Wish Upon A Star

Winning

"Lucky the ground was so soft."

"I thought he was dead for sure."

"But he didn't even break his glasses."

Harry could hear the voices whispering, but they made no sense whatsoever. He didn't have a clue where he was, or how he'd got there, or what he'd been doing before he got there. All he knew was that every inch of him was aching as though it had been beaten.

"That was the scariest thing I've ever seen in my life."

Harry's eyes snapped open. He was lying in the hospital wing. The Gryffindor Quidditch team, spattered with mud from head to foot, was gathered around his bed. Ron and Hermione were also there, looking as though they'd just climbed out of a swimming pool.

"Harry!" said Fred, who looked extremely white underneath the mud.

"How're you feeling?"

It was as though Harry's memory was on fast forward. The lightning — the Grim — the Snitch — and the dementors . . .

"What happened?" he said, sitting up so suddenly they all gasped.

"You fell off," said Fred. "Must've been — what — fifty feet?"

"We thought you'd died," said Katie, who was shaking.

Hermione made a small, squeaky noise. Her eyes were extremely bloodshot.

"But the match," said Harry. "What happened? Are we doing a replay? We didn't — lose?"

"Look at your hand, mate," Fred said

Harry looked at his hand, there tightly clutched was the snitch. He sank back into his bed with relief. 

"You were holding it so tight like your life depended on it" Wood chuckled. Harry gave a weak smile.

"So, we won," he asked slowly

The others nodded happily. That's when he noticed that Ashlyn was missing.

"Where's Ashlyn?" he asked.

"Madam Pomfrey wouldn't let us near her," George said, nodding pointedly at a bed in the corner.

Harry turned to look at the direction the others were looking at. Ashlyn was lying on the bed, unconscious. She looked so peaceful, she might as well just be sleeping.

"She saved you, mate," Ron said thumping Harry on the back, then retracting his arm quickly as Harry winced.

"She did a pretty good job with the Patronus" Fred said proudly.

"I knew this would happen. She hasn't been sleeping ar eating properly for the past few days. She didn't eat today, did she, Harry?" Hermione said disapprovingly.

"She could have died. If it wasn't for Dumbledore..." she trailed off, sniffling slightly.

"Wonder how she did it. You know, how did she know the dementors were going to come to the match?" Angelina said looking at the raven-haired girl with wonder. The others nodded.

"She does that a lot," Ron said

"What, predict the future?" George asked

"She could be a seer," Katie suggested

"She does pretty well in Divination," Hermione mused. 

Ten minutes later, Madam Pomfrey ushered them out of the hospital wing, asking the team to give Harry some peace.

"Dumbledore was furious," Ron told Harry once the team had left.

"It was scary," Hermione squeaked with a shudder. "We've never seen him so angry. Once Ashlyn was taken away with you, her Patronus vanished, you see. And we heard him —"