After The War (Romione & Hinny fan fiction)

The 423rd Quidditch World Cup

Harry watched in awe as seven players in red and white robes walked on the pitch, brooms in hand.
"Firebolts." wishpered Ron, looking dreamily at the shiny broomsticks.
Even little Teddy was clinging on the railing of their box to have a better look onto the wide Quidditch pitch, his face presses to the cold metal and eyes wide.
The stadium seemed to explode as the team made its entrance. People screamed, roared and cheered louder than ever. The players formed a line and looked up, chins held high, determined looks on their faces. Some of them were even smiling besides the tension of the upcoming match.
"-of course, the Malawian doesn't stand a chance, we've been playing at the World Cup since 1963!" Harry heard a man say in the row under theirs.
"Why would that matter?" said the man that sat near him irritably "It's not as if the one ones who played in 1963 are still on the team, is it? Well, for what I can tell, it could be..." he smirked evilly, "That Blythe Parkin looks like she's sixty, but maybe she's got grey hair because of the last Quidditch Cup," he grinned again before continuing in an accent "when she saw the snitch slip from her fingers at the last second, and the Seeker of the Transilvanian team caught it."
The first man shook his head eagerly, as if wanting to forget what he'd heard. "Parkin is legend. She could master a difficult caught with a blindfold on. Nearly as good as Krum, she is."
"No mascottes this year?" Harry asked turni g to Ron.
"According to the programme they were temporarily removed. I mean, after what happened five years ago it was quite predictable..."
"At the Ministry there's word that the Greeks have been working very hard to guarantee high security at this Final." said Mr Weasley, "If it weren't for the popularity of the game, they could have expected less people to come after what happened the last time--"
"Shhh Dad, it's beginning!"
"Welcome the National British Quidditch team!" cried excitedly the commentator. His voice was barely audible over the noise. "We have Avery Hawksworth there," he pointed at one of the players on the pitch, "the lovely Chaser and Captain of the team!"
Harry pointed his pair of Omnioculars on the bronze skinned girl that the commentator was addressing. He'd once read on one of Ron's magazines that she was the first female to ever be proclaimed Captain of the English National Quidditch team.
"On Miss Hawksworth's right we have her fellow Chasers: Edric Vasper and Keaton Flintney!"
Harry clapped his hands enthusiastically. He remembered spending hours curled on the boys' bedroom floor with Ron, leafing through Quidditch books and magazines, discussing upcoming matches and hanging new chocolate frog cards on the wall. Quidditch players' cards weren't so rare to find, and Harry and Ron had made sure to give Teddy most of the doubles they found, and the toddler had developed quite an affinity to this new game.
"The young lady you can see there is Blythe Parkin, she covers the role of Seeker."
In the corner of his eye, Harry saw Ron turn to exchange a look with Charlie in the row being theirs. He knew the muscly Weasley boy had once been asked to play for England as a Seeker. Harry wondered if - choosing Quidditch over dragons - Charlie would be standing in Blythe's place now, smiling widely like she was doing.

When the whole English team had been presented, the Captain of the Malawian squad, Alexis Oliver, followed by the rest of the team, sped around the giant stadium, twirling in the air in gorgeous flight formations over the heads of the cheering crowd.
After a bit of show off, both the teams landed back onto the ground ad took their places. Then the referee of the match, a bloke with dark eyes and a face that reminded Harry of a grindylow, asked the Captains to shake hands, and reluctantly Avery and Alexis did so, but no one watching with Omnioculars missed the murdering look that passed on the captains' faces.
Everyone took their positions. "The game begins in three... twooo... one, go!"
They gaze of everyone on the stands followed the players as they took off so quickly that they were difficult to spot. The referee threw quaffle flew in the air, and the match began.
"Vesper catches the Quaffle, Kaunda on his heels. The Quaffle passes in Agness Bush's possession, and look at the way she flies!"
That Agness, she really knew what she was doing, Harry had heard she'd first mounted a broom when she was three and after that, no matter how her relatives tried to do, she wouldn't let go of it again. Legend had it she slept with the handle of her Shooting Star in her hand instead.
"-Keaton Flitney. Nytrenda. Bush again, quaffle in possession of the Malawian team. Oh, dangerous bludger hurled by Wakefield! Flitney dodges it easily, he flies towards the hoops, dodges Oliver's bludger and... Ten points to England!"
As the play went on and on, and he tension in the stadium beacame palpable. Emmanuel Kaunda, the Malawian chaser, was nearly hit by a bludger in the head no less than two times, things that permitted to the English Chaser Dawn Withey to score twice as half the Malawian team gaped at Kaunda.
Harry looked at the Seekers. Owen Anthony was following Parkin in the eastern aerea of the pitch. Both of them looked unable to stay still, and kept flying around, looking at where their fellow Seeker was, how at match was going, and, most inpostantly, where the tiny golden snitch was.
Soon Malawian supporters were shouting encouragements to their team's Keeper, Munthalí, and saying prayers under their breath. The Malawian defence of the hoops was clearly not fast enough, because Hawksworth scored three times in a row, dodging infuriated bludgers here and other Chasers there.
After fifty minutes of this strange scenary, England was on the lead with 160 - 90. It was just as Munthalí warded off the quaffle thrown by Withey that Harry saw it. The snitch was fluttering not very far from the ground, his golden wings nearly invisible to see even with his Omnioculars. "There!" he exclaimed, pointing att he golden ball. "The snitch!" Ginny spotted it just a few seconds after Harry, and then Blythe Parkin drove her shiny broom down towards the ground, faster than the wind. Anthony, Seeker of the Malawian team, watched Parkin for a second, surely wondering it it was a Wronski Fient or she'd really seen the snitch. His hesitation lasted less than a blink, the he was after her, pressing his body weight on the handle of his broom and sped towards the ground.