The Mudblood

Chapter 35 : Year 3

The first two weeks of school went by...smoothly. Moody continued to teach us intensely dark stuff in Defense Against the Dark Arts; Trelawney literally quivered whenever her eyes grazed over me, yet she refused to speak a word to me; Snape would intentionally drop improper ingredients into my potions so that he could fail me (and my partner, Melody); and Vector, while insanely nice, somehow made her class so impossible that I was failing.

But, other than all of that—things were great.

I barely slept at night, due to the fact that every time I closed my eyes, I saw my mother being tortured by that nefarious cloaked monster. However, on the second Saturday of the term, I was actually having a mediocre dose of sleep—when I was awoken very early in the morning by an overly excited Ashley Pucey.

"Lainey! Lainey! Lainey—OW!"

I sprung up and peered over the edge of my bunk bed to see that Ashley was hunched over, clutching her torso with her arms.

"Aw..." she moaned.

"What—what just happened?" I questioned, squinting at her through the darkness of our room. I could tell that she was wearing a Quidditch uniform—one that she had specially made over the summer.

"Melody punched me in the gut—"

"It's called a reflex, Pucey—you wake me up and I punch you," Melody explained groggily from the bed below mine.

"What's going on, Ashley? Why are you up?" I asked, rubbing my eyes.

"We're going to play Quidditch, remember? You said you'd come practice with me this morning, remember?"

I took in a deep breath of self-loathing. Yes, sadly, I remembered.

After putting on my lovely, green Quidditch uniform, Ashley and I crept out of the Slytherin dungeons and made our way toward the Quidditch stadium. The air was cool with the light breeze of autumn; the grass was damp with the droppings of dew that clung to each blade. With the sun barely over the horizon, I was sure that we were the only two people awake in all of Hogwarts.

My assumption was disproved when we arrived at the field, however; there were at least a dozen people mounted on their brooms, racing through the air as they passed the Quaffle around. Among them, I spotted the Weasley twins, along with Cedric Diggory. I nearly gagged at the sight of him. I actually gagged at the sight of Draco Malfoy and Vincent Crabbe, who we were swaggering toward us from the locker room. Both held two brooms in their hands, Malfoy seeming much more disgruntled than Crabbe; I almost thought the big old goon was smiling.

"Crabbe! You made it!" Ashley enthused, jumping up and down. "Oh—Lainey—this is going to be so much fun!"

"You told these two clowns to come here?" I questioned, pointing displeasingly at the two Slytherin boys who now stood in front of us.

"You're not the only one who's unhappy about it, Fitzroy," Malfoy grumbled sardonically. "I was under the impression that Crabbe and I were just coming out here so I could practice."  

"H—here, we brought you brooms," Crabbe said, coyly thrusting his spare broom in Ashley's direction. Delighted, she snatched it from his hand with a beaming smile on her pink lips.

Unexpectedly, Malfoy shoved his spare broom right into my chest, and I flinched back before grabbing it.

"Oh—I'm so excited!" Ashley squealed. "Just look at all of those boys up there! Mm—Quidditch boys!"