FINITE | Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire [4]

𝘅𝘅𝘅𝘃𝗶𝗶𝗶 | 𝗳𝗶𝗻𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗮 𝗱𝗮𝘁𝗲

The Hogwarts staff, demonstrating their continued desire to impress their Beauxbatons and Durmstrang guests, seemed determined to show the castle at its best this Christmas. When the decorations went up, Gwen immediately noticed that they were by far the best decorations she had ever seen inside the school. The usual twelve Christmas trees in the Great Hall were decked with everything from luminous holly berries to real golden owls, and the suits of armour had been bewitched to sing Christmas hymns whenever anyone passed them. They would have been impressive if they didn't only know half of the words; on several occasions, Gwen had witnessed Filch the caretaker extracting Peeves from inside the open helmets filling in the missing words with his own cursing lyrics.

  And still, Gwen had not been asked to the ball. She had to admit she was quite upset about it. She wondered if maybe Pansy Parkinson was right when she had said 'Stunningly pretty? Her?'

  But Hermione and Ginny had shaken that thought from her instantly.

  'Don't you dare,' Hermione said, somewhat rudely.

  'What?' Gwen said.

  'Gwen, you can literally change your entire appearance at will, and you don't,' Ginny said. The girls were walking the Hogwarts grounds, the Durmstrang ship looming a great shadow over them. 'I would love more than anything to be able to do that.'

  'This isn't my real nose,' Gwen said, gesturing to her face. 'I do change things about myself--'

  'But you don't change your whole face!' Hermione snapped. 'You don't have to! You're really pretty, even that Fleur Delacour looks twice at you.'

  'She probably thinks I'm her long lost cousin or something,' Gwen said, kicking a pile of dead leaves. 'It's the hair.'

  'Point is, Gwen, you're gorgeous,' said Ginny. 'Not in a stuck up way like Fleur. You could literally change your whole face, but you choose not to.'

  Gwen didn't really agree with them. She knew she had nice hair, that's why she opted to keep it blonde most of the time (that, and also her parents had told her from a young age that unnatural colours were unattractive), but she would never look in the mirror and call herself pretty. She liked her face, she wasn't unhappy with it, but she didn't like her eyes or her nose, and would never leave her bedroom if she hadn't magically modified them.

  'Have you got anyone?' she asked Hermione, taking the subject off herself; she didn't like to talk about herself much.

  Hermione suddenly blushed bright pink, and turned her face away, grinning. 'I got asked this morning.'

  'By who?' Gwen and Ginny said together, both of them smiling suddenly.

  'Promise you won't say anything?' Hermione said. 'Especially not to Harry and Ron.'

  Gwen and Ginny promised, each of them grabbing one of Hermione's arms and shaking them.

  Hermione took a deep breath. 'Viktor Krum.'