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Chapter 1047: Bad Practice
🕑 Added 2024-03-12 06:56:17 +0000 UTCRita's report would have to wait until next Monday; the next day was the Gryffindor versus Hufflepuff match.
Harry, Fred, and George took Elaine to find Angelina. As the Gryffindor team's last hope, they tested Elaine's ability overnight, and she proved to be excellent. No one expected her to fly so well and with such strength, easily filling the position of a Beater.
They went to Professor McGonagall, hoping to have Elaine play the next day.
In the past, this would have been no problem, but after the Educational Decree Number Twenty-four, this right belonged to Umbridge.
Any team recruiting new members had to pass her inspection, and unsurprisingly, Umbridge refused! Harry and his friends were used to disappointment, but Umbridge's actions angered Elaine thoroughly.
This little girl was full of dangerous thoughts, had a serious revenge mentality, and was extremely bellicose. She threatened to take revenge on Umbridge.
Although Evan warned her not to attack Umbridge, the look on her face showed that she didn’t listen.
Evan had no choice but to consider not getting caught while attacking Umbridge.
Directly attacking her within the castle was not an option. Besides students, the castle was filled with ubiquitous portraits, ghosts, and various magical creatures.
If they attacked Umbridge, there was a high chance of being discovered, so they had to make her leave the castle.
At eight o'clock the next morning, the Quidditch match started on time. The very best about the match was that it was short.
The Gryffindor spectators had to endure only twenty-two minutes of agony. It was hard to say what the worst thing was. Ron missed the Quaffle twenty-two times.
Hufflepuff's Chaser Alecia Esther was outstanding, and no one could stop her. The miracle was that Gryffindor only lost by thirty points: Ginny managed to snatch the Snitch from right under Hufflepuff Seeker Summerby’s nose, so that the final score was two hundred and sixty versus two hundred and thirty.
"Good catch," Harry told Ginny back in the common room, where the atmosphere closely resembled that of a particularly dismal funeral.
“I was lucky,” she shrugged. “It wasn’t a very fast Snitch and Summerby’s got a cold, he sneezed and closed his eyes at exactly the wrong moment. Anyway, once you’re back on the team..."
“Ginny, I’ve got a lifelong ban."
“You’re banned as long as Umbridge is in the school,” Ginny corrected him. “There’s a difference. Anyway, once you’re back, I think I’ll try out for Chaser. Angelina and Alicia are both leaving next year and I prefer goal-scoring to Seeking anyway."
As for Ron, he was hunched in a corner, staring at his knees, a bottle of butterbeer clutched in his hand.
“Angelina still won’t let him resign,” Ginny said. “She says she knows he’s got it in him."
At this point, Angelina's confidence in Ron had turned into a kind of cruelty.
Ron had left the pitch to another booming chorus of “Weasley Is Our King” sung with great gusto by the Slytherins, who were now favorites to win the Quidditch Cup.
Hufflepuff's Chaser was great, but she was alone, and the other players rarely cooperated with her. This was reflected in the second half of the game. As long as she couldn't touch the Quaffle, she couldn't perform. In any case, that girl couldn't possibly be a match for the Slytherin team.
Not to mention, the Slytherin team had many despicable ways to deal with her, such as attacks...
As long as they could win the game, they didn't care how dishonorable the methods were.
If this trend continued, Slytherin would win this year's Cup.
This news was depressing, but it wasn't nearly as much as everyone hated Umbridge.
Hogwarts students' attention to this match didn't last for too long, only until that afternoon.
At five o'clock on Sunday evening, as usual, Harry came to Snape's office for private tutoring.
There was really no good news. He broke up with Cho yesterday. The Gryffindor team just lost the game this morning. Now he had to go to Snape's office to learn Occlumency. This magic only made him feel pain, and Snape's repeated intrusion left his body exhausted.
In recent times, Harry and Voldemort had been in contact more and more frequently.
He saw too many things that he shouldn't have seen or heard, and he thought it was because Snape tortured him even more to fatigue.
In those damn dreams, Harry knew that Voldemort had obtained new information from Rookwood, important information about the Department of Mysteries.
After all, he had worked there before, and from him, Voldemort knew how to get that thing.
In addition, Harry also knew the cause of Bode’s death.
Lucius Malfoy had cast the Imperius Curse on him, hoping that he would get the Prophecy Orb.
But it was impossible for him to take it away, because under the protection of ancient magic, only Harry and Voldemort could touch the Prophecy Orb.
To prevent Bode from revealing the secret, Lucius Malfoy ultimately killed him.
Voldemort finally knew how to obtain the Prophecy Orb, and everything was ready. Now he just had to lure Harry to get it.
Evan was very satisfied with Harry's information, but Snape was not satisfied at all and was very unhappy.
“Get up, Potter," Snape said.
Harry was kneeling on the floor of Snape's office, trying to clear his head.
He had just been forced, yet again, to relive a stream of very early memories he had not even realized he still had, most of them concerning humiliations Dudley and his gang had inflicted upon him in primary school.
“That last memory,” said Snape. “What was it?”
“I don’t know,” said Harry, getting wearily to his feet. He was finding it increasingly difficult to disentangle separate memories from the rush of images and sound that Snape kept calling forth. “You mean the one where my cousin tried to make me stand in the toilet?"
“No,” said Snape softly. “I mean the one concerning a man kneeling in the middle of a darkened room..."
“Nothing,” said Harry quickly.
Snape’s dark eyes bored into Harry’s. Remembering that eye contact was crucial to Legilimency, Harry blinked and looked away.
“How do that man and that room come to be inside your head, Potter?” said Snape.
“It —” said Harry, looking everywhere but at Snape, “it was — just a dream I had."
"A dream," repeated Snape.
There was a pause during which Harry stared fixedly at a large dead frog suspended in a purple liquid in its jar.
“You do know why we are here, don’t you, Potter?” said Snape in a low, dangerous voice. “You do know why I am giving up my evenings to this tedious job?"
“Yes,” said Harry stiffly.
“Remind me why we are here, Potter."
“So I can learn Occlumency,” said Harry, now glaring at a dead eel.
“Correct, Potter. And dim though you may be, I would have thought that after such a long course, you might have made some progress, but you just told me that you had a dream about the Dark Lord. How many other dreams have you had?"
Harry looked back at Snape, hating him. “Just that one,” he lied.
