Three Months Later
"Have good trip Greg!" Miss Charlotte said cheerily from the door of 14 Milton Ct, as Greg walked down the path. The garden of the house was considerably nicer in the end blaze of summer than in frigid first breath of winter.
"Thanks Miss Charlotte!" he called back over his shoulder as he began his walk to the Tube station. "I'm really looking forward to getting out of London."
"Well call if you need to. Bye!" Miss Charlotte turned and walked back into the House/office that she shared with her sister and her sisters family. Greg had been amazed when he showed up one afternoon and a man dressed in stunning white robes had opened the door, called him by name and welcomed him.
Miss Charlotte told Greg that she often asked her sister and brother-in-law to give her space for the first few meeting with wizarding clients to make everyone feel more comfortable. They would apparate off to a small apothecary they ran in Diagon Alley leaving the house open for Charlotte.
Greg was surprised at how light on his feet felt. He was going to be leaving London for a week and he still was not fully convinced that this would actually be happening. While he had been recouping at St Mungo's Zacharias had stopped by to drop of the mail that had arrived for Greg.
To Greg's everlasting astonishment in between the various dunning letters from Stallings and Stallings, the slew of death threats - those had been coming his way ever since the Prophet had published a few details of the incident at Hammersmith Bridge in its Magical Law Enforcement blotter - and the offers for cheap broomstick polish there was one letter of actual interest.
The envelope was plain white, with the address written in the neatest most orderly printing that Greg had ever seen: Mr. Gregory Goyle, Smith House, Somerset Crescent, London. He wondered if whoever had sent this had a printing press like the Daily Prophet or Quibbler. There was even muggle picture sticker thing on the envelope with a woman's noble head picked out in unmoving grey on a blue background.
Opening the envelope several neatly pressed pages fell out. On in the same neat, deliberate hand as had addressed the envelope and the other a more traditional scrawl of someone writing with quill and ink.
Greg picked up the quilled page to read:
"Hullo Mr. Goyle,
After our chance meeting at the game against RAA and speaking with Zacharias I asked the head coach at MMS if he thought it was worth it to bring you on, and then after we saw the article in the Prophet the other day. Well it all fell into place fast. Please send me a reply by owl as soon as you can.
Terrence Higgs
PS. If you by chance are without a broom don't worry about it we've got a decent selection at the school, nothing fancy but enough to get you around the pitch."
The other letter on paper embossed with the seal of Mudgley Muggle School read:
"Mr. Gregory Goyle
Spare Bedroom
Smith House
Somerset Crescent
Dear Sir,
It is with great pleasure that I invite you to join us as a Visiting Instructor of Beaters for the first week of Quidditch training and selection at Mudgley Muggle School.
The school will of course be pleased to cover all travel costs, provide room and board for the length of your stay and provide you with an honorarium of 10 Galleons for your efforts.
Please respond via post.
Sincerely,
Keiran Broadmoor
Dean of Sports
Quidditch Manager, Mudgley Muggle"
With the help of a friendly Mediwitch two wards over who had attended Mudgley Muggle and had become of St. Mungo's chief liason with Muggle Britain, Greg had sent his eager response the same day.
And now his day of departure had arrived. With a term slated to start the next day, Greg was eager to reach Somerset. He had received a sheath of tickets and directions indicating how best to reach the hamlet of Mudgley, and he had a train to catch. With a smirk to himself he marveled at how much he seemed to be looking forward to using the muggle conveyances. He fancied that he had in his months going to Miss Charlotte's become a bit of an expert in muggle transport, he was fully versed in the strange unwritten etiquette of the tube station and trains and felt he was ready for this foray outside London.
Miss Charlotte had also specifically suggested they role play a scenario where he got lost. He was now confident in his ability to tell a police officer that he was on holiday and needed help.
It was a different sort of power, not the giddy rush of magic, but a power all the same. He looked at what muggles had done in awe now. Not his father's hatred or the Malfoy's disdain or even the Greengrass's pity. It was awe.
Platform 1 at Paddington Station was a jumble of muggles of all sorts. Although there did seem to be a number of families seeing their students off for a new year. The riots of color bright red and white mixed with blue and gold, amongst university bound students and outfits of more extreme style for other schools. Each group seemed to stop by several statues lining the approach to the Platform to take photographs, the most popular of which seemed to be that of a bear.
When the train itself arrived and began preparations for departure once more it was as much a source of wonder to Greg as the muggles had been. It was no train of the London underground but neither was it the scarlet steam engine that pulled the Hogwarts express. The front of the triangular nose was painted yellow, and the rest of the train a blue that moved from nearly purple near the track to practically sky blue where the black roof began. A stream of light purple and lighter blue accent paint swirled down the sides, reminding Greg strongly of the light that speed from a wand on casting Flipendo successfully.
He boarded the train with his rucksack casually tossed over his right shoulder, and found his seat. A surprisingly spacious one with a table in front of it. Greg settled in for the trip to the first of his change points, Bath.
Nearly three hours later on the bus that was bouncing over the road towards Wedmore Greg had found his enthusiasm for muggle transportation to be nearing its end. Thankfully there had been some decent periods of walking to allow him a chance to stretch his legs and not feel as if he had just been the target of a shaking jinx.
Descending the stairs of the bus at the pillar box in Theale Village he was surprised to see Terrence Higgs and another shorter man, leaning against the bonnet of a Range Rover with a discrete crest on the door.
"Mr. Goyle," Terrence called to Greg from where they waited. With a wave Greg crossed the street to the two men.
"Hullo Mr. Higgs, thank you so much for the invitation," Greg gushed, talking so fast he felt that this must be what Zacharias's words must feel like all the time. "You can call me Greg though."
"I shall Greg! But you must call me Terrence. Oh where are my manners, Mr. Gregory Goyle, may I present to you Mr. Keiran Broadmoor, our Dean of Sport, and head coach of our Quidditch team. Dean Broadmoor, Mr. Gregory Goyle." Terrence made the introductions as if he had been presenting a tasty treat.
"Very pleased to meet you, Mr. Broadmoor," Greg said looking at the obviously older wizard. He wore muggle clothing with no sense of self consciousness that many wizards did. He was short, and round but there was a sparkle in his eye that Greg liked.
"And you, Mr. Goyle. Terrence, let's get this young man back to the school and get him out on the pitch." Broadmoor's voice had an accent that tickled at Greg's mind.
"That sounds excellent Dean Broadmoor. I've not had too much time on a broom recently." Greg confessed.
"No worries lad, aside from last years hold overs only most folks won't start flying till next Wednesday. I'll run a few drills I drew up for my brothers for you if you like." Broadmoor said with a slight smile.
After a short drive, Terrence and Dean Broadmoor introduced Mudgley Muggle to Greg. It was a sprawling campus of relatively hilly terrain with the buildings of the school spread out over them in seemingly haphazard fashion. No building rose more than 3 stories, and aside from the main hall, pointed out only in passing by Dean Broadmoor, they all seemed newly built. When Greg made a comment on this Terrence gave him a strange look and said, "The school's been around for 125 years actually. We just had to rebuild most of in the last 4 years."
"Did something happen to it?" Greg asked curiously.
It was Dean Broadmoor who answered, short, direct and emotionless, "Voldemort and a giant decided to try and shut us down."
Greg blushed furiously. He should have known. He should have remembered. Greg's father spoke the giant tongue fluently, he had been the one who urged Greg to take that holiday with the Malfoys. And on Greg's return he had been smirking at how he and some friends had shown the Dark Lord their worth. Greg hadn't asked but the laundry that his father had left for him to do 'the muggle way' was covered in blood.
In silence the group came at last to a one story building that filled the space between two steep hills. With a wave Terrence beckoned Greg to follow him into the building and down a narrow hallway. Like many wizard buildings this one was larger on the inside than the outside. And the hallway though narrow seemed to travel for twice the width of the building it was inside.
The room at the end was obviously mean to coaches and referees and teachers to change into appropriate Quidditch gear. Greg slung his rucksack down on one of the benches and began opening it for his old robes.
"Greg," Terrence said, "You can use this locker while you're here." He gestured to a sizable locker space just down from Terrence's own. Greg moved down and opened the doors, inside were a set of dark grey robes with 'Instructor' picked out in white on the black and MM crest on the left breast.
"I think the robes should fit you, once you're changed come see me outside," Terrence gestured towards a door opposite the one they had entered through. Greg hurriedly changed into the MM robes, thankful he was wasn't trying to fit into his old Slytherin Quidditch robes once more. There were too many memories of those to make wearing them enjoyable.
Shaking his head to clear it of the descending black thoughts he stepped out of the door onto a grate floored balcony. Below him was Mudgley Muggles' quidditch pitch and it was unlike anything he had ever seen before. The dressing room building spanned the space between two steep hills and as Greg had surmised the pitch lay between the hills. It had made sense, the hills would provide decent coverage from local muggle eyes for flying up to 100 feet or so, but Greg had wondered even then about that. On average you wanted a clear blocking structure to be roughly 250 feet of which only the top 100 could be strictly spell based. What Greg had not forseen was that actual pitch of MM was sunken. An old quarry had been repurposed as the pitch. Roughly 50 feet nearly straight down from the dressing rooms was the actual pitch itself. Since most muggle/quidditch incidents were based on muggles looking and seeing large numbers of people sitting in stands way up in the air by lowering the pitch and starting stands from the 50 foot mark up to just below the crest of the hills MM provided some of the most ingenious anti-muggle security there was, the kind that didn't need constant reapplication of spells to make work.
There was a rack of Cleansweep 11s just outside the door, which drew Greg's attention when he finally stopped marveling at the simplicity of the design of the pitch. Most beaters tended to grab any old broomstick and get in the air, focusing more bashing the quaffle heroically from one end of the pitch to the other. In which case any old broom would do. Greg knew better. If that was indeed the case then you wouldn't see national teams all flying racing brooms, after all the Beater brooms could just be a any old stick with twigs and maybe a charm or two.
As a beater you needed to be able to not only over take and redirect the bludgers at a moment's notice, but you also needed to be able keep pace with a seekers and chasers as they moved around a pitch.
Just as you needed a good broom, when faced with a series of the same broom, there were subtle differences in the wood, the grain, the care for the twigs, how much lift the cushioning charm gave. Most of this could be adjusted but Greg figured that since he was a visitor for a week and was not likely to have the chance to tweak a particular broom.
As Greg was examining the twig trimming on what seemed to be the best of the lot of these Cleansweep 11s Dean Broadmoor touched down.
"I thought I'd find you here," the Dean said holding his own broom to the side carefully. It was a beautiful green color in the wood and brush was made of exquisitely shaped and trimmed twigs all a striking white color. In short the broom in the colors of his Hogwarts house spoke to Greg as no other broom ever had.
"Seems you've found the best of visiting brooms, Mr. Goyle," the Dean continued with a nod to the one Greg held in his hands.
"Hmm… oh yeah I suppose. Er… Mr...that is Dean Broadmoor, what broom is that?" Greg asked with a nod to the beautiful broom that the older man carried at his side.
Dean Broadmoors's flash of a grin showed he was pleased that Greg had asked. "Oh this?" he said with a false attempt at calm. "It's called a Hikosugi, the newest racing broom from Japan, and in my opinion the best broom a person could have, full stop.
"I tell you what Mr. Goyle, impress me this week and I'll let you take a spin on it, alright lad?"
Part of Greg bristled at being called a lad, but most of him wanted to fly that broom more than he would admit. With a nod to the Dean he said, "It's a deal Dean Broadmoor, shall we start flying?"
The Dean flashed that grin once more that Greg was starting to realize was something this man did often on the pitch. With a flash the Dean was mounted and cutting down towards the pitch below. Greg was not about to be out done and mounted the Cleansweep 11 smoothly and began his own rapid descent.
The Dean's off-handed comment about impressing him still in Greg's mind, he approached the pitch faster than was strictly safe and had to do two small loops to bleed a bit of his speed before he touched down.
There were approximately 20 or so people gathered around the Dean and all older than Greg and most were older than Terrance as well.
"Ladies and Gentlemen," the Dean said, "thank you for agreeing to join my other coaches and myself for this week long intensive kick start to our school year. In large part because of what you managed to teach our team last year during this time we managed to reach the championship match against Durmstrang Institute for the European Schools Quidditch Cup. This year with your help I hope to reach the Continental Cup.
"Well the team and hopefuls will be here tomorrow. For this afternoon let's do some warm up flying and then break off into the units to do more precise flying, that is Keeper's you'll be with Ms Wiggs; Chasers with Mr. Higgs, Ms Brout and Mr. Englert; Beaters with me; Seekers with Mr. Murray."
And with that they were off, broomsticks shooting into the air as the lapped the pitch for the 'warm up' flights as they were called. Greg was the only one there on a school broom, and judging by how many international quality brooms he was seeing he didn't expect to be at the front of the pack for the circles. However, it soon became clear, that the others were letting the slower brooms set the pace. A Cleansweep 11 could reach 70mph in 10 seconds, but its top speed was somewhere in the 115MPH range, and that took considerably longer to reach.
They split for their individual flying drills and Greg found himself with the Dean and another even larger man who bore a striking resemblance to the Dean. When Greg saw the ring on the other man's finger it clicked just who it was he was training with here.
"You're Kevin Broadmoor, you used to play for the Falmouth Falcons! Me father used to speak about watching you play all the time," Greg said in shock looking at the larger man on perched on the distinctive frame of a Firebolt.
"Aye, I'm Kevin, Keiran's always looked out fer me and tosses these odd coaching gigs my way every so often. He's a corker all right. Was yer Da a Falcon's Fan? Want me to sign something fer him?" the giant of a man asked carefully.
Greg shifted his weight on his broom bringing it closer in line with where Kevin Broadmoor hovered waiting for the Dean to return from talking to the other groups. "My father was a supporter, but he's dead. Thank you for the offer," Greg tried to put as much warmth into the thank you as he could since he knew that his tone had grown frosty when mentioning his father's death.
"Well, no worries. Ye've got the advantage of me though, I din't know yer name." Kevin said.
"Oh, ah sorry, I'm Gregory Goyle, please call me Greg."
"Oh-ho!" Kevin exclaimed. "You're the one who hit the two snitch shots are ya? Well glad to have you flying with us Greg."
Greg blushed, did everyone know that story now? At least it was only half the story. At that moment Dean Broadmoor arrived and began their own exercises.
Fours hours of flying later had made Greg realize just how rusty his skills were. Still the chance to be on a broom was not one to be missed. After the review and drills were finished the entire group changed and went off to the dining hall for dinner. Greg asked the Dean if he could stay and work a bit more and got that flash of a smile as an affirmative.
He flew till there was barely enough light for him to make out the hills. Sprints and laps and dives and climbs and agility bounces kept him fully occupied. When he touched down at last at the locker room, Terrence was waiting to show him the way to the dining commons as well as to the Visiting Faculty housing area, where almost all of the other instructors were already relaxing after the flying that day. Most with a glass of firewhiskey at hand.
Greg took one look at the common room where the talk was flowing and stories of quidditch games of long ago were being discussed and the scent of the alcohol was heavy in the air and excused himself. If he could he was going to stay as far away from the stuff as possible. He sought his bed and collapsed exhausted but with a smile brighter than he had imagined possible just 10 days before. He was back to flying.