• ‘I got it! I got it! YES YES YES!!!’ I screamed in my head the moment the fiery feeling had left my stomach. Looking down at myself, I found no longer a cat body, but my bare feet, pale legs, pajama shorts and shirt, and my hands, which were shaky. I couldn’t believe it. It was finally done; I could transform into a cat completely and without any hitches. I was an Animagus.

    *****


    I awoke at an hour before dawn when Mrs. Weasley shook us awake. “Time for breakfast, dears,” she whispered in my ear before moving on to wake Ginny. I sat up and my eyes focused themselves in the dark almost immediately. The exuberance I had felt from last night before I went to bed was still pulsing through me.
    I had never been much good at Transfiguration, but lately, I’ve been struck with ambition; to become an Animagus. I got as many books as I could on the subject and I’ve been practising by night since before summer started. It was really hard at first, and I had to exchange a lot of letters with my godfather, Sirius, before I finally got the jist of it. And the past two weeks, I had been able to transform into a cat and back, but I usually came back to human with some feline features. The worst was the tail and fangs. But last night was my first time doing it without ending up with random patches of cat hair, cat ears, or yellow eyes. I have never felt more accomplished in my life.

    It would be a few minutes before Ginny and Hermione would be awake, so I lit a candle and wrote a quick letter to Sirius.

    Dear Snuffles,
    It worked! I finally got it last night! Thank goodness you remembered that loophole in The Trace, otherwise I would have never been able to do this before school started again. I still think the Ministry’s stupid for not being able to tell who’s doing the magic.
    The cat thing worked out really well, I’m glad I tried that instead of an owl!
    Love,
    Jennifer

    The handwriting was awful, but it would do. I approched my owl, Fiona, a graceful barn owl. She had woken up when Mrs. Weasley had come in, and she looked now at me expectantly. “Morning dear princess. I have a letter for Sirius, do you think you can find him for me?” I asked, stroking her fluffy feathers soothingly. She nipped at my fingers after I tied the letter to her leg and she soared silently out of the window and into the not-yet-dawn.

    Yawning and stretching, I wandered down to the kitchen, where Mr. Weasley was seated at the table and Mrs. Weasley was busy making bacon sandwiches. “Well, look who’s up and running first for once?” joked Mr. Weasley, smiling. I was a notorious non-morning person.
    “Yeah, funny isn’t it? I guess I just couldn’t stand the excitement,” I beamed, accepting a sandwich from Mrs. Weasley.
    “Are you ready for the match?” Mr. Weasley asked, taking a sandwich as well.
    “Oh, so ready! Although, I have to say, Bulgaria doesn’t stand a chance against Ireland. Sure, they’ve got Krum, but Ireland’s got the best Chasers in the League.”

    The morning went by slowly. When we finally all left, the sky was finally starting to light up a little. I walked with Harry a little ways behind everyone else to tell him what I had accomplished last night.
    “So you finally got it eh?” he asked, yawning for the third time already.
    “Yeah, it’s really wicked. I turn into this little dark brownish red cat, perfect for sneaking around at night,” I said as gleefully as I could in a low voice.
    “That’s pro, Jen. But I thought you sucked at Transfiguration.”
    “Well, I do. But hey…it helps when our godfather is an Animagius himself,” I added, smiling.
    “And what was that loophole you guys found?” Harry asked, getting ready to yawn again.
    “Oh, the whole thing with The Trace is that it only tells them a specific area where magic is being used, not who’s using it. So with the Weasleys, we could pretty much use magic without any worry, because they think it’s Mr. and Mrs. Weasley or Percy, Charlie and Bill.”
    “So that’s why we got in trouble for Dobby two years ago,” Harry summed up.
    “Exactly.”

    We walked through the lightening darkness nearly for forever. I caught back up with Fred and George when Harry decided to walk with Ron and Hermione. The twins were grumbling about their older brothers. “It’s just rediculous,” said Fred.
    “JUST because they can apperate, doesn’t mean they shouldn’t have to get up and walk with the rest of us,” George finished.
    “And I just can’t believe Mum threw away all our Ton-Tounge Toffies…” Fred said gloomily.
    “Yeah, six months work, down the drain…”
    “Aww, cheer up guys, we’ll figure out how to get them back. Plus, now that you know how to do them, making more shouldn’t be that bad…” I said, hoping to cheer them up.

    “Where are we going Dad?” shouted Ron from behind us.
    “Haven’t the foggiest!” called back Mr. Weasley, who lead us. He and I were probably the most awake out of everyone. Ginny was still sort of stumbling. I grabbed her arm to steady her and we walked together, discussing just anything. She was practically like a little sister to me. I looked after her like I looked after Harry.
    Mr. Weasley led us to a rather large and steep hill, where he said the Portkey to the Quidditch World Cup would be. It looked daunting, and we had to stop talking and save our breath for climbing. Mr. Weasley, Ron and the Twins reached the top first.

    "Amos!"
    "Arthur!"
    Ginny and I looked up to where Mr. Weasley was. He was meeting a tall man with brown hair, and they shook hands. We scrambled up the hill to get a better look.
    “Are all these yours?” the other man asked jokingly.
    “No, just the red-heads. Except for Jennifer, that is,” Mr. Weasley said, nodding towards me as I finally made it to the top and stood next to the Twins. It was only after I was being bombarded with greetings did I see who was standing behind him.
    “My goodness, Jennifer Potter are you? Cedric’s told me a lot about you. Whoops, I guess I should introduce myself. I’m Amos Diggory, his father. It’s wonderful to meet you, and oh! That must be your brother…” Amos Diggory was very energetic, and after he shook the heck out of my arm he went for Harry, who was just coming to the top of the hill.
    “You kids know Cedric already, I take it?” Mr. Weasley asked, mentioning to Diggory off in his standoff-ish way. Fred, George and I just did our best not to glare.
    “Oh yes, we know him,” I answered, biting my cheek. I really didn’t like him, especially after our last Quidditch match against Hufflepuff, which was a disaster.
    “Hello Jennifer, Fred, George,” Cedric greeted us all in turn, nodding to us each. He sent me a small smile, which I narrowed my eyes at. Yes, I take Quidditch very seriously. But his gray eyes just laughed at my contempt.

    “Well, shall we get ready? Our Portkey leaves in a minute,” said Mr. Weasley somewhat awkwardly, pointing to our Portkey, a mangy old boot. We all croweded around the boot, and Mr. Weasley gave out instructions. "Everybody, grab on, a finger will do!" Once everybody was touching, there was nothing but to wait and listen to Mr. Weasley count down the time on his watch. "Three, two, ONE!" We started spinning upwards at an incredible speed. My stomach started churning, my brain felt like mush, and I decided that last bacon sandwich was a bad mistake. "OK, let go now!" came Mr. Weasley's voice.
    We did as we were told and all let go, falling through the air and landing hard on the ground. I fell right on my arse, and groaned, “I hate Portkeys…” I felt so sick all I desired to do was lay there in the grass with my eyes closed until my everything stopped spinning.
    When I did open my eyes, I was met by oh-so-casual brown hair, gray eyes, and a hand in my face. “Need help?” Cedric asked, with an almost smirk on his face. I brushed his hand aside.
    “No, I can help myself thanks,” I said, standing up, feeling my head rush.

    “Welcome everyone, to the Quidditch World Cup,” said Mr. Weasley grandly, gesturing over the thousands and thousands of tents. It was a dream come true.