11. Next Chapter

Sitting at the Gryffindor table for breakfast, Harry caught sight of Hermione entering the hall and nudged Ron beside him. Waving her over, they both continued to rush food into their mouths, causing Hermione to growl threateningly at them as she arrived. Harry almost laughed; by the time she left Hogwarts, the very same growl would have evolved into a weapon that could make even a Death Eater shiver with fear, but Hermione was a long way off that yet. In comparison, her current version was almost cute.

The dagger-like stare still did the trick though, and Harry slowed down his shovelling slightly (just enough to focus her ire on Ron instead) as Hermione gave them one last huff of disapproval before moving on to - in the boys' opinion at least - much more important matters.

"I suppose you two are planning to spend all day watching the Quidditch, then?" she asked, disapproval evident in her voice.

"As long as it lasts." Ron chirped.

"We're really too invested now, it would be more unproductive not to go. We'd spend all day worrying about what happened." Harry grinned. Invested in the match, invested in the mystery - although given recent events, the latter seemed like a bit of a let-down.

"When are you going down to the pitch?" Hermione said.

The two boys looked at each other, before turning back to her sheepishly.

"Actually..." Ron began, his hesitation evident. When it became obvious he had no plans on continuing, Harry finished the thought.

Hermione groaned. "I thought Parvati said she'd seen you earlier, don't tell me you've actually -"

"... We've already been. Just back for a bite to eat before we head back down." Harry completed.

Because the mystery was over, and Harry felt cheated. The Hufflepuff-Slytherin match was indeed taking place that day, but the reason the Slytherins had been acting so weird over the past week was now apparent.

It was Sunday.

The day before (the Saturday, as days before Sunday tended to be), from the start of the match, the Gryffindors had cheered on Hufflepuff while watching Draco for suspicious activity as they'd promised each other. They had spotted this 'suspicious activity' immediately; despite being the nominal seeker, to Harry's skilled eyes, it was obvious from the first minute of the match that Draco had no intention of catching the snitch.

This was an unusual but not unheard of strategy; occasionally a team with a sterling chaser group but outmatched seeker would have the latter focus on denying their opposite number instead of catching the snitch themselves, while the chasers did their best to rack up a 160 point lead as quickly as possible. The oddity was that, as Harry had witnessed during the Slytherin-Gryffindor match, Draco was a good seeker, well above the skill level of his Hufflepuff counterpart, and while the Slytherin chaser line was stronger than their yellow and black cloaked opposition, it wasn't by much, and in any case it was rare indeed that school level players could build the required lead with the necessary haste.

Maybe Flint had lost confidence in Draco's skills after the first round, but Harry couldn't see how. As much as he disliked the man personally, Flint had a keen enough eye for Quidditch to see that that wasn't the case, and if he was really so concerned, he'd have dropped Draco altogether and moved Higgs back from chaser.

Despite all this, Draco had done - was doing - his job well, and the Hufflepuff seeker (not Diggory - a flinch as Harry remembered that name - as Harry didn't recognise him, but given he'd spent his own first year match against Hufflepuff unconscious in the hospital wing, the lack of familiarity wasn't surprising) was left more frustrated as the game wore on. The Slytherin chasers had built a reasonable, but far from dominant, lead, and the day dragged towards the afternoon.

Enraptured by a spell as only Quidditch could weave, the collective Hogwarts student population had ignored their pangs of hunger as lunchtime came and went. A few of the more organised pupils brought out sausages and pastries they had smuggled out of breakfast. Distracted by their friendly bickering over what, exactly, Draco was doing up there, and how it all fitted into his evil masterplan, the three of them failed to realise that the concentration of picnic-munchers amongst the Slytherin stands were unusually high.

Naturally, Hermione was the first of them to snap out of the daze, and returned to her homework once it was evident that nothing indeed was happening (the snitch hadn't been spotted in half an hour, and the seekers were reduced to disrupting each other's chaser plays, Malfoy always watching the Hufflepuff like a hawk whenever he tried to break off and resume the search). Two hours later, she'd returned. Ostensibly, it was to nag her fellow first year Gryffindors - all of whom were still watching, even if Neville was half asleep - into attempting some schoolwork while they waited for some excitement, but she also brought with her a large basket of bread rolls from the house-elves, which were eagerly set upon by the ravenous spectators. Harry grinned at the thought of Hermione - Hermione! - breaking into the kitchens - and a school rule! - for them on her own initiative, and thought his influence might be finally paying off.

Cheers erupted from the Slytherin section of the grounds shortly before dinner as the team in green finally broke into a hundred and sixty point lead. Even the capture of the golden snitch, however unlikely that seemed, wouldn't save Hufflepuff now. Harry expected to see Draco switch tactics now the game was won, but his pale haired antagonist stuck to his original strategy of shadowing the opposition.

The game dragged on.

With the result in the bag, a good deal of the school who went off for dinner failed to return. Those less Quidditch obsessed, those students behind on work, and those who simply couldn't watch any longer as the Slytherin lead stretched ever onwards, stayed back in the castle. Harry noted that, despite the sudden shortage of fifth and seventh years with official exams at the end of the year, his own fifth-year captain Wood was still watching eagerly, having somehow procured a notebook over dinner, as were the majority of Slytherins (gloating over the magnitude of the victory) and Hufflepuffs (loyal to the last, bless their badgery little souls).

All of which was mildly interesting if, as Harry and Ron were, you were fascinated by the game and scarfed down dinner as quickly as possible to make it back out to rejoin the diminished crowd. But none of it explained why the Slytherin team had been acting so oddly in the run-up.

Until, with the scores at 640-330, darkness fell, and the game showed no signs of abating.

By then, the stands were mostly deserted, and only the hardiest braved the night's chill to stay and watch a match they could hardly see. The Hufflepuff players were tired, hungry, and roundly demoralised, whereas the Slytherin ones were well rested, well fed, and clearly energised. Gradually, those few remaining spectators realised why the Slytherin team had had an early night on Friday, why they had such large breakfasts as to make do for the weekend's meals. They weren't planning to stop.

Eventually, dreary-eyed and weary even as they did their best to focus on the Quidditch, Harry and Ron decided that since they were about to fall asleep anyway, it would be better to be in their own beds when they did so. The grounds were dark, and the stands were almost empty. Madam Hooch had been replaced by Professor McGonagall as the referee, Lee Jordan was snoring loudly (the sound-enhancing spell he had performed on himself earlier meant these were audible across most of the castle), and there were only a dozen or so particularly fanatical fans left, including one rather devoted girlfriend, two lumps sitting huddled in the Slytherin section that Harry could just about make out as Crabbe and Goyle, and a frantic Oliver Wood filling out his sixth roll of parchment on the two teams' plays. Harry could also make out Professors Sprout and Snape left in their respective sections, exhorting their houses to greater feats, while Dumbledore and Flitwick were making conversation in a neutral stand. Whether they were discussing lighting, calling the game done, or simply placing bets on the match, Harry could not tell.

Then, scant hours later, the two Gryffindors were up at the crack of dawn and headed back to the pitch to get in a few hours spectating before breakfast.

There, they found chaos. Harry couldn't quite catch the score, but it was evident that the Slytherins had arrived at a thousand points overnight while the Hufflepuffs were still on several hundred. In a way, it made sense. In the professional game, teams had reserves to use for occasions such as these, and would happily replace team members for weeks on end in rotating patterns should the need arise. Hogwarts Houses were often less blessed; the Gryffindor team hadn't been able to replace him all those years ago when he'd been in the hospital following his first encounter with the Philosopher's Stone, and that was on several days' notice. Hufflepuff wouldn't have realised what was happening until far too late, and had no prepared replacements; whatever they could scramble would be far below the usual level even for a house match.

Slytherin, on the other hand, had the reserve Chaser that was left over from when Draco bumped Higgs, the team's original seeker, sideways, and knowing what they had planned Flint had been rolling substitutions across the night to keep their midfield players, if not well rested, certainly in better condition than their yellow-robed counterparts.

Which brought them back to the Great Hall. Once they'd shaken off an increasingly persistent Hermione ("You really should be doing your homework you know, it'll be really bad for you if you fall behind!") at breakfast, Harry and Ron settled down next to a rather somber looking Hagrid, who was clutching two large buckets of water. One, he was dunking his head in at irregular intervals, and the other he was taking large slurps from.

"You okay, Hagrid?" Harry asked.

Hagrid only groaned in reply.

"Hagrid?" Ron persisted.

He got a groan, too, before Hagrid turned to look at them and said, "Yeh, I'll be alrigh'. Jus', yer know, keep it down a bi' fer me, if yer don't mind."

Harry stared, before doing his best to stifle a laugh. Hagrid, half-giant, eater-of-rock-cakes, who he had seen (before he'd returned to the past in the form of an innocent first-year) down litres of ale as if they were shots, was hungover.

Ron didn't seem to cop this, but they respected their friend's wishes anyway, and sat in silence as Slytherin continued to tear apart the hapless Hufflepuffs until midday came.

Having proven their point (and no doubt getting rather tired themselves; it was one thing to keep up on sleep, and quite another to stay airborne for so long on aching muscles), Draco rounded the Slytherin score off at a neat 2,500 just before lunchtime with a catch entirely unopposed by the Hufflepuff seeker, who was gently dozing by the side of the pitch. With exhausted arms, they'd held the Hufflepuffs to a mere 500, ensuring the largest Hogwarts Quidditch victory anyone could remember, and sending several Ravenclaws scuttling to the library to check if anyone had ever matched the achievement. The cheer from the green section caused Hagrid to wince, but he bade them a cheery enough goodbye anyway, and invited them down (with Hermione) for tea that evening.

Waddling back to the Great Hall just in time for lunch, Harry mentioned they'd spent almost their entire weekend either eating or watching Quidditch, to which Ron replied it had been two perfect days.

Showered, changed, and back in the Slytherin common room, Draco reflected on another positive aspect of dragging Quidditch games on far longer than they were supposed to be. By finishing the game in the early afternoon, the team had inadvertently opened up an opportunity for the resulting party to last most of the day.

"There he is!" Flint cried, the captain having beaten him back to the common room, "The kid who lasted all night!"

The crowded room cheered their hearty approval, and Draco let out a wide smile. While the chasers and keeper had alternated round, and they'd even found a substitute beater to use, they couldn't spare an extra seeker without pulling Higgs in, which would have compromised their chaser line. Fortified by a sleeping potion that Professor Snape had slipped him, along with his Head of House's permission to be absent from the Friday morning Potions lesson, Draco had managed an uninterrupted thirty-six hours of sleep from Thursday to Saturday before the match, and had therefore been able to stay awake long after his Hufflepuff opponent was barely able to stay on his broom. Despite having played through the night before, he found himself still buzzing, and wondered if he'd get himself to bed this night either.

Though, watching the large piles of chocolate, butterbeer and more 'unapproved of' drinks around the place, there was a good chance nobody else would either.

"Gryffindor will have to watch themselves now. One slip and the trophy's ours!" Flint grinned wolfishly.

"They still win it if they beat Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff," Draco conceded, "And I doubt either of them have enough firepower to cause Wood and Potter problems."

"Maybe not," Flint admitted, "But does it really matter? All that anyone will remember of this year is that we beat Hufflepuff by TWO THOUSAND POINTS!"

He shouted the last words out to the room, and the gathered Slytherins roared back at him. It was nice to have a little piece of Hogwarts history wrapped up so early in his school career, and he could feel his approval with the older students rise too. If he'd known how great being seen as something other than a pampered daddy's-boy was during his first run through, he might have tried ditching the image earlier.

He settled into a huddle of sofas with the other first years. Anyone who didn't care about Quidditch still cared about Slytherin winning, and not even the most uninformed observer could have failed to notice that their score had more digits than usual. Taking pats on the back from Zabini and Nott, he relaxed for what felt like the first time in weeks as he watched the girls gush over the match. Only rarely did their opinions seem to make any sense (they seemingly cared more about who looked best on a broom than who was most effective), but it was still good to be able to relax as a group. As dorm mates. During both of his times at Hogwarts, the students that made up the current Slytherin first years had been too fractious, too divided, too isolated to work together effectively. The few times they had gelled as a team were when they were insulting the Gryffindors (usually Potter and his lackeys) in increasingly childish ways; hardly their finest hour.

Idly, Draco wondered which of the students around him would fall under the sway of a resurgent Dark Lord, and whether he could gather enough influence to save any of them. A morbid thought, far from suitable for such a joyous occasion, as he noticed two of them on whom he did have great influence over approaching.

"Crabbe, Goyle!" He called.

They ambled over. "Malfoy," Crabbe replied. "You were flying well today."

"Thanks," Draco said. And then he stopped.

Did Crabbe just -

"Well played." Goyle grunted in agreement.

- he had.

He's spouted an opinion! Sure, it was simple, and everyone else in the room was thinking the same thing, but this was an honest, unprompted train of thought. As Draco hadn't been bragging about his own flying, it was either original or paraphrasing a source that wasn't Draco. While minions had their uses, Crabbe would be far more sufferable if he could hold a conversation that wasn't simply parroting Draco's words back at him, which made this development a very welcome change.

If he hadn't thought that he could make a difference, change his fate, before this moment, then he sure as Nurmengard believed it now. Truly, miracles were at work here.

"Not this year, kid, there's a reason they don't normally let firsties into the Quidditch team."

Flint's words brought him out of his little reverie, and Draco realised that he'd been staring in the direction of the two beaters taking shots of firewhiskey and laughing loudly. Blushing at his moment of absent-mindedness (for which he simultaneously loved and loathed his new body), Draco left the captain go off to his own friends and turned back to his fellow first years.

Maybe they weren't a team yet. But it was a start.

Walking down to Hagrid's with Ron and Hermione in tow, Harry reflected on the weekend. On one level, it seemed almost a waste. Draco's 'suspicious behaviour' was merely getting enough sleep before a twenty-four hour long Quidditch match, the rest of Slytherin House had been secretive about their sporting chances rather than a future Dark Lord they were raising amongst themselves, and the only negative arising from the past two days would be trying to dissuade Wood from implementing the same brutal regime in the run-up to the next Gryffindor match.

On the other hand, he wouldn't forget what he'd learnt on Friday. They'd discovered that Draco knew about Fluffy, and was wandering around both the castle and its grounds at odd hours. So maybe this time the brat had been innocently resting for a Quidditch match; Harry knew to follow his future activities with all the tricks he could muster. Something odd was going on, and he was determined to find out what it was.

But first, to Hagrid's.

The late winter sun was setting over the grounds, casting the lawns with a golden light as the three first years headed down to visit their big friend. They'd had dinner, once again sparing themselves from Hagrid's cooking (they were really becoming quite adept at this by now), and Harry was looking forward to whiling away the last hours of the weekend chatting over large mugs of steaming tea. With all the plots and deception in the castle, it was a relief to head down to good old dependable Hagrid for warm drinks and warm company.

The three reached the cabin at the edges of the grounds. Despite the half-light that twinkled around the castle, the curtains on Hagrid's windows were firmly closed, though Harry could see the shadows from the flickering of the flames dancing around their edges. Even though the day had been mild, it was always comfortable sitting around the hot fire.

A brief knock on the door later, and it creaked open slightly, revealing Hagrid's large face squashed in what little gap was between the door and the doorframe.

"Oh! Er, 'ello there, you lot."

"Hi, Hagrid!" Hermione replied. "Are you going to let us in?"

"Er... well, yer see, wasn't exactly expectin' company this evening, I wasn't..." Hagrid stumbled nervously.

"You invited us to tea during the match!" Ron exclaimed.

"Er... I suppose I did, didn't I..."

"And why do you have the fire up so much?" Hermione asked. Sure enough, even through the slim gap available, the Gryffindors could feel the heat radiating onto their skin from inside. Hagrid himself was sweating, though from nerves or the heat, Harry couldn't tell.

This was unlike him; Hagrid wasn't one to normally forget he had visitors (despite his state when her invited them over that morning), and regardless, would be welcoming towards them invited or not. At first, Harry wondered if his hangover had somehow taken a turn for the worse. But anything that would keep him disadvantaged this long wouldn't have been mild enough earlier to allow the groundskeeper to watch the match, and Hagrid was hardly the type to drink on school grounds in the middle of the afternoon.

"C'mon Hagrid, let us in." Ron whined. While not particularly polite, Harry's back was getting cold while his front was roasting, and he was keen to get to a set temperature so he could apply the appropriate charms accordingly.

"Well, I've a bit of a problem at the minute... not a problem, really, actually, it's rather beau'iful..."

Oh.

Oh no.

Oh, please Merlin, no.

Hagrid brightened up, as if coming to a decision.

"Alrigh', yer can come in, but I don' want a word of this to anyone, yer hear me?"

"What can't we speak a word of to any..." Hermione began, but was rendered speechless as Hagrid opened the door and hurriedly ushered the three of them inside.

Ron recovered first. "Er, Hagrid, is that... is that a...", but he couldn't bring himself to finish.

Yes, yes it was.

The word Harry swore caused Hagrid to choke, Ron to laugh, and Hermione to blush tomato red.

"... dragon egg?" Ron asked between giggles.

"Yep!" chirped Hagrid (and Harry seldom heard Hagrid chirp), with barely a glare at Harry for the indiscretion. "Isn't it just the most beau'iful thing you've seen?"

Despite himself, Harry couldn't quite find it in him to disagree.

A/N: Sorry for the delay. There might be a three (instead of two) week gap before the next chapter, but we should be straight through after that. Thanks for reading!