Chapter 20-The Quidditch Are Coming

Jeremy and Leo were in the Gryffindor boys' dormitories. It was really quite early, but Jeremy was already in bed. He'd have to get up before the sun even came up for a quick practice before the game tomorrow. He'd already taken a sleeping potion. It just took a while to drift off with the adrenaline from that day and the next day's anticipations still running through him. Just thinking about being high and streaking through the air with the wind lapping back his robes as he kept sharp for the other players darting around him was enough to counteract the sleeping potion in its weak beginning stages. He tried to think of something else. Anything else. Something calm and sleepy. But when he thought of clouds, he thought of swirling through them on his broomstick. And when he thought of just simple grass, he was falling from his broom and crashing against the pitch and tearing it open so the grass flew over the field and patches of dirt were ripped free. And owls, he was one of them, hunting for mice, but instead of tearing them apart with his beak he threw them through hoops. No matter what he thought of, he turned it into Quidditch. It wasn't his fault. The past week had been completely Quidditch every free moment to prepare for this game. He loved Quidditch, but he felt like it was consuming him slowly, like if it was a monster, he was sliding down its throat which just made him feel claustrophobic.

Jeremy threw the sheets off of the bed. Even with the snow outside, he was overheated. He closed his eyes and tried to let the potion take effect. He just thought of just simple darkness. But when he just closed his eyes to see the black backs of his eyelids, he saw that girl. When he'd looked over at her from the Quidditch pitch, he could only see shadow at first. She was a silhouette that just absorbed the sunlight around her. Darkness followed her everywhere. She was like a black hole, undulating at the edge of the Quittich field.

She seemed off, but not in a bad way, just in a way that made him curious. The last bit of their conversation still had him perplexed. "…you could come to the party." "I will ask Leo if that's okay."

"Are you dating Carina Honeycomb?" he asked suddenly.

Leo looked up from his work at the desk. He could barely keep his eyes open, but he needed to finish his essay.

"Sorry?" he yawned.

"Carina Honeycomb. She's a sixth year Hufflepuff."

"I know who she is. I just didn't think you did."

"Well, I do now. Carina told me she couldn't go to the party with me until she asked you if that was alright. Are you two dating or something? Because why else would she say that unless she was worried you'd think she was leading me on?"

Leo tilted his head. "You asked Carina to go to the party with you?"

"Don't change the subject. Do you have a girlfriend?"

"No. I don't know why she would..."

"What?"

"Nothing. No, we're not dating. Carina can just be clueless at times which often causes her to give people the wrong idea."

"Oh. Seems like her."

"Seems like her? You don't even know her. I can't believe you even remember her."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing. Most people don't, is all."

"Really? She's certainly nothing I'd ever forget."

"Jeremy, she's sat next to you every day in History of Magic since September and she's been in our classes since we arrived at Hogwarts six years ago. And you forgot her then. You'll forget her again."

Jeremy didn't say anything. Leo was right.

George puffed as she ran up the stairs to the Ravenclaw boys' dormitories. She hated being some errand girl for the Ravenclaws. They were practicing in the early morning before the game and Lorcan hadn't arrived again. The two of them weren't friends, but she knew him well enough to know he loved Quidditch. So, what was he thinking, behaving the way he was? Something must've been going on and she was, yet again, out of the loop. She wasn't very good at making friends. In fact, most of the ones she had were in Slytherin, as was her first, rather fleeting, boyfriend. All the others were just members of Frieda's vast friend group and anyone could be friends with Frieda. Thus being said, she wasn't commonly informed on why people may have behaved strangely. It was like the day before when Leo looked ready to tell her something important about Lorcan, but something had stopped him. She was sure it was her. If she had been Jeremy or Rose or even that Carina girl, Leo would have told her exactly what was on his mind. She wished she could be that friend. What made her seem so untrustworthy? She'd never let a secret slip in her life.

George burst through the door to shout to Lorcan to wake the bloody hell up; he needed to get to practice, when she stopped in her tracks. Paper crinkled beneath her feet.

"Let's see here…"

George examined the room which looked like a printer's playboy mansion. Ink and parchment lay strewn between clothes and books as Lorcan examined separate sheets of paper from the center of the room. The entire place was covered in paper and ink.

"Mate…" George said.

Lorcan turned to face her. "Oh, George, don't ruin my papers! Those haven't dried yet!"

George squatted to pick up the parchment which she'd stepped on to examine a list of utter nonsense. To her, at least. The paper was covered in symbols from top to bottom which danced about the page in no apparent order like they'd been written on a whim without regard for what was actually being said. She looked up from the paper at Lorcan who was had been biting into a ham sandwich until he stopped to stare at something on his page and dropped the bread, leaving the meat to dangle at his mouth as he scribbled along the page…or rather diagonally across the page.

"Ah…Lorcan?"

"Hm?"

"Why are you…Er…You know you have the Quidditch game against Gryffindor today."

"Oh? Yeah. Team's off practicing."

George didn't take her eyes off the boy. "And you didn't feel at all inclined to go with them?"

He looked up and stopped, looking back at the ground, catching the two of them in an odd sort of pause. It appeared he needed some time to think about the question. "No…" he said. "I suppose I didn't…" he ended the statement by wandering back into his pages, scrawling something onto the parchment with his quill.

"And, if you don't mind me asking, what are you doing, exactly?"

He paused again, mid-scribble. "You see, I actually do mind you asking." He continued writing.

"Really."

"Yes."

"I see." George nodded and then snapped. "What are you doing?! You've a game this afternoon and you haven't practiced in days! Do you know how hard your team has worked to get to this point only to have it crushed by one lousy player? Get out there now and practice!"

"Look, can't you see I'm busy?" the boy said, looking directly at her.

She paused, staring at him. He looked like he hadn't gotten a lick of sleep. His hair was clumped to one side the way it got on test days when he rubbed the side of his head. It wasn't like the two of them were friends. Frieda was her friend and Lorcan was Frieda's friend. She was nowhere to be seen, not that she would've been particularly concerned with the current situation. Frieda didn't much concern herself with anything. She had to get him out of this room, not because she cared about Lorcan, but because she had the feeling he was the ticket to figuring out whatever was going on in this school that everyone, for some reason, seemed to know about but her.

George grabbed a handful of papers and cut out of the Ravenclaw dormitories, through Hogwarts, until she reached the Quidditch field. She scrambled onto the pitch and waved to the players above. Nathan, who'd been the one to send her, came down towards her on his broom and hopped off in front of her.

"What is it?" he asked. "Where's Nathan?"

She looked above at the players, then pulled him to the side, into the boys' empty changing room and shoved the papers into his face.

"When I got there he was drawing these. Do you have any idea what this nonsense is?"

Nathan scanned the papers and looked back at her. "Why didn't you bring him with you?"

"He was engrossed in whatever this is. He won't leave the dorms. What is it?"

"Nothing. Thanks. Don't worry. I'll just get him myself."

George grabbed his robes to keep him from walking off.

"Nathan. What is going on with Lorcan? He hasn't been playing his best all season and don't think I haven't caught on to the connection between this and the whole Rose thing."

Nathan knitted his brow. "The whole Rose thing?"

"Don't play dumb. I know just about everyone but me knows what's going on here. The finch, the potion, that weird black girl."

"Weird black girl…"

"Carina."

"Never heard of her."

George grabbed his face and looked into his eyes before he threw her hand off like he'd been scalded. "What are you doing?!"

George smirked. "I think you're telling the truth."

"Stop being so cryptic. What is all of this about?"

George held up a sheet filled with symbols. "I'll tell you if you tell me where you recognize these from."

He looked them over.

"I can't be sure, but I think they're the same runes Lorcan's mother has been drawing in St. Mungo's."

George paused. "Mrs. Scamander is in St. Mungo's?"

"I'm sure Lorcan and Lysander would be happier if you kept that to yourself."

"So that's what Leo was about to tell me yesterday!"

"He what?! I'm going to kill him!"

"Nathan!" a boy shouted. It was the team captain, looking muscular and grim as ever. "Where's Lorcan?"

"It doesn't look like he'll be able to come," Nathan told him reluctantly.

The captain looked ready to pop a blood vessel.

"But it's alright. I'll play for him," George told him presumptuously.

The captain scoffed. "You play? Please. You were murder at tryouts."

"I'm from Ravenclaw and can ride a broom. The requirements for this field end there. A beater's job is hardly more difficult than whacking and I certainly do murder there."

He looked to Nathan who shrugged.

"We'll put her in," the captain agreed. "What's the worst that could happen? It's not as if Lorcan would've saved us from the Gryffindors."

George turned back to Nathan. "We'll finish this conversation later."

"Agreed," he said. "Now, get some robes on. You've got a lot of practice before the game if you don't want to make a complete fool of yourself."