A/N: WARNING: This book is a sequel! If you don't want to be in the dark, read my first "The Howl of the Moon", (id# 882673) which chronicles MWPP in their first year. This is about their second year. Also, I own nothing! Please R/R!

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Chapter Three:

Quidditch Season Begins

Over the next month and a half there would be nothing but hard practicing for the young new Gryffindor Quidditchers in their free time. It did not effect their schoolwork adversely, however. In fact, the excitement seemed to push them harder. The one price to pay, however, was their troublemaking schedule. It dropped off severely, though Lily, Mary, and Peter didn't seem to mind.

Joking and pranks would make a short return, one certain weekend, however.

"Hogsmeade!" Yelled Sirius, as he got out of bed, Halloween morning. Since it was on Saturday that year, they would be going the day of Halloween. Everyone had handed in his or her permission slip during Astronomy on Thursday (Professor Marus being the Gryffindor head-of-house), and those who would be going lined up to be seated once more in the horse-less carriages, to be taken to Hogsmeade.

It wasn't long until they were all released to roam on the streets of Hogsmeade, free from the teachers' sharp eyes.

"First, lets stock up on supplies." Said James, and he, flanked by Sirius and Remus with Peter, Lily, and Mary behind, made their way to Zonko's Joke Shop. Lily and Mary scouted out fake foods, Peter and Remus checked out explos-ives, and James and Sirius looked at everything, buying much.

Once they had stocked up on those, it was off to Honeydukes to get tons of sweets, browsing the latest Nimbus prototype at Quality Quidditch Supplies, then to Three Broomsticks for drinks.

"Ah, butterbeer." Said James, then he took a large gulp from his frosty mug. He and the rest had taken up a large round table in the middle of the tavern. As the group was getting to the bottom of their mugs, Professors Marus, Scuro, and Dumbledore entered the place, picking up a carryout order.

"Potter!" Said Marus as he saw them. "Black! Lupin! What are you all doing? We're playing Slytherin in the Quidditch opener, it's a classic first game matchup! Tradition! The Gryffindor-Slytherin opener is always one of the most important games! You'd all better be on top of your game when the time comes, Slytherin is tough!" Sirius smiled nervously.

"We've been practicing every day, Professor! Just relaxing a bit today." Said Remus. Scuro chuckled.

"No, Black, go right ahead!" He said. "The less you practice, the better it is for Slytherin's chances!"

"Gryffindor could beat Slytherin without a minute of practice, Byron." Marus said, quietly. Scuro turned to Marus.

"Is that so?" He asked. Professor Dumbledore stepped between the two, chuckling.

"Now, now, gentlemen. Let's not get so uptight about Quidditch. Why don't we all sit down for some drinks?" He asked, smiling. Marus and Scuro agreed, and they followed him to a table in one corner. Marus lingered behind for a moment to whisper to Remus,

"You better be ready, Lupin." They all gulped. Everyone quickly finished their butterbeers, and filed out of the tavern. Shoving a squirming chocolate frog into his mouth, Sirius said,

"Well, lets go ahead and get back to Hogwarts for Quidditch practice." Lily groaned.

"Sirius, you're not buying into what Marus said, are you? Seven days a week! You deserve a break!" James shook his head.

"Not much, Lily. Just a little flying to make sure we don't get rusty!"

"Well, I'm staying!" Said Lily, and Mary joined her.

"Fine." James said shrugging.

"You don't have to go with them, Peter." Lily said. He nervously smiled and said,

"It's okay...I want to." And they went off.

"Very good. Girls aren't good for the Quidditch player." Lily and Mary suddenly turned around to see Professor Marus looming over them. Lily gulped and weakly said,

"Professor...we aren't...romantic with them...." For one of the few times ever, the girls saw him smile.

"Sure." He said, and his face returned to the hard as rock, just plain mean expression they were used to. "Now stay away from my Quidditchers." And he walked off as well, joining the professors with whom he had entered the Three Broomsticks. Lily sighed.

As James, Remus, and Sirius made their way to the Hogsmeade station, they passed a group of third-year Hufflepuffs discussing their house's chances on the Quidditch pitch.

"Gryffindor was our only challenge last year, but after they lost all their seventh years, there's no chance for them." Said one.

"They've got three second years on the team! There isn't a second year on our reserve team!" Said another. James bit his lip. Gryffindor didn't even have a reserve team. But as the Hufflepuffs passed, James was determined to beat the Hufflepuffs on the score sheet. Sirius was determined to simply beat them. All of them.

"Hufflepuff is a joke." Said James. Sirius nodded.

"Yeah. We'll beat them so easy..."

"They're all a bunch of thick idiots."

"Yeah. Just as bad as Slytherin." Said Remus.

"Who would make friends with one of them?" James asked. "If you ask me, Hufflepuff is the most inferior house Hogwarts has got." The others nodded.

"So the rookies have finally decided to show up, eh?" Asked Will Johnson with a chuckle as James, Sirius, Remus, and Peter arrived at the pitch.

"You said today's practice was optional!" James exclaimed. Will chuckled a little more.

"I know, I was joking." He said.

"How much time do we have left on the pitch?" James asked.

"Slytherin's got the pitch booked for practice starting at seven. So we've got plenty of time. Come on!" Remus, Sirius, and James mounted their brooms and charged into the sky, beating, chasing, and seeking like the best of them.

When the day of the Slytherin-Gryffindor Quidditch opener finally arrived, Lily and Mary were quite glad to see something in exchange for the endless hours of practicing. Though this was a very important game for students and teachers rooting for Slytherin and Gryffindor, Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff supporters were very indifferent to the outcome, as Slytherin and Gryffindor were expected to perform much lower than Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff. In fact, Ravenclaw was expected to be the first real challenge to Hufflepuff's eight-year long Quidditch dynasty in quite a while.

"A'right, team." Began Evus McQuent, the Gryffindor captain, in the dressing room. "Maybe not everyone is picking us to upset Hufflepuff, but we're not facing the favorite right away. We're playing Slytherin. This is a good chance to get our team chemistry goin'. A lot of people underestimate us because we've three second years. But thas' not gonna matter once we find how every'n performs. I think our second years are fantastic. We can win!" The team cheered, and then after a moment, followed their captain out onto the pitch.

There, Professor Marus stood, a box on his left side, his broom on the right. The crowds were looming overtop of them, their seats raised into the air to see the action. They and the Slytherins lined up around Professor Marus along the center circle. James noticed Lestrange, Nott, as well as two Slytherins he knew from last year, Kravitch and another whose name he did not know. He wondered what positions they would be playing.

"I want a fair game. No foul play," here his eyes darted to the Slytherins, "and good fast, smooth flying. Let's get underway!" He opened the boxes to allow the bludgers and snitch to blast away into the air, and Marus ordered everyone onto their brooms and to their positions. He mounted his own broom, grabbed the Quaffle and threw it straight up.

With a shrill blast of his whistle, the game was started. James flew straight in between Evus and Max Dorian, grabbed the Quaffle, and darted between Kravitch and two others, who he now knew to be chasers. He flew straight in alone, and launched the ball past the Slytherin keeper, through the leftmost hoop.

"POTTER SCORES!" Screamed the announcer, excitedly. "And that is a new record for time before the first goal at a mere seven seconds!" James pumped his fist, and quickly flew back, surveying the others. Sirius was racing neck and neck with Nott, chasing a bludger, knocking it back and forth between the two. Remus was surveying carefully for the snitch, as was Nero Lestrange.

James smirked at the fact that Lestrange would be Remus's opponent, though feared slightly for Remus, should Lestrange try any unfair business.

Soon the Slytherins were racing back up the field and James was racing towards his own goal, keeping close to a Slytherin he didn't know, guarding in case the Quaffle was passed his way. It was Kravitch, however, who took the ball towards the net, swooping in speedily, where Evus was helping the keeper, Will Johnson, defending the hoops. He came in on the left side, at a poor angle, but fired quite accurately.

The keeper, Will Johnson, stretched his fingers out as far as he could, and barely deflected the former Seeker's shot, getting just enough of it, such that it struck the side of the hoop.

"Off the post!" Yelled the announcer. Max quickly picked up the ball and began racing back towards the enemy goal, when a bludger came screaming in.

"Got it!" Yelled Sirius, and he, flying in the opposite direction of Max, passed by him, and slammed the bludger back straight at Kravitch, who was nearly knocked off his broom when it struck him in the stomach.

The Gryffindors developed a quick fifty-ten lead, but the Slytherins came roaring back.

"Kravitch! To Morran! Back to Kravi-SCORES! And Slytherin is up 130-50!" And it only got worse. As Remus sighted the Snitch, Gryffindor went down 210 to fifty, so catching it would do no good. Lestrange, however, had sighted the Snitch as well, and Remus was forced to play defensively.

"Go on, Lupin!" Lestrange shouted, as they raced, knocking shoulders, towards the glittering, magical ball. "Go ahead and take it! I don't mind!" Remus leaned strongly to his right, and knocked Nero away.

"No you don't!" He shouted, and pushed Remus back.

Meanwhile, Sirius was tracking quite a difficult bludger that seemed to be intent on attacking nothing but Gryffindor chasers. As it flew towards Max Dorian, Sirius pulled up next to him.

"Come on!" He shouted to the bludger. It came in hard on Sirius's left, and he switched the beater club to his left hand. It tried to bypass him and hit Max, but Sirius wound up and smashed it in no particular direction, and quickly followed it down, away from the action. He tracked it blatantly, almost daring it to take a shot at him. But the bludger seemed to know better, seeking to find a way away from him.

Finally it made its way back into the heat of the Chase, and towards the Slytherin chaser Morran. But Sirius didn't let up. Just before it smashed Morran's skull, Nott, a Slytherin beater, swooped down in such an acrobatic manner that Sirius rethought his idea of Nott as a hulking bruiser, and smashed the bludger away. Sirius was so close to Morran and Nott, however, that all he had to do was hold his club steady with both hands, and direct it slightly towards the enemies. Then, when the bludger shot at him, he merely redirected it, smashing Nott into the shoulder, and then going on to hit Morran in the back.

The Quaffle shot from Morran's arms, and Sirius spied Kravitch speeding towards it. He also saw Evus doing the same, but from much farther away. Sirius jolted towards it, and smashed the Quaffle to Evus with his club, then sped back off in search of the bludgers.

Evus caught the Quaffle, somewhat shocked, but sped quickly towards the goal. The keeper, however, was coming out to challenge him, and Kravitch was closing in from one side. James, fortunately, was speeding in on the other side of the pitch, taking advantage of the momentarily-taken-out-of-the-play Morran. Evus quickly tossed it over, and James easily two-handed it through the leftmost hoop.

He punched his fist into the air, and brought his broom to a vertical position. He quickly, however, sped back towards his own goal, making a sweeping descent to accelerate more quickly. And that he did. He descended and accelerated so fast that he had to pull with all his strength to pull up and not smash into the grass. He pulled his legs up and his boots clipped the tips of the blades of grass.

The ploy worked, however, and he was far ahead of the charging Slytherins. There was, unfortunately, the task of rising fifty feet to the level of the hoops. James did not begin to do so until he reached the base of the hoops, and swung up radically, until he was flying vertically to the players' level.

Kravitch out-maneuvered Max, and fired a shot in towards Will. Will was able to swing towards the shot and extend his palm, deflecting the Quaffle, which proceeded to bounce off of the top of the rightmost hoop. It shot out past the defending Evus and right into the hand of Morran, who shot it right back. Evus was unable to stop it, but Will dove again, deflecting it barely. Morran shot past the stationary Evus, and was about to backhand-slap the Quaffle easily through the hoop, when James finally arrived. He came so suddenly and with so much speed, that the crowd was shocked. He knocked the ball straight up with the tip of his Thunderbolt as he climbed vertically, and smashed into the approaching Morran.

Morran flew back, but remained fairly steady. James, however, was completely removed from his broom. He reached out his hands and grabbed on desperately to the bottom of the center hoop. He could see that no one could aid him; the bludgers were occupying Sirius and Marcus O'Reilly, and the Slytherins were keeping pressure on the Gryffindor goal, forcing the Gryffindor chasers and keeper to remain concentrated on the play.

Thinking of no other way to aid his team, as his broomstick landed on the sand below, James pulled himself up, and bodily defended the center hoop. Professor Marus, the referee, however, quickly waved him away. James now remembered the penalty known as "Goalkeeping". He shrugged to Marus as if to say "I have no broom", but Marus shrugged back as if to say "I couldn't care less". James reluctantly returned to his dangling position over the sands below the Gryffindor goal, looking desperately to Will.

Will Johnson was showing quite the face of despair, wishing to help James, but the Slytherins were firing often at the Gryffindor goal, and they couldn't seem to keep the ball from the enemy. Finally, however, as Evus stole the ball away, Remus Lupin swung in from nowhere, retrieved the broom from the sand, and flew up quickly towards James.

James, however, allowed himself to drop from the hoop, and met Remus halfway, who threw the broom up to James. James caught the broom deftly, and was quickly off and flying to catch up to the Gryffindor rush.

With James out of the play, Kravitch and Morran double-teamed Evus, who carried the Quaffle up the left side of the pitch. James, on a broom superior to all the other chasers', swept up quickly on the opposite side of the pitch from Evus, and soon towards the goal, wide open.

Evus spotted him, and put two hands on the Quaffle. Just as Kravitch and Morran flew at him, Evus threw the Quaffle with all his might, getting smashed as he released. James sped up even more, and extended his hand to receive the Quaffle.

"JAMES!" Came Sirius's scream. He looked to the left quickly as he flew, and saw the bludger out-racing Sirius towards him. James pushed forward even more, but seeing he could not outrun the bludger, he suddenly stopped his broom, pulling the handle back and allowing the bludger to pass, barely. As Sirius passed, he yelled,

"Don't worry, I've got it!"

Seeing Kravitch was coming in too fast, and that he wouldn't be able to accelerate again, James put two hands on the Quaffle as Evus had done to pass to him, and launched it towards the farthest goal-hoop; that which was on the keeper's right. The keeper had flown out to challenge him, but James threw so hard and fast that he only reacted in time to deflect it slightly. The Quaffle, however, arched beautifully and floated gracefully through the right hoop, making the score now 210-70.

"And Gryffindor is a Snitch-Catch away from victory!" Roared the announcer. In fact, Remus and Nero had both sighted the Snitch again, and were diving towards it.

"The seekers are neck and neck towards the Snitch!" But the chasers did not lose focus. Kravitch immediately grabbed the Quaffle and raced back towards Will Johnson. He dodged Evus and Max well, leaving only James. The beaters, Marcus and Sirius, however, came to the rescue, battering the oncoming attackers with the bludgers, leaving only Kravitch and James.

Kravitch faked left, then right, then right again and finally accelerated under James. James flipped around and lunged for Kravitch, attempting to make life slightly easier for Will, but came up with only air. Kravitch now rose above Will and threw the Quaffle ferociously downwards. Will lunged back, but lost his balance, and the ball bounced off his knee, back through the hoop.

"The game is back out of reach for Lupin!" Yelled the announcer. Remus was extending his hand for the Snitch when he heard that a retrieval would now only garner a tie; and Remus was afraid of what might decide such a result should he do so. Seeing Lestrange nearing him rapidly, he cupped his hand and flung the Snitch down and away from both of them. Its wings struggled against the direction it was flying, then regained its composure and shot off.

Lestrange, however, was quick to follow and roared after it. Remus tailed him closely.

Meanwhile, Will quickly recovered the Quaffle after having allowed it to get past him, and threw a long pass to James. He rolled and ducked and faked his way past Kravitch and Morran, as well as both beaters and the bludgers they shot. Now, he was only facing the one chaser and the keeper. He looked up. There were Nero Lestrange and Remus, both reaching out desperately for the fleeing Snitch.

Thinking of only one thing he could do to aid Gryffindor's situation, he shot towards the Slytherin goal, stunning the chaser with his speed, and moving towards the goal. The seekers were flying parallel to him, and he found that he could not out-fake the keeper. He simply shot straight for him, and held out his right hand, holding the Quaffle. He swerved at the last moment, and collided with the outstretched keeper, and as they swung, he gently tossed the Quaffle through. As he looked up, Remus Lupin snagged the Golden Snitch.

Remus nearly leapt off his broom just then, but flew quickly to the center of the pitch and landed on the grass. The Gryffindor players surrounded him in the air, until James arrived and positively jumped off his broom to embrace Remus. Sirius quickly joined them, throwing his club into the air, and grabbing Remus underneath his outstretched arms, which were lofting his broom and the captured Snitch into the air. Evus, then the rest joined in the fray, the ground soon was littered with brooms and clubs. The only protrusion from the heap of gold and scarlet robes was Remus's hand, clutching the Golden Snitch, showing it off for all to see.