[A/N: sorry guys! I'm not able to write 3000 word chapters anymore. 1500 words are my max per week. I'm working so... yeah. Cheers]
With that incident out of my mind, I started revising for the exams that were fast approaching. Although I did attend all of my classes, attending Quirrel's classes were extremely weird and taxing. I had to always keep my head down and not make eye contact and maintain my Occlumancy to the max at all times till the end of his classes. Otherwise I had only the slight annoyance of Snape's constant bullying, which I ignored for most of the time.
Since the subjects like DADA, Potions, Charms and Transfiguration came naturally to me, I concentrated more on Astronomy, Herbology and History of Magic. I had always been quite miserable at the practical part of Astronomy and Herbology and I am currently taking help from both Hermione and Neville in hopes of getting a good grade.
I also had an eye on the Marauder's map, in case Quirrellmorte got past all the "defences" Dumbledore had set up. Luckily he did not seem to go past a few metres before returning back to the entrance of the third floor. Snape too tried and he too did not go past Fluffy, since he did not know how to put him to seems, before returning back to the entrance.
The two weeks we had for studying were up and we sat down for our exams. For fuck's sake! Can't they atleast have fans in this place!? They exam hall, which was sweltering in the afternoon heat had made the exams a bit more difficult to properly attempt it. But it was just a slight inconvenience for me and most others. Next was the practical examinations which I aced, including Potions, although I messed up Herbology as predicted, but did quite well in my Astronomy. All in all I was happy with my performance in both my practical and my theory exams and felt relieved that they were finally over.
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"We have to win this. Come hell or high tide. The cup is almost within our grasp. We have the best team in decades and by Merlin's shaggy beard we HAVE to win this no matter what!" Oliver straightened up as he went over the 'battle plans' as he likes to call it. "We have all practiced for this and gave it our all during the practice sessions. I'm very confident in our plan and I'm sure we will destroy them today!" Oliver banged his hand on the chair for extra effect as we were getting pumped up for the last match of the year.
We were playing against our hated and fated foes... Slytherin. In the semi-finals, Slytherin won against Ravenclaw in the first match and the next match was Ravenclaw Versus Hufflepuff, which Hufflepuff won with fair bit of difficulty, Owing it to Roger Davies. Although Gryffindor played fewer matches, the rules somehow put both Slytherin and Gryffindor in the lead with Hufflepuff in Third place and Rvenclaw in dead last.
It made no sense to me but that was how the rules were in th Wizarding world.
We heard Lee announcing the team's and we knew it was game time. Oliver and the whole team turned towards Angelina, "You got this Angelina." Wood gave a reassuring nod and patted her shoulder before turning to the door cracking his knuckles. "Let's go."
We zoomed out of our dressing room our brooms trailing Red and Gold smoke and sparks. We heard the confusion of the whole stadium as we took up our formation, as Lee was announcing:
"Wait a minute folks! Gryffindor has changed their team roster in the last minute.... No! They had changed the roster a week in advance. None of us had bothered to check the roster properly. I have with me the signed copy of the team roster signed one week ago! The Gryffindor team has thoroughly bamboozled the whole School! What an ingenious move by the captain Oliver Wood!"
The Slytherins did not look too happy as we took our positions. Flint was literally growling at me like a dog while the others were just confused as hell just like the whole stadium.
"Harry Potter is playing as a chaser while Angelina Jhonson is playing as the Seeker! What a twist this is! I have never seen such a play and I would bet a few Galleons that none of the teacher's have not seen this either. The Slytherins are trying to argue with Madam Hooch but it seems like she is not having it. The players take the positions, the Captains shake their hands and.... OF! THEY! GOOOO!!"
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In the first few minutes Gryffindor had scored four times pushing the Slytherin team hard and fast. Oliver had placed both Alicia Spinnet and Katie Bell on full offensive tell them not to even cross the half-line. Meanwhile I would fly back to defend on the other side. After ten minutes we stopped defending fully and went on a full-on attack creating a huge lead.
We kept tackling their slower brooms easily and used faints and used the specialized tackling techniques that we practiced extensively during the training sessions, which we "got" from my notes from the team I watched practice in Diagon-alley. For the next half an hour the match took place only on the Slytherin half as we started tackling and intercepting their passes mercilessly.
This angered the Slytherin as they started fouling us. Adrian Pucey and Marcus Flint started targeting me first in hopes to hospitalized me, but they just found themselves being pushed back by my obviously smaller frame... it almost looked like magic. Frustration was evident in their as trend to knock me off my broom only for me to make is foot slip from their foot rest pedal or push their broom causing them to wobble and veer dangerously almost hitting the spectator stands a few times.
Seeing that marking me was useless they started going after Katie Bell and Alicia Spinnet. Big mistake. Katie Bell fought back like a true Lion making the Slytherin Chasers think twice about tackling her again. Alicia was the only target they take advantage of with their bigger bodies, but she did her best to avoid them with hee faster broom. This gave us a lot of penalty shots which boosted our score more.
They came to regret taking their eyes off me, which resulted in more goals as I started marking the Goal-keeper himself to make it near impossible for him to pass to anyone without me intercepting the pass immidiately.
An hour was almost up when I scored a goal by fainting to the side and dunking the ball in the middle hoop, bring the score up to 290 to 110. The Slytherin Seeker in his desperation caught the snitch pushing himself to the limit, and Angelina having very little experince in playing Seeker could not do anything except stall for time since the start of the match, which she did brilliantly.
"... Slytherin caught the snitch but Gryffindor won the match with their stunning performance from the chasers. The final score is 290 to 260 giving the win to the Lion. WITH THIS, THE GRYFFINDORS HAVE WON THE QUIDDITCH CUP!!! BRILLIANT PERFORMANCE FROM...."
Lee Jordan's voice was drowned out as we landed on the ground and the entire Gryffindor house ran into the field joining our team in celebration lifting us all up and carrying us all the way to the locker rooms.
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"To The Lions!!!" Oliver yelled into the Common Rooms as he swung the Quidditch cup and started chugging the spiked Butterbeer straight from the championship trophy-cup. It was my idea to put the drink inside the cup and drink it, making a brand new tradition that would continue on from generations to come.
The whole Gryffindor common room was Blasting music and celebrating our win when Professor McGonagall came walking in calmly. The room became deathly silently as she walked into the middle of the crowd, which parted like the red sea to Moses. She grabbed the cup vanished the liquor inside and gave it back and silently walked back to the portrait door, "Ten points from Gryffindor for spiking beverages."
The mood of the Lions went down rapidly as everyone were getting ready to pack up. McGonagall stared baleful at us and sniffed exasperated, "And another ten points..." She looked scrutinizing at each of us ad we put our heads down not wanting to meet her stern gaze, "... for stopping the music." She left as she came as the whole common room froze collectively before we looked at each other, looking like Owls with our wide eyes staring blankly.
"...."
I couldn't hold back and lifted the Cup with wood and yelled, "TO THE LIONESS OF HOUSE GRYFFINDOOOOR!!"
The after party was legendary.