The match didn’t matter anymore, not with chaos erupting around them. Alicia heard screams from players and spectators alike as Death Eaters swooped in from the sky, seeming to be everywhere all at once. Turning her broom to the darkening sky, she flew upward, trying not to let the glowing Dark Mark above the stadium shake her confidence. They needed help. She had to call for backup.
Digging her wand out of her robes pocket, she and her broom climbed higher until the pitch began to look small beneath her. Taking a deep breath to focus herself, she clenched her eyes shut and raised her wand. After a few moments that seemed impossibly drawn out, a wisp of silver crept from the end of it, pooling above her until it took on the shape of a hummingbird. It hovered beside her for a split-second as she breathed, “Get help,” and sent it flitting away across the sky.
Layla Fairbourne watched it all happen from her perch on her broom at a higher elevation than her friend. The Dark Mark she’d launched earlier glowed eerie green against her robes and mask.
Choosing to attack from air given that Layla knew full well many of their targets would be on broomsticks (and excellent fliers, she knew full well) had given her a full view of Alicia climbing higher to cast her Patronus.
To alert the Order.
The Death Eater’s plan had been simple: corral Angelina and Alicia or chase them around until the attack was over. They didn’t need to get hurt in this, and she could say she tried in the chaos. But then Alicia outed herself, and Layla’s blood boiled. The months she’d spent defending them, risking everything, letting very dangerous people know they couldn’t be in the Order was thrown abruptly in her face.
Layla snapped her wand, and thick ropes sprung forth towards her friend even as she kicked her broom into gear, swooping down towards the Magpie. In her burst of anger Layla had no real plan formulating in her mind.
Alicia had only just turned her attention back to the fray beneath her when Layla's ropes struck her. The heavy coils threw her off-balance and she pummeled toward the ground while they wrapped around her and her broom. It took precious seconds in freefall to regain control of her trajectory and several more to slice her way out of her predicament. It was all she could do to breathe as she hovered above the pitch, but she couldn't stop there — she was under attack.
Searching the sky frantically for her assailant, Alicia decided it was best to keep moving and took off to make herself a harder target to hit. When she finally located the masked figure in the air, she sat back on her room and sent a blasting curse flying straight for them.
It was easy to dodge the curse, even hurtling towards Alicia though she was. Layla was as much at home in the air on a broom as her former squadmate, and a roll send the blasting curse soaring harmlessly into the air. Layla pursued, ignoring the danger posed by her equally agile friend, knowing that she wanted to at the very least subdue Alicia before she flew down into the fighting below like an idiot. The wind whipped past her, robes flapping, as she dove downwards in hot pursuit. She snapped off two stunning spells in quick succession — quantity over quality in this type of environment.
Alicia swerved the two spells as easily as if they were bludgers, a feat she had plenty of experience at. As high above the ground as they were, being hit with a stunner would be as good as any deadly attack. She couldn’t afford a hit — she couldn’t afford a fall. So she plunged on ahead of the Death Eater, knowing that if she’d been seen casting the patronus, she was as good as made. At least she didn’t have that left to lose anymore.
“You must not know who you’re messing with,” she shouted over her shoulder, though she doubted it’d reach the Death Eater’s ears with the way the wind was whipping around them. But following the same train of thought, she left a trail of blasters peppering her wake and hoped one of them hit their mark.
“Give me a break,” Layla shouted, although it was lost to the rushing wind. Trying to converse as the trailing party in a high speed chance didn’t work well. If Alicia thought she had a huge advantage, she was wrong. Layla might have been out of practice, but she’d been a chaser too, banking and dipping or climbing at a fraction’s notice to avoid deadly blasting curses was second nature, as was doing it all one-handed. Instead of a quaffle tucked under her arm she had her wand in hand, a shield forming here or there to catch the spells that were on point.
As the pitch came into full view Layla only increased her speed, racing a touch underneath Alicia in a hopes to force her to level out. Keep her away from the fighting. And that’s when the first bludger whizzed past her head, missing by inches. Shit.
When none of her spells landed, she cursed under her breath — clearly she didn’t know who she was messing with, but then again, that was the nature of the Death Eaters’ anonymity. But contrary to her opponent’s wishes, Alicia didn’t level out. And while the Death Eater dodged the bludger, she jerked her broom and angled straight for them.
Doing a barrel-roll and spin to dodge another bludger smacked by an irritating Puddlemere beater by too close a call, the Death Eater only righted herself to see Alicia hurtling towards her. The hunter had become the hunted, and suddenly the entire dynamic had changed. Her speed was slower now, and that was bad, very bad. It made her an easier target, and so all Layla did was accelerate, letting Alicia tail her instead.
She looked over her shoulder, and shot another stunning spelling before speeding towards the Magpie’s hoops.
From behind, dodging was even easier — Alicia had eyes on the Death Eater and every spell they sent her way. She had the advantage now. Deciding it was time to make the most of it, she sent a series of severing charms at the Death Eater’s back and finished with a fireball.
It wasn’t only the assault by her friend; the beater had been tracking her movements too, and kept cracking bludgers at the Death Eater. It was much different being chased, looking over her shoulder to see what was happening wasn’t conducive to steering. A severing charm slipped through her guard and sunk into her side, biting through cloak and flesh all the same. It was the fireball that was more of the issue, grazing the tail of her broom, and singeing the bristles. It made her flight more unstable, wobbling side to side. She turned again, and launched a lightning bolt at her friend that erupted from her wand with a loud, thunderous crack. And then she drove straight for the center hoop, a plan formulating in her mind.
The air around them became electrified and even as Alicia dodged the bolt of lightning, she felt her hair stand on end, even down to the tiny ones on her neck and arms. But she was determined and flew on after the Death Eater despite the chills running through her body. Setting her jaw, she fired off another stunner, keeping her eyes locked on her target.
It was both a curse and a blessing that Layla’s flying wasn’t smooth anymore. Harder to control, but also harder to hit, a little dip in her altitude had the stunner connect with the hems of her flapping cloak, missing her body. Oblivious to how close their fevered, aerial dance had come to an abrupt conclusion, Layla traversed the center hoop, and then she pulled up, hard, and raised a hand to touch the underside of the hoop’s apex to help guide her rapid, stomach-turning loop de loop.
Alicia’s eyes grew wide and her mouth dropped open at the sight in front of her, then above her, and finally behind her. She was leading the chase again, and shook the familiarity of the scenario from her thoughts as she pitched her broom forward and changed their course. She knew the Death Eater couldn’t keep up, couldn’t maneuver as well on a damaged broom, so she took them flying straight for the stands. She had her own plans now.
The maneuver had an additional effect: momentum. Like a slingshot Layla rocketed after her friend, closing the distance before her speed tapered off, hampered by the damaged broom she was now riding. Her side felt colder, damper now as the blood from the severing charm soaked her garments in chilly January air.
The distance closed, and Layla snapped her wand to the side, shooting a jet of flame at the bristles of Alicia’s broom.
At the sight of the flame, Alicia swallowed down a lump of panic in her throat and tried her best to avoid it. But the flames caught on the bristles of her broom — her broom — and she had no choice but to sacrifice some speed as she shot a jet of water over her shoulder to extinguish it.
By the time Alicia recovered, they were closing in on the stands. Leaning lower over her broom handle, she kept course, even as the Death Eater pulled alongside her. She could still pull this off.
Layla looked over at her friend. They were neck and neck now, almost able to reach out and touch each other especially with the speed having diminished. The stands below, once teeming with people. were mostly vacated as citizens fled at the Death Eaters arrival and attack. “Game over, Spinnet,” she hollered, adrenaline (and the exhilaration of a flight without holding back) fueling her at this point past any degree of sense to keep her mouth shut. She raised her wand, “Stupe—”
That’s what you think, Alicia thought as she clenched her jaw and yanked on the handle of her broom and sent herself flying straight up into the air.
The flash of red went off from the stunner, but Layla couldn’t see if it had landed. In fact, her friend wasn’t the issue anymore. The stands that Alicia had been guiding the Death Eater towards rapidly were, and Layla went to yank up realizing the danger, damaged broom sluggish in response —
Too late.
Her boots hit first, dragging along the top of an empty bench, their friction causing her control to waiver. It likely wouldn’t have mattered. Layla hit the next tier of seating hard despite attempts at deceleration full force, breaking through the wooden benches and practically bouncing off the ground, momentum pitching her like a rag-doll forward end over end. She landed ten feet up, in the wreckage of yet another row of seating, still clutching her broken broom with an arm and hand that matched her possession’s fracture.
Alicia sat back on her broom to slow her trajectory upwards, her heart pounding in her chest. Over her shoulder, she watched the Death Eater lose control and smash into the stands. As relief flooded her, she was too distracted to see the stunning curse ricochet off the flagpole rushing to meet her. Both collisions seemed to happen at once, and like that, the the match was over.
Angelina Johnson & Grace Jordan v. Lucius Malfoy
The last time Lucius had fought in the air, Potter had destroyed his wand.
It made him the slightest bit hesitant to get on the broom and attack the flyers, but he shook that off and vowed that this time would be better. Dodging a bludger that nearly took his head off, he huffed in exasperation and without further thought, he took off on his broom, zooming right towards the Magpies players he'd seen disperse. The quicker this was over, the more easily he could ensure a better outcome.
The Avada Kedavra he aimed at the player in front of him would guarantee that.
One of the bludgers made the mistake of flying in front of the curse, exploding in a flash of green that made Angelina flinch. She still couldn’t quite believe this was happening again. One moment they’d been playing quidditch, the next there were far too many people on the pitch and a killing curse meant for one of them.
“Are you kidding?” Using one of her knees, Angelina swivelled her broom around to properly face the Death Eater and shot an arrow at him with her wand.
Lucius swerved from the arrow before it could make contact and he wanted to return the question back at her, though he refrained from doing so. This was just what he should've expected. Turning back around, he spotted a few incoming bludgers coming his way and redirected them with his wand so they'd head towards the Magpie instead. He'd enjoy her fall to the ground.
With a crack, Grace’s bat slammed into one of the bludgers, sending it careening into the other before either could find their intended target. The dive she’d taken to catch the bludgers had been a frantic one, and it was training alone that kept her balanced on the broom.
Grace kept her furious glare on the Death Eater as she hovered between he and Angelina. “Ok?” She called back to her teammate with far more bravery than she felt. All she had was a bat and it trembled in her hand.
“Yeah,” Angelina answered breathlessly, her eyes darting between the Death Eater and her teammate. “Of course. Are you?” As she asked, she settled her gaze on the Death Eater again and pointed her wand at the handle of his broom, sending arresting chains looping for it.
Great. Now there were two of them. One Quidditch player was insufferable enough without adding another one. Ready to blast the newcomer off her broom, Lucius was momentarily distracted by the swift movement of his broom, which, contrary to his wishes, had jerked him forwards. Caught in the hold of the chains, another pull nearly unseated him — he only saved himself by clutching the handle. Before he could wait for his heart rate to settle back to normal, Lucius quickly detached the chains from the broom and regained his upright position.
"The game's over," he called out, "so you should leave before you get hurt."
Of course, he had no intention of allowing them to follow the last part of his statement, his wand pointed at the, he presumed, Beater to send her flying right at the other one.
Grace was far too busy noting the Death Eater’s general unsteadiness on the broom to pay attention to whatever lies were no doubt coming out of his mouth. The influx of bludgers was an advantage for a Beater so Grace took that opportunity.
“I’m —“ Grace’s words cut off in a punched out cry as the force of Lucius’ spell sent her flipping back towards Angelina. The bludgers she’d just sent towards him changed angle sharply.
Desperate to keep her hold on her broom, and avoid knocking Ang off of hers, Grace cracked her head on her own bat. “Fine,” she finished, painfully.
Even though Grace was trying to avoid her, Angelina wanted to make sure Grace wasn’t unseated, an arm thrown out and every muscle in her body braced to catch her if she had to. When her teammate hit her head, she resisted the urge to ask again if she was okay, settling on wincing sympathetically and urging her broom forward to put herself between Grace and the Death Eater.
Angelina threw a shield charm around Grace and, for Lucius, she sent a handful of severing charms.
In the air, the severing charms seemed to come in all directions and even the shield Lucius brought up was unable to block every single one of them. One landed on his shoulder, slicing through his robe and piercing his skin. Another grazed his ear. He grimaced at the contact and maneuvered away from the targeted area and closer towards the two players, tossing a succession of Bone Twisting curses at the girl in front.
Angelina quickly steered herself out of the line of fire, but she wasn’t quite fast enough and her elbow twisted in its socket with a gasp. The rest of the curses soared past her and she hoped they didn’t hit anyone else.
Cursing her thoughtless tendency to leave her wand behind during games, Grace shot forward, her bat coming down hard against two whistling bludgers, one aimed directly for the Death Eater’s broom.
On the heels of Grace’s bludgers, Angelina sent a melofors jinx at Lucius.
It took what felt like the longest while for Lucius to realize what had happened — one second, he was watching the Quidditch players in the sky, and the next, darkness enveloped him and his hand flew up to his head — or where his head was supposed to be and was now a pumpkin. Blindly, he sent a combination of Blasting Curses and Cruciatuses in what he hoped was the right direction before using the time he'd bought to shatter the pumpkin. The pieces exploded around him, splattering on his robes, in his hair, on his broom. He was going to kill them.
"Avada Kedavra!"
When the Death Eaters had gone and they’d come out of this relatively unscathed, the sight of a furious pumpkinhead in robes, firing off curses, would be something to laugh about. As it was, Grace dodged one poorly aimed Cruciatus only to feel her gut tighten at the telling green glow that followed it.
Instead, one of the bludgers intervened in a screaming explosion of light and debris.
Angelina’s own laugh — the badly aimed and easily dodged curses adding fuel to her amusement — had died in her throat at the second flash of green. She wasn’t joining her aunt today. She couldn’t. And it was time for this particular Death Eater to go. Dodging more bludger debris, she pointed her wand at Lucius with a silent Ebublio.
The jinx encased Lucius and his broom in a bubble instantly and what he'd thought was a stupid trick turned out to be a prison. By the time he was finally able to break through it, after a mix of spells, the Quidditch players were long gone.
Percy Weasley & Bill Weasley v. Humberto Pyrites
Screams punctuated the air, spurring spectators to first gape and then stampede, some of them apparating with cacophonous pops while still others pushed toward the exits. Percy, in the Minister’s box with the Irish delegation, stood abruptly and tapped his wand on the back of a chair. “Steady!” he said to the increasingly anxious politicians, one of which made a sarcastic comment about British safety and the Troubles, before a plastic comb was produced.
“Grasp tightly. This portkey will take you directly back to the Ministry. You’ll find yourself in the foyer beyond the Minister’s offices. From there, you can safely Portkey back to Belfast.” A petite witch, the leader of the group, gave Percy a nod.
“Not coming with us then?” she asked. Percy shook his head. Not with Oliver out on the Pitch and people in danger. Percy was sick of running from action, hiding behind quill and Hooter handle, letting Robards take the heat all while he continued to quietly work, despising the intent of all those around him.
“Your Portkey to Belfast is in an envelope on my desk. It really was a pleasure, and trust me when I say that I acknowledge your economic concerns and there will be a follow up --” Percy was cut off by a loud crack as a portion of the stands gave way. “Go now!” And the delegation went.
With his wand firmly in his grasp, he then leapt to the opposite side of the box, and intended to make his way down to the Pitch where he could hopefully be of service to whoever was marshalling a line against the ensuing Death Eaters. He took off at a sprint.
“Pick a card, any card!” gleefully cackled the Death Eater, white-gloved hand fanning out a selection of playing cards towards a group of Magpies fans. “For you, sir!” he sent the Queen of Hearts racing towards an elderly gentleman causing him to gasp for breath, his throat suddenly closing as if strangled. “And you madam!” The Ace of Spades soared like a dagger before striking a middle-aged brunette woman and bursting her into flames.
Cape billowing, the Death Eater whirled around looking for another victim, and his eyes, through mask-slits, settled on a bureaucratic looking man striding purposefully towards him. “There’s one left, good sir!” he shouted before chucking the blasting-curse laden King of Spades.
Intent on finding his way down to the Pitch, Percy was ill-prepared to cast the necessary charm to deflect the King of Spades. In fact, the blow didn’t register until he found himself sprawled against a wall, jacket smoking with the force of the card’s wrath. Because the Death Eater’s attention had been diverted, the other civilians began to flee (grasping their necks or arms, ducking to put physical space between themselves and the Death Eater), and Percy was left with the robed yet showboating figure.
He made it to a knee before he hurled an “Expelliarmus!” at his opponent.
The disarming charm struck the Death Eater, who had just procured a bouquet of flowers with a snap of his fingers. The roses went soaring from his grasp and landed in a vacant seat which promptly melted.
“Oh ho, those were my favourite roses, you miscreant!” exclaimed the Death Eater before he reached into the interior pocket of his robes. With a flourish a flock of throwing knives whizzed through the air towards the offending wizard.
“ … what the hell kind of Death Eater are you?” Percy, having gained his feet, was able to engage the use of a hot dog cart into which the throwing knives could clatter uselessly. Maybe this duel was turning in his favour? He sent sparks flying toward the Death Eater, and pushed the cart at him with a flourish of his wand.
A beat off the punch-line -- “Maybe a hungry one.”
“I’m not hungry!” Humberto retorted with a gasp, sparks dancing painfully upon his torso, not having his wand drawn to protect himself magically. He spun on his heel so that his cloak billowed once more covering his body just as the cart collided —
And then the cart appeared to be pushing the cloaked figure down the stairs to the pitch with a resounding crash at the bottom.
— but then there was the Death Eater, sans cloak, twirling back into sight from… wait, where did he come from? Now the dark figure had his wand in hand. “Ta-da!” he called, before sending Incarcerous ropes at his opponent. Humberto took a second to glance down, seeing the burns from the sparks, and then back up. “You don’t see very appreciative of my talents, my tricks, my being!” That was apparently enough to tip the scales, and with a violent looking slash: “Volnero!”
Proud of shielding himself from the entangling ropes, he was not prepared for the ensuing slashing curse. And as his tie fluttered to the ground, he felt the warm seep of blood as it began to soak into his undershirt. He’d worry about that later, though. This Death Eater had to be subdued and Oliver found.
“Evanesco!” he gritted out, pointing his wand at the Death Eater’s mask. Then, with another flourish of his wand he levelled a Stunning spell whose red hue came in bright and flashing. Percy was mad. And he wanted this Death Eater out of his way.
“You’re bleeding,” the Death Eater pointed out, sounding far too excited about it to not be some form of socio- or psychopath. Humberto’s mask vanished, but it only became apparent why he was so lax in defense — a second mask just below, looking like a mad jester’s, was revealed. “Now you’re really starting to tick me off!” A shield caught the stunner, and then he was conjuring a large amount of pencils -- for the pencil-pusher -- that hopped on their rubbers towards the bleeding bureaucrat, intent on stabbing him.
“This symbolism thing is going a mite too far!” A line of flames successfully saw to a great deal of the pencils, though the largest and angriest one in the horde made it through its vanguard of burning comrades to bury in the meat of his calf. Percy grimaced, but knew if he let his guard down for even an instant, this one would happily kill him and make it ridiculous.
He didn’t want his final act to be a joke. And he’d had enough of them to last him a few lifetimes. Ergo, his desire to be done with playing. Two sets of benches flew at the Death Eater in an attempt to flank him while he aimed at that mask and shouted “Confringo!”
The Death Eater had just sent a balloon animal bola to wrap around his opponent when that blasting curse took him in the mask. His head snapped to the side with tremendous force -- causing his whole body to spin -- just as the benches tackled him from either side. The Death Eater went down in a heap, a large crack spanning the side of his mask. Thank heavens for reinforcing enchantments.
As quickly as the Death Eater had been knocked off his feet, the benches blew back off of him, and Humberto stumbled, straining to his knees. This wasn’t his first rodeo, or his first bit of pain. What magician couldn’t fight through his tricks exploding on him?
But one thing was for certain, the Death Eater was no longer playing around. Wand flicked and slashed, and erupting in a flashing red light along with the cry of “CRUCIO!”
Percy attempted a shield charm but too weak, it shattered and he fell to a crumpled heap, attempting to hold in the cries of pain as fire shot up and down his nerves. This is it.
This was definitely not it. Not if Bill had anything to do with it. The rallying call issued, it had taken members of the Order mere minutes to haul arse to Puddletown -- but minutes, as they were all learning, could often mean the difference between life and death, and were too precious to squander. Hence the breakneck apparition when he caught sight of a familiar blonde head, one which brought him into arm's reach behind the Death Eater, appearing with a sharp crack of air.
And then a sharp crack of foot meeting the back of the Death Eater's knee whilst the air was still suffused with Cruciatus red. Nothing like a basic move to break someone's concentration, followed by a bone-shattering curse to the same place just for good measure.
"You've made a huge mistake, fucker."
So concentrated was Humberto on his victim — the Cruciatus curse required such things — that he didn’t even hear the Apparition so close by. Suddenly he was caving, crumpling backwards at the force of the kick taking out his leg at the knee. That was followed up by the bones breaking apart at awkward angles, bursting through the skin and sending the Death Eater to the ground, howling in pain.
But he wasn’t done, for as much as Humberto couldn’t stand he could still fight — with a roll to his back and aiming a slashing curse right at the new arrival.
Darting smartly to the side, a hastily erected shield charm caught the brunt of the curse, a sliver eating its way through enough to catch Bill just off the shoulder. He barely noticed, though, attention split on the Death Eater and what bone he should next smash, and his brother, bleeding and still.
A blast was quick, and it was easy, and Bill threw it at the Death Eater as he raced around him. “Percy?” he called, sending another shield charm out, this time to the younger Weasley.
Reaching into his robes with his free hand once more, Humberto grunted against the pain and took out another fistful of cursed playing cards. “Ta-ta!” he called, although it was more pained than he’d have wished. With a pop, he disappeared leaving behind only the cards he’d thrown moments before, and a flock of bewildered bats.
Percy came-to with a rush, gripping his wand prepared to flourish with a counter-curse, but it was Bill’s face that came into his view. Instantly deflating, he sat back and unwittingly set off the Ace of Spades, which began to choke him.
He scrabbled at his throat, clawing for air and gasping.
"Perce?" Confusion, at first, then panic as Bill watched his brother sputter for air. "Anapneo!" he spat out as he reached out to grab Percy's shoulders and pull him forward, hoping the spell might buy them some time as he looked for whatever might be causing this.
… a playing card. Right. With a quick slash of his wand, he pulled it away from Percy, sending it shooting into the air and aiming a destructive hex at it, hoping that obliterating it would also obliterate the curse.
Breathing once more - if shallowly, for the wounds still staining his button-down - he gave his brother a nod of thanks and turned to the cards left, pointing his wand and giving a growled out vanishing charm. The cards crumbled into a pile of inconsequential ash. Even that magic, however, caused his vision to swim.
“Bill,” he said, and shook his head. “I think I need help.”
“Agreed,” came tightly, as Bill took in his younger brother’s ashen cheeks… and the blood darkening what had once, he was sure, been a very smart dress suit. If Percy was lucky, this was only the result of a slashing hex. Moving quickly, Bill cast a quick, straight-forward healing charm, something to staunch the blood as he wrapped his arm around the other Weasley’s shoulders, propping him up so that they could both fall into the sphere of a hastily cast protective shield while he quickly looked him over. “Anywhere else?” he asked, as he closed Percy’s hand tightly around his wand. “I’m going to side-along you, okay?”
It was almost embarrassing, the amount of damage he took from the Death Eater. “There’s a gigantic pencil in my leg,” he muttered. And he wasn’t sure what came of the Blasting Curse, but knew that his breath was shallow and painful.
“Are they all that fucking dramatic?” But Percy gripped his wand and nodded. “Okay let’s go.”
“Let’s not stay and find out,” Bill agreed, and gave Percy a squeeze, tight but careful, before gathering in a grounding breath, steadying the both of them before, with a crack, they flickered and disappeared from the pitch.
Oliver Wood v. Richenza Selwyn
Richenza didn’t particularly care about this Quidditch match interruption nonsense, but she always felt she looked especially majestic on a broom. What better place to showcase that than a Quidditch match under siege?
But then she spotted Oliver Wood and she couldn’t not attempt to knock him from his broom, no matter how many classes they’d shared at Hogwarts. She had orders. So with the heaviest of sighs behind her mask, she shot a blasting curse at Oliver. She was sure if she felt things like guilt or regret she might feel either of those about singling him out.
The curse flew in his direction, fast as lightning, and Oliver swung his broom away. The momentum had him careening to the side, and he felt the blast from behind him. He didn’t look back to see what had been hit; he prayed it wasn’t the stands.
If this had been months ago -- months before the Inferi came to Angelina and Alicia’s match -- Oliver would have been in a lot more trouble. He was still in trouble, he thought, but after that match, he brought his wand onto the pitch every single time, even during practice. He hadn’t very often, before, even though he could. There’d been no reason to. Now, it felt like a blessing that Percy had given him a new holster for it, something that was comfortable --
His heart felt like it was going to drop out of his stomach at any second, thinking about who was there in the stands, thinking about if they were okay. Then his eyes narrowed and he focused on the person who’d tried to curse him. “Expelliarmus!”
A shield charm caught the disarming spell and Richenza’s wand stayed firmly in her hand. She bit back another sigh, frustrated that Oliver hadn’t let her gently tap him off his broom and so she could be done with this. She would’ve made sure he’d landed safely!
She thought about taunting him. Taunting could be great fun under the right circumstances, but this somehow didn’t feel like the right circumstances. So she went with flair instead, snapping her wand out with a whip of fire.
That was stupid, he thought as he watched his spell fail. (If he survived this, he was going to ask for dueling lessons from someone. If, if, if.) His opponent was better at this than he was. The fire lashed his left leg, sending a flare of pain in all directions. He knew he couldn’t out-curse them, but maybe he could out-fly…
He aimed a blast of ice-cold water at them before he angled his broom into a sharp dive, hoping to get underneath and behind the Death Eater before they could spin around.
The water was enough of a distraction and Richenza enough of a novice on her broom that Oliver was indeed faster than she was. The bludgers, one of which came dangerously close to unseating her in that very moment, were also not helping matters. She shot out blindly with another fire whip.
That time, he was able to evade the fire entirely. “Why --” Oliver didn’t understand what they were doing here. Was it because the two teams had been outspoken before? Was it that he and Angelina and Alicia had been? Was it his father? Malfoy was in charge of the department; why were they trying to up-end everything now?
He flew backwards towards his goal posts, hoping to draw them away from the stadium, and cast a jelly-fingers jinx at them. He didn’t have much of a plan outside of ‘occupy them until someone else could help.’ “Why are you doing this?” he called out. “You could at least show me your face if you’re gonna try to hurt me!”
From behind Richenza’s mask came a snort. But then the fingers on her wand hand became jelly and her wand slipped between them. She dived to watch her wand and when her broom levelled out again she was feeling less charitable towards Oliver. “I think you know exactly why, Oliver Wood,” she said, her voice unrecognizable behind her mask.
Wand in her other hand, she pointed it at one of the goal posts and with a wrenching protest, it tilted before falling forward into Oliver’s path. A lurid green acid curse followed.
Between the goal post and the acid, there was nowhere for him to go. The acid hit his left side, burning through the protective gear he wore like it was nothing. He swerved to avoid the falling post, just barely getting out of the way.
The acid was through to his skin now. Through gritted teeth, he muttered a hurling curse at her broom. He could hear shouts from below as people tried to get out of the way before the post fell, but he shook his head to try to get that out of his mind.
Another acid curse went wide as Richenza’s broom bucked beneath her, acid splashing a bludger that whistled by her.
Knocked off balance, she flung her wandless hand out to brace herself on the broom, but her fingers were still jelly and they merely flapped uselessly against the wood. Her legs weren’t nearly strong enough to keep her seated upright and the change in position prompted the broom beneath her to roll. Her legs screamed in pain as she tried to keep them wrapped around the handle, hanging upside down above the pitch, the breath knocked out of her by surprise and, even more surprising, fear.
Her brain seemed to waste those precious seconds she needed to right herself. As if in slow motion, she slipped from the broom and fell and fell and fell until a sickening crack and Robinet, I’m— and then nothing.
Oliver’s eyes widened as he watched the Death Eater fall. He’d meant to do that, hadn’t he? But as he saw them hit the ground, a pit opened wide inside him and his stomach dropped out of it. He didn’t need to be a healer to know what had happened, what he’d done. He’d fallen from great heights before, but there was nothing natural about the way the Death Eater was splayed out.
Pain seared through him again as the acid kept burning away anything in its path: his skin, now, more and more by the second. He had to get out of there. He had to --
Dizzy, he angled his broom to the ground, pushing it as hard as he could go. He could see his opponent out of the corner of his eye, bloodied and still. He tumbled from his broom and staggered away, towards safety, towards help, only casting one last glance behind him. He had to get as far away from them as he could, before anyone else noticed.
Fred Weasley v. Michael Rosier
The first thing that happened was a Bludger clipping Michael across the shoulder. He swore quietly, voice slightly altered behind his mask and blasted the second backwards as the pitch was filled by members of the public. Order members, probably. He really wasn’t sure. It wasn’t really important anyway. The important part was one of the Weasley twins, standing in front of him, pure Gryffindor and self righteousness.
Michael started simple, with a bone twisting curse, followed by a boring, yet generally effective blasting curse.
Fred, who’d come to the game to watch his friends play quidditch and not to suddenly have to fight Death Eaters only just got his shield charm up in time, stopping the bone twisting curse. But the blasting curse hit the ground around him, pushing him off balance as it exploded. He shot a quick confundus charm back at his masked opponent, wishing he had his beaters bat.
Michael blocked the Confundus at the last second, taking a step back as another Bludger whooshed past him, unintentionally giving his opponent a second to regroup before his next attack: a fire whip hurling towards Fred at high speed.
Despite not having played quidditch in a couple of years, Fred’s beater instincts still kicked in and he found himself paying more attention to the location of the bludgers than the Death Eater right in front of him, only just reacting to the whip in time. “Hydrinpes,” he aimed at the fire, transforming it into a controllable snake-like flame and sending it slithering back at Michael.
A severing curse cut the fire snake in half, which in theory should’ve stopped it. In reality it just doubled the threat. At least until Michael blasted one of them in Fred’s direction just as the other one snaked up the side of his robes, effective setting them on fire. “Oh fuck this,” he muttered, casting a blood boiling curse in his opponent’s direction, hoping it’d keep him busy long enough for him to be able to douse the flames.
Fred could feel himself flushing pink as his blood heated up and had to temporarily take his attention of his opponent to stop both the fire snake and the blood boiling. Still hot, but temperature no longer rising, Fred turned his focus back on the Death Eater, who too had unfortunately dealt with his snake. He sent a quick jelly-legs curse at Michael, hoping to make it harder for him to dodge the fireball he followed up with.
Feeling his legs turn to jelly (and wasn’t that an embarrassing thing to quite literally fall for?) Michael toppled over, the fireball skimming the shield he threw up for protection. It wasn’t enough to set him on fire. It was definitely enough to hurl him backwards, the heat washing over him through the shield, hot enough to blister.
A Bludger whizzed past him in that moment and he redirected it towards Fred with a slash of his wand before pointing it towards his own legs. Finite Incantatem, he murmured, and then towards the Weasley twin, “Volnero! as he jumped back to his feet.
Fred went to beat the bludger away with his wand, only realising just in time that this wouldn’t work like a bat and ducking out of its way, the bludger grazing his back as he bent his head forward in protection. Distracted by avoiding the bludger, the slashing curse hit him right on, blood quickly seeping through his clothes. He sent a babbling curse back at Michael, hoping to buy himself some time as he tried to apply pressure to his wound, following up with a Freezing curse.
Michael narrowly side stepped the babbling spell but the freezing curse hit true, ice spreading up his left arm, and that quickly. It was distracting enough that he didn’t see the Bludger that smacked into his head from behind, propelling him forward. His mask was secured with a sticking charm but still checked it as he hit the ground, seeing stars.
Fucking Weasleys.
He was more than ready to be out of here – point proven and all that – but he owed Montague one more crack against this one. He’d get his own shot eventually, but in the meantime… “Confringo!
Despite the situation, Fred couldn’t help a chuckle at the sight of a Death Eater being caught off guard by a bludger. The laughter turned into a yell as the ground around him exploded, taking him down with the rubble. He could barely see past the flames but he sent a bone shattering curse in the direction of Michael.
“I hate Quidditch,” Michael decided, managing to block the bone shattering curse at the last second. Quidditch and Bludgers and the Weasleys, and everything in between. He threw a last bone twisting curse at Fred and, relieved to see that other Death Eaters were Disapparating, decided to do the same thing himself.