A Young Genius in the Muggle World

Clara looked around. The place resembled a barren marsh.

Several wizards stood ahead, visibly exhausted, probably from having been on gate duty for a long time. Mr. Weasley was talking to them with the old boot in his hand.

After tossing the Portkey into a box, they began frantically leafing through the record books at hand.

"Weasley... Weasley... Weasley..."

"You're in the first campsite."

"The Diggory family and the Collins family are in the second. Look for Mr. Payne."

Mr Collins and Mr. Diggory exchanged smiles. Mr. Weasley seemed a little disappointed, though his family certainly wouldn't be bored.

The group walked together for a while before parting ways with the Weasley family at a stone cottage.

The cottage's caretaker was a Muggle.

A Muggle who had no idea the wizarding world existed.

"Your tents are here. You can pay now."

Clara watched Mr Collins pull two Galleons from his pocket.

Mr. Diggory did the same.

Merlin, they knew they couldn't use magic outside. Hadn't anyone told them to remember to exchange money???

Fortunately, dear Mr. Albert seemed to possess the power of foresight. He always liked to tuck a handful of pocket money into one of her pockets, though she never knew which one.

Mr Collins's and Mr. Diggory's gold coins had clearly startled the man.

"Oh, God, what on earth are these?" The middle-aged man frowned and held a coin up for a closer look. "You're the thirtieth people to give me these things today. Very strange."

Mr Collins and Mr. Diggory wore rather odd expressions. Clearly, the Ministry of Magic had forgotten to tell them about this.

Or perhaps they had assumed these clever wizards wouldn't make such a basic mistake, though the excitement of the Quidditch World Cup had probably lowered their intelligence to some extent.

"Hey, sir, they took out the wrong things. Those are badges." Clara squeezed between Mr Collins and Mr. Diggory and placed a roll of banknotes in front of the middle-aged man. "This is the money. Forty pounds. Keep the change."

She could feel everyone's eyes on her back-Rowle's, Mr. Diggory's, Mr Collins's, and Cedric's-like several spotlights shining on her at once.

The middle-aged man looked down at the banknotes on the table, then at Clara. He picked one up and held it to the light, checking the watermark of the queen's portrait. The confusion finally vanished from his face, replaced by the relief of someone who had finally met a normal person.

He took the money and pushed all four Galleons back. As he did, he glanced at them again, seemingly still wondering what sort of badge would be made of real gold, but he had clearly decided not to ask.

After all, the guests that morning had been strange enough. At least this one paid with real money.

"All right, tent pitches two and three. Go straight ahead and turn left." He handed over a hand-drawn map and four wooden marker stakes, then waved them on. "Enjoy yourselves."

Mr Collins and Mr. Diggory were both very open-minded adults. They were so grateful to Clara for getting them out of that predicament that they gave her all four Galleons, so she could have a chance to bet on the match.

After saying that, they pulled Cedric back into their argument over whether the Bulgarian Team or the Ireland Team would win.

"That was so cool, Lyla!" Rowle leaned over. "Did you see the way Cedric looked at you just now? It was like he was looking at the Chosen One!"

Her voice wasn't quiet. Cedric, walking ahead, broke away from the two adults' argument and winked at her.

They made their way through the tents with some difficulty.

Quidditch World Cup tickets were much like tickets to Muggle football matches: they came in different price tiers. But unlike Muggle football, there was another way to tell how expensive a ticket was-how early its holder arrived.

Rowle had said at the start that Mr Collins's tickets were probably in the lower-middle range. The tickets Mr. Diggory had given them, however, were clearly good ones, second only to box seats, so they hadn't set off until the day before the Quidditch World Cup.

Clara's attention was soon drawn to the tents around them. Wizards had a distinctive sense of aesthetics, a conclusion Clara had reached after five years at Hogwarts.

Heaven knew that when she had taken a wizard's robe home in her third year, her mother had criticized her taste for an entire month.

The tents looked ordinary, but there was always something strange about them, like a Golden Snitch on the pointed top or a brick chimney of unknown purpose. Some even had intricate runes on them.

It made no sense.

They soon reached their pitches. The two families' sites were next to each other, with several wooden stakes in the ground.

Mr Collins set down the tent he had been carrying on his back and clapped his hands with a smile.

"Children, we're not allowed to use magic here, so come on, we'll have to do it ourselves!"

Silence. More silence.

Mr Collins's smile froze on his face. He looked down at the pile of poles and canvas, then up at Mr. Diggory. Mr. Diggory was looking at him too. They exchanged a look that said, "You don't know how either?" The answer was plain.

Clearly, none of the four knew how. Rowle turned her eyes to Clara, full of admiration and expectation.

Clara folded her arms and looked helplessly up at the sky. You see, sometimes magic wasn't all-powerful.

Luckily, although the Alberts couldn't do magic, they had a rich camping tradition. Growing up, her parents had taken her to no fewer than twenty Muggle campsites—the Lake District, the Peak District, the coast of Cornwall—and every time they had hauled along a canvas tent that had to be pitched by hand. By the time she was eight, she could pitch a two-person tent on her own in twenty minutes. To her, pitching a tent was like riding a bicycle: once learned, it was never forgotten. And this wizarding tent was clearly no different from a Muggle tent on the outside.

She sighed, bent down, and pulled the main pole from the pile.

For the next fifteen minutes, Clara Albert became the center of attention in the entire second campsite. She rolled up her sleeves, tied her brown hair loosely into a ponytail, and crouched on the ground to hammer in the tent pegs with a stone, her movements brisk and practiced. The four wizards hovered around her like apprentices, their faces showing a mixture of bewilderment and admiration.

Once both tents stood perfectly pitched, Clara stepped back, brushed the dirt from her hands, and inspected her work. The canvas was taut and smooth, the poles were sturdy, and the guy ropes were angled just right. She nodded in satisfaction and turned around.

Then she found the other four staring at her as though she were some kind of magical creature found only in legends.

Their four gazes made Clara uncomfortable all over. She awkwardly tucked her hands behind her back and spoke in a muffled voice. "...What is it? Is there mud on my face?"

"Lyla," Rowle asked solemnly, "will you marry me?"

"...You're my best friend, Rowle, but I don't plan on getting married for now." Clara turned expressionlessly to put away the toolbox, her ears as red as a cooked shrimp.

Cedric was looking at her too. She didn't dare look up and meet his eyes; she was certain that if they did, her face would turn the color of ketchup at once.

Mr Collins and Mr. Diggory had already ducked into the first tent. A short while later, a head poked out.

"I think this tent should be very spacious for us. Rowle, Lyla, come in and have a look!"

Clara was a little puzzled. Judging by the outside, a tent this size could barely fit the three of them, let alone be called spacious.

She bent down and followed Rowle inside, where she was so surprised that her mouth fell open.

Inside was a clean, tidy two-bedroom home, complete with a bathroom and kitchen. Its layout was very similar to the Collins family's home.

With a cry, Rowle had already thrown herself onto the sofa. She sank into the cushions and let out a satisfied sigh. Mr Collins poked his head out of the kitchen, holding a teapot that was steaming on its own, a somewhat smug smile on his face.

"Lyla, it's an Extension Charm," he explained briefly. "The Diggory family's tent is even bigger than ours. They have three bedrooms, but I don't think we need that many. After all, you and Rowle are so close you don't need separate rooms anymore."

Clara smiled and nodded, only for Rowle to pull her down into the sofa as soon as she turned around.

Mr. Diggory's hearty laughter came from outside. His family was evidently settling in too. A few minutes later, two soft knocks sounded on the tent's canvas door.

"I'll get it." Rowle rose from the sofa, went to the entrance, and lifted the flap. Clara saw him through the gap.

Cedric stood outside, having changed out of his traveling cloak from that morning into a dark gray jacket. His sleeves were rolled up above his wrists, revealing part of his forearms. Probably thanks to years of exercise, the muscles in his arms were nicely defined.

He must have washed his face with cold water. The unruly lock of hair on his forehead still had a few droplets clinging to it.

"Hey." He greeted them and glanced past Rowle's shoulder into the tent, a faint smile on his lips. "Are you settled in?"

"Just about." Rowle stepped to the side so he could see Clara sprawled on the sofa inside.

Clara sprang to her feet like a startled squirrel, and Cedric lowered his head with a laugh.

"My dad said there's a betting area over in the camp where you can place bets on tonight's match. He gave me some spending money to try my luck-" He paused, his gray-blue eyes on them, his tone light and casual. "Do you two want to come along?"

"Of course!" Rowle made the decision for Clara before she could speak. She grabbed Clara's wrist as tightly as if she were holding a prisoner trying to escape, an overly radiant smile on her face. "We'd love to! Lyla, did you forget those four Galleons?"

Clara didn't even get a chance to voice an opinion before Rowle dragged her out of the tent.

The thick fog over the camp gradually dispersed, and more and more wizards emerged from their tents. The once-desolate marsh slowly came alive with activity.

The betting area was in a clearing at the center of the camp. They could hear the roar of voices before they reached it. Makeshift wooden counters stood in a row, each stall displaying signs for different kinds of bets-predicting the score, predicting which Seeker would catch the Golden Snitch, predicting the length of the match, and all sorts of others.

Wizards in striped shirts stood behind the stalls, shouting to attract customers and waving thick stacks of betting slips. The sweet scents of roasted nuts and Butterbeer drifted through the air, mingling with the crowd's sweat and the smell of trampled grass. It was noisy and chaotic, but impossible not to get excited.

"Ireland to win, one to one point five; Bulgaria to win, one to two!" a wizard in an oversized top hat shouted as they passed. "A small bet for fun, a big bet for a fortune! Come on, kids, try your luck!"