Quidditch Match Day Incident (I)

On Saturday morning, the sky over Hogwarts seemed as if it had been soaked in ink.

Thick lead-gray clouds hung like a sodden quilt, wrapping the entire castle within them. The rain had begun in the middle of the night, and by dawn, not only had it not stopped, it had grown heavier. Dense sheets of rain wove a vast, roaring gray curtain that engulfed the entire Quidditch Pitch.

Rain hammered against the castle's stone walls, streamed down through the cracks, and gathered into little waterfalls along the windowsills.

Gale-force winds lashed the stands, the flags, and anyone who dared stick their head out, carrying raindrops with them. The grass in the middle of the Quidditch Pitch had long since turned into a muddy swamp, and the water at the players' tunnel had risen past their ankles. Several early-arriving reserve players stood there, staring bitterly at the "battlefield."

Their brooms looked even duller after being drenched by the rain, droplets clinging to their tail twigs as though they had just been pulled from a river.

The goalposts were covered in droplets, which came rattling down whenever the wind blew. The wooden seats in the stands had been soaked black by the rain, cold and slick to sit on. Yet the terrible weather did nothing to dampen the Hogwarts students' and staff's love for Quidditch.

The stands of the four Houses were like four huge, brightly colored pieces of a puzzle set around the muddy pitch, each radiating a distinctive and vivid presence. From afar, they looked like four flames of different colors burning through the gray rain curtain, none willing to be crushed by the downpour.

The Gryffindor stands were the liveliest.

They were a blazing red fortress, bursting with astonishing enthusiasm and noise even in the torrential rain. Enormous