Chapter Five: Alias's and Quidditch tryouts!

After we'd finished classes for the day we made our way to the library. Jenny, of course, knew exactly were to look to put her hands on the old yearbooks. She grabbed a few of them out and handed them round between the three of us.

"Now remember, you're looking for the face not the name since you're hardly likely to recognize the name all right?" She asked us as we sat down at one of the large tables. The library was practically deserted since nobody was likely to be in there studying on the first day of classes!

"Yes Ma'am." Martin said mockingly, but Jenny ignored him and opened up the first yearbook on her stack. With a sigh I followed suit, as did Martin. All was quiet for about ten minutes before Martin said "Eureka!"

We stopped looking in our books and glanced at Martin's. "Here," He read out loud. "This is Michael Creevy, prefect, head boy, and even captain of the Gryffindoor Quidditch team. He has two older brothers who've also attended Hogwarts, Colin and Dennis."

I peered at the photograph of the seventh year student and did some mental calculations in my mind. "Our parents would have been in their seventh year when Michael arrived. I wonder why he's hiding his name though.." I pondered.

"I wonder why Snape so clearly hates him..." Jenny said thoughtfully. "I'm not sure when Snape went to Azkaban to work before coming back here but it's entirely possible he would have taught Michael for at least one year.."

"Maybe Snape wants the Charms job now instead of the DADA spot?" Martin suggested. "Even better maybe Snape wants to take over the entire school. He IS the deputy headmaster isn't he?"

"Is he?" I asked surprised. "Funny, I never knew that. But I don't think it really explains why Snape doesn't like Michael, and why Michael is using an alias." I glanced over at Jenny waiting for her to come up with some sort of explanation. Over the summer holidays I'd been telling Dad about how smart Jenny was and he'd laughed and said she reminded him of the way Aunt Hermione had been when they were at school. He'd added that at first she drove him and Uncle Ron mad, but then they'd all become friends. However this time Jenny had no answer.

She shrugged. "I don't know, but I'm determined to find out. There must be some proper explanation. In the meantime I think we should keep this to ourselves. There's a reason for Michael using a fake name and he wouldn't want everyone in the school to know about it, would he?"

During dinner that night we kept a very careful watch on Professor Mitchell and the looks Snape was giving him. There was no doubt about it, Snape was giving him the looks he usually reserved for me!

*****

The next day was Quidditch tryouts. Since Baston had left the new captain was one of the beaters, a wiry sixth year student named Norman Johnson. He watched, backed by the rest of the team, as we all gathered with our broomsticks. There was no rule about what year you had to be in to make the team, although generally first years didn't make it. My father had been the youngest seeker in over a century when he made the team in his first year. It had actually been a fluke the way he made it; apparently Draco Malfoy had stolen one of the student's rememberalls and Dad chased him to get it, and when Draco threw it Dad raced after it and caught it. Professor McGonagall had seen him out of her window, and decided that he was the perfect seeker. Much to my surprise even Jenny turned out for tryouts. When I asked her why she laughed embarrassed and said "Well you never know. I told you I've been practicing my flying over the summer with Dad." Greg appeared with his broom and grinned at us both. "You might as well go home now since that keeper spot is mine all ready." He told us. Before I could reply Johnson waved his arms for our attention.

"Right all, can you hear me?" Johnson called.

There was a chorus of replies in the affirmative.

"Right then, as you all know of course we are today looking for both another seeker to replace Lyons, and a keeper to replace our esteemed ex- captain Baston. I've been thinking about it and have decided that the best way to go about this is for me to simply put you through some exercises designed to show all your skills rather than people just showing off their skills as a seeker or keeper. You'll be divided into groups and we'll walk around and take notes. Everyone gets to try everything once, and at the end we'll confer and give you a list of the people we want to come back tomorrow. This should be about ten people from whom we will pick our new seeker and keeper." Johnson explained. "Any questions before we get started?"

"What if we get picked for the spot we don't want?" Someone called out.

Johnson looked thoughtful. "If you really want to be on the team I wouldn't think you'd be fussy." He said. "Right, I'll divide you up now, and one group will practice catching snitches, another group will practice saving goals, and a third group will practice some flying exercises."

Martin and I were put in the group practicing flying, whilst Jenny was put in the group practicing catching the snitch. "Good luck," She called to us with a grin.

"I don't get her." Martin said to me, as we waited our turns. "Last year at first she didn't even come to the games, and now she wants to be on the team?"

"Probably the influence of Uncle Ron." I replied.

Martin was before me, and I had to admit he wasn't that bad a flyer as he flew around the course set by Johnson. The members of the team who were watching us whispered to each other and made a few notes. Martin came back over to me and sighed. "Well I did my best and I can't do any better than that." He said.

"You were fine." I said as I was called.

I took a deep breath as I mounted my broom. Before I was told to take off one of the beaters who was watching us asked me about my broom, looking rather impressed. I told him about how Dad wanted me to have the best broom possible. "That's right, your Harry Potter's son, aren't you?"

I nodded, a little bit embarrassed by this. I didn't really want anyone to know who my Dad was in case they thought that I might get on the team from his influence.

"Right, well, let's see how you go then." The boy said, and I took off. Once in the air my heart rate was back to normal and I felt relaxed and calm as I flew around the course. When I landed I thought I'd done pretty well, and a look at Martin's face confirmed it.

Next we were to practice catching the snitch, which wasn't actually the snitch since it might take too long for us to try and catch it and we were on a time schedule. Rather it was a small round ball and it was thrown up into the air and we had to catch it whichever direction it went in. Most people went all right, although nobody got more than two out of the four. When it was my turn I missed the first one which was thrown to the left and I just missed it. I bit my lip angry; I'd gone too far to the left trying to anticipate the way that the ball was going to fall. My next one was thrown up to the center and I caught it easily. The third one went to the left again and again I caught it fairly easily. The last one was thrown to the right and I reached for it and almost fell off my broom, but I managed to hang onto it and hold it up in the air with a grin. There were cheers from down below including Martin who'd managed two out of four.

Lastly we went to the exercise where we were to practice saving goals. Even though I wanted to be seeker I knew a good performance here could put me in the top ten and let me have the chance to come back the next day. Martin wasn't too bad at all, only one got through him and in my opinion it was a fairly tricky one. On my broom I waited in front of the goals, taking a few more deep breaths. I wasn't sure how well I'd go at this, but to my surprise I found I was better at it than I had even expected and I managed to stop them all, along with three others in my group.

After we'd finished the team went off to confer and Jenny, Martin and I consulted on how we thought we'd done. Martin was pretty sure he wouldn't make the call back as in his opinion he'd done well, but not as well as some people.

"How about you Jenny? Do you think you'll get called back?" I asked.

To my surprise she shrugged. "I don't know." She said.

"Well did you do all right or not?" I asked a little impatiently.

"I guess I did all right." She said with a shrug.

"Well Sam's going to be in the list for sure." Martin said with a grin. "He did brilliant."

I felt my face redden a bit, but I didn't say anything. I wondered whether anyone knew just how much I wanted to be a seeker like my Dad. Everyone who'd seen him play said he was brilliant and I prayed feverantly I had the same Quidditch genes as both Dad and his father, James.

"Right listen up crowd. We'd like the following people to come back tomorrow!" Johnson called. To my delight my name was third on the list and I heaved a sigh of relief. However the last name called shocked me; "And last but not least Jenny Weasley."

"Jenny!" I cried, turning to her. "You didn't say you were THAT good."

She shrugged again. "Who knows maybe it was just a fluke?" She offered.

Greg overheard this and shook his head. "If they picked you to come back you must have been good Jenny. Well done little cousin."

Jenny's face glowed red with pleasure. Normally Greg spent most of his time teasing her, although it was usually good-natured, so to receive a compliment like that pleased her. We made our way back up towards the castle talking about who we thought was good and who wasn't, but I was quieter than usual. I was still pretty shocked with Jenny being called back. Part of me was glad for her, but the other part of me was a little concerned. I hoped she hadn't learnt so much over the summer that she was a better flyer than me. What would I do if Jenny got the seekers spot instead of me? I decided not to think about it then- I'd think about it tomorrow instead.

"I think you're a shoo in for the spot Sam," Henry Longbottom, one of the other second year Gryffindoors, said to me as we walked into the dining room. "I didn't see anyone better than you!"

"Thanks." I said with a smile. My confidence lifted as we sat down to eat: after all I knew I could do it, so I just had to prove it the next day!