Queerditch Marsh (2/3)
Title: Queerditch Marsh
Fandom: Harry Potter
Rating: PG
Genre: Drama/Comedy/Friendship
Characters: Gertie Keddle, multiple OCs, an ancestor of the Weasleys
Pairings: none
Disclaimer: I do not own or lay claim to anything related to Harry Potter.
Summary: One summer, a group of six teenage witches and wizards created a new game. Gertie Keddle wrote about it in her diary, unknowingly providing the only historical document about the creation of what would become the most popular game in the wizarding world: Quidditch.
Queerditch Marsh
By Spectral Scribe
---------------------------
Part II
Aberly was sitting on a rock with his arms folded, gazing across the blank, empty marsh, absently shooting a gentle spray of water from his wand that misted into the air overhead and cooled him off. There were always talks about putting into place a rule that would forbid students from using magic during the summer holidays, but Aberly suspected they would never actually do anything about it.
He was the first one there, having come straight after breakfast, but it wasn’t long before Kip landed to his left, dropped his broom haphazardly on the ground, and sat on the rock beside him.
“Get bit by a glumbumble, did you?” he asked cheerfully, and Aberly suspected he appeared as gloomy as he felt.
“Pernilla is none too fond of me since I hexed Derwin,” he replied, sending a little spray towards Kip to cool him off as well. Already the morning sun was beaming hotly down on them.
“Cheer up, mate. She’ll come round. It isn’t as though you gave him boils or an extra arm. You only made the lad dance.” Kip chuckled. “Bloody terrible dancer, he is, eh?”
This broke Aberly’s solemn mood, and he cracked a smile. Picking up the leather ball, he asked, “Shall we fly?”
“Let’s do,” Kip agreed, grabbing his broom and following Aberly into the air. The wind rushed in Aberly’s ears, blowing against his cheeks with a gentle caress as he sped into the sky. Turning around, he hoisted the ball up in one hand, gripping the wood of his broom with the other, and gave a mighty throw to Kip. Unfortunately, the ball sailed right past the young redhead, who had been caught a bit unawares, and flew in a great arc to the edge of the marsh, past a row of tall hedges that concealed the little shack beyond. From this height, Aberly could see the ball squash some cabbage plants and role into a bush.
He winced and drifted Kip’s way, murmuring, “Go get that, would you?”
“Are you daft? I’m not going, you go.”
Aberly cringed and looked about for Gertie Keddle, the batty old witch who lived there. They’d come across her from time to time during their games in the marsh, and she’d always ended up shouting at them, especially if they got too close to her land.
They were still hovering on their brooms when Myra and Rowan arrived, whizzing up beside them and following their gazes toward the smashed cabbages.
“What we staring at?” Myra inquired.
Aberly sighed. “The ball’s off yonder, near that shrub.”
“Someone has to go get it,” Kip added.
“Not me,” Myra put in. “I daren’t go near that nasty hag.”
Kip looked round at the fourth, silent member of their group and ventured, “Rowan, will you go?”
“Not on yer head, I won’t.”
So the four of them floated, all in a line, all staring over the hedge at Gertie’s plants. She didn’t seem to be about, but Aberly knew that the moment one of them flew into her garden, she would appear with her wand in one hand and a cauldron in the other (to knock them about the head with, of course; she had tried this once on Derwin).
Making a disgusted face, Aberly finally conceded, “All right, I’ll go. It was my fault.”
It was just as he was steeling himself to zoom down as quickly as he could that Pernilla showed up, asking, “What are we all staring at, then?”
Aberly didn’t stay to hear the response; sucking in a breath, he angled his broom straight for the ball and took off, rushing through the air, speeding as fast as the wind would allow; he was almost there-he could see the ball hiding amongst some plants, just ahead-
“Out, out!” came a shout, startling Aberly so that he jerked off course and landed roughly on the ground. A glance up sent his stomach plummeting just as he had from the sky, for here came Gertie Keddle, her wispy hair flying in all directions, a basket of nettles in one hand. “I tell ye and yer lot off my land, and ye listen naught! Out o’ here, ye ruddy scallions, and yer blasted games, out, or it’ll be yer head. An’ look!” she continued, shouting as she dropped her basket of nettles and pointed to her destroyed cabbages, and then to the ball, which sat a short ways off. “Look a’ me cabbages! Look wha’ ye’ve done! Tha’s the right end of it, that is, I’ll ‘ave no more.”
Aberly was only still standing there for two reasons: one was that the ball was about halfway between him and Gertie, which meant that he’d have to draw closer to the scandalized witch in order to retrieve it, which looked none too appealing as she shouted at him with wildly bulging eyes. The other reason was that it had appeared that she was unarmed, having just been out picking nettles.
Unfortunately, he had been wrong in this respect, for she quickly withdrew a wand from her skirt and whipped it in his direction. Before he could move out of the way, a spell shot at him, slamming into his knees and sending him sprawling backward onto the ground.
“That ought to teach ye, and yer filthy lot!” she cried out, now appearing downright delighted, a wicked grin overtaking her weather-worn features. Aberly blinked, not entirely comprehending what she meant, for he felt just the same as always and had assumed that her spell hadn’t worked. “Off my land now, an’ don’ come back!”
Grabbing his broom, which was lying on the ground beside him, he slid onto it, puttered forward, grabbed the ball with one hand, and then was off into the air again, flying high enough to get over the hedges and sailing back down to the ground, where the others were now congregating to meet him. Derwin had showed up as well, and they had all probably watched the whole exchange and had a good laugh. Aberly landed on the ground just after them, seeing that their faces were all screwed up with barely repressed mirth, but before he could say anything his knees buckled beneath him and he dropped to the ground, the ball rolling away.
“What…?” he murmured, lowering his gaze. A shock sprang through him, and he flinched when he saw his legs both bent in the wrong direction. Where his kneecaps should have been poking up instead was crook of the underside of his knees, bending his legs so that they jutted out behind him at the thigh and then came back to the front toward the ankle.
“Knee-reversal hex,” Derwin pointed out needlessly, while Aberly gaped at his legs. Derwin’s dark eyes sparkled with amusement as he said, entirely without venom, “That old wench.”
Aberly looked up at his friends, still in shock at the sight of his own backward legs. Kip had doubled over with unrestrained laughter; Myra’s mouth was open as she chuckled breathlessly, Derwin was smirking, Pernilla had a hand over her mouth, eyes sparkling with tears from laughter; even Rowan, the all-too-serious one of the bunch, was smiling brightly.
He tried to stand up again and wobbled, trying to get used to the unfamiliar sensation of having his legs bend the wrong way. He managed to stand, arms held out to either side to keep his balance. He had to lean forward a bit until he straightened his legs; but then Kip clapped him on the shoulder, still chortling, and he tumbled backward once more.
“Well, are you all just going to stand about, or will someone help me?” he burst out at last while his friends gave into a raucous round of laughter.
“Oh, don’t be a tetchy sod, you,” Derwin told him amiably as he lifted his wand and undid the curse. Aberly cautiously felt his kneecaps, now on the right side, and stood up, thankful at the restoration of his good balance. His face felt hot, and he figured that his complexion had gone a bit red in his embarrassment at having been done in by the mad hag. He mumbled his thanks to Derwin before stomping over to the ball to pick it up again, purposefully averting his eyes from his still-snickering comrades.
Pernilla was at his side in a moment, leaning down as he grabbed the ball so that her face was right beside his own. “I think it was brave of you to go into Gertie’s garden to fetch the ball,” she told him.
“You do?” he repeated, surprised, straightening up and looking her full in the eye. She nodded.
“Oi, Pernilla,” Kip called, causing both Aberly and Pernilla to turn around. “I hope you’re not chastising the poor chap. He is sorry about hexing Derwin and all.”
“I am,” Aberly added fervently, though in his mind he knew that he wasn’t, really.
Pernilla smiled. “I know. I’m sorry I was short with you. But I wouldn’t advise you go about jinxing people when their backs are turned. It isn’t very gentlemanly.”
With that, she gave him a small, chaste peck on the cheek before walking back toward the group. Now Aberly was positive that his face had gone quite red, and he bit his lip to stop himself from smiling as he examined the surface of the ball, sauntering back to his mates and joining in their discussion about the rules of the game, which they now simply referred to as “Queerditch.”
“-so if we want to have someone blocking the goal, we need-” Kip cut himself off with a glance at Aberly as he joined the circle. “Legs all right?”
“Fine,” Aberly mumbled, entirely pleased with himself, casting a quick glance at Pernilla, who was smiling happily as she earnestly listened to Kip’s proposition.
“Right,” Kip continued. “We need someone to keep the goal. So that makes it… four to a team. Five, if we want another one to chase.”
“What, we’ve got positions now?” Aberly asked.
Myra ticked them off her fingers. “One to block the rocks from hitting their team and send them at the others, one to keep the goal, and two-or three-to pass and score with the ball.”
“We need more people,” Derwin cut in pensively.
“Well, we can invite more,” Pernilla suggested. “Start spreading it around, to anyone who might want to play. I’ll ask my sister and… oh, you know, my older cousin, Gwenog comes round here quite frequently. She visits Gertie Keddle for tea sometimes.”
All five of the others stared at her. “Er… why?” Kip asked.
Pernilla shrugged. “She used to buy Gertie’s nettle tea quite a lot-it’s very good, I’ve tried it. I suppose after visiting so much to purchase tea, they just turned into social visits. I’ve heard Gertie Keddle can be nice, though she is a bit of a nutter.”
“Well, let’s just invite her to play,” Derwin suggested sarcastically, crossing his arms. “I’d love to see the old bat on a broomstick.”
Aberly glanced down at his righted knees. “Good luck with that.”
---------------------------
A week later, news of their game had spread wildly. Each friend had told another friend or family member, who had in turn told another… By the end of the following week, they had a group large enough for ten on a team, so they’d made four teams of five and split up when each team could play. Along with Pernilla’s sister, Pearle, and her cousin, Gwenog, they now had Bradford Cockburn, Mervin York, Quintessa Flobberton, Meriwether Bonbotton, Orion Black, Romulus Perkins, Matthew Spurling, Ardagh MacDonal, Troy Binns, and Kip’s brothers Art, Billius, and Chadwick, who had all already left Hogwarts.
Aberly could never have foreseen the popularity of his game. He had barely believed that he and his mates would take to it. He’d expected them to play once and then get bored again, moving on to a new game. That a whole group of witches and wizards-some who were much older than them, others who were a year or two younger-kept coming back to avidly play the made-up broomstick game simply boggled Aberly’s mind.
Of course, Aberly noticed that he wasn’t exactly getting the credit for his idea.
“Brilliant game, Derwin,” said Ardagh, a very large Scot who lived up the hill. “Can’t think of a time I’ve had more fun.”
As Ardagh walked away to join another group, eyeing the large hedge that separated Gertie’s land from the marsh, Aberly strode up to Derwin, who was looking rather smug. “’Brilliant game, Derwin?’” he quoted.
“Thanks, mate,” Derwin replied mildly.
“It wasn’t your idea,” Aberly argued. “I seem to recall a certain Aberly Quigg organizing the whole business while you stood about and complained and threw rocks.”
Derwin shook his head. “It was mostly my idea. And this lot knows it, all of them, so you can just bugger off. Go make eyes at Pernilla, why don’t you?”
“Why don’t you?” Aberly retorted lamely.
“Would you like your knees the wrong way again, because I can arrange that,” Derwin spat.
Aberly glowered at him, and they entered into a momentary staring contest. “Chadwick!” Aberly shouted, not taking his eyes off Derwin. He spotted the older redhead out of the corner of his eye. “How would you like to chase the ball today? I fancy playing the rock-bludgeoner.”
“Right,” Chadwick agreed.
Derwin smirked. “May the best team win.”
“Aye.”
After playing for the sport of it for about a week, they had all finally settled on ending a game when the first team reached 50 points. Aberly’s team, which consisted of him, Pernilla, Kip, Chadwick, and Ardagh, played Derwin’s team first, which consisted of him, Myra, Rowan, Bradford, and Gwenog.
It was quite possibly the roughest game yet. As they hadn’t thought of any rules against violence, everything went: those chasing the ball were able to ram one another with their brooms while constantly dodging flying rocks, which could be aimed anywhere on the body. Of course, mostly they were all there for fun, so the only ones employing excess brutality were Derwin and Aberly, both rock-bludgeoners, and both bewitching rocks to fiercely attack the opposing team. Mostly they just went after each other. Aberly just missed knocking Derwin in the head, which surely would have sent him unconscious, but he did manage to hit him in the foot. Meanwhile he, Aberly, had gotten clocked in the stomach, which had winded him for a moment, and had narrowly avoided a large rock which would have crushed his wrist.
All the others did was eye them warily as they went at it.
It wasn’t until Derwin let the rocks alone and physically knocked Aberly off his broom that Kip called the game to a halt and landed beside Aberly, who was mostly okay but whose back was now aching fiercely.
“You all right, mate?”
Aberly nodded and took Kip’s hand, rising to his feet.
“Why don’t we call it a draw?” Kip asked the two hovering teams.
Derwin flew down, closer to them. “If we stop the game now, my team wins. We’re two points ahead.”
Aberly put a hand gingerly to his back, knowing that getting on a broom would severely exacerbate matters. He was done with it, he decided. He was done with Derwin. He couldn’t believe he’d ever been friends with the lousy brute. “Fine,” he snapped. “You win.” Grabbing his broom, he marched a little away from Kip so that he’d have a clear takeoff. “I’ll have my ball back when you’re all finished with it.” Mounting the broom, he took off without a look back, zooming home as fast as he could.
Continue...
Fandom: Harry Potter
Rating: PG
Genre: Drama/Comedy/Friendship
Characters: Gertie Keddle, multiple OCs, an ancestor of the Weasleys
Pairings: none
Disclaimer: I do not own or lay claim to anything related to Harry Potter.
Summary: One summer, a group of six teenage witches and wizards created a new game. Gertie Keddle wrote about it in her diary, unknowingly providing the only historical document about the creation of what would become the most popular game in the wizarding world: Quidditch.
Queerditch Marsh
By Spectral Scribe
---------------------------
Part II
Aberly was sitting on a rock with his arms folded, gazing across the blank, empty marsh, absently shooting a gentle spray of water from his wand that misted into the air overhead and cooled him off. There were always talks about putting into place a rule that would forbid students from using magic during the summer holidays, but Aberly suspected they would never actually do anything about it.
He was the first one there, having come straight after breakfast, but it wasn’t long before Kip landed to his left, dropped his broom haphazardly on the ground, and sat on the rock beside him.
“Get bit by a glumbumble, did you?” he asked cheerfully, and Aberly suspected he appeared as gloomy as he felt.
“Pernilla is none too fond of me since I hexed Derwin,” he replied, sending a little spray towards Kip to cool him off as well. Already the morning sun was beaming hotly down on them.
“Cheer up, mate. She’ll come round. It isn’t as though you gave him boils or an extra arm. You only made the lad dance.” Kip chuckled. “Bloody terrible dancer, he is, eh?”
This broke Aberly’s solemn mood, and he cracked a smile. Picking up the leather ball, he asked, “Shall we fly?”
“Let’s do,” Kip agreed, grabbing his broom and following Aberly into the air. The wind rushed in Aberly’s ears, blowing against his cheeks with a gentle caress as he sped into the sky. Turning around, he hoisted the ball up in one hand, gripping the wood of his broom with the other, and gave a mighty throw to Kip. Unfortunately, the ball sailed right past the young redhead, who had been caught a bit unawares, and flew in a great arc to the edge of the marsh, past a row of tall hedges that concealed the little shack beyond. From this height, Aberly could see the ball squash some cabbage plants and role into a bush.
He winced and drifted Kip’s way, murmuring, “Go get that, would you?”
“Are you daft? I’m not going, you go.”
Aberly cringed and looked about for Gertie Keddle, the batty old witch who lived there. They’d come across her from time to time during their games in the marsh, and she’d always ended up shouting at them, especially if they got too close to her land.
They were still hovering on their brooms when Myra and Rowan arrived, whizzing up beside them and following their gazes toward the smashed cabbages.
“What we staring at?” Myra inquired.
Aberly sighed. “The ball’s off yonder, near that shrub.”
“Someone has to go get it,” Kip added.
“Not me,” Myra put in. “I daren’t go near that nasty hag.”
Kip looked round at the fourth, silent member of their group and ventured, “Rowan, will you go?”
“Not on yer head, I won’t.”
So the four of them floated, all in a line, all staring over the hedge at Gertie’s plants. She didn’t seem to be about, but Aberly knew that the moment one of them flew into her garden, she would appear with her wand in one hand and a cauldron in the other (to knock them about the head with, of course; she had tried this once on Derwin).
Making a disgusted face, Aberly finally conceded, “All right, I’ll go. It was my fault.”
It was just as he was steeling himself to zoom down as quickly as he could that Pernilla showed up, asking, “What are we all staring at, then?”
Aberly didn’t stay to hear the response; sucking in a breath, he angled his broom straight for the ball and took off, rushing through the air, speeding as fast as the wind would allow; he was almost there-he could see the ball hiding amongst some plants, just ahead-
“Out, out!” came a shout, startling Aberly so that he jerked off course and landed roughly on the ground. A glance up sent his stomach plummeting just as he had from the sky, for here came Gertie Keddle, her wispy hair flying in all directions, a basket of nettles in one hand. “I tell ye and yer lot off my land, and ye listen naught! Out o’ here, ye ruddy scallions, and yer blasted games, out, or it’ll be yer head. An’ look!” she continued, shouting as she dropped her basket of nettles and pointed to her destroyed cabbages, and then to the ball, which sat a short ways off. “Look a’ me cabbages! Look wha’ ye’ve done! Tha’s the right end of it, that is, I’ll ‘ave no more.”
Aberly was only still standing there for two reasons: one was that the ball was about halfway between him and Gertie, which meant that he’d have to draw closer to the scandalized witch in order to retrieve it, which looked none too appealing as she shouted at him with wildly bulging eyes. The other reason was that it had appeared that she was unarmed, having just been out picking nettles.
Unfortunately, he had been wrong in this respect, for she quickly withdrew a wand from her skirt and whipped it in his direction. Before he could move out of the way, a spell shot at him, slamming into his knees and sending him sprawling backward onto the ground.
“That ought to teach ye, and yer filthy lot!” she cried out, now appearing downright delighted, a wicked grin overtaking her weather-worn features. Aberly blinked, not entirely comprehending what she meant, for he felt just the same as always and had assumed that her spell hadn’t worked. “Off my land now, an’ don’ come back!”
Grabbing his broom, which was lying on the ground beside him, he slid onto it, puttered forward, grabbed the ball with one hand, and then was off into the air again, flying high enough to get over the hedges and sailing back down to the ground, where the others were now congregating to meet him. Derwin had showed up as well, and they had all probably watched the whole exchange and had a good laugh. Aberly landed on the ground just after them, seeing that their faces were all screwed up with barely repressed mirth, but before he could say anything his knees buckled beneath him and he dropped to the ground, the ball rolling away.
“What…?” he murmured, lowering his gaze. A shock sprang through him, and he flinched when he saw his legs both bent in the wrong direction. Where his kneecaps should have been poking up instead was crook of the underside of his knees, bending his legs so that they jutted out behind him at the thigh and then came back to the front toward the ankle.
“Knee-reversal hex,” Derwin pointed out needlessly, while Aberly gaped at his legs. Derwin’s dark eyes sparkled with amusement as he said, entirely without venom, “That old wench.”
Aberly looked up at his friends, still in shock at the sight of his own backward legs. Kip had doubled over with unrestrained laughter; Myra’s mouth was open as she chuckled breathlessly, Derwin was smirking, Pernilla had a hand over her mouth, eyes sparkling with tears from laughter; even Rowan, the all-too-serious one of the bunch, was smiling brightly.
He tried to stand up again and wobbled, trying to get used to the unfamiliar sensation of having his legs bend the wrong way. He managed to stand, arms held out to either side to keep his balance. He had to lean forward a bit until he straightened his legs; but then Kip clapped him on the shoulder, still chortling, and he tumbled backward once more.
“Well, are you all just going to stand about, or will someone help me?” he burst out at last while his friends gave into a raucous round of laughter.
“Oh, don’t be a tetchy sod, you,” Derwin told him amiably as he lifted his wand and undid the curse. Aberly cautiously felt his kneecaps, now on the right side, and stood up, thankful at the restoration of his good balance. His face felt hot, and he figured that his complexion had gone a bit red in his embarrassment at having been done in by the mad hag. He mumbled his thanks to Derwin before stomping over to the ball to pick it up again, purposefully averting his eyes from his still-snickering comrades.
Pernilla was at his side in a moment, leaning down as he grabbed the ball so that her face was right beside his own. “I think it was brave of you to go into Gertie’s garden to fetch the ball,” she told him.
“You do?” he repeated, surprised, straightening up and looking her full in the eye. She nodded.
“Oi, Pernilla,” Kip called, causing both Aberly and Pernilla to turn around. “I hope you’re not chastising the poor chap. He is sorry about hexing Derwin and all.”
“I am,” Aberly added fervently, though in his mind he knew that he wasn’t, really.
Pernilla smiled. “I know. I’m sorry I was short with you. But I wouldn’t advise you go about jinxing people when their backs are turned. It isn’t very gentlemanly.”
With that, she gave him a small, chaste peck on the cheek before walking back toward the group. Now Aberly was positive that his face had gone quite red, and he bit his lip to stop himself from smiling as he examined the surface of the ball, sauntering back to his mates and joining in their discussion about the rules of the game, which they now simply referred to as “Queerditch.”
“-so if we want to have someone blocking the goal, we need-” Kip cut himself off with a glance at Aberly as he joined the circle. “Legs all right?”
“Fine,” Aberly mumbled, entirely pleased with himself, casting a quick glance at Pernilla, who was smiling happily as she earnestly listened to Kip’s proposition.
“Right,” Kip continued. “We need someone to keep the goal. So that makes it… four to a team. Five, if we want another one to chase.”
“What, we’ve got positions now?” Aberly asked.
Myra ticked them off her fingers. “One to block the rocks from hitting their team and send them at the others, one to keep the goal, and two-or three-to pass and score with the ball.”
“We need more people,” Derwin cut in pensively.
“Well, we can invite more,” Pernilla suggested. “Start spreading it around, to anyone who might want to play. I’ll ask my sister and… oh, you know, my older cousin, Gwenog comes round here quite frequently. She visits Gertie Keddle for tea sometimes.”
All five of the others stared at her. “Er… why?” Kip asked.
Pernilla shrugged. “She used to buy Gertie’s nettle tea quite a lot-it’s very good, I’ve tried it. I suppose after visiting so much to purchase tea, they just turned into social visits. I’ve heard Gertie Keddle can be nice, though she is a bit of a nutter.”
“Well, let’s just invite her to play,” Derwin suggested sarcastically, crossing his arms. “I’d love to see the old bat on a broomstick.”
Aberly glanced down at his righted knees. “Good luck with that.”
---------------------------
A week later, news of their game had spread wildly. Each friend had told another friend or family member, who had in turn told another… By the end of the following week, they had a group large enough for ten on a team, so they’d made four teams of five and split up when each team could play. Along with Pernilla’s sister, Pearle, and her cousin, Gwenog, they now had Bradford Cockburn, Mervin York, Quintessa Flobberton, Meriwether Bonbotton, Orion Black, Romulus Perkins, Matthew Spurling, Ardagh MacDonal, Troy Binns, and Kip’s brothers Art, Billius, and Chadwick, who had all already left Hogwarts.
Aberly could never have foreseen the popularity of his game. He had barely believed that he and his mates would take to it. He’d expected them to play once and then get bored again, moving on to a new game. That a whole group of witches and wizards-some who were much older than them, others who were a year or two younger-kept coming back to avidly play the made-up broomstick game simply boggled Aberly’s mind.
Of course, Aberly noticed that he wasn’t exactly getting the credit for his idea.
“Brilliant game, Derwin,” said Ardagh, a very large Scot who lived up the hill. “Can’t think of a time I’ve had more fun.”
As Ardagh walked away to join another group, eyeing the large hedge that separated Gertie’s land from the marsh, Aberly strode up to Derwin, who was looking rather smug. “’Brilliant game, Derwin?’” he quoted.
“Thanks, mate,” Derwin replied mildly.
“It wasn’t your idea,” Aberly argued. “I seem to recall a certain Aberly Quigg organizing the whole business while you stood about and complained and threw rocks.”
Derwin shook his head. “It was mostly my idea. And this lot knows it, all of them, so you can just bugger off. Go make eyes at Pernilla, why don’t you?”
“Why don’t you?” Aberly retorted lamely.
“Would you like your knees the wrong way again, because I can arrange that,” Derwin spat.
Aberly glowered at him, and they entered into a momentary staring contest. “Chadwick!” Aberly shouted, not taking his eyes off Derwin. He spotted the older redhead out of the corner of his eye. “How would you like to chase the ball today? I fancy playing the rock-bludgeoner.”
“Right,” Chadwick agreed.
Derwin smirked. “May the best team win.”
“Aye.”
After playing for the sport of it for about a week, they had all finally settled on ending a game when the first team reached 50 points. Aberly’s team, which consisted of him, Pernilla, Kip, Chadwick, and Ardagh, played Derwin’s team first, which consisted of him, Myra, Rowan, Bradford, and Gwenog.
It was quite possibly the roughest game yet. As they hadn’t thought of any rules against violence, everything went: those chasing the ball were able to ram one another with their brooms while constantly dodging flying rocks, which could be aimed anywhere on the body. Of course, mostly they were all there for fun, so the only ones employing excess brutality were Derwin and Aberly, both rock-bludgeoners, and both bewitching rocks to fiercely attack the opposing team. Mostly they just went after each other. Aberly just missed knocking Derwin in the head, which surely would have sent him unconscious, but he did manage to hit him in the foot. Meanwhile he, Aberly, had gotten clocked in the stomach, which had winded him for a moment, and had narrowly avoided a large rock which would have crushed his wrist.
All the others did was eye them warily as they went at it.
It wasn’t until Derwin let the rocks alone and physically knocked Aberly off his broom that Kip called the game to a halt and landed beside Aberly, who was mostly okay but whose back was now aching fiercely.
“You all right, mate?”
Aberly nodded and took Kip’s hand, rising to his feet.
“Why don’t we call it a draw?” Kip asked the two hovering teams.
Derwin flew down, closer to them. “If we stop the game now, my team wins. We’re two points ahead.”
Aberly put a hand gingerly to his back, knowing that getting on a broom would severely exacerbate matters. He was done with it, he decided. He was done with Derwin. He couldn’t believe he’d ever been friends with the lousy brute. “Fine,” he snapped. “You win.” Grabbing his broom, he marched a little away from Kip so that he’d have a clear takeoff. “I’ll have my ball back when you’re all finished with it.” Mounting the broom, he took off without a look back, zooming home as fast as he could.
Continue...