Anna Black, The Girl Who Lived (Book 6)

12: Quidditch Tryouts

(Late chapter, mostly unedited, sorry)

The Sunday of that same weekend was free except for Snape's detention in the evening. Anna left her three Gryffindor best friends to their own fun earlier that day. She didn't want to discuss what she and Harry had seen the previous night, and she didn't want to explaining her sympathy towards the young Tom Riddle.

Yes, she had just a shred of sympathy, but not enough to ever forgive him or justify what he'd done.

After spending all of second year conversing with almost only the young Riddle, she understood him a bit. How he was an orphan, neglected, and a complete loner, and those things only got worse with age.

Regardless, she couldn't explain her feelings. She despised of Voldemort with every inch of her being and wanted to kill him in the worst way possible, but she felt a flicker of sympathy upon seeing him as a child.

She pushed the thoughts aside as she wandered aimlessly through the castle's corridors. The weather was a nice, warm, fall day, so almost everyone was outside, leaving the girl to a bit of alone time.

Anna rounded the corner and something caught her eye.

The Quidditch trophy case.

She stopped in front of it, her eyes skimming the contents. The 1976 Gryffindor Quidditch plaque stood out, polished and all. They had won the Quidditch Cup and all of the players' names and positions were listed. It was something Anna hadn't noticed before and her eyes widened at two of the engravings in particular,

Beaters: Sirius Black and Leah Kendricks

"Oh my gosh..." whispered Anna, her grey eyes widening. Sirius had told her he was a Beater - at which she wasn't surprised - but he never said her mother was.

In fact, he never told her much about her mother in general.

Not that she asked, though, because when Anna was reunited with her father, that was more than enough. Besides, she couldn't stand to see the pained look in his eyes at any mention of her.

"Um, Anna?" asked a warm voice.

She spun around the meet Caspar's gaze. "Oh, hey! Sorry, I didn't realize you were there."

"It's fine," he said with a smile. There was a moment of silence as his eyes scanned her, trying to figure out if she was sad or mad or merely tired. He decided against prying, as he had a tendency to do. "So, I heard you were Quidditch captain? Are you trying to picture your name on one of these plaques?"

"Actually, Harry and I are co-captains," she said with a raised eyebrow. "But no, I'm just looking, that's all."

"Ah, okay...'Sirius Black'. Your father was a beater?" asked Caspar, looking at the 1976 plaque.

Anna clenched her jaw, refusing to show any emotion. "Yeah, apparently my mother was too, Leah Kendricks."

"So what position do you play?"

"Um, well, it's ironic but I've played every position except Beater," she said with a chuckle. "I played Chaser the first two years and filled in for Harry before as Seeker, then stuff happened in the third and fourth year and I didn't play, then last year I played Keeper."

"Well, maybe you could try out Beater this year?"

"I don't know how-"

"I could teach you," he suggested with a grin. "You know...I was the best Beater at Ilvermorny."

"Really?"

"Yep. Well, don't tell my buddy Jason that. We always argue over it. I mean, we did, because I don't play for Wampus anymore."