Mamihlapinatapai

Sneaky Snakes⋆｡°✩

It was almost eight in the evening and the six Slytherins were entering the Great Hall for the Dueling Club. The dining tables vanished and were replaced with a long singular golden stage. It was lit by thousands of floating candles.

"I'm curious who our teacher will be," Blaise said excitedly.

"Flitwick was a dueling champion, so maybe he will," Draco guessed.

Atlas groaned. "Hopefully it's not-" Atlas stopped and whined. None other than Gilderoy Lockhart walked onto the stage, accompanied by Snape. "Oh, for Merlin's sake."

Lockhart waved an arm, gaining silence. "Gather round, gather round! Can everyone see me? Can you all hear me? Excellent! Now, Professor Dumbledore has permitted me to start this little dueling club, to train you all in case you ever need to defend yourselves as I myself have done on countless occasions. For full details, see my published works." He took off his cloak and threw it at a group of girls, who squealed. "Let me introduce my assistant, Professor Snape," Lockhart smiled. "He tells me knows a little bit about dueling himself and has sportingly agreed to help me with a short demonstration before we begin. Now I don't want any of you, youngsters, to worry. You'll still have your Potions master when I'm through with him, never fear!"

"If we're lucky, we won't have our DADA teacher after this," Atlas mumbled. He noticed Snape's upper lip was curling. He was hoping that Snape would kick his arse.

Lockhart and Snape faced each other and bowed. They raised their wands in front of them like swords. "As you see, we are holding our wands in the accepted combative position," Lockhart informed the students. "On the count of three, we will cast our first spells. Neither of us will be aiming to kill, of course."

"That's unfortunate," Atlas grumbled.

"One, two, three!"

"Expelliarmus!" Snape casted. Lockhart was thrown off his feet and flew backward on the stage. He smashed into the wall and sprawled on the floor. Atlas had to put a hand over his mouth to muffle his laughter. He noticed Snape was smiling, quite pleased.

"I hope he's alright," Pansy said.

"I hope he's not," Atlas disagreed. Blaise and Draco nodded in agreement.

Lockhard unsteadily got back onto his feet. "Well, there you have it!" He stepped back onto the stage. "That was a disarming charm. As you see, I've lost my wand. Ah, thank you, Miss Brown. Yes, an excellent idea to show them that, Professor Snape, but if you don't mind me saying so, it was very obvious what you were about to do. If I had wanted to stop you it would have been only too easy. However, I felt it would be instructive to let them see." Snape gave him a murderous glare.

"Yeah, right," Atlas scoffed. Snape looked down at him and smirked.

"Enough demonstrating! I'm going to come amongst you now and put you all into pairs. Professor Snape, if you'd like to help me-"

The crowd moved around and got into pairs. Atlas and Draco stood next to each other.

"Potter," Snape called. "I don't think so. Mr. Lestrange, come over here. Let's see what you make of the famous Potter. And you, Miss Granger. You can partner with Mr. Malfoy."

Atlas groaned and walked over to Harry, absolutely dreading this. The one person he didn't want to be face to face with.

"Face your partners!" Lockhart called. "And bow!"

Atlas felt the other boy's eyes on him, so he looked up. They bowed, maintaining eye contact.

"Wands at the ready!" shouted Lockhart. "When I count to three, cast your charms to disarm your opponents. Only to disarm them! We don't want any accidents. One, two, three!"