Disclaimer: Everything you recognise belongs to JKR. She's making boatloads of money from her ideas. I'm not. C'est la vie. J
Author's Notes: I'm tremendously, tremendously sorry about the delay in this chapter. A vast conspiracy between travel, writer's block, and Real Life threw me down and stomped on me. I grovel at all of your feet, and I'll try to cut down the time lapse on the next one. Thanks to all the lovely reviewers, and thanks to Yolanda, whose beta-reading skills save my bacon time after time.
The Try-Outs
On Monday afternoon, Slytherin lost points in a Potions class for the first time in years when Malfoy, Pansy Parkinson, and Tamerlaina Nott arrived seven minutes late. Harry suspected that Malfoy had been trying to play some sort of power game by showing up late, but most of the Slytherins hadn't played along, and Professor Jigger hadn't seemed impressed. Aside from this event, Monday and Tuesday classes passed
without incident, and Harry's meeting with the other Quidditch Captains arrived very quickly. Ron and Hermione walked him to the pitch after dinner and then left to wait in the stands. Cho Chang and Jasper Summers, Hufflepuff's seventh-year Keeper, were already there, and Harry smiled awkwardly at both of them. Jasper looked a bit apologetic, just as Charles Stebbins had looked at the first Prefect meeting on the Hogwarts Express. Harry could tell that Jasper, like Charles, knew that he was holding a position that should have been Cedric's. The three made stilted conversation for a few minutes until the arrival of Slytherin's new Captain Everard Derrick caused even this strained chatter to dribble to a stop.
Although Derrick had been known to attack an opposing Keeper when no Chasers were in scoring range—a tactic strictly forbidden by the rules of Quidditch—he certainly wasn't the dirtiest player on Slytherin's team, and Harry reckoned they could have picked a much worse Captain. In the past, Harry wouldn't have dreamed of trying to make a Slytherin feel more at ease in a tense situation; now, though, in the interests of trying to reduce inter-House grudges, he felt he ought to say something conciliatory, so he asked, "How's your team shaping up, Derrick? Looking to take many new players?"
The older boy eyed him suspiciously. "What's it to you?" he asked.
Harry brushed off this rudeness with a propitiating shrug. "Just curious. Gryffindor's planning to take a lot of new people to try to build up our reserves. That's the one area that Oliver Wood kind of neglected."
Cho nodded. "Roger Davies didn't pay enough attention to reserves, either. We don't even have enough people coming up from the reserves to field a full team; I'm going to need brand new people for Keeper and for one Chaser spot, and that's not even thinking about new reserves."
Jasper and a somewhat-less-suspicious Derrick added a few comments about their teams, and then the group lapsed into silence again. Madame Hooch emerged from her office near the changing rooms, her hawk eyes gleaming, and announced that the new broomsticks had arrived. Harry nodded, and the other three Captains looked blank. Seeing their confused looks, Madame Hooch said, "I assumed Potter would have mentioned them, but I can see that he hasn't." While Harry blushed furiously, Madame Hooch explained about his "generous donation" and then ushered them all into the broomshed to examine the new arrivals. Cho and Jasper looked very interested in the new brooms; Derrick briefly looked pained—Slytherin's team brooms had been far superior to everything except Harry's Firebolt, and he clearly wasn't happy about losing the advantage—but he cheered up a bit once he got a look at the new Cleansweeps.
After they had finished looking over the brooms, they discussed the try-outs, which would take place over the next two evenings, with Gryffindor and Hufflepuff try-outs on Wednesday and Ravenclaw and Slytherin try-outs on Thursday. Then, they agreed on practise schedules, and, finally, Madame Hooch gave them each a parchment showing the schedule of the matches. Gryffindor and Ravenclaw had the first match of the year, to take place on the first Saturday in November; Harry and Cho locked eyes over their parchments and shrugged companionably at one another. Madame Hooch asked if they had any questions, and, when they didn't, she sent them off.
As Harry was making his way across the pitch, Jasper stopped him to ask something. He said uncomfortably, "Ah, Potter, about those new brooms…. It's really none of my business, but, erm, did you buy them with the money you won in the Tournament?"
Harry shook his head emphatically. "No. I gave it away. I couldn't…. It wasn't…." He couldn't seem to manage to get a sentence out, and he shook his head again, trying to clear the image of Mr. and Mrs. Diggory from his mind. He had tried to get them to take the money, telling them that it should have been Cedric's, but they wouldn't have it, either. Finally, he blurted out, "I didn't want it. At least half of it should have been Cedric's—oi, it all should've been Cedric's—and I wasn't going to keep it after what happened."
Jasper nodded, approval in his eyes. "I just wanted to make sure. About the brooms, I mean. I don't think my team would have wanted to use them if…."
Harry nodded to show that he understood. The Hufflepuffs wouldn't have wanted to ride brooms bought with their friend's blood. Jasper clapped him roughly on the shoulder and strode away quickly.
The rustle of a robe caught Harry's attention, and he turned to see Cho watching him. He flushed, wondering if she had heard his exchange with Jasper. Very quietly, she said, "I'd have used them even if you had bought them with the Tri-wizard money. You know why? Because Cedric would have wanted the money to go to something like that. He wouldn't have wanted the Cedric Diggory Memorial Pointless Slab of Granite; he'd have wanted something people could use. Something to make people happy." As Jasper had done, she touched Harry's shoulder, but more gently, her fingertips barely brushing his robe. She took a few steps, then turned and said with a teasing smile, "Of course, you're going to regret your generosity when we flatten you in that first match."
"Not a chance," Harry said around the lump in his throat, managing to smile back. Cho laughed, and then she was gone, running across the pitch to catch up to Jasper, her black hair flying out behind her. As he watched her go, Harry repeated quietly to himself, "Not a chance." He wasn't talking about the Quidditch match. He gave his head a little shake, squared his shoulders, and made his way to the stands, where Ron and Hermione were waiting.
*
Half the school turned out to watch the Wednesday evening try-outs, with Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs eager to cheer on their friends and Ravenclaws and Slytherins either attending out of curiosity or, in the case of the team members and hopefuls, keen to check out the competition. Hufflepuff won the coin toss, so they were granted the first try-out session. Harry settled in with his Housemates to watch.
Jasper Summers had a reserve Keeper and a reserve Beater, so he was only taking Chasers and a Seeker. After conferring with the Chaser candidates, Jasper mounted his broom (one of the school's new Cleansweeps, Harry noticed) and flew up to defend the goals at one end of the pitch; his reserve Keeper, Tony Snow, took the goals at the other end. The first Chaser candidate, Megan Jones, flew up from the ground and took four shots against Jasper. She scored twice. Then, as Megan flew to the other end of the pitch, the second candidate, a second-year boy whose name Harry didn't know, flew up. While the younger boy took his four shots against Jasper (one of which went through a hoop), Megan took four shot against Tony, scoring three times. Megan landed, the second-year flew to shoot against Tony, and a third candidate flew up to take on Jasper. This pattern continued until the six candidates had all taken four shots against Jasper and four against Tony. Once the one-on-one trials were finished, Jasper divided the Chasers up into two teams and had them scrimmage for about fifteen minutes in order to gauge their passing skills and their flying ability when faced with Bludgers and opposing team members. After this, he sent the Chaser candidates back to the stands and called the Seekers forward.
As Jasper talked to his three Seeker hopefuls, gesturing toward a bucket of golf balls, Harry noticed Fred and George engaging in a whispered conversation. Fred hopped up from his seat in the stands and hurried down to the pitch. Harry heard him call from the sidelines, "Oi, Summers!" Jasper broke off his conversation with the would-be Seekers and joined Fred. Harry watched as Fred, gesturing excitedly, chattered away to Jasper for a few moments and then pulled a Seeker's Scourge from his pocket. He and Jasper talked a bit more. Finally, the two shook hands, and Fred pulled two more Scourges from his pocket. Jasper returned to his Seeker candidates, and Fred returned to the stands, grinning.
"Are you giving aid to the opposition, Fred?" Harry asked in a mock-stern voice.
"Yup," Fred replied, grinning even more broadly. "But I told him only the first one's free; he's paying for the other two when we get back to the castle."
"Trading with the enemy," Harry said, shaking his head. "What is the world coming to?"
"Welcome to free enterprise," George replied. He winked and added, "Have to keep the shareholders happy, don't we?"
Harry, who was, so far as he knew, the only shareholder, rolled his eyes and returned his attention to the pitch. Jasper flew up to goal level in the centre of the pitch, and the first Seeker candidate hovered about halfway between Jasper and the ground. Jasper set off the Scourge, and the crowd in the stands said, "Oooooh!" Harry realised that only the students who had been present at Gryffindor's unofficial practise session had seen the Scourges before. While the spectators were oooooh-ing and ahhhhh-ing at the Weasley twins' ingenious device, the Seeker candidate was scrambling after the little balls. She managed to catch about six. She landed, and the next Seeker candidate took her place. When all three candidates had finished, Jasper sent them to wait in the stands and called his current team members down to the pitch.
While the Hufflepuff team conferred, Cho Chang and Everard Derrick came to talk to Fred and George; the two Captains wanted Seeker's Scourges for their try-outs. The twins exchanged a glance, and George excused himself from the conversation. He gestured for Harry to follow him to an unoccupied corner of the stands. Quietly, he asked, "How far are we taking this 'be nice to the Slytherins' thing? Do you want me to sell Derrick Scourges for his team?"
Harry nodded. "Yeah. Since you sold some to Hufflepuff, it's only fair."
"Even though Malfoy's his Seeker?" George asked.
That made Harry pause for a moment. He didn't relish the thought of Malfoy training and improving his skills with the help of a product that he, Harry, had funded. He thought for a moment and finally said, "Sell Derrick the Scourges for try-outs if he wants some, but…." He trailed off, realising that there was no way to end that sentence without sounding like he was meddling in the twins' business affairs. He started over with a question instead. "Are you going to sell Scourges to the other teams for their practises?" he asked.
George thought for a moment and then said, "I'll have to talk to Fred about it, but I think probably not. I'd rather lose the money than do anything to help Malfoy, and I'll bet Fred would, too."
Harry nodded, and he and George returned to their seats. Fred and George arranged to meet the Ravenclaw and Slytherin Captains tomorrow evening with enough Seeker's Scourges to supply their try-outs, and Cho and Derrick left to rejoin their teammates. A few moments later, Jasper Summers stepped forward and announced, "The new Hufflepuff Chaser is Megan Jones." Everyone in the stands applauded. When the applause finished, Jasper continued, "New reserve Chasers are Nelson Goodspeed and Amity Peasgood." Everyone applauded again, and then again after Jasper announced the new reserve Seeker, Owen Cauldwell. After the last round of applause finished, Jasper ended with, "All team members, new and old, are to meet in the Common Room after the Gryffindor try-outs. Thanks to everyone who tried out, and thank all of you for coming to watch." He and the Hufflepuff team left the pitch. It was time for Gryffindor try-outs.
Harry, his teammates, and the students who hoped to become his teammates made their way down to the pitch. Harry called the Keeper candidates and Chaser candidates forward. "Chasers," he said. "Each of you will take three shots against each Keeper. That's a total of twelve shots. McDonald and Thomas, you two are in the goals first. Carberry, you'll take three shots against McDonald, then you'll fly down to the other end of the pitch and take three shots against Thomas, and then you'll get in line behind Amber. Kingsley, while Carberry is taking his shots against Thomas, you'll take three against McDonald. Then you'll take your shots against Thomas, and then you'll get in line behind Carberry. Does everyone see how this works? It's just like the Hufflepuffs did it." Everyone nodded, and Harry continued, "Once Carberry gets to the front of the line again, Thomas and McDonald will come down, and Pomfret and Ron Weasley will take their places. Then, Chasers, you'll do the same thing again, except this time you'll be taking your shots against Pomfret and Weasley instead of McDonald and Thomas. All clear?" Everyone nodded again, and Harry said, "Very good. Thomas and McDonald, go guard your goals." Dean and Natalie McDonald, a second-year, flew off toward their positions. When they were in place, Harry said, "Whenever you're ready, Carberry."
Josiah Carberry flew up and took his three shots against Natalie. He scored twice. He flew down to shoot against Dean, and Elspeth Kingsley flew up to face Natalie. Ginny followed Elspeth, and then came Robert Denton, Gerald Brandon, and Elaine Amber. After Elaine had taken her shots against Dean, scoring once, Dean and Natalie flew down. Harry gave Ron, whose freckles had suddenly become much more pronounced, an encouraging grin. Ron grinned back weakly, took the new Cleansweep from Dean, and flew up to his goals. Noel Pomfret wasn't far behind him. Josiah Carberry flew up to face Noel, and the Chasers went through their rotation again. Once they had finished, Ron and Noel landed again, and Harry explained the next stage.
"Next," he said, "you'll play a scrimmage match. Three Chasers, two Beaters, and one Keeper—everything but a Seeker. You'll be playing with the current players. I want McDonald, Denton, Kingsley, Johnson, Thomas as Beater, and Fred Weasley in first for one side and Pomfret, Amber, Brandon, Bell, Elliot, and George Weasley in for the other." The teams grouped together and mounted their brooms. Harry released the Quaffle, and they were off.
Harry didn't try to keep track of individual scores or plays (Alicia, a self-described "statistics swot," was taking care of that), instead focussing on getting a general feel for each player—for the way this one handled the Quaffle, the way that one blocked, the way another faked. After several minutes of play, he blew his borrowed whistle and called, "McDonald, Thomas, and Denton, out! Ron Weasley, Finnigan, and Carberry, in!" The players switched off quickly, and play continued. Harry blew his whistle again. "Pomfret, Amber, and Elliot, out! Thomas as Keeper, Ginny Weasley, and Staunton, in!" They switched off, and the remaining players kept going. Harry sent various players in and out, trying to make sure that everyone had relatively equal time. Finally, he blew his whistle to call them to the ground.
"Nice job, everyone," he said. "Very nice. The current team members will talk things over after the Seekers try out, and then we'll make announcements. Seekers, there are two parts to your try-outs. First, each of you will try to catch the balls from a Seeker's Scourge. You'll be alone on the pitch, just like the Hufflepuff Seekers were. Then, you'll try to catch the balls from another Scourge, but this time you'll have competition: I'll be trying to beat you to them, just as the opposing Seeker will try to beat you to the Snitch." A couple of the Seeker contenders gasped quietly at this last piece of news; they hadn't expected to have to play against Harry. "Any questions?" Harry asked. There were none. "In that case, let's get started. Wiggins!" Mary Wiggins followed Harry out onto the pitch. He took the goal-level position that Jasper had taken, and Mary hovered below him in the spot that the Hufflepuff Seeker contenders had chosen. Harry lit the end of the Scourge with his wand, then flew over to the sidelines to be out of Mary's way. When Mary finished, Rory Pontner, Dennis Creevey, and Rachel Franklin followed. Although Harry wasn't really attending to individual statistics just now, he noticed that Dennis seemed to catch many more balls than the other three.
When Rachel had finished her round with the Scourge, Harry called Mary Wiggins back to the pitch. He hovered at her level this time, and George Weasley flew above them to set off the Scourge. Harry's goal in this part of the try-outs wasn't really to catch the balls; rather, his goal was to try to rattle the Seeker candidates. He wanted to see how they would react to an unpredictable opponent. Thus, when George lit the Scourge, Harry didn't immediately race for a ball; instead, he raced for Mary. Whenever she got within grabbing distance of a ball, he would block her. She was flustered, and she lost her focus and wasted time trying to get away from Harry instead of forming a new strategy. When the last ball hit the ground, Harry had caught two balls, and Mary hadn't caught any.
Rory Pontner didn't fare any better against Harry; he didn't catch any balls, either, and Harry caught four. Dennis Creevey, though, must have had a quick head as well as quick hands, for, when the Scourge was lit, he flew straight at Harry. Startled, Harry dove out of the way, and Dennis caught one of the balls before Harry could get righted. Harry caught one on his way back toward Dennis, and the two spent most of the rest of their time in the air getting in one another's way. Finally, they found themselves racing for the last ball. Dennis was closer, but Harry had the better broom, not to mention three seasons of experience. Harry flattened himself out against his broom to decrease the amount of wind resistance, and he pulled level with Dennis. He knocked Dennis's hand out of the way with one hand, used the other hand to grab the ball (which was so close to the ground that Harry's knuckles skimmed the grass), and used his feet to pull out of the dive just before he crashed. Dennis plowed into the ground, but he hopped up immediately, grass-stained and grinning, and exclaimed, "That was brilliant!"
Harry laughed in impressed astonishment. Dennis was completely mad. The smaller boy bounced over to Harry and said anxiously, "Sorry about trying to fly into you."
Harry laughed again. "Don't be sorry; it was a great strategy. Do you need Madame Pomfrey to patch you up after that crash?" Dennis shook his head vigorously and insisted that he was fine, so Harry sent him to wait with the others and then returned to the pitch to face Rachel, who didn't catch any balls but managed to hold Harry to just one.
Harry called his current team members over. "Alicia, how are those statistics?" he said. Alicia showed him her parchments, and he gawked at them in awe. These were Hermione-worthy notes. Beside each contender's name, Alicia had made notes in categories Harry would never have thought of. For the Keepers, she had kept track of how many saves each had made, how many times someone had scored on them, which goal the save or score had occurred in, the level of difficulty of the save or score, the number of successful passes after a save…. The list went on, and Harry's head swam. "Erm, can you give us the summary version?" he asked. His fellow players snickered, and Alicia grinned self-deprecatingly.
"Told you I was a statistics swot," she said. "Okay, here's the really important stuff: For Chasers, Ginny Weasley had the most scores by far. Ron Weasley and Dean Thomas were really close in saves—Thomas had one more, 21 to Weasley's 20, but I think Weasley was playing against better Chasers most of the time during the scrimmage. Thomas was only against Ginny Weasley for a few minutes, and Ron was against her a lot. They were dead even, 12 saves each, in the free shots. As for Seekers, Dennis Creevey caught more balls than anyone else by a huge number, and he was the only one to catch a ball against you, Harry. Seamus Finnigan had the most hits and the most interceptions as a Beater, and Dean Thomas was close behind him."
"Okay," Harry said. "Dennis is the clear choice for Seeker, yes?"
His teammates made sounds of agreement, and Fred said, in tones of amazement, "Wouldn't have thought the little bloke had it in him." Harry nodded; he couldn't quite believe it himself. Who'd have thought that Dennis Creevey would be a natural Seeker?
On the other hand, he thought, who'd have thought, back when he started at Hogwarts, that scrawny little Harry Potter, always picked last for teams when they played games at his Muggle primary school, would have been a Quidditch star? You never could tell, with Quidditch. Returning to the task at hand, Harry said, "And we'll definitely take Ginny Weasley for Chaser." More nods from his teammates. "Who else should we take as Chaser?" he asked. "We're losing all three of you next year, so we should take at least that many, I think, to start getting them ready."
Angelina said, "The first-year girl, Kingsley, will fight like a dragon for the Quaffle. She took one of Finnigan's Bludgers right in the stomach, and she still managed to hang onto it. Even pulled off a fairly decent pass with all the wind knocked out of her."
"The little Carberry fellow is really fast, and he passes beautifully. Not quite aggressive enough, but he could probably be taught that," Katie interjected.
"Oh, and that third-year girl, Amber, didn't take many shots in the scrimmage, but she always seemed to be just where her I needed her when I needed to pass," Angelina added.
"Do we want to take all four of those?" Harry said. His teammates murmured in agreement. "Fine. And we definitely want Seamus as a Beater."
"Yeah, he's deadly with the Bludgers," Fred agreed.
"Pinpoint accuracy," said George. "I wouldn't want to be on the other end of Thomas's bat, either. Not quite as much finesse as Finnigan, but loads of power."
"Well, we obviously ought to take Dean, but do we want him as a Beater or as a Keeper?" Harry said.
The entire team was silent for a moment. Harry knew what was holding them back. One of the top two Keeper candidates was the best friend of one player and the brother of two others, and they didn't want to seem like they were making choices based on favoritism. On the other hand, Ron was good, and he'd have been one of the top two Keeper candidates even if he hadn't been Harry's friend or the twins' brother.
Angelina finally spoke up. "We could ask Krum. He knows more strategy than any of us, and he did work with the Keepers on Saturday." The team members all agreed to this, and Harry called Viktor down from the stands.
"We're having a tough time deciding on a Keeper," Harry said after he had led Krum over to the team's discussion area.
Krum nodded. "Your friend Veasley flies very vell," he said, "and his instincts are excellent. But the other older boy, the tall, dark-skinned von—"
"Dean Thomas," Harry supplied.
"Yes, Thomas. He is also very good. Perhaps not such an instinctive feel for the Qvaffle as Veasley, but very fast, and very strong. It vood be a hard choice betveen the two of them."
"What would you do?" Angelina asked.
Krum thought for a moment, his thick eyebrows pulling together. After a moment, he said, "I vood not decide tonight. I vood take them both onto the team. Have them participate in practises, see who vorks best under different conditions—rain, or cold, or vot-haff-you—and then make your decision based on that. It is not so important to put each von into their little … vot do you call it … sparrow-hole…."
"Pigeon-hole," Katie amended.
"Ah, yes, pigeon-hole. You do not haff to say, 'You are the main Keeper, and you are the reserve, and that is that.' You can simply say, 'You are both Keepers, and each of you vill play ven the time seems right.'" Krum shrugged. "That is vot I vood do. I vood also have Thomas practise as a Beater as vell; he and the brown-haired boy vood make a good pair, I am thinking."
Harry glanced around at his teammates, who were nodding. "Then that's what we'll do. Thanks, Viktor."
"You are most velcome." Krum nodded his polite, formal nod and returned to the stands.
Harry walked to the spot where Jasper had stood when he had called out the results of his team's try-outs. He called toward the stands, "Can everyone hear me?" A chorus of positive replies rang back. "Good. Okay, first, I'd like to thank everyone who tried out, and I'd like to encourage those of you who didn't make the team this time around to try again next year, when we'll need to replace our reserves. Now, the positions. Our reserve Seeker is Dennis Creevey." The spectators applauded wildly, apparently having been impressed by Dennis's performance, and Dennis's grin looked ten miles wide. "Reserve Chasers are Ginny Weasley, Elaine Amber, Josiah Carberry, and Elspeth Kingsley." More applause. "Reserve Beaters are Seamus Finnigan and Dean Thomas." Still more applause. "As for Keeper, we just couldn't decide. Ron Weasley and Dean Thomas, you are both on the team as Keepers—" (Harry had to pause for the applause, and he saw Hermione cheering from her seat.) "—and we'll decide which of you will be in the goal for our first game when the time comes. Thanks to everyone for coming. Team members, meet in the Common Room in, say, half an hour."
As the crowd dispersed, Harry disentangled himself from his old teammates and made his way across the pitch to Ron. He and Hermione reached their friend at the same time, and Hermione greeted Ron with one of her impulsive hugs. "Congratulations!" she said breathlessly. Then she turned to hug and congratulate Ginny as well.
"Oi, where's my hug? I'm on this team, too!" This protest came from Seamus Finnigan, who followed it up by giving Hermione a very ostentatious hug that involved spinning her around several times. Hermione blushed, Ron glared daggers at him, and Seamus grinned cheekily at Harry and left to join Dean. Harry added his congratulations to Hermione's.
"If it's all the same to you, we can skip the hug," Ron said. Harry feigned deep disappointment, but the effect was spoiled by his broad smile. His best friend was now his teammate, and that made him happier than he'd been in quite a while. Turning serious, Ron asked quietly, "Was I really as good as Dean?"
Harry nodded vigorously. "He had one more save than you did in the scrimmage, but you were against better Chasers more often. On the free shots you were even, twelve and twelve. You deserve your spot."
Fred, who had arrived beside the group in time to hear the end of the conversation, added, "Yeah. You certainly didn't get it because we like you or anything."
"I should say not!" George agreed, sounding scandalised at the very thought, and Ron, because of the perverse nature of sibling relationships, looked relieved.
"So, Captain, why is there half an hour between now and the team meeting time?" Fred asked Harry.
"If you and George wanted to sneak off and get some supplies for the meeting—"
"—Which, as a Prefect and your Captain, Harry could never condone," Hermione interrupted.
"Of course not. So don't even think about it. But if you were to do it, strictly against my advice, I thought you'd need about that long," Harry replied.
"A first-rank Captain always considers the greater good of the team when making decisions. Nice job." Fred and George ruffled Ron's and Ginny's hair, made embarrassing comments about how proud they were of their ickle brother and baby sister, and raced away to nick food from the kitchens with Lee Jordan.
"Don't know how they manage all that sneaking about without the Map," Ron remarked as he, Harry, Hermione, and Ginny strolled back to the castle. Ginny replied that she didn't want to know how they managed it, a sentiment with which Harry and Hermione both concurred.
When they arrived in the Common Room, the party was already in progress, even without the twins' pilfered food. Dennis Creevey, he of the impressive and wholly unexpected Seeker skills, was the man of hour, and the second-years had draped him in Gryffindor banner. Not to be out-done, the first-years had plied Josiah and Elspeth with House scarves, giving Josiah, especially, a striking resemblance to a scarlet and gold mummy. The third-, fourth-, and fifth-years relied on Confetti Charms to decorate the new team members from their classes, and Ron and Ginny had soon joined Seamus, Dean, and Elaine in picking glitter from their eyelashes. When Lee and the twins arrived (bearing enough food to fill a Quidditch stadium), the noise increased still more. Harry didn't even try to gather the team for more than an hour, knowing that it would be wasted effort. Finally, things calmed down enough for him to make himself heard above the noise, and he announced that he needed to see his teammates. The players, new and old, made their way to the far corner, and the party continued, a bit more quietly, without them.
"This shouldn't take long," Harry said to the attentive faces of his teammates. "I just wanted to let you know about practise schedules. We'll practise four times each week: Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday evenings and Saturday mornings. Each practise session is two hours—"
"Eight hours a week?" interrupted Fred. "Godric's ghost, Harry, that's worse than Wood!"
Harry explained that the first hour of each practise session would be for an individual position: Chasers on Monday, Keepers on Wednesday, Beaters on Thursday, and Seekers on Saturday. "So only five hours a week for each player," he concluded. "Is that better, Fred?" Fred acknowledged that this was much better, and Harry moved on to the next topic. "Slytherin and Ravenclaw have the pitch tomorrow evening for their try-outs, so our first practise is Saturday. I think we should all be there for the full two hours for this first practise, and we'll start the position-specific practises on Monday. Is that okay?"
His teammates assented, and Harry asked if there were any questions. Angelina asked, "Will you come to practise for all the positions?"
Harry thought for a moment, then nodded. "Yeah. At least for the first few weeks, anyway. If I'm going to be a decent Captain, I'll need to know more about the other positions. Anything else?" There wasn't, so Harry told his team that he'd see them Saturday at nine-thirty, congratulated the new team members again, and sent everyone back to the party.
Harry and Ron stayed where they were, and, after the other players had cleared out, Hermione joined them. She settled into her seat and said, "So, ready to work on the Potions assignment?"
"Hermione! We already did the Potions assignment," Ron protested. "You nagged us all afternoon about having it finished before try-outs, remember?"
"I know, but I thought you might want to go over it again. Just to be sure you know it." Hermione winked at Harry across the table.
Ron looked all set to protest, but he caught the wink. "You're having me on, aren't you?" he said.
"Would I joke about a homework assignment?" Hermione asked.
Ron opened his mouth, closed it, and thought for a moment. Finally, he said, "I'm not even going to try to answer that. Anyone up for chess?"
"You two go ahead," Harry said. "I just got those old play books from Oliver, and I want to look them over." He opened the first book and exclaimed aloud, "The nutter! These are in code!"
"I told you you should've taken Ancient Runes," Hermione said.
Harry scowled at her, and Ron laughed. Harry brightened considerably when he realised that Oliver had included a note saying, "Potter—Just write 'Gryffindor Shall Conquer' in the bottom left corner of the inside cover and then cast any Revealing Spell you want. The code is mostly for show, but I couldn't resist. Wood." Harry followed these instructions, and the senseless code changed into words and arrows. These made only slightly more sense to Harry than the code had, but he reckoned he could figure it out. He spent the rest of the evening working through the plays, listening to Ron and Hermione spar over the chessboard, and hoping he'd be a passable Captain.
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More Author's Notes/A Cry for Help: I've had some suggestions from reviewers that I give this story a more "serious" title so that folks will know that it's not a parody. The trouble is, I'm having major Title Block (a particularly specific form of Writer's Block), which is why this story didn't get a snazzy, non-tongue-in-cheek title the first time around. (I was going to go with "HP and the Order of the Phoenix," as the Order will eventually provide the centerpiece for the story, but there are already just too darn many of those out there. J ) I'm thinking about something like "HP and the Year of Preparations" or "HP and the Shadows of War." How do folks feel about either of those? Does anyone have other brilliant suggestions? I thought I'd sound out the readers before I commit to changing my cute, clever, tongue-in-cheek title to a serious, buttoned-down, we're-not-messing-around-here title.
Thanks,
TSS
