The Red Rose That Has Green Thorns

“Rose,” I heard, and I felt a hand on my shoulder, shaking me into wakefulness.

“Hmm?” I rubbed my eyes, propping myself up on one elbow.

“Get up, we need to get a good breakfast in,” Scorpius said as he came into focus, looming over me already dressed in a plain white t-shirt and jeans. “I’ll wait, just go change and brush your teeth and whatever else you need to do.”

He flashed a grin, then teasingly and deliberately ruffled my already monstrous bedhead. I made a shooing motion with my hand, gathering my pillow - which had fallen to the floor - and my blanket before heading up the stairs.

I put on the first things I found in when I rummaged in my trunk; a red t-shirt emblazoned with the Chudley Cannons crest and a pair of fading jeans. After I’d thrown them on, I ran downstairs to the bathroom, and brushed my teeth and hair before throwing the aforementioned curls into a ponytail.

“Ready!” I cried with a mock salute to Scorpius, who was standing casually by the door and examining a painting that was on the wall. He shook his head with a grin turning up the corners of his mouth, and opened the door for me when I reached him. “Thanks!”

“No problem, Rose.” he replied, letting the heavy door fall closed behind him

Breakfast was a rather sordid affair. My nerves were acting in their strange way again, and I only ate about half of what I’d usually stuff my face with. I heard, from about three people down the table, Scorpius-stalker Sandra mutter, “Look! It looks like that Weasley girl has finally noticed she eats like a pig!”

I saw Scorpius shoot a glare that way, but I pointedly rolled my eyes, and after a moment he went back to eating his - also smaller than usual - breakfast.

“Greetings, my quiet associates!” the ever-bubbly Albus waltzed over from the Gryffindor table to where my whole team sat at the middle table. “Don’t be so nervous! Sure, Durmstrang’s great…but so are you!”

“They’ve got Viktor Krum’s daughter.” Zack said dejectedly, picking at his sausage. “How am I supposed to compete with the likes of that?”

“Just think,” I tried to sound optimistic - and it worked, for the most part. “Zack, just think! At least it’s not Uncle Viktor himself.”

“One blessing,” Zack rolled his eyes, but grinned nonetheless at the cheerfulness I’d managed to muster up. “What did you want, Al?”

“Just to come over and talk,” he said, squeezing in between Lily and Zack. I snorted into my biscuits and gravy at the glare Lily gave him, but partially covered it with a fake sneeze. Scorpius looked at me with his all-knowing expression, but I had returned to eating, pretending that I had done nothing wrong. I saw him grin and shake his head again from the corner of my eye.

It was then that a loud rumble was heard, and our whole group froze and turned to look, for the first time, at the enchanted ceiling.

To my dismay, I saw dark, roiling storm clouds covering the ceiling, and even a flash of lightning.

“I didn’t even know it was supposed to be like that!” Hugh said in dismay, looking up. “I hate playing in storms.”

“Why, oh, why didn’t I ask someone about the weather?” I groaned aloud. “Visibility will be low, which will make tempers get higher, and despite our last, clean game…we might get fouled a lot more. Rain just makes people mad when they’re playing Quid ditch - trust me, I’m one of the ones that gets frustrated. But it’s very rare for a keeper to find a way to get a foul, so I should be good.”

The last was an attempt at lighthearted joking around, and the team realized this. Lily giggled a little, and Hugh and Scorpius, along with Al, chuckled. Zack snorted into his juice.

“Let’s finish up here,” Scorpius said, glancing warily at the ceiling once more. “We need to go assess the conditions, and see if there’s anything we can do to plan ahead.”

“I second that motion,” Olivia spoke up, finishing her toast and eggs and putting her fork down. “Whenever everyone’s ready, I am.”

“Yeah, me too,” Lily said, pushing her half-eaten meal away. Her hand was slightly shaking, and her brother noticed.

“Don’t be so nervous, Lils!” Al said, putting his younger sibling in a headlock and ruffling her hair a bit. “You guys beat my team, didn’t you? What’s Durmstrang to ya? No offense, Joe, Theresa,” he tossed over Zack, “just trying to comfort the sibling.”

Joe and Theresa laughed, then Joe said, “It’s all right. We’re nervous too - we did see you play against the other Hogwarts team, you know. It’s making me nervous just thinking about how we’ll be playing you guys in just two hours.”

Unlike the games the week before, this one would start at ten, and it was only about eight.

“It’s making you nervous?” I retorted. “Then what do you think it’s doing to me? Making me giddy with excitement, or something?”

“You don’t show nerves much,” Theresa said with a shrug. “We wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between whether you had the diarrhea or forgot to finish your homework.”

My face lit up - I could feel it. “What a lovely comparison,” I managed to force out, looking down and hoping that my ears weren’t red, too.

Scorpius was laughing, a real laugh that made my stomach lurch in a way that I was sure was completely unrelated to the Quidditch match. I could tell instantly that his laughter was from both my red face (that I was trying to hide, to no avail) and what Theresa had said.

“It’s true, though,” Al said, choking off his own laughter. “Even though you’re my cousin, I can never read your expression. Well, I can occasionally…but only when you’re sick and not trying to hide things.”

“Hide things?” I inquired, honestly curious. Sure, I tried my best to hide my newfound feelings for Scorpius, but I didn’t try to hide much else…never mind. This year was secret central, with Spunky and the Boyd incident and my visions. “What things?”

“How would I know what things you’re hiding if you’re so bloody good at hiding them?” Al said as Martha pushed her empty plate away.

“Whatever,” I rolled my eyes, and I realized that t his was exactly what he was talking about - I wasn’t giving away that there were things I hadn’t told them. “I’m done, too.”

“I can’t eat anymore,” Zack said, shoving his mostly empty plate away. “I’m too nervous to eat.”

Scorpius was also done, and Hugh grabbed a piece of sausage to take on the go and pushed his plate away. Al stood up with us and followed us out of the Great Hall, talking about secrets and hiding things and laughing at Theresa’s comparison some more. I caught Lily’s eye, and she rolled hers.

“I think we get it, Al,” Olivia said after the third time he mentioned the diarrhea and homework thing, “and we’d like to be able to concentrate. Just…go get your family some good seats, okay?”

“Mmkay!” Al shrugged, branching off.

“Finally!” Said Lily, Hugh, and I in unison.

“That was getting annoying,” I groaned. “Will I never live that down?!”

“Probably not.”

Scorpius, Lily, Hugo, and Zack had said as much in unison. I sighed, shaking my head as lightning illuminated the stands, where Al had taken refuge under an umbrella he must have conjured, since he hadn’t had it when he was with us.

“It’s going to be a muddy mess,” I remarked.

“Let’s go to the changing rooms for the next hour and a half, go over strategies and such.” Scorpius said, leading the way.

“Visibility will be low,” Olivia remarked after we’d run through three plays in a half an hour. We could hear the storm really raging outside. “These are the worst conditions I’ll have ever played in.”

“Today’s a day for goggles,” Zack said, “but I still don’t see how I’m supposed to spot the snitch through all of that rain.”

“It’s going to be freezing,” Martha contributed shyly to the conversation. “And I won’t be able to see or hear a bludger coming up over all the wind and rain…”

“Hugh and I will do our best to keep the bludgers away from you lot,” Scorpius said grimly. “It’s our job as beaters.”

“I’m going to run right into their keeper before I realize I’m at their goal,” Lily said glumly, slumped on the bench dejectedly.

“No you won’t,” I said suddenly, recalling something my mother had told me might come in handy. “Visibility won’t be quite as much of a problem. Everyone, bring me their goggles!”

With a curious glance my way, my teammates went to their lockers to bring me the goggles that they had. Martha was first back, having not hesitated when I asked for their goggles.

“Here,” she said, handing them over. Everyone else was there, and standing around.

“Watch,” I said, holding Martha’s goggles, “it’s a spell my mother told me might be useful. Impervius!”

There was a brief glow, and then the goggles lay, looking the exact same, in my hand.

“What does that do, Sis?” Hugh asked, looking confused. “And why wouldn’t Mum tell me?”

“They should repel water now,” I told the group at large, standing and making my way to my locker to pull out my own goggles. “Uncle Harry had trouble seeing in a match against Hufflepuff in their third year, and so Mum used this charm on his glasses. They still lost…but that was the year the dementors were here.”

There was a shudder among the group - we all knew what a dementor was capable of, and we’d all heard about how it affected those who had terrible memories.

“What are you lot waiting for?” Scorpius said, pulling out his wand. “Impervius!” he, too, used the charm on his goggles. Olivia followed suit, and Hugo and Lily did the same.

“I don’t know how long the charm will last,” I said, stowing my wand away. “So maybe when we go out in an hour, we should reapply it?”

“Good idea,” Scorpius said. “Now…let’s go back to working on our strategy, no?”

Lily fidgeted nervously, and Olivia was doing the thing where she straightened hoods and made sure ponytails were tight. Martha was hiding over by me again, as if her short pigtails could be tied together.

“Olivia,” I said, my voice sounding completely calm. “Calm down. If we lose, we lose. It’s no big deal; we’ve all lost a game before, haven’t we?”

“Yeah,” she said, straightening her Quidditch robes, “but this is different! This is an Exhibition! We’re showing the other schools what we’re made of…and if we fail, then what? What message are we sending - that their Quidditch players are better than ours and that none of us should go to the League?”

“No,” I said firmly. “We’re saying that we tried our best, and that we will continue trying our best. We send out the message that we can only get better, and that every time we play, we play to win. Besides…I thought you wanted to be a Healer?”

She looked at her toes. “I do…but I also wouldn’t mind playing pro. I mean, I don’t think I’m quite good enough, but it would be fun. I love the game, and I’ve trained with Dad and other Puddlemore players my whole life…and…I just can’t quite let it go, you know?”

I nodded. “I know.”

Suddenly, she turned to look at me. “What about you? You’ve grown up around it too - hell, part of the time was me, my dad, Al, and Viktor Krum against you, Lily, Ginny, and Harry Potter!”

“My family against two professionals, a cousin, and you. We must be cocky,” I chose to say, causing Olivia and Lily to snort.

“Not cocky,” Martha said.

“Not at all,” Olivia agreed. “You’re good. And the lot of you know it!”

“I bet the other Quidditch playing Gryffindors wish we would all graduate already so they’d get on the House team for once,” Lily giggled.

“Seriously, Rose!” Olivia had a gleam in her eye. “What about you? What are you going to do? Do you like Quidditch enough to want to go on, or are you going to go into the Auror business like your Dad, or curse breaking like your Uncle Bill, or even working with dragons like your Uncle Charlie?”

“I…I haven’t decided,” I muttered, hoping she wouldn’t hear. “The one option I’ve kept open…” I trailed off.

“Is Quidditch?” Martha and Olivia guessed. I nodded sheepishly.

“We’ll get you in,” Olivia decided promptly. “Right, Lily? Martha?”

They nodded, Lily with a wide grin on her lips. “Yup. We’re going to work you so hard, you’re going to wish you hadn’t worked the House team so hard.”

I laughed. “Thanks, guys. But I make it if I make it, I don’t if I don’t. Who knows? Maybe they have scouts or something watching our games.”

Olivia nearly fell over. “What?!”

“Kidding! Kidding!” I said, holding my hands up defensively. Martha giggled, and Lily laughed as we made our way back over to our three boys.

“We have about five minutes,” Scorpius informed us as we came around the corner. “I think now is a good time to reapply the water-repelling charm.”

I nodded. As the rest of the team went about it, I took my wand out and thought Impervius! in my head, succeeding with my non-verbal spell.

Seconds later, there was a knock on the door, and Oliver Wood walked in once more.

“They’re ready for you lot,” he said. Then he grinned and added, “I know I shouldn’t really take sides, but I’m rooting for you.”

“Thanks, Dad,” Olivia said in unison with the, “Thanks, Uncle Oliver!” from Lily, Hugo, and I.

“Thank you,” Scorpius said, holding out his hand with a half-grin (that I had to tear my eyes away from, my cheeks heating up. Lily saw and raised her eyebrow at me - I swear she was mocking me!).

“Yeah,” Zack and Martha agreed.

I gripped my broom as Zack walked up beside me, followed by the beaters and then our chasers. “Are you ready?” I asked them.

“Let’s go,” Zack said, and we received other murmurs of assent.

“Good luck!” Oliver called, following us out but branching off to join the crowds.

With one last glance at Zack, who nodded to indicate that he was ready, I mounted my broom and shot out of the alcove, zooming around the field as Leanne shouted out the introductions.