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"Way to go Ginny!" Summer yelled as the crowd cheered. Ginny turned and grinned, flying toward her team members to start again and celebrate after scoring. So far, the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff match had gone quite slowly, Gryffindor always at least ten points ahead.
"With the score now 50-20, both teams will be looking toward seekers to finish off the match." Jack Spyner, the commentator and sixth year Gryffindor said as the teams resumed play.
Dodging a poorly aimed bludger, Summer flew down a little lower to catch the quaffle as it was tossed between various team members. An orange beam suddenly shot passed her, narrowly missing her head. Turning, she saw a sixth year Slytherin showing his wand back into his robe pocket, whilst grinning at his friend and her in an evil manner. Seeing as she was concentrating on the game and also be disqualified for doing so, Summer could only glare and use hand gestures rather than spells to retaliate. However, Draco had noticed her do this, and decided to deal with the offender later.
Catching the quaffle, Summer flew as fast as she could and upward to the golden hoops, managing to get it through, though it narrowly missed the outstretched hands of a Hufflepuff.
Harry cheered with the rest of the team and circled above the game, carefully scanning the area in search for the little gold glimmer. A quick movement below him from the Hufflepuff seeker, Christian Marsheph, made him zoom downward as he noticed the snitch fleeing from Christian's grasp. Just as the other boy was about to grab it however, the snitch flew upward straight into Harry's glasses. He groaned as they fell to the ground and smashed, but realized as he had reached to steady them before they fell, he had captured the snitch, which was now desperately attempting to escape. Christian smiled graciously, but Harry could tell that he was disappointed at his near win and wondered why he always seemed to catch it somewhat accidentally.
"AND GRYFFINDOR WINS!" Spyner roared, as the crowd cheered, whistled and clapped. The team celebrated and eventually the pitch cleared of the players, students and teachers.
"See, I told you we would win!" Ron exclaimed triumphantly, poking Summer with his broom.
"Yeah, yeah no need to get violent." Summer replied, but grinned all the same at their current lead.
0o0
"Oh, someone needs to say something to you." Draco said as he and Summer entered the castle with Harry, Ron and Hermione.
"Who's that?" Summer asked, stopping as Ron bent down to tie his shoe lace.
"The idiot that tried to hex you." Draco replied.
their current lead.
0o0
"Oh, someone needs to say something to you." Draco said as he and Summer entered the castle with Harry, Ron and Hermione.
"Who's that?" Summer asked, stopping as Ron bent down to tie his shoe lace.
"The idiot that tried to hex you." Draco replied.
Someone tried to hex you?" Harry asked indignantly. "Why did no-one do anything? Its so annoying when people try to ruin the game for everyone else. And let me guess, it was a Slytherin." he finished, glowering at Draco. Draco scowled back, but bit his tongue so as not to argue; Summer always told him off for that.
"Yes, it was, but I'll make him apologize."
"What are you, king of Slytherin students or something?" Summer grinned teasingly, looking up at him.
"Well...most of them, all of them do generally listen to me and do what I say." he replied admittedly, trying to ignore Ron's poor attempt at hiding his laughter.
"So where is he then?" Summer asked as they made their way toward the centre of the hall.
"Here." was the reply as a slightly nervous looking brunette Slytherin appeared from a narrow passage way that led to the dungeons. He walked over to the five standing there, and stopped about three feet away, now looking decidedly nervous and giving timid looks at Draco.
Summer was quite surprised at the nervousness the other boy displayed; he was only a year younger than Draco and was the same if not slightly taller in height.
"D...did you want me, Draco?" he eventually said, swallowing nervously, but he then stood up straight and the apprehensive look on his face vanished.
"Yes. You are going to apologize for attempting to hex Summer." Draco replied simply, folding his arms and looking down at the boy.
"You want me to apologize? She's a Gryffindor for goodness sake." he snorted,
Looking at Summer, Harry, Ron and Hermione with disgust, but bit his lip when he realized that Draco wasn't joking as Draco had pulled out his wand and was pointing it at his stomach.
"I...I… um….Sorry." he eventually spluttered, taking a few steps back. Summer raised an eyebrow at him and he looked nervous again.
"Fine. Never do it again." Draco snapped, and the boy turned and fled back down the passage way. Ron was looking quite impressed at the fact Draco of all people had stuck up for his team and friend, but didn't say anything.
"Was that Draco Malfoy, actually doing something nice?" Harry exclaimed in mock-amazement. Draco scowled but then grinned; secretly he was glad to have friends he could talk to and mess about with, but he would never actually admit this, of course.
"Yeah...well we have some celebrating to do, so lets go!" Ron said shoving Harry.
"Oh yeah, well see you later Malfoy, coming Summer?" Harry added as they made their way slowly to the staircase.
"Yeah, sure!" Summer replied, turning to give Draco a quick kiss. "see you later." she whispered before following the other three to the common room.
o0o
"I'm gonna go see Sev now, and then Draco, K?" Summer said three hours later after the celebrations.
"Yeah, see you later!" Harry called as she disappeared through the portrait hole; Ron was currently too busy re-enacting something and Hermione was deep in conversation with Ginny.
The spacious halls were very empty as Summer made her way down them, made slightly eerie by the flickering candles. As she rounded the corner of one corridor, she could hear peeves cackling to himself, and made her way as quietly as she could without being seen across it. Unfortunately, peeves did see a shadow and made his way toward Summer.
"Ohh, student out in the halls…." he began, but Summer ran down the steps to the dungeons and into a narrow, barely noticed corridor that led to her uncles rooms. She decided to knock on the door instead of just bursting in; last time she had done so she had the unfortunate experience of seeing her uncle wearing just a towel, and a small one at that.
"Oh. Its you." Snape said wearily, opening the door wider for Summer to enter.
"Are you ever happy to see anyone?" Summer asked, plopping down in a chair and looking at him curiously. He just raised an eyebrow and sat in the chair opposite, conjuring up coffee, which he frequently did. "So...what exactly is going on?" she continued, resting the cup on her knee and looking at him intently.
"I wish you would stop asking me that." he replied, a slightly irritated tone about his voice. Summer sighed and rolled her eyes, resting them on a letter on the coffee table, its envelope to the left, revealing the black seal with a silver skull embedded on it. When he noticed her glance at this, however, he bit his lip and scolded himself for not putting it away.
"Fine, there is something…" he began, but he then drew in a sharp breath of pain and clutched his arm. Silently, he rolled back his sleeve, to reveal the dark mark he had been branded with. It got darker before their eyes, and Summer couldn't help letting her mouth drop open and the skull on it slowly changed to have a snake protruding from its mouth, the snakes head twisting out of its empty eye socket.
The two just sat and stared in silence for about two minutes, the utter shock of it seeming to paralyse their mouths.
"I...I've seen that before.." Summer eventually said, managing to tear her gaze away from the darkened mark.
"Where?" Snape half whispered, pulling his sleeve back down and looking at his niece expectantly.
"When...when I went into the town to get that ingredient for you...that guy had it on his sleeve, on the envelope seal of Harry's letter, and again on the sleeve of the guy in my dream...its all coming back to me now…" her voice trailed off as she remembered everything, a very glazed look floating across her dark eyes.
"What dream and letter?" Severus asked, concerned as to what had been going on. "Summer? What..?"
"Oh, I never told you? Well...Harry got this letter on his birthday, it was from someone who said he was going to finish off where Voldemort failed and then I had this really weird dream about some dark wizard who had got into Hogwarts. Harry had the same dream." Snape just looked at her in shock for a few moments before shaking his head and opening and closing his mouth.
"You do know you look like a goldfish, right?" Summer said lazily, stretching across the chair. Her uncle glared at her for a minute before erupting into a lecture.
"You what? All that has been happening, and you never thought to tell anyone? That is incredibly inconsiderate, you could put so many people in danger…" he stopped when he saw a triumphant look settle on Summers face, and scowled.
"Hah, I knew that this thing was big...but look, we would have said something if we had known we were meant to be looking for something...besides, we've been really busy and all." she said, laying back and staring at the ceiling. Severus sighed and moved toward the fireplace, threw in some floo powder and knelt inside, calling for Dumbledore's office. After a quick talk about something Summer couldn't hear, he stood up and signalled her to follow him out of the room.
"Where are we going?" Summer said, panting slightly as she jogged up the steps to catch up with her uncle.
"To see Dumbledore. He is flooing Potter and we are to go and discuss this now." he swept up the main flight of stairs and veered left, up another dingy passageway and then more, crooked this time, stairs.
"Hey wait a minute, I'll get Draco." Summer said as they advanced toward the prefect corridor. "I'll only tell him any way." she added seeing her uncle about to ask why.
Two minutes later they ended up in front of the stone gargoyle, which leapt aside as Snape growled the password at it. As Harry and Ron had been in the sitting room of Hermione's rooms, they were also with the professor.
"Ah, do sit." Dumbledore said as the six entered his office. They silently sat in the plush, rose coloured chairs, though Snape began to explain the reason for their visit.
"Well, as you know we are suspecting that their will be an attempt to follow the dark lord, though unfortunately I believe it has already begun." He began. Dumbledore nodded, resting his elbows on his desk, his fingertips resting against eachother. "Summer informs me that Potter has received a rather threatening letter and I believe there has been a distorting potion of some sort used as well as either an illegal dream inducer or more illegal spells or hexes." The room was silent for a moment, the only sound the crackling of the fire in the grate.
"Well this is definitely sooner than expected." Dumbledore eventually sighed, suddenly looking his age. "Do you have the letter, Harry?" Harry nodded and pulled it out of his robes, handing it over to the
older wizard. Dumbledore scanned the letter carefully, studying the hand writings detail.
"We have no idea who it's from. Hermione tried some kind of charm on it, to identify the handwriting or any spells cast on it, but it didn't work." Harry informed them. Dumbledore nodded, though Snape smirked. stupid boy, of course it wouldn't.
"And what about your mark?" Dumbledore asked Snape, making him jump and shift uncomfortably in his chair. "I would assume, if something is happening that the mark would change." Severus glared for a moment and then reluctantly nodded.
"Yes, it has changed. It has become darker and the skull has changed." He said through gritted teeth. An eagle owl suddenly swept in through the large arch-shaped window behind Dumbledore, landing on his desk and holding out a rather grandly tied scroll of parchment.
"Well, as of right now, I believe we cannot do anything but look out for more signs." Dumbledore sighed, taking the scroll from the owl. "However, due to the recent change in minister, I can now assure you that this matter will not be taken lightly, Raymond takes his responsibility more seriously." His eyes twinkled then, and they all smiled; Nathanuel Raymond was certainly a better minister than Bartemus Crouch, who had received a rather unceremonious de-throning, as it were. Taking this as their que to go, they bade their headmaster goodnight and made their way back down the staircase.
"Well goodnight unc." Summer said as they came to the platform above the entrance hall and giving him a quick hug before following the others up the hallway to the common rooms.
After two hours of talking and messing around in the head girl and boys living room, Harry Ron and Summer made their way toward their own rooms after a very long discussion on what was going on and what they thought would happen.
"I really don't know if I want to go through this again." Harry sighed. "I mean, not assuming that I'm going to be everyone's saviour or anything...its just I got that letter and all." he stopped to pick up some of his homework before turning to the others.
"Yeah...I guess it must be difficult to try and stop evil forces from attempting to destroy most of the world and you have to save everyone at the same time." Summer said, half voicing her thoughts as she stared out the window. Ron gave her a funny look then yawned.
"Well I'm off." he stated, making his way toward the twisting stair case that led to the boys dormitories.
"Night!" Summer called after him and Harry as he jogged toward the stair case also. She took a last glance out of the window before heading up to bed herself, slightly worried as to whether she would even wake up to a normal day.
f o0o
"It's your fault, and don't you dare tell me I'm like that! You damn well know I'm not!"
"My fault? How is it my fault? But fine, if that's what you think, don't think I ever want to see you again! Ever!"
Summer turned on her heel and stormed angrily out of the room, her robes billowing (scarily like her uncles) and causing various scattered papers to float down from their surfaces like blossom on a windy day. She slammed the heavy oak door forcefully, causing the vibrations from the slam to vibrate in Draco's ears. He stared at the door for a few moments after she had gone, still shocked at the temper she had and slightly upset with what she had said. After a while, he scowled, threw historical magical artefacts - VII at the door and flung himself on his bed, burying his head under a pillow.
Storming down the hallway to the common room (she wasn't going to stay in that place for more than necessary) Summer let out a slow, angry breath. The nerve of that boy. Seriously, he thinks its my fault when he is the one who...her train of thought was interrupted when Ron came around the corner and walked toward her.
"Hey Summer! You ok?" the greeting faltered on his lips as he caught site of the expression on her face, his grin fading. Summer closed her eyes for a second, biting her bottom lip as she did so, then shook her head.
"No. I'm not ok. I'm annoyed and upset and Draco...he is being a right prick." she replied, looking angry all over again.
"Well, I coulda told you that." Ron said, though slightly cheerfully. "Why not come back to the common room and forget about him, he can probably only play nice for a little while." Summer sighed and followed Ron back to the common room, barely noticing where she was going as she stared down at the red carpet that she walked on.
Back in the common room, she sat with Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ginny and Neville, trying to join in with the conversations and half-hearted games that they were playing, but she couldn't concentrate.
"So what did you two have an argument about?" Ginny asked, looking up at Summer from the floor. Summer groaned inwardly; she knew that someone would ask eventually.
"To be honest I'd rather not talk about it. I don't really even know how it started...it was just one of those things." she replied, fiddling with an antique looking ring set with an
an amethyst on her left hand. Hermione nodded sympathetically and patted her hand. "And I'm sorry if he causes you any hell." she added, staring into the fire.
o0o
Draco sighed in frustration as Summer scored the 120th point for her team. He had found out that getting her mad was not a good thing; unfortunately it made her play Quidditch with impeccable skill and speed. It also made her glare daggers at him, have the Gryffindors hate him even more for upsetting her, as well as making him look like a fool infront of his own house and to top it off, Pansy didn't leave him alone. 120—60, that was a very pathetic score for his house. As a cool breeze blew around him, he shivered and circled the pitch to warm himself. The end of October had come quickly, it was Halloween next week and he had been hoping to be with Summer for it.
"Watch it!" Alex Nabis, one of his teams own beaters yelled as a bludger came hurtling toward him. However, he was too late to react, and the bludger hit him in the elbow before flying off toward more of his team. Letting out a hiss of pain, he clutched at his elbow and bit his tongue, trying to even out the pain. He caught Summer looking at him, and for a second he could have sworn he saw a look of concern before she glared at him and flew off.
He circled above again, keeping an eye on Harry and for the snitch. He was just about ready to give up, everything was going wrong. When Harry caught the snitch (a genuine attempt that worked this time) Draco could have screamed and snapped his broom into a million little pieces.
He landed with the rest of the team, the world suddenly seeming blurry and noisy. Making his way toward the changing rooms, he staggered slightly, the pain in his elbow seemed to increase and his head felt light and fuzzy.
"Gonna shower." he said gruffly, pushing past one of his team mates that was about to say something.
After a scalding hot shower, Draco stepped out into the cool air, glad to feel the breeze gently wash over his face. The rest of his team stood out there, as well as the Gryffindors, a few of their house members milling around and talking to them all, though they all formed a ring; Slytherins on one side, the rest on the other.
"Don't worry about not winning, Drakey, we all still love you." an annoying, simpering voice from behind him met his ears. He closed his eyes in annoyance, opened them and turned around to face her.
"What do you want, Pansy?" he said through gritted teeth, glaring at her.
"Well I was thinking that we could go and do something more interesting, you know seeing as you're my boyfriend and all." she replied, giggling slightly.
That was is. He couldn't take it anymore, if his current life could get any worse, this was a person who could make it so.
"Look Pansy." he began, clenching his fists on either side of him and standing up as tall as he could. "I. am. Not. Your. Boyfriend, you are not my girlfriend, I don't even want to be friends, I hate your irritating, squealing voice, you are ugly and you are the most annoying girl I have ever met! I never want to be your boyfriend so why don't you take your annoying, ugly self away from me and never ever talk to me ever AGAIN!" he ended up yelling. The area around him had gone quiet, even the birds had stopped chirping. Draco stood their, half on tip-toes, his teeth slightly bared, his eyes glaring. He could feel his face was slightly flushed and his breathing had become slightly heavier. He smirked slightly at the tearful look on Pansy's face, and tried not to laugh when she ran off howling.
When she had gone, he turned back to the way he was originally facing and looked at everyone. They all were staring at him or whispering to each other, though when they noticed him looking they turned away. As he scanned the students, he caught Summer's eye, who raised an eyebrow at him then turned to Harry and Ron, then started to walk off back toward the castle. Then he saw something that made his heart freeze momentarily; Harry put his arm around her. True, it was only for a few seconds, but still he did it and she didn't pull away. Then he could have burst into tears, let alone scream and smash things. It was completely unfair, why should he feel so bad and upset when Summer seemed to be just fine, in fact, more than fine.
Kicking a clump of soggy grass that had been turned up, he stormed back to his room before locking himself in his bedroom and screaming into a pillow.
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Aww, poor Draco x( sorry for the long wait!