Had a rough week like I have? Why don't you sit down and enjoy a Quidditch match! That's right, today's chapter is all about Quidditch, and a little bit on Dementor anatomy, but you'll find that interesting, too. Anyway, enjoy and please review!

Special thanks to NaginiFay and KRP for their reviews. Hope to hear more from y'all.

Chapter 10 – Ravenclaw vs. Slytherin

He had taken Cho's advice after a week of prodding. Anyone in his house who had asked him got the opportunity to see his normal face. He was shocked when no one ran screaming, no one fainted, and no one stopped talking to him. If anything, things had gotten easier for him. So for this reason, Esdras found himself lying upon a hospital bed, with neither a cloak nor an animagus spell, waiting for Madame Pomfrey with his teammates.

It really had all been an accident. Even the best Quidditch players get into accidents on the pitch. It was lucky for Esdras and for Ravenclaw that this accident happened during practice. He had extended his cloak like a sail to slow himself down and fire an incoming Bludger. Britten, the other beater, hadn't looked behind him when he spun to fire the other Bludger. The cloak had slowed the Bludger down some, but it had still landed squarely on Esdras' back from almost fifty feet away. The impact knocked him from his broom and he fell slowly through the air, bouncing until he came to rest on the grassy pitch.

And now he was here, in the hospital bed in his normal form, conserving his strength. The transformation affected everything, even his Quidditch robes. The normally sharp black and blue colors were dull and tattered, the consequence of transforming with him. They would return to normal when he restored his animagus spell.

Esdras followed the bright silver glows of his teammates as they paced back and forth. Britten still hadn't stopped apologizing. Esdras looked up at the gathered mass and cleared his throat. "Everyone shut up. I'll be fine."

Roger looked sternly at Esdras. "You'll be fine? You broke two ribs, one of which punctured a lung, and you broke your shoulder blade. And I don't even know what Madame Pomfrey was talking about with those Dementor injuries."

Laughing, the Dementor leaned back. "The Bludger shattered one of my dorsal float bladders. That's why I'm not floating right now. If I tried, I'd be off balance."

Cho glared. "How can you laugh at a time like this? The Slytherin game is tomorrow and we were counting on you to be our secret weapon. Now we'll have to use Elric, and you know how bad he is."

The Dementor continued to laugh as Madame Pomfrey approached with the bottle of Skelegrow. She glared at him as well. "And what do you think is so funny? You should be thankful I thought to get you to put your spells on a set of blankets or this potion would be ice by now."

He gazed up at her with his sightless grey face and did his best to look contrite. "Actually, it wouldn't. I just finished with the last of the spells this morning. All my clothing is protected now. I don't need a cloak; I can be just like a mortal."

Her glare softened as she poured the potion and changed the subject. "You Quidditch types are all the same. You go getting hurt and expect me to be there for you all the time. Now, drink up."

Esdras gagged on the foul liquid and coughed once it was all gone. "That's the worst thing I've ever tasted, and I've eaten in the prison cafeteria on Azkaban."

The nurse handed him a glass of water, which he drank down quickly before returning to his prone position and closing his eyes. Within seconds, a warm silver glow began to suffuse his chest, moving upward to encompass his damaged bones and organs. Madame Pomfrey watched on in awe as the glow grew in intensity, and then faded away.

Once the glow was gone, Esdras slowly began to rise up, until he was floating a foot over the bed. He sat up slowly, the blanket falling from his chest as he stretched. "Could someone get me my cloak, please?"

Madame Pomfrey looked at him in shock. "Oh no you don't." She cast a triage spell on him and waited for the results. A glowing form of his Dementor body hovered over his prone form, glowing in shades of green. "How is this possible? These injuries would have taken most of the day to heal and at least another day or two of therapy."

Taking his cloak from Cho, Esdras flipped it over his shoulders and floated up from the bed, smoothing his Quidditch robes beneath him. "Dementors are provisionally immortal for a reason."

Whatever the reason may have been was interrupted by a crying form, tearing into the Hospital Wing. Katie Bell moved at top speed and leapt over a bed with the natural grace of a chaser. She came to a halt before him, relief mixed in with the tears in her eyes. "Esdras! Hermione saw them carrying you in and ran to tell me that you were hurt and I ran here so fast and I was so scared. Why aren't you in bed? You should be in bed so Madame Pomfrey can heal you."

Esdras changed to his mortal form and smiled brightly. "Remember, you have an immortal boyfriend."

Katie stepped close and placed a hand on his shoulder, squeezing lightly, and then trailing under the cloak to his back. When she was satisfied, she fell into his arms and hugged him tightly. "Hermione said it was bad, that you weren't floating."

He wrapped his arms around her and returned her hug. "No, it wasn't bad. And don't you worry; it takes a lot to hurt me." He looked around at the assembled lot. "Now, how about dinner?"

Katie sat at the dinner table next to Hermione. Between them sat the Dementor Medical Reference. The page showed a cutaway view of a Dementor. Hermione pointed to a glowing silver organ located below the stomach. "This one, the supersolenoid organ, it's the energy to matter conversion center. As long as the Dementor has enough energy, he can heal almost any injury to his body. Healing time varies depending on what the injury is, it can be anywhere from immediate to a span of days."

The chaser regarded the picture quietly, and then flipped to the chapter describing the supersolenoid in greater detail. "So that's why he wasn't able to heal the broken ribs without the Skelegrow, he hadn't seen Professor Lupin yet to feed." She flipped the page. "What do you mean by almost any injury?"

Hermione reached for a roll. "One roll at a time in your mouth, Ron. Honestly." She took a bite of her roll and spoke idly. "Major damage to the supersolenoid can't be repaired on its own, the injured Dementor has to either enter a healing bond with no less than four other Dementors or put on a stasis cloak until a healing bond can be performed. Other than that, it can heal most anything else, even amputation or decapitation."

Katie looked on in total shock. "You're kidding me. Esdras could…" She looked around cautiously before leaning in closer. "Esdras could lose his head and still be fine? How is that possible?"

Hermione flipped a few pages forward in the book and tapped a picture of a canister of glowing silver liquid. "Ichor, the secondary blood of Dementors; Dementor blood is black, the ichor is a glowing silver. It's basically a liquefied soul resin formed by the supersolenoid that accelerates tissue growth and decreases tissue aging. It's the same reason why Esdras, who is three hundred twelve, acts like he's in his late teens. Ichor slows Dementor physical and mental growth after maturity." They sat in silence for a while before Hermione posed her own question. "How are the language lessons going?"

Reaching into her book bag, Katie pulled out a small book and handed it to Hermione. "Today I read my first book in Azkabaaner. Granted it's a children's book, but Esdras said I did wonderfully."

Opening the thin text, Hermione was greeted by a picture of a cloudy day on a rocky island. In the center of the picture was a field of green and what looked like a black cloak frolicking in the middle. "That's a Lethifold."

"Yes, it is. This book is called The Lethifold and the Mint Field. It's apparently a pretty standard children's story on Azkaban, like The Wizard from Kent Goes to Market."

Ron perked up at the mention of this. "I loved that book when I was a kid."

Harry looked up from his potions text. "When you were a kid? You still have it in your trunk in the dorm room."

Ron sputtered. "It's a classic. Like that Gold Eggs and Meat book you told me about."

Hermione laughed. "You mean Green Eggs and Ham, Ron."

The redhead shrugged. "Whatever."

By this point, Harry had gotten his hands on the Azkabaaner children's book. The picture in front of him showed the Lethifold sunning itself on a rock. "It's funny, isn't it? They're just like us in so many ways."

"All the ways that count, right?" The voice that interrupted them came from the upside down hovering form of the resident Dementor. "That book has always been a favorite of mine."

Katie leaned behind Hermione and kissed Esdras before he righted himself, sitting cross legged and hovering at bench height in the aisle. Harry looked at the book again. "Yeah, Dementors are similar in all the ways that count. But you still scare me."

Esdras looked carefully at him, glowing green eyes regarding green eyes. "Ask yourself this question, Harry. Do Dementors scare you, or does the effect we have on you scare you?" He smiled and patted him on the shoulder before rising and turning to Katie. "I've got the match tomorrow, so I'm going to turn in early. Cheer for me tomorrow?"

Katie pulled the Dementor out of the air and snogged him senseless. "What do you think?"

The next morning, Esdras stood in the locker room adjusting gloves and tightening the leather wrist strap that kept his Bludgerbat connected. On his face, he wore a pair of glasses with cobalt tinted lenses. Cho looked curiously at him. "Esdras, I've been meaning to ask, what are those glasses for?"

Peering over the edge of the lenses, he looked down at her. "They're charmed to allow me to better see the balls. Since our vision is as dark as night, we use a face shield charmed to make the Quaffle and Bludgers glow. Since I have ears in this form, I made a pair of glasses. I don't really need them when I'm using my mortal eyes, but I'm so used to seeing the Bludgers glow that it's weird to play without it."

The seeker smirked. "The fact that you look cool has nothing to do with it?"

The beater shouldered his broom and smiled. "Nothing at all."

Roger called the team over for a last minute pep talk. "Alright guys, we can do this. Slytherin is tough, but we're tougher. We have experience on our side, over two centuries worth between the seven of us. This is the best Ravenclaw team I've ever seen. Let's get out there and show them what we can do."

Esdras put his hand into the center of the circle, and the others followed suit. He spoke something in the harsh whispers of Azkabaaner, and then translated for his friends, his voice echoing with his native accent. "Death to the opposition!"

The others laughed and repeated his chant before shouldering their brooms. They stood shoulder to shoulder in front of the curtain and waited for their call. Slytherin was called first, and there was a short, polite applause. The noise eventually began to grow louder until they could just barely hear Lee Jordan make their announcement. "And now entering the pitch for their first match of the year, Ravenclaw!"

The curtain parted and they mounted their brooms and zoomed out onto the pitch in formation. They made a slow circle around the pitch to the general accolades of the crowd. As they approached the Gryffindor stands, Esdras looked carefully, and found Katie Bell in the first row, cheering madly. He broke formation and flew closer to the stands. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a small bundle and tossed it right at Katie, which she caught easily as he flew off to rejoin his team.

Fred and George sat behind her and peered over her shoulders. They questioned her in stereo. "Well, what is it?"

Laughing, she opened the package and pulled out a soft woolen scarf knitted in the Ravenclaw colors of dark blue and silver, but with an added band of black. She gasped as the silver parts of the scarf began to glow of their own accord. She quickly removed her own scarlet and gold scarf and replaced it with the Ravenclaw/Azkaban hybrid and began cheering louder, joined by the twins behind her.

At the center of the pitch, the game was getting ready to start. Madame Hooch had the Quaffle in her hands, and she spoke under the sonorous charm so all could hear her. "Now I want a good, clean match." She looked up to regard the Dementor. "Mister Demnin, I know Dementor Quidditch rules are a little different, but I'll be expecting you to abide by mortal rules for this game."

The Dementor saluted in understanding and held his Bludgerbat to the ready. The referee nodded and punched the button that released the Bludgers into the air before tossing the Quaffle into the air to start the game.

Katie was torn watching the action, listening to the commentary, and making sure Esdras was okay. Somewhere in the background she could hear Lee calling out the play by play. "And Roger Davies of Ravenclaw has the Quaffle, passes to Chambers, passes to Bradley, loses it to Montague from Slytherin with a Bludger from Goyle. Bad luck, there. Montague has it, passes to Flint, and Flint and Montague are both down in a double strike by Demnin! That was incredible! Bradley has the Quaffle, makes the shot past Craven, ten points Ravenclaw!"

Cheers erupted through the stadium as the players reset for another run. High above the action, Malfoy called down to the two Slytherin beaters. "Crabbe, Goyle, just like we planned it in practice. Don't muck it up!"

Lee kept calling the plays. "Warrington of Slytherin has the Quaffle. Demnin fires a Bludger but he avoids it. And Crabbe and Goyle have the Bludgers, they both shoot…"

Crabbe and Goyle, from opposite ends of the field and with simultaneous shots, hit both Bludgers towards Esdras. With only one bat, Esdras spun to strike the first one. With his left hand he reached out and caught the Bludger. The angry ball struggled helplessly in his grip. The crowd fell silent, and most of the action on the pitch stopped as the two teams stared open mouthed at the Dementor. As quickly as they stopped, the cheering and action on the pitch started back up again. Lee was screaming the commentary now. "This is incredible, Demnin has the Bludger in hand and he's chasing down Malfoy! He throws it and just barely misses. Judging from the looks of it, folks, he meant that as a warning shot."

Malfoy pulled up on his broom and gasped. The Bludger had passed just inches from his face. He accelerated and gained height over the pitch, approaching Goyle. Flying right up to him, he grabbed him by the front of his robes and shouted at him. "You follow that Dementor and hit him when he's down."

Goyle gave him a blank look. "How will I know when he's down?"

Malfoy sneered and pushed him away. "Because he'll be on the ground, you great oaf. Now go!"

In the Gryffindor stands, Harry glanced upward with a curious expression. "What is Malfoy doing up there?"

Hermione idly looked up from her book. Non Gryffindor matches rarely excited her. "Looking for the Snitch, most likely."

Harry narrowed his eyes, but didn't bother to look at her. "I'd know what that looks like, thank you. He's not looking for the Snitch, it's like he's waiting for something to happen. He's got his wand out."

She followed his eyes up to the airborne figure in green. She followed the direction his wand was pointing. Her eyes fell to the pitch just in time to see Esdras, who had been skimming a few feet over the pitch, take a nosedive into the grass. He bounced up to float height and skidded along in midair, coming to a rest against the Hufflepuff grandstands.

Over the screams of Katie Bell, she could hear Harry and Ron calling the foul. "He used a Vertinverta curse on him! Come on!"

Hermione tried to calm them down. "Do you think maybe Esdras could have accidentally over steered?"

She was met with glares. Ron looked around Harry and spoke sternly to her. "You may know everything about everything else, but we know Quidditch. The only thing that could have done that to a flier as good as Esdras was a Vertinverta."

The impact stunned Esdras, and he could feel that his collarbone had broken. He closed his eyes and concentrated on healing the damage. Once the process was started, he opened his eyes and turned his head to follow the match. The only thing he saw was Goyle, his arm drawn back to fire a Bludger.

The force of the point blank impact pushed Esdras down onto the ground again, screaming with the intensity of the pain. The healing ichor quickly surrounded the damage on his back and the bones and skin began knitting. Slowly, he got to his feet. Above him he could hear the crowd cheering for him. He raised his hand to the air to show he was alright but just as quickly brought it down as he winced in excruciating pain. Again, he could feel the ichor flow, healing what felt like an internal injury, then again and again.

He looked up into the air, and his eyes grew with horror.

"Where's the other Bludger? Fred, George, where is the other Bludger?" Katie was growing steadily more frantic. Esdras was struggling to get onto his broom. His movements were slow and painful.

The twins turned to each other and brought their heads together to talk without Katie overhearing. "Fred, tell me you saw the Bludger bounce away. Tell me you saw it ricochet under the grandstand."

The other twin shook his head. "I followed Goyle all the way down. He hit, and it struck. All I saw was it hit, and then it disappeared in a silver glow."

They were pulled away from their discussion by the hair and quickly turned to face the fiery eyes of their companion. She was nearly hysterical. "WHERE IS THE OTHER BLUDGER?"

Fred cleared his throat as best he could. "We think…it's inside him."

Hermione nudged Ron. "Where did the other Bludger go?"

Any response from Ron never came as he was forcefully pulled back and replaced by Katie Bell. The look in her eye indicated that Hermione would be suitably dealt with for not obeying any command, and her voice was cool as ice. "Hermione, I need you to use the Dementor Medical Reference and find a way to find out what's going on inside of Esdras. Now."

Hermione nodded and fumbled for her book bag, keeping her eyes on the volatile chaser. She finally managed to get the book open and in her lap, and she began searching through the index. "There's the standard Dementor triage spell, but we have to be within five feet to cast it."

The ice in her voice grew even colder. "Does it look like we're within five feet of Esdras?"

The younger witch shook her head so violently that her hair tossed about wildly. Returning her attention to the book she came up with another option. "There's a spell that Azkaban doctors used to monitor troop health during battles during their last civil war."

Katie nodded. "That'll do. Cast it."

"I can't. You'll have to. It's in Azkabaaner."

The book was ripped from her lap as Katie began to read it. She placed a piece of parchment on the bench and began to read the incantation. She came to the last line and stopped. "I need to know the type of house Esdras is in. What does that mean?"

Hermione answered quickly. "There are three types of houses, major, minor and royal; each has a classifier that goes before the house name. Try using corvades."

Katie read the last line of the spell using his classifier and full name, Esdras Tarsus corvades Demnin, and watched as the parchment sprung to life. She cast an enlarging charm and fell back in shock when she saw what it displayed.

The parchment presented a scale representation of a Dementor, the caption below it read Esdras' name. The chest cavity was glowing an angry red alternating with flashes of silver as a small black ball bounced randomly inside. Beside that was a vertical silver bar, presently resting just below the number fifty five and steadily decreasing. The rest of the paper was filled with columns that cycled through lines of printed Azkabaaner at a very fast rate.

She set to work analyzing the parchment, looking up occasionally to view the action on the field. Esdras was putting far too much weight on the broom for a Dementor. She looked to the columns on the right side of the paper and gasped. "Here, this column is injuries. Superior dorsal and ventral float bladders are shattered; his lungs, diaphragm, trachea, esophagus, and heart are destroyed. Hermione, how long can he last without blood flow?"

The answer came immediately. "A month, give or take." She stood beside Katie and scrutinized the silver bar next. "This is his ichor remaining. He's healing the major injuries as they come. Damage this severe causes reflexive healing, he can't stop it but it will start to slow down as he approaches zero. He's going to start passively feeding when it drops below fifty percent, but he's got spells on his robes. He won't be able to feed, it'll keep dropping. Pray it doesn't hit zero."

"Then what will happen? Will he die?"

Hermione nodded grimly. "And he'll take out half the pitch when he goes."

On the pitch, Esdras disengaged his animagus form to conserve energy. He leaned against his broomstick and accelerated into the air before flipping himself upside down and docking onto Cho's broom from below, moving with her as she flew through the air. The seeker looked down for a second. "You look like hell, Demnin."

He smirked. "I feel like hell, Chang. That Bludger from Goyle hit me right as I was beginning to heal. It healed inside of me. I can't feed and I don't have my stasis cloak with me. If I don't get this ball out before I deplete my ichor reserve, my supersolenoid will implode."

Cho glanced down and accelerated into the mess. Esdras struck the remaining Bludger as it approached them and unseated Montague from his broom. After a moment, she pulled back up with a scowl on her face. "The Bludger is inside you? And what's a supersolenoid?"

Esdras winced as the Bludger destroyed a freshly healed lung. "It's my energy to matter conversion organ. If it completely runs dry, it will collapse in on itself. It will kill me and probably destroy most of the pitch in the process, and everyone else along with it."

Her eyes widened as she looked down at the Dementor, then slightly behind him. "Then find a way to get Malfoy off my tail, the Snitch is right below us. How much time do we have?"

He looked back at the trailing form of Draco Malfoy, whose grin gave away his guilt. "Long enough."

The entire Gryffindor grandstand was now torn between watching the game and the parchment display. The silver bar dipped below the number twenty.
The Dementor abandoned his broom and twisted quickly as Cho made a steep dive; he came to rest behind her, sitting back to back. Malfoy entered the dive with them, his Nimbus 2001 quickly closing the gap between them. Esdras waited.

Cho called out from behind him. "We're almost there. Keep him off me."

From the folds of his cloak, the Dementor drew his wand, and carefully reaching behind him, he placed the tip against his back. Malfoy was now no more than ten feet away. When the blonde had closed to arms reach, Esdras reached up with his free hand and pulled his hood back.

Malfoy's eyes bugged out and he let out a startled scream at the sight of the grey face. Esdras looked him in the eye as he whispered his spell. "Reducto!"

The crowd would later say that it had all transpired in slow motion. The Reductor curse tore through Esdras' chest, exploding his ribs outward. The Bludger, and a good amount of black blood and silver ichor, flew out, striking Draco Malfoy in the chest, knocking him from his broom. Cho swooped down and caught the Snitch before pulling up, but Esdras didn't follow. He fell heavily from the back of the broom, landing with a sickening crunch on the grass below. The crowd would later say that Katie Bell's scream brought time back to normal.