The Chaser's Heart

Year 4: Rakepick

'What d'you make of her?' Tulip hissed at me as we walked out of the Great Hall the second day of term.

Madam Patricia Rakepick looked like she was going to be a somewhat permanent fixture at Hogwarts for the next little while. She was a professional Curse-Breaker, old Hogwarts student and Dumbledore had hired her to investigate the Cursed Vaults. Apparently, I'd taken it a bit too far opening two of them accompanied only by other underage students. I wasn't sure what to make of her yet, but I'd be stupid to think she wasn't keeping an eye on me.

To be honest, I was a bit intrigued by her. She was a professional Curse-Breaker, after all. She must have a better chance than I did at breaking into the remaining Cursed Vaults. But, I had the map of the Forbidden Forest from the Vault of Fear and she didn't. I just wasn't sure if that was information I wanted to volunteer to her or not yet.

'Dunno,' I shrugged, trying to look uninterested.

'Oh, come on,' she huffed. 'You can't tell me you've given up on getting into the rest of the Vaults.'

'I'm not,' I hissed. 'I just don't know if I can trust her or not. I'll just see how far I get on my own first.'

'I like that plan,' she grinned. 'Where do we start?'

'Hang on, it's only the second day of term!' I scoffed.

'Exactly, Knight!' Skye appeared out of nowhere while we were ascending the Grand Staircase towards Ravenclaw Tower. 'It's already the second day of term and we haven't sorted the Quidditch Friendly teams yet!'

'Oh, right,' I said, switching gears quickly.

'Now, I've been speaking with Amari, Markov and Pritchard, and we're looking at doing eight teams again this year. I'll be on the blue team again, and it's looking like you'll be on the red team.'

'Brilliant,' I told her, happy to be discussing something that had a bit more structure and predictability to it than the Cursed Vaults. 'Who else is on the red team?'

'Er...' she looked up like she was thinking about it. 'Loads of new people, Jensen though, you know him, Hufflepuff Beater, and Siobhan Coughlan, fifth-year, she's a Keeper prospect for Ravenclaw this year.'

'Oh, brilliant,' I said again.

'We'll need to keep a keen eye out,' she said seriously. 'I mean, Ross wasn't exactly League material, but he was decent enough. And we have to consider the fact that we're defending champions this year.'

'Of course,' I nodded.

I looked around but Tulip had gone on ahead of us. I would catch up with her in our dormitory.

'Ah, you're discussing out Keeper conundrum,' McNully was on the landing directly outside of Ravenclaw Tower when we reached it. Skye's voice tended to carry.

'Won't we just have try-outs and sort it all out?' I asked. It didn't seem like much of a dilemma to me. We were only missing a Keeper. Everyone else from last year's team had returned this year.

'It's not quite as simple as that, Nora,' McNully chuckled. 'You're forgetting that Orion's try-outs are on an invitation-only basis.'

'Oh, right,' I nodded, remembering.

'It'll be your job, as well as Skye, Orion, Seth, Chris and Irina to keep a keen eye out during the Friendlies to scout out potential players,' he explained.

'You as well,' I told him. 'Are you still commentating on all the Friendlies?'

'But of course!' He scoffed. 'I'll have the best seat in the house! But you'll be the ones who have to actually play with who ever makes the team. If I know anything about Orion Amari, it's that he's big on teamwork.'