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James glanced around at the Americans, curious to see who was in attendance and what they seemed to think of the match so far. Madame Delacroix was seated on the end of the row, her face expressionless and her hands folded tightly on her lap so that they looked unpleasantly like a ball of brown knuckles. Professor Jackson glanced at James and nodded in greeting. James saw that his black leather case, with its inexplicable cargo, was sitting between his feet, securely closed this time. Professor Franklyn was dressed in what passed for his dress robes, with a high white collar and a frilly ascot at his throat, and his square spectacles which caught the light cheerfully as he looked around the grandstands.
"Where's Ralph?" Harry asked James. "I thought I'd see him with you tonight."
James shrugged noncommittally, avoiding his dad's eyes.
"Ah! Here we are," Franklyn a
The Gryffindor team streaked out of the broad doorway at the base of their grandstand, their red cloaks snapping behind each flyer like a flag.
"The Gryffindor squadron, led by Captain Justin Ke
The team pulled into a corkscrew formation that tightened as it rose, and then yanked their brooms to a halt as the players formed a large letter 'G' right in front of the Gryffindor section of the grandstands. Then the shape dissolved as the players broke formation, dodging around one another in a dizzying bout of aerial acrobatics, and reformed into the letter 'P'. All the players sat up straight on their brooms, faced Harry and James, and saluted, gri
"You'd think the Queen was in attendance," James heard Harry mutter as he sat back down.
"And now, here come the Ravenclaws," Damien called, his voice echoing around the pitch. "Headed by Captain Ge
The Ravenclaw team burst from the opposite side of the grandstand like fireworks, each flyer pulling off into a different direction, weaving through each other and tossing a Quaffle from player to player with speed that defied the eye. After several seconds of spiraling wildly and apparently randomly around the grandstands, the Ravenclaws streaked simultaneously into the center of the pitch, pulled to a sudden stop, then spun on their broomsticks to face the crowd in all directions. Each player raised their right arm, and Ge
Finally, Ge
"I want to see a clean match," he called up to the players. "Captains, ready? Players in formation? A
Ridcully heaved the Quaffle straight up and simultaneously lifted his foot from the Quidditch trunk. The trunk sprang open, releasing the two Bludgers and the Snitch. All four balls shot upwards, merging with the players as they exploded into motion. The grandstands erupted into cheers and wild shouting.
James remembered to look for Zane among the Ravenclaws. His blond hair wasn't hard to find against the royal blue of his cloak. He spun through a knot of players, executing a surprisingly tight barrel roll, then leaned precariously and backhanded a Bludger as it banked around the group. The Bludger missed its target, but only because Noah ducked and rolled aside at just the right moment. The crowd roared in mingled delight and disappointment.
The heat of the summer evening was unusually fierce. The lowering sun beat down on players and spectators alike. On the ground, both teams had marked out team cool down areas, one at each end of the pitch. Each area held a dozen large buckets filled with water. Occasionally, a flyer would perform a wand signal, alerting the team's cool down crew. One member of the crew would use his wand to levitate the water out of one of the buckets, so that it floated thirty feet over the pitch like a solid, wobbling bubble. Then, just as the flyer swooped into position, another crew member would point his wand at the levitating ball of water, exploding it into a cloud of droplets just as the player flew through it. The crowd laughed delightedly every time a player emerged from the rainbow-laden mist, shaking water from their hair and joining the fray again, happily refreshed.
Gryffindor took the lead early on, but Ravenclaw began a steady comeback that stretched into the evening. The sun was setting by the time Ravenclaw overtook Gryffindor, and the match took on that feverish, hectic tone that only very close games can sustain. James watched the Seekers, trying to get a glimpse of the elusive Snitch, but he couldn't see any sign of the tiny golden ball. Then, just as he looked away, there was a flash of setting sunlight on something over the Hufflepuff grandstand. James squinted, and there it was, flitting in and out of the ba
The Ravenclaw Seeker lunged as the Snitch streaked past him. He almost fell off his broom, turned the fall into a diving loop, and doubled back toward the match. Ted, one of Gryffindor's Beaters, aimed a Bludger at Ravenclaw's Seeker, making the boy duck and weave, but not deterring him from his course. Noah was approaching from the other side of the field, ducking and banking wildly through the other flyers. The rest of the crowd caught on to what was happening. As one, the spectators leaped to their feet, shouting and cheering. And then, just at the very height of the action, James saw something else that completely distracted him from the match for the first time since it had begun.
The Muggle intruder was down on the field, standing just to the side of the Ravenclaw cool down area. James could hardly believe he was seeing it, but the man was simply standing, wearing a cast-off cloak from one of the cool down crew, staring up into the match with an expression of total awe and bewilderment. He was holding something to his eye, and James recognized vaguely that it was some sort of handheld Muggle camera. He was filming the match! James tore his gaze away from the intruder and looked up at his dad, who stood next to him, shouting happily at the end-of-game brawl. James yanked Harry's robes and yelled up at him.
"Dad! Dad, there's someone down there!" He pointed wildly, trying to indicate the Quidditch pitch through the throng of standing, waving spectators.