Chapter 22 — Above the Grass

The broom at my feet had a split in the handle and several twigs pointing in directions I didn’t intend to travel. Others along the row had worn patches or lengths of cord binding their shafts. Upstairs, my Nimbus was wrapped safely beneath the bed, where it could present no danger to anybody except the person reaching for my slippers.

Harry noticed me examining the split. ‘You’re supposed to fly it,’ he said. ‘I don’t think staring will improve it.’

I told him I was trying to establish a working relationship. He moved his foot away from a crooked twig on his own broom and wished me luck. Then Madam Hooch arrived, her whistle hanging against her robes, and the conversations nearest us began to quieten.

She had short grey hair and yellow eyes which seemed particularly well suited to noticing children doing things they shouldn’t. Her inspection of the equipment reassured her more than it reassured me. She told us to stand to the left of a broom, leaving enough room between each person, and moved Neville a little farther from my side.

He checked the pocket holding his Remembrall before settling into place. Across the grass, Malfoy looked entirely comfortable, as though the lesson had finally reached a subject prepared for his benefit. I kept my attention on Hooch while she showed us where to hold our hands.

‘Palm down, above the shaft,’ she instructed. ‘Then call it up. You must mean the order you give it.’

Harry’s broom jumped into his hand at once. He stared at it with a delighted expression, while Malfoy’s followed a moment later. Mine remained on the lawn through the first attempt and the next. Beside us, Hermione’s rolled half a turn towards her shoe, giving her something else to look offended by.

I tried again, concentrating on the movement I wanted. ‘Up!’ The handle slapped into my palm hard enough to sting, and I closed my fingers before it could reconsider.

For a moment I simply held it. I had given an instruction to an enchanted object and received a result without paper or ink. That didn’t explain the difficulty with my wand, but it did mean the same difficulty wasn’t going to keep me on the ground while everyone else learnt to fly. I could investigate the distinction after enjoying it.

Hooch corrected Hermione, then turned as Ron supplied his broom with considerably more determination. It pivoted on its tail and struck him under the chin. Harry made a strangled noise beside me, and I looked away too late to pretend I hadn’t seen anything amusing. Ron rubbed his jaw and advised us to wait until our own equipment developed an opinion.

Eventually everybody held a broom. Hooch walked down the line adjusting grips, including Malfoy’s despite his explanation that his father had taught him. I listened closely when she demonstrated mounting, balance and stopping. Experience with unfamiliar equipment in my old life had taught me the value of finding the brakes before exploring anything which made it go faster.

We were to push off at her whistle and rise only a short distance. Hooch was still explaining how to return when Neville’s feet left the grass. At first he hovered barely above it, trying to put them down. Then the shaft tilted, taking him higher while his hands tightened around the handle.

‘Lean forward gently, Mr Longbottom,’ Hooch said. Neville insisted he was trying, his voice rising with the broom. His knees came level with my waist, and I could see how quickly the chance to reach him was disappearing.

I dropped my broom and jumped. My hand caught his robes below the shoulder, and I pulled sideways with my weight before he rose farther. Neville came off the shaft against my arm. I twisted so I wouldn’t land on top of him, then hit the grass hard enough to drive the breath from my chest.

The broom shot upwards without its rider. For a moment I could do nothing except listen to Neville struggling for air beside me. Harry dropped to his knees at my other side, while Ron helped Neville sit. Above us, Hooch’s wand checked the runaway broom and began bringing it slowly down.

‘Stay still a moment,’ she told Neville. She checked his arms and legs, asking where it hurt. He shook his head, still watching the descending shaft, and finally managed to indicate that the fall had winded him.

I sat up with Harry’s help. My elbow stung and grass had worked down the back of my collar, but Neville was on the ground and looking less terrified than he had in the air. I waited until I could speak without gasping before suggesting that Hogwarts might consider some newer brooms.

Hooch examined the one settling into her hand. ‘This will certainly be checked,’ she said. ‘Five points to Gryffindor, Mr Mercer. That was quick thinking.’

Neville thanked me twice before I could tell him I had heard. I squeezed his shoulder and got up, trying not to make too much of the protest from my elbow. Hooch brought him a replacement from the spare equipment and tested it herself. He still didn’t want to take it, so she allowed him to watch from the ground until he felt ready to try with her beside him.

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This time we waited for the whistle. I pushed off, and the lawn dropped several feet beneath my shoes. My stomach objected immediately. The rest of me was too interested in remaining upright to offer it much sympathy.

There was support beneath me which the narrow wooden shaft couldn’t explain. When somebody asked about it, Hooch named the Cushioning Charm, and I understood how anyone could endure sitting on a broom for a whole match. I adjusted my position carefully. The support moved with me, leaving only the problem of directing the machine attached to it.

Wind touched my face as I drifted forward. The grass slid beneath my feet, close enough to see every uneven patch and far enough away that I wasn’t touching any of them. I made a cautious turn, corrected it too sharply and nearly swung back the other way. Then I found the balance again and laughed before I could help it.

Harry passed nearby with the same delight and much less argument from his broom. He turned at the end of the line and slowed neatly when Hooch raised her hand. Watching him made it clear how much of my own attention was still devoted to instructions which his body seemed to follow without discussion.

Malfoy went past faster. He glanced towards me before adding a flourish which drew approving calls from the Slytherins. I stayed at my cautious pace. Competing with somebody who could control the broom much better than I could seemed an excellent way to discover whether the Cushioning Charm helped after you fell off.

Hooch caught his next display and told him to demonstrate control by following the lesson. At the edge of the lawn, Neville finally rose a few inches with her beside him. Harry slowed at a distance which gave him space to concentrate. Neville managed a careful turn, put his feet down and began smiling at the broom instead of looking as though it might try to escape with him again.

We completed several circuits before two short whistles brought us back. My landing bounced once, but I remained on my feet and decided that satisfied the essential part of the instruction. Hooch collected Neville’s faulty broom, whose tail still twitched against her robes.

She was taking it to the equipment store, she told us. We were to stay on the lawn with every broom on the ground until she returned. Her description of what would happen to anyone who ignored the order left very little room for an interpretation like the one I had applied to buying a Nimbus.

For a little while, the instruction survived her departure. I brushed grass off my clothes and flexed the sore elbow while Ron wondered how soon we could fly higher. Hermione reminded him that we had just been told not to fly at all for the moment. Then Neville’s voice interrupted them, demanding that somebody give something back.

Malfoy stood before him with the Remembrall turning between his fingers. Neville reached for it, and Malfoy lifted it above his hand. I crossed the grass with Harry and Ron, watching the glass catch the sunlight as though it had become an interesting object only after being taken from its owner.

‘Hand it over,’ I told him. Malfoy asked whether I intended to spend the entire afternoon looking after Longbottom, while Neville repeated that his grandmother had sent it to him.

I reached for Malfoy’s wrist. He stepped back and caught up his broom with the other hand, leaving Crabbe between us. The movement made his intention clear before he invited anyone who wanted the Remembrall to come and get it. I told him to put the broom down, but he was already mounting.

His feet left the grass. Calls from the Slytherins encouraged him higher, and soon he was above our heads, holding Neville’s present where everyone could see it. He asked whether I had forgotten how to fly. I knew exactly how little I had learnt and how much he hoped I would forget that difference.

Chasing him would give him what he wanted. I reached into the pouch instead, angry enough to choose an answer before considering what it might do. Hermione caught my wrist while the attack talisman was still partly inside.

‘He’s in the air,’ she said. She kept her grip when I told her I could see that. ‘Then don’t use it.’

I had intended a fright, a pulse near enough to make Malfoy stop enjoying himself. Looking at his legs dangling above us, I could see how little control I would have over what followed. A small correction in the air had nearly unseated me during the lesson. Deciding that he deserved to be scared wouldn’t decide how he landed.

Harry shouted at him to return what wasn’t his. Malfoy suggested leaving the Remembrall on a roof for Neville to find. Before I could get the piece properly away, Harry seized his own broom and pushed off. My warning reached empty air behind him.

Hermione released my wrist. I returned the attack talisman and took a prepared shield, then moved clear of the group to look for a useful angle. I had never tested it against a falling person. Holding it ready did not make it a solution, and I hated how much now depended on two boys remembering that the ground was a long way beneath them.

Harry stopped near Malfoy beside the turret. Their words barely reached us, but I saw Malfoy’s arm move and Harry lean forward. The space between them closed fast. Malfoy rolled, the underside of his broom flashing in the sun as Harry shot past him. Cheers rose from the Slytherins while I tried to decide whether I had watched a skilful escape or an accident which happened to work.

Harry turned back. Malfoy threw the Remembrall towards the castle and dived for the lawn, leaving the glass ball to draw the chase away from him. Harry followed it. From the ground, his new course appeared to end at a wall, and running several steps for a better view did nothing to improve that prospect.

The ball dropped past a window. Harry stretched out one hand and caught it, then pulled the broom into a turn so sharp that my stomach tightened in sympathy. He stopped beside the stone with Neville’s present in his fist. Gryffindor’s cheers began before I had quite convinced myself he wasn’t about to hit something after all.

I lowered the shield, still intact. Harry descended into a crowd of hands and voices, with Neville trying to reach him through the excitement. Ron turned to call me over. I was looking at the windows above us, trying to match that part of the castle with the corridors I had visited during the previous week.

One of those windows ought to belong to McGonagall’s office. I couldn’t be certain from the lawn, but the possibility was enough to make Harry’s performance seem less safely over. I pointed it out to Ron just as a figure came striding towards us from the castle.

‘Harry Potter!’ The voice cut through the celebration. I put the unused talisman safely away and watched Professor McGonagall approach the boy who had just saved Neville’s Remembrall.