Percy Jackson and the Hound of Hogwarts [Book 3]

24) The Duel

Defense Against the Dark Arts quickly became most people's favorite class. In Lupin's class, we learned about Red Caps, these goblinlike things that straggled around places of bloodshed. After Red Caps we learned about kappas, these scaly sea monkeys that strangled waders in their ponds.

Potions was not as fun. Normally I loved making potions, but Snape was in a terrible mood. Word about the whole him as a boggart situation got around to him, and he got mad whenever someone mentioned Lupin, and he bullied Neville more than ever.

Trelawney's class wasn't fun. She kept trying to discuss prophetics with me, and it was starting to get on my nerves. She also got teary-eyed whenever she looked at Harry, and she smelled a little too strongly of perfume. Most of the class respected her, though I found it difficult to like her with all of the constant nagging. Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil stayed with the Professor at lunch time, and they always come back with superior looks, as if they knew things that we didn't.

Care of Magical Creatures had become boring after that first class. Hagrid had lost his confidence, and we ended up spending all of our time studying and caring for flobberworms, the most boring things to ever exist.

"Why would anyone bother looking after them?" Ron complained after another hour of feeding flobberworms shredded lettuce.

At the beginning of October, though, things got a lot better. Cedric had us practicing for Quidditch again.

The Hufflepuff team had never found Quidditch to be the most important thing. Our goal was just to have fun, and that made everything so much cooler. While the Gryffindor team was discussing tactics in one of the locker rooms.

It was Oliver Wood's, the Gryffindor Keeper and team captain, last year at Hogwarts, and we knew they would be doing their best to win this year.

We were playing hot potato with the Quaffle.

Soon enough, the Gryffindor team came out of the locker rooms, and we started practice.

Ever since Cedric had become captain in his third year, the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff teams had practiced together. It was pretty similar to a regular game, save for the fact that Wood called breaks every three minutes and we'd try to knock each other off of our brooms.

After one of these very fun training sessions, we made our way back to the Hufflepuff common room, which was practically buzzing with excitement.

"What's going on?" I asked Kahlida, a little confused.

"Someone bewitched Neville's grandmother's clothes onto Snape," she said, grinning.

"Seriously?!?" I grinned back.

"No," Kahlida smirked. "It's the first Hogsmede weekend. Halloween. Can't wait till I'm old enough."

I nodded happily, "It's gonna be awesome. I'm gonna get so much candy."

Kahlida glared at me when I said, "Of course, you'll never get any."

I grinned at her, then walked into my room and  changed. I was supposed to study with Hermione, so I left for the Gryffindor common room.

***

When I got there, it was a mess. Scabbers was running from Crookshanks, nearly everyone was trying to catch the cat, and Hermione and Ron were yelling.

I walked over to stand by Harry, and eventually Scabbers ran beneath an old chest of drawers. Hermione grabbed the hissing cat, and Ron struggled to get Scabbers out from beneath the chest.

"Look at him!" Ron waved Scabbers in front of Hermione. "He's skin and bone! You keep that cat away from him!"

"Crookshanks doesn't understand it's wrong!" Hermione said, her voice shaking. "All cats chase rats, Ron!"

"There's something funny about that animal!" Ron struggled to get Scabbers into his pocket. "It heard me say that Scabbers was in my bag!"

"Oh, what rubbish," Hermione said impatiently. "Crookshanks could smell him, Ron, how else d'you think—"

"The cat's got it in for Scabbers!" Ron ignored everyone around him, who were starting to giggle. "And Scabbers was here first, and he's ill!"

Ron marched away, into the boys dormitories. It was amazing.

***

That night, all of the demigods snuck out into the courtyard. It was time for the duel.

They stood in a loose circle around Draco and I, watching us draw our weapons. We shook hands, and the duel began.

Neither of us wanted to make the first move. We circled each-other, examining weak points and strong points. After a few minutes of this, I decided to move.

I lunged towards Draco and he sidestepped, slashing down at my back. I twisted, bringing a foot up and towards his knee. He jumped, rolling out of the way, and I was on him again. I slashed down at him, and he rolled out of the way. He kicked his legs out at me, and I fell, using my elbows to break my fall. Before Draco could get up, I swung at him, and he rolled out of the way, but not before I could clip his arm.

He stood, and I climbed up too. We circled each other again, but Draco was the first to make a move this time. He swiped his dagger at me, and I blocked it with my sword. He kicked me in the stomach before I could realize what he was doing, and I was on the ground again. I lunges towards his knees, but he dodged, swiping at me as I did so. I felt a sting beneath my eye, and quickly twisted, bringing my legs up towards his knees. This time, he dodged, falling in the process. I swung my sword at him, and he blocked it with his dagger.

If I had been stronger than him, I would have been able to press my sword down towards him, but Draco was considerably bigger than I was, so I just twisted it out of his grip. Instead of immediately scrambling for his weapon, he punched me, and I stumbled backwards, tasting blood. I went back towards Draco, moving to swipe at his back. He turned at the last second, swiping at me. He hit my left arm and my ribs, and I winced at the sudden pain. Draco elbowed me in the chest then kicked out my knee. He then pinned me, holding his dagger above my neck.

"Do you yield?" Draco panted, looking down at me with a grin.

"I yield," I nodded, grinning back.

He pulled himself off of me, then gave me a hand up.

Duels were always fun.

I went saluting yesterday. I'm really bad at it. The friend I went with is really good. He couldn't slow down, and I couldn't speed up. So we ended up just sitting and talking for an hour and a half. We both agree that was the best part. I told him I was asexual then. He's the only person that's tried to 'help' me. Don't worry, he want going at it as if I were just confused or something. But I mentioned about how trying to make myself like someone just made me sad. He took it to heart I guess. He tried to help, and I think it was super sweet. He's one of my best friends. He actually thought it was tough, and offered to help me out if I ever needed it. He's awesome. We're planning on having him come over to my house to play LEGO Harry Potter, which will be awesome. When I was skating, I only fell once, which is awesome. I almost fell after getting distracted by these other girls. They go to this school near ours. I'm ngl, our school is doing really well. Like, the teachers are awesome, we're like second in the state on a few grade things, and everyone's just kinda good people. This other school fucking sucks. They're actually terrible. Like not everyone there of course, but the teachers don't care, and neither do most of the students. A bunch of the people at the rink were from this school. There were the girls who slammed into a wall and started twerking (this is where I got distracted). There was the girl that nearly killed me like twenty times. There was the ten year old that said he wasn't a virgin and smoked a blunt. It was just weird. There were also these girls who were cosplaying. My Hero Academia and Danganronpa. That was pretty neat.  Uhh. Oh I knew I was gonna start me period I just freaking knew it. My period doesn't come every month, it comes whenever the fuck it wants, so I can't time it. But this time I felt it coming. And it came. It also came with six sneezes. Six. I sneezed six times in a row on my stupid period. Freaking sucks.

Anyway, I hope you all have a nice Saturday, and I'll see you on Monday. I love yoooooooouuuuuuu.