And The Quidditch World Cup is here.
GINNY XIV
Although they had a succulent breakfast this morning, lunch mostly consisted of sandwiches, very similar to the few they ate before leaving to find the Portkey. Ginny didn't complain, though she suspected that Ron was about to complain, especially when many families around were serving food prepared with ovens inside their tents. But their father wanted them to follow the regulations, and Ginny complied without complaints.
Once lunch was over, she left her family to wander on the camping site, looking for the people she knew from Hogwarts. Hermione followed her. There was someone she wanted to visit.
"What did you and Harry want to talk about?" Ginny asked Hermione as they walked away from the Weasley lot. She was curious as to why he and Hermione spent some time discussing alone within the girls' tent.
"Something personal. Nothing to worry about, Ginny," Hermione evasively answered. This didn't reduce Ginny's curiosity, and Hermione's attempt to redirect the conversation failed at getting it out of Ginny's mind. "Who are you going to visit?"
Ginny listed a few of her friends from her year she intended to find. She had not left the tent for the whole morning and wanted to stretch her legs. "What about you, Hermione? Who are you looking for?"
"Susan. She arrived with Harry, so I should be able to find her not far from where he and his mother settled."
While talking, Ginny noticed Mrs Lily not far away, discussing with a man and a woman of Asian appearance. Harry didn't seem to be anywhere close though. She saw a sign indicating that the occupants of a nearby tent were the Changs. Ginny guessed that it had to the family of the Ravenclaw Seeker.
"You think that Fred and George are right? That there are going to be selections for the Quidditch team this year."
Hermione shrugged. "I don't know. It will depend on the new captain. I suppose it will be Angelina. She is obviously the leader among the Chasers, and the player on the team with the most experience. But she is a good person. I think she will give you a chance."
This heightened Ginny's mood. She really hoped to integrate the Quidditch team this year. She was there when they won the Quidditch Cup in the Spring, and she wanted to live that as a player as well. She trained more often than ever on her brothers' broomsticks, with Hermione's complicity who remained silent about it.
Ginny appreciated Hermione. She spent a large part of this summer at the Burrow with her. It was good to have another girl than only herself and her mother in her home. Ginny could talk to Hermione about subjects she would never dare to broach with her brothers or her parents.
Their discussion was interrupted by one of Ginny's friends in her year, and Ginny went to talk with him for a few minutes. Hermione waited behind, then she and Ginny resumed their path. Ginny came across a few other friends, who she spent some time with each time. Hermione, in the meantime, also discussed with other students of Hogwarts she knew. Then, finally, Hermione caught sight of the person she was looking for.
"Hey Susan!"
The girl Hermione hailed was sitting in a small chair at the entrance of a tent, a book opened on her lap. She raised her head and smiled when she saw Hermione walk towards her. Ginny recognized this girl. She had red-brownish hair, arranged into a long plait behind her back, with brown eyes, freckles on her face, and was a little taller than Ginny.
"Hi, Hermione. You arrived by Portkey?"
"Yes, this morning. And you, how was the trip?"
"Good. Uneventful, mostly. I'm glad we've arrived. And I hope the match will begin soon. My father is like a hippogriff in a cage."
"What are you reading?"
"Oh. Nothing very interesting. It's my mother who recommended it to me."
On the cover of the book, Ginny saw an old man with few white hair, a cigarette between his fingers, wearing a suit, on a beige and blue font. She didn't understand what the words written on it meant, which they seemed to be written in another language.
"Well, in fact, she almost forced me to read it," Susan continued.
"My parents had me read something about dental care one day. I was eager to finish it so I could read something else," Hermione commented, to which Susan laughed a little.
All of a sudden, Ginny spotted another sign with a familiar name on it. Lovegood. She decided to head there, and after bidding farewell to Hermione, she went to the tent in question, which was probably the strangest on the campsite. The tent, displaying a mix of colors including blue, yellow and green, was tall, almost like a tower. There was a small garden surrounding it, with all kinds of plants that each looked stranger than the ones next to them. There was a cage on the front circular door with an odd animal looking like a crossing between a bird and a frog. Ginny remained there, looking at the strange appearance of the tent. There were all kinds of tents around, but this one probably beat all the others in terms of oddity and originality. All of a sudden, Ginny was no longer sure that she wanted to go in. She didn't even know if Luna was there.
"Odd, isn't it?"
Ginny almost jumped at the voice who spoke right behind him. "You scared me," she complained to the boy behind him, who had thick, long black hair.
He laughed. "Sorry. I didn't want to scare you."
"Well, you failed."
The boy looked at her with curiosity all of a sudden. Ginny didn't like it. She didn't like when people looked at her with that kind of expression. "Are you Ronald Weasley's little sister?"
"Yes. So?"
"I'm Michael. Michael Corner. I'm in the same year as your brother."
"I have six brothers she informed him."
"Really? Six? Well, you're lucky. I wish I had brothers. I only have two sisters."
"Poor them," she retorted.
He looked stunned for a moment, then burst into laugh. "You're much cooler than your brother."
"If you think it is a compliment, then you're wrong," she retorted once more, although she couldn't prevent a smile from creeping over her face. The smile in question however faded when she spotted Harry far away, discussing with a girl. It was that Seeker from Ravenclaw, Cho Chang. Ginny shook her head. She remembered what Hermione told her during the summer and refocused her attention on the boy in front of her. "Are you taking for Ireland?"
"Of course, I am. Someone should be stupid to take for Bulgaria."
She nodded. "When we are from England."
Ginny talked a few minutes with Michael, but they went separate ways finally. Ginny noticed that he was heading towards Harry and Cho, who were still discussing. Ginny went back to Hermione, still engaged in a conversation with her friend.
"I hope we will have a good professor in Defence Against the Dark Arts this year," Susan was saying as Ginny approached. "If only Professor Lupin decided to stay. He shouldn't have left."
"I wish he stayed me too, Susan. But let's face the reality. The Board of Governors would probably not have allowed Dumbledore to keep him, even if he tried."
"Too bad someone told everybody about it," Ginny declared, attracting the attention of the two other girls.
Ginny knew very well how Professor Lupin lost his teacher position. A girl from Hufflepuff, a friend of that girl Susan, screamed in front of everybody in the Entrance Hall that he was a werewolf. Ginny got along with a few people in Hufflepuff, but really, sometimes, there could be very dumb people in this house.
"I'm sorry," Susan said, looking at the ground.
"Come on, Susan. It's not your fault," Hermione said. "And I'm sure Dumbledore will find us a good professor for September. He always does."
"Like when he chose Gilderoy Lockhart?" Ginny asked, skeptical.
The two girls in front of her looked ashamed this time. Ginny and Hermione never really talked about it, but Ginny knew that Hermione did have a crush on this teacher two years ago. And considering that this man flew away when he was asked to save Ginny, she didn't have much consideration for him, if any at all.
"I think we should head back to our tent," Hermione said. "Maybe we'll see you later, Susan."
"Bye," the girl said, and Hermione and Ginny headed back from where they came from. "You could have been gentler with her, Ginny."
"What? Did I say something wrong? I only said that someone was stupid enough to scream about Lupin's condition."
"Yes, but it wasn't on purpose. And it wasn't Susan who did it."
"I never said that. I didn't blame her, Hermione. I blame the fool who shouted in front of half the school that Professor Lupin was a werewolf."
"Well, the person feels very guilty," Hermione said. "And look, Ginny. It was inevitable that people would learn. I found out the truth myself, and even Harry found out later in the year. All the professors were aware of this. We were lucky to have Lupin as a professor, but it would have been impossible to keep it a secret forever. Other people would have noticed that he was sick only during full moons."
"Yes," Ginny admitted, "but still… I learned a lot of things with him. His course was the best we had. And now he's gone. It's too bad that he didn't come. I would have liked to see him."
"Perhaps he's occupied somewhere else," Hermione offered weakly, although she didn't seem to believe it herself. Ginny wouldn't be surprised if Professor Lupin went into hiding. Her father explained them that life was very hard for werewolves. Most of them lived in misery.
When the two girls came back, they were in the middle of the afternoon, and magical events, far from disappearing, increased. Ginny had the impression that people of the Ministry did not enforce the law as much as early this morning. Fred and George were playing Exploding Snap with Ron and Charlie on the grass.
"I'm going to change," Hermione said. "The game is approaching, and while we have a shower, we should enjoy it."
Ginny decided to do like Hermione, and they washed one by one. When Ginny came out of her own shower, she found Hermione reading about the rules of the Quidditch World Cup, one of the rarest books Ron ever gave her.
"I can't believe how far some teams are ready to go to win," she commented. "I'm surprised no player ever died during a match."
Ginny rolled her eyes. Hermione, sadly, would never understand how Quidditch was important to so many people. And yet she should. She was just as crazy as everyone else last year during the final between Gryffindor and Slytherin. She even carried Harry to the Quidditch Cup with many other people from three different houses. That reminded Ginny of when Hermione asked her to leave her alone with Harry.
"Hermione, why did you want to talk with Harry alone today?"
Hermione raised her head and rolled her eyes. "I told you, Ginny. It wasn't important. It was just something personal, and Harry didn't want anyone else to know."
"Not even Ron?"
Hermione didn't reply, but Ginny could tell from her expression that she hit the mark. This was strange, since Harry and Ron usually told each other everything. What could there be that Harry wanted to tell Hermione but not to Ginny's brother?
"Why wouldn't he tell Ron? Why wasn't he with you both?"
"Because it was a private matter, Ginny, okay?" Hermione almost snapped, exasperated.
"Okay," Ginny said after a while. "But… just to warn you, I think someone might have heard you."
Hermione's expression turned completely into one of surprise. "What?" Ginny nodded, a little satisfied with the impact her words had. "But… Oh no!"
"Lily Evans arrived while you were discussing, and she stopped for a good minute or two next to the tent. I think she might have heard something."
Hermione hid her face within her hands. "Oh no! I swore Harry that I would keep it a secret." She removed her hands from her face and looked frustrated now. "Well, anyway, it's not as if it was something that would remain a secret for long. I'm even surprised he could hide this from his mother."
"What do you mean? What did he hide?"
Hermione hesitated for a very long time. Then she sighed. "He wanted some advice. That's why he wanted to talk to me."
"An advice on what?" What kind of advice could Harry be asking only to Hermione, without wanting anyone, not even his mother or Ron to know about it.
"On a girl."
Hermione's answer took some time to make its way into Ginny's mind, but when it did, she felt as if something quite heavy had fallen into her stomach.
"Harry dated a girl recently," Hermione explained very quickly. "Not for long. He broke up with her not long ago. He wanted to have my opinion about what he should do now. That's all."
Ginny wasn't really sure about how to react to this. Learning that Harry had dated a girl was a shock to her, though the news that he broke up with her almost relieved her, but Ginny remained stunned by the news.
"Harry has… Harry had a girlfriend?" Her voice was shriller than she would have liked.
"Only for a few weeks. And he ended the relationship quite quickly. In fact, he thinks of himself as stupid for dating this girl. I wouldn't say that. I think it is more stupid from him to think that he was stupid going out with her, but well… Boys!" Hermione raised her hands in the air. "If it can reassure you, it was nothing serious. That's why Harry broke up with her after only a few weeks."
Ginny wasn't entirely sure that it reassured her. On one side, yes, a part of her was definitely happy to learn that Harry was still alone. But she was also afraid to learn that he actually went out with another girl.
"You know who this girl is?" Ginny asked.
"Yes," Hermione acknowledged. "But I'm not going to tell you, Ginny. Sorry. I swore I wouldn't tell anybody."
Ginny was lost in her thoughts for some time. Harry went out with another girl. Why? Immediately, all sorts of thoughts came to her mind, thoughts that she pushed away.
"Ginny, look. It had to happen one day or another," Hermione said. "You too, you're going to date a boy one day. Perhaps it will last a few weeks, or a few years, I don't know. But it will probably not be Harry."
Ginny wasn't convinced of that. Hermione told her that before during this summer, but she didn't feel like she would date another boy. The only one she felt in love with was Harry.
"Why isn't Harry in love with me?"
The question she uttered sounded stupid even before she pronounced it.
She heard Hermione containing a short laugh. "Because we don't choose who we fall in love with, Ginny. Look, I'm friends with your brother, and I'm not in love with him. Harry likes you, Ginny. He's just not in love with you."
This truth had slowly sunk within Ginny over the last two years, but still, it was hard to accept. Ginny wasn't stupid. She didn't blind herself into believing that Harry was secretly in love with her. She just wished he was.
"Have you ever been in love with anyone, Hermione?" she asked.
She never asked the question to her friend, and Hermione looked quite surprised by it. Ginny didn't mention Lockhart, as this was clearly a stupid child love that Hermione didn't feel anymore.
"Well… Not really," Hermione finally confided. "I mean, last year, I was so busy with work, between my classes, and also… Buckbeak."
Both girls felt sad at the mention of the name. Ginny had not been as involved in the accident. She didn't even witness it. But she knew enough about Malfoy's responsibility in all this to hate this boy and his family more than ever. It was because of them that she almost killed people during her first year at Hogwarts.
"And…" Hermione resumed, "I don't think I need to be with someone. I mean, there are many important people in the Magical World who are not married. Let's look at Dumbledore, Professor McGonagall, Amelia Bones, or even Nicolas Flamel. They were never married, and they had very good, long, and interesting lives. Most of them still live, and they're still changing the world as we speak. I don't think we should give so much importance about the fact of being with someone."
Ginny nodded absently. Maybe Hermione was right. Maybe she was giving too much importance to her feelings. She had worked over the last year to see Harry like a more normal person, as difficult as it was. She was able to speak when he was around, and to behave almost normally. She could almost speak to him normally, though she still had work to do on that. Last year, Hermione told her to relax, and that if she behaved more like herself around Harry, he might take notice of her in a different way. So far, it didn't seem to be successful. Harry seemed to be always looking somewhere else when Ginny was around. And now she learned that he went out with another girl. She wondered who that girl was.
Suddenly, Ron's head appeared in the entrance of the tent. Ginny almost jumped, afraid that he might have heard their conversation.
"What are you still doing here? There are all kinds of merchandise in sale outside for the game. Come!"
He disappeared right away. Ginny was relieved that Quidditch was all that occupied her brothers' minds today.
"Let's go," Hermione said. "And cheer up, Ginny. This is the final of the Quidditch World Cup. Don't let a boy ruin your day."
Hermione was right. Ginny had been looking forward to seeing this match. She inhaled deeply, pushed Harry back into a corner of her mind, and left the tent with Hermione.
Once outside, it wasn't difficult for Ginny to not think about Harry. People were now flying freely over their heads, and various stands had appeared where merchants and salesmen offered various souvenirs and objects for the upcoming Quidditch match. Ginny's family didn't have much money, but their parents still gave them a little more than usual in prevision of today, and Ginny and all her siblings saved money during the entire summer for today. So she rushed towards the stands, looking at all items the salesmen were offering.
The most common souvenirs were rosettes of green color for Ireland and red for Bulgaria, that squeaked the names of their team's players, and also flags that played the national anthem of their respective countries. Despite saving for the whole summer, Ginny didn't have much money, so she looked carefully at the prices. There were rosettes of all sizes, and after thinking carefully, she decided to buy one of the largest size, which lit the most and said the name the louder. Not far away, her father was buying a flag of Ireland.
There were also less common souvenirs. For example, there were small models of Firebolts, and figurines of players. She saw Ron buying one of these representing Viktor Krum. However, as Ginny wandered among the stands, admiring everything on sale while keeping a close look on the prices of hats, scarves, binoculars, crystal balls, and even cards, she bought little. One stand looked really weird, and her father got very interested in its content as the salesman explained he was selling the most popular Muggle novels on wizarding. Hermione herself got very interested in it.
"Here, you have the entire trilogy of the masterful Lord of the Rings written by John Ronald Reuel Tolkien. The most popular work of fantasy that all Muggles love. And here, you have the Witcher series by Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski, although the series is not complete. And here are the seven books of The Chronicles of Narnia by Clive Staples Lewis."
The salesman looked a little too much enthusiastic to Ginny's taste, considering he was selling books whose cover pages were not moving. There were even a series of seven books by a certain Joanne Rowling, whose titles looked a little familiar to Ginny, but she didn't give them too much attention and resumed her visits.
After looking at everything of interest, which meant almost everything on sale, Ginny settled to buy an album with photos of each of the fourteen players who would play today, each photo signed by the very player it displayed.
As darkness was falling over the campsite, Ginny joined back her family at their tent. Bill and Charlie had rosettes just like her own. Her father had a flag of Ireland, the very one she saw him buy earlier. Fred and George didn't buy anything because they bet their money with Mr Bagman. Percy didn't seem to have spent a single Galleon. Ron was by far the one who bought the most things. He had a hat, a rosette, and also showed them his figurine of Viktor Krum. He also had these strange binoculars that Ginny spotted earlier. Hermione had a rosette and binoculars too, and she was also holding programmes in her hands.
"Alright. We're all there?" Ginny's father asked.
"Wait. Harry wasn't supposed to join us?" Ron asked, looking at Hermione.
"We're here."
Harry's voice came from behind. He was wearing a green rosette too, and binoculars. His mother and godfather were with him, each wearing a rosette too, though Harry's godfather seemed to have emptied the stands like Ron did. Hat, flag, rosette, even a cloak at the colors of Ireland, he wore everything someone could think about to show his support to the Ireland team. It was quite different from the time when Ginny saw him for the first time in Egypt last year, when he had seemed about to kill Peter Pettigrew. He was radiating happiness and excitement now.
"So, do we go, Arthur?" Sirius Black asked.
"We must wait…"
Right as her father was talking, a long, huge gong resonated through the campsite. A series of green and red lights appeared in the woods, illuminating a large path that went deep into the forest.
"Let's go," Ginny's father simply said, and they all followed him.
If the atmosphere had been feverish during the late afternoon, it was almost about to explode right now. Ginny's own heart was ready to burst as they approached the shining walls of the huge stadium, which her father kept giving details about to them. Thousands of wizards walked in packs all around, singing, cheering, shouting. Ginny even saw two groups of supporters from opposite teams almost coming to fists, who officials of the Ministry stopped right away.
The man responsible for checking their tickets instructed them to head up to the top box, saluting Ginny's father at the same time. When he saw the tickets of Harry and his family though, he almost fainted, but gave them the same instructions in a blabbering voice. Harry seemed more exacerbated than anything else, a reaction Ginny often witnessed when people realized who he was. They climbed the stairs until they reached the very top of the stadium.
Ginny had been able to take a look at the seats as they climbed. Those of this lodge were even more comfortable though. But what took Ginny's breath away was when she took her seat and looked over the whole stadium at her feet. It was the largest crowd she ever witnessed. She had been impressed by how full the stadium at Hogwarts was during last year's final, but this was completely different. She could hardly believe her father when he said there were one hundred thousand people down below. To her, it seemed more like they were about a million wizards and witches from all the corners of the world, green and red illuminating dots and flags waving from everywhere.
"Super!"
"Fantastic!"
Her brothers were at a loss of words as well.
"Wild!" Ron said, his binoculars on his eyes. "I can make that old bloke down there pick his nose again… and again… and again."
Ginny snorted in derision.
"There are so many people," Hermione whispered next to Ginny. Even she was impressed by the sheer scale of the place. "There are flags from countries all over the world. I can see a group of Jamaicans right there… And French farther away… There are really flags from everywhere… United States, Spain, Italy, Morocco, Sweden, Russia, Ukraine, Japan, China, Korea, Australia, Brazil, South Africa, Canada, Mexico, Argentina, Chile…"
"Hermione, you don't need to list all the countries in the world," Ron complained, though still smiling. But Hermione didn't seem to have heard him.
"There are flags I don't recognize. This one… It is red with a single horizontal white line in the middle. And that one… Blue and white with lily flowers on it… It reminds me of French symbols… Perhaps it is a flag of one of its departments…"
"Hey!" Harry had joined them. He was looking through his binoculars as well. "Is that normal that people in the crowd have bats?"
"They're not real," Ron said. "They're fake. It's a tactic to distracts your adversaries, but it's not dangerous. Those bats couldn't even hurt someone even if they tried."
"No weapon is authorized here," Ginny's father. "Believe me, Harry, we are safe. The Ministry took all precautions."
Ginny used Hermione binoculars, which were called in fact Omnioculars. Hermione gave them to her while she consulted the programmes of the match. Ginny was awed by all the functions of this. She could look closely to any section of the pitch, as if she was standing right next to it. She could slow down events, revisit them, and even stop them. She wished she bought one, but they looked so expensive that she didn't.
"A display from the team mascots will precede the match," Hermione informed them all.
"Oh, that's always worth watching," Ginny's father said excitedly. "National teams bring creatures from their native land, you know, to put on a bit of a show."
"Four years ago, Scotland brought a Kelpie for the final. And not any Kelpie. They brought the Loch Ness Monster," Bill informed them.
"What?" Harry said. "It exists?"
"Yes, Harry, it does," Hermione said. "The book Hagrid got us to buy last year mentioned it. The Loch Ness Monster is a Kelpie that Muggles sometimes got sight of, but the Ministry has a team watching over him all the time to prevent Muggles from truly understanding who he is. It must not have been easy to bring him to a match of Quidditch."
"No," Charlie confirmed. "I had some friends who helped bring him here, and believe me, this was no small feet. That Kelpie is not stupid, and I think he's even aware that he is a celebrity among Muggles. It was quite hard to control him. Four people ended up in St Mungo's Hospital, and that was only to bring him to the match. I'm not sure how many more were sent there during and after the game."
"It cannot have been worse that what Canadians had to endure," Fred pointed out. "Is it true that they brought Bigfoots?"
"I thought it was Yetis they brought," George said.
"Yetis come from Tibet," Percy said. "Bigfoots are in North America. And technically, the Canadians brought Sasquatches to the last final. And it caused a lot of problems. After the tenth goal of Scotland, they almost rammed down their goalposts."
Charlie chuckled at this. "That must have been quite a sight."
"I heard they also brought a werewolf, is that true?" Bill asked.
"No, they didn't," Charlie said. "It was a Rougarou. And the Canadians didn't bring it. It was someone in the attendance who brought it along with him and unleashed it on the Bigfoots in the middle of the game."
"What's a Rougarou?" Ginny asked.
"A magical species of wolves in North America. Often mistaken with werewolves. Werewolves are humans, at the basis, but Rougarous are initially wolves who learned to stand on their back feet and who can take an almost human shape for short periods of time."
"Cool!" Ron said.
"That's not cool, Ron," Percy berated him.
"I sadly agree with Percy on this," Ginny's father said. "Rougarous can be quite dangerous. Although there are some who were domesticated and almost behave like humans. That's how this one managed to make its way into the stadium."
"Harry!" Ginny turned to see Mrs Lily calling after her son. She was sitting two rows behind in the lodge. "Come! The match is about to begin."
"Sorry," Harry said to everyone, and he went back to the seats he and his family had.
Ginny turned her attention back to the pitch, where a huge blackboard showed advertising of all sorts, including for boutiques on Diagon Alley. Ginny was absorbed by everything that went in the large stadium at her feet that she barely heard the name when the Minister of Magic uttered.
"Ah! Here's Lucius!"
It was only Ron's and Hermione's sudden movements next to her that forced her to take her eyes away from Hermione's Omnioculars and to look at the entrance of the lodge.
Every muscle, every nerve in Ginny's body tensed as she watched Lucius Malfoy, the woman who had to be his wife and their son Draco walk into the box. His gaze wandered across the lodge and fell one moment upon Ginny. She held his gaze nonetheless. It was this man who was responsible of everything that happened during her first year at Hogwarts.
"Lily, you surely know Lucius," the Minister was saying, speaking to Harry's mother. It was then that Ginny realized that Mrs Lily, Harry and Sirius Black were all sitting next to the Minister and his entourage. "His son is about the same age as Harry, isn't he?" he asked, looking at Mr Malfoy who looked almost offended, just like Draco Malfoy, to be even compared in the slightest way to Harry.
"Only too well, Mr Fudge," Lily Evans replied between her teeth.
"Good. Very good. Lucius has just given a very generous contribution to St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries. I invited him personally."
"I see."
Mrs Lily didn't seem more enthusiastic at the idea of being close to Lucius Malfoy than he was to be sitting close to a Muggle-born witch. Ginny noticed he also shot a hateful glare at Hermione.
"Hello, cousin." Sirius Black just stood up, and stared at Draco Malfoy's mother, who looked shocked by his presence. Though Ginny didn't understand for a moment. "Any news of your dear sister?" he further asked.
"Oh, Andromeda is very fine, Sirius," Mrs Lily replied before anyone could say a word. "And she is very proud. You are proud as well, Narcissa, aren't you? After all, your niece just became an Auror."
Ginny didn't understand much, but she found it funny to see Narcissa Malfoy redden out of anger.
"Your niece just became an Auror?" the Minister, who didn't seem to realize what was truly going on, asked in curiosity to Lucius and Narcissa.
"Yes, Mr Fudge," Lily explained. "You met her. Nymphadora Tonks. She is the daughter of Andromeda, who is Narcissa's sister and Sirius' cousin."
"What a marvelous thing," he exclaimed, brightening. "Why didn't you tell me, Lucius? You should have. I would have congratulated your family."
Lucius Malfoy seemed to be fighting urges to scream and insult people around, but instead he replied softly and calmly. "We didn't see fit to bother you with that, Cornelius. We do not boast about our success."
Ginny scoffed.
"If we can call that success," Mr Black said while the Minister, who did not hear him, kept speaking.
"Nonsense. You deserve recognition when it is due, Lucius. But I'm talking too much. Please, take your seats."
To everyone's relief, Fudge indicated a row of chairs in front of the one Harry and his family occupied. Ginny didn't miss the assassin look Harry shot to Draco, and the utter ignorance the Malfoys showed the Potters by ostensibly keeping their backs on them, nor the contempt they displayed towards Ginny and her family. Ginny gave it back to them by turning her back on them too, though Fudge's voice was still clear behind. He kept speaking to Mrs Lily.
"I guess your son is eager to start his new year, aren't you Harry? You must be excited, with everything that is planned?"
"What is planned" Harry asked.
"Oh! You don't know? You didn't tell him, Lily? Well, it's probably for the better. It will be quite a good surprise. Anyway, it's better not to talk about it. I just signed with the other ministers, so…"
"Everyone ready!" Another man just came into the box. Ludo Bagman looked more excited than everybody else. "Minister, ready to go?"
"Ready when you are, Ludo," Fudge replied, settling comfortably in his seat.
Ginny sat down as Bagman pointed his wand at his throat. When he spoke, his voice resonated through the entire stadium, loud, clear, while not piercing Ginny's ears. It was as if his voice came from all corners of the stadium.
"LADIES AND GENTLEMENT!" The chatter in the crowd subsided. "WELCOME! WELCOME TO THE FINAL OF THE FOUR HUNDRED AND TWENTY SECOND QUIDDITCH WORLD CUP!"
The crowd erupted, screams, poundings, claps, shouts, and anthems of all countries sung by thousand of flags, including the one raised by Ginny's father, creating a chorus of cacophony. Ginny's rosette squeaked louder, as if reacting to the excitement of everyone around. The blackboard that displayed the publicity a moment ago now showed the score, zero for each team. Bagman tried to talk a few times but relented as the crowd didn't silence or calm down.
"You want to get back your Omnioculars, Hermione?" Ginny asked her, almost screaming into her ear.
"No, you keep them for now."
Ginny thanked Hermione as Bagman finally managed to place a few words with his still amplified voice.
"And now, without further ado, allow me to introduce…" He made a pause, then declared, "… the Bulgarian Team Mascots!"
On the right side of the pitch, a large panel kind of opened, and… Ginny wasn't sure what to make of it. The mascots of the Bulgarian team were women.
"Aaah!" Ginny heard her father say. "Veela!"
"What are Veela?" Ginny asked. But her father looked totally focused on the show below. "Dad! DAD!" she finally screamed while snapping her fingers in his face. That seemed to awaken him.
"Oh, yes. Vella. Well, they are magical beings. Almost human. Though…"
His voice trailed off, and Ginny found his father's reaction quite absurd. When she looked down on the terrain, the only thing she saw was about a hundred women dancing on the pitch. Well, their shining skin and hair might create some beautiful portrait, but aside from that, Ginny didn't see much of interest. She turned to Ron to ask him a question, only to realize that her brother was drooling, his mouth wide open, his eyes big and fixed on what was happening on the pitch. Quickly, Ginny realized that most people around her were affected, although maybe not at the same level. Even Percy looked to be somewhere else. She grew more worried though when she noticed that Ron stood up and took a posture similar to someone who was about to jump.
"Ron?" she asked, not sure what was happening. Bill and Charlie also stood up, though they didn't seem about to jump. "RON!" He didn't react. "RON!"
She grabbed him by the arm, right when Hermione was doing the very same thing. They both pushed him back into his seat.
"Hey!" he screamed.
"What?" Ginny's father, and also Percy, seemed to have recovered their spirits. Her father, especially, shook his head. "Oh! I forgot how these could make you lose your head."
The dance ended. Ginny's father sighed in relief, as if he just ran for several miles. The rest of the crowd though, including most of her brothers, seemed desperate and asked for the Veela to come back.
"What just happened?" Ron was asking, touching his hat as if he wanted to verify that it was still there. He looked lost.
"Honestly!" Hermione said. Ginny thought the same as half the crowd seemed on the brink of despair, and many green lights had faded away. She shook her head, rearranging her green rosette on her sweater to show she supported Ireland.
"And now…" Ludo Bagman declared, "… kindly put your wands in the air… for the Irish National Team Mascots!"
Ginny hoped that these mascots would be more interesting than the hundred women who now remained behind one of the goalposts and who seemed to entrance all men. Ginny noticed that Hermione was still looking at Ron, a suspicious expression on her face, as if she expected him to do something else stupid. But Ginny's attention was caught by a comet that suddenly appeared over the pitch. It divided into two comets that crated a rainbow covering the whole pitch. The two comets then reunited, and formed a giant, shimmering shamrock in the air that crossed the benches of the whole stadium, letting a generous golden rain fall on the attendants. When they reached Ginny and her family, she realized these were golden pieces.
"Leprechauns!" her father exclaimed, enchanted just like Ginny was.
The shamrock was composed of thousands of these. Everyone seemed to have forgotten about the Veela. Ron raised his hat to collect as many coins as he could.
The leprechauns headed towards to the other side of the pitch, opposite to the Vella, and sat down on the field. Ginny removed a golden piece that had remained stuck in her hair.
"And now, ladies and gentlemen," Bagman announced, "kindly welcome… the Bulgarian National Quidditch Team!"
Half the crowd roared.
"I give you… DIMITROV!"
A figure clad in bright red robes appeared in the air from somewhere in the pitch Ginny couldn't locate.
"IVANOVA!"
New exclamations from the Bulgarian supporters as the only woman on the Bulgarian team raised in the air.
"ZOGRAF! LEVSKI! VULCHANOV! VOLKOV!"
There were new applauses and cheering for each new player flying through the pitch. But the crowd, including Ginny, was awaiting for someone in particular.
"Aaaaaand… KRUM!"
The stadium almost exploded as the best Seeker in the world raised in the air at an impressive speed. Ginny adjusted the Omnioculars so that she could look at him from close. When she first saw him, Ginny struggled to believe that he was only eighteen. He was very tall, muscular. Ginny would have placed him in the thirties. The crowd was ecstatic, chanting Krum! Krum! Krum! Again, and again, and again. Ron joined these screams.
"And now…" Bagman began, trying to bury the cries of the crowd as Ginny looked more closely to Ivanova, the only girl on the Bulgarian team, "please greet the Irish National Quidditch Team!"
The other half of the crowd roared, managing to somehow bury the supporters of Bulgaria. Ginny joined them, along with her brothers and her father, the flag and rosettes chanting and squeaking louder than ever, joining Bagman's voice as he announced the players.
"CONNOLLY! RYAN! TROY! MULLET! MORAN! QUIGLEY! Aaaaaand… LYNCH!"
Despite the Irish supporters doing their best and Ginny joining them to scream as loudly as she could, she couldn't stop the feeling that their encouragements didn't reach the same level as those the Bulgarians, and especially Krum, received. However, Ginny had to admit that she was most especially interested in the Chasers. This was her favourite position in Quidditch, and she couldn't wait to see the game begin.
"And here, all the way from Egypt, our referee, acclaimed Chairwizard of the International Association of Quidditch, Hassan Mostafa!"
The crowd was still shouting, applauding and screaming, but Ginny was sure that it had nothing to do with the very small wizard dressed in golden robes who just came on the pitch. In fact, the noise began to subside a little as he placed a large wooden crate in the central circle. He then kicked the crate open, and Ginny saw the two Bludgers get out with incredible speed. Pointing the Omnioculars straight at the crate, she thought she saw the Golden Snitch escape, but she lost sight of it right away. Mostafa then mounted his broomstick, seized the Quaffle, and sent it up with great force.
"THEEEEEY'RE OFF!"
Bagman barely managed to put effect in his voice as Mullet seized the Quaffle less than a second after it was released.
Only a few seconds were required from Ginny to realize that this kind of Quidditch was nothing like the one she witnessed before. She would never forget the first game she attended, when Harry's broomstick got mad, and he caught the Snitch with his mouth. She was impressed from the very beginning by the chemistry and teamwork of Angelina, Alicia and Katie, similar to that showed by Fred and George, and the talent of Oliver Wood in front of the goalposts. Especially during the last game against Slytherin last year, Gryffindor had played better than ever, and Harry's performance with his Firebolt left her, and everyone at Hogwarts, speechless.
But what she witnessed right now was without common measure. It was almost useless to follow Bagman's commentary. The Chasers were passing and intercepting the Quaffle between them so quickly that he barely had time to say their names. The Irish players managed to make two passes between them before Dimitrov intercepted it, but he immediately lost it to Troy, who lost it again to Levski, before Moran recovered it. The Irish Chasers then managed to keep it for some time, but a Bludger destabilized Moran as he was about to make another pass, which Levski used as an opportunity to take the Quaffle.
The red ball changed hands and teams probably a dozen times, but Ginny soon noticed that despite this, the Quaffle was slowly approaching the scoring area of the Bulgarians. And finally, Moran threw the Quaffle towards the goalposts, only for Ivanova to catch it… Then Troy charged and punched the Quaffle right as it was in her hands.
A cling louder than any Ginny ever heard sounded through the entire stadium, and the crowd exploded.
"TROY SCORES! 10-0 to Ireland."
Ginny screamed her encouragements along with her rosette, her father raising his fist with his flag high in the sky. The leprechauns celebrated as well from behind the scoring area of Ireland. Ginny didn't complain that the Veelas looked beaten down.
The following minutes were a flurry of hopes and worries, as Bulgarians and Irish battled for the Quaffle. It changed hands all the time, and the Bulgarians managed to get two shots at the Irish goalposts, but Barry Ryan, the Keeper of the Ireland team, intercepted each of them. In the meantime, Ireland made three shots that Zograf managed to stop. At the fourth shot, however, Mullet scored, and the Irish supporters celebrated once more.
Ginny had always been awed by the chemistry and synchronicity of Gryffindor's Chasers. But Troy, Mullet and Moran were even better. It was as if they could read each other's thoughts. Moran was the next one to score, bringing the score to 30-0 for Ireland. Ginny now understood why some people said that Bulgaria's victories rested entirely on Krum's shoulders. The Bulgarian Chasers were outmatched at every turn by the Irish.
However, the Bulgarians were still capable. Volkov and Vulchanov, their Beaters, adapted their playstyle and began to send Bludgers more accurately and more brutally on Irish Chasers, forcing them to break their formations. In quite a feat, the only woman on the Bulgarian team, Ivanova, intercepted a pass between Moran and Mullet, then somehow managed to avoid all obstacles leading to the Irish scoring area. When she feinted towards the right ring, then to the left one, to finally placed the Quaffle into the right, she brought Bulgaria on the scoreboard. It was now 30-10 for Ireland.
"Fingers in your ears!" Ginny's father warned everybody. And she saw that each and every one of her brothers were obeying. Only she and Hermione didn't do anything. They watched in amusement as the boys tried to not give any attention to the Veelas. Ginny chanced a look behind towards Harry and laughed hard when she saw that he not only covered his ears, but also closed his eyes, under the watchful gaze of his mother.
Luckily enough, the Veelas were done dancing quickly, and the match resumed. Barry Ryan made a wrong pass that ended in Ivanova's hands, but she couldn't capitalize this time. Ryan stopped the Quaffle, and this time he accurately sent the Quaffle to Troy. The Irish formations were broken by an adjusted, more brutal style of play from Bulgaria, and the Quaffle changed hands several times, mostly around the central circle, without any team managing to get to the other's scoring area. Connolly and Quigley, the Irish Beaters, managed to create a lot of problems to Bulgarians too. Still, Krum's team managed to mount an offensive, and Ivanova was close to the Irish goalposts when Bagman roared.
"Oh, I say!"
Ginny's attention switched immediately to the two Seekers, Lynch and Krum, who were rushing to the ground at high speed. The whole stadium looked at them. Ginny tried to locate the Snitch…
"They're going to crash!" Hermione screamed.
Right when she finished saying that, a loud crack was heard through the stadium. Lynch had indeed crashed on the ground, while Krum pulled out at the very last moment. Ginny looked closely with the Omnioculars to Lynch, who was lying on the ground in an awkward position.
"Fool!" her father was complaining. "Krum was feinting!"
For the time being though, Ginny was focused on Lynch as a mediwizard came to take care of the Irish Seeker. It reminded her of the various times when she witnessed a player crashing on the ground of the pitch at school. Here, it looked even more brutal.
"He'll be okay," Charlie told her. "He only got ploughed. Which is what Krum was after, of course…"
If Charlie wanted to reassure her, he failed. She looked at Krum, who was hovering high over the pitch where Lynch had crashed, his eyes sweeping across the stadium. Ginny understood that he was searching for the Snitch.
Although Ginny understood why Krum did that, she didn't feel right about his move. The Omnioculars told her that he performed a Wronski Feint, a dangerous Seeker diversion. Ginny, however, didn't feel right about the fact that Krum performed a feint with the intent of having his opponent crash. Due to her hatred for Slytherins and their own brutal and unfairly way to play Quidditch, she disapproved of any attempt to injure another player. For the Beaters, she understood. It was their job to use Bludgers against other players, and it was allowed. The goal was not to injure them, really, but more to cause them trouble. But intentionally doing a maneuver with the aim to hurt another player seemed unacceptable to her.
Whatever worry Ginny had for Lynch, he got back on his Firebolt after he swallowed a series of potions, under the cheers of the crowd. And the game resumed.
It was now Ginny's impression that Krum had feinted to gain an opportunity to catch the Snitch, and perhaps to bring a blow to the Irish team. However, he had failed, for Lynch was flying as well as before, and Krum didn't seem about to catch the Snitch. In fact, his maneuver seemed to have the entirely opposite effect on the game. Within fifteen minutes, Ireland led 130-10. Troy, Mullet and Moran played better than ever, outwitting the Bulgarians at every turn. The Bulgarian Chasers failed again and again to reach the Irish goalposts. When the Irish Chasers didn't succeed to stop them, Connolly and Quigley caused them so much trouble that they ended giving up the Quaffle. And Barry Ryan stopped what few shots reached his goalposts. On the other side of the pitch, Lev Zograf had his hands full. Truth be told, Ginny thought he made a good enough job as Keeper, blocking more than half the shots coming in his direction. The problem was that the Irish Chasers shot too often, and too well, so a good performance wasn't enough, and Dimitrov, Ivanova, Levski, Volkov and Vulchanov failed to bring him the necessary help.
The Irish team was boosted by the return of its Seeker, and they played better than ever, dominating the Bulgarian team entirely. Even Krum, the few times that Ginny looked at him, seemed to struggle, with Lynch never far away from him and the Bludgers sent by the Irish Beaters complicating his task. Perhaps it was true that if Krum couldn't get the Snitch quick enough, Bulgaria had no chance of winning.
The Bulgarian players didn't help their cause much. Their teamplay looked almost inexistent right now, and as Ireland increased its advance, Bulgaria made several mistakes. It started when Volkov sent a Bludger towards Ryan when the Quaffle wasn't in the scoring area. Then Levski grabbed Troy by the arm when he tried to take the Quaffle away from him. Ireland scored the two times it got a penalty from these fouls. The nail in the coffin happened when Zograf stopped Mullet in its course to Bulgaria's goalposts. The referee called a foul for excessive use of elbows.
This kind of fouls was always very hard to call, and subject to much interpretation, and while the Irish supporters congratulated Hassan Mostafa, the other half of the crowd shouted in outrage at him.
What happened next was so… unrealistic. Each time Ireland scored, the leprechauns celebrated, and they were also outraged each time Bulgaria committed a foul. The Veelas, in comparison, did almost nothing. This time, however, as the leprechauns mocked the Veela when the penalty for Ireland was obtained, they began to dance. Ginny looked in amusement as her brothers covered their ears once more, but it was nothing like the amusement she felt when she looked at the pitch, and she burst into tears of laughter with Hermione when they realized what was happening.
"Ron!" Hermione was screaming, almost out of breath. "Look at the referee!"
Everyone was laughing at the situation, even Bagman who still called for mediwizard when he realized that the referee had landed on the ground and was standing in front of the Veelas, showing up his muscles. Someone finally came to the pitch, his hands on his ears, and kicked Mostafa hard in the legs, which seemed to bring him back to his senses. He now looked quite embarrassed, but also very angry, and he pointed at the Veelas.
"Mostafa is actually attempting to send off the Bulgarian Team Mascots!" commented Bagman. "Now there's something we haven't seen before…"
The Bulgarians didn't seem to take it well. Their supporters in the crowd booed at Bagman's comments, but their Beaters also came to argue with Mostafa. The referee finally gave two additional penalties to Ireland, and the Beaters accepted to take back their positions, though the Veelas didn't leave the pitch finally.
The Irish team continued to score more goals, and the game turned even more brutal, the Bulgarians using tactics that reminded Ginny way too much of the ones the Slytherins were using. It looked more and more like a match between Gryffindor and Slytherin, between teamwork and individual efforts, between finesse and brutality, between fairness and cheating, between talent and muscles. More than once, players were almost knocked off their broomsticks by the bat of Volkov or Vulchanov. Even the Irish raised the brutality of their strategies, though they managed to avoid as many penalties as Bulgaria because they hit Bludgers towards opposite players, instead of hitting the players directly with their bats. This is what Quigley managed when he sent a Bludger that got Krum right in the face.
At this moment, the match had fallen into complete chaos. The leprechauns and the Veelas had begun to fight on the ground, and the attempts from people of the Ministry to stop them failed miserably. In the meantime, Ireland kept scoring. However, when Krum's nose was broken by the Bludger, a large part of the crowd went silent. Despite this, no time-out was called by Mostafa, whose broomstick had just gotten fire after a Veela threw a fireball at him. Ginny didn't think that boys found these Veelas so attractive now, with their furious appearance of fire eagles.
"Time-out!" Ron was screaming. "Ah, come on! He can't play like that, look at him. His nose is broken!"
Ginny had to admit that she agreed with her brother when it came to Krum. Blood covered his face now.
However, the behavior of the crowd soon changed. Ginny had been so focused on the grounds' events, Mostafa's burning broomstick, and Krum's bleeding nose that she had not noticed, like most people in the assistance, that Lynch had gone diving. She took as much time as most of the crowd to realize what was happening. It was when Krum went after Lynch, managing to tail him, that she realized what was going on. With the Omnioculars, she saw something shining ahead of them.
Everything seemed to slow down. Ginny barely heard anyone around her. All her attention was focused on the two Chasers. Krum, despite probably having an inferior quality broomstick than Lynch, was closing the increasingly short distance between them. They were getting closer and closer to the ground, their trajectories now almost perpendicular to the ground. Ginny felt her heart was going to burst. She held her breath.
This time, she heard nothing when Lynch crashed. But she screamed again, because the Irish Seeker was flooded by a horde of angry Veelas. The Irish Beaters rushed to his help and extracted him from the fight taking place.
"Viktor Krum caught the Snitch!" Bagman announced. Ginny's head jerked up, and she indeed noticed that the famous Seeker was quietly flying up, blood still coming out of his face, but with his right fist raised in the air, an unmistakable glint in his hand. "The game is over! The game is over!"
The scoreboard adjusted immediately, adding one hundred and fifty points to Bulgaria, bringing their small initial score of 10 points from Ivanova's goal to a significant 160 points. However, it wasn't that score that attracted Ginny's attention the most. It was the number of points for Ireland.
170 points.
For a moment, Ginny didn't know how to react. She wondered if what she was seeing was real. She looked back to Krum, still holding the Snitch in hand, then again to the scoreboard, trying to understand. Krum caught the Golden Snitch, and yet Ireland had more points than Bulgaria? It was impossible.
But… No, of course, it was possible. The Irish Chasers scored so many points. They were so superior to their Bulgarian counterparts. And Ginny understood. Ireland had been leading by 160 points. Even with Viktor Krum's catch, Bulgaria couldn't win. The whole pitch had gone silent, even the mascots and the Ministry's officials stopping to fight as they realized what had happened. And then, among the crowd, some cheers and applauses began to be heard, accompanied by the anthem of Ireland sung by flags. The anthem resonated high next to Ginny when her father raised his own flag and screamed. The entire Weasley family seemed to wake up, and Ginny joined them as they cheered.
Bagman's voice was barely understandable in the chaos of celebrations. "IRELAND WINS! I don't think any of us were expecting that!"
The stadium was vibrating like it never had of the entire evening. The leprechauns moved away from the Veelas they were fighting a moment before, and went to cover their players, who had gone to the ground and were dancing under a shower of golden pieces. Even the employees of the Ministry on the ground were cheering for them.
In the other corner of the pitch, the Bulgarians gathered around Krum, who tried to stop mediwizards from attending his wounds, while their Veelas, back to normal appearance, looked like they lost the love of their life.
The rest of the stadium filled with green, the few signs of Bulgarian loyalty vanishing in the sea of festivities from the Irish supporters. Ginny screamed and clapped so much that she no longer heard what Bagman was saying, and anyway she didn't care about what he was saying. All that mattered was to celebrate Ireland's victory. The only thing that stopped Ginny from screaming and clapping longer was a powerful, blinding white light that suddenly caught her from high in the sky.
She covered her eyes and noticed that the box had grown quite silent all of a sudden, although the rest of the crowd was still just as noisy as before. Ginny followed everyone's gaze, and that was when she saw it. A large, golden cup, that looked almost as tall as a grown man, was carried by two men who were panting, and handed it to Cornelius Fudge. Ginny couldn't believe her eyes. She had, right in front of her, the Quidditch World Cup itself, made of gold, displaying two players on their broomsticks with a silvery globe representing the world atop of them. But she barely had time to register her vision that Bagman made an announcement.
"Let's have a really loud hand for the gallant losers… Bulgaria!"
One by one, the players of the Bulgarian National Quidditch Team walked into the box.
"Ivanova! Dimitrov! Levski! Zograf! Volkov! Vulchanov! Aaaaannndddd… Krum!"
When the Bulgarian Seeker walked into the lodge, his nose still bleeding, his face a mess, still holding the Golden Snitch in his hand, the crowd erupted. Ginny politely applauded. She still hadn't forgotten how this player purposefully caused Lynch's first crash. She had to say that, now that she could look at him from up close, and that he wasn't on a broomstick, he looked quite clumsy. It was as if he could barely walk straight.
"And now…" Bagman resumed, as the Bulgarians took place on the right side of the box with their country's officials, "welcome the victors of the four hundred and twenty second Quidditch World Cup… IRELAND!"
And the entire stadium erupted and chanted once more with more force.
"TROY! MULLET! MORAN! CONNOLLY! QUIGLEY RYAN! Aaaaaand… LYNCH!"
Bagman seemed more excited to say the name of the winners, and truth be told Ginny was more impatient to see them than the Bulgarians. Lynch was supported by two of his teammates, looking entirely lost. Then Troy and Quigley seized the Cup and raised it high under the celebrations of the crowd. Ginny's rosette screamed louder than ever, and her father's flag chanted the Irish anthem like it never had in the entire evening.
The Irish players, still carrying their Firebolts, then mounted them and flew through the air, the Cup high as they made a lap of honour around the stadium. Ginny wasn't sure for how long they stayed there, congratulating, clapping, applauding, celebrating, screaming, shouting like one hundred thousand fellow wizards and witches who just attended one of the greatest final in the history of Quidditch. This was a night that Ginny would never forget for the rest of her life.
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Next chapter: Ron