Harry Potter and the Year of Toil and Trouble

Chapter three

As promised, Sirius made the Weasley children, Harry and Hermione play Quidditch the next morning to take their minds of things. However, Ron wouldn't play without reassurances that no bad news had been heard. They played Quidditch four-on-four. Ginny and Hermione were chasers, Fred and George were beaters, and Ron and Lupin were keepers, while Harry and Sirius were seekers. Ron was able to forget his worry about his father, as he was excited about playing Keeper. Gryffindor's previous keeper, Oliver Wood, had graduated two years ago. There had been no opportunity to find a new one as Quidditch had been cancelled last year due to the Triwizard Tournament. Ron had been hoping to be chosen as the new keeper on his return to Hogwarts. Today, Harry's team robe's had been changed colour by Hermione. They now wore midnight blue, while Sirius's team wore gold. Sirius had flatly refused Hermione's suggestion of green as green was the colour of Slytherin House's robes.

"You DO know that I was the youngest seeker for a century?" grinned Harry as he and Sirius warmed up in the air outside.

"You DO know that I was a beater and if I was one today, I'd knock your head off?" replied Sirius, smirking.

"No, you wouldn't!" laughed Harry, and they stopped arguing as Lupin shouted "one...two...three!" and threw the four balls into the air. The game began. Mrs Weasley watched from the ground, smiling. The game had the success of distracting her from her worries.

Hermione had the quaffle and was heading towards Lupin at the goalposts. Unfortunately, Hermione rarely played Quidditch, preferring instead to watch Harry play from the stands; a bludger from Fred Weasley slammed into her side, making her drop the quaffle with a scream of pain. Ginny quickly caught it, and headed in the opposite direction, towards Ron.

"All right Hermione?" cried Harry as he zoomed past on his Firebolt broomstick, in search of the winged golden snitch.

"I'm okay!" replied Hermione, now trying to get the quaffle back, but Ginny had scored. Ron cursed loudly, making his mother and Hermione shout "RON!" Fortunately for him, Harry, Hermione and George, he saved several more of Ginny's attempts while Hermione managed to get some past Lupin. They were now leading 30-10.

Sirius was an excellent flyer, Harry noted, but wasn't as good a seeker as Harry, who was obviously smaller and lighter on his broomstick. Sirius also had obviously not flown a broomstick for many years. Still, he twice managed to stop Harry catching the snitch, once by blocking Harry as he flew towards the goalposts, hand outstretched, and next by pretending it was behind Harry. Such things would not normally have distracted Harry, but he was enjoying himself so much, he was more distracted.

Ginny now had the quaffle, she was a very good chaser, Harry noticed. She made to score with it but a bludger from George Weasley headed towards her and as she tried to avoid it, she fell off her broom. Mrs Weasley and Hermione screamed as she fell, but before she hit the ground, Sirius caught her.

"Sirius!" yelled Lupin, but it was too late, Harry had caught the snitch. Ron, Hermione and George were all cheering.

"No fair!" protested Sirius; "I just saved Ginny's life!"

"Yeah, but that wouldn't have stopped Ireland from winning the Quidditch World Cup last year, would it?" replied Ron. But he turned to Ginny, looking concerned.

"Are you okay, Ginny?" asked Harry, also concerned, as a white faced Mrs Weasley fussed over her.

"Yeah I'm okay," nodded Ginny, blushing. She had had a severe crush on Harry, ever since she started at Hogwarts. "Sorry for losing the game, Professor Lupin."

"Sorry? Don't be silly, Ginny. Your safety is more important," smiled Lupin. "Now, it's almost lunchtime. I think we should go back inside and eat, and you can all do some more homework," He grinned as Harry, Hermione and the Weasley children let out a collective groan.

So back inside the house they went, and ate a delicious meal to rival those at Hogwarts, consisting of options of roast chicken, roast pork, roast beef, pasta, pizza, spaghetti, potatoes, fries, other vegetables, ice cream, gateau and pumpkin juice. Between eating, Harry turned to Hermione, "so how did you get on in Bulgaria?" Ron turned around also, to hear Hermione's reply, frowning slightly as he listened.

"Oh, it was alright, really," said Hermione, not meeting Ron's eyes. Harry and Ron looked at each other. Harry shrugged.

"Did you see a lot of tourist attractions?" Harry asked.

"Did you and Krum break up?" asked Ron getting straight to the point.

"N...yes...NO! No, not really," cried Hermione, flustered and going slightly pink.

"Did he dump you? 'Cause if he did..." Ron stimulated punching Krum.

"Ron, no! No, he didn't!" Hermione sighed and resigned herself to telling them: "I just felt very uncomfortable there. Viktor spent almost every single minute practising Quidditch and I hardly saw him. His parents spoke hardly a word of English and anyway, they made it perfectly clear that they thought I wasn't good enough for him."

"You're more than good enough for anybody, Hermione," said Ron, then, realising what he had said, went bright red.

"Thanks, Ron," replied Hermione, also going red. "But I'm okay really. I suppose he was too old for me. It's no big deal, honest."

Harry looked from Ron to Hermione and realisation dawned on him. His two best friends liked each other!

"Why are you grinning at us like that?" asked Ron, suspiciously.

"Oh, no reason," said Harry, still grinning. "I think we'd better go and study. That was great Mrs Weasley," he said as they finished their third portions. The others murmured their agreement as they left the table, the girls stayed to help tidy up. Then, Sirius and Lupin went outside into the garden to talk privately, no doubt about their roles in the war against the dark side. The teenagers retreated to another room where they began their studies. Harry and Ron had dropped divination, with "I-told-you-so's" from Hermione. Harry had finally had enough of Professor Trelawney predicting his death every lesson, so he had decided to study a new subject - the Politics of Magic, while Ron, on his father's advice, took Muggle Studies. Hermione took the Politics of Magic with Harry and they worked together on their essays. Hermione refused to help Ron with his homework, she had taken Muggle Studies the previous two years, but she criticised his work so often, she in effect WAS helping him.

"How do the Muggles get into the telly-thing?" Ron was now asking

"They don't get into it, Ron," said Hermione, exasperatedly. "It's a picture, taken by a video camera, and it transmits the picture to the television so that we can see it. It's like watching lots and lots of Wizard pictures, one after the other. And these pictures talk, unlike Wizard ones."

"What's a video camera?" asked a bemused Ron.

Hermione rolled her eyes and started to answer, but Harry cut in. "Maybe you should go to Hermione's house next summer to find out. You won't be allowed at the Dursleys, obviously."

"I'll have finished Muggle Studies by then!" Ron pointed out.

"And we might not be allowed to. It's too dangerous." Hermione also pointed out.

Harry started to speak, but was interrupted by a loud scream from downstairs.