Disclaimer: I'm going to stop putting these at the beginning of each chapter, you people know I don't own Harry Potter.
Harry hadn't fully anticipated the amount of publicity the Hogwarts Dueling Competition would attract. It seemed that since he and Hermoine had announced it to the press at the Ministry the week before, Harry couldn't even teach his classes without getting a mountain of letters deposited on his desk from reporters. Ginny, of course, had been the first to publish a story. She rarely strayed outside of the quidditch section in her reporting, but occasionally she made an exception when Harry gave her the information before anyone else could know about it.
Harry was glad the tournament was less than an hour away, so that all the owls would stop and he could get back to just being a teacher, albeit an incredibly famous one. Harry stepped out of his office to find no less than seven reporters, he declined to answer their questions. As he walked down the corridors, the group of reporters following him grew larger and larger. By the time he reached the area where the four dueling platforms had been set up, there were at least thirty of them following him. He took his place between Neville and Malfoy on the platform closest to the castle, and addressed the crowd.
"Good afternoon, students and guests. Today marks the first ever Hogwarts Dueling Championship." This brought a fairly large amount of applause, mainly from the students. "As you know, the plan was to have a competition in each house to see who would face their head of house in a final contest. However, plans change, and I have been informed that we cannot allow professors to duel the students, so instead we will place all twenty-four students in a single elimination tournament with the top three earning house points and the champion receiving an invitation to the British Dueling Invitational in London this summer. Now, since we prepared our heads of house for a dueling competition, we decided that the only course of action would be to allow them to face each other to open the tournament. So without further ado, the first duel of the day. Professors Flitwick and Longbottom, facing Professors Malfoy and Ansley
The battle that followed between the professors was easily the most exciting duel Harry had seen in some time. Professor Flitwick and Neville were moving nonstop, dodging spells and throwing their own back. Malfoy had created a bunker by conjuring bricks around his location and putting his shield charms on the bricks instead of himself. Harry nearly forgot the young professor Ansley was in the fight, when he materialized behind Flitwick, sweeping his short legs from under him and disarming the professor. This left Neville to face the pair of them alone. Neville, to his credit, didn't miss a beat.
The pair backed Neville into the barrier surrounding the platform, and seemingly hit him with a stunner. Harry had seen the spell disappear into the barrier behind him, but Neville crumpled to the ground. The two professors across from him had only just began celebrating, when a blue light shot from where Neville lay, hitting Ansley square in the chest. This sent his wand soaring, Neville rolled to his feet and caught the wand, which he used to turn Malfoy's barrier into ice. He followed this up by casting a large fireball at the base of the structure, melting it. What followed was some of the quickest spellwork Harry had seen in his adult life. Neville, wielding two wands, sent a stunner at Malfoy's legs. Malfoy jumped to dodge the red light, which was exactly what Neville wanted. Harry noticed the smirk on his friend's face before he realized what had happened.
While Malfoy was in the air, Neville had refrozen the water from the melted barrier. When Malfoy landed on the ice, he lost his balance. This gave Neville the opening he needed to stun and disarm his opponent. Malfoy took it all in stride, however, getting up and reaching to shake his opponents' hands.
After the platform had been cleared, the actual tournament began. Harry took the stage to introduce the combatants. "From Gryffindor: fifth years, Rein Cornwell and Dominque Weasley; sixth years, Ryan Smith and Sascha Bell; and seventh years Victiore Weasley and Elias Aston. Representing Ravenclaw: fifth years Constant Feld and Roscoe Winthrop; sixth years Cherise O'Neill and Louis Achthoven; and seventh years Kendra Sheinfeld and Leyton Tipton. Hufflepuff sends fifth years Wenonah Phillips and Heinrike Devereux, sixth years Zena Foss and Billy Achterop, seventh years Able Sneijers and Tucker Driscoll. Finally, representing Slytherin house: fifth years Lynsay Ryley and Clemens Arbeid, sixth years Luvenia Killough and Haden Alfred, and seventh years Juliana Seymour and Darion Hailey." The first round saw sixth years facing fifth years from different houses.
Luvenia eliminated Heinrike in the first match of the competition. Followed by Dominique eliminating Zena, Ryan eliminating Clemens, and Billy eliminating Rein without even allowing Rein to cast one spell. The platforms were cleared, and the next round commenced. Lynsay wiped the floor with her opponent, Louis Achthoven. This match ended more quickly than the others happening at the time, eventually Constant, Cherise, and Haden eliminated Sacha, Wenonah, and Roscoe respectively.
The second round saw the winners facing random seventh year students. All of the seventh years were victorious, aside from two. Tucker was defeated by Dominique, who used her Veela charm to distract him while she disarmed him. Ryan also defeated his older opponent, Darion Hailey, an incredibly strong, incredibly mean Slytherin that Harry had almost removed from the dueling club after he punched his opponent in the face in one of their meetings.
The third round was where it got interesting. With Dominique facing her older sister in the first match. It was highly anticipated, but not so highly competitive, with Dominique falling within five minutes. Ryan, being now the youngest duelist still in the competition, survived the third round by summoning his broom and using it to fly around the platform, just inside the boundaries, and shoot stunners at Juliana, who was so taken aback by the strategy that she hardly moved, until one of the stunners found its mark and threw her across the platform, causing her to drop her wand. Abel and Leyton also advanced, eliminating Kendra and Elias in the process.
This left the semi-final matches, where Victiore continued her winning ways, eliminating Ryan in the longest duel so far. Leyton and Abel, not to be outdone, gave the crowd a spectacular display, with the duel finally ending when Leyton threw himself into the barrier, using it to bounce forward at Abel, and surprising him by sliding into his leg and casting a disarming charm as he fell. Abel and Ryan then competed in a third place match, with Ryan easily overcoming Abel with a simple stunner. People in the crowd all concluded that Abel came into the match still upset over his previous loss.
The final match of the competition was easily the most exciting of the day. Victiore was very popular with most all of the students, including a fairly large number of Slytherins. Leyton, a Ravenclaw, was well liked, but the quiet sort. Nobody would have picked him to advance past Abel, who was nearly unmatched in the dueling club. This was hard to believe, considering he had just been bested by a sixth year from America.
The final match started, much like every other duel, with the two combatants throwing simple stunning spells and disarming charms to test their opponent's defenses. Victiore was moving, graceful as ever, back and forth on her end of the platform. She hardly ever even had to block a spell from Leyton, who was standing still, weaving shield charms to deflect Victiore's stunners. Victiore danced around the outskirts of the platform forcing Leyton into the middle. Harry thought this was her best move, considering how Leyton had won his last match by using the barrier. She continued to move around him, coming closer with every rotation, throwing more and more complex spells at him. Just when Harry thought she was going to get close enough to breach his shields, Leyton dropped his defenses and dove away from her, twisting in the air and casting a patronus. Harry was incredibly confused for a moment, What good would a patronus do in a duel. He would have his answer momentarily, when the shining form of a hawk flew directly at his niece's face, obscuring her vision. Leyton used the distraction to move, more quickly than Harry had though him capable of, behind Victiore. He reached around her as his patronus disappeared, and plucked her wand from her hand.
A stunned silence spread across the group of spectators, but only lasted a moment. The Ravenclaws in attendance were the first to break into applause, followed by everyone else, including Victiore. In the end, Leyton earned Ravenclaw 100 points, while Ryan and Victiore, having placed in second and third, earned 125 combined. At the feast that night, all anyone was talking about was the tournament, which led Harry to believe that it had been a complete success. Most of the Gryffindors were bragging about their sixth year getting third place. Ryan, for his part, seemed content to just move on from the tournament entirely. He and his brother left the feast as soon as they finished their meals.
Harry followed the Smith twins out of the great hall, moving at nearly a run to catch up to them. He did so when the pair had to stop and wait for a staircase to stop moving. "You fought well today, Ryan." Harry said, trying to judge his response.
"I lost, though." Ryan said, unenthusiastically.
"Victiore is an incredibly talented duelist, there's no shame in losing to her." Harry replied, he was the talk of his year after going so far in the competition, he shouldn't be so upset.
"Look, professor, I know you're just trying to help and all, but I lost. And when you live like my family has for the past year, you come to associate losing a fight with much worse consequences than a third place match." Ryan said, turning and walking away from Harry and his brother.
"You'll have to excuse my brother, he's very competitive. You really don't want to see him if we lose at quidditch." Ian forced a laugh before following his brother, leaving Harry to find his way back to the great hall. While he was making his way toward the feast, which was nearing its close, he heard the alarms from the wards surrounding the school start to sound. He ran to look out of the nearest window, and he saw it. A cloud, darker than the usual darkness of the grounds at night, was moving quickly toward the castle. A thousand thoughts shot through Harry's mind, but he pushed them aside reflexively. He sprinted down the stairs to the doors of the castle, where he met all of the staff, prefects, and the adult visitors there for the tournament.
He found the headmistress on the steps, and she stepped aside. Gesturing for him to take control. He saw the darkness approaching, and an idea occurred to him. "Call the dueling club, they can all cast corporeal patroni," Harry said, to no one in particular, he heard footsteps moving away from him, then heard the sound of the students moving out of the great hall. He turned to them, "All of you will stay at the doors of the school and cast your Patronus toward that cloud, if I'm right, it will push the darkness back and we can fight whatever is inside." A moment later, he saw the same Lioness from his first Defense class pounce over the adults on the steps, followed by no less than fifty other animals. The light produced by them was nearly blinding, but it worked in driving back the cloud that had been approaching. As it was forced back, Harry saw what was hiding within. Hundreds of the same golems that had attacked the restaurant stood, wands raised, on the grounds of Hogwarts.
Harry and the other professors didn't wait for the golems to make the first move. Harry and Hermoine, who was there for the tournament, both cast their first spells at the same target. Harry saw the golem split in two as both of the Reducto spells hit it in the stomach. He noted that the anatomy seemed identical to that of a human, which was sickening. The combined might of the ministry workers and Hogwarts staff members had cut the numbers of the attacking force by nearly half before the golems cast their first spell. Harry saw the green flashes of light fly in all directions, he dodged the one nearest him and hoped that everyone had done the same. He managed to disable another two of the golems before they cast their next barrage, Harry noted that this time there were far fewer killing curses. They were winning. By the time the golems managed to cast another spell, only five of them remained. These five were dealt with swiftly, and upon surveying the battlefield, Harry noted that only the golems lay on the ground. That was too easy. Harry thought, wondering what purpose this attack could have possibly served. He found his answer just as he thought about it, when Ian and Ryan came running from the castle.
They ran directly to Harry, "They found our parents!" they shouted in unison.
"What?" Harry said, "That's impossible."
"Just like getting into here is supposed to be impossible?" Ryan asked, gesturing to the fallen golems. Harry agreed to go to the flat and check on the American adults.
When harry arrived in the fireplace of his old apartment, he knew instantly that something had gone terribly wrong. He knew this because the building seemed to be crumbling around him. He shouted for his guests, but there was no response. He learned why when he rushed from the fireplace and tripped, over the body of Adam Smith. He searched the apartment as quickly as he could, not finding any other bodies, then he rushed back to the fireplace, bringing Adam's body with him through the floo network to his home.
Harry spun into his house, clutching Adam's body in order to keep it from falling out early and into the wrong house. He was greeted by a scream from Adam's wife, Claire. This scream actually relieved Harry, at least the rest of them had gotten out.
"What happened?" Harry asked Tyler, who was the nearest one in any condition to answer the question. Tyler's face darkened, a look Harry was familiar with.
"Zach happened. The bastard attacked us when we were eating dinner." Tyler said, his tone murderous. "He attacked all of us, even his wife. When we started fighting back, he brought the damn building down. He was laughing about how no one was coming because everyone was at Hogwarts, so Adam ran to grab his two-way mirror and see if the children were alright. Zach caught him on his way back to the fireplace. Hit him with a killing curse and kept laughing while he flew out of the window on a broom. We've lived with that man for almost a year, and he just turns on us today? It doesn't make a damn lick of sense."
Just then, the fireplace went green again and Hermoine joined them. "Oh my," she said, kneeling down next to Claire, her hand on the crying woman's shoulder.
Something didn't seem quite right to Harry, "Did your friend Zach leave the apartment at any time in the last day or so?" He asked, Zach had been the adult in the group that Harry had seen the least of since they had arrived.
Kayla, who hadn't spoken yet, nodded, "He went for a walk yesterday, he never really liked being all shut up in the apartment," her voice was remarkably calm for someone wearing the distressed look Harry saw on her face.
"Was anything different when he returned?" Harry asked, wheels turning in his head. After a few silent moments, Kayla spoke again.
"He was happy," she said, "for the first time in almost a year, he was smiling and laughing. I just thought the fresh air had done its job." Her voice broke on her last word and she started sobbing. Harry, however, had the answers he needed.
"I don't think the person that attacked you was your friend." Harry said, explaining everything he knew about the creature that had attacked Ginny. To their credit, the Americans didn't seem surprised at all.
"So, this thing, the one that attacked your wife, can change its form?" Kayla asked, a glimmer of hope in her eyes.
Harry nodded, "We thought that it could only change its face to the mirror of the person that was looking at it. But, I suppose it could be similar to a metamorphmagus and be able to change its form to whatever it likes."
"But, then what happened to Zach?" Kayla asked. The hope in her eyes making Harry not want to tell her his thoughts.
"There's no way to be sure." He answered, but something told him that whatever had happened to him, it was terrible.
Zach awoke in a dark, damp cell. "Oh good, you're awake." A voice, eerily similar to his own said from outside his cell.
"Where am I?" Zach asked the voice, unable to see where it came from. "Who are you?"
"Who am I? Well, I suppose right now, I'm you." The voice said.
"What the hell? What do you mean?" Zach asked, more than a little confused.
The owner of the voice appeared in front of the small window in his cell door, and turned to face him. Zach's voice failed him when he saw his own smiling face on the other side. "Ah, you've been so quiet all day, we can't have you starting that again." His captor pointed a wand through the bars of the cell. Zach only had time to think, is that mine? Before the man on the other side said "Crucio" and the most intense pain Zach had ever felt came over him. He screamed, and his captor laughed, "Much better." The last thing Zach heard before the pain overwhelmed him and caused him to pass out was, "Oh, well that's no fun. I'll be here when you wake up, Zachary."
A/N: This chapter is a bit longer than some of the others, I think I may have gotten a bit carried away with the dueling competition, but it could have gotten way longer. I included all of the names of the competitors because they each will play a role in later chapters, or in Albus' storyline. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed it, I'll probably wait a couple of days to upload to this story again.