"I'm going to try out for the quidditch team."

Serena looked up from her book, blinking owlishly in surprise at the sudden declaration. In front of her stood Regulus, in that tall, still stance he always took when he felt nervous.

"Are you nervous?" She asked bluntly, wondering if there was something she could do to help. She had never been one to do sports or even watch them, so she had no reference for this. Being nervous was fairly standard before a tryout though, so she figured there wasn't much actually wrong with the situation.

"Of course not," he snapped shortly, drawing himself up even taller. His ability to appear taller and taller like that when he barely broke 5 foot three was actually very impressive, and Serena found herself wondering if it had something to do with him being a pureblood. Maybe it was some kind of long-kept wizarding secret, because it seemed that all the Black children as well as several of Regulus' pureblood-elitist friends had that same ability.

Darn, perhaps Reg had infected her with those pureblood ideals that he was always talking about. She made note to look out for non-purebloods who could do the expanding thing.

"Okay," Serena conceded in turn, and she patted herself on the back for her social-skill mastery of not pointing out his obvious lie. Of course she had to immediately re-evaluate her hasty use of the word mastery since she now had no idea how to continue the conversation and instead just stared at him blankly, waiting for him to tell her why he had told her that in the first place.

This led to them staring at each other in silence for nearly half a minute- 26 seconds to be exact by Serena's count.

"Purebloods are probably better at quidditch," Regulus finally said, the words seeming to spill out of his mouth to fill the conversational void more than anything. Despite the lack of intention behind the words Serena felt a wave of relief - this she could do, she was used to their constant discussions about supremacy.

"The star on the Gryffindor team is a muggleborn," she reported, and for once felt grateful for some of the more vocally biased Slytherins since it was only due to their grumbling that she knew that. Archive of knowledge as she usually was, sports just weren't her forte and she couldn't list any famous or current players off the top of her head.

She made another note to start learning more about quidditch since she expected more arguments based around the game if Regulus really did make the team.

"I'm probably better than you at least," he muttered as he sat down across from her. He wasn't expecting her to react at all, and he definitely wasn't expecting the tips of her ears to go red in embarrassment. "Serena, are you bad at flying?"

He looked entirely too pleased with himself. Serena was loath to answer such a ridiculous question - what could actually quantifiably prove that she was a bad flyer? Nothing, that's what, because bad is a completely subjective term and while she was admittedly less skilled than many, she could specifically point out at least three people just in her year who couldn't best her in a flying competition.

"Humans weren't born with wings," she muttered quietly in her own defense, almost hoping he wouldn't hear or respond to her honestly lackluster rebuttal.

But of course it was a very rare chance indeed for Regulus to have a leg up in an argument with Serena, so there was no way he was going to let this go.

"I thought that muggles made those air-transporters, you seemed very proud when you told me about them."

"Those have safety measures," she insisted, but still quietly and her blush was becoming more prominent.

"Ha!" He laughed triumphantly, smirking in that way that she knew meant he was genuinely amused. Serena was fairly certain he didn't know how to give a proper smile, but his eyes had a certain guileless light to them when he smirked like this. "I've finally got you beat!" He was already standing to leave, and Serena was tempted to make a comment about him leaving before she could collect her thoughts and win, but she knew that he would stay if she did that. And she really didn't have anything scientific or logical to say for herself.

"Good luck in your tryouts on those flying death sticks," she muttered almost to herself, and he just laughed a little louder.

Regulus left the library feeling more ready for his tryout than ever - after all, if someone could beat Serena Wendal in an argument then they were capable of pretty much anything.

"What'd we miss?"

"Anyone good this year?"

Remus didn't so much as look up from his book as Sirius and James rushed over to their spot on the quidditch stands. They had politely requested (IE loudly begged, demanded, and plead) that he and Peter go to the quidditch pitch and watch tryouts in their stead, as they had once again been put in detention and Professor McGonagall had correctly deduced that making them miss watching tryouts for their team would be the only thing that made them regret it even a little. They had clearly sprinted all the way here from the transfiguration classroom, just in time to see Hamish Frater, the team captain, giving the hopefuls congratulations on their efforts and telling them to await his decision.

"They all seemed great, right Remus?" Peter cheered, enthused at the show he had just watched. The poor boy was always a fan of the game, but coordination, and therefore flying and all the other skills necessary for quidditch, had always been beyond his capabilities.

There was no response.

"Remus?" Peter asked again, peering closer. "Oh," he whispered suddenly, "he's asleep."

"What? He said he'd watch with you!" Sirius started forward with the clear intention of shaking Remus awake. Peter opened his mouth as if to object, wanting to let Remus catch up on at least a little of the sleep, but snapped it shut almost immediately. He couldn't tell Sirius what to do.

But James could, and he caught Sirius by the shoulder before he did anything.

"Let him sleep, he's probably tired from… you know," he paused, gesturing vaguely upwards, and Sirius looked cowed.

"We really should come up with a codeword for that," he muttered, but made no further move to wake Remus. "So how do the seekers look, Pete?"

Two people on the team had been seventh years last year, the seeker and a chaser, so those were the two they were attempting to replace. It was important that the chaser be able to work with the team of course, but since the seeker was always such a match-deciding role they were very invested in having a good one.

"They seemed really good to me," Peter beamed, "and there were at least six of them trying out, so we've got options!"

"Hey, Hamish is coming over here," Sirius interrupted, elbowing James and pointing to where their captain was indeed striding across the field to where they sat.

"Probably to consult his best players about the new team," James preened, and Hamish scoffed as he came up to them.

"You two are my best players? Merlin help us if that's true," he shook his head and sighed theatrically.

"Why else would you ask us for help?" Sirius grinned in response, leaning back smugly. Hamish rolled his eyes, he hadn't actually asked anyone for help, but tamped down his response since he had more pressing matters.

"I need some information," he said seriously, and Sirius and James glanced at each other. He was going into full captain mode for some reason. "About Slytherin's new seeker."

"Huh?" Peter asked, then looked to his friends wondering if they knew something he didn't.

"You know Slytherin doesn't allow spectators at their tryouts," James frowned, looking more disappointed in himself than anything.

"We should have spied, mate!" Sirius groaned as well. "We'll do it next year for sure."

"You're not funny, you know that's not what I meant," Hamish chided, and the three third years paused and looked at him in honest confusion. When it was clear that they weren't just pulling his leg, Hamish looked honestly taken aback. "Are you telling me you really don't know?"

"Know what?" The younger boys prodded, wondering what on earth they could have missed. There weren't many Slytherins that they knew well enough to report on their quidditch skills.

"It isn't Snivillis, right?" Sirius sniggered, sending the other two conscious third years into a fit of malicious giggles, but Hamish just stared at him in such utter disbelief that even the unshamable Sirius Black felt like he had missed something.

"You really don't know?" Hamish asked once more, this time staring only at Sirius.

"Obviously not," Sirius snapped back, tiring of this very quickly - he wasn't used to being the one who couldn't figure things out.

"... It's your brother, Black, he's their new seeker. You really didn't know?"

There was a beat of silence in which Sirius' jaw dropped and the other simply stared at him in disbelief.

"WHAT?!"

Remus jolted at the sudden shout, flailing off the chair and then blinking in confusion upon finding himself on the ground. Peter was the only one who wasn't too busy staring at Sirius to help him get back up.

"So how is he?" Hamish asked impatiently, clearly not caring that he had just given the team's youngest beater quite the shock - he was much more concerned about quidditch.

"I-" Sirius paused, thinking back. How long had it been since he had actually played against Regulus? At least two years by now, and Reg had only been nine or ten at the time, which wasn't much of a base for how he was now. "Probably just average, I don't know," he replied, shoulders tensing up to his ears.

"What's going on?" Remus muttered to Peter in confusion, having missed the cause of the tense situation.

"We're gonna get to trounce my brother in quidditch," Sirius forced a huge grin, "so we're gonna need a good seeker. How were the tryouts?"

Hamish began an animated recap of what had happened during tryouts. Usually Sirius would be just as intent as James at this, but this time he sat silently and pondered what was going on with his stupid, misguided little brother.