Wandlore really was fascinating, but Tver didn't pay it much attention.
If he had any particular feelings about his aspen wand, there was only one:
It was beautiful.
White wands were rare in the wizarding world to begin with, and ones with aspen's elegant, mysterious grain were rarer still. And the patterning on Tver's wand was even more regular than most.
As for the supposed benefits people liked to talk about, strength, willpower, and the rest, he'd never felt any of it.
Because whether he used a wand or not, the spells he cast came out the same. No difference at all.
Really, by the time wand woods and cores had been passed down to the present day, almost anything still considered suitable for wandmaking had some "remarkable" quality. The truly ordinary materials had been weeded out long ago. What was left was, more or less, a collection of absurdly impressive options.
So even if Ollivander made it sound grand, if aspen really was that extraordinary, why stop making wands from it?
Because other materials were simply more practical.
And that was that. Everyone, Tver included, quickly forgot the little interlude and moved on to taking photos under Rita's direction.
They started with a standard group picture. But Madam Maxime was so imposing that the photographer had to seat her and arrange everyone else on either side before he finally managed a shot he was happy with.
Then Rita insisted on more pictures "for the article": individual portraits of the Champions, pairs of each Champion with their headmaster, and a three-person photo featuring Hogwarts and Durmstrang.
At the end, she tried to push her luck by asking for individual photos of each Champion with the judging panel. One restrained, warning look from an increasingly impatient Tver made her back down. She hurried out of the classroom with her photographer, clearly annoyed, but moving fast all the same.
As if she was afraid Tver would keep scolding her.
"All right, off you go," Dumbledore said at last. "It's nearly evening. I expect the Great Hall will be setting out dinner any moment now."
Even Dumbledore, with his unusual reserves of energy, sounded relieved.
Tver's eyes brightened, and he immediately moved to follow him toward the Great Hall.
But a voice called out behind him.
"Um, Professor Fawley… do you have a moment? There's something I'd like to talk to you about…"
The accent was distinctive enough that Tver turned around in surprise.
Fleur stood where she was, a little stiff, ignoring Madam Maxime's concerned look. She held Tver's gaze steadily, as if she'd decided not to back down.
Karkaroff's eyes flicked back and forth between them. Before he could say anything, Tver spoke first.
"Of course. Would you all mind giving us a little privacy?"
"Certainly." Bagman pulled back his curious stare, tugged at Madam Maxime when she frowned, and ushered everyone out of the classroom. He even shut the door behind them.
What Tver hadn't expected was how odd the room felt afterward. Without the torchlight outside, the classroom was lit only by the fading dusk through the windows, and the atmosphere shifted in a way that was hard to name.
Fleur, on the other hand, let out a quiet breath, as though the attention from everyone earlier had weighed on her more than she'd shown.
"Right."
Tver snapped his fingers and lit the candles around the room. It immediately felt more normal.
"Thank you," Fleur said softly.
Tver blinked, confused.
"You're thanking me for lighting candles? If that's all it takes, the boys in this castle would happily carry candles around all day."
"No." Fleur laughed, genuinely amused.
"I meant… thank you for saving Gabrielle this summer. I wanted to bring her with me to thank you properly, but she still has lessons to make up!"
By the end of that, a sharp, almost fierce edge flickered across her expression. For a moment, it reminded Tver of Professor McGonagall.
Still, Beauxbatons' missed lessons were, in a way, Hogwarts' problem.
"That part is on us," Tver said. "Coordinating classes takes time. You may have to wait until next week before you can attend lessons with the Hogwarts students."
The curriculum and pace didn't match up, so Professor McGonagall, as Hogwarts' representative, still needed to discuss things with the other two headmasters before deciding which classes Beauxbatons and Durmstrang students could join.
"No, I didn't mean I blame you," Fleur said quickly, looking a little embarrassed. "It's just…"
"I think you've noticed that Gabrielle and I are Veela mixed-blood. Our talent for magic isn't as strong as a normal wizard's, so we have to work harder. But Gabrielle is always so careless about studying."
(For Fleur, the idea of "mixed-blood" wasn't quite the same as it was for other witches and wizards.)
Tver already knew Fleur and Gabrielle were Veela mixed-blood, from what he remembered and from the moment he first met them.
But being mixed-blood affected magical talent?
That, he honestly hadn't known.
Then again, he hadn't met many mixed-blood witches and wizards. If he was being strict about it, the only ones he knew well were Hagrid and Madam Maxime, both mixed-blood giants.
Hagrid's lack of polish had more to do with his education being cut short than anything else. His actual ability… was probably not bad at all.
And as for Madam Maxime, she was Beauxbatons' headmistress. Tver hadn't seen her in action, but he was certain her spellwork had to be among the best in Europe.
Fleur seemed to catch what he was thinking.
"That's because the mixed-blood witches and wizards you've met are the exceptional ones."
Survivor bias, Tver realized suddenly.
"We have to put in several times the effort just to make up the difference," Fleur continued. "And throughout history, there haven't been many mixed-blood wizards, but among the truly famous top-tier figures, not a single one was mixed-blood. Talent always ends up limiting how far we can go."
Tver ran through what he knew of wizarding history and, to his surprise, found it hard to argue.
Of course, it was also possible those great figures had never publicized their blood status, or that it simply hadn't been recorded. That wasn't impossible.
But there was no need to debate Fleur on it. She was the one living it. She understood her own limits better than he did, and she had no reason to invent something like this.
"So," Tver said, "as Beauxbatons' Champion, you must have worked incredibly hard."
"And even then," Fleur said with a light, bitter smile that looked closer to mockery than amusement, "all anyone talks about is my blood. Worse, they think my success comes from Veela blood!"
"People are like that," Tver replied. "They love finding excuses for someone else's success, and for their own failures."
He'd heard plenty of that kind of talk back when he was in school, people insisting his strength came from the Fawley family bloodline.
Even in the stories, plenty of people liked to pin Dumbledore's power on the Elder Wand.
But in truth, whether Dumbledore held the Elder Wand or not, it wouldn't have changed the fact that he defeated Grindelwald and Voldemort.