With the prospect of having to share practice sessions with Orion looming over her, Lizzie's enthusiasm at returning to the pitch had rapidly faded.
The closer the beginning of her training drew, the more her excitement was dwindling, but her fury at Orion wasn't the sole reason for it. Matthew didn't grow tired of reminding her that he thought it was too early for her to take up flying again. He didn't let the matter drop, and every time Lizzie winced at the pain in her wrist, he found himself confirmed.
"It's only for her own sake that she wants you back, not yours. If Skye depends on you backing her captaincy, maybe she shouldn't have become captain in the first place."
Matthew and Skye not getting along wasn't news, and usually, Lizzie would have jumped to Skye's defence. But whatever her role in Orion's unexpected reappearance had been, Lizzie was still mad at her for not giving her so much as a warning, so she remained quiet and let Matthew rant away.
Skye wasn't the only thing Lizzie was keeping quiet about, however. After leaving Lewis Parkin's farewell feast, Matthew wouldn't stop asking questions about Orion, how he and Lizzie knew each other, and his abilities as a player. Lizzie felt sorry for brushing him off, but she couldn't tell him any more than she already had.
In introducing Orion as nothing but an acquaintance from school, she had purposefully kept the truth of what had been between them from Matthew, and a whole week after Orion had so suddenly reappeared, Lizzie's chance to correct herself had long since passed. If Matthew was irritated by her conciseness, it couldn't be helped.
The thought of Orion wouldn't leave her alone, and Lizzie wasn't sure what to make it. It had been two years since she'd had any sign of life from him last, and now he was back, and in Wigtown of all places. His return was touching on wounds she had been convinced had finally healed; when she thought back on the day she had found his flat in Montrose empty and abandoned, however, there was still a painful sting inside her heart.
Not knowing why Orion had left everything behind without so much as a word had haunted Lizzie for months, but after many tears and sleepless nights, she had begrudgingly accepted it and moved on. She had met Matthew, and after a while, she had begun to heal. And just when she had believed that this chapter of her life had finally closed for good, Orion had decided to come back.
So now he was to be a member of her Quidditch team. The thought was absurd to Lizzie. There was so much hurt and anger still inside her that she couldn't even look at him. How was this supposed to work?
When Lizzie woke on the first day of practice, her mood was bad. Plagued by fitful dreams of falling, she had barely slept and felt moody and exhausted. She freed herself from Matthew's arms, brushed her hand over his hair, and quietly got dressed. As she packed her Quidditch bag for the first time in months, she had to breathe deeply to quell the nerves fluttering in her stomach.
By the time she arrived at the Quidditch pitch, the fluttery feeling in her gut had turned into a tight knot and Lizzie felt sick. The goalposts were gleaming in the pale morning sunlight, and she stopped to admire the sight. It was a new day and a new season, and she had worked hard to be a part of it; she could do this.
The thought comforted her, but only until she walked beneath the wooden perimeter of the pitch and out onto the lawn. Much to her chagrin, Orion was already there waiting for her. To Lizzie's surprise, he wasn't alone.
"What are you doing here?" Lizzie spoke directly to Skye, not acknowledging Orion's presence with so much as a glance.
"I'm in charge of the team," Skye shrugged in return. "Need to make sure you lot get back to form, don't I?"
Lizzie gave her a dark look. "Can we get this over with? I've got better things to do than hang around and reminisce all day."
Skye glanced between Lizzie and Orion, who was shrouding himself in silence. "Might be harder than I thought," she muttered under her breath before clapping her hands together. "Let's get cracking, shall we?"
Her words rang out over the Quidditch pitch. When no one moved, Lizzie raised her eyebrows at Skye, who, in turn, was looking at Orion; Orion himself was trying very hard to look anywhere but in Lizzie's direction. Eventually, Lizzie cleared her throat.
"How about you tell us what you had in mind, Captain?"
It wasn't lost on her how the way she was addressing Skye made Orion flinch. Skye rubbed the back of her neck, the colour rising to her face.
"Right, yeah. Both of you haven't been flying for a while, so I'd say we do some warm-up rounds around the pitch." Her face lit up. "Dunno about you, but I feel like a race. Like in the old times. Ready, set, go!"
Skye mounted her Comet 260 and took off while Orion and Lizzie scrambled to do the same. There was no time for Lizzie to feel nervous as she shot into the air on her Silverswift. As soon as her feet left the ground and the wind hit her face, it was as if all the pieces she had struggled to keep together over the last few months were falling back into place.
The feeling quickly faded when Skye sped up after the first round, and the months Lizzie had spent off her broomstick were beginning to show. She had been forced to remain on the ground, but Skye had finished the season in excellent form; there was no chance of keeping up with her.
Lizzie lay down flat on her broomstick to at least not let Orion overtake her. But her Silverswift was a sensitive broom, and her reactions to it not as finely tuned as Lizzie would have liked. She held on tightly as she took a turn with too much speed, and suddenly, she became aware of how much strain she was putting on her wrist.
On their third round - Skye was already way ahead - Orion slowly began gaining on her, and by the time they crossed the finish line, he had overtaken Lizzie by almost a broom's length. Skye opened her mouth to comment on it but quickly reconsidered when she saw the look on Lizzie's face.
They began their practice properly with some simple passes, and Lizzie grew increasingly frustrated as their training drew on. Skye may have been the captain, but she kept on looking for Orion's approval on every exercise, as if they were still on the Hufflepuff team and this was the school pitch they had learned their basics on. But this wasn't Hogwarts anymore, and things had changed. Lizzie and Skye were professional players now, and Orion had to learn the ropes from them, not the other way round.
"I get the Quaffle in this shooting range," Lizzie snapped during an aiming exercise. Even though she had clearly indicated that she wanted the Quaffle, Orion had attempted the shot himself. "Pass it to me next time I tell you to. If our manoeuvres are too hard for you, that's your problem, not mine."
"What are you waffling about, Jameson?" Skye interfered before Orion had the chance to reply. "It's all good. Passing would've been nonsense."
"It wouldn't have."
"Orion was in a much better position to score, and he made the goal alright. What're you getting your broomstick in a twist about?"
"I shoot when we do this manoeuvre," Lizzie hissed at her. "I always do. It's one of my signature moves."
"Yeah, a move he taught you if you've forgotten about that," Skye shot back and pointed at Orion.
"Maybe he did, but I was the one to perfect it!"
"Would you listen to that?" Skye scoffed. "With your scoring record today, I'd come off my high Hippogriff if I were you."
Orion stayed back while Lizzie and Skye were snapping at each other. When he flew between them and raised his hands in a placating manner, Lizzie again felt reminded of their time at school.
"It's alright, Skye. The student has surpassed the teacher, and thus the roles have been reversed. Acknowledging our need to learn is only the first step towards wisdom. Lizzie may still lack efficiency, but she makes up for it with experience that my own doesn't match."
"Oh, just shut up, will you?" Lizzie snarled. The look she gave Orion was scalding. "You don't even know what you're talking about."
"Jameson..." Skye's voice had a warning ring to it, but Lizzie cut her off with an impatient gesture of her hand.
"What? It's true! He barely made, what, one match for Montrose? Two?" Lizzie knew precisely how many times Orion had played for the Montrose Magpies, but she would rather cast a Tongue-Tying curse on herself than admit it. "He doesn't know the business, and I will not have a bloody beginner lecture me on what my gameplay is lacking."
"Offending you was never my intention, and I apologise if I have," Orion said and looked away when he couldn't hold Lizzie's glare any longer. "But if we want to achieve harmony within our team -"
"There is no harmony between us whatsoever, and this isn't our team either," Lizzie interrupted him hotly. "You need to earn your place on the roster, as we all did. I wouldn't let you play at all if you asked me."
"Good thing no one's asking you then," Skye butted in, her green eyes flashing. "You don't make the decisions here - I do. And I'll not have you speak to another member of my team like this. Now back off. This is not your place."
Lizzie looked between her best friend and her ex, pressing her lips together. "No," she said through gritted teeth, "this isn't my place at all."
Whipping her broomstick around, Lizzie flew back to the ground. As soon as she landed, she stormed away, ripping her arm and shin protection off and throwing them into the grass next to her Silverswift. Her anger made her walk away from the pitch faster and faster until she was almost running.
She had been looking forward to this day - her moment back in the air - for months, but it had been nothing like she had imagined it. It hadn't been the exhilarating return to the pitch Lizzie had made it out to be, and that was all Orion's fault. He had come and ruined everything, and now even Skye was on his side.
Her feet took her from the Quidditch pitch to the training grounds where the annual tryouts for promising Hogwarts graduates were being held. Lizzie stopped to watch, her mind returning to her own tryouts two years prior. They had been on a different pitch and for a different team; part of a different life, really. A lot had changed since then.
Her presence didn't go unnoticed for long. The whispering and pointing in Lizzie's direction drew Ethan's attention, who exchanged a few words with his scouts and then joined her at the sidelines.
"Shouldn't you be at practice?"
Lizzie snorted. "We're done with practice."
"Are you now?"
"We are. I'm not doing this." She shook her head. "You can't be serious about Orion being on the team."
"Pretty sure I am. Doesn't look like he's the one making problems."
Lizzie's anger suddenly flared up again. "What did you expect I was going to do? Jump into his arms and kiss your feet for bringing him back? He knows jack all about what it means to be a real Quidditch player. How is this supposed to work?"
Ethan looked her up and down sceptically. "If I'm not doolally, he's only got one year less experience than you, so tone it down a notch. You ain't a trouper in the business just yet, Lizzie. And from what I saw at his tryouts, Orion knows what he's doing alright. Well enough to have taught you and Skye, at least."
"That's different."
"It's not. He's got some real potential, and it's ours to profit from." Ethan's features softened. "But that ain't why you don't want to work with him, is it, lass?"
"He broke my heart," Lizzie finally managed to say. "How can you expect me to just forget that?"
"I know. After all, it was me you came running to after you'd thrown everything in the wind because of him. I gave you credit of trust that day, you'd better not forget that. I certainly won't."
Lizzie swallowed her protest, and Ethan nodded appreciatively.
"Now listen up. You're not at school anymore, this ain't the place for petty little love stories. This here is about the Wanderers. You're a professional and a bloody good one at that, so I expect you to get a grip. Orion's been out of business for a while, but so have you. With you, him and the rest of the lot, we now have a fine selection of Chasers for our line-up. Skye is the captain, so she's set, but the rest of the spots are fair game. Replacing you with Yarwood was a workaround, but I've seen worse in my days and I only want the best players on my team. If you want to play for the Wanderers, you'll have to fight for that privilege like everybody else."
Lizzie's anger had dwindled during Ethan's speech, and she ducked her head when he was done. He was right; she had acted like an entitled kid straight out of school, not like the professional she had worked hard to become.
"I expect you to go and finish your training now," Ethan added after a moment of silence, and Lizzie nodded.
"Yes, coach."
"One word of advice," Ethan said as Lizzie turned to go. "It's the team that comes first, not the player. Always. You'd better not forget that."