Chapter 91: CHAPTER 84: THE QUIDDITCH WORLD CUP FINAL

O fortune, fortune! all men call thee fickle:

If thou art fickle, what dost thou with him.

That is renown’d for faith? Be fickle, fortune;

For then, I hope, thou wilt not keep him long,

But send him back.

 

– Shakespeare (Romeo and Juliet, 3.5.59-63)

 

~~~~

 

24th of August 1994, Ed was outside the cottage, as lately he’s rarely going into the suitcase anymore, he doesn’t know why, but he felt more ‘alone’ in the island rather than in the suitcase, as Gilligan can see everywhere there. He was now building some kind of giant pendulum at the edge of a cliff, looking at him are Ciri and Hermione, who were enjoying themselves, having a picnic.

"What is this for anyway?" Ed grumbled, looking at the two giggling girls.

"For training, of course." Ciri answered. "You told me to train Hermione and you in the ways of the sword, then you have to make this thing."

"Well, what if we fall?" Ed questioned.

"Then don’t fall." Ciri answered simply.

Ed sighed as he continued building the thing. He placed the wood one by one, using a levitation charm so he wouldn’t be too tired. He hadn’t made the pendulum itself yet, and that takes a lot of time.

After he finished doing the base of the ‘podium’, he walked back to the two girls, joining them.

"Here." Hermione gave him a piece of sandwich and a glass of juice, which he happily accepted.

"Magic’s unfair." Ciri commented. "You did all that with no sweat…"

"What? Do you want to see me sweaty?" Ed joked.

"No, but Hermione does." Ciri smirked, making Hermione embarrassed and smacking the young woman’s shoulder.

"Shut up." She mumbled, still blushing, which earned a chuckle from Ciri and Ed.

"Anyway." Ed bit into his sandwich and ate it quickly. "You owl the Weasleys yet?" he asked Hermione.

Hermione frowned and scoffed at Ed. "I did."

Ed chuckled once again. "Don’t whine Hermione, the plan’s changed, Ciri’s here now, and I can’t exactly leave her unsupervised here."

"I’m not a child, you know." Ciri pointed it out in dissatisfaction, but Ed ignored her.

"Why can’t we bring her there then?" Hermione asked, still insisting. 

"Yeah, why can’t I join you?" Ciri repeated.

Ed sighed. "You want her to fight the death eaters?"

"I can fight." Ciri stated.

"With swords, not sticks." Ed half-joked.

"You wizards fight weirdly…" Ciri mumbled.

"Well, you can just send her back when the time comes." Hermione insisted again.

"Yeah, but—"

Before Ed could finish the sentence, an owl suddenly swooped down on them, dropping a letter in front of Ed, which surprised everyone, especially Ciri.

Ed took the letter and opened it. He read the content of the letter and sighed in surrender.

"What is it?" Hermione asked.

"It’s from Lupin." Ed said. "The ministry had apparently dropped a late invitation for the World Cup on me and Richard."

"So you’ll go?!" Hermione asked rather excitedly, her face showing a bright smile.

"I don’t know Hermione…" Ed said, making Hermione frown a bit. "What about Ciri over here?"

"We can bring her Ed, if the riot happens, you can just blink her back…" Hermione pleaded.

Ed sighed. "Fine…" Ed relented, which made Hermione shriek in happiness, hugging the boy.

"Hold on! How did you not talk about the fact that an owl just delivered a letter right now?!" Ciri inquired, still perplexed by the strange sight of an owl delivering a letter.

The couple then sighed at the sight of Ciri's uneducatedness, and Hermione started to explain it to the young woman, while Ed just left them alone, not wanting to hear Hermione’s rambling.

The next day, Hermione had cancelled her trip with the Weasleys, and early in the morning, Ed was packing things, a bit of food, some clothes, and the owl mask.

"Ready Hermione?" Ed shouted.

"Wait! I forgot my metal bracelets! " she panickily said.

"Just be quick!"

Ciri then entered the living room where Ed was. "Why metal bracelets?"

"It’s her thing." Ed vaguely said. "Anyway, after this trip, you need to meet a family of mine that can train you better than me."

"Who is it?" Ciri questioned.

"You’ll see." Ed once again vaguely said. "Just don’t freak out when you meet him."

Ciri scoffed. "I’m not a scaredy cat."

Ed chuckled. "Yeah, right."

Hermione then hurriedly joined them, "What are you talking about?" she questioned, ragged as she was hurrying.

"Just talking about a particular owl." Ed said. "Ready?"

"Yeah." Hermione smiled softly.

The three were then covered in blue particles, and it slowly made them disappear, leaving no traces.

The group then appeared in Ed’s office. It was still early in the morning, so it was still a bit dark. There was no one in the room, but Ed could sense that there were two people downstairs.

"Let’s go, someone’s waiting already." Ed said, and the group exited the room, walking downstairs.

As all of them went down the stairs, Ed could see that Lupin and Richard were already there, Richard had a rucksack behind him.

"Hello, Remus, Richard."

"Hello Ed— Whow, who’s this? " Richard pointed at Ciri, who didn’t really mind him pointing.

"This is Ciri… my distant cousin." Ed lied, because Lupin was in the room.

Richard just eyed him suspiciously and shrugged. He then looked at Ciri and introduced himself. "Richard Neil, at your service."

"Ciri." The young woman simply answered.

"Nice scar by the way." Richard pointed out again. "It’s wicked."

"Well, thank you." Ciri blushed a bit from the compliment. "No one ever said that before… not even him." she pointed at Ed, which made him snort in amusement.

"Right, now that the introduction is over, let’s go to the World Cup." Lupin interrupted.

"You’re watching?" Ed asked.

"No, I’d rather stay here. It’s nice being at work." Lupin said. "You boys and girls, enjoy yourselves, and the minister wants to talk to you, Ed."

Ed sighed. "I already know that, What else would he invite me…"

Lupin just nodded, and he pulled out a portkey in the shape of a goblet. "Grab the goblet, it should activate any minute now."

"What?" Ciri was confused as everyone grabbed the goblet.

"Just do it, Ciri." Ed grabbed her hand and put it on the goblet, and not a second later, they instantly apparated away from the store, and into a field of tents that was packed with people.

Ed then saw that Ciri was throwing up next to him, and Ed just patted her back to comfort her.

"W-What was that?" she asked while groaning.

"Apparition and portkey, it’s different from our way of teleportation." Ed informed. "It makes you feel nauseous."

"Ugh... I never want to do that again. "

"It’s only the first time." Ed said. "But I get what you’re saying."

The group was then led by Lupin to their tent. It was a normal tent, ordered by the ministry, and doesn’t really look fancy at all.

"Here’s your tent." Lupin said, "I haven’t checked what’s inside yet, but I’m sure it’ll be adequate."

"Right…" Ed and the group entered the tent, and Ed saw that it had a dining table, and a kitchen. He hadn’t seen the bedroom yet, though.

"Alright, boys and girls, I’ll leave you here." Lupin said, leaving the group.

"Let’s check the bedroom." Ed stated, and the group spread out to check what they were working with. A couple of minutes later, the group gathered back to the dining room.

"We only have three beds, a room with a bed, and the other room with two beds." Richard said. "That shouldn’t be a problem right?"

"Yeah." Ed continued. "I can sleep with Hermione, while you and Ciri get the other two beds."

"I get to sleep with him?" Ciri asked, pointing at Richard.

"Yes, you’ll be sleeping in the same room. Different beds, though." Ed confirmed.

Ciri sighed. "Fine."

The group then split up again to put their things down. Ed and Hermione walked to their bed and placed a bag on it.

"What do you want to do?" Ed asked the girl.

"I want to visit Luna first, I think she’s already here with her dad." Hermione answered.

"Alright then."

After they settled in, the two exited the room once more, and grouped up with Richard and Ciri, who were getting to know each other in the kitchen.

"Alright, me and Hermione are going to Luna’s tent. You want to come?"

"Sure—"

But then, a rather formal suited man with a green hat entered the tent unannounced, interrupting the conversation.

"Good day, Mr. Aldrich, and Mr. Neil." He greeted, ignoring the rest.

Ed frowned. "Did your parents ever teach you manners minister?"

"Pardon me?" The man, who was the minister, Cornelius Fudge was surprised.

"You entered our tent unannounced." As Ed pointed out, "Is that polite, minister? No. it’s invasion of privacy. And as you might know from the oh so exaggerated news last spring, I valued my privacy dearly…" he said, sharply as ever with a threatening tone.

"Oh, well, forgive me…" Minister coughed privately, "I was hoping that we have some tea together… to discuss… business…"

Ed sighed at this. "I thought I told the ministry that every problem that the ministry has with my and Richard’s company goes through Mr. Lupin?" Ed questioned, frowning at the ministry.

"Well, Mr. Lupin himself that this problem cannot be decided by him himself, he recommended that I should talk to the both of you."

Ed sighed. "Fine." He answered. "You’ll talk to Richard."

"Wait what?" Richard was definitely caught off guard. "What about you?"

"These two needed guarding." Ed simply said, pointing at Hermione and Ciri. "Especially her." Ed specifically pointed at Ciri.

"Like I said, I’m not a child." Ciri scoffed.

Richard just sighed in surrender. "Fine, go... I’ll deal with this."

Ed just hummed and went out of the tent with Hermione and Ciri, leaving Richard and the Minister alone to ‘discuss’ business.

The trio then searched the field of tents. The place was decorated with green and red, the colours pointing to their allegiance to the team that will play tonight.

When they searched, the group bumped into someone unfamiliar yet familiar to Ed, it was a little girl, around 9-12 years old, she had silvery-blonde hair, just like someone that Ed knew. She was crying and panicking, looking around the place, Ed didn’t recognise the girl, Hermione though, recognised the girl.

"Gabrielle! " She shouted, making the little girl notice her presence.

‘Gabrielle, Fleur’s sister?’ Ed thought in his mind, and the little girl recognising Hermione confirms his thought.

"Hermione!" the girl shouted excitedly, running to the group, hugging Hermione tightly, which Hermione returned to.

"What are you doing here alone?" Hermione spoke in rough French, making Ed surprised a bit.

"I- I was separated from my sister…" she started to cry a bit again.

"Shh… don’t cry…" Hermione calmed the little girl down. "Let’s go find your sister shall we?" she said to Gabrielle, in which the little girl nodded meekly.

Hermione then looked at Ed, and he had a knowing look. Ed then scanned the entire grounds with his space magic, and instantly found the location of Fleur, who was also panicking, looking for her little sister.

"Here." Ed then walked towards the direction of Fleur and guided the rest. On the way, Ciri was questioning everything around her, Ed felt strange, to say the least. She reminded him of himself a bit, just a tad bit.

"What language did Hermione speak just now by the way?" she asked.

"It’s called French." Ed answered. "We have a lot of languages here."

Ciri hummed, but when they were about to arrive at Fleur, who everybody can see now, Ciri froze up for some reason, staring directly upfront.

"You alright?" Ed questioned, confused at the situation.

"Y-Yeah…" she recollected herself. "Yeah… I’m good."

The group then walked to Fleur, and Gabrielle ran to her immediately.

"Gabrielle!" Fleur also ran to the little girl, hugging her immediately. "Where did you go?!"

"I- I was pushed away…" she stammered, hugging her big sister.

Fleur just comforted the little girl for a couple of minutes, and finally noticed the group behind her little sister. She broke away from the little girl and started to hug Ed, much to Hermione’s dismay.

"Good to see you Ed." She spoke in rough English. "Thank you for finding my sister…"

Fleur then kissed Ed’s cheeks, earning a scoff from Hermione.

"Alright Fleur, don’t be too touchy." Hermione pushed the Veela away from Ed.

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"Oh Hermione!" Fleur ignored her words and hugged her, and she did the same thing to her, kissing both of her cheeks.

She then looked at Ciri, who had a dazed look. "Who is this?"

"Oh, she’s my… distance cousin." Ed nudged Ciri, who still had a dazed look on her face.

"Really?" Fleur raised her eyebrow. "Fleur Delacour, nice to meet you." Fleur stretched her hand towards her, but Ciri was still frozen.

Ed then pinched her hip to wake her up from whatever dream she was having, and she stuttered. "O-Oh… I’m Cirilla— I mean Ciri! Call me Ciri!..." Ciri’s face was red right now, making Ed confused, but Hermione had a knowing look.

"Nice to meet you Ciri." Fleur smiled softly at Ciri, then she turned to Ed. "You are taller than before." She commented.

"Of course." Ed scoffed. "It’s called puberty."

"Well, puberty certainly does you good." Said Fleur, winking at Ed, which made Hermione groan in annoyance.

"Can you stop flirting with him?" Hermione complained.

"What? it’s not like he’s taken or anything…" Fleur said in a low, slightly seductive tone.

"He IS taken." Hermione glared menacingly at Fleur. She held Ed’s hand and showed it to Veela. "By me."

"Really?" Fleur squealed. "I’m glad that my little brother got a girlfriend then!" she stated, which caught Hermione off guard, but the brown-haired girl sighed in relief that Fleur probably won’t flirt with Ed anymore.

Ed just sighed, "Where are your parents, Fleur?"

"They’re talking to the British Ministry official right now." She informed. "Do you want to look around with us?"

"Well, we were about to look for the Lovegood’s tent. You should come with us. Who knows, you might make a new friend there." Ed said. "You’re going to Hogwarts after alright? This year? "

"Yes, Triwizard Tournament, I’m surprised you know." Fleur answered. Now the group was walking to the Lovegood’s. "Are you competing?"

"Oh no." Ed shook his head. "But word of advice: be careful and I suggest that you don’t bring your sister there."

Fleur looked at Ed weirdly. "Why?"

"It’s the Triwizard Tournament Fleur. They won’t just endanger you, they’ll endanger the people you care about."

"They won’t do that..." Fleur said weakly.

"Then you’re too naïve Fleur. too naïve…"

Fleur then went to talk to Hermione, bringing her sister with her, leaving Ed to talk to Ciri.

"What’s with the dazed stare by the way?" Ed questioned.

"I- I don’t know, whenever I look at Fleur, I feel really attracted to her, like really attracted…"

Ed was surprised. "You like girls?"

"I swing both ways." She simply said. "Anyway, what is happening to me?"

"It’s because of her heritage." Ed answered. "She’s part Veela."

"What’s a Veela?"

"Semi-human beings." Ed continued. "They have this hypnotical aura that makes everyone who is attracted to females attracted to her."

"Is that why?"

"Yup."

"Why aren’t you attracted then?"

"Mental shield." Ed said. "After this trip, you definitely need to learn it."

Ciri just nodded weakly, and after a couple minutes, they finally arrived at the tent, who was quite eye-catching in Ed’s opinion, because the colour was different than the other tent, it was purple.

"Hermione! Ed! " The boy could hear a dreamy voice shout from inside the tent, and someone got out of the tent. It was Luna Lovegood. The dreamy girl then hugged Hermione, which Hermione hugged back.

"How was your summer Luna?" Hermione asked, while Ed got a hug from Luna too.

"It was okay." she said with her signature tone. "Dad took me around Sweden to find some magical creatures."

"Did you find one?" Ed asked, curious about the answer.

"Sadly, no…" Luna answered, still in her signature tone, but with a bit of sadness in it. "But Sweden was cold though."

"Well that’s great Luna." Hermione said.

"Luna? Who is it? " Ed heard a man’s voice inside the tent, and the man got out of the tent. It was probably Luna’s father, Xenophilius Lovegood.

"This is Hermione Granger, dad, and this is Ed Aldrich." She introduced the two, but then she looked at the rest of the group, who were standing there awkwardly. "Um... I don’t quite know the rest of them."

Ed just chuckled at this. "These two blondes are Fleur Delacour and her sister Gabrielle, while this is Ciri, my distant cousin."

"Well, it’s good to meet all of you." Luna casually said.

"Aldrich? As in the genius boy? When my Luna said that she was friends with you I thought she was lying."

"Well, you should trust your daughter’s words more in the future than Mr. Lovegood." Ed chuckled. "Edgart Aldrich, it's a pleasure to meet you."

"Oh, please come in." Mr. Lovegood insisted the group come into the tent, which the rest happily complied with.

Ed was reluctant, but he walked to the tent anyway, and when he was about to move, Luna spoke.

"Ed doesn’t want to enter the tent dad, he looked like he was hurrying off, we could talk outside." Luna spoke in her usual tone to her dad, devoid of any other emotion.

"Is that right?" Mr. Lovegood questioned. "Well, forgive me."

"It’s fine Mr. Lovegood, it’s just that we left Richard in the tent with the minister, and I don’t really know what would happen to them if they were in the same room for long periods of time…"

"Well it’s fine then, Luna and you all could talk to each other." He said. "But could I talk to Ed for a minute?"

"Oh, sure, Mr. Lovegood."

Ed then followed Mr. Lovegood beside the tent, while the rest caught up with each other.

"So Ed, how was my Luna in school last year?" he said.

Ed grimaced. "To tell you the truth, Mr. Lovegood? It’s bad... Her own housemates are bullying her. "

Mr. Lovegood frowned. "She reported it right?"

Ed shook his head. "She blames magical creatures for the bullying."

Mr. Lovegood sighed. "Can you protect her in school, Ed?"

"Already working on it Mr. Lovegood." Ed said. "Though it’s mostly my friend Richard who tried to stop the bullying, he’s at the same house as her."

"Then I have to thank that young lad next time I meet him." Mr. Lovegood nodded. "By the way Ed, are you interested in investing in my newspaper outlet, we have—"

Mr. Lovegood then continued to try to persuade Ed to invest in his company, while he was doing that, Fleur was now talking to Luna, she found her quite interesting, she isn’t like any other girls who was simply jealous at her looks, she found her personality quite intriguing in some ways, she was simply looking for a friend, a true friend, and Fleur liked her a lot, maybe she could spend time with her more this school year.

Fleur had different ideas about Ciri though. The young woman was mysterious. She looked like she was at her age, which made the two have a connection instantly, but she was always stuttering when faced with her. She had a suspicion that Ciri was into girls, but then her thoughts were interrupted by Ed coming back to the group, making her a bit uncomfortable.

"I will think about it Mr. Lovegood." He said. "If I’m ever interested, then I will owl you."

Mr. Lovegood just nodded. And the group said goodbye to the Lovegood’s. The group then toured the grounds a bit, mostly because of Ciri’s insistence as she wanted to explore.

After about half an hour, Fleur and Gabrielle parted ways with them as it’s nearly time for the match to start. The group realised that too, and quickly went to their tent. But on the way, they found the Weasleys' tent, which Hermione insisted on greeting them.

Ed relented, and the group entered the tent, greeting the redheads.

"Ed!" Mr. Weasley suddenly greeted. "Good to see you."

"Hello Mr. Weasley." Ed hugged the man, patting his back. "Good to see you too."

"When did you arrive?" Mr. Weasley asked, and Ed saw in the corner of his eyes that Hermione was talking to the other Weasleys, and she was introducing Ciri to them.

"This morning." Ed answered. "I wasn’t going to go to be honest, but Hermione insisted and the minister wanted to talk to us as well."

"The minister?" Mr. Weasley raised his eyebrow. "Well, I see that you have become a successful young man." The man smiled and patted Ed’s shoulder.

"Thank you Mr. Weasley." Ed answered. Mr. Weasley then wandered off to the kitchen, while Ed walked to the rest of the Weasleys.

"Well hello there boss." One of the twins said.

"Business has been going well, isn't it?" the other grinned.

Ed just shrugged. "Quite well." He answered. "Your share has been transferred right?"

Fred sighed. "It’s a lot of money Ed…" he said. "We probably won’t be this successful without you."

"We don’t know what we’re going to do with all the money…" George continued.

"I’m sure you can figure it out." Ed said. "Maybe you could do something similar like me, creating a company and temporarily making an adult run it."

"Nah we’d rather run it ourselves." Fred denied.

"It’s not fun to make other people run it." George added.

Ed shrugged. "Alright, suit yourself."

Ed then saw that Hermione was arguing a bit with Ron, Ed just sighed at the sight and came over to them.

"What’s going on…" Ed said lazily.

"Ronald here is being a jealous prick." Hermione scowled.

"I’m not!" Ron refuted. "I’m simply asking you why you ditched us!"

"I didn’t!" Hermione hissed. "I’m here!"

"But you went with Ed!"

"It’s the original plan!" Hermione argued. "I owled your family because Ed told me that he wouldn’t come! But he got an owl from the minister at the last minute! So I cancelled the meeting with your family!"

"Bloody hell, could you all stop? Please?" Ed was a bit annoyed, which made Harry grateful, as he didn’t know what to do.

Ron just grumbled. "Whatever." He said, slightly eyeing Ciri. He then left the conversation, walking towards the kitchen.

"Well, that was something." Ciri commented.

Ed sighed. "Come on Hermione, we need to get Richard first. Say goodbye to everybody."

"You’re leaving already? The match is about to start." Harry questioned.

"Yeah, we left Richard with the minister…" Ed commented. "We need to fetch him first."

"See you later then."

The group then said goodbye to the family and went back to their tent. In there, Ed saw that Richard and the minister were waiting for them, which made Ed confused.

"What’s going on?" Ed questioned.

"Well, the minister offered us something." Richard said. "But I couldn’t decide on what to do… so I told him to wait for you…"

Ed raised his eyebrows. "What do you offer, minister?"

"Come on, the match is about to start, we’ll talk while we go to the stands." Fudge said, pushing the group to the stadium.

"So?" Ed asked again, walking towards the stadium.

"I’m simply offering your company a deal Mr. Aldrich." Fudge said, a bit sweating. "We want the privilege of ordering in bulk and being a preferred customer."

Ed narrowed his eyes. "In exchange?"

"Anything." Fudge coughed.

"Anything?"

"Yes." Fudge nodded. "The ministry is having internal strife because of the lack of a protective necklace... The aurors are protesting. "

"Really?" Ed smirked. "Alright then, I’ll discuss it with Richard now."

Ed then went to Richard while they arrived at the stands, making the minister a bit nervous.

"What do you think?" Ed whispered.

"I think we should use this to smoothen our plan." Richard answered.

"So to do favours with the ones who joined Tom not by choice?" Ed questioned.

"Something like that." Richard nodded.

Ed hummed. "That’s a good idea, but let’s add other things to the deal shall we?" Ed smirked.

Ed then walked to the minister, who was waiting for him. "Alright minister, I think we can make a deal."

"That’s great news then!" The minister was happy. "Let’s go to my stand."

"I’ll say goodbye to the rest first then." Ed said, walking toward Hermione.

"Hey, I need to talk to Fudge a bit." Ed said to the girl, which made the girl disappointed a bit. "Watch Ciri, will you? Especially with the Veela…"

"Okay." she mumbled, and she leaned onto Ed to kiss his cheek. "See you later."

Ed hummed and walked back to the minister and was guided to his stand.

"Your girlfriend, Mr. Aldrich?" The Minister suddenly asked.

"Mind your own business, Fudge." Ed coldly stated, which the minister didn’t answer. Once they arrived at the stand, the two started to talk.

"Okay minister." Ed tapped his foot. "I want you to drop the Werewolf bill and made them have equal rights as the wizards and witches."

The minister was surprised. "Pardon me?"

"You heard me, minister." Ed answered. "In return I can give you a fifty percent discount in every batch you bought from us."

"Fifty percent?" The minister was interested.

"And, if you’re willing to subsidise the werewolves who haven’t had the werewolf ring yet, I can make the werewolf ring cheaper, for the ministry only, of course."

"I- We need to think about this…" he said. "Are you a werewolf supporter Mr. Aldrich?"

"You can say that…" Ed answered. "Although I’m more of an ‘equal rights’ guy."

The minister hummed, the Quidditch match then started, but it didn’t interest Ed a bit. "Very well Mr. Aldrich, we will owl you if we have reached a conclusion." He said. "Now, I must bid you farewell, I need to attend another minister’s duty."

Ed just hummed, and the minister left him. He was leaning onto the fence. He had a blank look on his face. He then scanned the area, and had already noticed that there were some people hiding death eater’s masks.

"It’s almost time, I guess."

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