About three days later, Pete returned to Fiona's side just in time to see her awaken. She was weak, and wouldn't ride a broom for a week. The Healers gave her a Painkilling Aura and a box of chocolates to get over the pain, but she was still pissed off. The first thing she said when she was awake was "The little rats! Where are they?" Pete eventually calmed her, telling her that two of the women, including Aquila, the team's incredible seeker, were arrested for a week, so their team would have the same training time. She now had a grudge against them and hoped that they would be facing them in the tournament.
"I can't
believe them. That… that girl nearly used the Cruciatus curse on
me!" Fiona had only just realised, but Pete didn't know.
"Surely
she can't have. This is pro Quidditch! Would she risk her carrer
like that?" Pete was confused, and thought that Fiona was
delusional.
"No!
But… I dunno. I'm kinda confused. I don't really know what
happened."
A Healer
skidded past the door, and ran into Fiona's room. He was quite
tall, with light brown hair that flowed back in a cool kind of way.
His dark brown eyes warmed Fiona with a loving gaze that was like
being wrapped in loads of blankets on a cold day. Fiona knew who it
was then.
"Mark?
What are you doing here! And in Healer uniform! Take it off, before
you get seen!" Fiona hissed at her teammate, although she didn't
want to.
"I work
here part-time. Seeing as we can't practice, I'm working here for
the moment. And by the way, you broke your leg in the night. Reparo
Skeleta!" He shot a beam of white light from a mahogany wand at
her left shin, and a lot of cricking and snapping occurred, until the
leg was straight again.
"Whoa.
You are good. You could have told us. That'd save a lot of
visits to this place." Fiona laughed. Suddenly, Mark fired a stream
of white shining powder into Fiona's tea, while stating the spell
Caffien Increduo!
"Caffeine
increasing spell. You need to get up." Mark was obviously
concerned. Whether it was out of it being his job or her friend,
Fiona did not know. She drank up her tea, and asked Mark, "How are
the rest of the team?"
A day
later, and Fiona was back on her broom. She was perfecting her
Phoenix Corkscrew, a move in which one gets some height, Quaffle in
hand, and pummels at the Snitch in a spiral and snatching it, turning
towards the goal and scoring just before the bell rings. She was
having trouble getting the score. She kept hitting Kate, their
Keeper, in the face, or getting it just below the hoop. She had
scored a few times, but that was it. Once, in the descent, she had
been caught by a spell, Arresto Momentum, and was lowered
safely to the feet of a 19-year-old Belgian boy. She stared up at him
in shock, realising who it was.
"Viktor…
Nice to make your acquaintance." She scrambled to her feet and
threw the hair out of her eyes.
"I am
nice to meet you, too. I came to invite you, Fio-narr, to a von-on-von in Belgium." He was looking to the ground now, a piece
of parchment in his outstretched hand.
Mark came
striding up to him, looking very bone-to-pick-ish. "Look, Krum,
she's busy training here and does not want to, or have the time
to…"
"Fine,
I'll come. I'd love to. When should we leave?" Fiona made
Mark's face sweep from a steely determination to a confused
whimpering puppy mug.
"Uh, ve
fly at dawn tomorrow?" Viktor looked slightly red now.
"Fine.
You wanna stay 'round mine tonight, then?"
"But Fi,
I'm going to yours tonight! It's The Grim's concert on
the Floo-box!" Mark was really annoyed now, his face turning a
different kind of red, the red of anger.
"No,
don't worry, I didn't forget. You can still come!" Fi smiled,
got on her broom, and called "Kath! Get ready!" She flew off and
left Viktor to Mark.
"Sorry,
Mark, you'll have to find another voman…"He smiled, and Mark
growled, sitting down on a park bench. Krum sat next to him, and
said, "Should have been kvicker. She flies like an angel, with the
sight of an eagle. Still, no match for me, eh?" Mark got
up, taking Viktor with him.
"Tha's it! You little bastard!" He
punched Krum about five feet away, and cast FLIPPENDO! on the
recovering Quidditch pro on the floor. He skidded to the other side
of the park, slamming up against the metal wiring.
"FLIPPENDO!"
Two shots of blue collided, one from Mark's wand, one from
Viktor's.
Fiona
stared in awe. "Priori Incantatem?"
"No,"
replied Kate. "It's a Spell Struggle. The two spells are the
same, so they fuse. Each wizard or witch who cast the spells thrusts
it to the other's wand, and if it reaches a wand, the spell
explodes, severely damaging the loser of the Struggle."
This was
true, as the bright orb in the centre of the beam of light that
connected the two wands was edging closer to Mark. Suddenly, it
lunged at Krum, then it shot to Mark's wand, exploding and sending
Mark flying through the air.
"Alright,
let's go ho…" Pete was interrupted by many shoutings of spells
like Stupefy! Tallantallegra! Rictusempra! Relashio! Mobilicorpus!
Incendio! Suddenly, Pete stopped all this with a PROTEGO
MAXIMUS! This stopped the two fighting, and weakened them in
realisation. They both set off to help up Fiona, who had been hit two
or three times by random spells that missed. They carried her
together to her house.
