A Darker Form of Magic, book two: Parseltongue

Chapter seven

The winter holidays were drawing close when Harry walked into the common room one morning to see a small mass of Slytherins gathered at the notice board. The boy raised a brow at the girl as Pansy slipped away from it and glided over to where Harry had taken a seat by the large glass walls, watching the Grindylows swim peacefully by with a sort of calm that he yearned to have within the sea.

"They're starting a Dueling Club," Pansy said as she took the seat across from the scarred boy, leaving the ones on either side of the other snake for the two boys likely to walk down the stairs any moment now. "The first meeting is tonight."

"And you, who loves watching people fail at dueling almost as much as I do, sound less than impressed," the boy noticed easily. "Why?" He asked as he pulled his knees to his chest with a shiver before casting a silent warming charm over them both.

The other Slytherin bit her lip in thought, a habit that she shared with Harry himself and that the boy only did when refraining from saying something that he knew that he shouldn't - mostly in Defense Against the Dark Arts.

"They haven't announced the Professor overseeing it," the girl said slowly, as if not wanting to voice her own thoughts out of fear of them becoming true, "but dueling is defensive magic..."

Harry bit back a groan as the other snake trailed off, yes he could see perfectly well where the girl's lack of enthusiasm had come from.

That didn't mean that they weren't all still going.

At eight that night the ten second year Slytherins walked up to the Great Hall from the dungeons and stood with some of the older snakes at one end of the long stage that had been brought down just for this.

Those from Slytherin house that had decided to come all wore polite masks of disinterest as Lockhart walked onto the stage, blatantly ignoring the swoons from the girls of the other three houses that still believed the fraud to be some sort of great wizard instead of an admirable con artist. Truly, his cunning and the inevitability of the man being removed in some fashion before the end of the year was the only reason that no one within the house had complained to the parents yet about his appointment.

Most of the snakes felt as though this was a waste of time filled with lessons that they could have easily learned in house on a dueling night, so many Slytherins only showed up because of the man following Lockhart onto the pompous stage.

They were waiting for a show.

"Let me introduce to you my assistant, professor Snape," Lockhart announced with a too wide smile and a sweep of his arm, seemingly having forgotten that everyone present had been taught by the potions master for at least until sixth year when potions as a class can then be dropped. Harry couldn't understand how Hermione still thought that he was some sort of hero. "He's told me that he knows some about dueling and had humbly agreed to participate in this demonstration before we go into smaller groups. Now, I don't want any of you to worry, you will still have your potions master when I'm done with him!"

The snakes snickered as they looked to their Head of House and knew that it was much more likely that Hogwarts would be in the market for a new Defense Professor than a potions master after this. Not that Harry thought it would come to that, Slytherins - especially older ones - did not so easily show their cards before they played them.

Harry watched as the dueling pair moved with much more formality than their house fuels ever held, the need for a fight always overwhelming their adherence to the bowing that Lockhart had done - Snape only going as far as to incline his head, more respect that Harry would have given the blond - before both professors raised their wands to one another.