Chapter 29: For the Love of the Game

  Violet Potter

  Remember, spitters might be quitters, but you probably shouldn’t swallow this one.

  Love,

  Lord Speaker of the Parliament of Owls

  PS: Don’t laugh. You know Hedwig loves me more.

  I crumpled the note in my hand. It didn’t take a genius to know who sent it. Only one person had an owl who ruled the owlery like her personal fiefdom. Besides, Hedwig allowed exactly one other person to pet her and he also happened to be the smuggest, most annoying asshole in the school.

  I felt my eyebrows twitch in frustration. It probably wasn’t healthy, but damn if that jerk couldn’t get a rise out of me with one sentence. I tossed the note in the rubbish and walked out of the girls’ locker room.

  “Good, I like that game face, Violet,” Oliver, my captain, said. He smacked my back hard enough to make me stumble.

  “I don’t have a game face,” I denied. I didn’t; I was just plotting a little homicide. Perfectly natural, really.

  “You look like you’re about to murder someone. Good on you, kid.”

  “That’s-Never mind…”

  “Alright, gather ‘round. This is the first game of the year. It’s the game of the year, got it? Even if we win the House Cup, I won’t be satisfied unless we beat those snakes!” Oliver shouted, pumping his fist into the air.

  “Relax, Ollie,” one of the twins said with a smirk. I never could tell the two apart. “They made Flint captain. How good could they possibly be?”

  “That’s no reason to not be careful. You know they play rough.”

  “Then we’ll play rougher.”

  “None of that. You know McGonagall’s going to have our hides if we don’t play a clean game. Snape might not do anything, but our head of house cares a lot about this game.”

  “As she should,” Angelina said. She was something like Oliver’s right hand, the next senior-most person on the team. Where Oliver gave orders from the goalposts, it was Angelina who carried out the plays. She pointed at herself, Alicia, and Katie, the chasers. “We can handle the snakes, The twins should be screening for Violet. This is her first game.”

  One of the twins put his arm around my shoulder. “Aww, worried about our ickle flower? We’ll watch out for her.”

  “Yeah, bludgers aren’t cheap. It might crack if it hits Violet’s skull,” the other twin said with a teasing smirk.

  I ignored them in favor of trying to figure out whatever the fuck Blaise meant by that note. I got the innuendo, fine, but he wasn’t the kind of person who’d say dumb shit just to fuck with me.

  Oh, who the hell was I kidding? He was exactly the kind of person who’d do that.

  Oliver said a few more things about the game to pump us up. I’d never been part of any kind of sporting event so I had no idea if his level of enthusiasm was normal, but it was a little overwhelming.

  Soon, it was time to begin the match. I mounted my broom and slipped in behind Katie Bell, the youngest chaser. Like me, she was also new to the team, but she grew up with the game and Angelina and Alicia had taken her under their wings.

  My heart hammered in my chest. This was it. I’d become the youngest seeker of the century after Professor McGonagall bent the rules for me to have my own broom a year earlier.

  Would my dad be proud of me? What did he feel when he flew for the first time? How embarrassing would it be if I failed? I felt like I’d rather fall off my broom than become the school laughingstock.

  Then, the world faded away, leaving me and the Nimbus between my legs. It was an incredible feeling. The wind that swept through my hair also swept aside my doubts and anxieties. I heard Lee Jordan shout our names as we flew a lap around the pitch.

  We then hovered at the center, where Madam Hooch waited with the balls. Oliver had taken a full day of practice to make sure I knew exactly where and how high I should float. I didn’t see the issue. I just needed to hover across from the other seeker, right?

  My counterpart was Terrence Higgs. I knew because Oliver made sure I knew every one of them in such detail that I felt a little like a stalker. If he thought he could’ve gotten Zabini’s help, I was sure he would have.

  Higgs was bigger than me, not that that was difficult. He had broad shoulders and a thuggish smirk that reminded me annoyingly of Dudley.

  I banished the thought. I didn’t want to think of my fatass, shitstain of a cousin right now. Right now, I wanted to fly, to enjoy the freedom without having to be the Girl Who Lived or Freak. I wanted to see what it was about this game that dad loved so much.

  Beneath me, Angelina and a trollish man I could only assume was Marcus Flint ritualistically touched the quaffle. Madam Hooch blew the whistle three times, said something about a clean game, and hurled the ball straight up.

  Both players shot into the air. It looked like Flint would out-muscle Angelina aside for a moment, then I saw her long, slender finger tap the quaffle. It was the barest of touches, but it was enough to nudge it aside, out of Flint’s way and directly into the path of Katie.

  “Gryffindors have first possession!” Lee Jordan hollered at the top of his lungs.

  The game was on.

  X

  Terrence Higgs

  There was a lot riding on this game for me. Flint was a piece of shit, but no one followed him for his personality anyway. Pucey was better, and was honestly how I got on the team. I couldn’t wait ‘til he became captain next year.

  Either way, I had to show results. I had to prove that I could bring home the snitch, especially since my opponent was a fucking firstie. Girl Who Lived or not, she couldn’t possibly be as good as everyone said she was.

  The match began and I saw the snitch fly from Madam Hooch’s hand. It soon became a flicker of gold before zipping off towards the Gryffindor quarter of the stands. Then, much like a mosquito, it switched trajectories so swiftly that I soon lost track of it.

  Potter hovered high into the air, standard play for seekers to get as big a field of view as possible. I didn’t bother; I knew where the snitch would be. I flew between the Hufflepuff and Gryffindor stands, about mid-height between the ground and the tallest goalpost so I could see when it moved.

  I knew the score. The goal wasn’t to win as fast as possible here. We could still lose the cup if we only left this game with 150 points because the House Cup was awarded based on the total number of points accumulated, not the number of games won.

  No, the goal was to humiliate the lions. We had to catch the snitch within ten minutes to make use of Zabini’s predictions. During that time, the plan was to go for an all-out offensive and score as much as possible. At least 200 points, or Flint wouldn’t be satisfied. I pretended to scan the field for the snitch while the skirmish between chasers began in earnest.

  It was as Zabini said: Bell started with possession but almost immediately fell back into a supportive role. She stalled slightly before passing the quaffle to Spinnet. Spinnet then passed to Johnson before running interference for her to take the first shot at the hoops.

  Tallest hoop, like he said. Our keeper, Miles Bletchley, caught it with ease before kicking off our own counterattack.

  Flint bull-rushed Bell. She was decent, pretty good even, but she was still just a second year, just like Vaisey on our team. She was as green as grass and didn’t know how to deal with Flint’s bullying.

  She let out a squeak of fright and froze for a moment as Flint, easily twice her size, ran her down at full speed. He shoulder-checked her before flying right on by, sending her Cleansweep spiraling and nearly knocking her off her broom.

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  Jordan began shouting something over the mic but we ignored it with long practice, just like we ignored Professor McGonagall’s ineffectual bitching. The two could say what they liked, that wasn’t no foul and Madam Hooch’s silence proved it.

  It took Flint, Vaisey, and Pucey three different flybys, but we were first on the board. I thought we’d have more points if Flint wasn’t a quaffle-hog and passed to Pucey once in a while, but he was oldest and captain and we’d just have to live with that.

  The snitch left a golden streak damn near in front of my face as it moved from the Gryffindor stand to the Hufflepuffs’. It hovered only two feet from my left shoulder for a few seconds. I could have grabbed it, ended the game with us in the lead one 170-0, but I held back and pretended I didn’t notice. Flint would throw a fit if he only got to score twice.

  Our score mounted, but Gryffindor soon recovered. The score was now 80-30 at about eight minutes in. They’d scored all three of their goals within the past two minutes.

  As the match wore on, it became obvious that they had the better chasers. Flint would kill me if I said it out loud, and Pucey would help, but they did. Maybe Flint and Pucey were just as good as Johnson and Spinnet individually, but they both had big egos and didn’t work well together. The less said about Bell and Vaisey the better.

  It was only thanks to Bletchley knowing their chasers’ habits that we could keep ahead. Even then, Johnson had wised up quickly. She started being more mindful with her shot placements, scoring two goals for the lions. Spinnet had followed with the third with a smooth hookshot to the bottom goalpost.

  Potter was flying slow, high laps around the pitch. She’d yet to cotton on that I knew where the snitch was already. Which meant it was about time for me to do my job.

  X

  Quirinus Quirrell

  How frustrating…

  Potter, the Dark Lord’s great enemy, was right there. She was flying without a care in the world, playing a nonsensical children’s game. She had no idea. How could it be that the Dark Lord was brought low by an innocent babe? She was free and oblivious while I–

  An agonizing spike drove itself into my mind. It was an overwhelming, all-consuming presence that made me feel as though my head would split in two.

  ‘M-My lord, mercy,’ I whimpered.

  ‘Your mind is not your own. You exist to serve Lord Voldemort,’ he hissed. Each word made my body shiver uncontrollably.

  ‘Yes, my lord…’

  ‘Serve me loyally Quirinus. My return is nearly at hand. My servants shall be rewarded. My enemies shall burn.’

  ‘My lord, there is Potter now,’ I said, hoping to distract him from my dissatisfaction. Every thought, every notion, had to be curated; the Dark Lord had a gateway into my innermost mind.

  I winced as another spiked drove itself into my head. ‘Lord Voldemort knows your thoughts. It is by my mercy you live.’

  ‘Yes, my lord. But Potter… I can jinx her broom, my lord. I can knock her from the sky, end your enemy.’

  ‘She is not my enemy, merely the instrument of fate by which I am tested.’

  ‘The prophecy…’

  ‘Yes, Quirinius, the prophecy. Its contents… concern me.’

  ‘Sybil Trelawney is a charlatan. Surely, the ramblings of an insane drunkard is of no use to you, my lord.’

  ‘I had once thought the same,’ he whispered, his wrath a palpable simmer in the back of my mind. ‘I had been too hasty. I acted on incomplete information and that resulted in my first defeat. No, I must know the full contents of the prophecy.’

  ‘There is a seer–’

  ‘Zabini, yes, a more useful piece than you would ever be. Immagine, Quirinius, my imminent return. A new seer, and one clearly more gifted than that fool, Trelawney, emerges. Fate is at work here. I know not what its machinations might be, but I will not act rashly again.’

  ‘But if I throw her from her broom now–’

  ‘Dumbledore will catch her, you fool! You are an insect before him!’

  ‘Y-Yes, my lord. I only seek to hasten your return.’

  ‘You seek your freedom,’ he said venomously, ‘but now is not the time. Zabini has his own designs on Potter.’

  ‘He is a cautious lad, wise enough to not look into the third floor corridor. Surely, he would show discretion.’

  ‘But perhaps, not wise enough to avoid investigating a classmate’s death.’

  ‘He can be dissuaded.’

  ‘He shall be made to serve Lord Voldemort in the end, but no. Attacking Potter now would only reveal my presence prematurely. Even should he choose not to investigate of his own accord, Dumbledore will ask. He would be a fool not to utilize such a resource, and that will only give him the opportunity to draw the seer into his sphere of influence.’

  ‘Yes, my lord. As you say.’

  ‘Potter’s time will come, but the philosopher’s stone is our objective. For now, we require unicorn blood.’

  ‘Would that not draw the seer’s attention, my lord?’

  ‘Fool. He cares not for what happens in the Forbidden Forest. Just in case, we shall hunt during the winter holidays. Zabini is a pureblood. He will have to leave Hogwarts for various social obligations.’

  ‘Yes, my lord.’

  X

  Violet Potter

  The game wasn’t going so well. Angelina and Alicia managed to score some points, but the Slytherins found the weakest link in our team’s formation. Oliver said the Slytherins would play like absolute dickwads, but I didn’t think they’d be this violent.

  They each took turns hounding Katie like a pack of wolves. None of them minded ramming into her shoulder-first because they all outweighed her by at least thirty pounds. The only reason Katie hadn’t fallen from her broom yet was because the twins covered the youngest chaser with bludgers. And since Katie couldn’t pass to Angelina or Alicia, their formation broke down.

  I had to end this, and fast. As much as I liked flying, I didn’t want to see her get hurt. Katie was a nice, bubbly girl; she didn’t deserve their shit.

  There were several tactics seekers employed. I knew them all within the first month because Oliver gave me homework. My quidditch-obsessed captain let me borrow-read, forced upon my very much unwilling person-his books, a collection of tactics, history, and career biographies of famous players. He’d then quiz me every fucking morning and act like I personally crucified his owl if I didn’t try.

  The books were interesting enough, especially the biographies of some of the modern legends, but it sometimes felt like quidditch was an eighth class on top of the regular schedule.

  The classic, “condor” approach to being a good seeker was to fly high then cruise around the pitch. The snitch was random, but by slowly lowering my altitude, I had a good chance of spotting it in motion. It also allowed the seeker to help make callouts, especially in cases where the chasers were unable to keep an eye on the two bludgers.

  That wasn’t what my counterpart was doing. Higgs, Oliver fed me enough info about him to make me feel like a stalker, floated about mid-height near the Hufflepuff side of the stands.

  He could be waiting, maybe looking for a chance to interfere with the chasers, but that didn’t seem right. It wasn’t against the rules or anything, but usually, the seekers kept to ourselves.

  Just in case, I started to hover nearby. It was a foul if a chaser obstructed the seeker from the snitch, but the seeker was free to roam anywhere; best that I blocked Higgs then.

  Then, about ten minutes into the game, he dove. I followed, of course. There were entire choice matrices for whether a seeker should or should not dive after their counterpart. In general, the consensus was that yes, the seeker should always follow. It could be nothing, or a bluff, but when calling it wrong meant losing the snitch, it was always better safe than sorry.

  Of course, there were seekers who turned that cost-benefit calculus on its head. Wronski, for example, made bluffing his entire identity as a professional seeker. But then again, I doubted Higgs was anywhere near that good so that was besides the point.

  I saw it then, a flicker of gold. It vanished in and out of visibility, blending with the yellow parts of the Hufflepuff stands and making gauging distance difficult.

  Dimly, I was aware of the roaring of the stands. It started as a dull rumble and grew louder as more and more people saw what we saw. Then, it became a thick, almost tangible wall of noise that urged us both onward.

  The wind blew my hair back and I thanked Alicia for loaning me her hairband. Blood pounded in my ears. My uniform rippled against the wind and I leaned forward, pressing myself flat against the Nimbus to eke out that bit of extra speed.

  I was gaining. Higgs’ broom was nowhere near as good as mine. He also had a good twenty pounds on me, too. It all came down to this. Everything would be decided in the next ten seconds.

  Higgs glanced back at me and I saw his eyes widen in surprise at how close I was. I could reach out and grab his broom by the bristles. The urge was almost overwhelming, but that was apparently against the rules.

  The snitch sank beneath the bleachers. Navigating the wooden posts was like weaving through a maze. Here, the difference between our brooms mattered little. Yes, my Nimbus 2000 was faster, but it handled about the same in tight spaces. I tried to overtake him, but each time, there physically wasn’t enough space to squeeze ahead.

  We emerged to the roar of the crowd, but the snitch wasn’t in my hand. Higgs held a fist aloft. Between his fingers, a pair of golden wings fluttered helplessly.

  My shoulders slumped as Lee Jordan announced Slytherin’s victory. I looked to the scoreboard: 230-30, our loss. I glared futilely as Higgs smirked at me.

  “We were unlucky,” Angelina said as she patted my back. “Chin up, Vi. There will be other games.”

  “Yeah… Unlucky…”

  Author’s Note

  Short chapter because quidditch is a shit sport and writing about quidditch makes me lose brain cells. I’m sure I’m getting the ages of Slytherin players wrong in my head, but I really don’t think it matters.

  Slytherin wins in just ten minutes, but that’s like saying an American football team will score first if they start twenty yards from the opposing team’s endzone.

  The important takeaway this chapter is that MC’s existence pushes Voldemort to obsess over the prophecy earlier than in canon. He has to. The emergence of a seer in this context is way too much of a coincidence.

  Animal Fact: Sorta… Food industry fact…? Whatever. Arkansas is the birthplace of commercial catfish production. Today, it accounts for ~$19M of the state’s agricultural sector, with ~11,000 acres devoted to production.

  The state is also home to the largest number of the digital variety of catfish in the US according to the FBI’s cybercrimes unit. Interestingly, the pandemic lockdown period saw an increase in the catfish breeding population by over forty-eight percent.

  *I lied.

  Thank you for reading. To reach a wider audience, and because I enjoy a more forum-like setup to facilitate discussion, I like to crosspost to a wide variety of websites. You can find them all on my Link Tree: .