Authors Note:
This brief interlude was cut from 'The Construction of Light' which some of you know is the sequel to the 'The Seekers'. I'm actively writing both 'TCoL' and 'Legacies 2' at the same time. I thought I'd release this snippet, just to hold those of you have waited so patiently (or not) for more Harry and Cho goodness. Enjoy with the knowledge that there's more to follow.
As a note to new readers, 'The Seekers' was written well before the release of JKR's 'HP & tOotP' forcing the story into 'Alternate Universe' status. Sirius is alive and well and there are no prophecies hanging over Harry's head. I highly recommend that you read 'The Seekers' first (and review too!), but then I'm hardly objective about the matter.
Harry awoke with the morning sun shining brightly on his face through the small window of his attic room. As was his habit, he leapt from bed and headed for the shower to start his day. With water dripping from his hair, it suddenly occurred to him that there was no list of grueling chores awaiting him downstairs; that there was no Dudley to harass him; no Aunt or Uncle to berate him. It was absolutely surreal to think that he had nothing to do, not only for the entire day, but the rest of the week as well.
The previous week had been a rush of signing contracts, shaking hands, and introductory meetings. In another week, he and Cho would begin training and work outs, but this week there was nothing. All of his life, Harry had wanted a normal summer and to be free to do as he chose. Now he had one, and he was forced to admit that he had no idea of what to do with it.
Once dressed, he went downstairs to discover he was the first to rise. Bored, and as much from habit as anything else, he started breakfast.
"Great Merlin, Harry!" Remus exclaimed, running his fingers through his still uncombed hair as he stepped into the kitchen. "You expecting company?"
"What?" Harry asked defensively. "This is a normal breakfast isn't it? I should know, I cooked enough of them at the Dursleys'"
Professor Lupin shook his head in disbelief. "No wonder Vernon looks like a house with feet. Pass the bacon then…"
"Is that real food I smell?" Sirius stumbled in, still groggy and unshaven.
"Young Harry has created breakfast 'a la Dursley' this morning," Remus explained.
Sirius' brow furrowed. "Is it safe?"
"As long as you don't have high blood pressure or a heart condition, I think so," Remus answered between bites.
Sirius sat down at the table and began to devour food. "You're gonna make a fine wife someday, Harry," he said casually, his spirits obviously improved by a hearty meal.
"No wonder Cho is so taken with you," Remus agreed.
Harry went a bit red, but realizing that he was free to eat his share now stoked his appetite and he dug into the spread as well. "I'll burn something tomorrow for you," he replied. "Just so you don't get too used to things by the time I go back to Hogwarts."
Sirius flicked a piece of toast at him in response. Harry's superior reflexes caught it before it struck, and he flicked it back in Sirius's direction. "Really, Harry, you don't have to cook anymore."
"Tea and toast would do nicely if you just have to," Remus added.
"So what are you doing today?" Harry asked.
"Work…" both men answered simultaneously.
"Any chores need doing?" Harry continued tenatively.
"Chores?" Sirius challenged. "You mean, like work? Certainly not."
"Really, Harry" replied Remus, "We want you to enjoy yourself. Just have a good time and try to stay out of trouble."
"For the record," Sirius explained, "Staying out of trouble means not getting caught; or failing that, having a Slytherin scapegoat and a good alibi."
Remus chuckled. "As I recall from Hogwarts, Harry is well aware of the meaning… and besides, what son of James would need that explained to him?"
"Just go out and have a good time," ordered Sirius. "Go down to Hogsmeade or something… go visit Cho or Ron… I'm sure you'll think of something."
The two elder men hadn't even allowed Harry to clear the table, using charms to clear and clean the mess of breakfast away. Minutes later, they had Apparated out on their own missions leaving Harry alone and still wondering what to do. Cho was busy with her mum all morning, and Ron… He missed Ron, but the thought of visiting the Burrow still made him apprehensive. Maybe though, Ron would be interested in a Hogsmeade visit.
Harry stepped through the hearth and into the familiar arms of the Burrow. Fred and George were in the living room standing front of Ron, who was seated on the sofa.
"Harry!" shouted Fred, "Just in time!"
"Try one of these," George said as he forced a tiny pink glob into Harry's hand.
Harry looked at it suspiciously. "What's it do?" he asked.
George looked hurt. "It's Bubble Gum," he replied. "What harm could bubble gum do?"
"Turn my head into a large bubble," Harry answered without the slightest pause.
"Nah," replied Fred. "We thought of that, but the risk of popping someone's head was too great."
Ron attempted to speak, but instead of words, a stream of brightly-colored, translucent bubbles emerged not only from his mouth, but his nose and ears as well. No words were needed to see that Ron was extremely unhappy about his current state. Harry handed the confection back to George with a hearty 'thanks, but no thanks'.
"How are we supposed to test our products without test subjects?" Fred complained. Ron responded with another colorful stream of bubbles.
"How long does it last?" Harry asked.
"Not long," answered Fred, "Only about fifteen minutes or so."
"We're aiming this one at the younger market," George explained. "Don't want their parents worrying about the effects not wearing off."
"How responsible of you," Mrs. Weasley said snidely as she came into the room. "Not as responsible as actually getting a job and leaving your poor brother in peace, of course," she added as she gave Harry a hug. She fussed over him for several minutes before he was able to get a word in edgewise.
"I came by to see if Ron wanted to go to Hogsmeade with me…" Harry offered tenuously. Freedom of movement was still a very new concept to him.
"That would be great!" Fred insisted. "George and I were headed there anyway to take care of some business and to meet Lee for a round or two of Quidditch."
"Go grab your broom, Harry," George continued. "You'll get a chance to show off those new moves of yours."
"I don't know," countered Mrs. Weasley. "You're father should have a say in this…"
"Come on, mum," Fred and George pleaded together. Ron joined in with pleading eyes and a stream of bubbles. After a minute of thought, Mrs. Weasley relented and agreed it would be alright.
Less than an hour later, Harry and Ron were in the central square of Hogsmeade with brooms in hand. "Thanks mate," Ron said appreciatively. "Mum's been hovering over me non-stop since I got back and it's been making me nutters. It's good just to get out of the house."
"Anytime," Harry replied. "Remus and Sirius are off to work, Cho's busy with her mum, and I was just plain bored."
"Good to know I rank so high up on your list," Ron snapped at him, but then smiled. "Just having you on, Harry. I'd rather be with Cho too…"
"Good," grinned Harry. "I owled her and she said she'd be along to hex you into a toad later."
"What about Hermione?" Ron asked.
"I sent her an owl, but got no response. She's not on the Floo Network anyway."
"Too bad," Ron said wistfully.
It was a brilliant, sunny afternoon. Harry and Ron visited all of their favorite haunts from school-year weekends and ran into countless friends. They drank butterbeers at the Three Broomsticks, stocked up on sweets and pranks at Zonko's, and tossed Dungbombs at the crowd of Slytherins gathered near the fountain. The ensuing battle of insults that might have devolved into hexes or fists was dispersed when Professor Sprout wandered by and sent everyone about their business.
Short on ideas on how to kill more time, the two friends wandered down to the meadow that served as a makeshift Pitch for spur-of-the-moment Quidditch matches. While these games were not as formal as the matches at Hogwarts and the rules might change slightly to accommodate varying numbers of players, they were taken every bit as seriously. Etiquette required new players to sit on the sidelines until the current game was over or they were invited in by the current players, so Ron and Harry sat under a tree to watch the action until their opening came.
Four-on-four Quidditch was usually played with Keepers and Chasers only, with neither the Snitch nor the Bludger in play. Offense and Defense were the focus of this game, usually with the first team to reach one hundred points being the winner. This particular match was rather lopsided with one team absolutely dominating the other.
Lee Jordan arrived and joined them under the shade of their tree. "What's the score?"
"Don't know," Harry replied, "but I'm pretty sure that's Davies up there handing the other Keeper his posterior on a plate."
Lee, who was a very experienced observer of Quidditch, nodded. "That's Davies alright. Have you heard he's going to play for Liverpool?"
"That's awesome," Harry grinned. "Cho's playing for England."
"No way," Ron countered. "Rookies don't play on national teams…"
"Viktor Krum did," objected Lee. Ron scowled at the mention of the Bulgarian's name.
"Cho will too," Harry insisted. "She'll tell you herself when she gets here. We start training next week."
Ron's eyes went wide. "You too, Harry?" he asked in disbelief. "I'd always hoped you'd rescue the Cannons. With those new moves of yours, the Cannons could dominate the league…"
"Come on, Ron," Lee argued. "Who would play for the Cannons when they could play for England?"
It was apparent that Ron felt Harry should have. The argument was cut short however, by the arrival of Fred and George. The twins were not the type to sit idly by while a Quidditch match was going on. They began to heckle the losing team and shortly thereafter, Lee got into the spirit and began providing a play-by-play commentary that would have gotten him expelled from Hogwarts if Professor McGonagall had heard it.
Davies' team won handily with a final score of 100 to 20. The players landed and joined the small group of arrivals. Immediately, plans began for a new match. As there still weren't enough players to form full teams, Harry agreed to sit out the new match and wait for Cho to arrive.
Fred and George became Beaters for the ad-hoc team that had just lost, while Ron and Lee went to Davies' team. The addition of the Bludger made for a far more interesting game. Fred and George, having years of experience playing their positions as well as an intuitive understanding of each other, made an immediate change in the performance of their team. What had been a massacre in the previous match was now a pitched battle.
However interested Harry was in the game at hand, he found his mind soon wandering to the one subject that interested him more than Quidditch: Cho. Harry felt as if his mind was full of Cho: the sight of her; the sound of her voice; the lightness of her touch; even her smell. He closed his eyes and allowed himself to imagine her fully, the way he remembered her best, on his lap, in his arms. When he concentrated, it was as if he could actually smell the scent she wore – stargazer lily she'd told him – not that he'd know a stargazer if he tripped over it…
"It's not like you to sleep through a Quidditch match, love," a magical voice interrupted his reverie.
Harry's eyes snapped open to see Cho standing in front of him. The smile that lit his face came rapidly and rivaled the sun in its brilliance. "I had more important things on my mind," he answered as he rose to his feet. Gently, he wrapped his arms around her and kissed her.
Cho smiled back at him with a brilliance to match his own. "More important than Quidditch? I wouldn't mention that next week…" Her eyes sparkled like jewels.
"If you're so fired up about Quidditch," Harry grinned, "You'll have your chance in a bit. Davies is good but, with Fred and George gunning for him, even he can't hold up for long."
"Roger can take care of himself," Cho mused. "I'll be happy to show how to catch a Snitch though."
"Awfully confident of yourself, aren't you, Ms. Chang?" Harry began to tickle her ribs. "Care to make a wager on that? Anything I want versus anything you want?"
Cho smiled at him mischievously. "I know what you want, Mr. Potter"
"So it'll be win-win," Harry smirked.
"You're on, smarty-pants," Cho said. "But don't think I'm going to let you off easy… either during the game or after I win…"
"Wouldn't have it any other way, love," Harry laughed. The two of them settled down under the tree and watched what remained of the game, breaking their attention away occasionally to steal a quick snog or just a silly grin. It seemed that way to them at least, and the fact that they were interrupted by the cat-calls from the players they'd been watching without knowing the final score or even that the match had ended, did nothing to convince them otherwise.
"Right then," Roger Davies interrupted, "You two interested in Quidditch or are you just going to sit there all day?"
There was a long pause before either Seeker answered. Lee Jordan cleared his throat, as if to remind them an answer was expected. "Hang on," snapped Cho, "I'm still thinking about it…"
"At least get a room," Lee chuckled.
"I don't know," observed Fred, "it could be rather entertaining…"
"I'm sure we could give Harry a few pointers," George continued.
"You know," Cho replied, "what you read in those magazines is all made up, don't you?"
"Of course he does," snorted Stuart Ackerly, one of Cho's fellow Ravenclaws, "he's a regular contributor."
Eleanor Buddock, a Hufflepuff and the only other female present, began to blush. "Could we get back to Quidditch?" Fred and George decided to cut their losses and agreed. Cho went over to Davies' team and Harry joined Fred and George. A few newcomers arrived and were promised slots in the next game.
Once in the air, both Harry and Cho focused all of their attention on finding the Snitch. Cho went into a spiraling search, while Harry went to a seemingly random, but purposefully zigzagging pattern that Cho hadn't seen before. Simple competing search patterns reduced the game to a matter of luck, however, and neither of them could tolerate that.
Cho realized the brilliance of Harry's pattern and why he'd chosen it. As he zigzagged through three-dimensional space, varying not only direction, but altitude as well, he had a freedom of acceleration – he could feint or counter-feint without breaking his search. Cho had to smile in admiration as she adjusted her own strategy accordingly. Just to keep him on edge, she jerked her own broom around and accelerated into a steep dive, jinking her course enough to be convincing.
Harry responded in astounding time, but just as quickly realized he'd fallen for a feint. Cho grinned back at him, but was cut short as Harry was suddenly distracted by something to the right and pulled up hard and fast. She felt her heart fall as she reversed course and accelerated in pursuit of Harry, who was bobbing and weaving his way down the Pitch.
Cho was mere yards from Harry when he dived abruptly. A flick of gold up and to the left caught her eye a slight instant before she began her own dive. That Harry had been leading her on astray on a feint even more devious than her own was obvious, but in doing so he'd inadvertently led her to the Snitch so there was no time for either anger or frustration. All she had to do now was catch it before Harry could interfere.
Her initial strategy had been to use Harry's feint as an excuse to change direction without drawing attention to her true intent. Harry performed an Immelman Roll out of his dive so as to reverse his direction, making it apparent that he too had seen the Snitch. Cho willed more speed out of her broom and concentrated on the task at hand. Turning her head to find Harry would cost her time, speed and eye contact with the Snitch, all advantages she needed if she were going to seize her quarry. Being on matched brooms, there was little chance of Harry overtaking her but she also knew that Harry had an uncommon knack for anticipating a Snitch's behavior. Not knowing where he was or what he was up to was definitely a cause for concern.
Harry, knowing that he wouldn't be able to outpace Cho if she was moving at top speed, had chosen a new strategy. Unless Cho caught the Snitch in the next second or two, which he considered unlikely, the Snitch would reach the boundaries of the Pitch and reverse direction. That meant Cho would have to do the same and, when she did, he would be waiting for her.
Harry accelerated to top speed and nosed his broom upward until it was completely vertical. As his altitude increased, his acceleration bled off rapidly until it stopped completely. Harry used that brief moment of free-fall to assess the situation below him and develop a plan. Gravity began to take its toll, pulling broom and rider back toward the earth and slowly tipping it over nose-first toward the ground. Harry threw his weight forward and accelerated into an intercept course with both Cho and the Snitch.
Cho was flat against her broom, arm and hand stretched forward in anticipation of the small winged orb when Harry arrived alongside her. "Not today, love," he said with a wink. Cho only growled in response. This was her Snitch and Harry was not going to take it from her. She dropped a foot or two of altitude to clear herself of physical interference from Harry. Harry used the last of his kinetic advantage to raise his altitude a few feet, then inverted, reaching downward just as she was reaching upward.
The Snitch, feeling no obligation to the will of the competing Seekers, banked slightly, bobbed, and reversed course in a wide arc. Harry and Cho, in a maneuver that appeared choreographed to those watching, performed mirrored maneuvers to match it. The Golden Snitch, with its uncanny, inanimate awareness, seemed to sense that its seconds were numbered and responded with due desperation.
Neither Seeker was aware of it at the time, but all other activity on the Pitch had ceased since Harry had plummeted down his Tail Slide. Members of both teams watched in amazement along with the small crowd that had gathered to participate in or watch the afternoon matches as Harry and Cho spiraled and rolled around each other in a serpentine path, accelerating, inverting, diving, each attempting to out-maneuver the other, to gain some small advantage in their quest to snatch the Snitch away from the other.
Harry at last grabbed his elusive prey, more by virtue of position than skill. The Snitch had begun to double back and Harry had broken left while Cho had broken right. The Snitch's course had taken it almost straight to Harry's outstretched hand. Exhausted, Cho landed beside Harry on firm ground and they exchanged their customary hugs and kisses to the also customary background of applause.
Members of both teams came around to congratulate them, awestruck over the aerobatics they had just witnessed. "You guys compete harder as a couple," observed Davies, "than most Seekers who flat out hate each other. That was better than your last two Hogwarts matches."
"That was better than most Pro matches," agreed Lee.
Each player in turn heaped praise on the couple. When Ron's turn came, he approached Cho first instead of Harry. "Cho," he started, "I take back everything I've ever said about you before. If there was ever a woman made for Harry, it's you." He offered his hand as a gesture, thought better of it and gave her a bear hug instead.
Harry ahemed a few seconds into Ron's hug. "Do you mind, mate?"
Without breaking his hug, he turned to Harry. "Not at all; I'm actually enjoying it, to tell the truth." Cho pushed him away at that point, calling a 'perv' and a beast, but laughing as she did so.
Harry, Cho, the brothers Weasley, and Roger Davies, all conceded their positions to newcomers and walked down to the Three Broomsticks for cold Butterbeers. The talk was all of Quidditch: future careers, past matches, and new tactics. Not until the sun began to set, did the conversation falter, and a group of fast friends said their good byes to each other, Harry and Cho the last two to leave.
"I have to get home," Cho complained. "I promised mum I'd be back early."
"What about our bet?" protested Harry, "You aren't reneging, are you?"
Cho looked insulted. "Certainly not, but I'd just as soon not explain to my mother why I'm coming home with Chocolate Syrup in my hair, or whatever else it is you have in mind."
"Maybe some whipped cream too," Harry added with a smile. "What else are you thinking?"
Cho gave him a lingering kiss that steamed his glasses and left him gasping for air. "You won the bet, you tell me," she whispered.
Harry looked at her with raised eyebrows. "Sure, steam me up, and then leave. How fair is that?"
With all of her remaining resolve, Cho stood up. "You know I don't want to, love," she said consolingly, "It's hard to steam you up without doing worse to myself."
Harry nodded in understanding and rose to his feet to escort her to the Floo. He might as well head home himself since everyone else had too.
"We're going to be spending the next few weeks in training," Cho offered. "It seems we'll have an awful lot of time to ourselves without having to worry about what time we're in or what my mother has to say about it."
They lingered several more moments beside the hearth, neither wanting to actually leave. What ever her strong words, Cho hated to part from Harry and hated even more to be the cause of the lonely, crestfallen look on his face. After several false goodbyes, they both steeled themselves, gave each other a final parting peck, and took their turns throwing a flash of powder into the fire and stepping through to their respective homes.
Harry stepped into Lupin Lodge feeling bereft. The sounds of conversation drifting from the kitchen told him where to find his Godfather and host. As much as he would have preferred to just go up to his room and sulk and have a cold shower in hopes of sleeping, he decided that he ought to at least stick his head in and let them know he was home.
Remus and Sirius greeted Harry warmly and motioned him to the table to help finish off a roasted chicken. Harry sat pliant and dug into what was left of the bird, eating ravenously while the two elder men watched with amusement. With his physical hunger sated, he sat back in contemplation.
"So, Harry," asked Sirius, "What did you do all day?"
Harry pondered a moment, and with a shrug of his shoulders answered, "Nothing much."