Intention. In all things both on the stage and off, nothing is more telling than intention. Despite what one may have heard from a cynic, it is only through intention that one may get to know others. How else can someone be known if not for and through their desires, wishes, and intentions?

That was a constant theme throughout the next few weeks. Sports tryouts were held the second weekend of the term and play auditions were held the subsequent weekend. Link had a sense of focus and drive that Evergreen had noticed was pretty much non-existent during the first week. It was refreshing to see Link having kind of returned to his old self.

Why was that? Well, Link and Evergreen were finally able to try out for the school sports teams! Evergreen had absolutely zero plans to try out, but Link fully intended to do so and for that reason, Evergreen was going to support his friend all the way and go to his tryouts and his games. It was the least he could do, after all.

It was breakfast on Friday, September 7th and a bright sun was peering through the many windows in the commons. Evergreen was still stuffing his face, but Link was so excited for Quodpot tryouts that all he managed was an apple and two pieces of toast. Well, at least he managed that, right?

"I'm gonna make forward chaser, I just know it! They're looking for three this year. I really think I have a chance!" Link happily exclaimed.

"No one deserves it more than you, Link." Evergreen said with a laugh.

"Thanks nerd! You will actually come to the games this year, right?"

"I don't know…" he replied with an evil smirk.

"Hey now, that's not fair. You promised!"

"I'm only kidding, bro. Of course I'll be there! When did you start taking things so seriously?"

It wasn't long until Link, other hopefuls, and friends made their way through a small thicket of trees just outside of the Steward Courtyard. Beyond the thicket were two sports stadiums. One was for Quodpot, the popular sport, and the other was for the European game Quidditch. Link had no plans to try out for Quidditch, but he told Evergreen that he still enjoyed taking in the games. He had been to the Quidditch World Cup twice. Still, when it came to gameplay, he was 100 percent a Quodpot man.

Because Evergreen didn't even know the rules and gameplay of the No-Maj games basketball, baseball, and football, much to Dad's chagrin, Link took it upon himself to owl-order Evergreen a small Quodpot handbook. It was read cover-to-cover within 48 hours.

"Quodpot," Link had reminded Evergreen, on their way over to the stadium, "is a simple game, really. There are eleven players on each team. Four forwards, three midfielders, three defenders, and a goalie. There is one ball called the Quod and it explodes after a set amount of time. The object is to either get the Quod into the other team's basket, or to make sure the ball explodes while in the other team's possession. If your team makes it into the basket, you get 10 points, if the Quod explodes when held by your teammate, you lose 10 points, and that teammate is out until after halftime. First team to 100 wins!"

"Have you ever held an exploding Quod?" Evergreen asked hesitantly.

"Sure did," Link replied, moving his broom to his right shoulder, "It knocked me down on my butt and it hurt like hell, I'll tell you!"

"Here's hoping you don't have any exploding balls today, then!" Diva said brightly, eliciting snickers from both boys. She was oblivious.

It was good for Evergreen to get out of the castle and do something like this, even if he was only spectating. When he met with Professor Woods earlier in the week, she had encouraged him to get involved in things that were fun and things that he didn't really need to think about. She said that all work and no play is the perfect recipe for burnout. It was helpful for doing away with the nagging feeling of guilt for Mom he was experiencing that first week of school.

When they got to the field, Evergreen was kind of taken aback. Those stands could easily fit 5000 people or more. Plus, the field was a massive oval with a midfield line with a circle smack dab in the middle and two baskets of either long end of the oval filled with some kind of liquid also surrounded by a circle only three times the diameter of the baskets. According to the handbook, any team member may fly anywhere within the stadium as high as they would like, but if they go out of the boundaries, they are disqualified from participating in that specific half. It was kind of like they had held the exploding Quod, only there wasn't a point subtraction to it.

Evergreen, along with Andie and Glade took a seat in one of the middle most sections as Link went down to meet with the group of maybe three dozen students between the ages of 13-17. Glade mentioned that she had observed many games of Quodpot during her time, so she told her No-Maj raised friends that she'd answer any questions about it to the best of her ability.

"I can't hear what they're saying." Andie said, standing up and straining her ear to hear.

"Should we get closer?" Evergreen asked.

"No need. It's not like a stage play, Evergreen. You don't need to hear it, just keep your eyes open." Glade laughed.

"I know sports are different from theater!" he replied.

"Don't get your panties in a twist. Just sit down and watch." Came Glade's response through a wide smile.

So, watch is what they did.

Eventually, every person with a broom was in the air. Link was floating with a group of younger-looking students from their house. Maybe eighth and ninth graders. There was another group across from them with a few familiar older Thunderbirds. Christoff Jerrod was with them.

Then, tryouts officially began. Brooms were zooming every-which-way. Link himself was seen tearing across the field faster than a ballistic missile. There were several quods that were being tossed about. Some of them made it into a basket, others flew out of sight.

There was a striking, older girl with dark skin and short, black hair who looked like she may have been a junior or a senior who was apparently leading the tryouts. She kept barking orders to many of the flyers and Evergreen guessed she was being heeded because every time she yelled anything; the hopefuls changed what they were doing.

Link got ahold of the quod and passed it off to a girl nearby. She passed it back and when he caught it, it apparently began smoking. Immediately, he threw it away. In that moment though, when it was just outside of his arm's reach, it exploded. He stumbled and Evergreen feared that he would fall off his broom. That he briefly did, but he just twisted his body in midair and managed to hook the broom behind his knees. It was an incredible move! It was so smooth, Evergreen almost thought it was choreographed. Many of the hopefuls whooped and hollered at the display, Evergreen and their friends joined in.

Later during the tryout, Christoff leapt from his broom and held it like it was a baseball bat, smacking the quod into the basket 20 yards away. It was ingenious and Evergreen heard Glade's voice catch. According to her, not many players can manage that move. Of course, thought Evergreen, how many people would have the guts to even try something like that? The guy was maybe 100 feet from the ground and at that height, gravity could make quick work of anyone doing anything stupid.

At some point, the team captain, as far as Evergreen could guess, started getting everyone started on a variety of drills. She was intense, for sure. They may have been just to test flying ability or reaction time. In the one, the hopefuls were to start at the one end of the field and to fly as quickly as they could to come to a complete stop at the other basket. People flew by in a blur. Evergreen realized just how fast Link's Sequoia broom was. Blinding! They also did this drill where every hopeful was to hang off the edge of their brooms and to pull themselves up several times. I couldn't even do one pull-up! Evergreen mused to himself. Later, some of the bigger returning players were tasked to try and knock the hopefuls off their brooms. That part scared Evergreen and his friends just a bit. Link managed to hold his own though, versus some 17-year-old boy who could've been double Link's weight. Good for you, my friend. Don't you move from your broom.

The whole process just spoke to how physical a game Quodpot must be. Not for the first time, Evergreen expressed how glad he was that Link had not succeeded in getting Evergreen to try out with him. Sure, he loved the feeling of flying on a broom, but broom racing fit the bill for him. He didn't need the glory of throwing a ball whilst flying at 100 miles per hour or something. In fact, he didn't feel like he needed any sort of glory. He was simply Evergreen, after all, and he was fine with that. Plus, why would he want to attract the attention of hundreds of people he didn't really know when the attention he got from his friends and favorite teachers was all the energy that his small social battery could manage? He wasn't crazy, well, at least not entirely.

"Did you see me?" Link asked breathlessly, dripping with sweat, and nearly dragging his broom across the grass to catch up with Evergreen and the girls.

"You were a little hard to miss." Andie replied.

"Yeah, you were quite aggressive considering you were the skinniest guy out there." Glade followed.

"Well, I'd have to be. If not, they'd eat me alive."

"So, do you think you made it?" Evergreen asked.

"I don't know. I ended up switching my position when I saw how many forwards were trying out. I guess mid is as good a place as any." Link responded, thoughtfully. "Plus, when I have just a little more clout and experience, I can always transfer in a year or so."

That was prudent thinking, Evergreen thought. It was true that when one really wants something, they merely needed to get their foot in the door and eventually, they would be able to get it. It's like getting into a place of work. Dad, for example, started in his food distributing company as a machine operator and eventually made his way to become the logistics supervisor. He got his foot in the door, and it just took a few short years to get to what he wanted to do with them. The friends continued talking all the way back to the school, eventually, they separated so Link could go off and get showered and a change of clothes.

The next day, everyone woke up to see the Quodpot and Quidditch team rosters posted in the Nest. As expected, Link's name appeared on the defensive list, between Etheri Emberhell and Arkania Wisedew. Those were some magical names if he ever read them! Anyway, Link was obviously over the moon and Evergreen was thrilled on behalf of his friend. It was the house team. Link would now compete against others to be the school champion team which, according to Link, will culminate in an inter-school Quodpot tournament held over the first two weekends in March, just before the Transfiguration Tournament.

As Link and Evergreen were looking at the lineup and chatting amongst themselves, the tall, striking, black girl that he assumed was the team captain walked by.

"Hey Captain, thanks for letting me in!" Link squeaked as she towered over them both.

She was over six feet tall. That Evergreen was sure of.

"You've got spirit and you're tough, even though you're a little thing." She replied. "Also, call me by my name, Imari. I did get it for my birthday." She followed immediately with a smirk.

When she left, Evergreen let out a breath that he didn't even know he was holding. Imari was tall and muscular. Even though she was quite pretty and seemed quite nice, he found himself terrified of her. How odd.

It was Saturday, and that meant that Evergreen would meet with Coach Frost and other middle schoolers to try out for the racing team. So, that's what he did. Link went along too, of course, not to try out, because the only sport he wanted to do really was Quodpot, so he just went to watch. Evergreen made it, just like last year. Sure, the racing team wasn't as glamorous or as recognized, but Evergreen just loved the feeling of flying. Could I transfigure myself into a bird, somehow? Probably not. Someone else would probably need to do the spell. Plus, as a bird, could I still think like a human or would I suddenly think I was a bird and had always been a bird? He decided against thinking too much about that, because hypothetical situations like that were unnecessary worry at best. That is, if he didn't get changed into a bird or some other beast during the upcoming Transfiguration Tournament. Great. Now he was worrying about that.

That Tournament was going to be a fresh, 13-year-old Evergreen against a group of maybe 15-18-year-olds with vast experiences in magic that he could scarcely comprehend.

Once they got back to the commons that afternoon, they saw the Solitary Separatist aimlessly floating over the Thunderbird table. She looked very much the way Mondays felt. Because he felt a bond with her over their shared worries and woes, Evergreen decided to speak with her.

"Good afternoon, Miss Masterson!" he said

"Is it?" she asked, looking over at the large clock that was stuck in the wall above the commons main doors. "I guess it is… who's your friend?"

"This is Link Blackguard."

"I knew his father; he brooded almost as much as I."

No one really knew how to respond to that, so Evergreen just tried to keep it light.

"How are you, Miss Masterson?"

"The same as ever. Mr. Quandary, how do you fare?"

"Much better now after our little talk a while ago. Thanks."

She stopped floating aimlessly and froze in midair. She then looked down at Link and Evergreen and she smiled warmly, which was odd to see on her usual frown. In that moment, she sunk through the floor. The boys waited a few beats, but she never resurfaced. So, they took their seats with the Summerhill twins and started on lunch. Time went on and it wasn't long until Andie, Glade, and Diva surfaced. The kids talked a bit about Quodpot because that was all anybody would talk about from then on. Not really, but Evergreen knew how gaga the No-Maj world got over American football, and Quodpot was the wizard equivalent of it, so he anticipated learning more about Quodpot going forward than he had any other sport. It's what happens when your friends are sporty. You are going to learn whether you like it or not.