"Of course not!!"
Hermione answered at the speed of light, without even a moment's hesitation.
"I just didn't expect— I mean— why would you suddenly invite— invite me!"
"Because…" Harry faltered under her question. "Because… we get along really well? Because we're friends? Because we're the same age? Because we both need a partner?"
"Alright, alright, that's enough!" Hermione raised one hand in front of her face and let out a long, dramatic sigh. "I get it. I accept."
Harry exhaled in visible relief. "Good. Otherwise I really wouldn't know where to find a date."
"All those girls, the older students… You didn't have anyone else in mind?" Hermione asked, genuinely surprised.
"I'd rather not have one at all," Harry said with a small shake of his head. "I don't even know them. I don't know anything about them."
Hermione didn't reply; she just pressed her lips together, the corners of her mouth twitching as though she were trying not to smile.
The news that Harry had a date spread through Hogwarts faster than a Firebolt. Wherever he went, the hopeful stares that used to follow him turned into something closer to mournful resentment. It gave the acutely perceptive Harry goosebumps.
At the same time, Hermione suddenly became public enemy number one for most of the girls who fancied Harry. But as a champion—especially the champion who had scored full marks in the first task by taking down a dragon single-handed—she had plenty of supporters of her own.
The two camps inevitably clashed. It escalated to the point of people sneaking hexes at each other in the corridors, until Professor McGonagall lost her temper completely and sentenced the lot of them to mucking out dragon dung under Professor Sprout.
In McGonagall's words: "If you have that much excess energy, put it toward something actually useful."
A tragic reality for third-years Ron and Neville was that no upper-year girls asked them to the ball, so they had no choice but to go home for Christmas with their families.
Ron grumbled about it for ages. After all, he already had a girlfriend—Lavender was in third year too—and in private he'd bragged to Harry that if he weren't already taken, he absolutely could have snagged an older girl to take him.
Well… it probably wasn't impossible. Ron was something of a celebrity at Hogwarts these days, after all.
The Great Hall had been transformed into a winter fairyland. The walls glittered with silver frost, the enchanted ceiling showed a brilliant starry sky, and hundreds of mistletoe-and-ivy garlands hung overhead. The four long House tables had been replaced by more than a hundred little lantern-lit tables, each seating about a dozen people.
"Don't be nervous, Harry—turn… you almost stepped on my foot," Hermione murmured, one hand resting lightly on his arm.
As champions—more precisely, as the pairing of two champions—Harry and Hermione were the first couple to lead the dance. Even though they'd practised for days, both of them were still a little tense.
"I know," Harry muttered back. "Er… you look really pretty tonight."
"Thanks?" They kept turning as Hermione glanced up at him in surprise. "I thought you wouldn't notice—"
"Why wouldn't I notice?" Harry said with a grin. "I'm not blind."
"In a certain sense you might as well be…" Hermione muttered under her breath.
"What?"
"Nothing." She shook her head quickly. "I mean—say more!"
"More?" Harry thought for a second. "You used a charm to shrink your front teeth, right?"
"Ah, what keen powers of observation," Hermione laughed, swatting his arm. "Say something else."
"They're very pretty, but still a bit… young," Harry said after another moment. "Like a lily that's just about to bloom—you can smell the fragrance, but it hasn't fully opened yet."
Tonight Hermione wore a white dress robe adorned with sparkling silver decorations. She had clearly tried her hardest to look mature and elegant, but in Harry's eyes, with her still-childish features and figure, the overall effect was simply… adorable.
"Er… thanks." Hermione hadn't expected that; when he finished speaking, she lowered her head, a faint blush rising on her cheeks.
Neither of them was particularly passionate about dancing, so after leading the opening waltz they slipped out a side door, turning down countless other invitations along the way, until they finally found a quiet spot in the courtyard.
The courtyard had been set aside for anyone who wanted a breather from the ball—or, more accurately, for couples looking for a bit of privacy. Since the dance floor was at its liveliest right now, the place was still empty.
Magic kept the air as warm as midsummer, so even thin dress robes were perfectly comfortable. Little magical fairy-creatures flitted through the flowerbeds; they had no real intelligence, just peeked out from the leaves at Harry and Hermione and occasionally giggled.
The moonlight tonight was extraordinarily bright, making the decorative chains gleam white.
"Better than I expected," Hermione said suddenly, sitting down and rubbing her knees.
"Good. I was worried the whole time I'd step on your feet."
"Oh, your steps are heavy," she snickered. "But… can I ask you something? Something kind of personal?"
Harry considered. "Go ahead. But I reserve the right not to answer."
"Of course." Hermione nervously pressed her knees together. "Well… according to you, you lived in that world—Azeroth—for many years, right?"
"Yes," Harry answered frankly. "So I'm a lot older than I look."
"Like Dumbledore?"
"Not that old," Harry said, waving his hands. "If you don't count the age I was when I left, I only lived twenty-seven years in Azeroth."
Hermione whipped her head around, eyes gleaming mischievously. "So you're actually a middle-aged uncle in his forties? Uncle Harry?"
Harry coughed. "If my body from the other world had come back exactly the same, you could call me that. But for some reason, when I returned to this world, my body reverted to eleven years old." He sighed. "You probably can't understand, but it's really inconvenient for me."
"Being a child and being an adult are completely different," Hermione consoled him. "When you suddenly came back like that… the family you had in Azeroth must miss you terribly."
"Yeah…" Harry fell silent for a moment. "They're the family I love most. If I just vanished, they'd be worried sick… And Azeroth has never truly known peace. War never ends…"
"I believe they'll be all right," Hermione said suddenly. "And you said demons have already appeared in our world, right? The elemental languages from Azeroth work here too. That has to mean there's some kind of connection between the worlds—sooner or later you'll see them again."
"…Yeah." Harry smiled. "I think so too."
"So… was there never anyone you liked in that world?"
Hermione kicked off her shoes, tucked her feet under her dress, hugged her arms around herself, and turned to study Harry's face.
"You were an adult there, right? Powerful, with your own responsibilities. A forty-something 'uncle' should have been at the age to settle down and start a family." She spoke quickly, almost as if she herself didn't understand why she sounded so calm, as though this were the most ordinary topic in the world.
"No, and I'm not forty-something," Harry said, rolling his eyes.
"That's not the point!" Hermione reached over and poked him in the side. "Come on—were you married?"
"No," Harry sighed.
"Why not?" Hermione's tone was starting to sound suspiciously like Professor McGonagall. "War is the fastest way to forge friendships—or love. I refuse to believe there wasn't a single woman you were close to. Have you really never been in love? Or… do you like men? Wait—do you actually like real tauren? The kind that are a different species from you physically?"
"I do not like men, and definitely not male tauren, and especially not female tauren!" Harry said, utterly exasperated. "What goes on in that head of yours?"
"Then was there someone you liked?" Hermione pressed. "Someone who made your heart race, someone you wanted to spend the rest of your life with—was there no one at all?"
"I…" Harry opened his mouth, then closed it. "Fine…"
"Aha! I knew it!" Hermione clapped lightly like Sherlock Holmes who'd just found decisive evidence. "I knew there was someone!"
"But it was only liking… Liking someone doesn't mean we'd end up together," Harry said quietly.
"Why not?" Hermione fought to keep her excitement under control and tilted her head. "By your own account, you became the High Chieftain of the tauren tribes, didn't you? You had power, you had authority."
"Maybe that was exactly the problem," Harry said with a bitter smile. "If either of us had just been ordinary people, we might actually have had a chance. But that was impossible—if one of us had been ordinary, we would never have met in the first place."
"That's… true," Hermione swallowed. "I mean… yeah, that makes sense… What kind of person was she? Were you from different nations?"
"She was the princess of the maritime kingdom of Kul Tiras… maybe queen by now… Jaina Proudmoore." Harry gazed up at the moon, voice calm. "Kul Tiras belongs to the Alliance. The tauren tribes I led belong to the Horde. There has never been true peace between Alliance and Horde—war is the eternal song."
"I'm sorry." Even though Harry's expression stayed serene, Hermione could still see sorrow and regret in the eyes of the boy beside her—or rather, the man inside the boy's body.
"There's nothing to be sorry for." Harry seemed to snap out of his memories and smiled. "There's no such thing as a perfect ending in this world. No one can hold every beautiful thing in their hands. That's normal. Come on, we should head back. If both champions disappear for too long, Professor McGonagall might have a fit."
Hermione said nothing, just took the hand Harry offered her, slipped her shoes back on, and stood.
"I don't think things are as hopeless as you believe," she said after they'd walked a little way. "Lady Jaina—sorry, I keep thinking of your owl—anyway, I think she might be waiting for an opportunity too. I don't really understand your Alliance and Horde, but even you admitted there have been brief periods of peace, right?"
"As long as leaders like you keep working at it, one day you'll definitely achieve lasting peace." She stopped walking and pulled Harry to a halt, looking at him earnestly. "When that day comes, you can be together."
"…Maybe," Harry said after a long silence, meeting her shining eyes. "But right now, that's impossible."
"Yeah." The corners of Hermione's mouth curved slightly. "You've come back to our world, after all… Let's go in."
She didn't say anything more, just tightened her grip on Harry's hand.
Inside the Great Hall, the music was still joyous.
Time flew by amid the students' excitement. The secret of the golden eggs was no longer a secret—everyone knew each champion's egg contained a parchment inscribed with a different spell. Speculation immediately shifted to what those spells might be for, and the guessing games continued unabated.
Winter slipped away unnoticed. When the students next realised Professor McGonagall was looking tense again, they finally looked up from their piles of homework and practice drills and remembered that the second task was almost upon them.
24 February—that was the official date of the second task. The half-destroyed arena from the first task had somehow been fully repaired, the weather had warmed slightly, but it was still cold enough to bite.