She wasn't sure what had made her suddenly so popular. People had barely looked at her in her first few weeks, but now that she sat with Sarafina and Louisa in class, they looked at her all the time. Callisto thought she liked Sarafina. She was upfront and honest, if a little mean at times. Most of the girls gossiped about Adeke, about her clothes or how she hung out with the guys. Callisto stayed silent. She still liked Adele, no matter what the other girls said about her. And since the message on the beside table, she had felt more sympathetic. She knew what it was like to be called names like that. She encouraged Adele to tell the other teachers, but her friend refused, saying she knew who it was, though she wouldn't tell Callisto.

The Halloween feast came quickly, and they all gathered outside in their House groups to welcome the other schools. There was a vicious breeze, and Adele shivered.

"Perhaps you would be warmer, Miss Rosenbluth, if you had a skirt instead of a scrap of cloth," Snape said coldly. "And fix your tie, please. Need I remind you all that you are representing the school?"

Adele stuck her tongue out at him as he turned his back, and deliberately loosened her tie even more.

"And Miss Booth, please do something with your hair. You look like a scarecrow."

Louisa turned red and quickly tied her hair back.

"I've heard you sit with them in class," Adele murmured. "Her and Dearheart."

"Yes. I like them."

"They're okay, I suppose," Adele said slowly, just as some of the first years started pointing at the sky and yelling at the shape that was hurtling through the darkness.

The carriage, powder blue and pulled by massive horses, came gently down to earth. They stood watching with bated breath, and then the door opened and one large high heel stepped out. Callisto's eyes went up the woman's long, long legs to her torso, her shoulders, and finally her head, and when she stopped, she towered above Dumbledore.

"Jesus Christ," Adele murmured. "Somebody's been eating her weetabix. How tall is she? Eight feet?"

She had to be at least that. She had to bend to speak to Dumbledore, who was not by any stretch of the imagination a small man. And Professor Flitwick, when he came up to shake her hand, looked like a toddler in comparison.

Her students began to exit their carriage, about a dozen boys and girls in elegant silk robes. And she heard the murmur through the crowd as the last girl stepped out, and Adele gasped.

"What is it?" Callisto asked, craning her neck to see. The girl didn't look like anything special to her. She was tall, slim and willowy, sort of girl who never had to worry about her weight or appearance.

Adele made a low strangled noise in her throat as the girl turned dark blue eyes framed by long golden lashes to the castle.

"Is it that girl? Adele?"

"You straight people," Adele said faintly. "You never know what you're missing."

Once Durmstrang arrived, they gathered in the Great Hall to eat. The Beauxbatons students, to Adele and many of the boys' disappointment, sat at the Ravenclaw table, where she started talking to Jaron.

"Figures," Adele said. "I'd say even McGonagall thinks he's hot."

"Don't be disgusting," Callisto said, but she laughed.

The Durmstrang students sat with them, and Adele nudged her sharply as a boy with heavy eyebrows took his place beside the Bloody Baron.

"That's Viktor Krum!" She hissed.

"Ow," Callisto said, wincing at her ribs. "Who's that?"

"Who's that?" Adele repeated. "He plays for Bulgaria! Got the snitch in the match against Ireland!"

"Oh," she shrugged. "Yeah, I was at it, but I didn't remember his name."

She shook her head in disbelief. "I was listening to it on the radio. He's a bit uglier than I imagined, to be honest."

"Adele!" She hissed. "You can't say that!"

"Course I can. Bet he'll be their champion though. Just watch. And maybe Cedric Diggory," she sighed wistfully. "That boy's got some cheekbones."

Callisto privately agreed.

The champions from each school were exactly as expected, Viktor Krum, Cedric Diggory, and the girl, Fleur Delacour. But then things went pear shaped, because Harry Potter's name came out of the cup too. It was all a mess, and most of the Slytherins and Ravenclaws were bulling mad that their Houses had been overlooked.

"Pretty boy Diggory," Sarafina said with distaste at breakfast the next morning.

"I mean, of everyone."

"He is good looking though," Louisa sighed happily. "All that floppy hair. And Potter!"

"Oh, Potter," Sarafina said dismissively. "Potter just wants fame."

Callisto found herself alone with her brother for the first time in a long time that night. She was doing homework by the dying embers of the fire, and he came up the stairs, then stopped.

"Oh," he said, like it was a surprise to see her in her own common room. "Hi."

"Hi," Callisto said, and coughed.

The fire crackled. Draco sat in the other chair.

"People've been asking me," he said, in a low voice. "About....you. Orson."

"Orson isn't me," she said quietly. "Not anymore. What did you tell them?"

"That Mother and Father sent you – him – to a different school. Some of them laughed. Montague said I must be ashamed."

"Yeah," she said, swallowing a lump. "Yeah, I bet he did. Did you tell him you were?"

"No," he said in surprise. "No, I'm not ashamed of you. I was just....confused before."

She looked at him. "Father is ashamed. He told me so."

Draco sighed. "Father is....Father."

She understood. Before, it had almost been like they had one parent each. Lucius was proud of Orson, he was always the one held up to be like him, good results at school held up proudly for people to see. And Draco had been their mother's pet, attention lavished on him. She had been jealous, once, but that had been before she had realised it was because Lucius never passed much attention on Draco.

"Did you see Viktor Krum?" She asked tentatively, because Draco had always been interested in Quidditch.

"Yeah," he said, and smiled for the first time. "I got his autograph, and he said he remembered when we met him after the match. Zabini practically went green."

Callisto yawned, then looked at her watch. Almost midnight.

"I guess we should go to bed," she said, collecting her things. "Goodnight, Draco."

"Goodnight....Callisto."

When she got up to bed, she dug around in her trunk. She hadn't wanted to keep any photos, but Narcissa had told her it was good to remember.

She found it at the bottom, a picture from two years ago, on holiday in France. Narcissa, blonde and beautiful and smiling, Lucius, tall and elegant with his long white-blond hair and the silver cane he didn't need ("It's all about the style, Narcissa.")

Then Draco, with their father's pointy chin and their mother's haughty stance, and then....Orson. It was like simultaneously looking at a stranger and somebody she had known all her life. He stood awkwardly, a boy who was pudgy and awkward, standing uncomfortably, like he wasn't happy in his own skin. She had once lived with that face. She had looked in the mirror and seen that face. If she took off her wig and removed her makeup, she would see that face again, slightly thinner, perhaps, but still the same, the hair longer but still the same colour. She couldn't deny that was so much happier as Callisto. Orson had been like a trap, and she had spent years wondering if thinking she was a girl was wrong.

She still hadn't fully answered that question, but as she got ready, took off the wig and the makeup and climbed into bed, she knew it felt right, Merlin it felt so right, to be Callisto, because that was who she was, that was who she had always been. Callisto had been under the surface all along, hidden under the layers of fat and insecurity that was Orson, but now, she could shine.