Dumbledore's half-blood grand-daughter: Year One

Chapter Nine: Dark Magic and Some Quidditch

As we entered November, the weather turned very cold. The mountains around the school became icy gray and the lake like chilled steel. My mother and father sent me post almost every day. They were very excited for me to come home for Christmas. They even said I could invite my new friends.

Every morning the ground was covered in frost. Hagrid could be seen from the upstairs windows defrosting broomsticks on the Quidditch field, bundled up in a long moleskin overcoat, rabbit fur gloves, and enormous beaver skin boots.

The Quidditch season had begun. On Saturday, Harry and I would be playing in our first match after weeks of training: Gryffindor versus Slytherin. If Gryffindor won, we would move up into second place in the house championship. Hardly anyone had seen Harry and I play because Wood had decided that, as their secret weapons, Harry and I should be kept, well, secret.

But the news that he was playing Seeker and I was one of the chasers had leaked out somehow, and I didn't know which was worse -- people telling us we'd be brilliant or people telling us they'd be running around underneath us holding a mattresses.

It was really lucky that Harry now had Hermione as a friend. I didn't know how he'd have gotten through all his homework without her, what with all the last-minute Quidditch practice Wood was making them do. She had also lent him Quidditch Through the Ages, which according to him, turned out to be a very interesting read. I would have helped him myself since I was doing just as well as Hermione in class, but I also had the late night practices to worry about.

Hermione and I were closer than ever. On weeknights we would do homework together, and on weekends we would stay up later eating sweets the Weasley twins would nick from the kitchen for us. I had also grown close to Fred and George. After homework with Hermione I would often help them with their pranks. Just the other day we made all the erasers on the second floor hit anyone that tried to use them. I cracked up when I say students come to lunch with chalk dust all over.

Harry and I learned that there were seven hundred ways of committing a Quidditch foul and that all of them had happened during a World Cup match in 1473; that Seekers were usually the smallest and fastest players, and that most serious Quidditch accidents seemed to happen to them; that although people rarely died playing Quidditch, referees had been known to vanish and turn up months later in the Sahara Desert.

Hermione had become a bit more relaxed about breaking rules since Harry and Ron had saved us from the mountain troll, and she was much nicer to them for it. The day before Harry's and my first Quidditch match the four of us were out in the freezing courtyard during break, and she had conjured us up a bright blue fire that could be carried around in a jam jar.

They were standing with their backs to it, getting warm, when Snape crossed the yard. We noticed at once that Snape was limping. Harry, Ron, Hermione, and I moved closer together to block the fire from view; we were sure it wouldn't be allowed. Unfortunately, something about our guilty faces caught Snape's eye. He limped over. He hadn't seen the fire, but he seemed to be looking for a reason to tell us off anyway.

"What's that you've got there, Potter." It was Quidditch Through the Ages. Harry showed him. "Library books are not to be taken outside the school," said Snape. "Give it to me. Five points from Gryffindor." "He's just made that rule up," Harry muttered angrily as Snape limped away. "Wonder what's wrong with his leg." "Dunno, but I hope it's really hurting him," said Ron bitterly.

The Gryffindor common room was very noisy that evening. Harry, Ron, Hermione, and I sat together next to a window. Hermione was checking Harry and Ron's Charms homework for them. She would never let them copy ("How will you learn."), but by asking her to read it through, they got the right answers anyway. I just sat laughing at them. I had already finished my homework.