Harry Potter and all associated everything belongs to J.K. Rowling
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Try as she might in the coming weeks, Heather found that it was not easy to keep her word to Hermione about staying out of it. After returning from Slughorn's party and sliding into her four-poster bed, she lay awake for several hours trying to recall every whisper or rumor she'd overheard recently. Meanwhile another part of her busy mind was taken up running through the half discernable faces she'd seen down the corridor only a few hours earlier, trying to identify as many of them as she could. She gave this up after they had lost what little distinction they held in her memory, becoming nothing more than indistinct blobs.
Her desire to get involved became even harder to repress after the Halloween Feast. The feast was one of the most looked forward to events in the term, being both the first real feast since arriving at school and marking a rough halfway point until the Christmas holidays. This year was no different. As soon as they woke up on that chilly October morning, everyone in the castle could smell the tantalizing scents of baking pumpkin suffusing the air even all the way up in Gryffindor tower.
Perhaps it was an attempt to mark this first year after the darkness of the war, but it seemed that the staff was determined to outdo itself this year. In addition to the usual thousands of live bats and carved jack-o-lanterns everywhere, the bannisters of what seemed to be every staircase were festooned with glistening enchanted spider webs, thankfully without any live spiders to go with them. Likewise the school ghosts threw themselves into the spirit of the holiday. Several times during the day lessons across the school came to a sudden halt as half a dozen ghosts burst through solid walls cackling madly or engaging in mid-air duels with their spectral swords. To no one's surprise, Peeves refused to be left out of the fun. He spent an enjoyable afternoon, for him anyway, prowling the castle's corridors invisible, grabbing student's noses at random before zooming away whooping with glee.
The other aspect of the Halloween feast that everyone looked forward too, though with marginally less excitement, was the fact that strange and mysterious events tended to take place that evening. Only the oldest students could remember, for instance Quirrell rushing into the Great Hall screaming about a troll in the dungeon or reading the glistening words on the wall about the opening of the Chamber of Secrets. However, as all great stories tended to do, these had taken on such a mythical status and had been told and retold so often that everyone knew them, even if they hadn't been there themselves.
While Heather had no particular issue with these retellings, she did note that her role in these stories had become warped with time. During her free period that afternoon she overheard a second year boy telling his friends how Sirius Black had broken into the tower and how she had fought him off in a one on one duel. Knowing that the boys could not have noticed her being there, Heather smirked to herself and slid further down. The last thing she wanted to do was talk about Sirius to anyone who hadn't actually known him.
When the school crowded into the Great Hall that evening at seven o'clock, they could see that if the staff and ghosts had pulled out all of the stops, it was nothing to what the house elves in the kitchens had managed to accomplish. All four of the house tables were so laden with countless dishes of food that there was hardly any space left for plates and goblets. Everyone raced to find places on the benches, squeezing in as best as they could. Heather ended up at the end of the table nearest to the staff table next to Hermione and Seamus. In the space of a few minutes no one in the entire hall bothered with such trivialities as talking as they filled their mouths with the sumptuous feast.
Course followed delicious course. As Heather finished cleaning her second plate her mind, which was as heavy with the aftereffects of food as her stomach was, wondered just how she could possibly eat anything else. As though the table or the house elves had somehow read her thoughts, the platters before her vanished, to be replaced a moment later with towering cakes, vats of a dozen different ice cream flavors, and pies and puddings as far as the eye could see. Ignoring her protesting stomach, Heather snatched up the nearest scoop and began to doll heavy mounds of ice cream onto her magically cleaned plate.
A loud commotion on the other side of the hall distracted her and she looked up to see everyone else staring in the same direction. Something appeared to be happening at the Slytherin table. She could hear disjointed sounds of wood scraping on stone floors, like the entire table had gotten to their feet at the same time. Then a moment later what sounded like a hundred or more screams split the air, followed by several loud thumps.
Heather was on her feet immediately, trying to force her mind to work faster than it seemed capable of at the moment. The ice cream scoop fell forgotten from her hand to land on her shoe, depositing a large measure of chocolate ice cream onto her foot. Heather barely noticed the coldness seeping down across her sock as she forced herself to focus. By now everyone else was on their feet, effectively blocking her view of what was happening.
Since she was only ten feet from the end of the Gryffindor table, she quickly scrambled over the bench and dashed around to where she could get a better view of whatever calamity seemed to have befallen the Slytherins. Already harsh laughter was breaking out from the tables closer and this, along with the conversation buzzing everywhere, made it impossible to hear anything else.
She stopped near the owl podium in front of the Headmistress' seat and could see plainly what must have happened. The benches on either side of the Slytherin table were upturned or lying upside down next to their former occupants, many of whom were only now recovering from being dumped to the stone floor.
"They just threw them all out," muttered Ernie who had come to stand next to her and watch.
He had just opened his mouth to continue speaking when, as one, the many platters and tubs laid out along the Slytherin table floated up into the air and then drifted lazily to either side, directly over the still dazed students. A few of the quicker Slytherins who had brought their wands with them managed to cast shield charms in the moment before the many dishes flipped over in midair, but the rest were doused in dessert, some of them getting hit by a second round as the food momentarily supported by their neighbors' shields slid off and onto them. As if to add injury to insult, the dishware then fell to the ground around or on their victims.
All of this had taken perhaps twenty seconds from start to finish, but to Heather it might have been minutes. She watched as the Slytherins all along the table slowly got to their feet, brushing and wiping away the detritus that had been their feast a minute ago. No one came to help from any of the other three tables. They just stood there, some laughing, the rest not making a sound. Even Heather found her feet rooted to the spot with a mixture of horror and disgust.
"Back to your seats!" barked Professor McGonagall, shooing students aside as she raced around the staff table towards the mess with Professors Maufe, Slughorn, and Flitwick on her heels.
Heather obeyed the command and returned to her place on the bench. It took ten minutes before the Slytherin table was set right and more food was sent up from the kitchens. When she was done, Professor McGonagall addressed the hall from her seat looking more livid than Heather could ever remember. The Headmistress' lips, whose thinness was the best measure of how irate she was, were practically nonexistent. "I do not know which of you had any part in this despicable act," she spat out, gazing around the hall and radiating a rage that practically burned. "Let me be perfectly clear. Whoever did this will be caught and punished severely. Now, finish eating and get back to your common rooms."
Heather's appetite was gone. Here and there along the Gryffindor table small knots of students dug into their desserts with gusto, apparently unconcerned at what had just happened. Everyone else finished the feast in silence.
Professor McGonagall was true to her word. The next day she began issuing summons to her office for anyone even remotely suspected of being involved. In the end four Gryffindors and a Ravenclaw were implicated and sentenced to a week of scrubbing the floors of the Great Hall without magic.
Emboldened by this success and seemingly undeterred by the threat of punishment, a sort of free for all on Slytherin house began to break out. In the first two weeks of November Hermione, Neville, and the other prefects were hard pressed to try and keep a lid on the situation. Once again Heather offered to help Hermione track down whoever was behind it all, but she flatly refused. "We're handling it," she said wearily one evening in the common room. "Besides, I don't even think we're dealing with a single group. It's too random for that." Catching sight of the interested gleam in Heather's eyes and realizing she had said too much, Hermione changed course. "Just make sure your team stays in line. I suspect things are only going to get worse the closer we get to the quidditch match.
As usual, Hermione's prediction was spot on. As the match between Slytherin and Gryffindor drew nearer, it became apparent that it had become the focal point of whatever was happening within the walls of Hogwarts. It was clear that everyone outside of Slytherin wanted to see Gryffindor win. No, not just win, Heather decided, they wanted to see Slytherin ground into the dirt.
Traditionally, it was expected for there to be a continual onslaught of taunts and jeers between the houses that would be playing in the weeks leading up to a match. Occasionally these rivalries would escalate to the point of hexes and jinxes, predominantly from Slytherins. In the years that Oliver Wood had led the team, he had made it very clear that Gryffindors could say whatever they wanted in response to taunts, but using wands was out of bounds. Angelina had maintained a similar rule in her one year as team captain.
During her first captaincy, Heather had likewise held to that same standard. So, when she laid it out to her team that she expected them to tow the line no matter what, it was her intention for that word to trickle out to the rest of the house. "Do I make myself clear?" she asked firmly at the start of practice. Ginny, Demelza, Peakes, and Rhys all grunted and nodded agreement immediately, followed half a heartbeat later by Natalie and Coote. Heather eyed both of these latecomers, searching their faces for any sign of resentment or dissent and finding none.
When the news finally got out that Heather Potter wanted whatever was going on to stop, it did, for four whole days. Then a Slytherin second year ended up in the Hospital Wing after a Gryffindor third year had jinxed her coming out of a Transfiguration lesson. He got detention for a week, but the lid was off once again. Hermione doubled down on assigning punishments for even the most minor of infractions, hoping to settle the matter. All it really accomplished was to make her, and by extension Heather, extremely unpopular in Gryffindor Tower.
The problem for Heather was that no matter how hard she tried to stay above it all, the pre-match feelings were starting to take root inside of her without her being entirely conscious of it. While she had maintained over the summer that what house you were in and quidditch feuds were silly school things to be left behind, and had entirely meant it, it was almost impossible to not let the old, ingrained mentality seep back in now that she was constantly surrounded by it. After all, for five of her years at Hogwarts she had lived and died by the quidditch season, with particular emphasis on the Gryffindor-Slytherin match. While some of that fervor might be gone now that she wouldn't be facing Draco Malfoy, it was nowhere close to all of it.
She began to feel that if you could ignore enough of the utter brutality in the school's desire to see Slytherin lose, it was just possible for her to feel the same way. In addition to this, there was the undeniable fact that everyone in Gryffindor house was looking at her to bring home the cup for them. As the date of the match drew steadily closer, she became more and more determined to show them that not only was she a great quidditch captain, but that she wasn't someone they needed to hate just for being who she was.
She stopped pestering Hermione and diverted her entire being into winning the match. Hadn't Professor Brindlemore told her to find something else to live for? Why shouldn't it be quidditch? She still had vague daydreams about going professional after school, so winning could be important for her career as well. Every free minute of her days were filled spending hours with Ginny, revising her strategies and thinking through contingency plans. She even forgot to brood over Neville and Hannah.
There was a part of her that had hoped they might decide that they were better off as friends after Slughorn's party, particularly if it was only a ruse to keep Romilda off of him. If that had happened, she might have been able to move in and convince him that she wanted them to be more than friends instead. Unfortunately, it appeared the exact opposite had happened and he and Hannah were closer than ever.
By the morning of the match, Heather's sole focus was on quidditch. Nothing else could find hold in her mind for longer than a second. Even her dreams all took place on the pitch. The fervor filling the castle had suffused her entirely. Looking back with a clearer mind, she would not be particularly proud of how much she'd let it all get to her, but in that moment it didn't matter. The only thought that penetrated her mind was of winning the cup for Gryffindor. She'd been waiting months for this, had even feared she might never play quidditch again. Now it was here, and she was going to win.
"Good grief, Heather. You're as bad as Angelina," Ginny said to her as they finished dressing for the match down in the changing rooms. Without meaning to, Heather had repeated Angelina's pre-match speech word for word, it being just a rehash of some of Wood's best sermons.
As expected, the weather for the match was not ideal. Thick clouds blotted out the sun, giving everything a dull, lifeless look. Seeing the snitch on a day like this would be next to impossible. Still, Heather reasoned, it would be just as hard on Slytherin's new seeker as it would be on her, and she had much more experience. At least it wasn't raining.
Leading the way, Heather trooped out of the changing tent and onto the pitch to the tumultuous welcome of the crowd. The Slytherin team was already waiting for them in their green robes near Madam Hooch. True to form, they were all larger or taller than their Gryffindor counterparts. Only their seeker was an exception. At Madam Hooch's command, Heather and Urquhart, the Slytherin captain, grasped hands. Urquhart towered over Heather by nearly a foot and did his best to crush her fingers in his massive grip. She refused to flinch even as she lost feeling in the tips of her fingers.
"Mount your brooms," Madam Hooch shouted over the continued screaming of the crowd.
Heather threw her leg over her Nimbus Two Thousand and met the gaze of the new Slytherin seeker, a fourth year boy named Pritchard. He was a weedy boy, so much so that Heather mildly wondered if he'd be blown away in a strong breeze. His face, which was rather pointed, stared avidly at her from under a head of long blonde hair that was tied back. If it weren't for the fact that he wasn't sneering at her, Heather might have found it hard not to imagine that she was looking at a younger version of Malfoy.
Madam Hooch's whistle split the air, momentarily catching Heather off guard. She kicked off with all her strength, feeling the wind whipping through her own hair as the ground fell away swiftly below her. "And there they go!" said a familiar, magically magnified voice. Heather stopped halfway to her usual playing height and pulled her broom around to look at the commentator's box. She was certain her ears had been deceiving her but no, there in the front row of the box, holding the magical megaphone in front of her face was Luna Lovegood. If her long, dirty blonde hair wasn't enough of a giveaway, she was also wearing a lurid pink and orange sweater that only Luna would wear. The only thing missing was her giant lion hat she usually wore when Gryffindor was playing.
"…and Ginny Weasley for Gryffindor grabs the quaffle and flies away. Away she goes towards the Slytherin goal posts." Luna continued, her voice lacking its usual ethereal tone. "Ooh, it looks like Harper of Slytherin is trying to take it from her. That's not very nice. Ahh, well she's dodged it. He doesn't look very happy. She's going for the goal and…she made it!" Luna gave a little jump of excitement. "Gryffindor scores first, ten to zero!"
The stadium loudly proclaimed its approval as Ginny performed a lap of honor around the pitch. Harper must have given up on trying to play Seeker and switched over to Chaser, Heather figured as she remembered what she was supposed to be doing. Once she reached a height of about sixty feet above the ground, she began hunting in earnest for the snitch. Nothing whatsoever glinted inside the stadium. As her eyes moved this way and that, hoping for some glimpse of the tiny golden ball, she marveled at the fact that not only had Luna been allowed to return as quidditch commentator, but she was actually doing a passable job of it. They were now ten minutes into the game and there hadn't been a single mention of Wrackspurts or Loser's Lurgy.
"…A good shot by the Slytherin beater, but, oh no. I don't think it's going to work. No, Rhys Clarke of Gryffindor keeps the quaffle and shoots! Ahh, it didn't go in, but that was a very good save by Slytherin keeper Billingsly." A loud "booo" greeted this pair of compliments for the Slytherin players but Luna appeared not to notice.
The match continued and Heather felt nothing but pride for her team. Try as Slytherin might, they just couldn't match the coordination of the Gryffindor chasers. Only twice did they manage to score during the first hour of the match, bringing the score up to ninety-twenty to Gryffindor. Slytherin's only hope at this point was for Pritchard to catch the snitch before Heather could and bring the match to a merciful end.
But Heather had no intention of simply allowing Pritchard to search uninterrupted. He was doing high orbits of the pitch, sacrificing visibility for safety by staying above the action taking place below. Heather, who was roughly twenty feet below him, decided to show him how a real seeker played. She continued flying slowly until she was near enough to the Slytherin goal post that her face could be clearly seen by Billingsly. Then, screwing up her eyes as though she'd seen something, she abruptly leaned forward on her broomstick and sped off. Sure enough, Billingsley shouted loudly behind her, but Heather couldn't pick out the words through the wind soaring past her ears. She flew through the ongoing match, climbing steadily. The stadium had gone suspensefully quiet as every eye watched her. A quick look back revealed that Pritchard had pulled in directly behind her, just where she wanted him.
A hundred feet above the exact center of the pitch, Heather rolled over and inverted into a nearly vertical dive. She and Pritchard pelted towards the grass below at breakneck speed. Then, with the same precision she had seen Viktor Krum use at the World Cup, she pulled up at the last possible second. Turning her head just enough that she could watch while at the same time ensuring she wasn't going to fly into anything, she saw Pritchard try and copy her movement, but too late. He hit the ground hard and tumbled from his broom to lay prone on the grass.
Madam Hooch's whistle blew, calling for an immediate time out, but it was almost impossible to hear over the cheering of the crowd. She dropped to the ground next to the still figure, followed a moment later by Urquhart. Using this time to search for the snitch uninterrupted, Heather half watched as Pritchard stirred slowly and sat up. He still looked unsteady a few minutes later as he climbed back aboard his broom and took off again. Whatever coordination he had lacked on the ground did not inhibit his flying, however. He flew straight back towards the Slytherin goal posts and began orbiting above them slowly. Inwardly, Heather had to admit she was impressed at his recovery and willingness to pit himself against her again.
Play resumed moments later. To Heather's surprise, Pritchard abandoned his previous tactic and began closely following her as though determined to show her that he wasn't afraid. She ignored him, focusing only on winning the match for Gryffindor, even if it meant having to plow him into the ground again to do it.
A crack appeared in the clouds overhead and the barest sliver of sunshine filtered through to touch the stadium. There! A flash of gold near the base of the Gryffindor goalposts. Heather was already in motion the second she saw it, once more lying flat on the handle of her Nimbus. She dove first, using the dive to pick up the speed she would need after levelling off at ground level. The sight of something green and blonde hair in her periphery told her that her adversary was undeterred by what could easily be mistaken for another Wronski Feint and was right behind her.
The tiny ball was still fluttering this way and that above the grass, seemingly unaware of the two figures tearing towards it. A heartbeat before Heather was able to close her fingers around it and snatch it up, it dodged and tore upwards at a steep angle, leaving Heather momentarily flying in the wrong direction. Because he had been behind and above her, Pritchard was able to recover first and was now in a prime position to win the match. It was Heather's turn to do the chasing now. She pursued the blonde, who's hair was shining familiarly in the pale sunlight. The familiar sense of rivalry coursed through her as she urged her broomstick onwards.
Pritchard's lead didn't make any difference. If he had been flying a better quality broomstick or had more experience playing quidditch Heather probably would not have been able to get around him before he'd caught the snitch. As it was, Heather zoomed up to about five feet behind the tail twigs of his Cleansweep then looped around him. She brushed his hand aside easily and closed her fist around the golden ball, feeling it struggling wildly to escape.
"And that's that," Luna proclaimed happily. "Heather Potter catches the snitch for Gryffindor after some dangerous flying and a good attempt by the Slytherin seeker. Perhaps if he hadn't slammed into the ground, he might have managed to catch it. Still, the final score is two hundred and sixty to thirty."
Heather raised her fist into the air and pumped it as the stadium around her erupted into a deafening, earsplitting roar. She had done it, she had defeated Slytherin for the final time with a perfect record against them. She had beaten Mal… She stopped and swallowed hard. No, she hadn't beaten Malfoy. He wasn't even at Hogwarts. She turned on her broomstick to look at the blonde-haired by she had just beaten, still half expecting to see Malfoy's sneering face looking back at her. Instead, Pritchard was watching her dull eyes. There wasn't any anger there she could see, just the sadness that accompanies loss.
Heahter's heart dropped as quickly as if she had just fallen off her broom. What had she done? So, it wasn't just in fighting that she was able to completely get swept away and lose all sense of reality. How could she have forgotten that she wasn't playing her old rival, or even somewhere remotely close to her skill level. No, she had let herself get overrun in old emotion and quite literally plow a kid into the ground during his first ever quidditch match.
Her team was a dozen feet below her, whooping and hugging each other. They too had just beaten the life out of a team that was nowhere near their level. Her team was good, possibly the best in the school, and while there was no reason at all for them not to play to the maximum level of their abilities, did that mean that she'd needed to get caught up in it?
Pritchard had flown off, dropping slowly back to the ground where the rest of the Slytherin team was trudging off the field with slumped shoulders. That section of the stands overlooking the pass through to the changing tents was filled with students booing them on their way. Heather watched, knowing that there too she had played right into the crowd's hands. They hadn't just beaten Slytherin, she and her team had pulverized them.
An idea suddenly occurred to her, a way to at least try and rectify some of the damage she had just done. She dove, passing her team who looked around quickly to see where she was going. With the snitch still clutched tightly in her hand, she landed a few feet behind Pritchard.
"Hey," she called, running to catch up. Pritchard turned, looking a lot less like Malfoy at this distance. Behind him Heather saw the rest of the Slytherin team look around and stare at her with stony expressions.
Aware of the fact that the noise level of the crowd had diminished enough that her words might be heard by the people in the stands, Heather held out the snitch to Pritchard. "Here, take it. You earned it."
Pritchard made no move to take it. "Why are you giving this to me?" he asked woodenly.
"Because you flew really well today for your first match," she said, reaching her other hand out to grasp his wrist. She raised his hand level with her and pressed the snitch into his palm. It wasn't what she really wanted to say, but for right now it was the best she could do without sounding false. "That was a really good match, Pritchard. Good luck against Ravenclaw, to all of you," she added loudly so the rest of the Slytherin team could hear her.
With that done she returned to air and the embrace of her team, allowing their excitement to drive away any lingering regrets she might have had about how she had played. In much the same way that she hadn't been able to maintain perspective in the run up to the match, it was impossible to remain introspective when she was surrounded by unbridled joy.
"Want to tell me what that was about?" Ginny whispered in her ear as they hugged tightly.
"I'll tell you later," Heather muttered.
As the team changed back into everyday clothes, word spread that a full blown victory celebration was being laid on in Gryffindor Tower. "Right, you lot!" Heather shouted over the excited babble of the changing tent. "That was a great game. All of you played better than I've ever seen before." It was a slight exaggeration, but she didn't care. "You all get next week off practice as a treat. Don't let it go to your heads," she warned seriously as the rest of the team grinned toothily back at her.
It was only as they walked back towards the castle amid a mob of excited Gryffindors that kept breaking out into snatches of "Weasley is our Queen, Weasley is our Queen," that Heather tried to put some semblance of order to what she was feeling. Yes, she held some regret over what had just happened during the match, even if she was still glad Gryffindor won. But, hadn't she been supposed to play to the best of her ability? A mixture of guilt and attempts at reassurance swirled around inside of her as she was swept along back into the castle.
When the portrait of the Fat Lady swung open for Heather, she was certain that a dozen howlers had all gone off simultaneously. A dozen arms reached out and took hold of any part of her they could before bodily pulling her through the portrait hole. Instantly she was surrounded by what felt like the entire house, all of them jumping up and down and screaming her name. People who hadn't said a word to her in months were now acting like they were her best friends as they celebrated Gryffindor's victory.
A finger tapped her on the shoulder, which almost went unnoticed amid all the commotion around her. She turned on the spot, trying her best not to trip on several pairs of feet, to see Lavender standing there, having pushed through the crowd as best as possible, staring firmly at a Heather's knees. She mumbled something that Heather could not make out over the screaming. After leaning forward and asking her to repeat herself, Lavender mumbled "I…I just wanted to say that I'm sorry for how I've been treating you. I see now how much of an arse I've been."
For the span of a single second, Heather felt the same way about this apology as she did about the crowd surrounding her. That Lavender was only apologizing in the high spirits of the quidditch win. But there was something in her eyes, now that she was looking up into Heather's face, that showed true regret. "You're forgiven, Lavender. I understand," Heather replied softly.
But the rest of the crowd was not willing to allow Lavender to have Heather's attention to herself. Everyone wanted to be near her, to talk to her. It eventually reached the point of sheer overwhelmingness, particularly since it felt so false to Heather, that she forced her way out of the center of the crowd and was finally able to really look around the rest of the common room. Hermione was standing on a chair beaming at her. Seamus and Dean were doing some sort of spirited jig near the door to the boy's staircase, although whatever song they were singing, if in fact it was a song at all, was lost in all the noise. Eventually Heather's gaze fell on Neville, who was standing near the fire with Romilda clutching at his arm. She was leering up at him with her most lurid and disgusting expression. Rather pointedly, Heather turned away before either of them could catch her staring.
Out of a need for something to do before any one else got it in their heads to drag her back into the party, she pushed her way through to the food tables that had been pushed against one of the tower's round walls. Trying to distract herself from what she'd just seen, she began idly filling a napkin with food.
"Alright, spill. Something's eating you and it's not just the match," Ginny hissed quietly, appearing out of nowhere beside her.
Irritated at the intrusion and wishing for some time for herself, Heather sighed. "Just once, why can't I have friends who mind their own business?" she asked for the hundredth time, although without any real conviction.
"Let me guess, Neville." Ginny said, rolling her eyes and turning to lean against the table.
"More like the harpy on his arm," Heather muttered back.
She did not need to see Ginny's mouth curve upwards to know she was grinning widely. Her voice said it all. "So, you do like him!"
Now it was Heather's turn to roll her eyes. "What of it, he's with Hannah and…what?"
"Oh, just marveling at how clueless you can be," Ginny retorted with a disbelieving shake of her head. "Heather, you didn't really buy into that whole him and Hannah thing, did you?"
"What are you talking about?" Heather asked, trying, and failing, to act as though she wasn't really interested.
Ginny screwed up her face. "Are you sure you weren't the one to slam into the pitch today?"
"Explain it to me like I'm dumb, alright?" she said irritably. Her stomach had lurched at this reminder of the match.
"That won't be hard," Ginny said mockingly, patting Heather's arm gently. "He likes you. He's only pretending to date Hannah to try and keep Romilda off of him."
"Fat lot of good that's doing," Heather said sourly. Then, as though she had only just processed the first part of what Ginny had said, she whipped around to stare firmly at Ginny. "How do you know?" she asked seriously, both her food and irritation forgotten.
"Because he told me so weeks ago!" Ginny exclaimed exasperatedly. Misreading Heather's face she added, "And no, I didn't tell him anything. He brought it up."
Heather spun on the spot, her eyes searching out Neville in the throng, hoping more than anything that what she had just heard was the truth. Sure enough, there he was smiling at her in a way that all of a sudden seemed to make her knees melt. Some on had started a chant that Heather could hardly hear through the pounding in her ears, and Neville was clapping along with them, although it was possible that this was more to keep Romilda from latching onto him again. Presumably whatever they were chanting was about her because she was dimly aware that everyone else in the common room had turned to face her.
A rush of feelings too numerous to even begin counting raced through Heather and suddenly she and Neville were much closer than they had been a moment ago. Her legs had begun pumping, carrying her forward of their own volition at a rapid pace. Hot, fiery anger swelled in her chest as she saw Romilda, who was clearly unaware of the approaching danger, snake an arm up Neville's back and into his hair. What could have been fear flashed momentarily across Neville's face as he realized that the speeding bullet that was Heather was coming directly for him. Romilda must have seen the look too because she suddenly whirled around, her face turning a ghostly white at the sight of Heather bearing down on her.
She clutched vainly at Neville, hoping that somehow he could protect her from Heather. But not even Voldemort returned to his full power would have denied Heather from achieving her goal. Her hands filled with aa strength she could no more explain than control, and she grabbed wildly at Romilda's hair which, as always, flowed freely over her shoulders and down her back. Her fingers locked into the dark strands of hair with a vice like grip. "GET OFF MY BOYFRIEND!" Heather howled with rage, yanking the fistfuls of hair and sending Romilda sprawling to the floor.
The common room had gone so quiet that you could have heard a knut drop in a dormitory upstairs. Heather was still unaware of this, rendered temporarily deaf by a combination of blood rushing and ringing from her scream. All she knew was that Romilda had not moved from her place on the carpet, and that she would regret it if she dared to try. Abruptly, her view of the girl curled on the rug was blocked as a large, familiar presence interposed itself between the two of them. Heather looked up.
"Boyfriend?" Neville asked, looking slack jawed as though he'd been hit by a bludger.
The anger seeped away, Romilda was now completely forgotten. In fact, everything inside of her seemed to drain away. Unfortunately, this also included her ability to think straight. Romilda who? Dizziness took over, caused no doubt by the way that he was now smiling down at her.
"Well," she said in a watery chuckle once she remembered how to get her mouth to form words, "it's what you wanted, right?" She faltered, afraid suddenly that Ginny had somehow been wrong and that this was all some sort of terrible nightmare. "Right?" she asked again, her voice now quavering.
Neville reached out and wrapped his arms around her. "Absolutely right," he replied, scooping her up. Then his lips found hers and suddenly Heather wasn't aware of anything else.
"It's about damn time," Ginny said softly on the other side of the common room.
"Says you," grumbled Seamus, who had moved next to her. He fished in his pocket and extracted a galleon that he slapped into Ginny's waiting palm.