Chapter 5
Sebastian stared open mouthed as Irmi filled him in on certain things.
"Crumbs!" he said "I guess that explains a lot of things… and you want ME to be your blood brother? I – I guess I was sort of hoping you'd be my girlfriend, not a sister…" he blushed furiously.
"You poor prune" said Irmi, who drew freely on her adored stepmother's vocabulary "We can't love as deeply anyone who ISN'T blood joined; no-one blood joined marries anyone who isn't. I mean" she blushed too "Talking about married is going way too fast but…..well, it'd make us closer. And I want to be your girlfriend."
Sebastian brightened.
"Oh! Well that's all right then" he said "What do we do and when do we do it?"
"We wait" said Irmi severely "To be invited to a ceremony. Severus is expecting to bring in another layer of Marauders and it's sort of silly not to bring in odd people as well. He's sometimes a bit stuffy about bringing in people unless they need protecting – like I did – if they're not proven Marauders because he kind of feels it's not fair on people; so I expect he's got something big on hand like going against Odessa in Russia where it's still going and is less scrupulous about getting supporters in. He's such an old softy really and agonises over if it's right or not."
"A big softy is NOT what I'd use as a descriptor of the famous sneering agelast" said Sebastian with feeling, having just received back an essay with rather a lot of red ink on it, whereupon the shortest and most innocuous criticism was 'fatuous twaddle'.
Irmi giggled.
"Well you shouldn't do your prep at the last minute when you KNOW it's nearly bed time" she said. "I thought that 'the effluent of your turgid thought processes appears to equal the feculent concatenation of the poorer efforts of first year cauldron work' was fair comment on the crap you wrote, actually."
"Here, steady on!" said Sebastian "I know true friends don't mince words but that IS going too far!"
Irmi giggled.
"I don't HAVE to mince words; Professor Snape does it with far more skill then me" she said. He poked her.
This led to some agreeable making up that went beyond the tentative smiles they had so far exchanged and left Irmi rather breathless; and thinking how much nicer it would be when his blood sang with hers!
oOoOo
Tarquin was dead keen to start Hogwarts next year blooded; and to be closer to his adoptive brother and best friend Sevvy as well as to Lilith and Richard on either side of him in age.
Ismenia considered deeply.
"You're rather young" said Severus "No older than Lydia was when we brought her in; and that was only to protect her."
"Why ISN'T I bloodgroup daddy?" asked Ismenia.
Severus lifted her onto his lap.
"Because although it takes a man to be a father, any male can make a baby with a lady" he said "I am your daddy because I want to be; but a nasty man made mummy pregnant when she was still just a schoolgirl, before she joined my other wives. And she chose to have her baby; because it wasn't fair not to let you be born, even though she didn't plan a baby. Because you had happened. And I said Krait and Sirri and I would help bring you up; and then mummy became my dear wife too, so you really became my little girl. But it was before SHE was blooded in; and as my seed did not make you, you didn't get it from me either."
"Oh!" said Ismenia "But Remus and Humphrey have got it?"
"Yes" said Severus.
"I think I want to be it too; or it's not fair" said Ismenia "I would have chosed to be your little girl for real. What happened to the bad man?"
"I jinxed him into a ball for hurting one of my pupils" said Severus with grim satisfaction "And with jinxes that wouldn't stop him working but that he couldn't undo."
Ismenia considered this.
"Good" she said "He's NOT my father."
"If you like, poppet, when we do the blood joining, we can also do a special chant to make you more mine than his" said Severus.
"Yes" said Ismenia firmly. "Come and see my fairies, daddy; I've got them all nice counterpanes that I've sewed to hibernate in, in my fairy house."
A little girl had her priorities after all; and once assured Severus could be her real daddy with a chant, fairies became uppermost in her mind.
Ismenia collected most of her fairies in the greenhouses; where they huddled for warmth especially at nights. Fairies did not truly hibernate but were inclined to become very torpid with cold, and to sleep for great parts of the winter unless welcome indoors somewhere; one reason – apart from their vanity – that they liked to be Christmas tree decorations.
Valerie Burdock had been rather taken aback to see a small child in those greenhouses that held some of the more challenging plants; but as she had been about to quietly pounce on the child to evict her, the little girl had absently cast bluebell flames – controlled and without a wand! – at the devil's snare plant that was attracted to her movement sending it cowering back.
"You recognise the plant, then?" asked Valerie.
Ismenia regarded her solemnly.
"Only a true dork with ambitions of imbecility mistakes devil's snare for flitterbloom" she said "But mummy says the world is unfortunately full of dorks so I s'pose it was a fair question."
"Who is mummy?" asked Valerie.
"My mummy is Dione Parnassus Snape; my other mummies are mummy Krait and mummy Sirri" said Ismenia. "You must be Madam Burdock" and she beamed.
Valerie was still adjusting to being Madam Burdock; last year she had been a schoolgirl – and that had been something that was wonderful enough! – and now she was teaching, a respected pillar of the community!
"You are a talented child!" she said.
Ismenia considered.
"I don't THINK so" she said "I'm not as good as some of my siblings. Only mummy said if I was going to muck around rescuing fairies from greenhouses I needed to know what spells could irritate the more aggressive plants. I don't go in with the snargaluffs of course, but I CAN repot baby mandrakes. And of course I know the shield charm like anyone who's old enough to use magic, but I can't do any jinxes yet."
"My good brat, you're damned lucky to grow up expecting to know the shield charm before school; I still have trouble with it" said Valerie. "Where I come from, I don't suppose more than one in twenty adults knows it, let alone the kids."
Ismenia blinked.
"Oh; perhaps it's because daddy fights Odessa and dark wizards and likes us to be prepared then" she said. "I'm sorry you have trouble; why don't you come to the MSHG? I'm allowed to join in now and we practise all sorts of stuff. As well as running to help s'stain spells, which means" she wrinkled her brow "Hold them up a long time which you might need to in a real fight. 'Cos bad people have to be obliteeriated" she added.
Draco's mispronunciation in the mouth of the character Convolvumort had entered the common parlance of Snapelings and Malfoylings alike.
"Well….. I should think it's a family thing" said Valerie "I wouldn't intrude."
"Oh no!" said Ismenia "It's for anyone at school; and the rule is, you call professors first names in the club but you have to be proper in school. When I go to Hogwarts I shall have to call all daddy's friends Professor this or that in lessons even though they're all uncles out of school. And even that's going to be better than having a daddy as the headmaster, Lilith says. Lilith went up to Hogwarts last year. She's AWFULLY talented."
Valerie had heard enough to know that Lilith had gone up to Hogwarts early and was doing spectacularly well; and that this child spoke of her older sister's talent with pride not resentment spoke well of the way the Snapes – and their odd ménage – handled Lilith's talent.
And having three wives who were not discarded and seemed best friends was a nicer thing than Kordach's ever-changing catalogue of mistresses at that.
"Well, young 'un, I am going to have to ask you to hop it" said Valerie "I have a class in here in ten minutes."
Ismenia bobbed her a curtsey, beamed, and took herself off.
Valerie had never been curtsied to before, wondered briefly if the girl was taking the mickey and decided she was too young to know how and merely displayed the amazing courtesy that the Austrian people seemed to do, having essentially grown up here.
The class was the second; and they were to be started off right away on pruning Abyssinian Shrivelfig.
The class filed in politely and waited to be invited to sit on the stools at the benches down the centre of the greenhouse. Valerie smiled austerely.
"Be seated class" she said.
That had been a shock to her and her fellows when they started the free school only five years ago, she and her closest friends being in the fourth; the idea of rising for professors. It had soon become habit, and it WAS a good idea; it had the class ready and receptive for having taken part in a small ritual to start it. And that meant it went beyond courtesy and had practical applications too. And that, as a professor, she was learning. She had received good advice from Professor Longbottom and Madam Carmichael-Malfoy too; to keep the children at a distance and to be harder on any that were for any reason likely to be favourites. Madam Carmichael had said 'like when they're yours or the children of a friend' which was unlikely to occur for a while; but if for any reason she was teaching that engaging child with the fairies it would be good advice.
The second beamed expectantly. There were three goblins, a child who could pass as a Malfoy, six other humans and an elf girl. That was something not to be found in the free school; though part fey might occasionally turn up. Valerie acknowledged that it was a shock to find goblins in what she thought of vaguely as a 'posh' school; though it was serving the function of an alternative to Durmstrang so…. Well, there was to be a new school for goblins and mudbloods, and her friend Mortimer Bane was to be teaching in it next year; and it was said entrance to Prince Peak would be by exam only. And how many goblins would then come? That remained to be seen.
These thoughts passed through Valerie's mind as she introduced herself, and the task in hand and sent the class to get on with it.
They got about their task with a surprising lack of noise and without jostling or fussing; and that was one of the main differences between posh kids and the rather feral kids of the Umbrous Lane complex she supposed. The class WAS a well behaved one – the Breuer twins notwithstanding – and they had, moreover, been much impressed by Anett Breuer's explanations last year that if they expected a little genteel gardening, they should consider the more feisty plants such as had been set on the Triwizard champions.
Valerie was impressed and thought the class very competent.
They were none of them incompetent; but again they had, most of them, had advantages the children of the Umbrous Lane complex had not had, being familiar with plants for the most part other than weeds in the pavement. Valerie corrected the few mistakes, and had the pleasure of seeing children solemnly trying to do it properly after correction; one of the little thrills in teaching, where a few words have made a difference to the abilities of a child. She would not know for a while the greatest thrill, that of seeing a class obtain good results; but to know that she could demonstrate techniques was a small victory, and she began to relax.
She had been afraid she would hate teaching or be no good at it, for having only had four years of education; but it was going to be fine!
Valerie started asking questions to check the class's knowledge and found them able to answer fully; and that was a relief too. She was going to enjoy herself!
Valerie was having to settle in with the other members of staff too; and it had to be said she had arrived feeling a trifle defensive.
She was one of four new teachers; two of whom had come from Hogwarts, one because she had married one of the existing teachers; and the famous quidditch player Viktor Krumm. Even Valerie, who was no quidditch fan, had heard of Viktor Krumm; and expected him to be some stuck up self opinionated git.
She had been chatting to him for several minutes before she vaguely started to realise that he had a slight accent, when he waved at Madam Granger and called her 'Hermowininny' having learned to improve on his pronunciation of her name. He explained happily to Valerie that 'Hermowininny' and Ron Weasley and Harry Potter and David Fraser had all been great friends of his in Hogwarts, from the time of the Triwizard for the first three, and David later, as allies in the fight against Odessa and racism. And he added how pleased he was that he was to teach with all of them except Harry, who was an Auror! Valerie had not realised that several of the professors had been Harry Potter's famous bodyguard – but of course, they had the scar! And there was a lot about the whole business in the press – between the scandal about that poor Zabini boy – because this was to be the tenth anniversary of the killing of Voldemort, to be celebrated at the end of the Easter term. And she had not realised that Viktor Krumm had managed to fight dark wizards between his career as a mere quidditch player!
Valerie though the other new male teacher seemed stuck up when he failed to answer her until the new female teacher poked him hard and said,
"Hey, Godders, you're being spoke to you dozy prune."
"Eh what? Sorry?" said Godfrey Goodchild "'Scuse, I'm sure, have you a pencil Dimsie?"
Dimsie Burke-Nuffield sighed and handed him a pencil and conjured paper with an aplomb that made Valerie envious; and the young man started scribbling furiously.
"Musical you know" said Dimsie "He was always in trouble at school for leaving half his brain in a symphony; except in Professor Queach's class because Professor Queach actually got banned potions on those days he had a tune in his head when HE was at school from the day he embedded a cauldron in the ceiling when it exploded. That was when our very own Krait Malfoy Snape was teaching junior potions at Hogwarts."
"My name being taken in vain there?" said Krait. "Oh yes, Tony Queach was the world's greatest dream! He wised up as he got older after I threatened him with laxative to get his tunes out if they were causing him so much trouble my pearls of wisdom were lost; at least I don't think any of your juniors are so much dreamers Dimsie."
Dimsie laughed.
"Lee says that Sarah Elliot in the second can go off into an artistic brown study but then she IS muggle born so I suppose his lessons are less interesting to her" she said. "And as Severus has been training the juniors as well I should think the second and above will be on the ball in potions. I have to say the first seem mostly harmless. Evadne Horrocks is a bit of a pompous prig, but no VICE to her; and she takes explanations."
"Oh lumme, not another Marianne Wilder" groaned Krait "Mind you, Wilder's problem was that she would try to liberate people who didn't need liberating – imagine explaining to the daughter of the foremost goblin rights activist what her rights were!"
Dimsie giggled.
"I bet Garjala gave her short shrift!" she said.
"I'll say; so did Hermione, who was head of house at the time, because the wretched girl had a go at HER over what she was doing for the rights of others; and Hermie, as well as standing up vigorously for other muggleborn WAS the founder of the Society for Provoking Elves Wantonly…."
"Krait! You KNOW it was the Society for the Promotion of Elvish Welfare!" said Hermione, outraged.
"Whether, at first, they wanted their welfare promoted or not….Gotcha, there, Hermie! And actually Wilder had her uses because she made you think even more deeply than Sirri's shouting at you about not forcing people into doing what they weren't ready for. Valerie, did you find in the Umbrous Place complex that a lot of people weren't ready to embrace education because it was too new and scary so they took refuge in calling it sissy and stuff?" Krait drew Valerie in.
The new Herbology teacher blushed and nodded.
"I guess they were afraid of failure" she said "Only Professor Longbottom said to us that if we truly worked hard there was no failure, just different degrees of success."
"Quite right" said Krait.
"I'll vouch for that personally" said Dimsie "I had to work hard to overcome some pretty bad things happening in my life – a cursed necklace that nearly killed me by someone wanting to get at my dad being one of them – and it's hard to work when there are those making fun of you, but to do so is a personal triumph. And to overcome yourself too; I was an egregious brat before I learned about life. You may have been one of the other kids that beat me up in Obscura Alley, Val. Do you answer to Val or do you prefer the full form."
Valerie stared.
"You – surely you're not Dympna Burke?"
Dimsie laughed.
"Oh I used to be, but she wasn't a very nice little girl, so I hatched into Dimsie and grew up" she said. "And so far as I'm concerned, if there IS any past between us, it's past – and gone."
"I – well I must say that's decent of you. Yes, I was among the ones who helped torment you when I could" said Valerie. "And – well, I suppose I've changed for having the chance at education."
"Education comes in many forms" said Dimsie "I got mine from adversity; and that's education in life. And it's an awful responsibility, isn't it, to have the knowledge that anything we say and do might turn a child with problems round or blight them."
"Cheerful cow" said Godfrey, amicably, who had finished jotting down his tune. "Still, look at the Brewer child – denied music and by all accounts a little bitch until Severus gave her a second chance; and found out her parents didn't let her play; like my parents with me, because I couldn't be as much a star as the twins. Parents muck their kids up and it's up to us to un-muck them."
"Good job Krait's wandered off to harangue Ron about something" giggled Dimsie "Your GRAMMAR!"
"And we haven't ever heard Krait get colourful?" said Godfrey lazily. "Don't let her scare you with all this make-or-mar business, Val; hang in there and do your best, it's all any of us can ever do, and if there's a problem child it's what the staffroom is for, to pool ideas."
"Thanks" said Valerie. They weren't as stuck up as she imagined Hogwarts kids might be; mind you, Mortimer had written often and spoken of his new friends that seemed to be quite normal people, and he had not become stuck up either. Except to that snotty rent collector whom he had ticked off so beautifully when he blew in for a visit before going off to Germany to look for a school or something that he was to teach in.
"The Horrocks girl seemed quiet enough to me" she ventured.
"She has the odd idée fixe" said Dimsie "Like 'why is Professor Snape teaching if he's the world's pre-eminent potioneer' – DUR! Because he LIKES it is why and because he likes to find the few with talent! Silly little cow. Her dorm mates tolerate her with amusement; you can see it. They aren't friendly towards her. I guess having lived in dormland I notice things like that; but you watch. All the boys in the first have gelled into an unholy mass very quickly; the other four girls are friendly to each other and tolerant of Horrocks. No HARM in her you see, but something not entirely right. I expect she got at them for bad grammar or slang or untidiness; which is fine in a prefect or a grown up but NOT in a fellow weevil. We need to keep an eye on her and NOT let her smarm up to us or sneak. Because she strikes me as one who might take normal mischief as wrongdoing and get all righteous. Of course if she DOES sneak we have to act on it; but there's no harm in telling her off as a silly little girl and not very loyal to her fellows to rat them up. And do so relatively gently because I don't think she knows any better. I didn't!"
"Right, I'll remember that" said Valerie. "There IS a lot to learn – especially as I've never been to boarding school."
"Oh you'll pick that up" said Dimsie "And if you read some of the school stories we have as well – muggle ones as well as the Cassie books – that does help. I got my nickname out of a muggle school story because it followed well off Dympna. And it's new to the first as well, think on!"
Valerie nodded. They were really nice to her; accepted that she came from a different background, asked her opinion on her knowledge of that background but made no issue of it!
And term progressed without any undue upsets.
So long as one did not count Rose Hubble breaking her wand – again – and using Spellotape to mend it; with the result that her wand work had rather unexpected results. This caused a brief upset in Charms when summoning things with the spell accio which – it has to be said – most of the fourth already knew for being, as AHHa readily admitted, too lazy to actually LOOK for stuff; summoning a bottle of ink, Rose managed to summon it both overhead and open, as well as upside-down. Madam Parnassus was NOT amused, but since the male members of the First Peak Marauders had thought it funny to accio every fairy still in the garden did not notice that Rose's wand was broken in the ensuing mayhem and just put it down to a Hubble moment which she ticked Rose off about it, and turned to banish the fairies back outside, to their disgust and AHHa, Albert and Granville's disappointment.
In Transfiguration, the class were turning hedgehogs into pincushions; a transfiguration that Krait permitted so long as they were returned safely to normal using Naming magic to facilitate the return.
None of them were actually poor at transfigurations, though Svetlana struggled slightly; her pincushion was inert and seemed unaware though it still sported spines and the others varied from AHHa's slightly slapdash one that was a felt hedgehog with pins in through to Silvina's very competent embroidered pincushion and Albert's velvet one and Flo's patchwork offering. And Sara Barbary managed to surpass herself and produced a pincushion that had the pins arranged in the shape of a treble clef.
Rose's wand, however, had other ideas.
Her hedgehog swelled and started firing off spines, to the screams of consternation of her seat partner, Hanna-Leena, whose own effort was creditable enough.
Krait swung round and restored the hedgehog to normal with a quick flip of the hand and removed spines from Hanna-Leena; then turned to Rose.
"What WERE you thinking of, you aberrant child?" she said.
"Please, Madam Malfoy, I was TRYING to think of a pincushion" said Rose "Only my wand doesn't seem to be interpreting things very well…" she tailed off as Krait held out a silent hand for the offending wand and passed it over.
"Oh Rose" said Krait "You silly child! Haven't you LEARNED that broken wands are no good? How did you break it THIS time?"
"I was rattling it down the banisters as I ran downstairs and I sort of tripped" said Rose.
"Do I have to point out the obvious about such an activity to a big girl in the fourth?" said Krait. Rose hung her head. Krait sighed. "Rose, you'll be taking OWLs next year; I shall write to your mother for a new wand, meantime draw a school one; try the willow one with the unicorn hair core. And you may take ten reps of the Chrysogon Rufus poem 'Growing up'; the one that starts 'I'm a big boy now, I can do my buttons up, I'm a big boy and I can tie my shoes' to try to remind you that you ARE fourteen not four. And I'm keeping this travesty before you do any more damage. I thought a fictional wereknarl was bad enough from the New Marauders but an aggressive archer animal like that? Preposterous!"
It may be said that the story got about and the Muggle Marauders, who were devotees of Monty Python, declared the beast to have been Spiny Norman, and dubbed Rose 'Dinsdale' for the rest of the term.
Rose took this all in good part – as was her wont – and merely asked for some kind of an explanation.
It may be said that the explanation left her neither any wiser nor better informed and she decided to settle with the idea that it was a muggle cartoon character and leave it at that. As Randolph had gone into the daring parody on the still powerful, if gaoled, Kray brothers embedded in the sketch of the Piranha brothers she had every right to be mystified; since this was ancient history unknown to most muggle children let alone of any interest to the wizarding world who had besides their own troubles at the time in the form of Voldemort and the first wizarding war.
She found the school wand much less troublesome than her broken one; and being the property of someone else was a trifle less slapdash with it too.
The juniors meanwhile felt that Emily Grant was driving them a little hard over quidditch practice. They knew that the weather would not last; but even so, right was right, and she had no business to be more demanding than Viktor Krumm even if it might be argued that Professor Ron was a soft touch at times.
The prospective Bee Marauders proceeded to read muggle science on how clouds were made, filled a bath with cold water to sublimate it into vapour and froze it firmly with freezing charms and poked their snow cloud at Emily to cool her ardour with a personal snowstorm.
Emily was hurt and wanted to know what such a rag was in aid of.
They told her.
"And what's more you can't make us turn out for practice" said BaHH "Because it's voluntary; so if we don't like the way you run it, we give up quidditch."
"And that goes for me too" said Arbek, who may not have been a Marauder but he was a crony, and supported their action. "You come close to bullying and being a little Grindelwald to us juniors; and we reject it."
Emily was aghast; Arbrek was first team seeker, despite his youth; and if HE joined the rebellion she must really have put her foot in it! Emily was abrasive and not particularly sensitive, but she was a nice enough girl under her brusque manner and was definitely embarrassed to have caused the ire of the junior school.
"Look, I'm sorry you oiks" she said "I only wanted to see you enjoyed as much of the weather as you could while we had it. And Viktor's got us a fixture against the Innsbruck Ironbellies."
"Well if you'd only SAID that we'd have been less off about it" said Crow. "Though for those of us who only play for fun and can't give the first team a good game it's still a bit heavy."
"Like I said, I'm sorry" said Emily "Can you take this damn snowstorm away and we'll negotiate a more reasonable settlement?"
They took the snowstorm away promptly and thrashed out an agreement with the head of games.
Some of the stars of the first team had left; and though Seagh and Angelica were on hand to bolster the third team when not all its members felt like playing, they did not feel it proper to play as part of the school team since they were technically no longer schoolchildren; so Emily Grant herself and George Ingate moved up into their position as chasers, leaving the position of beaters in the adequate hands of Pete and Fred Lowther, Kate Grant as the more talented of the three chasers – she surpassed her older sister in talent – Arbrek as seeker and Victor Crabbe still as keeper.
The day of the match against Innsbruck dawned and the school team with Liriope Hallow as reserve travelled by train to meet their fixture. It was considerably warmer down in the valleys; which was nice. The air was also less thin and seemed quite heady to the team that trained on top of a mountain.
The Ironbellies were definitely a team to be taken account of; not perhaps in the top league, but certainly a match for any school team in the normal way.
And had not their team captain sneered at the concept of the school being so short of talent that they had to play a goblin the result might have been very different. Viktor Krumm was infuriated.
"You will apologise for that comment or meet me after the match" he said coldly to the captain "Such comments are not cultured and are the sort of thing I might expect from a half troll, the other half being jarvey."
The captain sneered.
"Oh I'll meet you quite happily Krumm" he said "And I'll try to be gentle on you in my pity that you had to take a job teaching sissies and little girls in a school instead of a real coaching job; you MUST have done something awful to have lost your place on the team AND not be able to get a real quidditch job."
Viktor smiled.
"Some of us" he said gently "Prefer to mould talent before it gets given bad habits; and actually I choose to teach at my future father-in-law's school. Since I too have fought Odessa alongside my quidditch career; like the great Severus Snape, my bride's father. I may not have been at the battle of Hogwarts to get the scar, potato head, but I AM a friend of Harry Potter's too. Which means I have a life; somehow I doubt you will when you're too old to play, and too stupid to realise to get out when the going is good. Very well; we have a date after the match."
Insulting their seeker was bad enough; this oik had also insulted their Coach and the Prince Peak team was NOT about to take THAT lying down. Even though one of the chasers was muttering embarrassed apologies to Arbrek.
The Lowther twins and Victor were blood group; and made a great team in the keeping out the opposing team's quaffles. As all three now broomsurfed happily – to the horrified amazement of the Ironbellies – this was an advantage too. Kate and Emily flew well together as sisters, and George was used to working with Emily; and if they were not great scorers they at least kept the opposing team's beaters and keeper busy and managed to get a few quaffles in while their opponents goggled in disbelief at their counterparts' broomnastics. The Lowther twins had been working hard on it!
And Arbrek was determined to show this racist pig of a seeker up; and flew with every trick he knew to lead the Austrian astray. And one move they practised assiduously at Prince Peak was the Wronski feint; and with the tactic suggested by Brutus Scrimgeour in his 'Beater's Bible' Arbrek felt that 'take out the seeker' was a valid tactic for any seeker to use as well. He jinked a few times as though he was chasing a snitch and dove full speed for the ground; and thrilled to see his opposite number attempting an intercept course. It required careful timing and a nice bit of broomnastics on his own part, so as not to collide with the Austrian when pulling out of the dive; but any dedicated follower of the MSHG was familiar with the Immelman turn and Arbrek also swung all the way under his broom to miss the other seeker by literally inches.
The time out for the crashed seeker was sweet.
And the racist Austrian may have remounted but he was still distinctly fuddled.
Which meant that Arbrek had a distinct advantage. Having his beaters shout,
"Red Five, bandit below at four o'clock!" was another advantage; they had code named him Luke Skywalker to play Hellibore's where an equally racist comment had put him on his mettle; and it worked so they might as well continue it. Training in muggle military parlance helped too. Arbrek did a wingover to the imaginary four on his personal clock face and below him; and there was the snitch. He dove again – and this time the Austrian seeker was not about to follow him! Arbrek stood on his broom as the snitch rose above his dive and his long, secure goblin fingers closed on it!
The team went wild.
The experience of the Innsbruck Ironbellies had brought them ahead in scoring; and before the snitch was caught the score stood at three hundred and seventy to two hundred and ninety with the school visitors down to their hosts; a hundred and fifty points made all the difference however and Prince Peak finished on four hundred and forty.
There were scouts from many teams watching and a lot of note taking was going on; and the majority of the Innsbruck team were ready to shake Arbrek ruefully by the hand.
"Wilhelm lost us that match by making you all mad" said the keeper.
"Well if your coach does not make that perfectly clear, I fancy ours will" said Arbrek. "Coach Krumm is very protective of us all. As is Professor Ron, our teacher."
"Well, you're a lucky bunch" said the keeper.
Viktor called upon the blood group to restore the offensive seeker to full health so he could duel with him without it being like shooting fish in a barrel; and proceeded to demonstrate why he was one of the foremost fighters against evil. He left Wilhelm the seeker dangling from one ankle, disarmed, giggling hysterically between vomiting slugs and with bats pouring out of his nose and uncontrolled farting noises and highly coloured effluvium issuing from his rear. Nothing so boring as the blasting curse for one trained by the MSHG.
His team were much impressed and cheered him mightily.
The Innsbruck Ironbellies had to get in a top curse breaker to get their seeker in a fit state to play their next fixture; and billed him for it, since it had been his own fault he got into that mess.