POV of Parvati Patil

On Saturday, I was in an incredibly good mood right from the moment I woke up. Right after breakfast, James and I would fetch his Nimbus to head to practice. Unfortunately, neither I nor Professor McGonagall had received a response from my parents since she wrote to them about me being accepted into the house team. She had also requested that they get me a broom. Until I had my own broom, I would have to make do with one of the old school brooms.

As we sat at breakfast, Hermione, who was sitting next to me, borrowed the Daily Prophet from Seamus Finnigan, who had already read it since he had been in the Great Hall longer than we had. Although I usually didn't read the newspaper, I curiously glanced at it while I ate my cereal. The headline on the front page immediately caught my eye: 'Gringotts Tightens Security Measures.' Interested, I began to read the article:

'Following the break-in a few weeks ago, where the perpetrator targeted the contents of a vault, the head of Gringotts Bank has announced that the security systems will be renewed and expanded. According to a representative of the Aurors investigating the case, this is a step in the right direction to prevent further incidents of this kind. Although the theft was unsuccessful at the time, the search for the perpetrator is still ongoing. Any information should be reported to the Ministry of Magic[...]'

I didn't read any further, as at that moment Jenna, my owl, landed on my shoulder, causing me to flinch and knock over my, fortunately almost empty, bowl of cereal. She held the letter in her beak until I calmed down and took it from her. I briefly searched one of the pockets of my robe until I found the packet of owl treats, from which I offered her one. She gratefully took the treat and flew outside. Still preoccupied with the newspaper article, I put the letter in a pocket of my robe to read later. 'I hadn't even realized there was a break-in at Gringotts,' I began to bring up the topic. 'Not surprising, considering you haven't read the Daily Prophet once in the last three weeks,' Hermione replied with a slightly snippy tone. 'There's usually nothing interesting in it, especially the articles by Rita Skeeter, I don't like them much,' I defended myself. 'Crazy that anyone would be so insane to break in there…' Ron interrupted us. 'They say there's no safer place than Gringotts... Except maybe Hogwarts. It must have been a powerful wizard who knew the security system well enough not to get caught, even if he didn't get to the contents of the vault.' 'I think so too,' James agreed. 'I wonder what was in there... There's a rumor that whatever was in there is now being kept elsewhere.' 'Hmm…' I pondered aloud. 'I doubt the thief was just after money. There must have been something almost unique in there, or else the thief could have gotten it elsewhere. I mean, if you have the choice between breaking into Gringotts or somewhere else, you'd never voluntarily choose Gringotts.'

'Rivers, Patil, practice starts in ten minutes. Don't be late, or you'll be running penalty laps,' Wood interrupted us before he left the hall himself. Since James and I had no particular desire to run instead of fly, we headed straight to the common room to get his broom.

When we arrived at the Quidditch pitch nine minutes later, which seemed quite record-breaking to me considering we had to go up to the seventh floor and back, Wood handed us our Quidditch robes. These had been specially made for us and were entirely scarlet except for the crest on the chest and the writing on the back. Our surnames were embroidered on the robes in shimmering gold , we barely had time to admire the robes, as Wood impatiently looked us over and sent us to our respective changing rooms, where the others were already getting changed. In the girls' changing room, Angelina and Katie were already waiting for me, both fully dressed and chatting. 'So, which broom model will we see you flying?' Katie asked me curiously. 'With a school broom, I'm still waiting for a response from my parents…' I admitted, a little sadly. 'They can't be serious about leaving you without a broom,' Angelina said indignantly. 'How often do first-years even get a chance at a spot on the Quidditch team..! And they don't even bother to get you a broom?!' 'You should talk to McGonagall or Wood again; they won't let you fly on such an old model. After all, they want Gryffindor to finally have a chance at victory this year!' Katie recommended. I just nodded and quickly changed so we wouldn't get in trouble with Wood for taking too long.

When we arrived on the field, he handed me one of the newer school brooms, which was still quite old. He immediately promised to speak with Professor McGonagall about this issue again, as he considered the school brooms to be a disgrace. As expected, the practice didn't go nearly as well as last week, when I flew with James' broom, due to the much worse and slower school broom. I constantly misjudged the broom because I was still used to the good acceleration and steering of the Nimbus 2000. As a result, the timing for passing the Quaffle was off, as I often didn't arrive quickly enough where I needed to catch it. This led to increasing frustration towards the end, and I was glad when the practice was over. Back in the changing room, Katie and Angelina tried to cheer me up by saying that I would soon get a better broom and that the practice hadn't gone as badly as I thought.

After I had finished changing, I said goodbye to the two of them rather tersely. The next training session would take place next week. At that moment, I wasn't sure if I should even look forward to it. With a bit of luck, I might indeed have a better broom by then. They were right that there was no point in being so pessimistic. McGonagall would surely take care of it. At the very least, I firmly resolved not to let this spoil my weekend.