Harry Potter was a relic, was my dear Headmaster.
I'm aware the term "relic" might be lacking somewhat in the humble admiration we are supposed to extend to our elders. Yet the memories we retain of our headmasters are few and powerful. To a young man or woman of eighteen—the usual age one joined Vyzerworth—headmasters hold the unenviable position of being our master's master, and therefore presumably twice as capable of locking us up in a dungeon should we not learn how to hunt down beasts.
In my time, we regarded him as something between a legend and a disappointment. His bright white beard and the loud, creaky sounds that accompanied his wheelchair made him something of a figure out of an old painting, never more than a moment away from appearing behind you and uttering your new nightmare for the next couple nights, nightmares that would never realize because you would find out—though you would never be able to convince yourself of it entirely—he was a truly kind old man who seemed frightened by his own legend.
Harry Potter would always smile when he watched the hallways he was so proud of, offering help to those who needed it the least and appearing blissfully ignorant of the ones too timid to ask for it. It is perhaps important to mention that the man's kindness, though commendable, was not the driving force of his fragile body. That was something else that we could not often place but could easily curse. He would look at us in disdain when we acted concerned about him thinking of grabbing his old Firebolt out for one last flight, as if we were being silly brats for worrying so much. Then Lord Velice, the healer, looked at us with a stare conveying he held us responsible for his behavior.
I would dare say that is the type of memory we hold of our dear Headmasters after schooling. Their legends often take place before our births and we can hardly remember what evil sorcerer they vanquished and which frozen volcano they fenced atop of. And so, we instead remember the times they thought, "Ah, well, what harm can that do?" like we all do before attempting something foolish.
If this was how I felt about him—and indeed it was—then I could not begin to imagine how current students would feel about him, a good few years after my time. Vyzerworth's location was hardly common knowledge, but I was armed with an eternity. My journey first took me to Diagon City, through Hogsmeade, near the Durmstrang ruins, all the way to my poetical final destination of Hogwarts.
To say that information of this was hidden from the public would be an understatement, but the castle's ghosts were surprisingly helpful. Not because they could see me—a fact that filled me with fragile hope—but because they were uncontrollable gossips at the top of the castle where they thought no person might see them. It took me what I assume must have been a couple years to fully put together what they meant, but I eventually came upon a very complete picture of what had happened.
Each year, four men and four women graduating from Hogwarts were offered the chance to further their studies at Vyzerworth, whereupon they would learn to hunt beasts. Once, this offer was something to consider carefully; the undead beasts were many and the means to hurt them were few, killing curses unable to kill that which was already dead.
Nowadays, however—and this matched my own recollection of the matter—the beasts were few, the risks fewer, and the opposite could be said about the position's. A combination of wealth, respect and the ever alluring ability to evade adult life for a couple more years attracted students like little else did.
"I will not announce your grades yet." Lockhart spoke in an almost singing, enthusiastic tone that left no doubt he was not finished speaking. "Rather, I will offer you a choice. You may stick with whatever grades you have now, if you're confident in your exam performance. Or!" He declared this alternative with a thunder, striking his cane against the floor. "You may attempt to improve your grade by duelling me."
Had I possessed anything sacred to hold dear, I would swear by it here that Master Lockhart nonchalantly drew a sword at the crowd of students. So fluent was his motion—and so unexpected his action—that the crowd could do nothing but take a step back in a fearful sort of awe before he had transfigured his cane into a sword and lunged at them.
It would have been a shameful display of cowardice by the class, but Elle Atwood was never much for crowds anyhow.
The young woman mirrored their examiner's actions, tossing a stick forward and transfiguring her own Hogwarts cane into an épée, holding it diagonally pointing down towards where Lockhart's wrist would have been had he not stopped his lunge.
Elle's grin was curious one—it was not merely arrogant, it was egotistical. It was the grin of somebody who knew and was quite fond of how she was hated. After a moment holding her blade in that same stance, she cleared her throat, whereupon Lockhart smiled, retreating back to En Garde and giving a courteous bow filled with flair.
"What are the rules for this challenge, professor?" Elle asked, a sort of sportsmanlike taunt in her tone as she bent her knees slightly and gave a few stabs at the air as though in preparation for something.
"I'm not your professor until you have entered Vyzerworth's gates, Miss Atwood!" he declared in a loud, booming voice. He took a step backwards, maintained the tip of his blade at the girl for a second, then dropped his blade to his side. "Though I suppose there is little point in pretending you weren't already accepted. It is old fashioned to pretend that some of us aren't more talented than others. A thing of the distant past."
Following tradition made you somewhat of a relic these days, and as such it was almost fashionable. The crowd of students was a well-behaved one, if only because of the dullness of the surprise. An admittance into Vyzerworth was a dream for many and a reality for few—yet this sudden fortune for Elle felt less of a lottery and more of a long expected inheritance. You would have needed to go back nearly seven years to understand it.
Lockhart tossed a badge at her—a scarlet shield with black swords carved on top of it. One had to present it to the conductor before being allowed in the Vyzerworth Express, I had learned.
"I believe it is also old fashioned to believe that the pupil must always be weaker than the master, professor Lockhart. I look forward to the day we get to have a real duel." Perhaps even being present as she grew up wouldn't have been enough to understand how she grew into what she did, but you would have, if nothing else, shared the dull surprise that comes with seeing her outdo her peers.
I can still see her during sorting: timidly sitting on the little empty stool at the centre of everyone's gazes, under that beautiful false sky. Up until the end of her second week, she would not dare look anyone in the eye for fear of offending them. Yet she was placed in Gryffindor, at a simple request.
The conversation between Sorting Hat and student are one of the few privacies a young girl of eleven can ask for, but—it shames me to say—I'm fond of violating this. Before passing down judgement, I ask whoever stumbles upon this to consider themselves in my position. Suppose yourself invisible to even the ghostlier of spirits, for long enough that your own name escapes you. Now suppose that you notice, after a minute or a year, that some younglings have the habit of mouthing off what they are thinking since nobody can hear them—well? Would you not be a little curious as to whether you could predict where the hat would sort them into?
Should you be more virtuous than me, feel free to skip the next couple lines lest you be shamed with knowledge you do not wish for. For the others, you will want to know that young Elle informed the hat that she wished for nothing more than a chance to prove herself without the help of any other. I do not know what the hat replied, but I recall her frowning face and her saying, "Being the best because you had help is the same as admitting you're not good enough!" Her voice shook, her lips trembled, but her eyes burned with the courageous intensity of a youngling who hates her own fear.
The Sorting Hat contorted then in what I thought was a sort of smile and proclaimed her as part of Gryffindor. The young girl had wanted nothing more than a chance to find out how far she could go were she to give it an honest effort, and surprised everyone—especially herself—when she saw that she could go very far indeed. With every rival conquered, she also conquered herself, up until the shy, quiet girl seemed like a distant memory to many.
"Come on!" Elle declared, spinning around to face her fellow students. "Does anybody have a problem with this? I will duel anybody who thinks I don't belong in Vyzerworth. You can have my spot if you beat me!"
A couple heads turned to Lockhart, who frowned and muttered in a corner before lifting his head in a familiar smile and shrugging. "I will enforce those terms. Anybody capable of beating Miss Atwood in a duel will be accepted into Vyzerworth."
Not a single student moved forward.
"You can't be serious!" It was less a taunt and more a plea. "Some of you have to know you didn't pass the exam by now!" Curiously, her words appeared then to have robbed her peers of the fighting spirit she attempted to foster. Upon noticing this, Elle loudly stomped her feet, but this too evoked no reaction. "Don't you want to study in Vyzerworth? Isn't that why we're in this room? And you're telling me that even someone like you—"
Elle cut herself off bringing her finger at the students' general direction, and only after a pause did she seem to find herself a target. "Gwen, you most of all!" Her booming threat had the sound of a prepared speech, as if she had rehearsed it many times before. Yet there was little doubt in anyone's mind she had picked the first person she locked eyes with. "After that gross attempt at dueling the exam beast, you really think you have a chance to enter Vyzerworth?"
Under normal circumstances, Gwen measured at about the height of Elle's neck. Under a stressful challenge, the young Ravenclaw barely seemed as tall as the other's chest. Yet, she managed a surprisingly loud, "I transfigured my cane successfully—" before the other interrupted her.
"You managed to transfigure your cane! My, that is positively impressive. You think a beast would rip his jaw out of his mouth and bow down to you in awe of your transfiguration abilities? If you can't hunt a beast, you are useless."
"I can hunt a beast just fine! That time my nerves just—"
"Then prove it!" Elle screamed excitedly. She leaped back into the En Garde position and smiled, her épée still in hand. "Be your infernal logical self when it actually matters! If you have no chance to get into Vyzerworth anyway, why not take the one in a million gamble and fight me?"
The well-behaved crowd had its limits, the challenge bringing about the shuffling of feet ,whoops, whistles and murmurs. Occasional bursts of laughter were overshadowed by louder whispers of concern; even a skilled wizard would be most fortunate to leave a duel against Elle without injury. The implication that Gwen was less than skilled hung in the air quite heavily then, and even the most timid of girls have their own quiet pride. Her lips trembled for a second, and upon any oath you might impose on me I would hold that the Ravenclaw's lips trembled and her wrist twisted toward her wand for a second. Yet, after a moment her fingers closed under her thumb without further emotionality.
"I won't take that gamble because it's not one in a million. My chance of beating you is zero." To Gwen's credit, her voice was frank, but not meek. "That is hardly tempting."
Elle's face had not yet turned to disappointment before Gwen went on, "I have a much better chance against Professor Lockhart."
Lockhart's first thought then, he told me much later, was that it was refreshing for his ego that he was made relevant in that room once more. Though Elle was his favorite student, he still wished for the stage to be his, and this sudden attention rejuvenated him—he felt nearly forty again, alert, youthful, excited, and not particularly astonished by Gwen's sword tip pointing at his chest.
His next thought, a bad one, was the unsettling revelation that his students thought him weak. "Pardon?" he grunted. "You think your Master weaker than your peer?"
"No. I think you kind, Master Lockhart." There was no mocking in Gwen's tone. "I think that, faced against a failure's desperate last resort…you would not fight to win. Not immediately. I think you would go easy, to make this failure of a student think that perhaps they didn't have to be so ashamed of themselves. That kindness—" Gwen nodded toward Elle"—is not something I'd expect from her."
It was not something anyone expected from her. Elle grinned, hands behind her head and leaning lazily against a wall. Though I cannot be certain, it was likely that all Hufflepuffs in the room were thinking of their last encounter with her on the Quiddich pitch, where Elle humiliated them immediately after their captain's heartfelt dedication of the game to his recently deceased mother. Sentimentality was not part of sportsmanship, she declared.
"Gwen, your grades are more than good enough for a normal job with the ministry. Heck, you can probably even become an auror if you want, there's absolutely no reason to make a fool of yourself here." It was Avan who spoke then, a serious young man who would have benefited from any Master other than Lockhart. "Just quit!"
"No, I have to do this!"
At this point, a short, heated argument between the two came to pass. Many questions were repeated, with the same answer flung back right at them. It felt awkward—to me and to many others—to witness the boy insist he knew best while the timid girl shook her head and desperately tried not to "Do what you want. I'll be there for you if you need comforting later." Avan stormed out of the room then, but not before cursing under his breath.
"He did not even wait to see his own results," Lockhart noted in an annoyed tone. "Will somebody tell the boy he passed the exam? I would go after him myself, but, well…" The Vyzertworth Master bent his knees, magical épée in hand. "To five points." Gwen mirrored his actions—too closely for it not to be intentional. "We both use swords, then? I would have expected you to be the wand type, Miss Hart." No invitation was necessary for Elle to approach the two from the side and appoint herself as overseer of the duel. The crowd whispered again, some mild laughter mixed with concerned voices.
"En garde. Prêt. Allez!"
To everyone's surprise, Gwen recklessly advanced twice before attempting a lunge to the hand. Lockhart was surprised, but not enough he couldn't safely retreat, though the distance between the two was smaller now. Gwen recovered forward from her lunging stance and lunged again, which Lockhart again opted to retreat from, and which again reduced the distance between the two. Rather than recover, this time Gwen took advantage of her bent knees to explosively leap at her Master in a speedy flèche.
Lockhart was a fool in many ways, but Harry Potter would not have put up with him if he could not hold his own in a duel. Raising his sword at eyelevel for a high-line parry, he took her blade and guided it to the side and above his shoulder before taking a step forward with his back foot and gently touching her stomach with the tip of his blade in a prime parry.
"Halt," declared Elle. "Zero, one."
"Had I gone through with it, you would be dead, my dear," Lockhart said kindly. "Would you like to stop? In a real match against a beast duelist, you would be dead. Fight me as if you were fighting a beast…unless you'd like to stop."
Gwen retreated back quickly as though she were dodging his attack rather than being allowed to walk away. "No, sir. Thank you, but I want to keep going."
Lockhart smiled wryly at that. He would tell me later, he felt less inclined to offer his student kindness after that last move. A duel was a match of wits as much as a match of blades, if not more. Sudden attacks, while successful, were discouraged due to their high risk—you only have one life, after all. To allow a student with such a style to volunteer to fight beasts…it was akin to murder in his eyes.
The next point was more strategic, but it was too late to earn the Master's sympathy. Gwen attempted a blade extension at the high quarte line, but it was beaten aside. She repeated the extension, then exploded into a lunge switching into the high sixte line. Her blade had gone under Lockhart's, but rather than being fooled her Master held it high and diagonally pointing at her, so that her own momentum caused the blade to enter her arm. A perfect stop-hit.
"I must insist—fight me as if your life depended on it, Miss Gwen!"
There was much astonishment at the great flowing of blood, jutting from her forearm and into the floor. It was not a deep wound, but from a half-supressed cry and the way she fell to her knees, it was clear the woman was not used to pain. "Halt. Zero, two." Elle's face turned to the disdainful expression she went to in absence of sympathy. "Gwen, I may have encouraged you to do this, but this is embarrassing. Quit now."
Gwen shook her head wordlessly, keeping her lips sealed tight as though not doing so would force her to let out a terrible scream. At this, Elle only shrugged. "En garde. Prêt. Allez!"
This time Gwen attempted a light touch to the hand—it was too conservative an attack, and Lockhart deflected it with his bell guard. The resulting impact threw Gwen awkwardly off her guard, allowing the Master to easily find a line between his blade and her right shoulder. This time there was no blood—but the mistake was humiliating enough, and the laughter coming from a couple students seemed to sting more.
"Halt. Zero, three."
"Picture yourself in a fight against a beast!" Lockhart roared. "A beast in the shape of a man appears in a dark street at night. He draws his sword made of the bones of your friends and attacks you like I did. Show me what you'd do!"
The fourth point was over as soon as it started. Gwen's earlier mistakes dulled her initiative, and Lockhart took advantage of this to beat her sword aside and go in deep with a lunge to the right forearm. It was minimally damaging, but it was enough to make Gwen drop her swords and fall to the floor. "Halt. Zero, four." The persistent laughter from one dark haired student seemed of particular bad taste now—others seemed uncomfortable to laugh as the injuries piled up.
"You did your best," Lockhart attempted kindly. "You can quit now."
"No!" Despite her best efforts, Gwen could not keep her voice from cracking. With what seemed to be a gargantuan effort, she let out a dry, "Please. Just one more point."
Despite his concerns for her injuries, Lockhart nodded. Sportsmanship was not his forte, but it was common knowledge that since his stay with Velice he had—and no one who wished for a good grade should ever say so out loud—adopted a decidedly old fashioned understanding of pride. He clearly intended to draw blood before he could draw tears, for the sake of her dignity.
"En garde." Elle paused momentarily, glancing at her barely upright classmate. "Prêt. Allez!"
Lockhart closed in the distance quickly before launching himself in a flèche. To his surprise, Gwen managed an awkward high-line parry, quickly enough to avoid being hit by the blade but not quickly enough to avoid being hit by Lockhart's shoulder and tossed to the ground. Lockhart, who did not fall, took only a second to regain his balance and extend his arm at her back.
It was then that she spun around, wand in hand, and screamed, "Expelliarmus!"
Had he expected the move, Lockhart could have easily parried the spell with his blade. It was what Vyzerworth taught above all else, after all. Yet he did not expect it, and his sword flew out of his hand. Bouncing his right foot off the wall, Lockhart caught his sword midair but heard another, "Expelliarmus!" and a jet of light came out of Gwen's wand.
This time, Lockhart did parry the attack. The Master's feet had yet to touch the ground when his blade clashed against the jet of light and moved it past his right shoulder. Yet the movement was to sudden and thus too wide, the parry bringing Lockhart's blade so far to his right that Gwen found a perfect opening to flèche at his quarte line. The blade barely hit him, but it unquestionably drew a small amount of blood.
"Halt. One, four," Elle announced, quite proudly too.
"You're counting that? She used her wand!" Lockhart screamed indignantly. "Her wand!"
"You told her to fight as if was fighting an actual beast…and there are wizards who use wands together with their weapon of choice," Elle said. "Not everyone sticks to one or the other."
"To the next point," Lockhart growled. "To the next!"
Exhaustion, pain and embarrassment were such that Gwen could neither celebrate her point nor defend her choice of strategy. She did not stop gasping for air until Elle said, "En garde. Prêt. Allez!"
This time, it was Lockhart who moved as though he were fighting a real beast. Without holding back, he leaped in, encircled Gwen's blade and delivered a furious lunge, first a feint to her shoulder then switching lines to her leg, drawing more blood than before and sending her backwards as she screamed in pain.
"Halt. One, Five," Elle said bitterly. To Lockhart's credit, he seemed positively disgusted with himself.
"Do you need help to see the Heale—" he started, before Gwen herself interrupted him.
"No, I—thank you for your attention professor. It was a valuable lesson…not that I'll need it again in the future…but thank you…I'm sorry for wasting your time. "Gwen attempted to rise to her feet, but after a single step forward her injured leg gave out and she fell flat on her face. Immediately afterwards, the injured girl awkwardly hurried herself off the room in a desperate limp, laughter from the same dark haired witch behind her back. Upon witnessing this, Elle stepped toward the laughing woman.
Hereupon I must confess my sin: I am quite indecisive. My first reaction was to stay and watch Elle's confrontation with the dark haired woman. A moment later I decided I wanted to see what happened with Gwen, and I hurried after her. Again I changed my mind, and made my way back to the classroom. Finally, I opted toward following Gwen, having delayed my decision enough that even with that terrible limp she managed to outrun me.
I found her, hours later, sitting by the lake. Though this was a long time after, her eyes were still bright red and she still breathed quite heavily. Occasionally, when tears came out, she would bring both hands to her face as though trying to force them back into her eyes. "I'm useless…Avan was right…I shouldn't have tried."
"You're not useless. Given the circumstances, your move was excellently executed."
Even I—ghostlier than any spirit—had not heard the old man come in. One minute he wasn't there, the other he was sitting beside her, close enough to reach out with his arm and grab her. Instinctively, Gwen moved away from him, but the old man paid no mind. "You are just as bit as talented as your friends, Miss Hart."
"I am not. There's no pointing in pretending that. I only scored one point on Master Lockhart, and I had to cheat for it."
"Is that so? Be that as it may…" The old man tossed a scarlet badge at her, and she caught it before it fell. "I still want to see what you can do in Vyzerworth. I think all youngsters have the same amount of talent…with different ways to apply them."
With a smirk, the old fashioned old man climbed back onto his wheelchair, not bothering to look at the girl's expression. In the dark, even I could not tell if it was amusement or fear that he had left her with. Before he left, Gwen managed through her surprise to say, "But sir, it is old fashioned to pretend some of us aren't better than others."
He responded with a simple smile before wheeling away.
Harry Potter was a relic, was my dear Headmaster.