Harry almost chokes on Oleandra's ball

Instead of heading directly back to the Slytherin common room after their Wednesday Astronomy lesson, Oleandra and Daphne hid in the girls' bathroom to wait for a chance to return to the Astronomy tower to watch the stars together.

Oleandra tapped her temple, activating her Mystic Eyes. They were good at seeing traces of magic, which usually wasn't too convenient at Hogwarts, where magic was omnipresent. But at night, the students went to sleep, so the amount of magic floating around from spells lessened. This way, she wouldn't be blinded by the lights, and she'd be able to spot patrolling prefects from a mile away.

"The coast is clear!" Oleandra whispered loudly to her sister.

Daphne nodded, and they retraced their steps back to the Astronomy classroom, almost running into Filch and Mrs. Norris for some reason.

"Did he have some way to cloak his magical fluctuations?" Oleandra thought.

Moments later, they were back under the starlit sky. Oleandra shivered, wrapping herself tightly in her robes. It was getting colder and colder by the day.

After a few minutes of staring at the constellations Oleandra had told her about, Daphne sneezed. The stars continued to twinkle prettily in the black sky. Daphne felt like they were taunting her, with their insolent starriness.

"Sister dearest," Daphne said. "Your approach doesn't seem to be working."

"No magical lights?" Oleandra asked. "No sky falling on your head?"

"It seems to be quite content up there, where it has always been," Daphne said spitefully.

Oleandra wasn't sure how to proceed from here. The star maps and their runes had been engraved into her soul, which meant she could synchronize with the stars and borrow their power. Similarly, she could resonate with physical runes that existed down here on Earth to channel further power through them.

If the stars wouldn't share their power with Daphne, then there was nothing she could do.

Or was there?

Disappointed, they both returned to the Slytherin common room, and went to bed.

It was finally Saturday, the day of Oleandra's first ever Quidditch match. The entire school was buzzing with talk of the match, as history was made two times in a row, when two first years made it into a Hogwarts Quidditch team for the first time in a century!

Oleandra, who at first didn't really care that much for Quidditch, had grown increasingly nervous about the upcoming match. A lot of hopes were riding on her, and it was the first time she had got so much attention!

As she stood in the Quidditch field, she noticed the banners Malfoy had had some other first-grader work on, which read Go Greengrass! and Slytherin Supremacy!

Oleandra swallowed hard. No pressure, right?

"Now, I want a nice fair game, all of you," said Madam Hooch. She looked meaningfully at Captain Flint.

"Mount your brooms, please."

A loud whistle resounded throughout the pitch, and fourteen figures rose skyward.

"And the Quaffle is taken immediately by Angelina Johnson of Gryffindor — what an excellent Chaser that girl is, and rather attractive, too —"

Oleandra opened her Mystic Eyes. No reaction from anyone in the audience. She was expecting this, as she had used them a few times while talking to her professors and none of them had seemed to notice.

Her only job was to find the Snitch, so she circled the pitch, scanning the field with her eyes. The Snitch was walnut-sized ball that fluttered about at extreme speeds, and the field was huge. It seemed that even with her Mystic Eyes, finding the Snitch wouldn't be an easy task. Meanwhile, Potter did the same, with as much luck as she had.

"GRYFFINDORS SCORE!"

A few minutes later, Oleandra finally caught sight of a golden streak of light. It was the Golden Snitch! She urged her broom after it. Potter evidently noticed that she had seen something, so he engaged in hot pursuit. Their brooms were the same, so he couldn't quite catch up. Fred Weasley sent a Bludger hurtling towards her, but she dodged with a barrel roll without losing any speed.

And then, something strange happened to Potter's broom. It suddenly stopped, and starting bucking and rolling, all the while taking him ever higher. George Weasley, suspecting foul play, tackled Oleandra, preventing her from catching the Snitch right away.

"FOUL! THAT'S A FOUL!" screamed Flint, as though he had never committed one.

He was in the middle of scoring a series of points, as the entirety of the Gryffindor had their attention elsewhere, worried about Potter's safety.

Suddenly, Potter regained control of his broom and dived after something. The Snitch, Oleandra realized. It was right under Potter! She dived after him. Both players executed a perfect recovery after the dive, causing gasps to rise up from the crowd. They had been an inch from crashing into the lawn!

There was no way for Oleandra to catch up those precious few inches Potter had on her without doing something drastic, so she decided to dive off her broom in a last-ditch effort! Unfortunately, she accidentally knocked into Potter, who fell forward and swallowed the ball whole, getting it lodged in his windpipe.

"Glllk!" Potter made a strange sound and grabbed at his throat.

"Stand still!" Oleandra ordered him.

Luckily for Potter, Oleandra was there to apply the Heimlich manoeuvre on him. After a few tense seconds, he managed to spit out the Snitch.

He frowned. This wasn't the kind of victory he had hoped for.

"GRYFFINDOR WINS!" shouted the magically enhanced voice of Lee, the commentator.

Twenty minutes later, Flint was still howling like a beaten dog to Madam Hooch.

"It's not fair, our seeker was going to catch it, but she got fouled! And their seeker didn't catch it, he nearly choked on it!"

After he was done yelling at Madam Hooch, he gathered up his team, still seething with rage.

"We're not losing again this season, you hear me?" he spat. "Until we win a game, there will be one additional practice session each week."

He turned to Oleandra. "You did well out there," he said. "Better than Higgs could've done. But you should've dodged that tackle. We trained for this, remember? They like to pretend they play by the rules, but we all know it's the law of the jungle out there."

Before leaving, he added, "We'll be doubling your dodging training, seeker. See you next Tuesday."

Oleandra groaned.