Chapter 10

Mara's face lit up with devilish glee as she read the notice board. That couldn't be good.

"They've started a dueling club. Excellent."

Lucy sighed. "When is it?"

"First meeting is tonight."

Lucy instantly wished it was Tuesday so she could disappear off to her own club. "I've got a lot of homework, but you have fun."

"Nope, you're going. This is payback for Potions club." Mara insisted.

"You bring that up every time you want me to do something."

"It left a deep emotional scar." She defended.

At eight o' clock, Mara dragged the still protesting Lucy back to the Great Hall.

"Who do you think is leading it?" Lucy asked.

"Anyone but –" she growled. "Lockhart."

This was going to be worse than Lucy thought.

Lockhart called for silence. "Now, Professor Dumbledore has granted me permission to start this little dueling club, to train you all in case you ever need to defend yourself as I myself have done on countless occasions – for full details, see my published works."

"Oh but Professor, I've already used them for kindling." Mara muttered. She wasn't lying either.

"Let me introduce my assistant, Professor Snape." Said Lockhart, flashing a wide smile. "He tells me he knows a tiny 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!"

"Come on Snape, go in for the kill; make my millennium."

By the look Snape was giving him, Lucy was afraid he'd grant Mara's wish.

"One – two – three –"

Mara didn't get her wish. Snape had merely blasted him off his feet. When Lockhart announced they were going to pair them all up, Mara looked like a kid on Christmas morning, where Lucy just felt sick.

Lucy ended up being paired with Justin Finch-Fletchley, where Mara, looking more terrifying than Snape on a bad day, was paired with a Slytherin girl that had been bothering her a lot lately.

"Feeling okay, Lucy?" Justin asked.

"Yeah. I hate dueling."

"Have you done this before?"

Her mother and Aunt Bellatrix had spent the better part of the worst Christmas break of her life teaching her, quitting only when out of exhaustion and delirium, Lucy had correctly cast the Cruciatus curse. She merely nodded, instead of mentioning this.

"Go easy on me then." He said, looking a little scared himself.

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

"Wands at the ready!" shouted Lockhart, and she and Justin shakily pointed their wands at each other. "When I count to three, cast your charms to disarm your opponents – only to disarm them – we don't want any accidents – one…" Lucy was regretting this already "two…" She was going to kill Mara… "Three!"

Lucy and Justin looked at each other for a moment, neither wanting to hex the other. There was a flurry of various hexes being thrown around them, and it seemed that Lockhart's instructions to disarm only went unheeded.

She heard a loud wail, and looked over to see that Mara's opponent was bleeding profusely. Snape walked over, fixed the damage, and gave Mara a look that almost looked like pride.

Justin conjured a bouquet of yellow flowers, which he presented to Lucy.

"I hate dueling too." He explained. "One of my friends dragged me here."

"Same here." She said empathetically. The flowers smelled like butterscotch.

Once Snape and Lockhart had calmed the storm of dueling students, they decided to teach them how to block spells. Now that, Lucy could do.

Mara walked over to her with a grin.

"What did you do to her?" Lucy asked.

"Just a bit of well-deserved payback. Where did the flowers come from?"

"Our duel was friendly." Justin replied. Mara sighed.

Lucy groaned as her brother and Harry Potter took the stage to demonstrate the blocking spell. "Oh no."

"Three – two – one – go!" Lockhart shouted.

"Serpensortia!" Draco bellowed, conjuring a snake. Lockhart tried to get rid of it, but instead managed to throw it into the air, causing it to go after Justin, who looked terrified.

Lucy was about to do something when Potter yelled "Leave him alone!" in very poor Parselmouth.

"His accent is awful." Mara whispered.

"Agreed." Lucy said.

Both suddenly paused, and looked at each other with mouths agape, neither of them noticing that Justin had fled the room, or that Snape had gotten rid of the snake.

"You're a Parselmouth too?" They said in unison.

"Uncle Bob taught me." Mara explained. "Don't tell me you're a natural."

Lucy looked at her sheepishly. "I'm the only one in the family."

"I'm sure they're real proud."

The next day, Lucy couldn't help but hear the whispers in the common room. Harry Potter was the heir of Slytherin, and was after Justin. Lucy couldn't help but laugh. Anyone who spoke Parseltongue could tell you that he was just trying to get the snake to back off.

Also, it couldn't be Harry. Lucy had tried to avoid the conversations that went on in the parlor last summer, but she couldn't help but wonder, is this what her family had been planning? After all, she wasn't even sure if the Chamber of Secrets was a real thing or not.

But her brother definitely wasn't skilled enough to petrify people, and no one else he hung around with had the brains either. Snape had mentioned in passing a potion that would petrify the drinker, but every victim was found in a state of shock, like they had been so terrified by what they had seen that they turned to stone. If it was a poisoning of sorts, it would look more accidental.

Lucy looked up from her contemplations to see Justin sitting with Zacharias and Megan. Justin just looked terrified and his friends were trying to calm him down but were really just making matters worse.

"You're better off just hiding out in here." Zach said.

"Are you sure I'm safe here?"

"The Hufflepuff common room is the most difficult to find, I'm sure you're safe in here." Megan insisted.

Justin took a deep breath. "Harry seems so nice though. He got rid of he-who-must-not-be-named after all."

"That was years ago though. If he is the heir of Slytherin, he must have gone bad somewhere." Zach insisted. "You heard the way he was egging that snake on."

"We're so lucky that Lockhart was there to protect us." Megan added dreamily.

Lucy was suddenly very happy that Mara was in her own common room. She liked to tell off anyone who seemed to like Lockhart too much. In Mara's defense though, it had been Snape who had gotten rid of the snake.

As they talked on and Justin looked more and more upset, Lucy wondered if she should tell them what she knew. Would they believe her? After all, talking to snakes was a rather odd skill to have – especially for a Hufflepuff.

She turned to them. "Guys, Harry wasn't telling the snake to attack Justin. He was telling it to back off."

All three of them gave her confused looks. It was Zach who spoke. "Lucy, we know you like to see the best in everyone, but there's no way you can know that."

She bit her lip. "Actually, I can."

Justin looked at her wide eyed. "How?"

She hesitated. "I can talk to snakes too."

Megan laughed but Zach gave her an angry look before speaking. "This isn't time for joking. Justin's life is in danger."

"I believe you, Lucy." Justin stammered.

Lucy smiled. "Thanks Justin. You're really not in any danger, honest."

"Are you really going to listen to her?" Zach looked at Justin in disbelief.

"Lucy isn't the type to lie." Megan defended.

"Megan, she's a Malfoy." Zach hissed just loud enough for Lucy to hear.

"My family name has nothing to do with this."

Zach crossed his arms and looked at her. "How do we know that you're not on the side of Potter and his monster anyway?"

Lucy felt anger burn at her throat and tears form in her eyes. "Harry isn't the heir of Slytherin. He's in Gryffindor. He got rid of the Dark Lord. He's not a bad guy." Lucy wasn't even sure why she was defending him at this point. Why did she care anyway?

Justin got up and headed for the door.

"Where are you going?" Zach demanded.

"To the bathroom. Please stop arguing by the time I get back."

"Justin please, it's dangerous." Megan whined.

Justin looked at Lucy. "I – I think I'll be okay."

Ten minutes later, when Ernie Macmillan came in yelling about how Justin had just been petrified, Zach gave her a glare that could have melted glass, and Megan refused to speak to her. Lucy's heart fell into her stomach. It had been her fault that he had left the common room. But Harry couldn't be the Heir of Slytherin. She knew he couldn't.

I hope you enjoyed! Please be sure to review and tell me what you think!

-Zen