The Ordeal of Quidditch Training (2)

His dark circles were so heavy they looked smoke-stained. During class, his head kept bobbing like a pecking chick, and several times Severus Snape woke him with venomous mockery, earning him extra detention in the process—after Quidditch training, naturally. Professor McGonagall sternly reminded him during Transfiguration, "Potter, focus! Your brain is about to turn into a broomstick handle!" Professor Flitwick also watched his increasingly poor spell accuracy with concern.

Worst of all, his search for that mysterious voice had been completely interrupted. Several times, in the freezing corridors as he returned from the pitch at dawn, or while dragging his exhausted body toward his next class between lessons, he thought he heard that familiar, hair-raising hiss again, as though it were just behind the adjacent wall or in the cracks of stone overhead.

"The voice..." He would suddenly stop, his heart seeming to halt as he strained to listen.

But then—

"Harry! Hurry up! Wood said we're doing extra scrimmage practice today. Slytherin has new tactics!" Ron's anxious voice would call out.

Or—

"Potter! What are you dawdling for? You dare lose focus in Potions? Want to try my new formula?" Snape's cold voice would coil around him from behind like a venomous snake.

Every time, every time! The faint thought and energy he had just gathered to investigate were immediately crushed by more urgent, more inescapable "reality"—Wood's roaring, academic pressure, the professors' reprimands.

He felt like a spinning top under a whip, whirling madly between the classroom, the pitch, and the common room, driven by invisible lashes without a moment to catch his breath. His body was utterly drained, his mind stretched taut, and his head was stuffed with Quidditch tactics, homework, Snape's harassment, Wood's bellowing... As for his worries about the strange voice, they had been buried deep