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Chapter 23

Halfway between Christmas and Easter, Hogwarts had the half term break, and with that came Quidditch. Gryffindor had beaten Hufflepuff by a hundred and twenty points before Christmas, as Cedric's replacement on the team didn't have his flair or experience to match Harry, not even when Harry was flying his Nimbus. Today would be different, however, with it being the Gryffindor versus Slytherin grudge match. Harry and the team were unwilling to give any ground or give up an advantage, so he was going to be flying his Firebolt in a Quidditch match for the first time ever. Of course, Malfoy had his own adventure with a Firebolt previously, but now it was Harry with the Firebolt and he was sure Malfoy was going to try and even the score somehow. However, Harry knew he was a better flyer than Draco, who was only on the team because his father had bought the whole team Nimbus 2001s that year. More importantly, though, Harry had over a year of flying with his Firebolt now outside of Quidditch, so unlike Draco he was well versed in what the broom and he were capable of together.

Ron was agitated once again, as the Slytherins had started singing "Weasley Is Our King", but as Fred and George had told him it was a good reminder of his first game when he had done well. The redhead was still nervous, but he wasn't the wreck of nerves the Slytherins were hoping for. When it was time to go down to the pitch, Hermione and surprisingly Lavender went down with them. When Hermione gave Harry his now traditional good luck kiss, Lavender did the same for a rather stunned Ron. Harry couldn't help but laugh at the stunned look on Ron's face, and just before they disappeared into the changing rooms he flashed Lavender a thank you smile. Whatever her intentions with Ron, she had gotten his mind off his nerves.

After they had all gotten changed into their Quidditch uniforms, the girls came over to the guys changing rooms and Angelina gave her version of Wood's old pre-match speech, much to the ribbing of the twins. Then, they made their way out onto the pitch. While they were in the changing rooms, the Quidditch stands had filled and almost the entire school was sitting in the stands. The Gryffindor-Slytherin match was always the most anticipated of the year, as the animosity between the two Houses always tended to bleed over onto the pitch, and it led to somewhat exciting matches. Lee Jordan was doing the commentary as usual, and Madam Hooch was warning them that she wanted a clean game, giving the new Slytherin captain a significant look as she said that. At Madam Hooch's whistle Harry kicked off from the ground and felt the cares of the world fall away. He actually had to fight a little not to transform into his Falcon form as he felt the wind rushing through his hair, and he was filled with the joy and freedom only flying could bring.

Lee Jordan's commentary filled the stadium, and Harry listened to it as he started his search for the snitch. "And they're off. Montague takes the Quaffle first and passes to Warrington, who charges straight for the Gryffindor goals. He fumbles the shot thanks to a Bludger from one of the Weasley twins. Keeper Weasley passes the quaffle to Johnson, who passes to Bell, then to Spinnet. You can see why they earned the name 'The Flying Foxes of Gryffindor.' The Weasley twins send both Bludgers up the field trying to clear the way, but Pucey evades them and tackles Spinnet for the quaffle. Crabbe and Goyle try to send the bludgers back at the Gryffindors. Spinnet takes back the quaffle and tries to pass to Bell, but it's intercepted by Warrington who takes a long shot at the goal hoping to catch Keeper Weasley off guard, and he scores."

The Slytherin stands erupted in cheers and started once more to sing their song.

"Weasley cannot save a thing,

He cannot block a single ring,

That's why Slytherins all sing:

Weasley is our King."

The Slytherins were using their size and broom advantages to push around the Gryffindor chasers, but Harry knew the girls had the experience and teamwork advantage. He was flying back and forth, up and down the pitch trying to spot the glint of gold that was the snitch. After some of his previous Quidditch games, he knew now to specifically check places where the snitch might hide itself, such as the twigs of the broomsticks they were all flying. He even carefully stuck his hand in the twigs of his own Firebolt to make sure the snitch wasn't hiding there.

Harry was just turning around to do another pass of the pitch when he spotted Malfoy diving for the snitch. Harry put on a burst of speed and did his best to catch up, but Malfoy had just enough of a lead that Harry had to push his broom to its top speed as he dove to catch up. That's when Harry noticed something strange. Malfoy was diving for a point, and his falcon instincts were telling him that was how you dove for a rat or mouse that had stopped moving. But they were hunting flying prey, and flying prey doesn't stay still, which meant Malfoy's dive was a feint. Harry angled his dive to be less steep so that he would shoot right past Malfoy as he came out of his dive. As he flew by Draco, Harry shouted just loud enough to be heard over the wind, "Nice try." Then he climbed back into the air to continue his search.

As the match carried on, the Slytherins still managed to hold a 30 - 20 lead, and as it often did with the Slytherins, it seemed that the game would most likely come down to the snitch. Malfoy tried feinting Harry two more times, but to Harry it always looked fake with Malfoy making the same mistake of diving for a fixed point every time.

After about two hours of game the Slytherins called a timeout, and Harry summoned a water bottle up to himself from the pile of water bottles as he and the rest of the team flew over to Angelina to see what their team captain had to say.

"Right, we are holding our own, but it looks like it's going to come down to the snitch. Harry, what do you think? I saw Malfoy diving for the snitch more than once."

"He is feinting. I think he wants to make me crash like I did to him before," Harry told her his suspicions.

Ron chipped in, "Well at least if he is focusing on you, he isn't looking for the snitch."

"But what's he going to do when he realises his feints aren't going to work?" one of the twins asked.

"I'll just have to watch my back," Harry said.

Angelina went on to tell the chasers a few plays she wanted to try and gave everyone a few words of encouragement before the whistle blew and it was back to the game. Harry hadn't even managed to make one pass of the pitch before a Bludger came hurling at him. Harry dodged it easily and went back to his searching, only for the second one to come flying at him a little less than a minute later. That was the start of Crabbe and Goyle targeting Harry for the rest of the match. The two Slytherin beaters kept up their barrage of Harry, to the point where he could do nothing else but evade the flying cannonballs or be knocked off his broom.

This meant Slytherin's chasers were doing better, as they were used to not having particularly competent beaters backing them up, whereas Gryffindor was used to having the twins clear out at least some of the opposing chasers. Also, now the only seeker really looking for the snitch was Malfoy. Still, Harry wasn't ready to throw in the towel yet, and he had Fred and George backing him up. Harry would use his faster broom to fly to the other end of the pitch and the twins would intercept the Bludgers as much as they could and send them back at the Slytherins, but after a few minutes Malfoy's bookends would get them and send them careening towards Harry again. His game became to search for the snitch, dodge the Bludgers, fly to the opposite side of the pitch, and repeat. He did admit that unless he got really lucky, the only way he was going to catch the snitch was if he passed Malfoy on the chase. Yes, Harry had the faster broom, but if Draco had enough of a lead then Harry wouldn't be able to catch up to him.

Harry spent the next hour trying to stay seated on his broom and thinking of a better way to do this. He thought about flying close to the Slytherin chasers, so that any shot that missed him had the chance to hit one of them, but the Slytherins just boxed him in and forced him to either foul them to get out, giving them a free shot at a goal, or take the hit. Then he thought about flying between Crabbe and Goyle, hoping that they would get hit with a bludger that missed him, but unfortunately the move he had quickly dubbed in his head as the Looney Tunes manoeuvre required either impossible timing or monumental amounts of luck.

Then Harry saw it: a glint of gold flying over them that was catching the light of the late afternoon sun. Malfoy hadn't seen it yet and Harry was closer. He turned his broom to face the snitch and pushed his broom as hard and as fast as he could. Unfortunately for Harry, Malfoy may not have seen the snitch, but with Crabbe and Goyle targeting him there was no way they would miss him going for the snitch. He avoided the first of the Bludgers no problem and was closing in on the snitch. Malfoy at this point had seen Harry going for the snitch and was chasing Harry but he was so far behind that it didn't matter at all. Harry's hand reached out and took hold of the snitch, and just as he raised his hand in triumph there was a solid impact of a Bludger hitting him in his side.

As Harry only had one hand on his broom at this point and that was the side on which he was hit, Harry was knocked off his broom and sent hurtling towards the ground below him. Without taking any time to think, he reacted by shifting into his falcon form. Somehow, during the shift the snitch ended up in his claw, even though he was holding it in his hand and his claw was one of his feet. Harry didn't have time to wonder about that, though, as he was in an uncontrolled dive and if he didn't do anything about that he wouldn't be doing any more thinking at all.

Harry spread his wings as much as he could so that he would catch as much air as possible and slow him down, converting vertical falling to forward movement. It hurt a lot, the Bludger hit had done something to his left side and the strain was making it feel like Harry had a knife in his side, but he clenched his beak and bared it. It was close, he actually felt the grass on his talons before he was able to finally start rising again. Harry shifted back to his human form as soon as he was at head height again and landed with a bit of a thump, promptly falling on his ass - he really did still need to work on his landings. Harry got back to his feet and once again held up the snitch in victory.

The match was over, but the Slytherins were calling foul and accusing Harry of cheating. However, as Harry had caught the snitch before being unseated from his broom and therefore only used his animagus form after the game had ended, it was outside of the game. Even if it hadn't been, Harry had only used it to protect himself from a fall, and the rules of Quidditch clearly said that any method an unseated player uses to prevent injury from falling is allowed as long as it doesn't interfere with the game. In short, Harry had done nothing wrong. There was some talk from the Gryffindor's about whether the last Bludger to hit Harry was legal as well, as the game had ended at that point, but the ball was already flying at Harry before he caught the snitch, so it was just one of the unfortunate downsides of playing Quidditch. Harry also got lucky with his Firebolt, the broom had a feather fall slowing charm on it to prevent it getting damaged if the rider was unseated, and Katie had caught it out of the air as she had been flying to help Harry until he had caught himself.

He was escorted by Hermione to the hospital wing to get the hit checked out, but it turned out to only be some bruising on his left side. Hermione made him lay on the hospital bed with his shirt off as she applied a bruise paste and some bandages, mostly just to keep the paste from his clothes. Harry just let her play nursemaid and see to his side, it was probably one of the more modest Quidditch injuries he had ever received and he had had worse from his cousin growing up, but letting Hermione do this was the easiest way to prove he was just fine.

"So how big do you think the Gryffindor party is going to be?" Harry asked, knowing the twins were going to go nuts.

"I already have my homework for the week done because I'm pretty sure I'm not getting any sleep tonight," Hermione admitted, and they both laughed.

-ϟϟϟ-

With Easter quickly approaching, Harry and Hermione were now in full revision mode. Hermione had written out revision schedules for both of them that weren't very accommodating to any other pursuits the two normally had. The Patronus lessons were cut to once a week, with only Hermione teaching them while Harry's night off was devoted to Quidditch practice. The only real stress relief the two teens had was their date nights in the Room of Requirement. Harry even cut his weekly French lessons with Fleur, which was just as much for her as him as she was about to sit her Important exams as well. The rest of the time it was an all out focus on their O.W.L.s.

The trial of Umbridge finished, and the results provided the Prophet with a few days of stories. Umbridge was sentenced to just two years in Azkaban, but all her assets were seized and would be sold with the proceeds shared among her victims. From what the teens were able to work out, Umbridge had too much dirt on top people in the Ministry to get a full sentence. Still, in two years when she got out she wouldn't have a Knut to her name, none of the purebloods would want to to associate with her, and the marginalised people who would normally support each other would remember her as the one who made things so bad for them and shun her. According to Kathryn it wasn't uncommon, a number of werewolves like Greyback liked to bite people who were anti-werewolf, and those people had difficulty ever being accepted among the werewolves. They often become lone wolves off on their own or trying to hide their condition.

A number of Umbridge's victims were either released from Azkaban from a frame job or had the records against them that prevented them from getting decent jobs overturned. However, the only things that weren't overturned were the laws she had helped put in place regarding werewolves and part humans. This upset Harry and Hermione the most, but there was little they could do about it, as not only did neither of them have a say on the Wizengamot but also they had to focus on their exams.

The lycanthropy students were still riding the high of what happened to Umbridge, but as Hermione said to Harry, "considering the number of anti-werewolf laws the woman had pushed through, Umbridge was like their boogeyman." While it was true this didn't mean that anything would instantly get better for them, it did mean that things wouldn't keep getting worse at the same rate, and that must have felt like a massive relief. Another immediate positive was that although the requirement for lycanthropy students to wear arm bands was still in effect, it was no longer enforced by anyone, so most of the students who were supposed to wear them left the hateful things off, and some even went as far as to throw them into the fires in their common rooms.

The next day, Harry got a letter from the Ministry and was reminded about something he had forgotten about. Aunt Petunia was dying. The letter was a request from his aunt for Harry to go and visit her. His first instinct was to just say no, after all he didn't owe her any of his time after everything she and her husband had done to him while he lived with them. But it was still his aunt, she was literally half of all the blood relatives Harry had left, and that made it more complicated.

He spoke to Hermione, Fleur, and Remus about it, but their answers were basically that it was his choice and that they would support him no matter what he decided. Harry purposely avoided talking to Tracey about it, thinking that she didn't need to worry about something that would bring up memories of her parents, with the Weasleys out for the same reason. That left one more person at Hogwarts he could talk to: Daphne. They met in the Room of Requirement, not needing to be worried about being seen together any more now that she was part of the House of Potter. The Slytherin girl had most people convinced that she was using Harry and his position as a Warlock to prevent an arranged marriage and he was her useful idiot, but Harry didn't want to be overheard for this conversation and the Room of Requirement was both out of the way and comfortable.

"So Harry, what is this about?" Daphne asked from the large overstuffed armchair where she sat curled up with a hot mug of tea in her hand courtesy of Sassy.

"My aunt is requesting I visit her this month before the full moon. The healers are apparently saying it's unlikely she will survive another transformation." Harry had his own mug of tea but he was just holding it for the moment and not drinking it.

"What are Hermione and Fleur saying about it?" She asked.

"That it's up to me and they will support me no matter what decision I make. Which honestly doesn't help me one bloody bit. What am I supposed to do?"

Daphne gave him a look of slight pity and said, "Well, unfortunately no one can work that out but you. But I can help you break it down into more manageable questions if you like." Harry nodded so she continued. "The first question is, what do you think the possible reasons your aunt wants to speak to are?"

"Well…there is the slim possibility she wants to make amends before she dies, probably more out of fear that my mother is waiting for her on the other side than any genuine remorse. Or she could want to beg me to pay for a healer to prolong her life, but I doubt it. The aurors I spoke to said it would cost about ten thousand galleons a year to treat her, as she is a muggle and isn't covered by St. Mungo's like witches and wizards are."

"You seem to think she would be too ashamed to come to you for help," Daphne interrupted.

Harry gave a small snort of derision. "People who have a working sense of shame don't lock children in a cupboard for a week."

"True enough," Daphne conceded the point. "Any other reasons?"

"I wouldn't put it past her to want to speak to me just so she can tell me it's all my fault and how I destroyed her perfect little life with all my freakiness."

"So it boils down to blaming you, asking for help, or asking for forgiveness. All you have to do now is answer how would you feel about each of those options and compare to how you would feel if you didn't go at all. What is the worst possible scenario for you? Is it your aunt proving that she is exactly the person you have known her to be for years, or is it always wondering if she would have surprised you in the end?"

That got Harry thinking. How bad would his aunt truly be able to make him feel if she went off on one? He was long past caring about anything that woman said to him. But, the wondering could eat at him for years. Harry let out a sigh as he realised what he had to do.

"So you have your answer then?" Daphne asked.

"Yeah. Though now I have it, I think the reason it was so difficult until now is that I really wanted it to be the other answer," Harry told her.

She nodded. "Yeah, what you want and what you need don't line up as much as we would like."

"Speaking of, how are things with your parents?" Harry asked, knowing that Daphne still exchanged letters with her parents.

"They are good. They are mostly encouraging me to focus on my O.W.L.s and to keep my head down. They are working on my grandfather, but he is a stubborn old bastard. He is refusing to believe that some of his old friends are Death Eaters and is accusing my parents, me, and even you of slandering them. I honestly don't think he will ever come around now unless it was publicly proven or they admitted it to him, and of course they won't do that because they know he will instantly drop them. That's the one positive with his extreme neutrality position, he will drop anyone working for Voldemort the moment he has proof."

That was interesting, and Harry started to have ideas about how he could prove to the man who the Death Eaters were - after all, Warlock Greengrass was also the head of the family business, and if he could cut off their access to that it could really slow them down.

A/N

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