In Ink and Inheritance (Book 1)

Chapter 4 - Between Name and Choice

Oliver Wood's POV

I wasn't sure she'd come.

The note had been simple. No pressure. Just an opening. If she didn't respond, I'd understand. I wouldn't chase her down like a crazed romantic from a bedtime story. Even if part of me - the part that hadn't stopped thinking about her since the contract arrived - desperately wanted to.

But when I turned toward the fire, she was already there.

Harriet stood just inside the common room, her braid tucked into the collar of her cloak, hands clasped tightly in front of her. She looked like she might bolt any second.

"I didn't know if you'd actually-"

"I wasn't going to," she said, cutting in quietly. Then added, almost to herself, "But I couldn't sleep."

I nodded and moved to the long sofa near the fireplace. "Sit?"

She hesitated, then crossed the room and took the far end of the couch, folding her legs beneath her. There was space between us, but the silence stretched thin across it, vibrating with everything neither of us had said yet.

I cleared my throat. "You got the letter."

Her eyes flicked to mine. "You did too."

"Yeah."

She looked back at the fire. "So... what now?"

I swallowed. That was the question, wasn't it?

"I don't know," I said honestly. "I've been trying to figure that out. All I know is... we didn't ask for this. But the magic doesn't care about that."

She gave a small, dry laugh. "Story of my life."

We sat in silence for a moment. The fire popped. Somewhere upstairs, the twins were probably rigging something unspeakable in the dormitories.

I looked over at her - really looked.

She was beautiful, yes. But more than that, she glowed in quiet ways. Her strength wasn't loud, but it was there - a steady thing, forged in fire and silence and far too much grief for someone her age. She hadn't crumpled. She hadn't lashed out.

She'd endured.

"I don't want to scare you," I said after a long pause. "Or make you feel trapped. If I could tear the contract in half right now to give you a choice, I would."

Harriet didn't look at me. She reached into her pocket instead and pulled out the scroll. The same gold-inked document I had hidden in the bottom of my trunk.

"I think... part of me is scared," she said, voice quiet. "But not of you."

That stopped me cold.

She turned her gaze toward me - those eyes, impossibly green, impossibly old. "I'm scared because some part of me doesn't want to tear it up."

The admission hung between us like smoke.

"I've never belonged to anything," she continued. "Not really. I've always just been the girl in the cupboard. The weapon. The story people whisper about. But this... this makes it feel like maybe I came from something real. Something worth continuing."

"You do," I said instantly, before I could stop myself. "You are. You're more than a name, Harriet. You're-"

"Don't," she said gently. "Not unless you mean it."

I stared at her for a long moment, then nodded once. "I mean it."

Something in her relaxed, just a little. She looked down at the scroll again. "So what happens now?"

"I think," I said carefully, "we take it slow. Talk. Learn. Decide what it means for us, not just for the Potters or the Woods. No magic. No rules. Just... us."

Harriet bit her lip. "You're a lot more romantic than I expected."

"I'm Scottish," I said with a smirk. "We're dramatic by nature."

That made her laugh - a real one this time, warm and surprised.

I felt like I'd just won a game I hadn't known I was playing.

"So," I said, leaning back, "do you want to ask me anything? Anything at all."

She tilted her head, thoughtful. "Alright... what would you have done if the contract named someone else?"

I gave her the most honest answer I had.

"I wouldn't have come down to the common room."

She didn't speak, but her breath hitched just slightly. Her eyes dropped to the floor, and a bit of pink bloomed across her cheeks.

For a long moment, there was no magic in the room. No legacy. No fate or contracts or bloodlines.

Just Harriet.

And me.

And something that, for the first time, didn't feel like a trap.

It felt like a beginning.