Chapter Twenty Three: We Shall Overcome
Lucy didn't remember much of dinner, she didn't remember much of walking back to the Tower, and she didn't remember much of getting into bed, although she assumed the next morning she had done it all without assistance, seeing as she was still wearing her shoes when she woke up.
She looked out the window for any sign of Faustas, who liked to exercise in the early morning air before anyone was awake to notice, but she neither saw nor felt him. He had left at the same time as Virgil's group to "handle" something back west, which usually meant he wanted to meet with someone in Peru. It was always Circle stuff that did not concern her, and after receiving a detailed account of the first such visit, Lucy didn't think she had the strength to stay awake through another play by play of boring meetings with very little accomplished.
It didn't really matter, he'd be back soon enough.
Hermione, as usual, was already awake and Lavender, as usual, was not. Lucy thought the better of slamming her trunk lid closed; Lavender's hexing accuracy had improved remarkably since she had broken up with her latest boyfriend.
As she came down the stairs she was pondering whether it would be considered a bit obsessive if she stopped into the BA room for just a second before breakfast to check on their new hook-up to the Web. True, she had checked it yesterday, but it was a new hookup and –
In the midst of her inner debate she had quite neglected to look where she was going, which was most unfortunate for whomever it was she collided with at the base of the stairs, knocking them both to the ground.
"Sorry," she began as she accepted a hand and was helped up.
"I'd say we're even, but we wouldn't be," Seamus replied.
"Oh," Lucy wasn't sure what to say. Seamus didn't look very comfortable either.
"Listen, Lucy I'm-"
"THERE you are! Luce, hurry up, come with me!"
Lucy found herself being torn away by a remarkably strong Maria Moray.
"What are you doing?"
"Hurry up! Everyone else is already there, Warren says we have to hurry!"
Lucy could only look over her shoulder at Seamus and shrug as she was pulled out the portrait hole by a girl who looked as if she could be blown over by a slight breeze at any moment. What on earth were they feeding the kids in South Africa?
She was hauled, half running the whole way, to the back of the library. There were students everywhere, in the chairs, on top of tables, on the floor, all surrounding Warren and Aysha, who were reading something and muttering to each other.
Lucy freed herself from Maria's bony fingers and dropped down in front next to Vladimir and Misha.
"What is going on?"
"Fudge tabled the proposal."
"What does that mean?"
"It means," Warren spoke up, "That the Minister of Magic has postponed the vote by the senior council."
"Until when?"
"He could, foreseably, delay any action for the entire length of his term as Minister."
Arguements and shouts arose, while the 7th years attempted to calm the group, Lucy looked around, saw Wesley's leg dangling from a table on her right, and tugged it gently.
"When did this happen? How did he find out?"
"Marguerite's parents, for one, and half a dozen other ambassadors and family friends, notified us by express owls about an hour ago."
"Ambassadors?"
Wesley nodded, "The Ducasses have been following this closely, both because their daughter is involved and because the French Ministry is very interested in what's going on here. Word of this has spread among the other ambassadors; they're all intensely interested. That's how it got upgraded from a proposal to a bill, someone got it on the agenda for the lower house of Legislative Ministry Affairs, and they passed it yesterday afternoon."
"So its a law?"
"No, it has to be approved by the Senior Council, and Fudge must be afraid that it will. That would make him look pretty foolish, so he's blocked it, stupid blighter."
Warren was passing the paper around now.
"As far as we can figure, this is completely legal."
"Doesn't make it right," Lukas muttered.
"What do we do now?" Marguerite was holding a paper herself, undoubtedly a letter from her parents.
"Is there anything we can do?" Gisella Trifiro passed the paper to the rest of the Hufflepuffs.
"What CAN we do? Fudge doesn't care about us, he's not going to care what we say."
"Then we have to get someone HE listens to to care about it," Mikhail muttered.
"What was that?" Aysha's head snapped around.
Mikhail shrugged. "Well, Koji-"
"Kentaro."
"Sorry, Kentaro over there is right, Fudge doesn't care what happens to us. And he doesn't answer to international authorities, so the ambassadors aren't going to influence him much. If he's going to change his mind, we have to get some fairly important British wizards on our side."
"I thought we already tried that."
"I think we need something a bit more drastic this time, we have to get their attention."
"Well we can't exactly have a sit down strike on the Ministry steps now can we?" Lucy muttered.
A lively discussion was springing up now, terribly disorganized, as all their discussions tended to be, with students shouting suggestions on how to grab the attention of the Ministry. Lucy was about to see if she could sneak out to grab a bit of breakfast when she felt a tap on her shoulder.
Vladimir was tapping her on the shoulder.
"Dimitri has an idea, but we want a non-Slytherin to propose it."
Lucy rolled her eyes, "Vlad, I think we are beyond house rivarly at this point, none of us may be here next year anyway."
Vlad shrugged.
"Fine, what is it?"
Dimitri leaned across and whispered in her ear.
"Are you insane! Dimitri, you'll be killed, we'll all be killed. We'll be massacred by our fellow students and you know very well the heads of house won't do a thing to stop it, it may even earn house points!"
She hadn't realized she was yelling until in the unearthly silence that followed "house points" she turned to see Warren, Aysha, Misha, and Maeve staring at her from the 7th year huddle.
"Lucy, is there something you'd like to share with the rest of the group?"
Lucy shook her head and pointed at Dimitri.
"Chernyshev?" Misha raised one eyebrow.
Dimitri shrugged and stood. "Well, you all know what's happening on Saturday..."
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"We are all going to die." Lucy sulked all the way back to the common room.
"We may not," Nicholas piped cheerfully. He happend to think the idea was brilliant.
"It's easy for the Slytherins, they've all been learning nasty curses since they could toddle, THEY'LL stand a fighting chance. I, on the other hand, with my rudimentary wand technique, am going to get my ass hexed back to the Stone Age."
"Try to be optimistic Lucy," Svetlana chuckled.
"Optimistic, right, I am optimistic about spending the rest of my life as an insentient blob of jello."
"I am sure once they understand our situation that our fellow students will support us."
"Understand? We are talking about an aspect of Hogwarts life where even the most intelligent of students is reduced to a mindless, witless, cheering and jeering sack of flesh and water. You can't reason with that unless you hit it with a bludger. And there are only two of those. Two bludgers versus the entire Hogwarts student body. Right. Goodbye end of year feast, hello St. Mungos."
"Lucy, you don't know that."
"You're right, there may not be enough of us left to take to St. Mungos."
"You're overreacting."
"I'm overreacting? Don't you get it? They aren't even going to have to ask, they already know I'm the weird one. When this goes down, I bet you a dozen galleons they start AIMING for me. 'Take down the freak, that'll do it!' You guys are normal, you could blend in, sneak past them, tunnel out through the dungeons using spoons and start up life somewhere else under new names while I'M being sacrificed to the Whomping Willow. IN PIECES!"
"You could say you did it in the name of freedom and equality."
"Thank you Ginger, that's very sweet. Have them put that on my tombstone, right under the words 'Here lies Lucy Montero, what's left of her.'"
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"Has anyone seen Lucy?" Seamus came down to the common room, adjusting his Quidditch robes and carrying his freshly trimmed broomstick.
Ron and Harry were waiting for him, Hermione was performing her nearly patented water/shatter resistance charm on Harry's glasses. The three of them shook their heads.
"She was gone when I woke up this morning," Hermione returned the glasses to Harry. "You three better get down to breakfast if you want Ginny to leave you anything."
Seamus cast one last glance around, sighed, and followed his teammates down to breakfast.
The entire school was up earlier than usual for a Saturday morning, for today was the Quidditch final, with Gryffindor and Slytherin once again vying for the Cup. House colors were out in abundance, with the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws wearing red and gold in addition to their own colors as a sign of solidarity. With all the excitement and speculation amongst the breakfast chatter, no one really took notice of the few students that were missing.
The sky looked overcast, but the winds were calm and the temperature warm as the students assembled in the stands, some whispering and pointing at the VIP box, which was full of important alumni and Ministry officials who often came up for the final game of the year. Professor Dumbledore, however, was not in his seat yet.
All attention focused on the pitch as Aluicious Javenson began the introduction and the teams circled proudly, assumed positions and waited for Madam Hooch to begin the game.
Harry was tense, focusing on the snitch and trying not to worry about Ron, who had been given a sharp talking to by Ginny the night before about not interfering. The team had come a long way this year, and had managed to do so with remarkably few injuries.
Just one more game with no funny business and the Cup was theirs.
The Quaffle was released, Ginny darted for it, Ron went hunting a bludger to cover her with, and Harry shot skywards to begin a hunt of his own.
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The game was going well, no injuries, but both sides were scoreless after half an hour. Seamus cornered a bludger on the far right of the Gryffindor end of the pitch and sent it sailing towards the Slytherin chaser who, as Seamus had guessed, was just about to receive a pass. The surprised chaser veered, the Quaffle dropped, and Ginny snatched it up. Seamus grinned, she was very good at picking up the trash.
"And a superb play by Ginny Weasley, she shoots- is the keeper really supposed to be THAT close to the posts, I'm sure there is a violation in there somewhere, no doubt one of our esteemed alumni here can tell me what that is, but it's back to Gryffindor now, an excellent execution of the Pulinster Dart by Underwood, he has shown incredible improvement this year, he's all on his own, he's- what's that?"
Seamus nearly missed the bludger he was working on as he turned to stare at Aluicious, and then down at the pitch where Aluicious was pointing. Something was moving down there, several somethings.
They moved so quickly that almost before everyone had begun to look down at the pitch they were already in position.
Aluicious seemed to feel the need to keep commentating, despite the fact that Madam Hooch had blown the whistle and was in possession of the Quaffle.
"And, wait a second I know that one, that's Wesley Lane, and William, that's Nicholas Kornakovitch and his sister, and they all seem to be linked together between the goalposts, what in Merlin's name is going on here! Where are your loyalties people, this is QUIDDITCH!"
As Lucy handcuffed herself to Marguerite midway across the pitch and offered her left wrist to Misha, she tried to quiet her racing heart and listen. Somewhere, not far off, there was a quiet purring, she looked over her left shoulder with the Sight, and saw the Snitch flying figure eights lazily around the Gryffindor goalposts about 20 feet above the ground.
By this point the international students were handcuffed and chained together in a line stretching from Aysha's right hand, which was handcuffed to a chain around the Slytherin center post, to Warren, whose left hand was similarly attached to the Gryffindor main goalpost. Lucy caught Warren's eye and nodded, he smiled, and using the wand in his right hand, sent a paper airplane flying up to Aluicious.
As the plane dove and turned, it appeared to split, first into two, then four, then the multiplication became too fast to keep track as the air was literally filled with paper airplanes, buzzing the players on their brooms and aiming for the stands. Within minutes, every spectator and athlete was holding one. Warren looked immensely proud of himself.
"The assembled body of your peers, in demonstration against the gross injustice done this week by the Office of the Minister of Magic against the basic human rights of all international students, has been forced to this final attempt to gain the attention and support of all decent and ethical British Wizards by holding the ground of this pitch in a manner of non- violent protest. As is our right by the precedent of the Great Goblin Spit- In of 1872."
What followed the preamble was a brief description of what had happened that year and most importantly Fudge's recent actions. The students were still staring at the pitch in horror, as were most of the teachers, with the noted exception of Professor Binns, who's wavering form could be seen shimmering in delight that someone had actually paid attention and retained some memory of his lecture on the Great Goblin Spit-In of 1872.
"Well done my dears!"
Lucy shrugged, still waiting for the hexes to come raining down. "Well, we got Binns' attention."
"He's dead, he doesn't have much weight with Fudge, Luce."
At this point the Quidditch players had had enough, and descended on Madam Hooch en masse.
"They can't actually-"
-"Can still play even if the pitch is occupied."
"Remember the mooncalf outbreak in '35? They kept playing!"
A loud shrill blast of the whistle brought the commotion to a halt. Madam Hooch strode over to the Gryffindor goalpost, where Warren Lane was leaning over to munch on a sandwich in his left hand.
"Mr. Lane."
Warren stood up. Consequentially, the entire line of protesting students was forced to stand. Lucy gave Madam Hooch credit; a lesser woman would have been intimidated at such a showing. The players certainly took a step back. That is, every player but Ron Weasly, who was fixing Lucy with a Look she was trying not to see.
"Yes, Madam Hooch?"
"Do I have your assurance that you and your fellow conspirators will confine yourself to this area of the pitch and remain on the ground while play is in progress?"
Warren smiled, he could be incredibly charming if he wanted to be. "You have our absolute assurance ma'm."
The small woman strode back to her players. "Play will resume as normal, take positions."
A cheer went up from the crowd, the players took to the air, and the whistle was blown. Lucy found the Snitch flying high above center pitch, and it took only a little probing to spark its interest and tease it into coming closer. When she had it in range, she got Warren's attention again. He nodded grimly.
"Sorry Harry," she whispered, rechecked her grounding, reached out, and cloaked the Snitch.
The Hogwarts Golden Snitch was supposed to be tamper-proof. It was kept under lock and key and had enough anti hexing spells on it that even the tiniest of modifications would cause it to turn bright purple, close up, and drop to the ground. However, the Snitch had never been protected against Western Magic, and it was, Lucy found, pathetically simple for her to put on a very low energy shield which made the ball completely transparent. Not even Harry would be able to find it now.
No one but Lucy noticed its absence, as the snitch was often never seen before the end of the game by anyone but the Seekers anyway, and play continued seamlessly throughout the dirty little deed. It had been Dimitri's idea to try and keep the game going, he was thinking along different lines, but Wesley, who had been watching out the window during Lucy's master trials the previous winter, had asked her if she could do anything. She pointed out that she could hide the snitch, then had to convince everyone that this was theoretical, she hadn't actually interfered with Quidditch games in the past.
One thing was for certain, if the Looks Ron Weasly was sending her way now were any indication, she was as good as dead the minute the players found out, and she wasn't certain she was any safer with the Gyffindors than the Slytherins.
Harry hadn't noticed anything amiss, poor boy, and was gliding high above most of the action, out of "accidental" bludgering range, a tactic he had learnt well last year. Harry watched Ginny nearly score, and held his breath when a bludger came dangerously close to her head. Not that he was too worried about Ginny, she was an ace at ducking those things, uncanny little sixth sense really, but he and the rest of the team had learned they needed to watch Ron at these times. Player or not, that was his little sister up there, and Merlin help anyone who tried to knock her off her broom. The Slytherins, unfortunately, were on to this as well by now, and they liked to see how far they could push him.
Seamus was on to it, however, and he passed Ron the bludger he'd been coddeling, letting him send a blow legally rather than risk the full body tackle that had nearly occurred last game. Seamus was feeling a little distracted, however, there was this strange buzzing in the back of his head that he couldn't quite shake, and he hadn't even been hit yet.
Five hours later the buzzing in his head had been replaced by the growling of his stomach. Not one dive had Harry made for the Snitch, they were tied at four goals apiece, it had been a tight game, and the wind had picked up, throwing off his bludger vectors. The one grim piece of satisfaction was that the alterations to his broom were proving well worth the effort, his cornering was tighter, and there was significantly less leeway, the tendency of an idling broom to drift to the side, than before. That was proving helpful with the wind; nothing was worse than missing a dead on bludger return because your broom sidled.
The wind was making it unpleasant for the protesters as well. While the walls of the stands kept them somewhat protected, they were on the ground and completely exposed. Marguerite was shivering.
Lucy was too busy being annoyed to really notice the weather; she had been gifted with an uninvited guest ever since the game began. The Hogwart's Snitch was fast, elusive, and not particularly bright, but it was curious, damn curious. And the presence of something that was creating an energy field around it seemed to excite the godforsaken ball to no end. It had been buzzing Lucy's head and flying circles around her for hours.
It was the intense loathing for the Snitch that was causing the buzzing in Seamus' drowsy, empathetic head. He didn't know it, of course, but as the afternoon wore on and on, he became less and less alert. It was just after the Slytherins called a time out, as he sank lazily down, that his eyes unfocused, and all of a sudden, he Saw it.
Seamus had never really used the Sight before, Lucy had tried to train him in it last year, but he thought he was blocked. As it turns out, it seemed it was something he had, but didn't have very much conscious control over. So it was only in his exhausted state that he Saw the pitch in the bright colors of energy fields. And there, buzzing around Lucy's head and emitting a nearly blinding energy field, were the fluttering wings of the golden snitch.
That got his attention, snapped him out of his haze, and snapped his eyes back to normal sight. The snitch was gone, but Lucy looked supremely annoyed...oh bloody hell.
It didn't take an A in advanced arithmancy to figure out why Harry, the most brilliant Seeker Hogwarts had seen in decades, hadn't been able to find the snitch since nine that morning.
She was hiding it, the little vixen, they could be playing for days.
His first impulse was to tell Harry immediately. His second was that if Ron ever found out they'd be mailing Lucy home in a matchbox.
Discretion, he sighed, was the better part of valor.
Harry was just to the left of the protest line in the center of the pitch, talking to Madam Hooch and Draco Malfoy, a captains' conference. It didn't take long, Harry nodded and headed back to his teammates, who were stretching after hours of flying. They were also sending dirty looks at the line of bodies extending from their goalposts, most especially at Warren, since he was actually attached to it. Warren Lane, however, having brought an extra scarf and filled his pockets with food, was supremely comfortable and remained unphased.
"We're going to keep playing, but if the game hasn't ended by dinner we're stopping and carrying on tomorrow."
The Gryffindors broke from their circle, and Seamus managed to grab Harry's arm before he kicked off.
"What is it?"
"Harry, I don't think you're going to find it."
"Come on now, think positive."
"No, it's not that. I don't think you CAN."
The gravity in Seamus' face made Harry pause.
"What do you mean?"
"You can't tell Ron, but I think Lucy is cloaking the Snitch."
"WHAT!"
"Shhh!"
"How can you tell?"
"I can tell, the way she taught me. It's her kind of magic, that's why it hasn't been detected."
"We should get Madam Hooch-"
"There's no way to prove it."
Harry glanced over at where Lucy was sitting on the grass, back to back with a small girl with blond hair. She certainly looked annoyed about something, and the other girl kept swatting at something in the air.
"You can't tell me where it is?"
Seamus shook his head. "I thought about that. My guess is that the minute she sees you make a move, she'd move it anyway."
"So we are playing for as long as she wants us too?"
"Unless they get what they want, I suppose so."
Harry groaned and ran a hand through his hair.
"You could use this to take a break, you know, let the reserves take over, its not like there is any chance Malfoy is going to catch it."
There was a scuffle across the pitch, Seamus squinted against the setting sun to see Draco being restrained by the Slytherin beaters. The keeper put something back into his robes, his wand no doubt, and there was an audible SNAP in the air.
"Oh no."
"What is it?"
"The Slytherins were using the cancophonious charm again." The Slytherins had been caught audio-spying on the Gryffindor huddle before, usually the team used a nullifying charm before a tactics meeting. That had not been performed today, as this meeting wasn't about tactics."
"That means-"
"It means they know that Lucy is holding the game up."
"We don't know that, we don't know when they started listening."
At that moment the whistle blew, and there was nothing to do but take to the air.
It didn't take long to find out how much the Slytherins had overheard. Less than a minute into the game a bludger came screaming toward the ground from one of the Slytherin beaters. Misha was more awake than Lucy at that point, and jerked her to his side just before the ball slammed into the ground inches away.
But the Slytherins weren't done yet, not by a long shot. Twenty minutes into the renewed game and the ground around Lucy was pockmarked with holes from near misses with bludgers. Marguerite was white as a sheet, and Misha was red with cursing his house mates. Lucy was busy fixing her spell, tying the energies into a ley line, so if she was knocked out the Slytherins wouldn't get the satisfaction of breaking the sheild, they still wouldn't see the Snitch. Of course, it was a little difficult to focus when she had to shift to one side every few minutes.
The bludgering of Lucy was, however, a very good thing for the Gryffindor Chasers, as there weren't any bludgers flying at THEM. Gryffindor now had a commanding lead.
Madam Hooch was quite at a loss. There was, however, no rule in Quidditch against sending bludgers into the ground. The international students had agreed to be on the pitch at their own risk, so she could not penalize the Slytherins for using Lucy Montero for target practice, as it were.
Dinner, for everyone concerned, couldn't come soon enough.
"Hang in there kiddo, they have to break sometime."
"Remind me never to sit next to you again."
"I don't get it, how do they know it's you?"
Lucy shrugged, "Maybe they just don't like me."
"I am going to strangle-"
"Misha, I'm betting you would do the same thing in their position."
"Well, not so often, I'm getting quite tired really."
"Hang on, I think we have an incoming."
The three heads turned to the right, where a sneering Slytherin beater had paused mid-pitch, playfully bouncing his bludger. The rest of the players were at the Slytherin end, where Gryffindor Chasers were assaulting the goalposts yet again.
"Wait for it," Misha breathed, they had learned it was important not to move until you were absolutely sure where the bludger was going to land.
Their eyes were fixed, trained on the bludger. Finally the beater smirked and let it fly.
"3-2-1-Now!" Misha yelled and they all shifted to the right, Lucy looked up into the still smirking face of the beater.
"What's he so happy-"
BANG!
Lucy's head snapped forward before the rest of her body keeled over into the dirt.
They had been so fixated on the bludger to the right, they hadn't noticed the other beater sweep in behind them.
Marguerite screamed, but it was drowned out in the cheers from the still hearty crowd as Ginny Weasly scored again.
Misha turned Lucy over carefully, putting an ear to her chest.
"Still breathing."
On his left, Dimitri Chernyshev pulled his wand out of his robes, leaned as far as the chains would allow, and gently tapped Lucy's forehead, muttering, "assaymus skeletus". A swirl of blue light surrounded Lucy's head, disappeared, and then reappeared, now a bright green.
Dimitri nodded, "That's good news at least, means the bludger didn't fracture her skull."
Misha was staring at him in astonishment. "How did you know that?"
"Simple, it turns red if there are any broken bones. We use it all the time back home, the safe places to play Quidditch are sometimes far away from the house, it helps to know how serious it is. She probably has a concussion, however."
"A concussion?" Marguerite squeaked.
"Don't worry, I've had half a dozen. Not supposed to have too many more though, bad for you. But a few won't do her any permanent harm, I don't think."
It was long past dark, at this point, and the poorly illuminated ground of the pitch meant that few had seen the "accident." It wasn't until several minutes later that Alucious commented blandly, "Oh, and it appears we have a protester down, I repeat, protester down."
Seamus turned to see Lucy lying on the pitch, with her head in Misha's lap, and a small girl holding her hand and crying.
"Calm down Marguerite, she's going to be just fine."
"The minute this game breaks I am going to hex those two to Hawaii and back."
Dimitri tapped Misha on the shoulder and passed him a large cloak and two scarves.
"Warren said to keep her warm, and you can put this under her head."
Misha strained in the darkness to make out Warren Lane, sitting at the base of the goalpost in only his sweater.
They wrapped Lucy up, as best they could in handcuffs, sliding the folded scarf under her head for a pillow.
There was nothing to do but wait for the game to end.
It seemed an age before Madam Hooch blew her whistle.
"This game is to reconvene at nine tomorrow morning!"
The teams landed, and seven seperate curses hit the Slytherin beaters square in the back.
"Um, Nicholas, I don't think you are supposed to mix those two."
Nicholas Kornakovitch shrugged, "That is an unexpected side effect."
"I didn't know people could bend that way."
"I don't think they're supposed to."
Seamus dismounted and ran over, but there was already a group of people surrounding Lucy, and he couldn't get near.
He relaxed a bit when he heard her voice, soft and a little slurred, drift over the pitch.
"It's Saturday, I'm Lucy, and if you keep asking me stupid questions I'm going to hit you- as soon as the Marguerites stop spinning."
Madam Hooch had made her way over.
"You should send her to the hospital wing Mr. Grigorev."
"I'm fine, really, I think I have a little bump though."
"See she's-"
"Misha, when did you get a twin brother?"
"-Er fine, she's just fine."
"Actually, I may not be. Is there normally a funny bendy-type platypus playing Quidditch for Slytherin?"
Dimitri looked where she was poining, where the Slytherin beaters were being helped off the field.
"Yes Lucy, today there is."
"Oh, then that's ok then."
Lucy didn't remember much of dinner, she didn't remember much of walking back to the Tower, and she didn't remember much of getting into bed, although she assumed the next morning she had done it all without assistance, seeing as she was still wearing her shoes when she woke up.
She looked out the window for any sign of Faustas, who liked to exercise in the early morning air before anyone was awake to notice, but she neither saw nor felt him. He had left at the same time as Virgil's group to "handle" something back west, which usually meant he wanted to meet with someone in Peru. It was always Circle stuff that did not concern her, and after receiving a detailed account of the first such visit, Lucy didn't think she had the strength to stay awake through another play by play of boring meetings with very little accomplished.
It didn't really matter, he'd be back soon enough.
Hermione, as usual, was already awake and Lavender, as usual, was not. Lucy thought the better of slamming her trunk lid closed; Lavender's hexing accuracy had improved remarkably since she had broken up with her latest boyfriend.
As she came down the stairs she was pondering whether it would be considered a bit obsessive if she stopped into the BA room for just a second before breakfast to check on their new hook-up to the Web. True, she had checked it yesterday, but it was a new hookup and –
In the midst of her inner debate she had quite neglected to look where she was going, which was most unfortunate for whomever it was she collided with at the base of the stairs, knocking them both to the ground.
"Sorry," she began as she accepted a hand and was helped up.
"I'd say we're even, but we wouldn't be," Seamus replied.
"Oh," Lucy wasn't sure what to say. Seamus didn't look very comfortable either.
"Listen, Lucy I'm-"
"THERE you are! Luce, hurry up, come with me!"
Lucy found herself being torn away by a remarkably strong Maria Moray.
"What are you doing?"
"Hurry up! Everyone else is already there, Warren says we have to hurry!"
Lucy could only look over her shoulder at Seamus and shrug as she was pulled out the portrait hole by a girl who looked as if she could be blown over by a slight breeze at any moment. What on earth were they feeding the kids in South Africa?
She was hauled, half running the whole way, to the back of the library. There were students everywhere, in the chairs, on top of tables, on the floor, all surrounding Warren and Aysha, who were reading something and muttering to each other.
Lucy freed herself from Maria's bony fingers and dropped down in front next to Vladimir and Misha.
"What is going on?"
"Fudge tabled the proposal."
"What does that mean?"
"It means," Warren spoke up, "That the Minister of Magic has postponed the vote by the senior council."
"Until when?"
"He could, foreseably, delay any action for the entire length of his term as Minister."
Arguements and shouts arose, while the 7th years attempted to calm the group, Lucy looked around, saw Wesley's leg dangling from a table on her right, and tugged it gently.
"When did this happen? How did he find out?"
"Marguerite's parents, for one, and half a dozen other ambassadors and family friends, notified us by express owls about an hour ago."
"Ambassadors?"
Wesley nodded, "The Ducasses have been following this closely, both because their daughter is involved and because the French Ministry is very interested in what's going on here. Word of this has spread among the other ambassadors; they're all intensely interested. That's how it got upgraded from a proposal to a bill, someone got it on the agenda for the lower house of Legislative Ministry Affairs, and they passed it yesterday afternoon."
"So its a law?"
"No, it has to be approved by the Senior Council, and Fudge must be afraid that it will. That would make him look pretty foolish, so he's blocked it, stupid blighter."
Warren was passing the paper around now.
"As far as we can figure, this is completely legal."
"Doesn't make it right," Lukas muttered.
"What do we do now?" Marguerite was holding a paper herself, undoubtedly a letter from her parents.
"Is there anything we can do?" Gisella Trifiro passed the paper to the rest of the Hufflepuffs.
"What CAN we do? Fudge doesn't care about us, he's not going to care what we say."
"Then we have to get someone HE listens to to care about it," Mikhail muttered.
"What was that?" Aysha's head snapped around.
Mikhail shrugged. "Well, Koji-"
"Kentaro."
"Sorry, Kentaro over there is right, Fudge doesn't care what happens to us. And he doesn't answer to international authorities, so the ambassadors aren't going to influence him much. If he's going to change his mind, we have to get some fairly important British wizards on our side."
"I thought we already tried that."
"I think we need something a bit more drastic this time, we have to get their attention."
"Well we can't exactly have a sit down strike on the Ministry steps now can we?" Lucy muttered.
A lively discussion was springing up now, terribly disorganized, as all their discussions tended to be, with students shouting suggestions on how to grab the attention of the Ministry. Lucy was about to see if she could sneak out to grab a bit of breakfast when she felt a tap on her shoulder.
Vladimir was tapping her on the shoulder.
"Dimitri has an idea, but we want a non-Slytherin to propose it."
Lucy rolled her eyes, "Vlad, I think we are beyond house rivarly at this point, none of us may be here next year anyway."
Vlad shrugged.
"Fine, what is it?"
Dimitri leaned across and whispered in her ear.
"Are you insane! Dimitri, you'll be killed, we'll all be killed. We'll be massacred by our fellow students and you know very well the heads of house won't do a thing to stop it, it may even earn house points!"
She hadn't realized she was yelling until in the unearthly silence that followed "house points" she turned to see Warren, Aysha, Misha, and Maeve staring at her from the 7th year huddle.
"Lucy, is there something you'd like to share with the rest of the group?"
Lucy shook her head and pointed at Dimitri.
"Chernyshev?" Misha raised one eyebrow.
Dimitri shrugged and stood. "Well, you all know what's happening on Saturday..."
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"We are all going to die." Lucy sulked all the way back to the common room.
"We may not," Nicholas piped cheerfully. He happend to think the idea was brilliant.
"It's easy for the Slytherins, they've all been learning nasty curses since they could toddle, THEY'LL stand a fighting chance. I, on the other hand, with my rudimentary wand technique, am going to get my ass hexed back to the Stone Age."
"Try to be optimistic Lucy," Svetlana chuckled.
"Optimistic, right, I am optimistic about spending the rest of my life as an insentient blob of jello."
"I am sure once they understand our situation that our fellow students will support us."
"Understand? We are talking about an aspect of Hogwarts life where even the most intelligent of students is reduced to a mindless, witless, cheering and jeering sack of flesh and water. You can't reason with that unless you hit it with a bludger. And there are only two of those. Two bludgers versus the entire Hogwarts student body. Right. Goodbye end of year feast, hello St. Mungos."
"Lucy, you don't know that."
"You're right, there may not be enough of us left to take to St. Mungos."
"You're overreacting."
"I'm overreacting? Don't you get it? They aren't even going to have to ask, they already know I'm the weird one. When this goes down, I bet you a dozen galleons they start AIMING for me. 'Take down the freak, that'll do it!' You guys are normal, you could blend in, sneak past them, tunnel out through the dungeons using spoons and start up life somewhere else under new names while I'M being sacrificed to the Whomping Willow. IN PIECES!"
"You could say you did it in the name of freedom and equality."
"Thank you Ginger, that's very sweet. Have them put that on my tombstone, right under the words 'Here lies Lucy Montero, what's left of her.'"
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"Has anyone seen Lucy?" Seamus came down to the common room, adjusting his Quidditch robes and carrying his freshly trimmed broomstick.
Ron and Harry were waiting for him, Hermione was performing her nearly patented water/shatter resistance charm on Harry's glasses. The three of them shook their heads.
"She was gone when I woke up this morning," Hermione returned the glasses to Harry. "You three better get down to breakfast if you want Ginny to leave you anything."
Seamus cast one last glance around, sighed, and followed his teammates down to breakfast.
The entire school was up earlier than usual for a Saturday morning, for today was the Quidditch final, with Gryffindor and Slytherin once again vying for the Cup. House colors were out in abundance, with the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws wearing red and gold in addition to their own colors as a sign of solidarity. With all the excitement and speculation amongst the breakfast chatter, no one really took notice of the few students that were missing.
The sky looked overcast, but the winds were calm and the temperature warm as the students assembled in the stands, some whispering and pointing at the VIP box, which was full of important alumni and Ministry officials who often came up for the final game of the year. Professor Dumbledore, however, was not in his seat yet.
All attention focused on the pitch as Aluicious Javenson began the introduction and the teams circled proudly, assumed positions and waited for Madam Hooch to begin the game.
Harry was tense, focusing on the snitch and trying not to worry about Ron, who had been given a sharp talking to by Ginny the night before about not interfering. The team had come a long way this year, and had managed to do so with remarkably few injuries.
Just one more game with no funny business and the Cup was theirs.
The Quaffle was released, Ginny darted for it, Ron went hunting a bludger to cover her with, and Harry shot skywards to begin a hunt of his own.
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The game was going well, no injuries, but both sides were scoreless after half an hour. Seamus cornered a bludger on the far right of the Gryffindor end of the pitch and sent it sailing towards the Slytherin chaser who, as Seamus had guessed, was just about to receive a pass. The surprised chaser veered, the Quaffle dropped, and Ginny snatched it up. Seamus grinned, she was very good at picking up the trash.
"And a superb play by Ginny Weasley, she shoots- is the keeper really supposed to be THAT close to the posts, I'm sure there is a violation in there somewhere, no doubt one of our esteemed alumni here can tell me what that is, but it's back to Gryffindor now, an excellent execution of the Pulinster Dart by Underwood, he has shown incredible improvement this year, he's all on his own, he's- what's that?"
Seamus nearly missed the bludger he was working on as he turned to stare at Aluicious, and then down at the pitch where Aluicious was pointing. Something was moving down there, several somethings.
They moved so quickly that almost before everyone had begun to look down at the pitch they were already in position.
Aluicious seemed to feel the need to keep commentating, despite the fact that Madam Hooch had blown the whistle and was in possession of the Quaffle.
"And, wait a second I know that one, that's Wesley Lane, and William, that's Nicholas Kornakovitch and his sister, and they all seem to be linked together between the goalposts, what in Merlin's name is going on here! Where are your loyalties people, this is QUIDDITCH!"
As Lucy handcuffed herself to Marguerite midway across the pitch and offered her left wrist to Misha, she tried to quiet her racing heart and listen. Somewhere, not far off, there was a quiet purring, she looked over her left shoulder with the Sight, and saw the Snitch flying figure eights lazily around the Gryffindor goalposts about 20 feet above the ground.
By this point the international students were handcuffed and chained together in a line stretching from Aysha's right hand, which was handcuffed to a chain around the Slytherin center post, to Warren, whose left hand was similarly attached to the Gryffindor main goalpost. Lucy caught Warren's eye and nodded, he smiled, and using the wand in his right hand, sent a paper airplane flying up to Aluicious.
As the plane dove and turned, it appeared to split, first into two, then four, then the multiplication became too fast to keep track as the air was literally filled with paper airplanes, buzzing the players on their brooms and aiming for the stands. Within minutes, every spectator and athlete was holding one. Warren looked immensely proud of himself.
"The assembled body of your peers, in demonstration against the gross injustice done this week by the Office of the Minister of Magic against the basic human rights of all international students, has been forced to this final attempt to gain the attention and support of all decent and ethical British Wizards by holding the ground of this pitch in a manner of non- violent protest. As is our right by the precedent of the Great Goblin Spit- In of 1872."
What followed the preamble was a brief description of what had happened that year and most importantly Fudge's recent actions. The students were still staring at the pitch in horror, as were most of the teachers, with the noted exception of Professor Binns, who's wavering form could be seen shimmering in delight that someone had actually paid attention and retained some memory of his lecture on the Great Goblin Spit-In of 1872.
"Well done my dears!"
Lucy shrugged, still waiting for the hexes to come raining down. "Well, we got Binns' attention."
"He's dead, he doesn't have much weight with Fudge, Luce."
At this point the Quidditch players had had enough, and descended on Madam Hooch en masse.
"They can't actually-"
-"Can still play even if the pitch is occupied."
"Remember the mooncalf outbreak in '35? They kept playing!"
A loud shrill blast of the whistle brought the commotion to a halt. Madam Hooch strode over to the Gryffindor goalpost, where Warren Lane was leaning over to munch on a sandwich in his left hand.
"Mr. Lane."
Warren stood up. Consequentially, the entire line of protesting students was forced to stand. Lucy gave Madam Hooch credit; a lesser woman would have been intimidated at such a showing. The players certainly took a step back. That is, every player but Ron Weasly, who was fixing Lucy with a Look she was trying not to see.
"Yes, Madam Hooch?"
"Do I have your assurance that you and your fellow conspirators will confine yourself to this area of the pitch and remain on the ground while play is in progress?"
Warren smiled, he could be incredibly charming if he wanted to be. "You have our absolute assurance ma'm."
The small woman strode back to her players. "Play will resume as normal, take positions."
A cheer went up from the crowd, the players took to the air, and the whistle was blown. Lucy found the Snitch flying high above center pitch, and it took only a little probing to spark its interest and tease it into coming closer. When she had it in range, she got Warren's attention again. He nodded grimly.
"Sorry Harry," she whispered, rechecked her grounding, reached out, and cloaked the Snitch.
The Hogwarts Golden Snitch was supposed to be tamper-proof. It was kept under lock and key and had enough anti hexing spells on it that even the tiniest of modifications would cause it to turn bright purple, close up, and drop to the ground. However, the Snitch had never been protected against Western Magic, and it was, Lucy found, pathetically simple for her to put on a very low energy shield which made the ball completely transparent. Not even Harry would be able to find it now.
No one but Lucy noticed its absence, as the snitch was often never seen before the end of the game by anyone but the Seekers anyway, and play continued seamlessly throughout the dirty little deed. It had been Dimitri's idea to try and keep the game going, he was thinking along different lines, but Wesley, who had been watching out the window during Lucy's master trials the previous winter, had asked her if she could do anything. She pointed out that she could hide the snitch, then had to convince everyone that this was theoretical, she hadn't actually interfered with Quidditch games in the past.
One thing was for certain, if the Looks Ron Weasly was sending her way now were any indication, she was as good as dead the minute the players found out, and she wasn't certain she was any safer with the Gyffindors than the Slytherins.
Harry hadn't noticed anything amiss, poor boy, and was gliding high above most of the action, out of "accidental" bludgering range, a tactic he had learnt well last year. Harry watched Ginny nearly score, and held his breath when a bludger came dangerously close to her head. Not that he was too worried about Ginny, she was an ace at ducking those things, uncanny little sixth sense really, but he and the rest of the team had learned they needed to watch Ron at these times. Player or not, that was his little sister up there, and Merlin help anyone who tried to knock her off her broom. The Slytherins, unfortunately, were on to this as well by now, and they liked to see how far they could push him.
Seamus was on to it, however, and he passed Ron the bludger he'd been coddeling, letting him send a blow legally rather than risk the full body tackle that had nearly occurred last game. Seamus was feeling a little distracted, however, there was this strange buzzing in the back of his head that he couldn't quite shake, and he hadn't even been hit yet.
Five hours later the buzzing in his head had been replaced by the growling of his stomach. Not one dive had Harry made for the Snitch, they were tied at four goals apiece, it had been a tight game, and the wind had picked up, throwing off his bludger vectors. The one grim piece of satisfaction was that the alterations to his broom were proving well worth the effort, his cornering was tighter, and there was significantly less leeway, the tendency of an idling broom to drift to the side, than before. That was proving helpful with the wind; nothing was worse than missing a dead on bludger return because your broom sidled.
The wind was making it unpleasant for the protesters as well. While the walls of the stands kept them somewhat protected, they were on the ground and completely exposed. Marguerite was shivering.
Lucy was too busy being annoyed to really notice the weather; she had been gifted with an uninvited guest ever since the game began. The Hogwart's Snitch was fast, elusive, and not particularly bright, but it was curious, damn curious. And the presence of something that was creating an energy field around it seemed to excite the godforsaken ball to no end. It had been buzzing Lucy's head and flying circles around her for hours.
It was the intense loathing for the Snitch that was causing the buzzing in Seamus' drowsy, empathetic head. He didn't know it, of course, but as the afternoon wore on and on, he became less and less alert. It was just after the Slytherins called a time out, as he sank lazily down, that his eyes unfocused, and all of a sudden, he Saw it.
Seamus had never really used the Sight before, Lucy had tried to train him in it last year, but he thought he was blocked. As it turns out, it seemed it was something he had, but didn't have very much conscious control over. So it was only in his exhausted state that he Saw the pitch in the bright colors of energy fields. And there, buzzing around Lucy's head and emitting a nearly blinding energy field, were the fluttering wings of the golden snitch.
That got his attention, snapped him out of his haze, and snapped his eyes back to normal sight. The snitch was gone, but Lucy looked supremely annoyed...oh bloody hell.
It didn't take an A in advanced arithmancy to figure out why Harry, the most brilliant Seeker Hogwarts had seen in decades, hadn't been able to find the snitch since nine that morning.
She was hiding it, the little vixen, they could be playing for days.
His first impulse was to tell Harry immediately. His second was that if Ron ever found out they'd be mailing Lucy home in a matchbox.
Discretion, he sighed, was the better part of valor.
Harry was just to the left of the protest line in the center of the pitch, talking to Madam Hooch and Draco Malfoy, a captains' conference. It didn't take long, Harry nodded and headed back to his teammates, who were stretching after hours of flying. They were also sending dirty looks at the line of bodies extending from their goalposts, most especially at Warren, since he was actually attached to it. Warren Lane, however, having brought an extra scarf and filled his pockets with food, was supremely comfortable and remained unphased.
"We're going to keep playing, but if the game hasn't ended by dinner we're stopping and carrying on tomorrow."
The Gryffindors broke from their circle, and Seamus managed to grab Harry's arm before he kicked off.
"What is it?"
"Harry, I don't think you're going to find it."
"Come on now, think positive."
"No, it's not that. I don't think you CAN."
The gravity in Seamus' face made Harry pause.
"What do you mean?"
"You can't tell Ron, but I think Lucy is cloaking the Snitch."
"WHAT!"
"Shhh!"
"How can you tell?"
"I can tell, the way she taught me. It's her kind of magic, that's why it hasn't been detected."
"We should get Madam Hooch-"
"There's no way to prove it."
Harry glanced over at where Lucy was sitting on the grass, back to back with a small girl with blond hair. She certainly looked annoyed about something, and the other girl kept swatting at something in the air.
"You can't tell me where it is?"
Seamus shook his head. "I thought about that. My guess is that the minute she sees you make a move, she'd move it anyway."
"So we are playing for as long as she wants us too?"
"Unless they get what they want, I suppose so."
Harry groaned and ran a hand through his hair.
"You could use this to take a break, you know, let the reserves take over, its not like there is any chance Malfoy is going to catch it."
There was a scuffle across the pitch, Seamus squinted against the setting sun to see Draco being restrained by the Slytherin beaters. The keeper put something back into his robes, his wand no doubt, and there was an audible SNAP in the air.
"Oh no."
"What is it?"
"The Slytherins were using the cancophonious charm again." The Slytherins had been caught audio-spying on the Gryffindor huddle before, usually the team used a nullifying charm before a tactics meeting. That had not been performed today, as this meeting wasn't about tactics."
"That means-"
"It means they know that Lucy is holding the game up."
"We don't know that, we don't know when they started listening."
At that moment the whistle blew, and there was nothing to do but take to the air.
It didn't take long to find out how much the Slytherins had overheard. Less than a minute into the game a bludger came screaming toward the ground from one of the Slytherin beaters. Misha was more awake than Lucy at that point, and jerked her to his side just before the ball slammed into the ground inches away.
But the Slytherins weren't done yet, not by a long shot. Twenty minutes into the renewed game and the ground around Lucy was pockmarked with holes from near misses with bludgers. Marguerite was white as a sheet, and Misha was red with cursing his house mates. Lucy was busy fixing her spell, tying the energies into a ley line, so if she was knocked out the Slytherins wouldn't get the satisfaction of breaking the sheild, they still wouldn't see the Snitch. Of course, it was a little difficult to focus when she had to shift to one side every few minutes.
The bludgering of Lucy was, however, a very good thing for the Gryffindor Chasers, as there weren't any bludgers flying at THEM. Gryffindor now had a commanding lead.
Madam Hooch was quite at a loss. There was, however, no rule in Quidditch against sending bludgers into the ground. The international students had agreed to be on the pitch at their own risk, so she could not penalize the Slytherins for using Lucy Montero for target practice, as it were.
Dinner, for everyone concerned, couldn't come soon enough.
"Hang in there kiddo, they have to break sometime."
"Remind me never to sit next to you again."
"I don't get it, how do they know it's you?"
Lucy shrugged, "Maybe they just don't like me."
"I am going to strangle-"
"Misha, I'm betting you would do the same thing in their position."
"Well, not so often, I'm getting quite tired really."
"Hang on, I think we have an incoming."
The three heads turned to the right, where a sneering Slytherin beater had paused mid-pitch, playfully bouncing his bludger. The rest of the players were at the Slytherin end, where Gryffindor Chasers were assaulting the goalposts yet again.
"Wait for it," Misha breathed, they had learned it was important not to move until you were absolutely sure where the bludger was going to land.
Their eyes were fixed, trained on the bludger. Finally the beater smirked and let it fly.
"3-2-1-Now!" Misha yelled and they all shifted to the right, Lucy looked up into the still smirking face of the beater.
"What's he so happy-"
BANG!
Lucy's head snapped forward before the rest of her body keeled over into the dirt.
They had been so fixated on the bludger to the right, they hadn't noticed the other beater sweep in behind them.
Marguerite screamed, but it was drowned out in the cheers from the still hearty crowd as Ginny Weasly scored again.
Misha turned Lucy over carefully, putting an ear to her chest.
"Still breathing."
On his left, Dimitri Chernyshev pulled his wand out of his robes, leaned as far as the chains would allow, and gently tapped Lucy's forehead, muttering, "assaymus skeletus". A swirl of blue light surrounded Lucy's head, disappeared, and then reappeared, now a bright green.
Dimitri nodded, "That's good news at least, means the bludger didn't fracture her skull."
Misha was staring at him in astonishment. "How did you know that?"
"Simple, it turns red if there are any broken bones. We use it all the time back home, the safe places to play Quidditch are sometimes far away from the house, it helps to know how serious it is. She probably has a concussion, however."
"A concussion?" Marguerite squeaked.
"Don't worry, I've had half a dozen. Not supposed to have too many more though, bad for you. But a few won't do her any permanent harm, I don't think."
It was long past dark, at this point, and the poorly illuminated ground of the pitch meant that few had seen the "accident." It wasn't until several minutes later that Alucious commented blandly, "Oh, and it appears we have a protester down, I repeat, protester down."
Seamus turned to see Lucy lying on the pitch, with her head in Misha's lap, and a small girl holding her hand and crying.
"Calm down Marguerite, she's going to be just fine."
"The minute this game breaks I am going to hex those two to Hawaii and back."
Dimitri tapped Misha on the shoulder and passed him a large cloak and two scarves.
"Warren said to keep her warm, and you can put this under her head."
Misha strained in the darkness to make out Warren Lane, sitting at the base of the goalpost in only his sweater.
They wrapped Lucy up, as best they could in handcuffs, sliding the folded scarf under her head for a pillow.
There was nothing to do but wait for the game to end.
It seemed an age before Madam Hooch blew her whistle.
"This game is to reconvene at nine tomorrow morning!"
The teams landed, and seven seperate curses hit the Slytherin beaters square in the back.
"Um, Nicholas, I don't think you are supposed to mix those two."
Nicholas Kornakovitch shrugged, "That is an unexpected side effect."
"I didn't know people could bend that way."
"I don't think they're supposed to."
Seamus dismounted and ran over, but there was already a group of people surrounding Lucy, and he couldn't get near.
He relaxed a bit when he heard her voice, soft and a little slurred, drift over the pitch.
"It's Saturday, I'm Lucy, and if you keep asking me stupid questions I'm going to hit you- as soon as the Marguerites stop spinning."
Madam Hooch had made her way over.
"You should send her to the hospital wing Mr. Grigorev."
"I'm fine, really, I think I have a little bump though."
"See she's-"
"Misha, when did you get a twin brother?"
"-Er fine, she's just fine."
"Actually, I may not be. Is there normally a funny bendy-type platypus playing Quidditch for Slytherin?"
Dimitri looked where she was poining, where the Slytherin beaters were being helped off the field.
"Yes Lucy, today there is."
"Oh, then that's ok then."