A/N: Thank you to MartynaS, kayla-michelle0523, & silversprings-1997 for the follows/favorites, & thank you to carrie76 & Musicluver225 for the lovely reviews! Makes my day when people like my writing.

Without further ado, I present chapter 14 - time for some Quidditch! JKR owns all of importance, I'm just working my plot. Please R&R, & enjoy! :)

November brought with it a wave of cold that left the students with little doubt that winter was on its way – no one lingered in the chilly corridors between classes, seats in front of common room fires became coveted, and glittery frost greeted them almost daily. Three nights a week, Draco and Lisa would return to the third floor in various states of frozen exhaustion. Phoenix Rising was scheduled to play in the opening match of the season, and Ginny had them training hard – as was usually the case right before a big game, they resigned themselves to very little sleep as they balanced long practices with even longer homework sessions.

The morning of the match dawned bright and cold. The eighth years chattered happily as they dressed – Draco and Lisa were the only two of them who'd been selected for any of the teams, and the rest of them were eager to show their support for their classmates. The two athletes had flat-out refused to show the others their team robes – "Ginny wants them to be a surprise," Lisa stated firmly – but she did at least tell them that either navy blue or phoenix colors would be acceptable choices. After the type of rowdy breakfast only an impending Quidditch match could bring, Ginny dragged her team off to the pitch, leaving everyone else to their leisure before they too wandered down to the stands.

Ginny paced the locker room as her team changed, a fierce glint in her eyes.

"Little Red, you're going to put holes in your boots if you keep that up," Draco said with a smirk as he pulled on his own. Ginny glared at him but stopped pacing.

"Right then," she said after she'd taken several deep breaths. "I'm not going to give you all some big inspirational speech, because that'll just make me nervous. Just…fly like you've been flying all week, and we'll be fine."

"And we'll look damn good doing it!" Sam said playfully.

"Oh, yes we will," Ginny grinned. Their uniforms were indeed sharp – the robes were a deep navy color with the entwined golden letters "PR" replacing a House crest and intricate flames decorating the cuffs and hems. The flames were so realistic that they seemed to move with the material. "Alright team, hands in!" The seven teenagers formed a circle, and with a shout of, "Let's go Phoenix!" they grabbed their brooms and marched out onto the pitch, where cheers erupted from the hundreds of students crammed into the stadium. Ginny spotted Hermione and the other eighth years sitting in the top row and flashed them a broad smile and a thumbs-up.

"Goooooood morning, ladies and gents, and welcome to the first Quidditch match of the season!" Ginny laughed as the familiar voice of Lee Jordan echoed around them. Madam Hooch had asked Lee if he'd like to come back to commentate for the special season, and the dreadlocked young man had jumped at the chance. "We're delighted to have you here today, and we welcome today's opponents to the field – Phoenix Rising, Captained by Ginny Weasley, and Helga's Hippogriffs, Captained by Zacharias Smith." Smith's team wore robes in a bright yellow very similar to that of Hufflepuff House, the silhouette of a hippogriff head on their backs.

"Captains, shake hands!" Madam Hooch called. Ginny and Zacharias did so but let go rather quickly. A short blast from the whistle later, and fifteen broomsticks shot in the air as the teams took to the skies. Ian snatched the Quaffle when Madam Hooch sent it skyward, and the game began.

Just as he'd done at the trials, Draco continued to gain altitude until he was far above everyone else before he began circling slowly. Nothing, absolutely nothing, could compare to the thrill of a match, the rush he got when he knew the whole school was watching him play. The excitement he felt, coupled with Lisa's scoring the first goal of the game, made him want to do loop-the-loops, but he restrained himself – even if it was Quidditch, he still had to maintain at least some of his Malfoy dignity.

The majority of the match wasn't all that exciting, to be honest – Zacharias, the prat that he was, had refused to take anyone on his team who wasn't a Hufflepuff, and as the Badgers had never been all that great at Quidditch to begin with, Phoenix Rising had a comfortable lead fairly early on. The Snitch had yet to make an appearance, and Draco allowed himself a moment to take in the view below him. He caught sight of his dorm mates cheering in the stands and grinned, and he whistled appreciatively as Ginny scored a particularly spectacular goal. Draco might have hated all things Weasley in the past, but he had to admit that Ginny was a bloody fantastic Quidditch player. The fire on his teammates' uniforms flashed brightly in the November sun as they celebrated the goal, and he resumed his search.

"How's Drake doing up there?" Blaise asked Hermione, who had her Omnioculars trained upwards.

"Fine, I guess," she answered. "He's not really doing much – if I didn't know any better, I'd say he was a little bored." Blaise laughed.

"Yeah, well, that kind of comes with being a Seeker, doesn't it? You sort of fly around aimlessly for a while until the Snitch finally decides to show up." Lisa flipped the Quaffle through the nearest hoop as he spoke, and they cheered once more.

"Wait a minute – is that what I think it is?" they heard Lee ask excitedly. "Yes, I think it is! I think our Seekers have spotted the Snitch!" And indeed, Draco had suddenly plummeted into a steep dive as Kevin Summerby raced across from the opposite end of the field, both hurtling towards the small golden speck glinting near the base of one of the goal hoops.

"Come on," Draco urged his broom, "faster!" His Nimbus was a bit outdated at this point, but it was still a far better broom than Summerby's, and Draco was damned if he was going to lose to Zacharias Smith. Lower and lower he flew, racing around the goal posts as the Snitch started to take off again. He caught up with it barely four feet from the ground and pulled out of the dive, the little golden ball clutched tightly in his fist as he raised his arm in triumph.

"YES!"

The stadium around him exploded in cheers as Phoenix Rising's supporters celebrated. The team circled up as Lee shouted out the final score – 220 to 40 – and Ginny pulled Draco into a fierce hug. In the past, he would've been appalled that she'd dared to even touch him, never mind hug him, but now, he found he was too ecstatic to care. As they sank back to the ground, he caught sight of Hermione and Blaise waving madly from the stands.

"Party in the common room!" he called to them, grinning madly.

"Got it!" Blaise shouted back. "Shall we, Granger?" He offered Hermione his arm, and she laughed.

"Really, Blaise, you're ridiculous!" she chided, but she took the offered arm anyway, and the two began the trek back to the castle.

"Thank you, by the way," Blaise said when they were about halfway up the lawn.

"For what?" Hermione asked.

"For all you've done for Draco. He was a right arse to you in the past, but he does really want to make amends, and it means a lot to him that you're giving him a chance."

"Of course I am," Hermione said softly. "I think, if circumstances had been different, we could've been great friends – we're a lot more alike than I'd ever thought. It may or may not be too late for that kind of closeness, but it's never too late for second chances, and I do believe he really has changed for the better."

The party, as all Quidditch celebrations tended to, lasted well into the night in spite of the much smaller crowd in attendance. There was a large supply of both butterbeer and snacks, and the assembled friends reveled in their classmates' happiness as the team basked in post-match glory. Ginny blushed furiously when they praised her skills as Captain, and even Draco couldn't stop grinning as the euphoria continued. He'd gotten used to his team's victories being celebrated by only a small portion of the school – seeing so many people cheering them on today had been nothing short of amazing.

Professor McGonagall finally showed up around midnight to insist that the younger team members return to their common rooms, long past curfew as it was, but it was with a smile on her face that she congratulated them and suggested they all go to bed. They did so with smiles on their faces, and even Hermione, Quidditch novice though she was, had to agree that the game had given them some reassurance that everything would be just fine.