Haunted by her second year and now with a murderer on the loose, Gwenevere Everill finds herself facing more battles that she does not think she can win.
Tormented by dementors and struggling under the impact of her new studies, will Gwen be able t...
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Gwen hardly slept that night. She kept dozing in and out of sleep, listening to the thunder rumbling overhead, the pounding of the wind against the castle windows and the distant creaking of the trees in the Forbidden Forest. She was looking at the clock hourly. At one point, Peeves drifted into the room, pelted something at the wall, then bobbed out cackling.
At around five in the morning, she could not drift back off to sleep, so she got herself up and dressed, quietly so as not to wake the others, then went down to the common room.
The noise of the storm was even louder downstairs, and Gwen knew better than to think that the game would be cancelled. Quidditch was not cancelled for trifles such as the weather.
Nevertheless, Gwen was apprehensive. She was light on her broom which made her faster, but against the gale she would be easily thrown about. She was the average weight and stature for her age, perhaps on the more petite side, but with the storm, she was at a disadvantage.
While Gwen sat across from the fire, trying to ignore the wind as she read her book, Harry came down from the boys' dorms.
'Can't sleep?' he said, carrying Crookshanks in his arms.
'No,' she said. 'Why've you got--?'
'He keeps trying to get in the boys' dorms,' Harry said, placing Crookshanks on one of the empty armchairs. 'I think Ron's right, thousands of mice in this castle and he's trying to get to Scabbers.'
Gwen smiled. 'Scabbers is probably the easiest one to get,' she said.
'They're like Tom and Jerry.'
'Who's that?'
Harry yawned. 'Muggle thing,' he said. 'Cat and mouse who are always after each other.'
The two of them sat by the fire, waiting for the hours to pass as they discussed their apprehension for the upcoming game, taking it in turns to get up every now and then and stop Crookshanks from creeping up the stairs to where Ron and Scabbers lay sleeping. The wind was rattling the windows in their casements, and it had started to rain, thundering it down in noisy sheets.
Eventually, they left to make their way down to breakfast.
'Stand and fight, you mangy curs!' yelled Sir Cadogen as they climbed through the portrait hole.
They managed to wake up a bit over some cereal, and as they helped themselves to some toast, the rest of the team began to show up.
'It's going to be a tough one,' said Wood, who wasn't eating anything.
'Stop worrying, Oliver,' said Angelina soothingly. 'We don't mind a bit of rain.'
But it was considerably more than a bit of rain. Quidditch was a popular sport, and thus, the whole school turned out to watch the match as usual, but they ran down the lawns towards the Quidditch pitch, heads bowed against the ferocious wind, umbrellas being whipped out of their hands as they went.
