A/N: This really started from the title I suppose. My science teacher was
talking about the "solar rotation of the earth" and a lot of other
stuff...anyway, it was really boring. But one phrase caught my mind, and
that's the title of this story. And the story was built around the title.
Just as a warning, this story will have little to no romance, slash, or anything that JK didn't put in there. It takes place after the events of OotP, about two weeks after the school year's ended. Spoilers are included Any love that is in the story will be bitter, painful, and most likely unrequited. Why? Cause I'm evil like that. There will most likely be some torture scenes...nothing REALLY bad, but not acceptable for children under the age of...lessee...ten. Okay? Okay.
Disclaimer: JK and the characters are thanking God that I don't own them...I tend to return the characters in slightly worse shape than what I found them....oops.
Harry Potter sighed despondently and looked out of his window. There was not a reason in the world he should be this depressed. It was a bright June day out, the temperature had to be at least 80 degrees F, nothing was wrong. Except for perhaps the major fact that Lord Voldemort was back, and in a few weeks everyone he cared about could be dead. Well, everyone he cared about that was left that is...
He sighed angrily and pounded his head against the window-pane. Though he knew it wasn't going to make anything better, he couldn't help himself from wishing that Sirius was back. This summer was actually worse than last summer. he was maintaining regular correspondence with Hermione, Ron, and all the other members of the Order, but there were no letters from Sirius to brighten his mood. There would never be any more letters from Sirius.
He perked up as he saw his daily owl flying towards the house. "Hullo Pig," he said, letting the tiny owl in and scratching the top of his head fondly. Ron's owl bounced up and down on his window-sill while Hedwig brought her head out from under her wing and looked haughtily at him. With some level of difficulty, Harry removed the letter from Pigwideon's leg, and let the owl over to get some water from Hedwig. She watched him with a glare that was not unlike that of Harry's Transfiguration teacher, Professor McGonagall. He laughed at the resemblance, and turned to the post.
It was rather larger than the usual letter from either Lupin, Hagrid, Hermione, or Ron. Sometimes Mrs. Weasley would write long letters, but this was positively a novel, judging by the thickness. He opened the envelope, and found that the reason that the envelope was so thick was that a copy of the Daily Prophet had been wedged in there. His curiosity aroused, Harry scanned the Prophet, wondering what was so important. He finally reached it on the fifth page, a small blurb that was circled. He scanned it urgently.
Puddlemere Confused about Keeper
Puddlemere United had no comment as to why their Keeper could not be found. This is the second week that he has not been able to be reached. He disappeared after a game played in northern Russia, and has not been seen or heard from since.
"Yes we're worried," a spokesperson said irritably, "but he's a good chap. No, of course he's not in any trouble, why would you say that?"
Rumors remain to be quelled that this disappearance has to relate with the return of You-Know-Who.
Harry stopped to consider this for a moment. Didn't Oliver Wood play for Puddlemere? Yes, he was RESERVE Keeper, not the actual Keeper. From the look of this article it had been their main Keeper that had been missing. He realized with a sharp pang of shame that he hadn't followed up on Oliver's career that much. Then again, he justified to himself, perhaps the return of Voldemort was an itty-bit more important than who was playing Keeper for Puddlemere.
For the first time Harry noticed a small slip of parchment that had fluttered out of the envelope. He picked it up and noticed it was Hermione's neat writing at the top of the letter. He prepared himself for a long tussle with his brain; Hermione's letters were often code-filled. She was a conspiracy theorist ever since Umbridge had been at Hogwarts, always insisting that the mail wasn't safe unless it was sent in code.
Dear Harry,
It feels like it's been ages since we've seen you. You might want to come down for a visit, though we're all burrowed up in here. Most everyone is here, and it's not a good order either. I wonder if you're missing Quidditch. I know it keeps all of your attention. Something's wrong with you and that game, you've got a head of wood about you and your stubbornness to play Quidditch.
Hope you'll be over here with a visitor like a bolt.
Yours, Hermione
Harry felt like crying as he read the letter.
With a deep breath he steeled himself. Well, start with the first sentence. Nothing appeared hidden in there. Right. Good one Potter. Onto the second sentence. "You might want to come down for a visit," he repeated to himself. Well, it sounded very much as if she wanted him to visit them. "We're all burrowed up in here." Well. All right then. Burrowed up in here, burrowed, burrowing...THE Burrow...THE BURROW!
He snickered in satisfaction. Either Hermione had decided to be nice and make the code easy, or he was just plain smart. Either way, it was turning out to be the easiest letter he'd had all summer long. So what did he know? Apparently Hermione was at the Burrow with the Weasleys. What did the next sentence mean? Most everyone is here and it's not a good order either. Huh?
It's not a good order? That didn't make any sense on a code scale, let alone grammatical. Maybe Hermione had finally lost it. Maybe she was just doing this as a cruel joke, though it wasn't really like her come to think of it. His brain started pinging questions around while he idly doodled something on the corner of the parchment. After about ten minutes he paused to see what he had written.
Odd, he mused, biting his lower lip. It looked sort of like a phoenix...a phoenix...the order of the phoenix...
"That's it!" Harry yelled, jumping straight up into the air. Hedwig gave a startled hoot and Pig looked at him oddly. "Sorry," he muttered to the two owls. He heard Uncle Vernon give some sort of shout of protest, but interestingly enough, Harry found out he couldn't care less. "The Order of the Phoenix is at the Burrow," he told himself, feeling immensely pleased. "Now what?" he asked the parchment, feeling like he might ask McGonagall if he could take several more advanced classes. Obviously he was very intelligent.
"Blah, blah, blah, Quidditch, I am not obsessed by it," Harry said crossly at the paper. "At least not as obsessed as Oliver Wood was by it." He spared a smile for a fond remembrance of being unceremoniously awoken at five in the morning on a cold November morning to practice Quidditch. "Hermione, your letters are making about as much sense as Trelawney," he mumbled to the parchment, trying to figure out what all the stuff about Quidditch was.
"Hope you'll be over here with a visitor like a bolt," he muttered to himself. That was easy enough. She wanted him to fly to the Burrow with a member of the Order of the Phoenix on his Firebolt. "All right. Maybe the other stuff's just to throw someone off."
He grazed her letter again. Something was bothering him. A head of wood, and a stubbornness to play the game...a head of wood, and he was obsessed by the game...wood...obsessed...
"Oh Merlin's Beard," Harry moaned, knocking over a chair in his urgency to reach the paper. He scanned it, and found what he had been missing the first time: there was a snapshot of the missing Keeper directly underneath the article. Because of the paper's fold, Harry had not seen it yet. With his heart sinking into his knees, Harry stared at the photo. He knew that face, it was that face that had cajoled the Gryffindor Quidditch team to the Quidditch Cup, it was that face that could stop Fred and George Weasley from their tricks...it was that face which could be anywhere in Russia...
It was Oliver Wood's face.
Hermione Granger impatiently waited at Ron's window. She had sent the letter off to Harry, surely she would get an answer back today! Perhaps it was too hard for him, she wondered, a cold tendril of fear seizing her heart. I did try to make it easier...
Her heart lightened as she saw a tiny owl floating back. She reached out of the window and snatched Pigwideon into the room. He gave a small hoot of shock, but then Hermione was untying the letter that was around his leg. Pig gave her an affronted look and winged to the cage to get some rest.
"Hermione," Ron said as he galumphed up the stairs. She rolled her eyes. One could hear him coming from a while away. A herd of rampaging Hippogriffs was quieter than that one solitary boy. "Did you get his answer?" Ron asked, poking his red head in the room.
"Just got it," she said smartly, unfolding the letter and reading it. Just three words were on the paper, hastily scrawled out in Harry's untidy script.
Come get me.
"All right," Hermione said, feeling determined. This was something that she, Ron and Harry were doing for the Order! They really could help! She felt a surge of fierce pride as she looked at the tall gangly Ron, his freckles sticking out on his nose, his tall frame hunched against the peeling doorframe.
"Hermione, what'd you reckon that we'd better go tell them the answer," Ron suggested to her, breaking her stare and thoughts. He shifted uncomfortably as she moved her brown eyes up to look at his face. "I know Mum's been worried sick about him all summer long, and everyone's here. It'll be the perfect time."
She followed him down the stairs with Harry's answer in hand. She had spent so much time worrying: what if the letter were intercepted? What if Harry didn't understand her message? What if he didn't know what was at stake here? She shook her head, not being able to dispel the greatest fear from her mind: what if Wood was already dead? She shuddered so violently that Ron gently laid a hand on her shoulder. "Hermione, are you okay?" he asked in his deep voice that was so drastically different from the squeaky voice he used to use. When had his voice changed? She couldn't remember.
"Yes, I'm fine," she said, nodding and smiling at him. Ron squeezed her shoulder once before continuing down the stairs. "I just got the chills," she explained further to her best friend.
"Mum, we got Harry's answer!" Ron announced as he came down the stairs. The low chatter subsided as Dumbledore stood up.
"And what has he said?" he asked in the voice that made Hermione believe that somehow, someway, things were going to be all right.
"He wants to leave now," Ron said, with a large amount of pride for his friend. The people sitting clustered around the small table relaxed.
It was quite a group of names that were sitting around the table, a whole slew of legends, even without Dumbledore. Minerva McGonagall, Professor of Transfiguration and the Gryiffidor Head of House, Remus Lupin, former Professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts, Tonks with her hair a rich gold today. Mad-Eye Moody was sitting restlessly at the table, one of his legs jiggling and his magical eye spinning around at a 360 degree angle. Bill Weasley was sitting beside Moody, the earring and hair still firmly in place. Mrs. Weasley kept on casting dark looks to the hair and then fondling her wand with an expression of longing on her face.
Ginny was perched at the landing of the stairs, trying to listen to what was going on. Ron and Hermione politely stepped over her. Charlie stood up to take the letter, his arm in a sling from a nasty burn. He had been sent home to get better and while he was home, he was making good use of his free time in the order.
"Right," Lupin said. "I suppose we could go get him tomorrow, weather permitting," he cast a look up at the blue sky, "or if anyone wants, we could go get him tonight."
"I think tonight is a little too early Remus," Dumbledore said. "Give him time to get packed and to say goodbye to his aunt and uncle."
Ron snorted at the thought of what that goodbye would sound like.
"Uncle Vernon?" Harry asked as he crept down the stairs. The enormous man was sitting in a chair with aunt Petunia bustling around the kitchen.
Uncle Vernon grunted. Harry, who knew to take this as a sign that he was listening, continued.
"Well, I just got a message from some of my school friends, and they want me to leave soon."
Another grunt, this time with some satisfaction in it.
"Well, if that's all right with you, I'll just go to get ready then shall I?"
Grunt.
"Thank you very much. Have a nice rest of the summer." Another grunt. Harry bounded up the stairs, packed his trunk within six minutes and paced around his room. Something bad had happened to Oliver...something perhaps fatal...and the Order wanted him to look into it.
He had to admit that he wasn't really all that close to Oliver. They were friends really, but outside of Quidditch they never really saw each other that much. Oh yes, Oliver would talk to Harry, but just to give him strategies. Wouldn't it be better if they got someone who was closer to Oliver? But come to think about he really didn't have any friends...did he? Harry didn't know. He supposed that the Weasley twins could count as friends, but they spent most of their time annoying Oliver than anything else.
Hmmmm. Did Wood have any friends? This was a puzzle, and Harry wasn't particulary good at puzzles. Hermione's letter had taken all of his brain power for at least a week. He flopped down on his bed and buried his face in the pillow. Everything would be explained to him when he got to the Burrow...everything would be all right when he saw Dumbledore.
"Yes!" Angelina Johnson sailed around on her broomstick and punched the air. Alicia Spinnet flew to the ground, snatched the Quaffle that they were practicing with and came back up.
"You make a terrible Keeper Spinnet," Angelina joked as she caught the thrown Quaffle. "I think you're worse than Ron was at the beginning of last year."
"I'm that bad?" Alicia asked, wrinkling up her nose. "Well." She shook her pale blonde hair out of her eyes. "If you think I'm that bad, then I'm obviously too bad for you to practice with," she said as she made to land.
"No, Lish, I didn't mean that!" Angelina said hastily, swooping down to stop her friend. Alicia smiled as she came back up to hover in front of the goals in Angelina's backyard.
"I knew that," Alicia said easily. She paused for a moment, then flew straight at Angelina, seizing the Quaffle from under her arm. "Your turn to Keep now Johnson," she said, a victorious grin on her face.
"Alisha, you are evil," Angelina said in the tone of a long suffering person. She shook her head and flew in front of the goals. "Wish we had a real Keeper," she said absently. "It would make it a lot more interesting. Wish Wood was here," she said.
"Oh do you?" Alicia asked with a devilish grin on her face. Angelina looked at her for a moment. "Exactly why do you wish he was here?"
"Not like that you weirdo!" Angelina insisted, flying around the field and smacking her repeatedly. "I mean as a friend," ("A special friend?" Alicia asked) Angelina clarified. "And as a Keeper too. He makes a bloody good Keeper."
"Yeah," Alicia agreed absently mindedly. "Listen, I'm famished," she said, checking her watch while hovering on her broomstick. "We've been out here for nearly two hours, and it's not getting any cooler."
Angelina nodded, as she knew her own face was probably red with exertion. "Yeah, I could do with a snack," she said, landing her broom down and walking into her house.
"Lucky your folks live out here so you can practice without anyone seeing," Alicia said, gesturing to the wide fields. "By the way, thanks for having me over," she said as she held the door open for Angelina.
"Don't mention it," Angelina said, pouring herself a glass of pumpkin juice. Alicia opened her mouth and Angelina interrupted her. "No, really, don't." she smirked at Alicia and lay down on the soft carpet. She looked at a photo album while Alicia flicked open an old copy of The Daily Prophet.
There was a photo of when she had made the team in her second year. It was really a surprise, her making the team. She had always thought of Quidditch as something she could just do, nothing special. But apparently it had been to the people in Gryffindor. There was a picture of her fooling around with Fred and George, a picture of her, Katie, and Alicia together, and a picture of Wood talking with Harry over some last minute things. There was a picture of the entire team having a snowball fight in the winter, and a picture of just Angelina and Wood after a match, their faces and robes sweaty, Wood's face alight with victory, his arm thrown around Angelina.
"That was taken right after the Ravenclaw game in his seventh year," she muttered to herself, smiling at the memory. Good game. Good year.
"What?" Alicia asked absently, her light blue eyes flicking over the paper. Angelina murmured a reply, and Alicia nodded her head.
Blah, blah, blah, she thought to herself. Nothing much has happened lately, after the end of last school year. It's been a rather uneventful summer so far actually. She hummed a song that sounded an awful lot like "Weasley is Our King" as she flipped through the rest of the paper.
A small article at the middle of the page caught her eye and she read it with growing horror. She looked at the familiar smiling face below the article and spat out her pumpkin juice all over the paper, soaking the face, which glared at her. She had seen that glare before when she had failed to make a pass, or turn too quickly...
Alicia Spinnet stood up with the paper shaking violently in her hands. "Angelina?" she called out, though the black girl was reclining only a few feet away. "Angelina?" she called out again, her voice shrill in desperation.
Angelina jumped up and took the paper from Spinnet. She spun away the read the article. Wood's face was now grimacing at them and shaking pumpkin juice out of his hair. Angelina's face grew as pale as it could get as she read the article.
When she was done, she dropped the paper to the floor. It landed with a papery thud. "Oh my god," Angelina whispered, sinking into a chair.
Snow fell all around him. It was cold, very cold, and it made him wish like he had brought a jumper with him, or better yet, was back in England. Nice, safe, warm England, with trees, and an actual moon...anywhere but this frozen wasteland. Anywhere would be nicer than here. Merlin, he would rather be back in the dungeons, doing detentions for Snape than be here. Now he knew that things were bad. When one wished for the kindness and charity of Severus Snape, things had to be pretty darn BAD.
There was one thing that he had found out through all of this. Blood really did bounce on snow. Fred had told him that one time, and had actually demonstrated it with one of the nutty sweets that he and his brother were coming up with. But he had never believed it himself until a few days ago.
"Well now, things are not looking good for Mr. Wood," a cold, cruel voice mocked it. Oliver rolled his eyes, hissing at the sharp pain that went through him when he did so. "What say you Wood? Ready to tell me what you know?"
Oh stuff it, Oliver thought to himself. He said it too.
"Oh stuff it," he heard his hoarse, pain filled voice say. He thought about the expression that had to have been on Voldemort's face, and he would have laughed, but a discovery he had made the other day stopped him.
He had said something very rude, and something that his mother had never dreamed her baby boy would say, to Voldemort. He had actually caught a glimpse of what the most feared wizard in the world face looked like, and it was pretty damn funny too. He had burst out laughing, not exactly knowing why, and had made the discovery that when he laughed, blood came out of his mouth. When he coughed, blood came out of his mouth. Matter of fact, when he did anything much besides breath blood came out of his mouth. And sometimes it came out of his mouth when he was breathing too.
All in all, it was a miserable way to go out of the world.
Maybe I need a hug, he thought to himself. He felt like smacking himself if he could raise his hand. How can you think all this stuff? You're going to die, and you want a hug? You moron! You imbecile! Stupid, stupid, stupid Wood!
But the look on Lord Voldemort's face had been so funny...
"Well Mr. Wood, my lessons do not seem to have kicked in enough," Voldemort said, his voice shaking with rage—How dare this stupid, young wizard taunt him? He brought out his wand and leveled it at Oliver.
Oliver smiled the smile that had won him the Witch Weekly's honor of being chosen one of the sexiest men alive. Actually, he hoped he was smiling, he couldn't really tell what his face was doing. For all he knew he might have been frowning, or giving Voldemort a look that he would have given one of the more hotter girl's at Hogwarts during his student days.
Oh ewwwwwwwwwwwwwww............
All thoughts of that nature were driven out of his mind by the incantation that was spoken by the voice cold enough to freeze Hell.
"CRUICIO!" For at least the fifth time that hour, Oliver Wood was seized by a thousand white hot knives cutting into his body. His legs were kicking wildly in the air, he was screaming with what voice he had left and his arms were wrapped tightly around his waist.
His mind's former levity was gone, and he was left with a desperate plea of survival. Please, make it stop, make it stop, make it stop...I swear I'll do anything, just make it stop....
The pain didn't stop until Oliver was unconscious, and even then, Voldemort didn't lift his wand from the body.
Just as a warning, this story will have little to no romance, slash, or anything that JK didn't put in there. It takes place after the events of OotP, about two weeks after the school year's ended. Spoilers are included Any love that is in the story will be bitter, painful, and most likely unrequited. Why? Cause I'm evil like that. There will most likely be some torture scenes...nothing REALLY bad, but not acceptable for children under the age of...lessee...ten. Okay? Okay.
Disclaimer: JK and the characters are thanking God that I don't own them...I tend to return the characters in slightly worse shape than what I found them....oops.
Harry Potter sighed despondently and looked out of his window. There was not a reason in the world he should be this depressed. It was a bright June day out, the temperature had to be at least 80 degrees F, nothing was wrong. Except for perhaps the major fact that Lord Voldemort was back, and in a few weeks everyone he cared about could be dead. Well, everyone he cared about that was left that is...
He sighed angrily and pounded his head against the window-pane. Though he knew it wasn't going to make anything better, he couldn't help himself from wishing that Sirius was back. This summer was actually worse than last summer. he was maintaining regular correspondence with Hermione, Ron, and all the other members of the Order, but there were no letters from Sirius to brighten his mood. There would never be any more letters from Sirius.
He perked up as he saw his daily owl flying towards the house. "Hullo Pig," he said, letting the tiny owl in and scratching the top of his head fondly. Ron's owl bounced up and down on his window-sill while Hedwig brought her head out from under her wing and looked haughtily at him. With some level of difficulty, Harry removed the letter from Pigwideon's leg, and let the owl over to get some water from Hedwig. She watched him with a glare that was not unlike that of Harry's Transfiguration teacher, Professor McGonagall. He laughed at the resemblance, and turned to the post.
It was rather larger than the usual letter from either Lupin, Hagrid, Hermione, or Ron. Sometimes Mrs. Weasley would write long letters, but this was positively a novel, judging by the thickness. He opened the envelope, and found that the reason that the envelope was so thick was that a copy of the Daily Prophet had been wedged in there. His curiosity aroused, Harry scanned the Prophet, wondering what was so important. He finally reached it on the fifth page, a small blurb that was circled. He scanned it urgently.
Puddlemere Confused about Keeper
Puddlemere United had no comment as to why their Keeper could not be found. This is the second week that he has not been able to be reached. He disappeared after a game played in northern Russia, and has not been seen or heard from since.
"Yes we're worried," a spokesperson said irritably, "but he's a good chap. No, of course he's not in any trouble, why would you say that?"
Rumors remain to be quelled that this disappearance has to relate with the return of You-Know-Who.
Harry stopped to consider this for a moment. Didn't Oliver Wood play for Puddlemere? Yes, he was RESERVE Keeper, not the actual Keeper. From the look of this article it had been their main Keeper that had been missing. He realized with a sharp pang of shame that he hadn't followed up on Oliver's career that much. Then again, he justified to himself, perhaps the return of Voldemort was an itty-bit more important than who was playing Keeper for Puddlemere.
For the first time Harry noticed a small slip of parchment that had fluttered out of the envelope. He picked it up and noticed it was Hermione's neat writing at the top of the letter. He prepared himself for a long tussle with his brain; Hermione's letters were often code-filled. She was a conspiracy theorist ever since Umbridge had been at Hogwarts, always insisting that the mail wasn't safe unless it was sent in code.
Dear Harry,
It feels like it's been ages since we've seen you. You might want to come down for a visit, though we're all burrowed up in here. Most everyone is here, and it's not a good order either. I wonder if you're missing Quidditch. I know it keeps all of your attention. Something's wrong with you and that game, you've got a head of wood about you and your stubbornness to play Quidditch.
Hope you'll be over here with a visitor like a bolt.
Yours, Hermione
Harry felt like crying as he read the letter.
With a deep breath he steeled himself. Well, start with the first sentence. Nothing appeared hidden in there. Right. Good one Potter. Onto the second sentence. "You might want to come down for a visit," he repeated to himself. Well, it sounded very much as if she wanted him to visit them. "We're all burrowed up in here." Well. All right then. Burrowed up in here, burrowed, burrowing...THE Burrow...THE BURROW!
He snickered in satisfaction. Either Hermione had decided to be nice and make the code easy, or he was just plain smart. Either way, it was turning out to be the easiest letter he'd had all summer long. So what did he know? Apparently Hermione was at the Burrow with the Weasleys. What did the next sentence mean? Most everyone is here and it's not a good order either. Huh?
It's not a good order? That didn't make any sense on a code scale, let alone grammatical. Maybe Hermione had finally lost it. Maybe she was just doing this as a cruel joke, though it wasn't really like her come to think of it. His brain started pinging questions around while he idly doodled something on the corner of the parchment. After about ten minutes he paused to see what he had written.
Odd, he mused, biting his lower lip. It looked sort of like a phoenix...a phoenix...the order of the phoenix...
"That's it!" Harry yelled, jumping straight up into the air. Hedwig gave a startled hoot and Pig looked at him oddly. "Sorry," he muttered to the two owls. He heard Uncle Vernon give some sort of shout of protest, but interestingly enough, Harry found out he couldn't care less. "The Order of the Phoenix is at the Burrow," he told himself, feeling immensely pleased. "Now what?" he asked the parchment, feeling like he might ask McGonagall if he could take several more advanced classes. Obviously he was very intelligent.
"Blah, blah, blah, Quidditch, I am not obsessed by it," Harry said crossly at the paper. "At least not as obsessed as Oliver Wood was by it." He spared a smile for a fond remembrance of being unceremoniously awoken at five in the morning on a cold November morning to practice Quidditch. "Hermione, your letters are making about as much sense as Trelawney," he mumbled to the parchment, trying to figure out what all the stuff about Quidditch was.
"Hope you'll be over here with a visitor like a bolt," he muttered to himself. That was easy enough. She wanted him to fly to the Burrow with a member of the Order of the Phoenix on his Firebolt. "All right. Maybe the other stuff's just to throw someone off."
He grazed her letter again. Something was bothering him. A head of wood, and a stubbornness to play the game...a head of wood, and he was obsessed by the game...wood...obsessed...
"Oh Merlin's Beard," Harry moaned, knocking over a chair in his urgency to reach the paper. He scanned it, and found what he had been missing the first time: there was a snapshot of the missing Keeper directly underneath the article. Because of the paper's fold, Harry had not seen it yet. With his heart sinking into his knees, Harry stared at the photo. He knew that face, it was that face that had cajoled the Gryffindor Quidditch team to the Quidditch Cup, it was that face that could stop Fred and George Weasley from their tricks...it was that face which could be anywhere in Russia...
It was Oliver Wood's face.
Hermione Granger impatiently waited at Ron's window. She had sent the letter off to Harry, surely she would get an answer back today! Perhaps it was too hard for him, she wondered, a cold tendril of fear seizing her heart. I did try to make it easier...
Her heart lightened as she saw a tiny owl floating back. She reached out of the window and snatched Pigwideon into the room. He gave a small hoot of shock, but then Hermione was untying the letter that was around his leg. Pig gave her an affronted look and winged to the cage to get some rest.
"Hermione," Ron said as he galumphed up the stairs. She rolled her eyes. One could hear him coming from a while away. A herd of rampaging Hippogriffs was quieter than that one solitary boy. "Did you get his answer?" Ron asked, poking his red head in the room.
"Just got it," she said smartly, unfolding the letter and reading it. Just three words were on the paper, hastily scrawled out in Harry's untidy script.
Come get me.
"All right," Hermione said, feeling determined. This was something that she, Ron and Harry were doing for the Order! They really could help! She felt a surge of fierce pride as she looked at the tall gangly Ron, his freckles sticking out on his nose, his tall frame hunched against the peeling doorframe.
"Hermione, what'd you reckon that we'd better go tell them the answer," Ron suggested to her, breaking her stare and thoughts. He shifted uncomfortably as she moved her brown eyes up to look at his face. "I know Mum's been worried sick about him all summer long, and everyone's here. It'll be the perfect time."
She followed him down the stairs with Harry's answer in hand. She had spent so much time worrying: what if the letter were intercepted? What if Harry didn't understand her message? What if he didn't know what was at stake here? She shook her head, not being able to dispel the greatest fear from her mind: what if Wood was already dead? She shuddered so violently that Ron gently laid a hand on her shoulder. "Hermione, are you okay?" he asked in his deep voice that was so drastically different from the squeaky voice he used to use. When had his voice changed? She couldn't remember.
"Yes, I'm fine," she said, nodding and smiling at him. Ron squeezed her shoulder once before continuing down the stairs. "I just got the chills," she explained further to her best friend.
"Mum, we got Harry's answer!" Ron announced as he came down the stairs. The low chatter subsided as Dumbledore stood up.
"And what has he said?" he asked in the voice that made Hermione believe that somehow, someway, things were going to be all right.
"He wants to leave now," Ron said, with a large amount of pride for his friend. The people sitting clustered around the small table relaxed.
It was quite a group of names that were sitting around the table, a whole slew of legends, even without Dumbledore. Minerva McGonagall, Professor of Transfiguration and the Gryiffidor Head of House, Remus Lupin, former Professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts, Tonks with her hair a rich gold today. Mad-Eye Moody was sitting restlessly at the table, one of his legs jiggling and his magical eye spinning around at a 360 degree angle. Bill Weasley was sitting beside Moody, the earring and hair still firmly in place. Mrs. Weasley kept on casting dark looks to the hair and then fondling her wand with an expression of longing on her face.
Ginny was perched at the landing of the stairs, trying to listen to what was going on. Ron and Hermione politely stepped over her. Charlie stood up to take the letter, his arm in a sling from a nasty burn. He had been sent home to get better and while he was home, he was making good use of his free time in the order.
"Right," Lupin said. "I suppose we could go get him tomorrow, weather permitting," he cast a look up at the blue sky, "or if anyone wants, we could go get him tonight."
"I think tonight is a little too early Remus," Dumbledore said. "Give him time to get packed and to say goodbye to his aunt and uncle."
Ron snorted at the thought of what that goodbye would sound like.
"Uncle Vernon?" Harry asked as he crept down the stairs. The enormous man was sitting in a chair with aunt Petunia bustling around the kitchen.
Uncle Vernon grunted. Harry, who knew to take this as a sign that he was listening, continued.
"Well, I just got a message from some of my school friends, and they want me to leave soon."
Another grunt, this time with some satisfaction in it.
"Well, if that's all right with you, I'll just go to get ready then shall I?"
Grunt.
"Thank you very much. Have a nice rest of the summer." Another grunt. Harry bounded up the stairs, packed his trunk within six minutes and paced around his room. Something bad had happened to Oliver...something perhaps fatal...and the Order wanted him to look into it.
He had to admit that he wasn't really all that close to Oliver. They were friends really, but outside of Quidditch they never really saw each other that much. Oh yes, Oliver would talk to Harry, but just to give him strategies. Wouldn't it be better if they got someone who was closer to Oliver? But come to think about he really didn't have any friends...did he? Harry didn't know. He supposed that the Weasley twins could count as friends, but they spent most of their time annoying Oliver than anything else.
Hmmmm. Did Wood have any friends? This was a puzzle, and Harry wasn't particulary good at puzzles. Hermione's letter had taken all of his brain power for at least a week. He flopped down on his bed and buried his face in the pillow. Everything would be explained to him when he got to the Burrow...everything would be all right when he saw Dumbledore.
"Yes!" Angelina Johnson sailed around on her broomstick and punched the air. Alicia Spinnet flew to the ground, snatched the Quaffle that they were practicing with and came back up.
"You make a terrible Keeper Spinnet," Angelina joked as she caught the thrown Quaffle. "I think you're worse than Ron was at the beginning of last year."
"I'm that bad?" Alicia asked, wrinkling up her nose. "Well." She shook her pale blonde hair out of her eyes. "If you think I'm that bad, then I'm obviously too bad for you to practice with," she said as she made to land.
"No, Lish, I didn't mean that!" Angelina said hastily, swooping down to stop her friend. Alicia smiled as she came back up to hover in front of the goals in Angelina's backyard.
"I knew that," Alicia said easily. She paused for a moment, then flew straight at Angelina, seizing the Quaffle from under her arm. "Your turn to Keep now Johnson," she said, a victorious grin on her face.
"Alisha, you are evil," Angelina said in the tone of a long suffering person. She shook her head and flew in front of the goals. "Wish we had a real Keeper," she said absently. "It would make it a lot more interesting. Wish Wood was here," she said.
"Oh do you?" Alicia asked with a devilish grin on her face. Angelina looked at her for a moment. "Exactly why do you wish he was here?"
"Not like that you weirdo!" Angelina insisted, flying around the field and smacking her repeatedly. "I mean as a friend," ("A special friend?" Alicia asked) Angelina clarified. "And as a Keeper too. He makes a bloody good Keeper."
"Yeah," Alicia agreed absently mindedly. "Listen, I'm famished," she said, checking her watch while hovering on her broomstick. "We've been out here for nearly two hours, and it's not getting any cooler."
Angelina nodded, as she knew her own face was probably red with exertion. "Yeah, I could do with a snack," she said, landing her broom down and walking into her house.
"Lucky your folks live out here so you can practice without anyone seeing," Alicia said, gesturing to the wide fields. "By the way, thanks for having me over," she said as she held the door open for Angelina.
"Don't mention it," Angelina said, pouring herself a glass of pumpkin juice. Alicia opened her mouth and Angelina interrupted her. "No, really, don't." she smirked at Alicia and lay down on the soft carpet. She looked at a photo album while Alicia flicked open an old copy of The Daily Prophet.
There was a photo of when she had made the team in her second year. It was really a surprise, her making the team. She had always thought of Quidditch as something she could just do, nothing special. But apparently it had been to the people in Gryffindor. There was a picture of her fooling around with Fred and George, a picture of her, Katie, and Alicia together, and a picture of Wood talking with Harry over some last minute things. There was a picture of the entire team having a snowball fight in the winter, and a picture of just Angelina and Wood after a match, their faces and robes sweaty, Wood's face alight with victory, his arm thrown around Angelina.
"That was taken right after the Ravenclaw game in his seventh year," she muttered to herself, smiling at the memory. Good game. Good year.
"What?" Alicia asked absently, her light blue eyes flicking over the paper. Angelina murmured a reply, and Alicia nodded her head.
Blah, blah, blah, she thought to herself. Nothing much has happened lately, after the end of last school year. It's been a rather uneventful summer so far actually. She hummed a song that sounded an awful lot like "Weasley is Our King" as she flipped through the rest of the paper.
A small article at the middle of the page caught her eye and she read it with growing horror. She looked at the familiar smiling face below the article and spat out her pumpkin juice all over the paper, soaking the face, which glared at her. She had seen that glare before when she had failed to make a pass, or turn too quickly...
Alicia Spinnet stood up with the paper shaking violently in her hands. "Angelina?" she called out, though the black girl was reclining only a few feet away. "Angelina?" she called out again, her voice shrill in desperation.
Angelina jumped up and took the paper from Spinnet. She spun away the read the article. Wood's face was now grimacing at them and shaking pumpkin juice out of his hair. Angelina's face grew as pale as it could get as she read the article.
When she was done, she dropped the paper to the floor. It landed with a papery thud. "Oh my god," Angelina whispered, sinking into a chair.
Snow fell all around him. It was cold, very cold, and it made him wish like he had brought a jumper with him, or better yet, was back in England. Nice, safe, warm England, with trees, and an actual moon...anywhere but this frozen wasteland. Anywhere would be nicer than here. Merlin, he would rather be back in the dungeons, doing detentions for Snape than be here. Now he knew that things were bad. When one wished for the kindness and charity of Severus Snape, things had to be pretty darn BAD.
There was one thing that he had found out through all of this. Blood really did bounce on snow. Fred had told him that one time, and had actually demonstrated it with one of the nutty sweets that he and his brother were coming up with. But he had never believed it himself until a few days ago.
"Well now, things are not looking good for Mr. Wood," a cold, cruel voice mocked it. Oliver rolled his eyes, hissing at the sharp pain that went through him when he did so. "What say you Wood? Ready to tell me what you know?"
Oh stuff it, Oliver thought to himself. He said it too.
"Oh stuff it," he heard his hoarse, pain filled voice say. He thought about the expression that had to have been on Voldemort's face, and he would have laughed, but a discovery he had made the other day stopped him.
He had said something very rude, and something that his mother had never dreamed her baby boy would say, to Voldemort. He had actually caught a glimpse of what the most feared wizard in the world face looked like, and it was pretty damn funny too. He had burst out laughing, not exactly knowing why, and had made the discovery that when he laughed, blood came out of his mouth. When he coughed, blood came out of his mouth. Matter of fact, when he did anything much besides breath blood came out of his mouth. And sometimes it came out of his mouth when he was breathing too.
All in all, it was a miserable way to go out of the world.
Maybe I need a hug, he thought to himself. He felt like smacking himself if he could raise his hand. How can you think all this stuff? You're going to die, and you want a hug? You moron! You imbecile! Stupid, stupid, stupid Wood!
But the look on Lord Voldemort's face had been so funny...
"Well Mr. Wood, my lessons do not seem to have kicked in enough," Voldemort said, his voice shaking with rage—How dare this stupid, young wizard taunt him? He brought out his wand and leveled it at Oliver.
Oliver smiled the smile that had won him the Witch Weekly's honor of being chosen one of the sexiest men alive. Actually, he hoped he was smiling, he couldn't really tell what his face was doing. For all he knew he might have been frowning, or giving Voldemort a look that he would have given one of the more hotter girl's at Hogwarts during his student days.
Oh ewwwwwwwwwwwwwww............
All thoughts of that nature were driven out of his mind by the incantation that was spoken by the voice cold enough to freeze Hell.
"CRUICIO!" For at least the fifth time that hour, Oliver Wood was seized by a thousand white hot knives cutting into his body. His legs were kicking wildly in the air, he was screaming with what voice he had left and his arms were wrapped tightly around his waist.
His mind's former levity was gone, and he was left with a desperate plea of survival. Please, make it stop, make it stop, make it stop...I swear I'll do anything, just make it stop....
The pain didn't stop until Oliver was unconscious, and even then, Voldemort didn't lift his wand from the body.