The train ride back to Hogwarts was as uneventful as it was unnecessarily long. There's no way wizards couldn't figure out a more efficient way of arriving at the school. Hell, it didn't even take me 10 minutes to come up with possible alterations to shorten the journey. To take my mind off the mind-numbing boredom that accompanied hours spent alone with Crabbe and Goyle, I began planning my eventual conquest of the wizarding world. The end goal was my total domination of the world, from the Arctic to Africa. I'd start with Britain. Voldemort's return and eventual defeat would provide an atmosphere for me to rise into control of the country easily. I just needed to ensure that I showed visible opposition to his rule. I probably wouldn't get to become Minister immediately after his fall, but headship of the Auror office should be an achievable goal. I'd need to be a very skilled wizard for that though and these skills need to be shown in as public a manner as possible. This train of thought is what led me to deciding to compete in the Tri-wizard this year. I would have to replace Diggory and avoid winning the third task but it should all be possible. I even had a small plan of how to get my name into the cup.
Crabbe and Goyle looked at each other before observing me silently, I guess even they could tell that something was different about me. I didn't bother trying to assuage their fears or even address their unspoken concerns. They weren't the first to notice something off and definitely wouldn't be last. Both Lucious and Narcissa and even the Malfoy elves could tell something was up. They did not speak up, and neither did I. The train ride finally came to an end, and we joined the small crowd that formed out of students hurrying to leave the train. It was raining cats and dogs, but most of them did not seem to mind getting wet and simply ran towards the carriages. A simple charm I'd read up in Standard Book of Spells Grade 7 cast above our heads served to protect Crabbe, Goyle, and I from the rain. We walked to the carriages and claimed one for ourselves. No one seemed inclined to join us.
My first look at Hogwarts stole my breath away. It was simply magical. It was a castle, but more than that, It was something more. It has a certain Je ne sais quoi. We filed in with the rest of the school and took our seats at the Slytherin table. The Sorting took a short eternity, and the welcoming feast afterwards was a welcoming sight, After we'd polished our plates, Dumbledore began his announcements, I didn't pay much attention, but the mention of a duelling tournament did catch my attention. It turns out there would be a duelling tournament involving 5 participants from all three schools. I was going to sign up. The quidditch tournament did not interest me as much and I would leave that to Potter and his ilk.
The ceremony ended with the offence to Music that is the Hogwarts school anthem, and we made our way to the common room,
I had to stand around looking menacing with the rest of the House, waiting for Snape to come in and do his bit with the first years. After an entirely overdramatic speech that I found myself struggling not to laugh at, I trudged up to my rooms in the boys' dormitories. Slytherin students were expected to live in groups of two, with each year having their own floor. There are five fourth-year boys in Slytherin that left me with the honour of staying alone. I looked around the room, noted that my trunk was already positioned at the foot of the bed. I got out of my clothes, performed the cleaning charms I needed for my physical and oral hygiene, and went straight to bed, naked as the day I was born.
The Sun rose the next morning as it always must, and I rose with it. Seeing that it was Saturday as the first of September fell on a Friday this year, I would have the whole day all for myself. Although, my memories told me that Draco would normally use such days to further his position within the house by holding court in the common room with his 'friends'; I did not have the time nor interest for such frivolous activities. I made my way to the kitchens, I was welcomed by the elves like every student was, with happiness and joy. I requested a picnic basket packed with sandwiches and pumpkin juice and the elves were happy to comply. I did not see Dobby and I was grateful for that.
With my requisitioned basket of food in hand, I walked to the room of requirement on the seventh floor. It was a long walk and I was happy to arrive at my destination, a tapestry that showed Barnabus the barmy teaching a group of trolls how to dance. I was lucky that Draco had passed by this hallway before and noted the portrait in his attempts at finding the Gryffindor common rooms. I walked past the portrait three times while focusing on the thought; 'I need a room to learn the rules of the Room of requirement'. The doors appeared after my third pass.
I walked in and noticed that the room took the form of a comfortable office. It just had a single couch and a wide desk with a chair behind it. I took the seat behind the desk and picked the book off the mini-shelf next to the table. It was a journal filled with things the room could not do. It was not a very long list, the room couldn't actually create items unless the master of the room knew exactly what he wanted. It was also unable to summon items that had 'owners' for lack of a better word. For example, I couldn't ask the room for Potter's invisibility cloak as that was his property but I could ask for a book from the library since those were owned by the castle itself. The room could not change it's form while occupied. It could only be opened from the seventh floor hallway but could form exits anywhere so that was nice.There room could not make food or living things as I wuld naturally expect. After taking in the rules, I left the room and went out to request a new room to practice defense against the dark arts.
While I was NEWT level on transfiguration and charms, I had gone no farther than OWL level on defense against the dark arts so that was where I was going to concentrate my efforts. The course's title was a bit of a misnomer, especially in the way I was going to be studying it. I would be focusing on the more offensive uses for the spells studied. I started with the blasting curse, confringo and drilled it till I could perform it silently then moved on to the bludgeoning curse, impactus, the slashing curse, vulnus, and finally the shield spell before I was forced to stop because I could no longer ward off the creeping fatigue. I took a seat at the couch the room provided and scarved down the sandwiches the elves provided with a few glasses of pumpkin juice. I checked the time with a tempus charm and smiled. Four spells mastered in just over five hours of practice. My dream was beginning to feel more and more achievable. I felt that the progress I made over the summer was a fluke of some sort and felt that I would not do as well with offensive magic. I thought this would be where I would fail but I still didn't. It came as easily to me as everything else. My progress awed me and I knew it was as unnatural as my placement in this world. After all, I still had Draco's old memories and he was nowhere near this talented but still near the top of his class.
After spending a couple more minutes praising myself, I went right back to it. My goal for the rest of the day would be to learn spell deflection. It looked really cool and would be useful in duelling. I searched the pages of the book the room recommended and found a chapter talking about the theory and then began to read. Spell deflection it turned out was not a fixed spell with an incantation, it was basically matching the intent of the spell being deflected and turning it aside with your own magic.So you could not actually deflect spells you did not know or spells cast by someone much more powerful than you. You have to match the intent and overwhelm the magic, that's why curses were much more difficult to deflect than hexes or other low-level spells. The unforgiveables are also impossible to deflect as are some high-level elemental spells like fulminis and fiendfyre. I could not actually practice spell deflection without a partner or some sort but I did ask the room to provide a tennis ball machine and practiced deflecting the balls with small shield charms, at least this way I'd be less likely to freeze up when I see a spell coming my way.
After an hour of practice with the tennis ball machine which ended in tears, literally. I'd never been this bruised in either life. I asked the room to create an entrance near the great hall so I could head over for lunch, but a quick look at my condition changed my mind. Instead, I requested a shower from the room as well as a change of clothes from my box in the dorms. I took a shower instead of using cleaning charms because I really missed the feeling and felt lik it would do wonders for my bruises. It did, I really wanted to take a bath but I did not have the time and had to put it off till later.
I stepped into the great hall and had my lunch and did not bother striking up conversation with my year mates who slowly trickled in and sat around me. I was 18 in my previous life and even then I failed to properly click with my year mates, so socializing with 14-year olds was out of the question. I let their conversations wash over me, what did Flora Carrow's embarassing fall into a pool at Daphne Greengrass' birthday party have to do with my studies in magic or eventual conquest of the wizarding world?
I polished off my meal and made my way to the Slytherin Dorms where I spent the rest of the day curled up in bed reading the book I had got on the unforgiveables.They were truly unique pieces of magic annd while I desperately wanted to practice them doing so in Dumbledore's domain was not appealing. I went to bed by 6pm, I was just that tired.
The next day was spent similarly to the previous one except that when I got back to the common room after lunch I noticed a sign-up sheet for the Hogwarts duelling team. The try outs were to begin this evening at the Great hall.
I entered the Hall a few minutes before 5 pm and waited for the show to get started. Professor Flitwick waddled up to the stage at exactly 5 pm and began to explain the modalities of the try outs.
"The tryouts shall be held every day of the week starting today until the 15th of September. Every participant shall engage in three duels and a panel of Judges comprising the heads of house and the headmaster shall watch the duels and award each participant a maximum of 50 points per duel based on spell selection, creativity, and skill, a win is worth 25 points making a total of 75 points per duel. The 5 participants with the most points will be the members of the Hogwarts duelling team. We will be using the European duelling rules which means no spells with permanent effect and we will step in if we feel any of you have gone too far. May the odds ever be in your favour"
After Flitwick's explanation, the duelling tryouts commenced. He pointed us at a chart that had the order of duels. I was surprised to note that only 47 people had signed up for the tryouts and most of them were Sixth and Seventh years with a few Fifth years and the only Fourth years to sign up being Nott, Potter, Weasley, Granger and I. This came as a surprise as the Great hall was practically filled with students but I reasoned that they were just here for the show.
I was going to have the third duel of today and my two other duels were scheduled for the 7th and 10th. I sat down on one of the seats reserved for participants and watched the first two duels, there was nothing impressive on display from either duel and all four participants loudly incanted their spells. I noticed Potter and friends staring at me as I climbed up to the duelling platform. I guess not bothering them has got the suspicious of me for some reason, as long as Potter doesn't start following me as he did or is it will do in the Half Blood Prince. Either way, I ignored them and mentally focused myself in preparation for my duel.
I stepped up to face my opponent, a Seventh year Slytherin named Dalia Hornby. We took our positions at the starting circles and waited for the referee to begin. This duelling platform was just like the one used by Lockhart's duelling club from Second year and I wouldn't be surprised if it was the exact same one.
"Mr Malfoy are you ready?" Oops I guess I spaced out for a moment there while Hooch explained the rules, it's interesting that she was chosen to referee these duels and that apart from Flitwick none of the Judges were present in the hall today. I guess they'd use Dumbledore's Pensieve to review the duels at a later date.
"Yes" I call out while facing my opponent and holding my wand out in front of me. Hooch counted down to three and sent sparks in the air to begin the duel. My opponent and I stared at each other for a few seconds, she noted my lack of a duelling stance which had me feeling a bit abashed as I'd tried all the ones in the textbooks but they did not quite feel right.
She adopted a haughty look and started things off with a silent stunner, I stared it down, focused my intent not to fall asleep, stretched out my magic into my wand and with a quick movement deflected the spell into the wards,. The crowd fell silent and Hornby looked stupefied, pardon my pun. She seemed to be re-evaluating me but I did not give her time to think as I sprung into actuon with a Disarming charm and a stunner sent right behind it, both cast silently. She dodged around both spells only to be caught by the weighted nets I had conjured immediately I saw her move. She was tangled up and a quick stunner ended the duel.
A/N; Sunday as promised. I think I'll be starting up a forum for this fic if I find the time. Thanks for reading.