A Penchant for Mischief [Rise of the Brave Tangled Dragons Hogwarts AU]

Tea Leaves and Muddied Waters

Smearing a healthy layer of jam across a buttered bun as he listened to the daily dramas of Hogwarts, Jack's eyes wandered up and down the benches and tables set throughout the Great Hall, wondering who else had entered the Tetra-Wix Tournament. Not that he was scoping out his competition, per se, it was more of an idle curiosity. After six years with the same folks, he thought he had a pretty good idea which of his peers would be the type to enter and which would not, but there had certainly been some surprises.

At the sound of footsteps, Jack glanced up and saw his housemates turning to watch as a stout Gryffindor boy with a topknot marched up to the centre of the room and entered his name into the Goblet of Fire. The flames reached up and consumed the parchment, then shrank back below the rim, as it had been doing since the ancient chalice had first been unveiled a week prior. Although entries seemed to have slowed to a trickle now, there seemed to still be at least one per day.

Reaching across the table, Jack dunked the bun into a large cup of coffee with a foamy swirl of hazelnut cream on the surface.

"Hey! What d'you think you're doing?" Aster demanded as he snatched the cup off the table, sloshing the dark brown liquid down the sides of the cup in the process.

"Losing my breakfast, apparently."

Still glaring, Aster's narrowed green eyes followed Jack's brown ones to the cup in his hands, where the bun which Jack had taken so much care in buttering bobbed and slowly began sinking to its hazelnut-flavoured demise. Disgusted, Aster set the cup back on the table, causing more of the coffee to spill over the edge and pool on the ancient wooden tabletop. "Well, dip it in your own damned coffee next time."

"I would, but mine's cold."

Rolling his eyes, Aster shook his head and with a long sigh, set about finding himself a replacement coffee.

Across the table, Jack picked up his glass of iced coffee and after swishing around the remaining ice cubes, took a long sip from a blue-striped glass straw. "You know, I've been thinking..."

"Good on you, mate," Aster said drily, carefully pouring a measure of hazelnut cream from a small silver pitcher into a fresh cup of coffee. "Only took the best part of seventeen years."

"Bunny, I'm touched," Jack put his hand on his heart and gave his most sincere grin. "That you feel I've been the best part of your last seventeen years."

"I see basic literary comprehension is still not your strong suit."

"I get by," Jack shrugged.

"Yeah, by the skin of your teeth." Aster snorted. "Last I heard, you're barely even tailing the rest of our year."

"Maybe so, but I'd rather that than having my tail between my legs," Jack leaned his elbows on the table and knit his fingers together under his chin. "You know, I really didn't take you for a coward."

"Oh, here we go," Aster set the tiny pitcher on the table and slowly raised his coffee to his lips for a tentative sip, taking time to savour the taste before he turned his green eyes towards Jack. "Riddle me this, Frost. If I'm a coward, what does that make you?"

"At least a few notches higher, I'm sure," Jack said. "I mean, I already put my name in the Goblet."

"You, Hogwarts' champion?" Aster almost spat, choking on his coffee. "Think I'd sooner cheer for the other schools."

"Where's your sense of school pride?"

"Flushed down the bloody toilet along with any hope of winning if your name's the one that comes out of the Goblet."