gloves, at least in winter. Back when she had had a crush on him, the outfit had tended to reduce her to speechlessness; even now, it made her stomach do a friendly little flip. Of course, he wasn't the only boy she knew who looked good in his Quidditch uniform, but still. There was no harm in silent appreciation.
She blinked as everyone around her started to their feet — apparently the pep talk was over and she hadn't heard a word of it. Seamus, Colin, Elizabeth and Dennis filed past her; Ron half-stood, then cursed quietly as the strap on his knee guard broke. Harry glanced back, but Ron waved him away. 'You go on,' he said, and grabbed for his wand. Harry nodded and reached for his Firebolt; Ginny followed suit, and went after him down the corridor that led out to the Quidditch pitch. They joined the rest of the team there, and a moment later Ron caught up with them.
It was a bright, brisk winter afternoon, so sharply chilly that Ginny's eyes stung. She raised her head, feeling the cold air touch the tip of her nose, her uncovered ears. Her hair was bundled under a black woolly hat, and the fingerless gloves on her hands were tipped with mini Warming Charms, but the chill still seeped into her skin.
She glanced around. The ground below the pitch was scraped clean, as flat and icy as a skating rink. The diminishing sunlight striped it with bars of gold. Behind the pitch rose the Forbidden Forest, the trees immense and winter-black. Stripped of leaves and outlined by the snow, they had a thorny, medieval symmetry.
The crowds whooped and cheered from the stands, many of them clutching orange-glowing Hot Potatoes, a new product from Weasley's Wizard Wheezes that exploded in House colors after the game ended.
Ginny saw Hermione sitting towards the front of the stands, a white knitted cap covering her curly brown hair. She was flanked on her left by George and his girlfriend Jana, who came in from Hogsmeade for the game. Both the twins liked to watch their little sister and brother fly, and were trading off coming in for the matches when the joke shop wasn't too busy.
Ginny raised her hand and waved, and Hermione waved back. Her cheeks were scarlet with cold and, together with the white cap and her curling dark hair, made her look very pretty. Next to her, George made a rude gesture. Ginny was surprised, until she realized that he was looking past her at the Slytherin team, who had just come out onto the pitch opposite them.
She felt herself tense. Gryffindor-Slytherin matches were always the worst, for a multitude of reasons. She hated how fierce and embattled they always were, and how tense they made Harry — she knew, since he had told her back in September, that he and Draco had made a pact never to use their telepathy during a game, as it was both too distracting and could be considered cheating. She knew that Draco was the best flier in the school, after Harry, and the only one who could really challenge Harry on his own ground; she also knew that Harry didn't like having to fly against him, although he never let it get in the way of the game. Harry was nothing if not consummately professional where Quidditch was concerned.
As if he knew Ginny was thinking about him, at that moment Harry tapped her on the shoulder. 'You all right?' he asked.
She knew what he meant; they were all always asking her if she was all right when Draco was around. She looked over at the unmentioned subject of the question, who stood as he always did before a game, arms crossed, broomstick at his feet, his team ranged out behind him as if they were arrayed on a stage. Everything was drama to him, she thought irritably. Everything was about staging. He had probably calculated for hours where to stand so that the sunlight struck him just so, lightening his fair hair to silver and making both it and the silver stripes along his green-striped sweater shine like new metal.
His forest-green Quidditch cloak hung just so, making a perfectly even line from his shoulders down to his polished black boots. Like Harry, he eschewed the elbow protectors and wore the fingerless leather gloves, although his were cleaner and gleamed as if they were new. In fact, the whole Slytherin Quidditch team gleamed as if they had just been polished, from Malcolm Baddock's new Asteroid 2000 broom to Blaise's red-gold hair, which was not, like Ginny's, stuffed under a woolly hat, but instead poured like a river of fire down her back to her waist. They had made some non-regulation alterations to their uniforms — they wore black instead of the usual light-colored corduroys, and all of them wore lace-up leather boots instead of trainers. Polished silver buckles held their emerald robes in place over their shoulders. The general overall effect reminded Ginny of the team of horses who drew the Beauxbatons carriage: sleek, matching, purebred, mean as hell.
'I'm fine,' Ginny said to Harry, who nodded. It was almost entirely true.
Madam Hooch blew her whistle. 'Captains greet each other!' she called out, and the two captains stepped out onto the pitch, Draco first and then Harry. They met in the middle and each held out their hand to be shaken.
Harry's cheeks were scarlet with cold, Draco looked pale and composed and untouched by the weather, and Ginny was struck as always by the similarity in their bearing and build, despite the superficial differences of coloring and uniform. Both were tall and slender without being thin, with the light build that made for exceptional Seekers. Each bent his head as their hands touched, and as the dying sunlight flared and faded behind them, she marveled at the incongruity of it — Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy, shaking hands. A year ago she would have thought that would be impossible; now she wondered that they managed to keep their manner towards each other so cold and reserved in public. They had faced death before shoulder to shoulder, yet as they broke off the handshake, turned, and repaired to their respective teams, they might never have known each other at all.
As the crowd above them roared and cheered, Blaise stood on her tiptoes and kissed Draco lightly on the mouth, as she always did before games, 'for luck.' He barely moved or acknowledged the gesture, seeming to accept it as his due, which annoyed Ginny despite the fact that she knew he was in some measure acting. But then he was always in some measure acting. 'Some people make scenes,' Harry had said to her once. 'Draco makes three-act plays.'
Madam Hooch's whistle blew, snapping Ginny out of her reverie. She seized her broom and kicked off with the rest of the team. Fourteen players rose up towards the darkening silver sky.
Harry immediately rose high above the rest of them, casting about for the Snitch. Draco flashed upward as well, a blur of green and silver at the corner of Ginny's eye. She pulled her attention away from the boys as something huge and black shot towards her — a Bludger, hit by Tess Hammond. Ginny ducked it as Colin flew in front of her, knocking the Bludger back towards Blaise with a mighty heave.
Blaise elegantly swerved around the Bludger, shooting Colin a vicious look as she did so. Colin looked taken aback and slightly frightened — Blaise was an expert at nasty looks.
'Ginny! Over here!' It was Elizabeth Thomas, the Quaffle in her grasp. She hurled the ball towards Ginny, who caught it, turned, and streaked towards the other end of the pitch. The cold air cut at her face, making her eyes sting. As she neared the Slytherin goalposts three dark figures shot in front of her — Blaise, Graham, and Malcolm. As Chasers, they couldn't touch her, but they could certainly block her way. Colin drove them off with a well-directed Bludger, but precious seconds had elapsed, and as Ginny started forward Tess and Milicent swooped in, furiously hitting Bludgers towards her, and she was forced to toss the Quaffle towards Seamus. Blaise intercepted the throw, passed to Malcolm, and the Slytherins scored, Malcolm swatting the ball through the posts so hard it nearly took Ron's head off when he tried to block it.
There was a discontented rumble from the stands. Nobody liked a Slytherin victory except, of course, the other Slytherins.
Ginny bit her lip, and when the Quaffle came back into play, this time she dove after it fiercely. She swatted it away from Blaise (which gave her no small amount of pleasure) and sped across the pitch, casting the ball towards Seamus. He caught it and headed away with it, and as she looked after him she saw something glint below her — The Snitch.
It shot by beneath her feet, and Harry and Draco rocketed after it, neck and neck, two blurs of green and scarlet. As Ginny turned to look down at the flying golden ball and its pursuers, something flashed out at her from across the pitch. It was like a sudden flash of light stabbing into her eyes, but it was not light, it was darkness — a hard and agonizing and painful darkness, sharpened to a point and driven right between her eyes. She felt her limbs stiffen, cold tearing at her insides like knives. Her fingers gone frozen and lifeless, she could no longer hold the broom. The world turned upside down, the sky at her feet, the glittering ice-covered world racing up to meet
