After hearing Jacob's voice and having a vision of the Ice Knight, Merula had been driven from Grace's thoughts. The next morning, Grace took her usual seat at the Slytherin table, temporarily forgetting the reason it had recently been unoccupied.
Strangely, there was no food on the tables yet. Normally, the tables were already filled with an assortment of foods by the time anyone entered the Great Hall. Grace looked at the head table.
Professor McGonagall rose to her feet. "I have an announcement to make before the food is served. A room in the west corridor of the fifth floor has been sealed. Anyone caught trying to enter this room will be severely punished." Grace thought she heard a slight tremble in the Headmistress's voice, but she dismissed the notion. Professor McGonagall wasn't scared of anything.
As soon as Professor McGonagall was seated, the Great Hall erupted into a flurry of discussion as people speculated about why the room was sealed. Ethan claimed that the remains of Albus Dumbledore were being stored there.
The west corridor of the fifth floor... The location sounded familiar, but she couldn't remember why. Suddenly, it clicked in her mind. That was where she had had the vision of the Ice Knight!
Merula elbowed her. "What did you do now, Prickle?"
"I didn't do anything," Grace lied.
Merula snorted. "Like I'm going to believe that. Did you find a Cursed Vault?"
"It's none of your business." Grace left the Slytherin table, reminded of why she had been eating in the Artefact Room.
A set of footsteps followed her. Assuming it was Merula, she spun around and snapped, "What?"
It wasn't Merula. Instead, Barnaby stood behind her, looking sheepish but excited. "Is it true that you're searching for the Cursed Vaults?" he asked.
"No," Grace said shortly. She never had patience with anyone except Rowan when she was angry.
Barnaby's face fell. "Oh. I was going to offer to help you," he said in a sad voice.
"Why would you want to help us?" Grace asked suspiciously. Barnaby had never been mean to her or Rowan, but he was closest to Ismelda, who was friends with Merula.
"I was hoping we could split the treasure in the vaults. There's supposed to be something in there that makes you super powerful!" Barnaby said.
"Well, we aren't looking for the Cursed Vaults, so you can't help us," Grace snapped.
"Okay," Barnaby said. He walked back into the Great Hall. Grace turned and walked in the other direction.
Weeks passed and the weather slowly grew warmer. Grace continued training in the Room of Requirement, with Rowan and sometimes Ben watching. After a week, she was able to cast Expelliarmus successfully for the first time. Another week, and she could do it consistently. Rictusempra was harder and took more time to perfect. The wand movement was more complex and the spell required a great deal of focus.
Finally, the day came when Grace could cast both spells consistently. When Merula wasn't looking, Grace slipped a note into her bookbag.
Meet me on the seventh floor by the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy after dinner. It's time to end this.
After dinner, Grace climbed the stairs to the seventh floor. She went alone.
Merula hadn't arrived when Grace reached the tapestry that marked the location of the Room of Requirement. She paced back and forth, reaching into her robes to grip her wand. She'd felt confident in her skills when she'd set up this meeting, but now she was doubting herself. Was two spells really enough? What if Merula had been training, too?
As the minutes ticked on, Grace nearly left and walked to the Slytherin common room. Only the thought of Rowan tangled in the Devil's Snare kept her from losing her nerve.
Just as she had decided Merula wasn't coming, she heard the sound of footsteps on the stairs. Grace stopped pacing and scowled at Merula as soon as she climbed into view. "You're late."
"If you wanted me to come here immediately after dinner, then you should have said so." Merula smirked. Grace was certain that Merula had taken so long to arrive just to annoy her.
Grace gestured to the wall. "There's a room behind this wall. To get in, you have to pace back and forth while thinking of a place to duel."
She waited until Merula started pacing. As Grace paced back and forth, she kept sneaking glances at Merula, worried she would be hexed while her back was turned.
The door took longer to appear than Grace was used to. When it finally appeared, she pushed past Merula and yanked it open.
This variation of the Room of Requirement looked similar to the one Grace had practiced in. It was a large, open space, empty but for the pillows strewn across the floor and a cabinet in the corner that was filled with various healing potions. Grace swallowed when she saw them. She hoped neither of them would be needing any potions.
"It's about time," Merula said.
"What?" Grace asked.
"It's about time you grew a spine and challenged me to a duel. I've been trying to get this to happen all year."
"Why do you want to duel me?"
"I wanted to see what you were made of," was Merula's cryptic answer. She drew her wand with a flourish. "Shall we begin?"
"Wait. If I win, then you have to leave me and my friends alone."
"Fine. And what do I get if I win?"
"Umm..." Grace hadn't allowed herself to plan for the possibility of Merula winning, as if not thinking about it could prevent it from happening.
"I know what I want," Merula said suddenly. "If I win, you have to tell me everything you know about the Cursed Vaults."
"And what if I don't know anything?"
Merula laughed. "Do you seriously expect me to believe that you haven't been searching for your brother for months? You'd never leave him to save himself."
"Fine. Deal. And one last thing, we're going to settle this fairly. No dirty tricks, no more spells after the duel is over." She glared at Merula as she pulled out her wand.
"I don't need dirty tricks to beat you," Merula sniffed.
"Then we start on three...two...one..."
"Flipendo!"
Grace barely dodged the light from the spell as it streaked towards her. "Expelliarmus!"
The duel continued in a flurry of spells. So many flashes of light flew back and forth that Grace could barely distinguish her own spells from Merula's. For the first time, doubt crept through her mind. She realized that she might not be able to beat Merula.
She forced the thought from her mind. You've got to be smart about this. Trying to wear her down isn't working.
Another Flipendo flew toward her- it was the only spell Merula was using. Grace twisted to avoid it before aiming her wand at the floor beneath Merula's feet. "Gelidamus."
A sheet of ice spread beneath Merula's feet. She slipped on the frozen surface, falling back onto the pillows behind her.
"Expelliarmus," Grace said quickly, before Merula had time to recover. Merula's wand flew from her hand. Grace plucked it from the air. "I won. Now promise to leave my friends alone."
Merula pushed herself to her feet, carefully avoiding the already-melting ice that had made her fall. When she looked at Grace, her purple eyes were burning. "I want a rematch. You've been training. It wasn't a fair duel."
"And the time you locked Rowan in a room full of Devil's Snare was fair, I suppose?" Grace asked. "No rematch. We had a deal."
Merula balled her hands into fists. "You aren't better than me! I'm more powerful than you could ever dream of being!"
"I should have known that you would break your promise. It's what I would expect from the child of two Death Eaters."
Merula let out a wordless, feral snarl and flung herself at Grace, resorting to punching her wildly. One hand grabbed for the wands in Grace's hand. Sparks flew from one of the wands- Grace wasn't sure if it was hers or Merula's- just missing Merula and setting one of the pillows on fire.
Grace grabbed Merula's wrist with her free hand, struggling to keep Merula from punching her. She managed to raise the wands in her other hand without Merula yanking them away. "Rictusempra!"
Silver light flashed, brighter than Grace had ever seen before. She pushed Merula away and got to her feet as the other girl dissolved into a fit of laughter.
The burning pillow filled the room with the acrid scent of smoke. Grace's eyes watered. She cast Gelidamus again, and the resulting sheet of ice extinguished the fire.
Merula was still on the floor, clutching her sides and gasping as she laughed. "Make- it- stop!"
"Not until you agree to leave me, Rowan, and Ben alone," Grace said.
"Fine! I- promise!" Merula gasped.
"Finite Incantatem." Grace walked to the door. Once it was open, she tossed Merula's wand to her before slipping quickly away. She didn't trust Merula to not jinx her again at the first opportunity.
She walked to the Slytherin common room, trying to collect her thoughts. Her face ached where Merula had punched it and she knew that she would have bruises the next day. But she'd won the duel, and that was all that mattered.
More troubling was the news that Merula was searching for the Cursed Vaults. Grace had hoped that they could avoid each other as much as possible given that they shared a dorm, but if they were both looking for the Cursed Vaults then they would come into contact frequently. And where Grace and Merula were concerned, contact guaranteed conflict.
She sighed. You always knew finding Jacob wouldn't be easy, she told herself.
Merula wasn't going to make her give up. Grace was a Prickle, and as her parents often said, a Prickle never failed.