It was probably for the best that Harry and Daphne were the first arrivals to the training grounds. While it wouldn't necessarily be the worst thing to be spotted walking side by side, they certainly would have lost a significant amount of impact. If they were spotted walking together by a couple of students, the rumor would spread across the school, but everyone above the 3rd year knew that the Hogwarts rumor mill wasn't the most reliable source of information. At the same time, those same students wouldn't be surprised of the rumor was true either. No, Harry sitting next to Daphne during lunch in the great hall would have a far larger impact than whispers of them walking next to each other.
They settled on opposite sides if the grounds, not so far as to make it seem intentional, but not close enough for people to make assumptions either. It was like when one walked into a classroom with only one other student who they didn't know. It would be considered rather strange to sit right next to them, but rather offensive if you sat as far away as possible.
While waiting for the other students to make their way onto the grounds, Harry pulled out a ball and played a game of fetch with Faolan. He worried that if he hadn't pulled out the ball, Faolan would have been a bit too… enthusiastic with the broomsticks littered by his paws.
Slowly the students trickled in, some giving slight nods of acknowledgment to Harry and others pointedly ignoring him. When Madam Hooch finally arrived, he looked around to see if anyone was looking and, when he saw the coast was clear, he wordlessly summoned the ball back to his hand with an exhausted Faolan rodding after it. Harry's familiar was very similar to him in the sense that, even when thoroughly exhausted, he would never give up, not even for the most trivial of things (Not that chasing a ball was trivial in Faolan's mind).
A snap of his fingers and a thought of intent saw to Twinky teleporting invisibly behind him, grabbing the ball, and teleporting back into his trunk. In a situation that didn't require stealth, Harry would always summon Twinky verbally. The reason for that was that with words, the house elf's magic was called upon to answer the summons, but with thoughts, his magic was called to pull the house elf to him. It wasn't a large amount of magic, but, if there was a way to avoid using it, why would he waste any magic at all? For now, he planned on keeping Twinky a secret, so he had to settle with the loss of magic.
Seeing that his extremely important mission was over, Faolan curled up into a ball next to Harry and fell asleep. That was probably for the best because Harry wouldn't be able to give him any attention while in the air anyway. Brooms just weren't meant for canines.
With a blow of her whistle, Madam Hooch grabbed the class' attention and pulled it towards herself. She gave a short speech about flight safety and ranted for a while about the many things that could cause someone to fall to their death. It probably wasn't the best lecture to give to a bunch of eleven year olds, but it did the trick and every student made a note to avoid any of those things.
At last she told them to command their brooms; to call them to their hands with the word 'up'. Just as things had gone last time, Harry's broom was the first to find his hand, though, unlike last time, when it forcibly smacked its way, trying to embed itself into his hand, this time it lazily floated up into his grasp.
Slowly the other students managed to summon their brooms. Harry had forgotten about Ron's initial difficulty with the task and didn't bother suppressing the laugh that came when the redhead's broom met his face.
Hermione was the last person to pull her broom to her hand, much to her displeasure. Harry wasn't surprised though. The broom probably knew that one hand would always hold a book and distracted flying was never a good idea.
The class swung their leg over their brooms in unison and prepared to launch up, but Madam Hooch planned on taking things slow. She gave another short lecture before at last saying, "On the count of three, please push of the ground lightly and hover in the air. One… two… thr-"
Before she could finish her count, Neville clumsily wobbled through the air, looking like a bird taking its first step to learning how to fly. Except Neville wasn't a bird. In a rather painful sequence of events, Neville found himself moaning on the floor, clinging to his wrist and writhing in pain. Again, Harry felt a wave of sympathy for the boy and wondered if his place on the Gryffindor team was really worth allowing pain to meet his friend. But it was too late now, so he may as well go through with it.
As Madam Hooch tutted and declared Neville's wrist to be broken, Harry subtly kicked the boy's Remembrell into Draco's feet. Upon feeling the impact, the blond boy looked around furiously trying to catch the perpetrator. When his gaze swept over Harry's face, Harry winked and Draco's eyes lit up in understanding.
The blonde picked up the sphere of magic and tossed it from hand to hand. "Hmph. Seems like Longbottom's lost his Remembrell. I think I'll be keeping this. It's better in my hands anyways."
Harry stepped forward like a hero making his final charge. "Give it here Malfoy," he growled out. It was some pretty good acting on his end if he did say so himself.
"Ooooh. Looks like Saint Potter's sticking up for the squib." Malfoy kicked up off the ground and flew into the sky. "You know, I think I'll leave this somewhere Longbottom can't get. A tree, perhaps, if his performance was anything to go by."
At this point, Harry got the feeling that the blond boy wasn't acting anymore- that he was getting too into the moment and actively enjoying himself. At the moment, Harry could care less if Malfoy talked smack. Those words would be meaningless, buried beneath the shadow of his victorious performance when he retrieved the Remembrell. But if Malfoy fell into bad habits, well… Harry knew more than enough spells to put him in his place. He didn't really have any further need of the petty heir anyway.
He too kicked off into the air and bathed in the refreshing air, relishing every moment of his takeoff. "Give it here Malfoy!" He repeated himself with more grit this time. Internally, he began to have doubts. What if Malfoy went through with his word and hid it in a tree? What if Harry missed the catch? The second one was ridiculous, of course. Harry rarely missed a snitch, much less an object falling in a single direction. But it is human nature to worry over the dumbest of things and Harry, no matter how powerful or knowledgeable he was for a first year, was, and always would be, a human.
But his worries were proved worthless when Malfoy wound back his arm and launched the sphere through the air, saying "You want it? Go get it," as it flew through the air.
Harry sped after it. Despite knowing that he could catch the ball, he was slightly ticked off at Draco. The boy had no knowledge of Harry's flying abilities and seriously could have broken the Remembrell, an act that Harry certainly wouldn't be pleased with. His belief that Malfoy fell too into the act was proven true with a single action. No matter how much work someone put into the Malfoy heir, he would always be a dick. He was raised to be one and rarely discouraged for it and, by the time that he was, it was too late to change him.
The air whipped past Harry's face, giving the feeling of tearing flesh around Harry's face. Subconsciously, he made a note to find a spell to soften the blow. It was the one part of flying that he hated, an unfortunate trait for a seeker to have. He would not let pain deter him. Voldemort was his enemy and the wind didn't have red eyes, nor slits for a nose. Even with every part of his body trying to escape through his back, Harry flew steadfast.
He caught the ball right in front of Gryffindor tower, directly in front of a window. Through the window, Professor McGonagall, who was in the middle of lecturing the Weasley twins for the 264th time, snapped her head over to the window as one of her lions shot towards the tower. They would certainly collide with the stone walls. Or, so she thought. Instead the student reached one hand out, closed it around a ball, and leaned back, taking his broom from beneath him to above him. Quickly, the student righted themselves, pumping their ball filled fist and laughing like a maniac.
As McGonagall stared in disbelief, the red headed menaces shared a look and scurried their way out of the common room, hustling to their secret experiments room. For once, McGonagall wouldn't notice. She was far to busy snapping out of her stupor and stomping down the tower herself in a brisk walk to the Training Grounds.
Harry landed to a symphony of cheers sung by his fellow first years. And then the unseen conductor closed his hand, signaling the end of their performance. McGonagall walked through the silence. "Come with me Mr. Potter," she ordered before turning back around and storming into the castle. Harry scurried after her to the beat of the sniggering Slytherins and the protesting Gryffindors.
He followed her in silence, making sure to keep his head down in 'shame'. It wouldn't do to have a look of victory on his face. To McGonagall, he had no reason to believe he would be rewarded for his act instead of punished.
The student and professor stopped in front of the DADA classroom and McGonagall wrapped her knuckles against the door before poking her head in. "Excuse me Professor Quirrell, but may I borrow Wood for a moment."
Harry winced at her choice of words, even though he knew their true meaning. Honestly, Professor McGonagall ought to have more sense than that. Then again, he supposed he could excuse her lack of thought with the absurdity of the situation.
At Quirrell's nod, a white, lithe boy stood up and walked towards his head of house with a nervous, confused look in his eye. He knew that he hadn't done anything wrong, but it was possible that McGonagall was pulling him to let him know that he would need to find some beaters for the next quidditch game. It wouldn't be the first time that the Weasley twins gained a detention on a game day. Their penchant for trouble and Professor Snape's hate of all things Gryffindor saw to that.
Finding a seeker as well as a pair of beaters would be a nightmare. Because Fred and George had already been unable to play in two games, the previous Gryffindor captain had assigned two players as backups, but those players had graduated the previous year and no Gryffindor seemed to have the skill to hit a bludger now. A note was made to give the Weasley twins a speaking to about their pranks and the caution behind them.
Oliver Wood was pleasantly surprised, though, by the transfiguration professor's news. "Wood, I have found you a seeker."
His first instinct was to let out a whoop of joy and to jump in celebration, but he surprised that. His more skeptical side needed to come out before he could relax. Harry Potter may be the boy-who-lived, but he was still a first year and surviving a killing curse had nothing to do with catching a snitch. "A seeker?" He questioned, "Are you sure?" While the captain spoke, he surveyed the subject of his query, making notes of advantages and disadvantages.
Being a first year, Harry Potter was small compared to the other house seekers, something which could prove advantageous, or lead to a Gryffindor defeat. His small stature would allow him better acceleration and sharper turns, but it could also render him helpless against the legal bullying of the opposing seeker. He noticed that Harry showed some sign of developing muscles, a decisively good sign that would certainly help deter other seekers from pushing him around.
But none of those were the most important thing in a seeker. "Can he catch?" Oliver asked.
McGonagall smiled in response. "I just saw him chase down a small ball, catch it perfectly, and perform a trick to avoid colliding with the Gryffindor tower that would have put Charlie Weasley to shame. Admittedly, catching what he did is a lot easier than catching a snitch, but with our lack of prospective seekers, is it not worth giving him a shot?"
Oliver nodded, but had one final concern to address before giving the young Gryffindor a try out. "First years aren't allowed a broom, professor." He stated this, but it was clearly meant as an inquiry.
"That rule is mostly there to prevent students from flying and hurting themselves because they have had no lesson. I will pull some strings and get Dumbledore to bend the rules. If he doesn't allow this, I'm sure we can find another solution to the problem."
Harry knew that Dumbledore would bend the rules for him, but, even if the elderly professor didn't, there was a rather simple solution. The rules stated that a first year could not own a broom at Hogwarts. There was no rule against a first year using one. Therefore, Harry could just give Oliver some galleons, tell the captain to buy a second broom, use that broom for practices and games, and then Oliver could give it to him as a start of the year gift in second year.
The captain nodded and asked for permission to test Harry out immediately. When McGonagall gave the go-ahead, Oliver grasped Harry's shoulder and guided him to the Quidditch Pitch. He went into the Gryffindor locker rooms to retrieve his broom and the quidditch balls. As soon as Oliver disappeared behind the entryway, Harry called for Twinky.
"Twinky, would you please wake up Faolan and bring him to me?" Harry knew that Faolan was still asleep on the training grounds. His familiar was always by his side when he was conscious and would have surely been barking up a storm if he had awoken to see that Harry was gone. The pair still hadn't figured out how to locate each other without seeing one another, something that Harry read was possible to do with a familiar bond.
Twinky disappeared and reappeared within seconds, the jarring motion of elf apparation causing Faolan to emit a yelp. Twinky disappeared back into Harry's trunk, likely to clean up an invisible speck of dust, just as Oliver walked back onto the pitch, clueless of the previous events.
He didn't give Faolan a second glance as he walked up to Harry with one hand holding a quidditch box against his side and the other slinging a broom over his shoulder. It was common knowledge that Harry and Faolan were rarely separated.
He knelt down in front of Harry and set the box down. Oliver opened it, revealing two strapped down, violently shaking balls, and a stationary one. In the upper-right corner of the box, a compartment with the Gryffindor house logo on its lid rested. Inside, Harry knew that the snitch was fluttering about.
Oliver asked if Harry knew the rules of the game and nodded when Harry said yes. Then he handed Harry his broom. "Here," he said, "use this for today." It was a Cleansweep 7, the latest of the Cleansweep brand and recommended by almost every professional quidditch player out there. It wasn't really surprising that Oliver owned that broom. His family wasn't the most wealthy, but they held their fair share of money and Oliver, being the quidditch maniac that he was, surely would get the best gear possible. He was an only child and so his parents had no qualms over spoiling him.
Harry gratefully grabbed the broom and mounted it. The speed and control had nothing on the Firebolt he once owned, but it was decent enough and its bulkier frame definitely made it the best fit for a keeper.
Compared to the school brooms, though, it was a rocket and when Harry took to the sky, he gained far more speed than he had in flying class. Oliver pulled out his wand and conjured a couple of gold-colored golf balls. They shot out of his wand and fell to the ground. He leaned over and picked one up, rolling it between his thumb and index finger like it was his final galleon in a casino. He used his other hand to wave Harry down.
"Alright. McGonagall isn't one to lie about quidditch, but I'm sure you can understand that I need to test you out in case what she saw was just a fluke." Oliver tossed the ball into the air and caught it with his palm facing up and cupped. "If you are as good as she believes, this should really be a cakewalk. I'm just going to shoot these high into the air. Your job is to catch them. Our seeker from last year caught two out of five so it shouldn't be too hard to beat him. Got all that?"
Harry nodded and shot off into the air, showboating a little bit with flips and aerial maneuvers. Below him, Oliver nodded his approval. Seekers had to be the most mobile players on the field. While chasers and beaters generally flew straight lines and inky had to worry about other players, seekers were usually the target of bludger shots from beaters and if they didn't have the skill to dodge they wouldn't last long.
Without waiting for any indication from Harry to signal his readiness, Oliver used a quick 'depulso' to shoot the ball into the air. He could have thrown it, true, but using depulso made the speed of the ball flying much faster.
A normal seeker would never have spotted that golf ball, having no indication that it was flying in the air, but Harry was no normal seeker. During one of his flips, he spotted the golden ball and he quickly repositioned himself to shoot after it. The catch was easy. Oliver shot two more golf balls into the air individually in the same way he had shot the first. Then, on a whim, he decided to test Harry further by shooting the remaining two at the same time, aiming his spell in between them so that they shot in opposite directions.
Harry was now well aware that Oliver had started his testing, so after each catch, he sharply turned to watch the Gryffindor keeper shoot the next ball into the air. Seeing Oliver shoot the two balls simultaneously caused him to raise an eyebrow, but Harry was never one to turn down a challenge, so he sped off.
First he went for the ball lowest to the ground. The choice was logical. If he went for the other ball, the one he was currently chasing would surely hit the ground. Before he reached his target, Harry realized that, without his Firebolt, he would never be able to catch both balls the normal way. So he took a risk. Instead or reaching out his hand to snatch the golden ball out of the air, Harry swung the Cleansweep around, using the tail end of the broom to knock the ball high into the air towards the position of the other ball.
Professional keepers did it all the time with quaffles, using their broom to pass to their chasers, saving time from the transfer in the process. Hitting a golf ball correctly was harder, but Harry, having such an acute talent in the air, managed it.
This move didn't buy him much time, though. Perhaps he would get an additional couple of seconds at most. So, without looking to make sure he correctly aimed the golf ball, he shot after the second, having already positioned himself in line with his spin.
He was only six feet off of the ground when he snatched the ball from gravity's clutches and it took an enormous amount of strength and talent to pull up, but, once again, he managed.
When he was safely level with the ground, he turned his broom up so that he was perpendicular to the pitch. Above him, and approximately 34 degrees to his left, the other golf ball was falling down.
With no other seeker to compete with, Harry could have positioned himself to let the ball fall easily into his hands. But Harry could not settle for mediocrity.
In a game situation, waiting for the snitch to come to you was both pointless and stupid. Firstly, seeking is usually a game of seconds, one seeker just barely grabbing the ball before the other. So waiting for the ball was a stupid idea because those seconds wasted would be a window of opportunity for the other seeker. Not that that reason really mattered anyway when put in conjunction with the other. That fact of the matter was that a snitch would never go in a straight line, much less directly towards a player.
Harry flew towards the other ball, carefully angling himself to meet the ball in the quickest time possible. He snatched it out of the air with his opposite hand, the first currently being occupied with the other ball. He was a great seeker, but he didn't trust himself to make a catch with something already in his hand. When the ball was secured, he transferred one to share a hand with the other so he could more easily steer his broom.
He landed next to Oliver, whose mouth had fallen to the ground in a combination of shock and ecstasy. Faolan rushed over to him, yipping and barking with glee in circles around his feet. Harry waited for a while, patting Faolan's head every once in a while to keep the wolf happy, but he soon grew bored of Oliver's dazed expression.
"I get it, I'm good," he began with a smirk, "but if you just stand there like that for another second I'm going to stuff this golf ball into your mouth."
That got Oliver's attention. No man ever wanted to be caught with a ball in his mouth, whether it was a ball for sports or one for… other things. His attention was caught, but his eyes still betrayed his feelings, wide and glowing with glee.
"Alright," the captain said at last, "I was going to have you catch the snitch a few times before adding in bludgers, but after that display, I think you're ready to go in the deep end. He glanced at his watch and spoke to himself. "The twins should be in History of Magic right now," he mused, "But they haven't gone to that class once in the past two years. Alright, they can take a break in their mayhem for the team."
Oliver pulled out a piece of wood shaped like a broomstick. At the end of its bristles, there was a button, one that Oliver pushed. Harry looked at Oliver in confusion. That wasn't something he remembered from his previous life. His ears were flooded with an unheard whisper.
"I couldn't exactly send you back in time. The rules are quite simple, you cannot change what has already been done. So instead I put you in a timeline as close to yours as I could. It's better this way anyway. I am meant to be a guide, I cannot simply make someone all knowing. So be aware that some things will not quite be the same."
Fate's voice faded out of his ears and were replaced by Oliver's. "—tired of letting players know when I wanted to practice, so I got a seventh year to make these. It's a Gryffindor house secret of course, so try to keep it to yourself, even from other housemates. We don't want anyone accidentally leaking it out, ay?" He posed the last bit like a joke, but if his eyes were any indication, it was anything but.
The Weasley twins hustled down to the field clinging to their chest. When they arrived in front of Oliver, they began their ping pong match of words.
"Damn it—"
"Oliver. That—"
"Bloody hurt."
Oliver wasn't in the mood for the twins' games though. At this point, he was in full quidditch mode. While he ranted at the twins, Harry began to puzzle out exactly what the mechanism did.
It had to be similar to the galleons Hermione made in fifth year for the DA. When Oliver pressed that button, it would send some kind of signal, likely a stinging hex if the Weasley twins' reaction was any indication, to the recipient's counter part, which was probably on a chain. 'But why aren't the foxes here?' Harry wondered in reference to Gryffindor's chasers, Angelina Johnson, Alicia Spinnet, and Katie Bell. He reasoned that the enchantment must be intent based. Oliver must have been thinking about how he wanted the twins when he pushed the button and so the signal only went to them. He then wondered why the twins didn't take it off, but determined that, for some reason, they must be unable to.
Oliver was just finished ordering the twins when Harry broke out of his thoughts. The rest of his tryout was comparatively more difficult to the beginning, but Harry didn't have any trouble securing his spot on the team, catching the practice snitch a whopping seven times in 30 minutes.
"Well done Harry, Oliver asserted. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a necklace with a miniature broom adornment. When he held it out to Harry, the young Gryffindor shook his head in refusal. The shock and worry flowing off of Oliver was palpable, so Harry quickly relieved the keeper.
"I'm not touching that necklace until you change the charm from a stinging hex to a cooling charm." Oliver was clearly surprised that Harry managed to work out how the necklace worked and slightly disappointed because he found pain to be a slightly more effective motivator, but, in his desperate desire for a good seeker, he nodded his assent.
The Weasley twins were not amused. "Wait! He can do that?" They spoke together incredulously. "Do it to ours."
Oliver smirked, "If a first year could figure that out, you should have too. It's not my fault you didn't think. You can't do anything about it either. Once it's put on only Jeremy can take it off or alter it."
'So the creator is identified,' Harry thought.
Oliver's smirk did not last for long because it was the Weasley twins' time now.
"Oh yeah?"
"What if we—"
"Told the vixens—"
They finished together with a 'hmm'.
Oliver paled. Unfortunately, he had not thought of the chasers' retribution when he tricked them into putting the necklaces on. Needless to say, by the end of the day the stinging hexes were replaced by cooling charms on all of their necklaces and, in compensation for his trickery, the chasers forced Oliver to get Jeremy to remove the charm that locked the necklaces in place. Harry received a kiss on each cheek from all of the chasers in thanks for his 'heroic save from tyranny'.
AN: I'm terribly sorry about the delay and even more apologetic to say that updates will continue to be this slow for a while. School started for me a couple of weeks ago and, as a student athlete who takes AP courses, I don't really have a lot of spare time to write. I will do the best I can though. This also may affect the quality of my writing as I have little time to proofread, draft, and finalize these chapters. Once again I want to redirect you to chapter 2 of IDAFT – Extras. Your votes will help push this story along and may affect the overall plot. So, if you want to make a difference, please vote. The next chapter should mark the end of chapters with no action and the story will likely move a lot quicker after that. To conclude, I just want to say that I will never abandon this story without giving prior warning. So if I haven't updated in a while, don't worry, the story isn't abandoned, I'm likely just swamped with school work.
