antebellum [t. riddle]

lii.

january 1945

"you are too generous with your wand movements. treat the wand as an extension of your hand rather than a separate item."

sicaria's training with fleamont potter was tedious, but not wholly unenjoyable.

it was less of them practicing together, and more of sicaria critiquing potter's technique. he wasn't a bad duelist at all, just a bit inexperienced. he didn't seem to mind learning from sicaria; she noticed that there was some kind of gryffindor need to prove himself. she was happy to note that he was both more productive and more focused when he wasn't looking over her shoulder.

it nearly reminded sicaria of how her parents used to teach her. the memories were unwelcome, but even occlumency had difficulty entirely muting the recollections.

as much as she loathed them, she did owe her dueling ability to them for training her at such a young age. she'd do anything to trade it, but she truly was an excellent duelist.

still, it didn't excuse the abuse. they were the biggest proponents of dueling while calm, but they'd often force her to defend herself and leave her to figure out how to heal her injuries herself, saying that if she paid more attention, she'd be able to do better. they had obviously harbored some sort of cold resentment toward her, present in the way that they didn't acknowledge her existence unless it was time to train.

nothing was ever perfect. nothing was ever good enough for them. she could beat them both in a duel blinded with a stolen wand, and her victory still would have been sloppy in their eyes, or there would have been some previously unknown rule that came from the deep recesses of their mind to snatch the win from her.

she had long come to terms with the fact that she'd never know the source of their bitterness toward her. she didn't know why they chose to dehumanize her from daughter to useful tool, and she never would.

she had long stopped caring.

oliver and priscilla edwards were dead. she refused to let their spirits haunt her mind, as if she cared what they would think of her.

"if you don't mind me asking," potter said panting as he struggled to catch his breath. "how did you become such a proficient duelist?"

she shrugged. "i've had a lot of practice."

outside of working with potter, she was bored out of her mind.

she started on her research into dumbledore's past, but many of the books in the hogwarts library consisted of passages that were largely in favor of dumbledore's more palatable achievements. there wasn't even a whisper of anything negative, which led sicaria to believe that dippet had something to do with what books were approved in the hogwarts library.

as for macusa, there had been little progress made on that front. eileen had sent her a letter that was impatiently worded. she essentially told sicaria to hurry her ass up with more information. it was odd to think that they had become so accustomed to and dependent on the secondhand gossip from teenagers, but they seemed to be becoming testy. she hadn't realized she wasn't putting in as much effort as before, but that was mostly because there was barely anything left for her. there were no rumors outside of the ones that revolved around her, and all three of her interrogations following caroline macmillian's had given her no information that she didn't already know.

socially, sicaria was a wreck.

the boys seemed to have switched tactics again, to something that she could describe as silent watching. they'd occasionally force people out of their seats in order to sit next to her, but refused to say a word the entire time. each time she finished her dueling sessions with potter, one of them was conveniently lingering in the next hallway over. when she left the common room at late hours of the night, their eyes followed her all the way out the door. she didn't know exactly what kind of persuasive technique this was, but it was still somehow getting both easier and harder for her to ignore them. it was instinctual to dodge them, but it hurt more and more each time.