The room... it was so dark... and so cold. The leering face of a masked death eater stood before me, a bloody whip held in one hand. His tongue was hanging out, giving him a maniacal appearance. I didn't want to show any sign of weakness, but I still shivered uncontrollably.
"Mudblood," he spat, before bringing the whip down and hitting my side... gently?
"KATHERINE BELL!"
Whoops, it was just a dream.
I groaned and rolled over in bed, burying my face in my pillow. I wasn't, and had never been, a morning person. Unfortunately, my best friend and roommate of about like three years, Angelina Johnson, couldn't seem to wrap her head around that fact. I swear, she's doing it on purpose just to annoy me. Some friend. Sniff, sniff.
"What time is it?" With the pillow muffling my voice, it was a wonder that she understood what I'd said at all.
"It's already eight, Katie. I've been trying to wake you up for the past fifteen minutes, but it seems you don't appreciate my efforts. If you hadn't gotten up to that, trust me, I would've shot a jet of icy cold water at you that would've frozen your lovely arse off. And I'm not bluffing! Now get up!" I'm pretty positive that she's smirking right now. I could just FEEL it.
I turned over to peek at her, opening my eyes just a fraction of an inch. From what little my eyes could make out, her wand, sure enough, was held loosely by her right hand, while her left was positioned at her hip. Then her earlier words clicked in.
"EIGHT?!" I thundered, opening my eyes fully. I was immediately blinded by the sun's rays streaming in through my window. Good job, girl. I sat bolt upright. "And why on earth are my curtains open? Anyway, you know how I get royally pissed off when woken up at ungodly hours in the morning, but no, you still had to wake me up! If something came up that so important, you could've waited until TEN! Unless, of course, someone had died or had fallen deadly ill, but that's beside the point. What's the big deal? And incidentally, did your efforts include slapping my side?"
Angelina just rolled her eyes then looked mock exasperated. "Yes, it did, and since you were able to feel that anyway, why did you have to wait until I exhausted my vocal chords before you decided to react?"
Oh, so that explains the dream.
"Anyway, Katie, darling," she continued, "you know very well that I'm bringing you to practice today, right? You couldn't have forgotten that. Actually, on second thought, you probably did." She grinned at me cheekily. I glared at her, but, recognizing the time when further arguments are going to be absolutely pointless, threw the bedcovers off my body and grumpily trudged to the bathroom we shared.
By the way, by training, Angelina meant Quidditch. She was signed by the Holyhead Harpies straight into the starting lineup right after she graduated. She instantly rose to fame, and is currently one of the best Chasers in the league now.
The same thing would probably have happened to me if it weren't for, well, the war. Nearly all of the muggleborns went into hiding because of You-Know-Who (call me a coward if you want, but I still have a hard time saying the name). Our flat was protected by the Fidelius Charm, with Angelina as Secret-Keeper since it was safer for her, being a pureblood and all. To be honest, I'm not even sure if I'm muggleborn. My mum's a muggle, but my dad died when I was six. Besides, the Quidditch season was put on hold at that time.
The year later, the Harpies asked me again to join, but I politely declined. I told them that I needed to recover, catch up with friends whom I lost contact with (I was in hiding for nearly a year) and get used to my new life. This year, when they asked me yet again, I could sense that they were already pretty desperate. One of their chasers retired, and Angelina told me that they didn't particularly have faith in their reserves. And so that's how I found myself waking up at bloody eight in the morning, putting in a set of Angelina's spare training gear.
Speaking of Angelina, she barged into the room right after I threw the robe haphazardly over my head, knocking down a bottle of shampoo in the process. I told you, I was not a morning person. I put my shoes on and tied my hair back into a ponytail, not even bothering to brush the tangles out, and turned to her, scowling.
"Oh good, you're ready!" Always the innocent one.
"Couldn't you at least knock before going in? What if I was stark naked right now?"
Angelina shrugged. "Unless I'm secretly a homosexual who's madly in love with you, which I'm not, I don't really care. Now let's go before we're late." She grabbed my arm and Apparated us to the Harpies training ground. I staggered a bit, but miraculously managed not to fall.
"Angelina! Hi! I missed you! How are you? Did you have fun in your vacation? And who's that you've got with you?" Wow, I had no idea that people were actually capable of saying that many sentences in one breath. Gwenog Jones, the Captain of the Harpies, lightly hopped off her broom beside us. She was tall, around 5'9", I guess, with fair skin, curly black hair, bright blue eyes and a huge smile on her face. It was impossible not to like her at once.
"Excellent, thanks. Gwenog, this is Katie Bell, my roommate and our soon-to-be Chaser. Katie, Gwenog Jones – I take it you know who she is already." Angelina introduced, hugging her Captain. "I'll answer your other questions later. Let me catch my breath first. I just completed the extremely tedious task of waking Katie Bell up." She grinned innocently.
"Hey, I'm not that bad," I protested, laughing. "Nice to meet you," I said, smiling at Gwenog and holding out my hand, which she promptly ignored, giving me a bone-crushing hug instead.
While they were catching up on each other's lives, I took in the field with scepticism. The grass was dry in some areas, uncut in others, and the goalposts looked like they could use some serious repair. I mean, come on. The Harpies were an internationally famous Quidditch team. Surely they could spare some time to keep their field in good condition.
My thoughts were interrupted by Gwenog waving her hand energetically in front of my face. "Time to go, Katie. The management's already up in the office waiting." Angelina handed me a broom (don't ask me where she got it from, I have no idea either) and the three of us flew up to the box where the management's offices were located.
Contrary to whatever you may think, my Quidditch skills and reflexes are still in top form. Angelina and I, along with George Weasley and Alicia Spinnet still play in the Weasley's backyard regularly (at least once a week). And when I say play, I don't mean playing just for fun or playing a friendly game or something. I mean playing with a furious intensity as if we were still competing for the Hogwarts Quidditch Cup. It was nearly always George and Angelina against Alicia and me. Angelina had professional training, and George was hopeless at being Chaser (although I assure you that he tried his best). Personally, I'd say it was to take our minds off what happened during the war. Even until now, it was still very painful, especially to George.
Sometimes we were joined by Charlie Weasley (when he was vacationing here from Romania), Harry Potter (when he was given a break from Auror Training) or Ginny Weasley (during school holidays). Since Ginny just graduated earlier this month, it was three-on-three more often than not, with Harry trying his best to work his way around his very busy schedule (one of the perks of being the saviour of the Wizarding world, ha ha) to visit his girlfriend.
I could barely contain my surprise when I entered the Captain's office (the management apparently agreed to meet us here) and saw Ginny sitting on a reclining chair, looking very confused. Her face brightened up when she saw me and she rushed forward to hug me.
"Ginny!" I exclaimed as soon as she released me. "We were together for the whole day yesterday, and you never, not even once, told me that you were going to try out for the team!" I looked at Angelina, whose face was also morphed into a look of confusion. "I take it you didn't know either?" She shook her head no.
"I take it you guys already know each other?" Gwenog said, watching our exchange with a grin. Ginny let out a delighted shout right beside my ear. Oh, my poor eardrums.
"You're Gwenog Jones! The Captain of the Holyhead Harpies!" Ginny shouted with almost child-like enthusiasm.
"Yes, funnily enough, I already knew that, thank you." Gwenog kept a straight face for about five seconds, then burst out laughing. "And you are?"
"Ginevra Weasley. But everyone calls me Ginny. Oh my God, I don't believe it! I actually got to meet my idol since childhood!" She began squealing and bouncing around the room. I did not know that Ginny Weasley was capable of acting this excited, I swear.
She stopped suddenly. "By the way, Katie, about what you said earlier, I didn't even know that I was in Harpies territory until you guys came in."
Angelina raised an eyebrow. I've always hated it when she did that. "Don't take this the wrong way, but then what are you doing here?"
"I don't know," Ginny shrugged. "I got an owl last night with a letter saying that the letter is a Portkey and that I could activate it by tapping my wand on it and saying 'portus' and that I take it to this place at exactly eight. At first I thought that it was some sort of dark magic, so I asked Harry to check the address and he told me that it was a field used by a Quidditch team to train, he just forgot what team, exactly, and he told me he reckons it's safe to go but that I should keep my wand with me at all times just in case it was a trap. And so I did what it said, tapping my wand and saying portus and everything and it sort of glowed blue and I landed here. And on my butt too." Ouch.
"I'm sorry to have caused you so much trouble," a deep voice intoned from near the door. We'd been so focused on Ginny's story that we all failed to notice the entrance of the Harpies' two officials. "For the rookies, I am the Harpies' manager, Evan Roswell, and he is Derek Matthews, our talent scout. Miss Bell," he inclined his slightly balding head towards me, "I take it you know why you're here?"
I nodded.
"Miss Weasley, we are very dearly sorry for not informing you about this in the letter, but one of our Chasers, Arriane Jordan, asked for an indefinite leave from the team just yesterday. If I recall correctly, it was due to pregnancy. And-"
"Pregnant? Arriane's going to be a mother? And she never told me? Hmph, and she calls herself a friend." Angelina crossed her arms, but a grin was playing on her lips. Oh, so there were two vacant spots now.
"Yes, Miss Johnson. Miss Jordan is going to be a mother, and I will thank you in advance not to interrupt me again." Angelina looked at her team manager sheepishly, "Now, where was I? Oh, right. Miss Weasley, Derek here found your Quidditch skills admirable when he was scouting at Hogwarts and we decided to recruit you along with Miss Bell here. If you turn out even better than Miss Jordan, we promise we'll keep you permanently. How does that sound?"
Ginny was speechless for a moment. "You jaw looks like it's about to drop to the floor any moment now," I whispered in her ear. She blushed.
"How does that sound? I mean, come on. Where do I sign?"