Chapter Four: Quidditch Tryouts

The Slytherin Quidditch tryouts drew more of a crowd than tryouts seemed to draw in Ginny's native-time. She was late as she made her way out onto the Pitch and some of the positions were already going through short drills to flush out the fodder. Ginny burst out onto the lit field and ran toward a figure holding a clip board near the sidelines. In her experience, the Captain of the team would be around that area.

"Have you done the tryouts for Seeker and Chaser yet?" Ginny yelled.

Tom Riddle turned to her with a smile. "You again? Now you think you can fly to?" he smirked. "The team's already got a Seeker," Riddle said pointing to himself. "But if you want to try for Chaser—be my guest."

The sight of Tom Riddle in silver and green standing with a broom and Quidditch gear was so much of a shock that Ginny actually started to back away. She nodded vigorously and took a place along the side of the field to watch the drills. Though she couldn't take her eyes off Riddle as he paced the edge of the field shouting encouragements and directing players to their positions, she'd spent the better part of a year with Riddle inside of her head. But he never seemed so ordinary to her as he did now.

"Ginny Potter! You're up!" Riddle yelled and Ginny nearly missed her own name.

Not bothering to walk back to the middle of the field, she kicked off from the side and vaulted herself up into the air. Ginny made a quick lap around the field and wove her way around between the goal posts as she passed them. The wind thundered past her as she picked up speed, the other Chaser-applicants were shuffling the ball back and forth between them to try and catch the Keeper with his guard down.

Ginny ripped between them snatching the ball away and tossed it up. She swung her broom around hard and batted the ball with the bristled end of her broom. It sailed down the Pitch and rocketed through the center goal hoop. The group of Slytherins watching from the stands burst into applause.

Riddle lifted off the field and passed close to Ginny, stirring her hair so that she turned to glance at him. He pulled to a stop in front of her. "So the Ice Queen can fly?" he asked in a sly tone. "Where did you learn it?"

Narrowing her eyes at Tom, she let out a short sarcastic laugh. "I used to fly with the Queen of England—she's a natural you know?" Ginny said.

"And secretive, aren't we?" Riddle asked shaking his head. "Well you can relax, you've done more impressive moves in one pass than I've seen out of this lot yet—you're on the team, Potter," he said.

Ginny brushed a red tendril of hair back. "Thanks," she said.

"You wouldn't happen to be related to Charlus Potter, the Gryffindor, would you?" asked Riddle.

Harry's Grandfather? That seemed to be very likely actually. Ginny stared at Riddle and forced a confused expression. "There's another Potter?" she asked. "It must be a pretty common, name right?" she shrugged.

"I suppose so," Riddle said. "I can see if you were embarrassed by the fact you had family in another House too, he's on the Quidditch tem for Gryffindor," he added.

Ginny shrugged. "Not embarrassed, just don't know the guy," she said.

Tom's eyes roamed over her as if searching for something and then he gave a crooked, sly smile and winked at her. "Right, you embarrassed—what was I thinking. Well if you don't want to stick around, Ice Queen, you don't have to. Your tryout's over," Tom said before he sped off down the Pitch.

She watched him go, his broom work was impressive. Though she wasn't sure how much of that was because she was actually watching Lord Voldemort laugh and play a game with people he might have considered friends. Ginny brought the broomstick down and landed near the exit of the Pitch. She made her way toward the castle out on the path and someone came racing down the path behind her.

"Wow, you're simply amazing, you know that?" Myrtle chased after her, catching up and finding a suitable stride. "I was just out here for a walk and I thought, is that Ginny Potter up on that broom there?" she smiled sheepishly. "I had to stop and watch," she added.

"Thanks, Myrtle," Ginny said. "Do you…every play?" she asked.

Myrtle gave her head a vigorous shake so that her dark pigtails swung out over her shoulders. "I can hardly steer a broom, most Wizard families were practicing before they got here. Muggles didn't grow up with such things, but I suppose you know that," she said.

"Yeah. I used to sneak my older brother's brooms out when I was little and fly myself around on them," Ginny replied. "Now I'm just a natural." They walked a little way and Ginny watched Myrtle, she was awkward but in a strangely endearing way. Not Luna awkward, but more like a female Neville. She couldn't help but want to help Myrtle out some, even though she knew the end result of this year. "I could teach you some stuff," Ginny said. "Just give you a few pointers," she added.

"You would do that?" asked Myrtle ringing her hands together nervously. Part of Ginny wondered had anyone ever really bothered to talk to Myrtle at all.

"Of course," Ginny said. "It's no problem really," she said.

Myrtle had followed her right back up to the school now. "Oh I bet you're a brilliant teacher…speaking of which I had your uncle earlier on in the day. He's quite fantastic, and so nice. Also he's very handsome," she said.

"My uncle, handsome? Pah!" Ginny said. She stepped onto stairs that led up to the covered walkway and she didn't even notice the huge statues on either side of the path. Their hands clasped over their faces in a sorrowful manner. Regal wings were spread out behind them and smocks covering their slender forms. These statues had never been here before; they certainly didn't exist in Ginny's time. And as she chatted with Myrtle, she passed them right by.

"What do you mean locked out?" asked the Doctor as he took large strides down the hillside toward the blue police box he'd left near the pumpkin patch at the forest's edge. The swoopy tuft of hair hung out over his forehead stood up against the wind as he whipped his head around to glance at Amy. "Maybe you're just not pressing the key in far enough, that happens sometimes…" he said in an irate tone.

Amy had pulled him away from his searching to show him this and he could have sworn it was another false alarm. The sky was already darkening and already the strange creatures of the Forbidden Forest could be heard stirring as he neared the TARDIS.

"I'm sure that's not the case," Amy said.

The Doctor snapped his fingers, trying to open the door from a distance but there was no effect. He drew the key from his jacket and jammed it into the hole and turning it. The door opened and he smiled back at Amy. "See, there!" but when he turned back he found the doorway blocked with a brick wall. The Doctor stepped back.

"See I told you," Amy quipped.

"Its protecting itself, its trying to keep whatever is here out," the Doctor said. He glanced back at the school-castle atop the hill at his back. "What's here that's doing all this…something that scares the TARDIS and actually is detectable as an anomaly…" the Doctor trailed off.

Amy tucked her hands in behind her back. "Wait, is that why you brought me here. You detected something?" she asked.

"But it doesn't make sense, there's nothing abnormal here…well nothing abnormal if you're a wizard," the Doctor said cupping his hand under his chin in thought.

"Oi, Spaceman!" Amy snapped. "What did you detect?"

The Doctor stared at the TARDIS with his arms limp at his sides. "Temporal Anomaly, though not sure what kind," he said. "I just don't get why the ship would go into lock down like this," he added.

"We'll have to sort that later, but look—we have an excuse to stay in a castle now," Amy said.

With his eyes locked on the forest ahead of them now he spoke to Amy. "Or it could be the excuse we've looked for to check inside of the Forbidden Forest," the Doctor said. "If students are strictly forbidden from entering the forest and the staff rarely does either, it's safe to say that if someone wanted to hide something they could do it out there rather safely and there would be no issue with it," he said.

"Right now?" asked Amy with a whisper.

"No—its dinner time, we're going to have to wait. Can't have the appearance that something suspicious is going on with us, now can we?" asked the Doctor.

"How did you get us into this place?" she asked.

"Psychic Paper, but we're lucky that you can even see the school for what it is," said the Doctor. "Non-Magic beings usually can't."

"But being a time traveler makes me different?" asked Amy.

"Exactly, come along—we need to get up to the Great Hall," said the Doctror.