As the bell rang to end class, Fred and George's frustration vanished. Although the twins hadn't managed to turn their teapots into tortoises, failure never weighed them down, nor did they carry that disappointment into their daily lives.
The naturally optimistic twins were always like this; they influenced everyone around them in their own way. Wherever they were, there was always cheerful laughter—and Eda was the greatest beneficiary of it.
Eda thought that if she had never met the twins, then when she grew old, her face would probably be smooth and free of wrinkles. But now that she knew them, every wrinkle she would someday have would be tied to the two of them.
After class, Eda and the twins walked along the corridor toward the Great Hall, when Cedric Diggory came up to them. After a simple greeting, Cedric went straight to the point. "I'm here to gather some intelligence."
With a sunny smile on his face, Cedric said something so baffling that Eda and the twins were left utterly confused, not understanding what he meant.
"Eda's performance against Slytherin was outstanding—it has some of my teammates worried." As if afraid Eda would misunderstand, Cedric quickly added, "Everyone really likes you, it's just…"
"Just that they don't want to face Eda in a match, right?" Fred finished Cedric's sentence for him.
"They're worried Eda will treat you the same way she treated Slytherin," George added.
Right now, Eda was exactly that kind of player—one deeply loved by her teammates, but one her opponents would dearly like to strangle.
The twins were very glad that Eda was on their side. If the opposing team had a player as wild as her, they couldn't guarantee their bats would be hitting only the Bludgers and not the other player.
After that match, besides her final reckless dive, word had also spread about Eda's trash talk toward Slytherin. No one wanted an opponent whispering endlessly in their ear during a game—it was maddening.
That was exactly why the Hufflepuff players were worried. They didn't want to face that kind of distraction. It was irritating, but there was nothing they could do about Eda, so they could only send Cedric to sound her out.
But in truth, Hufflepuff was worrying for nothing.
Eda bore no grudges against the little badgers, and naturally wouldn't treat them the same way she had treated Slytherin. Besides, Harry Potter was the team's official Seeker. As long as Harry stayed healthy, Eda wouldn't even be on the field.
"Rest easy, Cedric," Eda said. "You'll be up against Harry. He's not going to give you any trouble."
"Of course I'm not worried—I know you well enough," Cedric replied. "It's just that my teammates aren't so sure. I couldn't talk them out of it, so I had no choice but to come and ask for their sake."
And it wasn't only Hufflepuff that had such worries—Ravenclaw did too. But unlike Hufflepuff, they didn't have a Cedric, nor did they have anyone familiar with Eda. So instead of asking her directly for reassurance, they went to Oliver Wood.
Faced with Ravenclaw's captain, Wood had no choice but to give his word: "Gryffindor won't send Eda in first."
Only after hearing that promise did Ravenclaw's captain leave satisfied.
If Slytherin could change their infuriating ways, then perhaps the captains of Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff might have gone to Flint, proposing a joint petition among the three houses to bar Eda from playing. Unfortunately, Slytherin was still the same old Slytherin, unchanged in the slightest, and so the idea of boycotting Eda quietly fizzled out.
The protagonist of this whole "boycott" matter, Eda herself, knew nothing of it.
At that moment, she was sitting idly in the Charms classroom, flipping boredly through The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 4.
"All right, class, let's begin."
The voice came before the man himself. Only when the short-statured Professor Flitwick climbed atop a stack of books did the students catch sight of their Charms teacher.
Professor Flitwick began with a quick review of the material they had studied the previous term, and only then did he introduce something new: the Summoning Charm (Accio).
This spell could cause a target object from afar to fly into the caster's hands. The farther away the object was, the harder it would be to summon.
According to Miranda Goshawk, author of The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 4, the Summoning Charm's most infamous use was by the anti-Muggle extremist group, the Night Summoners, who notoriously abused it.
The founder and leader of that organization had used the charm inside his own Gringotts vault to summon piles of gold and treasure, which provoked the goblins' wrath. As a result, the entire anti-Muggle group was disbanded.
To prevent theft through the Summoning Charm, wizards later invented counter-charms. These protective enchantments could block objects from flying toward the caster. Seeing this, Eda slouched even lower over her desk—so summoning gold was out of the question after all. The predecessors had already sealed off every possible loophole.
The classroom was soon filled with cries of "Accio Cushion," with many girls even shouting "Cushion, come here!" in a lovely tone. As a chaotic swarm of cushions zoomed back and forth overhead, nearly knocking the chandelier from the ceiling.
The chandelier groaned and creaked, as if it might come crashing down at any moment.
Before the chandelier could break loose, however, unlucky Professor Flitwick tumbled from his tall stack of books first.
Some poor student's cushion had collided with the pile, throwing Flitwick off balance. When he finally got back to his feet, his head was noticeably puffed up—at least twice its usual size.
The entire lesson could only be described as utter chaos. By the time class ended, many students had managed to summon their cushions successfully, but the sight of a bruised
Professor Flitwick, the groaning chandelier, and a floor littered with ruined cushions made it clear just how disastrous the lesson had been.
If there was anything worse than this Charms class—or worse than poor Flitwick with his swollen head—it was Gilderoy Lockhart's Defense Against the Dark Arts lesson, which was nothing short of a catastrophe.
That class had taken place at the same time as Eda's Charms lesson, but the moment she stepped out of the classroom, news of the disaster had already reached her. Eda thought the speed of its spread might well have surpassed that of light itself.
By evening, every student across all four houses and seven years knew about Lockhart's performance, and how he couldn't even handle a handful of Cornish pixies.
Disappointment hung over the Great Hall. His display had been even worse than Quirrell's—at least Quirrell had never managed to turn his classroom into such a complete mess.
There were still some students who supported Lockhart—for example, Hermione.
These supporters, mostly girls, believed that their Professor Lockhart was simply trying to train the students' practical abilities. Just look at his achievements in his books! they said. Besides, it was only the first class—it was just an accident.
Yet while his supporters were cheering him on, Lockhart himself was busy embarrassing them. In the next day's Defense Against the Dark Arts lesson, he did not suffer another disastrous failure—unless, of course, one counted reading his own books aloud with exaggerated emotion as a failure. If that could be called a crash, then he might as well stab himself with his peacock-feather quill.
If you don't do anything, you can't go wrong. Gilderoy Lockhart, not yet thirty years old, seemed to have fully grasped that truth. Never again did he bring live creatures into the classroom. Instead, he turned Defense Against the Dark Arts into his personal book-signing and fan club meeting.
This baffling choice of his silenced even his most devoted fans.
His diehard supporters put away their excuses; they didn't dare defend him any longer. After all, they didn't want to be seen everywhere as brainless fangirls. Many of them even announced outright that they had "un-fanned" him.
But Lockhart himself remained blissfully unaware. He continued basking in the worship he received from outside the school, in the prestige of his professorship, and in the fame that came with teaching the Boy Who Lived.
Gilderoy Lockhart—
A man who claimed not to care about fame and fortune (while constantly trying to cozy up to Harry Potter).
A man "well-versed" in Herbology (who made a fool of himself in front of Professor Sprout).
A man whose teeth shone so dazzlingly white (they nearly blinded the ghost of Moaning Myrtle).
A man who could solve any problem with a flick of his wand (so long as the pixies didn't snatch it away).
A man who could overcome any difficulty.
Yes, Gilderoy Lockhart was a perfect man—!
A perfect man who was about to be in perfect trouble.
For soon, he would have to teach a fourth-year Gryffindor class, and in that class sat one Esmeralda Twist—who had been fed up with him for a very long time.
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