After Halloween, I started spending long hours alone in the library, without Crabbe and Goyle. They don't hate books, but not enough to haunt the stacks with me. Since I pretended it was all for coursework, they were a bit exasperated with my grind, yet they didn't pry and seemed to make good use of their time in their own ways.
Even with so much of my schedule diverted to research, I kept up the charm offensive with classmates. Luckily, people were beginning to see me as a diligent, high-achieving sort. No one grilled me about why I was living in the library, and—probably—I'd begun building decent relations with the Slytherins.
Hogwarts' library befit its history—magnificent. Some volumes were shelved in the Restricted Section and barred to me, but books adults don't want children to see are practically a family specialty. If I couldn't get them here, I could find a way later. Most valuable of all were the archives—newspaper back issues and the like—irreplaceable when you want breadth, not just depth.
By November, with rain turning to sleet, the first Quidditch match arrived: Gryffindor versus Slytherin. In the lead-up, the two Houses—never on warm terms—were constantly scrapping in the corridors.
Honestly, Quidditch doesn't interest me at all, but I couldn't announce that and earn yet another oddball label. Hiding my reluctance, I joined my year-mates and trudged out under the cold Scottish sky to the match.
Even allowing for the fact I don't like sport, Quidditch was not a game I could enjoy. The rules, yes, but also the unhinged height at which balls are flung about. The wizarding world must be mad to treat this as civilized entertainment. And yet there aren't that many deaths (that many). Wizards are absurdly sturdy—body and mind.
Even so, given the endless variety of ball games among Muggles, wizarding amusements feel impoverished. It's the tiny population and narrow culture, I know, but do import something from the non-magical world. Football would be better for children's health, for one. Judging from the lack of any real physical education and the negligible effect on overall health, perhaps wizards really are hardier than Muggles.
Uninvested as I was, I sat in the stands, draping spare cloaks over shivering children around me, and assumed the posture of a spectator.
The aerial skirmishing never quite held my attention (they fly too fast to tell who's who), but the commentary was entertaining. Every time Gryffindor's Lee Jordan sounded ready to slander a Slytherin play, Professor McGonagall cut him off—hearing her scold him took some of the sting out of the suspicion I'd harbored since she made Harry the Seeker.
Even so, the worry from back then hadn't vanished. Thinking in "story" terms, this looked like a match Slytherin would lose. There's no narrative point in making the protagonist the youngest Seeker in a century only to have him lose straight away. And if Harry, selected through McGonagall's favoritism, won the opener, Slytherin would find it easy to resent Gryffindor. There was nothing I could do about any of that now. All I could do was hope that, if we lost, we'd do it in a way that felt like our own fault.
I was gazing absently at the pitch when the crowd began to stir. What happened?
I couldn't find the cause at first—until Crabbe nudged my ribs and pointed. There it was: a sight I hadn't imagined. A small Gryffindor, hovering higher than his teammates, with a broom bucking like a furious stallion. Even from a distance I knew who it was—Harry Potter.
You've got to be kidding. In a place full of adult witches and wizards, someone was meddling with a player mid-match?
What's more, cursing a competition broom in flight is extremely difficult. It meant an unusually capable witch or wizard was trying, irrationally and publicly, to harm Harry Potter. For a heartbeat my brain stalled.
I came to, snatched Crabbe's binoculars, and swept the stands.
There were two likely casters. As I feared: Professor Snape and Professor Quirrell. From here I couldn't tell which idiot had chosen public murder as a strategy. Since both were staring at Harry and incanting, I couldn't rule out that one was casting the counter-curse. If I interfered and picked the wrong one, Harry might be smashed into the ground.
Surely one of the teachers would get a Cushioning Charm under him—but could I really trust that? And if I acted too, the outcome was unpredictable. Anxiety racked me as I checked the staff through the lenses, but I saw no decisive move. What were they doing? Please, for once, be competent!
Just as my nerves reached their limit, the stands shifted. Through the binoculars I saw Quirrell flung aside by someone, and flames licking up the hem of Snape's robe. Harry's broom steadied almost at once and he rejoined the match. The crowd calmed, and no one moved to stop play. So—no hunt for the culprit, then?
…In the end, it seems the story proceeds nicely even if I do nothing.
Goyle had to catch me as I sagged with relief.
Still—why curse him on the pitch? Of all places, in front of a stadium of witnesses? It made no sense.
Watching Harry cough up the Snitch, I tried to assemble an explanation. Why not strike inside the castle? Then it came to me.
The pitch lies outside the castle walls. It didn't exist when Hogwarts was founded. It might not fall under the castle's protections. The same would explain why the Forbidden Forest and Hogsmeade aren't drenched in castle-wide wards.
If so, Harry is safe inside Hogwarts—but I'd very much like him to stop wandering about outside. As I watched him head for the gamekeeper's hut after the match, I let out a long, worried breath.
Back in the dormitory, Crabbe and Goyle sat me on the bed wearing looks of mild—no, considerable—exasperation.
Crabbe frowned and pursed his mouth. "You stood out today. You hardly cheered, kept scowling whenever a player fell—either House. And then there's the Harry Potter thing. You're not his mum, Malfoy."
Fair point. I was fully aware that while Harry clung to his broom I'd been flailing about, ignoring the looks around me.
"…I'll have to fix that."
The sheer obviousness of my mistake left me limp. So much for Operation Blend Into Slytherin. Just then Zabini, evidently listening, wandered over.
"Upper-years have probably given up on you already," he said. "Gemma Farley's decided to ignore you. Also, Malfoy, you're not just Harry Potter's fretful mother. You're everyone's."
He grinned as he said it; there was no malice in it. Crabbe and Goyle bristled, and Zabini hastened to explain that he wasn't mocking them.
A new voice chimed in. "If you don't want to stand out, at least check that you're not wrapping upper-years in your cloak, Malfoy."
Nott, also apparently listening, pushed aside his curtains and smirked at me. Zabini burst out laughing and reenacted the upper-year's bafflement for our benefit.
…It wasn't as if I hadn't noticed. But only then did it truly hit me: I'd been treating even older students like children. Embarrassment flushed up; I nudged Crabbe away and yanked my bedcurtains shut.
Outside, the four of them were soon trading stories about my odd habits.
I had mixed feelings—but my roommates didn't seem to resent me, and for now I'd like to think this meant I was muddling through. Muttering excuses to no one in particular, I pulled the blankets over my head.
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