It was the final duelling club of the term, and the last duel of the session was between Harry and Draco. Flitwick said that he assigned the duels randomly, but the man was clearly lying through his teeth. Blaise had been okay the past few weeks, but his initial elation had rapidly faded, which made sense, they still might lose. Harry spent lots of time thinking about things he could do to tip the balance. He went to Draco whenever he had something like a plan and Draco would invariable talk him out of it. The adoption ceremony was next Monday, and the vote was on Friday, so they'd have just enough time for Sirius to vote.

Flitwick had informed them for next term he'd change the arena but for now it was the same as always, a classroom in disarray, with Harry at one edge of the circle and Draco at the other. Harry wondered how useful an environment it was, he guessed it be similar to fighting inside a house, but he wasn't sure. Often people in the class would beg off staying until the end by giving various excuses to Flitwick, and he'd often just let them go, but today everyone was here. Since he'd toppled Selwyn this was seen as the top match up.

'Are you ready boys?'

'Yes Sir.' Said Draco, oozing confidence, or at least trying to give off that image. Neither of them had been able to master the shield charm but Draco was close.

'Yes Sir.' Harry repeated in what he hoped was a bored tone. Despite his earlier successes Harry hadn't had any luck transforming his golden mist into a real shield.

'Very well, on my mark.'

Draco winked, Harry glared. They both raised their wands.

'Go!'

Keeping his wand trained on Draco Harry dodged behind a bookcase. The other boy for his part didn't move an inch. Harry leaned out from behind the bookcase to see Draco still rooted to the spot where he had started, wand held loosely and an easy smirk on his face.

The bastard thinks he can do it, Harry thought.

He stepped out from behind his bookcase to face the unmoving Malfoy. Harry could hear some murmuring in the crowd, clearly confused by the lack of spells cast.

'Titillando!' Harry exclaimed, a small green circle flying from his wand.

'Protego.' Was Draco's calm reply. A golden shield appeared between them, the tickling spell bouncing off of it. More impressive than his shield blocking the spell was that it didn't shatter when struck, although to save energy Draco dismissed it a second later.

'Expelliarmus.' Draco said, casting his retaliation.

'Protego!' Harry cried, and for the first time the shield was thrown up before him. It broke when Draco's red beam struck it, but it was enough.

Draco's smiled grew wider.

It was going to be a straight up contest of strength, neither of them were going to take cover, Harry was sure.

'Tarantallegra!' Harry said, casting the dancing feet spell at Draco, but it dissipated on his shield.

'Petrificus Totalus!' Draco shouted in reply, his calm disappearing in the face of the excitement of the duel. Harry once again blocked the spell, but once again his shield shattered, leaving him at a disadvantage.

'Immobulus!' Harry cast the spell with all the force he could, and watched Draco's shield shatter. Harry bet Draco wouldn't be able to intercept the next one at all.

The Knockback Jinx was Draco's reply.

'Protego!' Harry cast, but naught but a pathetic misting of golden particles came from his wand. He barely had time to mentally curse before the spell stuck his chest.

Sent flying backwards Harry painfully stuck his head on the ground and dropped his wand.

He had faced Draco in a straight up contest of magical ability and lost, and it hadn't even really been very close. Harry decided he was just going to lie right here for a while.

Flitwick was talking this and that about this being the most magically impressive first year duel he had ever seen but it didn't provide Harry any comfort.

'You alright mate?' Came Ron's voice.

Harry, still staring at the engraved ceiling reached a hand behind his head and then moved it in front of his face. No blood on his fingers.

'Yeah, I'm fine.'

A hand appeared, clearly offering to get him up, but he just stared at it.

'Come on Harry.' Ron said after a while.

'Can I not just lie here for awhile?'

'Stop moping mate, get up.'

'Alright alright.' Harry said, grabbing at the hand and levering himself up.

While Harry had been lying there Flitwick had finished congratulating Draco and had come over to Harry.

'Cheer up, Harry, that was a true performance!' He said, patting Harry on the shoulder. Harry bet he couldn't do that to seventh years. 'Not just of power, but also of a mastery of an impressively wide range of spells. This is truly an exceptional year, and you're part of it!'

'Yeah Sir, its great.' Harry replied tonelessly. Flitwick smiled and turned away.

'You wanna go?' Ron asked.

'Yeah, totally.' Harry wasn't up to facing Draco victorious.

'You've heard the plan?' Harry asked as they exited the classroom and started down the corridor.

'The plan?'

'For me going to yours.'

'Oh right, yeah my mam will collect you Monday evening and you'll leave Saturday afternoon. She's going to witness your adoption right?'

'Yeah, we'll come back from the ministry together.'

'So how do you feel about it?'

'About what?'

'Being adopted.'

'Oh, that. Yeah, fine, the progressives will benefit a lot from having another supporter in the Wizengamot.'

Ron gave him an utterly bewildered look.

'That's not what I meant mate. I was asking how you feel about it like emotionally. Your going to be a Potter no longer, maybe you feel like your turning back on your parents. Sirius is going to be your legal Father, how does that make you feel?'

'Right. Well, I dunno. I'm going to keep living with my Aunt and Uncle for now, and I'm still going to go by Potter, or try to anyway, so I don't feel like it'll change that much. I get what you mean Ron, and I don't want to seem like an emotionless freak, but I've just been focused on helping Blaise.'

'I guess that makes sense. My mam has been talking about it lately, terrible stuff, the French have this country over a barrel. They do terrible things to their wizards, and when those wizards do terrible things back they go sobbing to the world about how terrible wizards are in general, and then they just do worse.'

'So you think he did it?'

'I mean, seems like too big of a coincidence for all three of your wives to drop dead, doesn't it?'

'Yeah, hard to argue with that.''