Black Soul- George Weasley

The One With The Quidditch Cup

"Harry lost the map", Astraea told Fred and George.

"What? How?" They asked.

"Snape caught it, then Remus took it since its his department", Astraea explained. "We lost the damned thing"

                                            **************************

The Easter holidays were not exactly relaxing. The fifth years had never had so much homework. With OWLS coming close and prefect duties, Astraea was about to have a heart attack. She lived off caffeine and sugars. 

"Call this a holiday!" Fred roared at the common room one afternoon. "The exams are ages away, what're they playing at?" 

"I hate my life", George groaned. "I hate potions too"

"Come here", Astraea said opening her arms and George collapsed.

"Kill me", he groaned to her neck.

"Soon", she chuckled opening potions.

All usual pursuits were abandoned in the Gryffindor common room the night before the match. Even Hermione had put down her books. 

 "I can't work, I can't concentrate," she said nervously. 

"Me too", Astraea sighed, drinking more coffee. "Can you keep it down?"

 There was a great deal of noise. Fred and George were dealing with the pressure by being louder and more exuberant than ever. Oliver Wood was crouched over a model of a Quidditch field in the corner, prodding little figures across it with his wand and muttering to himself. Angelina, Alicia, and Katie were laughing at Fred's and George's jokes. Harry was sitting with Ron and Hermione, removed from the center of things, trying not to think about the next day, because every time he did, he had the horrible sensation that something very large was fighting to get out of his stomach. Astraea was glaring at George and Alicia for flirting. Well alicia flirting and George not noticing.

It came as a relief when Wood suddenly stood up and yelled, "Team! Bed!"

Wood spent the whole of breakfast urging his team to eat, while touching nothing himself. Then he hurried them off to the field before anyone else had finished, so they could get an idea of the conditions. 

As they left the Great Hall, everyone applauded again. Astraea ran behind them. 

"Okay — no wind to speak of — sun's a bit bright, that could impair your vision, watch out for it — ground's fairly hard, good, that'll give us a fast kickoff —" 

 Wood paced the field, staring around with the team behind him. Finally, they saw the front doors of the castle open in the distance and the rest of the school spilling onto the lawn. 

"Wood, Wood, OLIVER", she yelled and he looked at her. "You will be fine"

"If we lose-"

She looked into his mind and planted image of them winning there to relax him. He seemed to relax for a second before tensing again.

 "Locker rooms," said Wood tersely.

As they left Astraea looked and saw a man standing by the Whomping Willow, she relooked again and saw it was Snuffles the big, black dog she used to feed. Weird.

The Gryffindor team walked out onto the field to a tidal wave of noise. Three quarters of the crowd was wearing scarlet rosettes, waving scarlet flags with the Gryffindor lion upon them, or brandishing banners with slogans like "GO GRYFFINDOR!" and "LIONS FOR THE CUP!" 

Behind the Slytherin goal posts, however, two hundred people were wearing green; the silver serpent of Slytherin glittered on their flags, and Snape sat in the very front row, wearing green like everyone else, and a very grim smile.