Author's note

Written for Season 6 of the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition.

Round 5: Borrowed Inspiration

Team: Pride of Portree

Position: Chaser 2

Prompt: Use the title of a story written by your Chaser 3 for inspiration

Optional prompts:

1. (setting) Forbidden Forest
3. (dialogue) 'Do you mind if we stop for a minute?'
6. (object) broomstick

Word count (excluding author's note): 1,026

Betas: Story Please, crochetaway

I have chosen Claude Amelia Song's story called "Five stages of grief"

The Spark that Lit the Fire

Ginny and Neville walked through the Forbidden Forest in silence, broomsticks in hand. They knew the path well by now, their feet dodging roots almost automatically. Before long they arrived at a spacious clearing, and wordlessly, Ginny released a Snitch and took off gracefully after it.

Neville had gotten quite a bit better since he'd begun accompanying Ginny to her regular practice sessions in the Forest, but of course he was still no match for her. He stood for a moment watching her soar before mounting his own broom, and as he kicked off, the memory of the first time he'd joined her bubbled up.

It had been apparent to everyone in Gryffindor house that Ginny was sneaking out of the dorm several times a week; she made no effort to hide it. Most others were too busy finding their own ways to survive the Carrows' terrors to give her any mind. Her friends had previously tried to ask her where she kept going, but all she would reveal was that she needed to 'vent some frustration.' Finally, Neville could no longer swallow his worry for her, and he'd decided to just follow her.

'Go away, Nev,' she'd told him when she saw he was tailing her, 'I want to be alone.'

'I'm just out for a walk, in a very coincidentally similar direction to wherever you're headed,' he'd replied innocently.

Ginny huffed and sped off, but Neville kept up. She took back passageways that would keep her away from the staff's and prefects' main patrolling routes, finally leading them out the main entryway and onto the grounds. Once they'd made it a safe distance from the castle, Ginny had rounded on Neville. 'Why are you following me? I don't need anyone to look after me.'

'Of course you don't,' Neville agreed. 'I'm just afraid to be in the castle without you to look after me!' He batted his eyelashes in a comically exaggerated damsel-in-distress impression.

After a long moment, she'd smiled at him – the first smile he could remember seeing on her face all year – and said, 'Oh, fine. Come on, then.'

That had been several months ago. The castle was now deep in a winter freeze, but still Ginny visited the clearing religiously, and Neville braved the cold once or twice a week to keep her company.

Today had been a particularly difficult day, in which Alecto held a public punishment for a second-year who had been overheard telling his first-year housemate the latest rumours of Harry Potter's whereabouts. In September, an older and more outspoken student might have shouted for him to be left alone, or maybe even flung a curse Alecto's way. But by this point in the year, everyone had learned that trying to help a target of the Carrows' ire would only worsen the outcome for everyone involved. They would simply wait until the victim could be quietly ferried to the hospital wing for treatment.

Ginny didn't try to interfere anymore – she was brave, not stupid – but she didn't have the same wilted look of defeat that many of her classmates shared. Anyone who caught her eye could see an unmistakable rage simmering there, and on days like today, when the Carrows were at their worst, she needed to let it all out.

She flew recklessly through the clearing, dodging tree branches without an instant to spare, ascending and diving and spinning dizzying circles around Neville as he made a goodsported show of pretending he might ever have a chance of catching the Snitch before she could. The winter air bit into his exposed face and fingers as he flew, and he was just considering returning to the ground to simply watch, when Ginny called from the other side of the clearing, 'Do you mind if we stop for a bit?'

Neville was surprised but quickly descended in acquiescence. Ginny usually preferred to fly herself to exhaustion and go back to the castle to fall deeply asleep. He wondered if there was something wrong for her to want to stop already.

The two friends converged on a log at the edge of the clearing, dusting snow from its surface before taking seats. Neville ventured a guess as to what might be on her mind: 'Today was awful.'

The only response he received was a slow nod. He should have known better – Ginny wasn't one to open up about something until she was good and ready to bring it up herself.

The silence stretched on. Neville was looking up at the stars, absently picking out constellations, when Ginny finally spoke.

'Why has everybody already given up?' she asked.

Neville didn't have to ask what she meant. All year, the students had been grieving the death of Hogwarts as they had once known it. In the beginning, everyone was angry and full of fight. Now nearly everyone had passed to a hollow acceptance. Everyone but Ginny, stuck in the anger phase, brimming with fire and having nowhere to release it.

'They're all just trying to survive, Gin,' Neville said quietly.

'I know,' she sighed. 'I know it's useless to even try. We don't have the power to stop those monsters. But that doesn't make it any easier to sit here and do nothing.'

'You're not the only one who feels that way, you know. It may seem that way when you're the only one who can't keep her temper in check' – she gave him a playful shove – 'but we all desperately wish we knew what to do.'

She nodded. 'It feels better to hear that,' she admitted. 'Maybe I should talk about how I'm feeling a bit more often.'

'We all should,' Neville said. 'It's difficult to do within the castle walls. It doesn't feel safe enough anywhere.'

'Maybe everyone should start coming out here with us,' she joked. But Neville looked up at her, quite taken with the idea, and grinned.

'I could think of a few people who wouldn't mind the occasional outdoor excursion.'

That lone spark of hope would be all it took to begin a fire that would burn to light up Hogwarts through the blackest of nights.