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"THE HOGWARTS CHAMPION... IS ALBANY BRONWEN."

Time must have stopped, because Albany had frozen. She couldn't move, couldn't speak; all she could hear was blood rushing in her ears and the rapid pounding of her heart in her throat. Each heartbeat shook her whole body — unless she was trembling anyway, which was equally probable. Her mind had shut down, unable — unwilling — to process what was happening. It was a dream, for how could it be anything else? It didn't make an ounce of sense, she wasn't worthy, she was the only student in the room who didn't want their name to come out of the goblet. So how.... Why?

"Albany," Carly was saying, and her voice, though distant, grew slowly louder and more insistent as her hearing returned. "Albany!"

The Slytherin table was in uproar; her classmates were screaming and stamping, their tumultuous applause making up for the half-hearted attempts of congratulation from the other three tables. The only person completely quiet was her, frozen where she stood, feeling precariously unbalanced on her feet; Faith was also shocked into silence, and Carly was reaching across the table to gently nudge her.

"You have to go," she urged, and Albany stared blankly at her, unable to form words with her mouth.

"GO ON BRONWEN!" an older Slytherin was yelling from up the table, and similar roars of encouragement sounded from all around. She didn't even know most of them.

"Albany, you have to move," Arthur said from behind her, and maybe his voice was shaky; it was impossible to tell over the commotion.

Stiffly, she managed to climb over the bench, and walked slowly towards the staff table, feeling weak on her legs. The distance seemed to grow with every step she took, a never-ending path of cheering and motivated shouts from her peers. She received numerous pats on the back, and one or two playful punches to the shoulder, though couldn't acknowledge her housemates with so much as a glance or a smile, completely dumbfounded. When she eventually reached the teachers' table, it seemed even some of her professors were surprised, though clapped for her anyway. She barely noticed Moody's cold stare as she staggered past, nearly tripping over her own feet as she followed Fleur and Viktor's footsteps into the champions' room. One clear thought finally managed to make itself heard in the shell-shocked state that her mind had been left in; I'm so dead.

It was a small room, and she wondered vaguely if it had been created just for this purpose; she had never noticed it before. The walls were lined with moving portraits, who were whispering excitedly to each other as she entered. A blazing fire crackled in the fireplace opposite the door.

Krum was leaning against the mantelpiece, looking remarkably impressive silhouetted against the flames. He turned and acknowledged Albany with a single nod as she entered hesitantly, and it struck her for the first time how truly tall and broad he was.

Fleur stood slightly apart from him, hands clasped delicately behind her back as she gazed into the fire. She offered Albany a sweet smile as the shorter girl slowly stepped forward, and Albany was once again caught in the silverly blonde's stunning looks. She blinked a few times in attempt to clear her head.

"Another girl!" Fleur said happily, and beckoned her over; Albany walked a little faster, nearly tripping again in her haste. She stopped between the two champions, unsure of what exactly to do; shake their hands? Did French people hug? "I am glad, I was afraid I would be zee only one," Fleur continued, her perfect smile dazzling.

Albany just nodded, her gaze falling to the fire as her mind spun. This couldn't be real, she thought desperately. There was no way this was happening to her....

Fleur seemed a little unimpressed with the lack of engagement from her fellow champions and frowned, tossing her sheet of silvery hair over her shoulder. She turned at the sound of shuffling footsteps at the door, and given a moment, Albany did too, and her confusion only worsened.

There stood Harry Potter, and Ludo Bagman came rushing in behind him, a broad grin on his round, boyish face.

"Absolutely extraordinary!" the man was saying, delighted, as he led the younger boy forward. Harry looked just as shocked as Albany did, face blank but eyes wide. "Ladies... gentleman. May I introduce — incredible though it may seem — the fourth Triwizard champion?"

The rest of the night passed in a horrible blur of arguing, raised voices and cold glares. Albany wanted nothing more than to leave the room and the competition, but the latter was certainly out of the question:

"I can drop out," she had offered meekly at one point, in a brief moment of quiet between arguments. "To level the playing field—"

"Absolutely not, Miss Bronwen," Barty Crouch interrupted. He looked very ill where he stood, the light of the fire illuminating the wrinkles in his paper-thin skin, while the shadows made his eyes and cheeks appear sunken; nevertheless, his voice was curt and professional when he spoke. "You have been chosen by the goblet; you are bound by a magical contract to compete."

She swallowed hard, and stepped back as the adults continued to yell. Madame Maxime and Professor Karkaroff were livid, as were their respective champions; Dumbledore and McGonagall were attempting to mediate the situation, while Snape and Moody stirred the pot further. Crouch seemed to fall into a state of shutdown when he wasn't being directly addressed, while Bagman managed to smile throughout the entire thing. Harry looked nervous; Albany felt worse.

There was a tremble in her hands and knees and a building pounding in her head; no, she didn't want any part of this tournament. Why — seriously, why — had the only solution her brain had come up with been entering her own name? She was truly the worst kind of idiot, and now she was certainly going to die before the year's end, so that was an event to look forward to.

She felt nearly delirious the more thought she gave the notion. It had been made clear that there was no backing out; she was trapped, locked into her fate just as she was her destiny. It always came back to that. She was sick and tired of it, in every sense of the phrase.

So Albany left the room in the midst of the petty back-and-forth between her teachers.

"Miss Bronwen!" McGonagall called her, just as she reached for the door handle.

The arguing fell quiet, and she felt multiple stares upon her back, though didn't turn to acknowledge them, freezing in place.

"You have not yet received your instructions, my girl!" Bagman informed her cheerily, and she clenched her jaw. How was he taking this so well?

Well, for starters, he wasn't competing.

"I'll get them from someone else," she said coldly, glancing over her shoulder. Moody's stare was the most intense; he would never fail to deeply unsettle her. She opened the door. "Goodnight."

The Great Hall was deserted; some of the more sensible professors had evidently sent the students to bed. She was partially grateful for that, as she hadn't particularly fancied walking down through a crowd a second time. The candles in the floating pumpkins had burned low, darkening the huge room and giving the jack-o-lanterns an eerie, haunted appearance. Her insides felt as though they had flipped upside-down, a sickening pit of growing fear consuming any hopes of optimism.

"It's fine," Arthur said, and she was so caught up in her own thoughts that she barely noticed his arrival. "It's going to be fine, Albany."

"Just a spanner in the works," Merlin added, cheerful voice sounding a little hollow. "A big spanner, granted—"

"You don't have to pretend," Albany snapped, and continued walking down the hall at a brisk pace. "You both know I'm screwed. I know I'm screwed."

Arthur blinked, and then shrugged in casual agreement. "Well, yeah, right now you are," he said, which wasn't helpful in the slightest.

"It's more annoying than it is something to be worried about," Merlin reasoned, "just because now we have to deal with this on top of everything else—"

"Oh, annoying, is it?" Albany shot him a fierce glare. "Annoying that your big plans for me are ruined, because I wasn't allowed to enter my friends? Annoying that your powerful war hero is going to die before the war even starts? Annoying, because this is just some big inconvenience to you, right?"

The ghosts looked a little taken aback, but she wasn't finished, fear feeding the flames of her frustration.

"This is my life! You think I didn't have my own plans for the future? You think I wanted any part of this tournament, or my soulmate, or my destiny? Because I don't! I just let you into my life because I was lonely, and now it's a big fucking mess!" She took a sharp, wobbly inhale. "So sorry, if it's dreadfully annoying. Sorry if I fucked up by giving you a chance at all, and getting your hopes up. But you can find Arthur's descendant on your own, and fight your fucking war on your own, because I don't want any part in it." A shaky exhale. "Leave me alone."

Yet the moment they complied and did just that, she felt worse than ever, and hated the hypocrisy of it all.

The walk alone down to the dungeons felt longer than ever in the quiet and the dark. Albany felt caught in a downwards spiral with every step she took; the more she thought about it, the worse she realised she had screwed up. Fred and George weren't exactly going to be approachable after she had blatantly lied to them; they had wanted so desperately to compete in the tournament, and here she was, doing it instead. It was a cheap move, if anything was. She had no idea if Merlin and Arthur were ever going to show up again, and though she despised the fact that they had really only stuck around for her usefulness, she would miss their sarcastic remarks and childish bickering. Carly certainly thought she was weird, and deserved someone better at keeping up a conversation, anyway. And then Faith....

Faith was standing outside the entrance to their common room, nearly falling asleep where she was leaning against the wall.

Albany faltered in her tracks. She hadn't properly spoken to the girl in days; another friendship she had fucked up. She'd be lying if she said she didn't miss her. After being so close to her since first year, it felt horrible to acknowledge the fact that they were drifting this year. Yet there she was, waiting for her.

"Faith?" she called out, almost tentatively.

The girl's head rose rapidly, blue eyes wide yet tired. Her dark hair was pin straight where it fell over her shoulders, not a strand out of place, tidy as ever in stark contrast to the mess Albany's was. A reflection of their lives this year, she supposed.

"Albany," Faith responded, and her expression was blank as she met her gaze. "You didn't tell me you entered."

Albany swallowed. "I hadn't really been planning on it," she admitted, uncomfortable.

"We used to tell each other everything," Faith continued. "What's happened to you this year?"

Albany rubbed at her arm, chewing almost aggressively on her cheek. The weak light of the torch hanging on the wall flickered against the darkness of the underground corridor, illuminating the hurt in her friend's face.

"I don't know," she whispered.

"You got so obsessed with those Weasley twins," Faith said. "And then you actually started hanging out with them — you just forgot about me."

Albany winced. "No, that's not — I couldn't forget about you, Faith!"

Faith frowned, upset flashing in her eyes. "It felt like it," she murmured. "When was the last time we hung out? And now this?" She paused, and her gaze was watery. "I just... miss you. Between you and me, our roommates would make horrible friends. They're quite boring."

Albany wasn't sure if she was supposed to find that statement amusing. "I miss you too," she said instead, voice wistful, edging on desperate. "I'm sorry about everything this year. It's been... it's been crazy." She managed a weak smile. "I could tell you about it, maybe?"

Faith regarded her with a critical stare for a moment; it felt like an eternity as the icy blues scrutinised every inch of her face. Then she returned the smile, expression lightening considerably. "I'd like that," she said, and when Albany stepped forward to meet her, she was accepted into a warm embrace. "Don't forget who your real friends are, Al."

Albany smiled wider, feeling stupidly emotional in the girl's arms. "I won't," she promised.

Real friends she could always trust to come back, no matter what.