"Have you noticed how often they practice dueling?" Ron murmured one evening to Harry as the two of them sat listening to the radio. Regulus and Hermione were curled up on the couch that Regulus had transfigured from one of the chairs. Harry sat, fiddling with his bracelet. To anybody else, it looked like an ordinary woven bracelet, but Hermione had given one to each of the males shortly after coming to the forest, laced with magic that made each of them trackable only to each other.
"Well we are in the middle of war," Harry deadpanned. Ron rolled his eyes, watching Regulus conjure a flower from some of the smaller pieces of kindle they had on the floor, hovering it over to Hermione. "The two of them are gross," he scoffed, getting up from his chair to retreat into his bedroom. "Oh yes," Harry muttered to himself. "Because watching you and Lavender play tonsil hockey was so much better."
—
"You definitely don't have any focus today, I've disarmed you three times," Hermione commented cheekily as she once again took a few steps toward Regulus to hand him back his temporary wand. Regulus let out a scoff, grabbing his wand and then Hermione's wrist, placing a light kiss against it. "I was letting you win, build your confidence up a bit before I start using non-verbal magic."
"And then you'll be losing in silence," Hermione teased, going back to her original spot and getting into her dueling stance. Regulus raised a brow at Hermione, signaling for her to start the duel, since she was the previous winner. She smirked, flicking her wand and murmuring "Avis", a flock of birds conjuring from the tip. Regulus watched her curiously as the birds circled around her, his eyes widening as he watched Hermione murmur again, the birds darting toward him offensively. He was quick to throw up a shield, blocking each of the birds that tried to strike at his head.
Regulus extended his arm, throwing an Impedimenta in Hermione's direction in hopes to slow her down, but she blocked it with ease, countering quickly with a knockback jinx. They dueled rapidly, back and forth, dodging and blocking each other's spells. If Regulus threw a projectile jinx, Hermione was quick to counter it with a shield and stinging jinx. If Hermione sought to use a succession of spells, Regulus was quick to block each one, even though she managed to catch him briefly with a tripping jinx, and he stumbled, but did not fall over.
"Alright, how about we make this a little more challenging, yeah?" Regulus questioned and Hermione nodded in agreement. The two were quick to start sending hexes at each other, a deteriorating hex, knee-reversal hex, weakening hex, one after the next shot out of Regulus' wand and Hermione blocked them all quickly, but Regulus could tell she was getting worn down. "You need to have better stamina than that, love," Regulus smirked, rolling out of the way as Hermione threw a Bombarda in his direction, watching it crash into the dueling wards they had set up, the magic wall absorbing it without struggle. An Expluso flew out of her wand next, which Regulus was able to deflect with a particularly strong non-verbal shield charm. "You're keen to blow me up, aren't you?" he teased as he shot a stinging jinx toward Hermione, watching her block it. "Oh no, we don't need to inflate your ego further!" Hermione called out with a laugh, trying to catch him with another tripping jinx.
"I'm upping the intensity!" Regulus warned her as he deflected her curse and Hermione nodded, winking at him, clearly ready for the challenge.
"Crucio!" he called out, but barely putting any feeling into it, watching Hermione deflect it easily. "That's cheating," Hermione informed him, catching his ankle with a non-verbal stinging jinx. "You have to mean it, a death eater is going to mean it and I have to know how to block it or break it."
"Just remember, you asked for it," Regulus warned her as he cast the unforgivable again, putting more venom into it than he had the first time.
Hermione narrowly avoided the curse the second time, her shield charm almost not holding as Regulus pressed the spell harder into her shield.
YOU ARE READING
Between Fine Lines
Fanfiction"The world isn't split into good people and Death Eaters. We've all got both light and dark inside us. What matters is the part we choose to act on. That's who we really are." --- Harry returns from the cave with Dumbledore, except this time they co...
