all the whispers of the possible become clear

Chapter 4: 4th Year

"Well, that was cryptic." Rose mused.

"Yeah." Albus frowned as he dumped his bag in the overhead compartment. "What did Mum mean by us seeing Dad soon? Surely he doesn't have Auror work at Hogwarts."

"How cool would that be, though?" Lily clapped her hands in excitement. "Imagine being like Dad and Uncle Ron and Aunt Hermione, scrounging the depths of the castle for a hidden evil..."

"Or the Triwizard Tournament of 1994." Hugo reminded her, and she nodded enthusiastically. "Though after what happened I doubt they'll be in a hurry to reinstate that any time soon."

Rose sighed softly, remembering how Uncle Harry had told them about the Tournament and the meaningless death of Cedric Diggory in the graveyard. For all the exciting adventures her parents had been through, they involved a lot of pain and misery which Rose had no desire to experience. She sighed again.

"Didn't anyone teach you the polite thing to do when you see someone after a long break?" Scorpius raised a brow as he stood at the door of their carriage, having assumed that the sigh was for him.

"Please. I saw you more often than I saw most of my cousins." Rose scoffed. "I hardly think you deserve an enthusiastic greeting."

"Oh, how she wounds me." Scorpius said dryly, earning a giggle from Lily and exasperated eye-rolling from Albus and Hugo.

"Oi, Malfoy, either get in or move away." Fred Weasley said amiably from behind the Slytherin boy, who complied by entering the carriage.

"Where's James?" Lily asked Fred.

"I dunno, probably hiding from Emma somewhere on the train." Fred waved a hand nonchalantly.

"Who's Emma?" Scorpius whispered to Albus.

"Emily Wood, our team's Keeper." Albus explained. "James thinks she might be mad because he made Captain instead of her after David Smythe graduated."

Scorpius tried to imagine getting angry at one of his Slytherin year-mates for becoming a prefect instead of him, and failed. He looked over to Rose, expecting her to feel the same, only to see her flipping through a textbook.

"Really, Weasley, I know I'm stiff competition, but studying on the Hogwarts Express is just sad."

She glared at him. "I don't need extra study time to beat you hollow, Malfoy."

Fred leaned back in the seat, amused at the repartee going on in front of him. He took a look at Rose's book and smiled. "Ah, to be a fourth-year again. History of Magic doesn't get any easier. Enjoy it while it lasts, kiddo."

Hugo leaned over to glance through the chapter titles. "Oh."

"What?" Lily nudged him with her foot.

"It's about the Second Wizarding War." Hugo explained.

"In other words, bedtime stories for the Weasley-Potter clan." Fred concluded smugly.

No one noticed Scorpius shifting uncomfortably in his seat.

--

Despite the fact that Gryffindors and Slytherins no longer shared the same animosity to each other that they'd used to, it was common knowledge that their personalities tended to clash and that they generally didn't like each other that much.

It made Albus wonder who had decided to put them in Defence Against the Dark Arts together. He also wondered why the professor thought pairing each Gryffindor against a Slytherin to practice was a good idea. Perhaps he figured that they'd then be more serious about duelling each other.