Someday, I will own something of great value. This will not be Harry Potter, as J K Rowling already owns it.

The Badge

Life was going good for Ryua. She'd been acquitted by the Ministry, Lucius was still being strangely nice, thanks to the ease of her trial, and she still had her wand, so she could actually do homework. Well, sort of.

"Draco, I still don't get it!" she shrieked, after half an hour of trying to get a summoning charm to work. "I must be missing something!"

"I don't know what," he said, checking Ryua's notes. Strange, she took much better notes than him, did almost all the written work, and yet couldn't work the spells. "You just point the wand... Accio!" The vase on the table wobbled, then flew right into Draco's arms. "I dunno, it works for me."

"I know it works for you. Let's try something else... how about that dancing charm?"

"The one you used a curse for?"

"Yep."

"Okay..." Draco said, flipping through the pages. "Okay, here we go. The basic charm is easy, all you have to do is make the spiral with your wand..."

"Clockwise?"

"Yeah. And if you need to say it..."

"And we know I do,"

"The spell's Swingsea."

"Okay." Ryua carefully pointed her wand at the vase Draco had just set on the floor, spiraled her wand in the pattern so clearly illustrated by Flitwick, and said, clearly and with proper pronunciation, "Swingsea!"

The vase shifted backwards about two millimeters, and no more.

So she tried again, and didn't even get that much. "I am doing something wrong, Draco, I have to be."

"No, no, you're doing it exactly the way everyone else did. Let's try something else... how about... the bamboozlement charm?"

"Alright, who do I use to practice on?"

Draco shied away and tugged the bell pull. A house elf popped through one of the passageways a moment later, saying, "You is needing something, sir?"

"Yeah, would you be a subject for Ryua to charm, Kiwwi?"

The little creature gulped, but said, "Of course sir and miss."

"Don't worry, it won't hurt a bit. In fact, it's not likely it'll work at all, the way I've been going today. It's just a bamboozle charm, and Draco knows the counter charm in any instance." Much reassured, the elf stood on a couch, so if he got thrown backwards, he'd hit pillows. And Ryua raised her wand and said "Bamboozle!"

Much to her great surprise, the elf did indeed fly backwards onto a cushion. And when it tried to get up, it staggered sideways, then back the other way, and Ryua just caught him before he toppled off the couch. "Erm... Kiwwi? You alright?"

"Hee... Kiwwi is just fine, miss-miss-mississippi... You is a river, Mississippi!"

"I don't believe it. That was a perfect charm," Draco said as he cast the counter-spell on the giggling elf. "Thank you, Kiwwi, you may go now."

"Thank you sir and miss!" he squeaked and disappeared before they could change their minds.

"So, why does that charm work, and the others don't?"

"You got me. You've gotten others to work before... Silencio and Expelliarmus...Rictoshempra..."

"Hmm. I don't know. Maybe I'll just drop Charms next year. I should be able to, right?"

"Hey, you're right! Maybe I'll drop Transfiguration, McGonnagall hates me."

"No she doesn't, she acts that way with everyone." Suddenly there was a scratching noise on the window, and Ryua looked up to see a brown owl on the windowsill. "Hey, school letters!"

"Excellent!" Draco pulled open the shutters and took the proffered letters. "Here you go."

"Thanks." Ryua slit her envelope open, saw the usual booklists and such, and another slip of paper, signed by Snape and Dumbledore...

"Hey! Look!" Draco said, dropping the rest of his letter on the floor and holding something towards her. "The prefect badges are here too!"

Sure enough, they were. A silver serpent on a background of rich emerald green sat in his palm. "Cool. Good job. Of course, with Zabini out of the picture, who else were they going to give it to, Crabbe?"

"Cut it out. I worked hard for this..." he stuck his tongue out at her snort of derision. "So, where's yours?"

"Didn't get one."

"What? Why not?"

"Cause I killed one of my fellow students, duh!" Ryua said as she pulled out something from her envelope. "But I did get something much more fun."

"What could be more fun than giving detention to innocent first years?"

"Running a quidditch team."

"What?" Draco shrieked, almost dropping the badge. "How did you get captaincy?"

"The Ministry might approve prefects, but the head of house and headmaster decide on the quidditch teams. I'm sure father would much prefer my getting a prefect badge, though..."

"Oh, yeah... ouch. Better let me give him my news first, that way he should be in a really good mood."

"Good idea..." Ryua said, pocketing her letter and following her brother out.

Lucius was thrilled to see Draco's badge, clapping him on the back and promising another present. And then, he turned his gaze on Ryua, and gestured for her envelope. She'd kept her notice about quidditch separate, hoping he wouldn't ask if she'd gotten extra, when she noticed his eyes narrow at the bottom of the page. "Quidditch captains are recommended to supply their own broom?"

Oops. Why did it have to be right on the booklist... "Well, father, I reckon I can just use the team brooms, you know very well that they're fine. And you will not tell the school that I turn it down, only I can do that."

Draco hadn't even bothered to wait and see if Lucius noticed the captaincy note. The moment Lucius had let him go, he'd grabbed his mother by the hand and led her out. "What's wrong, Draco?" she asked.

"Ryua's been given captaincy of the quidditch team."

"Oh dear..."

"You will write back and turn it down."

"No, I will not."

"Yes, you will."

"No, I won't"

"You will."

"I won't. It's mine. And just because you seem to have some complex about feeling inferior to females, I am not going to back down like some spineless little servant!"

"I will offer you one last opportunity..."

"Oh, for Salazar's sake, Lucius, we both know you're just going to curse me anyway, so get on with it."

Maybe it was the use of his first name, that she dared use it like an equal. Maybe it was the sight of her own wand coming up, a spell already charging at the tip. Or maybe he just wanted to let off some frustration. Either way, his own spell left his wand just milliseconds after hers, and he threw himself sideways to try and dodge it. He sort of did, the jet of fire grazing his robes. He spared a moment to extinguish them, only to see that during that few seconds, Ryua had pushed up off the floor, a trickle of blood running down through her hair from bouncing off the wall. She had a feral look in her eyes, a hungry spirit stirring, crying for blood. He didn't waste time charging up for an unforgivable curse, just sent off a jelly-legs jinx.

Ryua cursed as her legs collapsed under her, and sent Tarrentallegra across the room at the same time. She pondered for all of half a second on whether she would have better luck trying to make a counter-jinx or a levitation spell, then started right in on Wingardium Leviosa. Without her constant attention, the first-level spell wouldn't last more than a minute, but she didn't have a choice. Almost before the spell was complete, she was readying an Impediment jinx.

Which never made contact. Lucius had managed to throw his weight to the left just as his legs jerked straight, sending him right into a chair. He sent Impedimentia right back at her, throwing her into the wall even harder than before due to the fact she was still floating. And this time, he didn't pause giving her a chance to get back up. He sent a whip of fire lashing out, curling around her writhing body, striking again and again...

And he was suddenly doubled over in his chair, rolling out...laughing? She dared use Rictoshempra?

Ryua didn't bother to push herself up, feeling burned welts all along her skin. She just kept her wand focused on her father, the first dueling spell she'd ever used coming through for her again. And slowly, painfully, she slid herself towards the door.

Until, of course, she hit a pedestal, holding up a large rose crystal orb. It was supposed to be used for scrying, or grounding magic. Right now, it was just very, very, heavy. Ryua felt her leg hit the pillar, and didn't even look up, just threw herself aside. Which was painful, as she skidded and tore the burns along her right side. Not as painful as the crystal orb, which rocked ponderously, then tipped down, missing her head, body, arm, but crushing her right hand. She screamed, and her tenuous hold on Lucius collapsed as her pain-wracked fingers lost their grip on her wand and it rolled across the floor.

Across the room, Lucius wasted no time standing up. Not that he needed to worry. Ryua had curled around her hand, wand forgotten on the floor. Most people, by this point, would have accepted her pain as adequate punishment. Lucius, however, didn't want to accept punishment from any other source as being enough. He walked over, and knelt next to her. Almost tenderly, he reached down, and pulled her arm out. It was easy to see she was trying to pull back, but the muscles in her arm were understandably not responding well. "Now, Ryua," he said, gently stroking down her forearm, lightly running his fingers over her broken ones. "I do, do wish that you would just do what I say, the first time. It would save so much energy, on both our parts. Don't you think that's a wonderful idea?" And he squeezed her hand, ever so slightly.

Ryua groaned, stretching out, still trying to suppress her pain. And then, much to his great surprise, Ryua rolled her head over, so she could glare up at him. Her ice blue eyes, full of hate, glittered up through her disheveled hair, a trickle of blood running through her eyebrow, framing the side of her otherwise dry face. Ahh, beautiful. Lucius believed pain was an art, and his daughter was most indeed a wonderful canvas."Y-you can... just... bugger off!" And she spit at him, which was not part of his .

Shocked, and disgusted at the wet patch on his knee, Lucius viciously squeezed her fingers and flung her hand back onto the floor as he rose. He stalked out, remembering to summon her wand on the way out. For even though she couldn't do anything right now, she would certainly try to kill him in the night if left with her wand.

And Draco, white with reflected pain, made sure he was well occupied with the hippogriffs before he made his way inside to find her.