument.
She shut her mouth.
He was right. Her legs felt unsteady; her brain buzzed as if full of bees. The infection in her finger added its own hot pulse, like an off-beat drum beneath the rest.
“Fine,” she muttered. “But only because your tea is marginally better than mine.”
He made a faint, almost amused huff.
“Obviously,” he said.
His quarters were cool and dim when they stepped inside, the fire down to embers. He flicked his wand and the lamps brightened, revealing the familiar tidy chaos: books in careful stacks, vials in precise rows, a kettle on a side table near the hearth.
Estelle sank into the armchair without being asked.
Her body seemed to fold into it with a kind of bone-deep exhaustion. The cushioning was firmer than in her own rooms but felt oddly reassuring—like being held upright by something that refused to let her collapse.
Severus moved around the room with his usual efficient economy, shrugging off his outer robe and hanging it on its peg, stoking the fire with a word. He picked up the kettle, weighed it, and filled it with water from his wand before setting it over the flames.
The small, domestic motions—familiar and unhurried—did more to steady her than any speech would have.
She watched him through half-lidded eyes.
“You should have gone to Pomfrey yesterday,” he said after a moment, without turning. “Your hand is worse.”
“How can you tell?” she asked.
“You’re holding yourself strangely,” he said. “Protecting it. And you went chalk-white when Karkaroff started shouting.”
“That was Karkaroff,” she muttered. “Anyone would go chalk-white.”
A ghost of a smirk.
“True,” he allowed.
The kettle began to hum softly.
He retrieved a tin of tea leaves from the shelf—one she recognized; he’d grudgingly admitted once that it was a blend she’d introduced him to—and measured them into two cups. The scent of bergamot and something darker curled into the air.
He brought her a cup first.
“Careful,” he said. “Hot.”
She accepted it with her left hand. Her right twitched, wanting to help, then recoiled from the heat. The motion sent a spike of pain through her finger that made her vision blur for a second.
Severus’s eyes sharpened.
“Let me see,” he said.
“I’m fine,” she repeated, more reflexively than convincingly.
“Estelle.”
He didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t need to.
She hesitated, then reluctantly set the tea down and tugged off her glove.
The bandage underneath looked worse in this light: darker at the edges, swelling stretching the cloth in an uneven bulge.
Severus’s mouth thinned.
“Drink your tea,” he said.
“That doesn’t sound like ‘let me see,’” she replied.
“I’m deciding whether I need to drag you to Pomfrey tonight or merely bully you into going first thing in the morning,” he said. “In the meantime, drink. It will help.”
She obeyed.
The tea was strong and hot and pleasantly bitter. It grounded her, bringing her back into her body more fully—the burn on her tongue, the warmth spreading down into her chest, the harsh, steady beat of her heart.
For a few minutes, neither of them spoke.
The fire crackled softly. The rain outside had softened to a quieter patter against whatever windows the dungeons could claim. Somewhere deep in the castle, a clock chimed the hour.
Finally, Estelle exhaled.
“I can’t,” she said.
Severus glanced over. “Can’t what?”
“Watch this,” she said, staring into her cup. “Not again. Not another boy with James’s face dragged into something he didn’t choose. Not a Hufflepuff who’s done everything right, who’s kind and fair and good, thrown into the same line of fire.”
Her voice fractured on the last word. She swallowed hard.
“The Tournament is controlled,” he said quietly. “Monitored. It is not war.”
“It’s not war yet,” she shot back. “But it’s dangerous enough without someone meddling with the Goblet. Someone who wanted Harry in there for a reason.”
She set the cup down with a clink and pressed the heel of her good hand to her brow.
“We both know how this goes,” she went on, words tumbling out now that the dam had cracked. “A boy gets marked. People call it fate, call it prophecy, call it anything other than what it is—adults deciding how much risk is acceptable when it’s not their bodies on the line. I stood in too many rooms where James laughed it off, where Sirius made jokes, where Lily exhaled like she was trying not to scream. I watched it go badly. I watched it end with a cottage destroyed and a baby orphaned and my twin in chains.”
Her chest heaved.
“And now he’s thirteen years older,” she said, voice low. “Carrying all of that, whether he knows it or not. And we’re still putting him on pedestals and in arenas and calling it destiny.”
Severus was very still.
Fawkes’s distant, mournful trill from the office earlier seemed to echo in the back of her mind.
Finally, Severus spoke.
“You think I do not see it,” he said. It wasn’t quite a question.
She looked up.
His dark eyes were fixed on the fire, not her, but his jaw was clenched.
“I see James’s face every time Potter looks at me with that… that mixture of fear and defiance,” he said. “I see Lily’s eyes when he is confused, or horrified, or determined. I see… outcomes.”
He spat the word like it tasted bad.
“That does not mean,” he went on, softer, “that there is nothing between now and then. That what we do now is irrelevant.”
She swallowed.
“You think someone is targeting him,” she said.
“I think,” Severus said, “that the Goblet of Fire does not make mistakes. It does not miscount. It is a tool. A powerful one. Someone used it. And I think that we would be foolish to assume that whoever is capable of such manipulation is done.”
A cold that had nothing to do with the dungeons settled in her.
“And Cedric?” she asked. “What about him? He didn’t ask for this, either.”
“No,” Severus said. “He did not. But Cedric Diggory chose to enter. He is of age, and he did so understanding it was dangerous. That does not make what may happen to him acceptable. But it is… different.”
Estelle let out a short, humorless laugh.
“You really have gone soft,” she said. “I remember a time when you wouldn’t have bothered to differentiate.”
“I remember,” he said dryly, “a time when you would not have stayed to listen.”
Their eyes met.
The tiredness in his face was different from Dumbledore’s. It wasn’t the tiredness of age, but of someone who had been braced against impact for so long he no longer knew how to stand any other way.
“I am…” She groped for the word. “Afraid,” she admitted. “For them. For us. For what this means. It feels like the ground has tilted, and we’ve only just found our footing from last year.”
From Azkaban. From Sirius’s escape. From Dementors on the grounds and fainting thirteen-year-olds and the revelation that the past never really stayed buried.
Severus inhaled slowly.
“I am not in the habit of offering comfort I cannot guarantee,” he said. “I will not tell you it will be fine. It may not be. But I will tell you this: we will not stand by and watch without acting. Not this time. Not if I can help it.”
“And if you can’t?” she asked, voice small.
He looked at her fully then.
“I have failed enough,” he said quietly. “I do not intend to add to that tally if I can prevent it.”
Her eyes burned.
She blinked hard, looking away, angry at herself for the tears.
Her bandaged finger pulsed insistently, drawing an annoyed hiss from her.
“May I?” he asked.
She glanced at him, confused.
“Your hand,” he clarified. “I cannot concentrate on doom and idiocy if you keep flinching every time blood reaches your fingertip.”
Despite herself, her mouth twitched.
“Such romance,” she murmured. “Tend to my wounds so we can better discuss doom.”
“It is what passes for romance at our age,” he said.
“Speak for yourself. I’m still in my prime.”
He made a soft, skeptical sound and held out his hand.
She surrendered hers.
The heat of his fingers around her wrist was steady and surprisingly gentle. He turned her palm upward, inspecting the bandage with a critical eye.
“Thicker swelling,” he said, mostly to himself. “Increased heat. You’re going to the Hospital Wing at dawn.”
“Bossy,” she muttered.
“Alive,” he countered. “Preferably with all digits intact. Unless you wish to be known as Professor Black, the woman who lost a finger to a Fanged Geranium. I would prefer not to have to explain that to future generations.”
She snorted, then winced as the movement jostled her hand.
He shifted his grip, thumb resting just above the bandage, not quite touching the worst of it.
For a moment, they were very close.
She could see the tiny flecks of gold in his otherwise black eyes, could smell tea and smoke and the faint, clean tang of potions ingredients clinging to his skin. His hair, often dismissed as greasy by students, simply looked damp and slightly disheveled from the long night.
“Estelle,” he said quietly.
She looked up, pulse stuttering.
“Yes?”
“Sleep, if you can,” he said. “We will need clear heads. And… leave the worst of the fear with me, for tonight.”
The words were clumsy, a little stiff, as if unused. But the intent behind them made something in her chest loosen and ache all at once.
“That’s not how it works,” she said, voice unsteady.
“No,” he agreed. “But if it did, I would insist.”
Her throat closed.
“You’re allowed to be afraid, too,” she said. “You know that, don’t you?”
He looked almost startled.
Then, slowly, he exhaled.
“I am,” he said simply. “Terrified. Of many things. But I am more terrified of what happens when we let that rule us.”
She nodded.
Silence stretched between them, not empty now, but full—of shared history, of grief, of something that might, in another lifetime, have been called hope.
Without quite deciding to, she leaned forward.
Not much. Just enough that their shoulders nearly brushed, that the space between them narrowed.
He moved first.
It was small, almost shy in its own way. He lifted his free hand and, with a hesitation she felt all the way down to her bones, touched her hairline, brushing a stray strand back.
Then he bent his head and pressed his lips to her forehead.
The kiss was brief.
Chaste, technically.
But it held more than most people managed with entire speeches.
Heat flared where his mouth touched her skin—a different kind of warmth than tea or pain or fever. Her eyes drifted closed for a heartbeat, the breath catching in her throat.
When he drew back, he did so slowly, fingers lingering at her temple for a moment before falling away.
“There,” he said quietly. “Consider that an extra measure of protection for Potter and Diggory both.”
She let out a shaky laugh.
“That’s not how that works either,” she said.
“No,” he said again. “But if it was, I would kiss your entire skull and be done with it.”
She laughed properly then, the sound bubbling up despite the heaviness in her chest.
The pain in her finger did not vanish. The fear gnawing at her ribs did not magically dissipate. Harry was still in danger. Cedric was still bound to three tasks designed to test the limits of survival. Someone out there had used the Goblet for a purpose they hadn’t yet seen.
But sitting there, tea cooling on the table, the fire throwing warm light across Severus’s tired, wry face, Estelle felt—if not safe, then at least less alone.
“That’s the second time you’ve threatened to kiss me in two days,” she said lightly, trying to steady herself with humor.
“I did not threaten,” he said. “I merely… suggested.”
“Is that what we’re calling it now?”
“For tonight, yes.”
She picked up her tea again, carefully, ignoring the twinge in her hand.
“Thank you,” she said after a moment. “For the tea. For the… reckless forehead magic.”
“You’re welcome,” he said. He didn’t say ‘anytime.’ He didn’t have to.
After a while, he walked her back to the corridor.
The walk to her chambers felt shorter with him beside her. The castle still hummed with unease, but the darkness seemed less absolute.
At her door, he paused.
“Hospital Wing,” he reminded her.
“Dawn,” she confirmed.
He gave a sharp nod, as though sealing a pact, then turned away, robes whispering along the floor as he vanished back into the dungeon shadows.
Estelle slipped into her rooms, leaning against the closed door for a moment, hand pressed to her forehead where his lips had brushed.
Her finger throbbed, distant and urgent.
Her heart did too.
Outside, the night held its breath around Hogwarts.
Inside, somewhere above and a few corridors over, Harry Potter lay in his four-poster bed, staring at the hangings, the weight of a magical contract pressing into his dreams.
Estelle crawled into her own bed, bandaged hand resting on her chest, and closed her eyes.
She did not expect sleep to come.
But when it finally did, it came threaded through not only with fear and memories of Sirius’s wild grin, but with the faint ghost of Severus’s touch, and the fragile, stubborn resolve that this time—this time—they would not go into the storm with their eyes shut.
The castle shifted around her, as if listening.
And the Triwizard Tournament moved forward, whether any of them were ready or not.