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"The what?" He whispered frantically, eyes wide in surprise. "Are you sure?"
"It's supposed to be a great secret and all," Harry admitted "so, naturally, Dad told me."
"The Triwizard Tournament?" Neville wondered out loud in awe. Then he glanced at his best friend, a smirk on his lips and a mischievous glint in his eyes. "You're thinking of competing, aren't you?" Harry raised an eyebrow at his friend's swift -and spot on- accession.
"You know me too well, Mr. Longbottom." He admitted, assuming and important air.
"I should hope so, being your best friend and all, Mr. Potter." Neville deadpanned. Nodding his acquiescence with a lopsided smile, Harry pointed to where their tents stood.
"And I should guess we tell nothing of the Tournament to Adrian and co.?" Neville whispered, his lips barely moving as he waved at the gathered crowd.
"You would be correct." Harry offered and introduced Neville to Charlie and Bill, the two Weasley brothers he hadn't met with in the past.
"Hello, professor." Neville said finally, sitting next to Severus and offering him a grin.
"Good morning, Neville." The potions master greeted him back. "Excited for the game?"
"Unbelievably so!" Neville supplied.
"Huh." Sirius muttered from his spot by the fire.
"Huh?" Severus asked, casting him a curious look.
"It's just, Neville over here doesn't look that much surprised by, you know, everything?" The dog animagus pointed out, looking at Neville critically. Before Severus or Harry got to answer however, Neville jumped at the opportunity to join in the fun.
"Surprised by what, professor?"
"I'm no longer your professor, Neville." The man in question offered somewhat affronted. "Call me Sirius. And what I meant was; doesn't Snape look a bit different to you? Or Harry for that matter?" Neville cocked an eyebrow and looked between his potions professor and his best friend.
"Why, they look exactly the same from last I saw them!" Severus and Harry did their best to mask their amusement at both Neville's declaration and the befuddled people surrounding them.
"And, when was that exactly?" James asked.
"About a month into the summer holidays, when I stayed at Silbreith for a few days. Just after the Rennes tournament, wasn't it?" He asked innocently as he turned to Harry for confirmation.
"Yes, it was five days after the tournament." Harry agreed.
"You've been to Silbreith?" Lily asked, her question eclipsed from her husband's.
"You knew about Silbreith?"
"Yes to both?" The boy asked, seemingly confused.
"How did you know?" The Potter patriarch asked again acidly. Neville, still furious at how Harry had been treated by his family and determined to honour the vow he gave about standing by his brother's side, opted on not hexing the man opposite him, consequences be damned, and instead said, shrugging as if it was obvious;
"Well, all I had to do was ask." James visibly deflated after that and Harry felt like hugging Neville right there and then while Severus mentally awarded ten points to Gryffindor. Lily tried to overlook James outburst and started a conversation on the game that slowly spread as Sirius and Remus shared a heavy look; Neville's words had affected them the most it seemed.
"You've wanted to say something like that since Harry first told you of his past, haven't you?" Severus asked Neville, hidden behind his newspaper.
"Yep." The boy answered.
"Has Harry told you of the Triwizard Tournament?" Severus asked smiling.
"Yep."
"You're really enjoying this then."
"Yep." Neville answered for the third time, smiling softly over a cup of tea he had received from Mrs. Weasley as Harry winked at him from the other side of the camp where he was explaining to Charlie the basics on how the latest model of the Firebolt worked. What was the most unexpected was the jealous look Adrian had cast towards Neville accompanied with a frown that went unnoticed in the midst of the generally jovial atmosphere.
The morning passed almost uneventfully with the Weasley twins refusing to bet against Ludo Baggman claiming that, when a goblin gives you a financial advice, you stick to it. Harry agreed wholeheartedly and so it was a slightly disappointed Baggman that left their group in search of more willing participants.
"We still think that Ireland will win but Krum will catch the Snitch." Fred admitted making Harry nod appreciatively; he had his bets on Ireland himself, but he had seen Krum play enough to know he would wish to end the game on his terms, keeping his pride should things go south.
The game was thirty minutes short of beginning when the group decided it was time to walk towards the stadium. Harry and Severus along with Neville were walking ahead, making predictions on the outcome while the rest followed in various states of confusion and ire.
James was fuming as he stared at the backs of his childhood rival happily chatting away on Quidditch statistics with his youngest son and his son's best friend as if he had no care in the world. The past few weeks had been testing his nerves to no end. He had tried to capture his younger son's interest to anything he and Adrian usually did together, he had tried to find out things about his life, about his interests. The boy simply didn't feel like sharing. The Potter patriarch has studiously ignored that little voice in the back on his head that whispered that all the questions he had were ones he shouldn't have need of asking. He should have known how his younger son spent his life, how he did in school, how he had managed to design a racing broomstick at the age of thirteen. But that voice was immediately smothered along with the traces of guilt that had crept up. This was all Snape's fault; it had to be.
Adrian on his part, looked at his brother as he conversed with Neville, laughing at an inside joke the boy had brought up -something to do with a greenhouse at Silbreith- his mind reeling. How come Neville Longbottom of all people knew so much about his twin brother? His mind traveled back to last summer when he had spend two hours staring at the Firebolt display at Diagon Alley; why hadn't Harry said anything to him? Why hadn't he stepped up and said 'You know, brother? I designed this!' to him? Didn't he deserve to know stuff like that?
And without the knowledge of either her sons or her husband, one Lily Potter was contemplating those urges she had been having lately. It was irrational she knew. Maybe it was the fact that she and James hadn't been doing that well lately. She inwardly winced. That was a weak excuse even for her personal ponderings. It was a pile up of reasons really but… James and her had been drawing further apart as the years progressed; it would be his job, a meeting he had to attend that was always more important than their plans together, Adrian's training even! Somewhere along the way they had just stopped being them. Lily and James, James and Lily, couple extraordinaire. And she knew it was somewhat petty, but she could also foretell that the future was going to be bleak. She just wanted her husband completely by her side when that future befell them. Was that too much to ask?
Severus on the other hand… He had always been there for her, she remembered that. In the years before Hogwarts when she had been so alone and scared at her first bursts of accidental magic. All through the years of her sister's jealousy. By her side at Hogwarts too, even if they were placed at rival Houses. His one mistake had been made when he was barely sixteen and had just been publically humiliated by James and the rest of the Marauders; the insult had slipped past his lips and she had seen -even back then she knew- that he had regretted saying it the very same minute. And what had she done? Pushed him away, of course. Trump on the feelings she knew he nursed for her and turn to the boy that had hurt him so many times before, the boy which, up to that moment, she had been terrified accepting an attraction for. But that incident had given her the opportunity to approach James while quenching the guilt of abandoning her best friend, in a way. Well, not completely. Severus though had seemed to move on, or so she had thought with her sixteen-year-old wisdom. In retrospect she should have known better.
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