Yay for the next chapter! I have over twenty reviews now (eeep!) and please remember to review! Okay, so now we're going to skip maybe a month or two to the first Quidditch match of the season o.O ! I'm expecting this story to start skipping more now, over less important times when nothing really happens, and I think the story will end close to the end of Lily's fifth year. But that is a huge maybe. Without further ado, here is the next chapter! (I have ten now! YAY)
Chapter 10: Cancelled Quidditch
Lily felt rather odd sitting amongst the Gryffindor Quidditch team adorned in scarlet robes. Alexander Wood, a sixth-year, had become the new Keeper for the team, and his younger sister, a fourth-year, had been in tryouts for Seeker. As he moved past her to sit down, he slapped her on the back for encouragement.
"You should really eat something, Lils," James told her, noticing that she hadn't touched her food. He and Albus had forgiven her for going to the Slytherin tryouts when she had returned to the common room that night, and they had gradually accepted that she was becoming friends with Scorpius, Alicia, and Julian.
She and Scorpius spent almost every day practicing Quidditch, and occasionally Alicia and Julian would play with them. Lily could beat him every time, although it was usually a very intense and competitive game between them. Her father had written to her about Scorpius, and they had been a debate for almost two weeks until he gave in but warned her not to let the Slytherins 'slither their way into you and get you in more trouble than they're worth.'
"I'm not hungry," she mumbled but nibbled on her toast to satisfy him. Her hands shook as she set the toast back on her plate, spilling a few crumbs onto the table.
"You'll do excellently," Jordan said, hanging an arm around her shoulder. He had become very protective of her, almost like her brothers. "But we've gotta go if you need to get dressed."
The team stood up and was walking through the Entrance Hall when Scorpius jogged over to her. "Wish me luck?" he asked with a cocky grin. His green and silver robes brought out his grey eyes that smoldered.
The Gryffindors watched him apprehensively. None of them really trusted the friendship, but tolerated it anyways. Lily laughed. "Fine, good luck, although I highly doubt you'll win. Lorcan has practiced very hard."
He grinned. "I can win. But you'll cheer me on, right?"
Lily rolled her eyes and fingered the scarlet and gold scarf hanging around her neck. "I'm a Gryffindor. Do you really expect me to desert my house?" She had lost most of her stutter after she fell into a familiar ease with him and she only stuttered when he really caught her off guard.
He laughed. "Yes. You might as well, seeing as I'm going to win."
"How can you be so sure about that?" she asked sarcastically.
"Because my good luck charm will be there," Scorpius answered simply.
"Oooh," Lily squealed. "Please won't you tell me who she is?"
"Now where did we get someone of the female gender in there? I never said it was a girl."
"But they have to be! Alicia and I already decided that it has to be a girl, unless you're gay."
Scorpius made a face. "I am not gay. And fine; it's a girl."
"Oh who is it?" Lily begged, ready to do anything to find out. This had been the one thing he refused to tell the girls, and the secret was driving Lily crazy.
"See if you can find her today," Scorpius answered.
"We've got to go, Lilsies," Albus warned, his green eyes making sure she didn't let anything slip.
"Bye, Flower," Scorpius said, using the nickname the Slytherins used for her after he had deemed her Lily Flower one day when they were bored. "I'll see you after the game." He winked at her before her turned to rejoin his team.
Lily smiled to herself as the team shuffled across the grounds. See you during the game, she corrected mentally. When they reached the edges of the Quidditch pitch, Lily wasted no time in slipping into the girls' shower stalls. She muttered the password that Professor Longbottom had given her at breakfast (they didn't want any boys sneaking in *cough*James*cough* to terrorize the girls) as Jordan went into the Captain's Quarters to get her broom.
She pulled the scarlet robes out of her rucksack with L. Potter emblazoned on the back. She struggled into the comfortable clothes and slipped on the matching boots. She heard Albus knock on the door. She stuffed her other clothes into her bag and stepped out.
Her brothers rushed her into the covered area where the team had to wait until they were announced. Jordan handed her the Lightningbolt with a breath-taking smile. "You can do this."
She only managed to nod. Suddenly, she could hear the magnified voice of a second year Hufflepuff whose name she couldn't remember at the moment. "Welcome to the first match of the season, and this is sure to be a good one! Today we have a match between Gryffindor and Slytherin!"
Cheers erupted, forcing him to fall silent as he let them die down. Lily looked to Albus for reassurance and felt shock when she saw that he really had a camera hanging from around his neck. "You can't be serious," she whispered frantically.
He smiled the trademark Potter smile (all rights reserved). "You can't really expect to pass up such a brill opportunity, can you?"
She rolled her eyes as the commentator continued. "And now for the Slytherin team!" She could hear the loud boos of the Gryffindors and the cheers of the Slytherins. "The Keeper, Amelia Hort, the Chasers Edmund Richards… Josh Whitman… and Heston Lestrange!" He paused between each name, and Lily knew they were individually walking out on the field, clapping each other on the backs as their members joined them. "The Beaters, twins, George and Kent Kempton…! And, finally, ladies and gentlemen, I present to you, the Seeker of the Slytherin team, Scorpius Malfoy!"
Lily wished she could tell the Gryffindors to bloody well shut up as they booed their loudest yet. They Slytherins tried to drown them out, but suddenly a roar told her that Lysander had found their mother's old hat.
"And now for the Gryffindor team! The Keeper, Alexander Wood!" The doors in front of them had opened and Alex walked out with his broom, waving to the crowd. "The Chasers, Jordan McLaggen… Kendall Arnett… and James Potter!" They left amidst the cheers, leaving Lily, Albus and Amos Blocc.
Soon though, much too soon, the commentator announced Albus and Amos and they left her in the shadows. "And the Gryffindor Seeker is…" She was tense, waiting for him to say her name and hear the confusion and cheers, but there was mumbling instead.
The commentator, whom Lily now remembered as Jonah Campton, could be heard talking to Professor Longbottom since he still had his voice magnified. "Professor, I think there's something wrong with your roster."
Longbottom's voice was faint but could still be heard over the microphone. "No, no, it's right."
"Are you sure, Sir? I'm positive that this isn't right."
"No, Mr. Campton. It is absolutely correct. I put it together myself."
"Can you double-check, Professor?"
The crowd in the stands was obviously getting restless. The Slytherin team was watching the stands where the teachers were curiously. James was practically jumping up and down with the secret, and from the shadows, Lily saw Jordan pull out his wand and point it at his throat. "Lily Potter!"
Only Gryffindor cheered as she walked into the blinding sun with a smile that changed to a smirk when she saw the reaction of the school. She couldn't help but laugh as she swaggered to the center of the field. Albus was actually taking pictures of the Slytherin team who were all staring at her like she had fallen from the sky.
Scorpius had gone completely white, his laughter at a joke his teammate had told him dripping away instantly. Emotions flitted across his face so fast that she was just barely able to recognize them before another replaced it. Shock… amusement… revelation… anger… she groaned when it settled on furious and his face started turning pinkish.
When she reached where the teams were gathered, she saw that his knuckles were white as his hands gripped his broom hard enough to break it. "You Liar!" he yelled suddenly.
She was suddenly more worried about what Scorpius was thinking than the game even. "I never lied to you! No one lied!"
"Yes you did! What was all that crap about Lorcan being on the team? You said you were practicing your Quidditch for next year!"
"Jordan said that Lorcan might be on the team! And maybe I want to be on the team next year, too! You should never assume things, Scorp!" Lily couldn't help but let his anger infect her, too, until she was yelling right back at him.
"You made it so that we would assume things!" His face was gradually growing redder, but Lily felt the heat creeping up her neck. "I bloody trusted you! I thought we were friends!!"
She faltered with her already planned retort. In the tiny silence between them, she was barely aware of the other fights going on around her. Her ears were ringing, and she was certain that her face was as red as her hair. "We are friends." Her voice was quieter, less forceful. Please forgive me, she thought desperately.
"You knew this the whole bloody effing time, didn't you?" Scorpius yelled at her. "You knew you were going behind my back to do this!"
"Maybe I did!" Lily shouted back. Letting the anger take over was easier than groveling on the ground for forgiveness. "It's Quidditch! Not running through a bloody field of daisies!"
From the corner of her eye, Lily watched as James punched the Slytherin captain in the face. He didn't punch anyone with the exception of his siblings unless he had a good reason. Her focus on Scorpius saw as he moved in to defend the captain and punch James in the gut.
Nobody hit her brothers.
So she did the only logical thing; she wasn't strong enough to hurt him with a punch. So she tackled him. He staggered around for a second with her riding on his back until they both toppled to the grass. They rolled over each other, trying to be successful in pinning the other down. Scorpius had her where she had to struggle for a moment, but she managed to kick him and roll herself on top.
He gave her that infuriating smirk. "I didn't know that you liked being in control."
Her vision became tinted with a red haze and she raised her fist to give him a crooked nose like hers. But she never got to connect her fist with his face because someone wrenched her off of him. She turned to punch them, but she dropped her fist when she found Neville Longbottom watching her with obvious disappointment. Dad's gonna kill me, randomly raced through her mind.
Then she became aware of the shrill sounds coming from Madame Hooch's whistle. Everyone stopped what they were doing, even the Slytherins. "I will not accept this behavior on my Quidditch pitch! And you haven't even gotten yourselves in the sky yet!"
A lump rose in Lily's throat, and she stared at the ground as the shame made her feel so idiotic. "I'm not entirely sure that I'm going to let you have a game today! This is not some muggle brawling ring!"
Everyone started protesting the idea, even the students in the stands. Lily, who was still being restrained by Neville, tried to say something, but they were so loud that she wasn't heard until she yelled, "Blimey! Just shut up!"
They stopped and looked at her curiously. Everyone, including those in the stands was silent, waiting for something to add to the gossip pile. She started stammering, not liking everyone looking at her and only her. "I-I-I'll dr-drop o-out i-if th-that will k-keep the g-game g-going. I-I'm th-the o-one e-everyone's m-mad a-about…"
Madame Hooch looked like she was debating it. Then Scorpius stood up, brushed himself off, and said, "Just let her play. We can settle this latter. I just want to play some Quidditch."
She scrutinized him carefully. Fine, but there will be no roughhousing up there. Do you all here me?" Everyone nodded their heads and got into position in a circle, mounting their brooms. On the counts of three, Madame Hooch threw the quaffle in the air and all the players shot into the air.
Lily zoomed up higher than the others, barely listening to the commentary. "And Potter has the Quaffle! James Potter that is! Things are starting to look confusing with all of the Potter students on the team now. Score for Gryffindor! And now Lestrange passes it to Whitman…"
She saw Scorpius not too far from her. She raced over to him. "Scorp, I'm sorry!"
He sneered and said, "Apology not accepted, Potter."
She stopped mid-call to him. Her vision of the bright blue sky and stunning green field blurred into grays and shadows of an alley. She shook her head and left Scorpius without another word, trying to scout out the snitch. They would talk later, then.
"Poor Lily…" She gasped and whirled to the oh-so-familiar sound that had been whispered in her ear. She had felt the breath tickle her neck. No one was there. She circled the pitch once before she dove into a Wronski Feint, focused on one of the painted while lines in the grass.
"It appears that Potter has seen the snitch! She's diving for it, and Malfoy's not far behind, gaining on her, even!"
The sound was blocked out along with the rest of her senses and she was pulled back to the alley where someone was appearing from the shadows. "Your little lover boy is so upset with you, isn't he? Poor Lily, you'll probably never be able to fix this one…"
She flashed back just before she crashed headfirst to the ground. She managed to pull away from the ground and she returned to her perch higher in the air. Scorpius, who had seen the ruse was on the other end of the pitch.
There was blood pooling in the alley. Mortellea abandoned the shadows, her black hair glimmering with the dim light and her eyes glinting. Lily started shaking on the broom when she saw a drop of blood splash onto the ground from the woman's hand.
"Lily's ruined her own life. And so quickly, too! Scorpius doesn't want to forgive her, and he never will…"
Lily squeezed her eyes shut, trying to see only the darkness of her own mind and pressed her hands over her ears. "G-go a-away," she mumbled.
"You can't make me leave." Mortellea was getting closer to Lily who couldn't make herself run away. She let a bloody hand brush against her cheek.
Lily screamed at the feeling of warm blood on her face. Whoever had died had been murdered maybe only a minute or two before. She thrashed against Mortellea's hand.
Her eyes jerked open and her hands reflexively found her broom handle as it swooped downward of her unconscious command. She tried to regain control, but she was already in the alley again.
"You don't like that, do you? You don't know what's happened here, and that terrifies you. What if it's someone you know?" Mortellea's breath flowed across Lily's face, bringing the scent of chocolate.
The chocolate smell mixed with the smell of the blood on her check. "Wh-who d-d-d-did you k-k-k-kill?"
The woman slowly walked in a circle around the immobile girl. "Don't you know?"
Lily started crying. Her eyes were squeezed shut again and her hands over her ears. "V-Vi-Viktor K-K-Krum," she whispered.
"Lily? Lily, look at me." She could hear someone calling for her from another world, a hazy dream almost. A dream that made her feel safe. But with Mortellea, a place like that didn't exist.
"You hear him calling you, don't you? But I'm not quite done with you yet."
She was moving in that other world, and it brought her out of the haze a little. Platinum-blonde hair. Scorpius was by her. "Lily, come on, you need to get to the ground."
Lily screamed again, more terrified than before. A man with a dark goatee that curled at the end and graying hair gazed at her blankly. His vacant eyes were blue ad blood covered the rest of his face and most of his body. Mortellea was holding him up by his bloody shirt. "This is him, isn't it? Do you know who he is?"
"Former Bulgarian Quidditch Seeker," she whispered, transfixed by the eyes. "He's forty years old and has three kids…" She broke into hysterics. She was trying to thrash away from Mortellea, but it seemed that she was only thrashing in the hazy world that couldn't exist.
The vile woman dropped the man. Lily moved for the first time, only jumping back a bit to avoid having his head fall on her feet. As it was, his own blood splashed and soaked her legs. She screamed again when she heard another crack that meant that he had broken another bone when he made contact with the alley floor.
"Calm down, Lily, everything's alright. No one's going to hurt you."
The vaguely familiar voice came again and this time, she screamed, "She's going to kill me! It's bloody everywhere! Help, someone, please help!"
"No one's going to help you, Little Lily." Mortellea told her in a seductive voice as she pulled out her wand. She twirled the stick between her fingers. She dipped it in blood and began tracing pictures on Lily's skin, like those from Ancient Runes class. "You're in my world now."
Lily shivered and shut her eyes, waiting for the killing curse. It didn't come. "I'm not going to make things that easy for you," the woman told her. She muttered something under her breath and Lily wished she would die.
Screams filled the air and it took Lily ages to realize that they were her own. She was curled in the man's warm blood on the ground. It was in her hair, soaked into her clothes, drying on her face, and she didn't care. All that she could tell was that every pore of her body was filled with pain.
In the back of her mind, Lily's Defense Against the Dark Arts class kicked in and she barely recognized the Cruciatus Curse. She tried to think about anything other than the pain, but nothing could block it out.
She thought to her hazy dream filled with bright colors and found the pain lessening and someone saying, "Lily! Lily, hang on! Wake up, Lily! Wake up!"
Lily. She recognized her voice and her eyes opened. The pain had disappeared along with the alley. She had somehow reached the ground of the Quidditch pitch and found herself curled into the ground. Her hands were caked with mud from digging her hands into the ground. Her white broomstick was five feet away from her and people were crowding around her.
James was the first one she saw, and he was terribly panicked. His voice had been the one she heard from the haze. She recognized Albus and the rest of the Gryffindor team along with Mistress Wilkinson, Madame Hooch, and Professor Longbottom. Scorpius was squeezed right beside Al and he held one of her hands, smoothing the mud off.
James sighed, relieved. "Merlin, Lily, Madame Pomphrey will be here soon, someone's already been sent for her. It's alright. You'll be fine. No one was hurting you."
She was still shaking and found that she was freezing cold although sweat made her hair stick to her face. "James," she barely whispered.
"Mum and Dad will be so worried about you. You're lucky you didn't fall off your broom."
"James," she said a bit louder.
"The game's cancelled for now, obviously, so don't worry about the snitch or anything—"
"JAMES!" she yelled, cutting him off. She grabbed the collar of his shirt and pulled him down with strength that shouldn't have been possible in her state. He was so shocked that he nearly squished her. She recognized white designs on her arms like the ones Mortellea had drawn on those exact spots.
The weakness came back and Lily whispered, "Tell Dad… Viktor Krum is dead."
And Lily fainted, letting the darkness envelope her.
This was soooo not how I planned the chapter, but this is how it came out… XP Please review! It helps me when you tell me what you think will happen. I crammed in this update for you so please review! And sorry to any Krum fans out there :( I needed someone familiar to die so that it be more shocking. I hope I didn't say too much! LOL