"Difficult to say." Replied the bushy-haired girl. "Normally, I would have said Snape, he appears really dangerous, not like Quirell, but..." Hermione touched her lips, lost in contemplation , while they left the stadium before the herd of triumphant Gryffindors was getting out. Alexandra had no intention to be caught in a tsunami of red and gold. A sea of red and gold having horrible taste in music, if the screams mounting from the stands were any indication.
"My fa-father says Snape know a lot about Dark Arts." Intervened shyly Nigel."He was accu-accused to be a Death Eater in the la-last war."
"For all we know about him," Said grimly Alexandra "Quirell might be more powerful than him. We all believed him to be a coward and a disaster as a teacher. But what if it was all an act?"
Silence fell between the two girls and the boy, all thinking about what had just happened.
"It would be an astounding performance." Said weakly Hermione. "Worthy of a Slytherin. Perhaps more. If he was really able to deceive everyone..."
"Not everyone." Alexandra smiled."After all, whether Professor Snape or Quirell wanted Longbottom dead, it's clear the other wanted to protect him. So at least one Professor wasn't fooled by Quirell act. Assuming he's the culprit, of course."
As the match had lasted less than an hour, Alexandra, Nigel and Hermione arrived at the right time for lunch. Unfortunately, having calm and silence for this meal was the next best thing to impossible, as more than a hundred-plus Gryffindors surged in the castle, shouting songs where the Slytherins and every variant of snake was routinely insulted at least a dozen of times, proclaiming the Lions were the best and the Quidditch Cup belonged to them and so on.
"Is it like this for every match?" Alexandra asked a sixth-year Prefect who was passing near where she was sitting in a semi-exasperated tone.
"Afraid so." Replied the older student, relishing in her discomfiture. "There's only six matches in the year, so at each of them, the winners throw a big feast and celebrations in their Common Room all the week-end."
" Why do they party so hard?" Asked Hermione."It's just a game!"
The face of the prefect grew pale as a moment, as if Hermione had suddenly sprouted magic didn't exist or murdered a puppy under his very eyes. Seeing the first-year Gryffindor was serious, the teenager boy explained.
" This game is the most popular sport in every country save North America. Quidditch is one of the only moment of the year the students can forget a bit their studies and celebrate without risking the wrath of their Head of House and the rest of the staff. It also gives a lot of points for the House Cup. Moreover, students who excel at Quidditch can be recruited in League teams if they perform exceptionally well in a match. Some victories at Hogwarts can launch a professional career on the national stage."
" And defeats can crush a career before it had begun, I suppose?" asked Alexandra.
"Exactly." Nodded the Prefect. "Was there anything you wanted to ask?"
"How much does a professional player earns in a year?"
"For the standard player, around four thousand galleons. Star players can have a salary twice or three times that, victory primes included. Rubbish teams like the Chudley Cannons have players earning two or two thousand and five hundred galleons per year."
"As you see," the boy said, smirking before her gob-smacked expression."Quidditch is a sport where the participants live their life very well." And he left the Hall, leaving Alexandra to her dreams of gold.
"Please tell me you aren't considering playing Quidditch!" Whispered Hermione, who had seen the expression on her face.
Alexandra opened her mouth to answer, but was brutally interrupted when the double doors opened again, and the Slytherin Quidditch Team arrived in the Great Hall, followed by the rest of Slytherin House, who all looked like if someone had told them the end of the world was today, advancing in a silence of death.
The contrast was stunning with the breakfast, when she had seen all the House present smirking and presenting haughty faces, with the players openly displaying bravado and arrogance. Now, most of them were displaying livid, haunted faces. Terence Higgs was looking like he was about to burst in tears. Bole and Derrick had uncomprehending expressions. The captain of the Quidditch Slytherin team, Marcus Flint himself, was whispering to himself in a state of shock "He didn't catch it, he swallowed it."
Draco Malfoy looked like someone who had just been told the pure-blood superiority was a myth. His year-mates were varying in their reaction from red of anger to mentally defeated. All in all, the only Snakes not looking annihilated by the reverse were Crabbe and Goyle, who had already begun to masticate the content of their plates with their usual gluttonous appetite. But these two gorillas had not two cells to create an idea in their skulls and they were definitely the exception.
Looking back at the Gryffindor table, Alexandra saw Neville Longbottom being carried in the direction of his Common Room by several fifth-years. Black, Weasley and the other first-years looking at the Boy-Who-Lived with plenty of veneration in their eyes.
"We only lack the laurels and the chariot..." Alexandra told Nigel and Hermione. If Nigel, being a pure-blood, didn't seem to have the non-magical knowledge to understand her remark, Alexandra saw Hermione's eyes widen and saw the girl was observing the Gryffindors from a new angle. Because indeed, when you thought about it, the resemblance was here. In their crimson-red wizard robes, the Gryffindor players led by Wood and Longbottom had clothes which could pass for a light purple in the late autumn's light. And purple had been the colour reserved for victorious generals on days of triumph in the Republic of Rome's era, or later for the Imperial Family when Rome became an Empire.
"Ave Imperator!" Alexandra whispered, raising her goblet.
"Morituri te salutant." Finished Hermione in a murmur.
And let's pray Longbottom will keep some humility and modesty inside him after this day, Alexandra thought. But with no slave or member of the defeated party in proximity to remind him of his mortality, the odds were good the Boy-Who-Lived would have a bigger head tomorrow.
At least now the black-haired Ravenclaw had reduced the list of the potential culprits for the troll incident to two. It was a progress. Of sorts.
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