Secrets from the Past

GRYFFINDOR VERSUS SLYTHERIN

...

No, our love won't be

An adventure

Or a fire which may die in the wind

It will live

As long as the world does

Until my eyes

Will have light to gaze in your eyes.

...

“An adventure” by Lucio Battisti

Harry's week passed by, full of lessons, homeworks and Quidditch practice to prepare the team for the first match, set for the following Saturday: Gryffindor versus Slytherin.

Harry and Ron were still avoiding each other: during Quidditch practice, they tried to talk to each other as little as possible. Once, they had even risked a fight: Harry was shooting impossible Quaffles at Ron, and each time he wasn't able to save the goal, Harry shouted at him like mad. Ron always answered him back, and all the others players ended the game frozen in mid-air, rolling their eyes.

During their trainings, Hermione was always watching them from the spectators' stands, but Harry tried carefully not to look at her.

The whole week Harry was in a really bad mood and he avoided talking to anyone, even to Hermione, who seemed really wounded by her best friend's attitude. Even during Occlumency lessons, Harry used all his anger to reject Snape's mental attacks, causing the teacher to end the lessons earlier.

As if it wasn't enough, Harry was having the same odd nightmare almost every night, the one with the ancient and dilapidated mansion, in which he heard a desperate woman screaming. The nightmare always ended with him running and running along an endless corridor until his scar abruptly started to burn. He kept asking himself the meaning of that nightmare, but he couldn't understand it.

Finally Saturday morning arrived, bringing the first championship match. Harry was having his breakfast, or at least he was pretending to have it, because he just managed to sip a few drops of tea.

While heading to the changing room, he started to feel nervous, as he always did before a Quidditch match, but especially this time because it was his first match as captain, and everybody certainly wanted a lot from him.

When the players were finally ready, Harry gathered all of them in front of him and made his first pre-match talk.

“We have trained hard for this match, and I'm sure that you won't disappoint me. THEY're strong, but WE're even stronger, because WE put our heart in all what we do.”

All his mates were staring at him entranced: Ginny was smiling at him, while Ron was stubbornly staring at the ceiling. Then Harry spoke again:

“Now let's go, and let's show everybody what we're able to do!”

“YEAH !!” They answered all together in a loud and excited voice before marching in single file out of the changing rooms. Harry was the last one to leave. He was really hoping that his talk had given the right strength to his players.

The stadium was amazing: the spectators' stands were full of people screaming and chanting for their Quidditch team. The day couldn't have been better: the sky was a uniform pearly white and there was no wind.

When all the players were ready, Madame Hooch blew her whistle and the match started.

Slytherin immediately took possession of the Quaffle and they were already heading towards the Gryffindor goal. Unfortunately Ron was not able to save the goal.

“Slytherin score! It's now ten-zero!”

The match went on and now Ginny had the Quaffle, but she wasn't able to throw it to her mates, because Stinger from Slytherin reached her and nudged her hard in the stomach, stealing the Quaffle from her.

The Gryffindor supporters were horrified, but Ginny was still flying.

Harry moved toward her to check if she was ok, and she nodded her head yes.

“Slytherin score! It's now twenty-zero.”

Harry turned to Ron, and for a short moment he asked himself if his ex-best friend was playing badly on purpose, to show everybody that he was a bad captain. The only way to save the game was to catch the Golden Snitch and Harry started to scour the pitch, until he saw it, flying lower, very near to the grass.

Without losing time, he dived, before realizing that Malfoy was right behind him.

“Slytherin score again! It's now thirty-zero.”

Harry had almost reached the Snitch and with all his strength he tried to catch it faster than Malfoy, who in the meantime was on his side, trying to push him off the broom. Suddenly the Snitch scooted off toward the sky, and Harry zoomed upwards to reach it. Malfoy was not as fast, and he fell down hitting the ground.

Harry was heading toward the sky like a lightning bolt, the wind in his hair. In that very moment he lost sight of time and space: there was just him and the Golden Snitch, which was fluttering in front of him. Then he stretched his right hand and finally closed his fist around it, feeling its tiny wings struggling in his palm. He had done it, Gryffindor had won against Slytherin.

Afterwards, everything happened very fast, and he felt a terrible stroke: something really hard hit him right in the head, and he couldn't think anymore... he just realized that he was falling and falling......

***O***

“Do you think that he's going to recover?”

“Yeah... he always does! Believe me, Harry is a really strong guy!”

“But he fell from about 40 meters up....”

“Hey, look... he's opening his eyes.”

Harry was slowly regaining consciousness and he found himself lying on a bed in the hospital wing. His friends were gathered around him, but he couldn't see very well who they were, since he didn't have his glasses.

When he stretched his arm to the table to take them, he felt a sharp pain in his head and he decided not to move further.

“Your glasses, Harry.”

Hermione just handed them to him, and he put them on. Now he could clearly see his friends' worried faces: there was Hermione, Ginny and all the other players, still with their Quidditch robes on. Ron wasn't there.

“What happened?” he asked them in a low voice, and Ginny answered promptly.

“You had just caught the Snitch, when Stinger from Slytherin threw a Bludger to you, which hit you right on your head... then you fell from a height of 40 meters...”

“Luckily Madame Hooch saw the whole thing and she transfigured a rock into a large mattress, otherwise we would still be looking for your pieces around the pitch!” said Slovoy, one of the new two Chasers, with a light smile on his face, but Hermione stared at him sternly. Then she spoke sweetly.

“How do you feel? We were all really worried this time... luckily everybody saw Stinger throwing that Bludger at you, and I'm sure that Professor McGonagall'll put him in detention...”

Harry was still puzzled and didn't know what to say. His head was hurting so much and he thought it was going to explode. Finally Madame Pomfrey came to him with a soothing potion.

“Come on boys and girls, you must let him rest now.... Here we are Mr Potter, drink this and you are going to feel better.”

Madame Pomfrey helped him drinking the potion, which had a terrible taste, but Harry didn't complain.

When Madame Pomfrey left his bed, Harry spoke to his friends:

“At least we won... and this is the most important thing...”

Hermione stared at him sternly: Harry knew that she didn't care about Quidditch as much as him.

“How can you talk like that? I can't believe that for you it's more important to win a Quidditch match than to remain alive!”

Harry was tempted to answer that for him playing Quidditch was the most important thing, but he remained silent, gazing at her with a silly smile on his face.

Then Madame Pomfrey asked everybody to leave him alone and they said goodbye and exited the hospital wing.

***O***

Harry slept all afternoon, until Madame Pomfrey came to bring him some food. He was feeling slightly better, even if he wasn't able to get up yet. It seemed that the impact had been really tough.

After dinner Hermione came to visit him.

“How are you feeling tonight, Harry?”

“As if a train just knocked me down! Anyway, I'm feeling better, thanks!” answered Harry smiling, while Hermione was sitting in a chair close to his bed.

“I heard that Professor McGonagall has gone to Professor Snape complaining for what Stinger had done to you.... and Snape gave him detention.... but I also heard that he just had him write a few lines...” commented Hermione bitterly.

“Typical!”

“But it's not fair, and Professor McGonagall should go back to Snape and ask for a better punishment... It isn't possible to constantly fear those stupid Slytherins... they're always doing what they want, without getting the correct punishment...”

“Now you're talking like Filch!”

Harry smiled slightly and stared at her sympathetically, even if she was still upset.

“Well, let's change topic, then.... Would you like to know what Professor McGonagall told us today before lunch?”

“What?”

Hermione seemed very excited about what she was going to tell him.

“She said that for Halloween, two old friends of us are going to join Hogwarts students for the banquet... in just three weeks we are going to see Fleur Delacour and Viktor Krum again! And they will stay for the weekend.”

”Are you serious ? But... why?”

“Professor McGonagall just told us that Dumbledore wanted to invite them for... she said... a `courtesy visit'... but I'am sure that there is another reason...”

Harry thought about that for a moment, asking himself which the true reason could be. Then Hermione told him her theory.

“I'm sure that this invitation has got something to do with the Order of the Phoenix... Fleur and Viktor have both been champions of their schools, and maybe Dumbledore will ask them to join the Order against Voldemort! What do you think about that?”

“Maybe you're right, even if Viktor's Headmaster has been a Deatheater in the past... I don't know, but the whole story seems odd to me... I don't trust Viktor very much!”

Harry's words offended Hermione, who spoke in rising anger.

“You're completely wrong! I know Viktor very well and I may assure you that he has never been attracted to dark magic.”

Suddenly Harry remembered that during their 4^th school year, Viktor was falling for Hermione, even if he never talked to her about that. He was starting to feel embarrassed again and his stomach hurt as if there were thousends of butterflies struggling inside. Without thinking it over, he spoke with a frown.

“Ha, yes... I forgot that Viktor was your boyfriend some time ago!”

Harry was teasing Hermione to see her reaction, and in fact she blushed before answering him back, seemingly annoyed by that statement.

“For your information, Viktor and I never dated... we're just good friends and we wrote to each other a few letters in the past... it has been about one year since he sent me his last letter.... besides this isn't your business at all!”

Hermione got up and was ready to leave, but Harry grabbed her arm to stop her.

“No, please stay a little bit more.... being forced to lie on this bed is so depressing!”

Hermione sat again and her mood changed.

“Come on, Harry... be patient... I'm sure that tomorrow morning you'll be able to leave the hospital wing.”

“I really hope so...”

Harry sighed and stared at the bedspread. Then he thought about Ron, and he asked himself if he knew that he was recovering from that bad fall.

“Ron feels really guilty about how the match went...”

Harry raised his head abruptly and looked Hermione in the eye with surprise: again his best friend knew exactly what he was thinking about.

“Why does he feel guilty?”

“Because he didn't save a single goal... he says that if it wasn't for you, Gryffindor would have lost the match...”

”Well, now that you're telling me... I believe that Ron really should feel guilty!”

Harry's temper was starting to rise.

“I agree with you, if you mean that Ron hasn't done a great job today, but I don't understand why you keep giving him all the blame!”

“Because it's HIS fault! If I didn't catch the Snitch on time, we would have lost the match. He didn't do anything to stop Slytherin from scoring... and you were there, you have seen everything!”

“NO, it isn't true! I think that Ron has done his best for...”

“Well, if that was HIS BEST, then I think that I'am going to ask him to leave the team!!”

This time Hermione got up in a fury and glared at Harry with anger.

“Why don't you stop talking like that? How could you be such a selfish boy! Ron is still your best friend and he feels bad for this situation, just like you. Listen to me Harry Potter: I'm not going to talk to you again, until you make peace with Ron!”

As soon as she finished her sentence, she rushed out of the hospital wing angrily without giving him a chance to reply.

(A/N: Now poor Harry has managed to argue with Hermione as well... please review, and you'll find out what comes next!)

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