Early morning was clear, and actually day not sunrise. Headmistress MacGonnogal, Selene Prince, and Delphini 'Diggory' stood alone on the far side of the lake - alone under penalty of more points loss and detentions than your ancestors could imagine. Even the Astronomy tower was closed and don't ask why. The memorials for the war dead were closer to the castle. Their only other witness was a silent Madame Pomfrey.
"I would ask your seconds to mitigate this foolishness but in your pompous, petty arrogance you have both chosen not to invoke one.", Professor MacGonnogal scolded. "I very much wanted to be able to cancel this farce because of that technicality but haven't we all done our homework? So I will take it upon myself. As your referee I get to make any inquiry within reason as long as I make the necessary inquiries. So, are you willing to not murder each other over a nick name?"
"Oh, don't worry.", Selene told her.
"Nope.", Delphini popped.
"Nobody will die today.", Selene continued. Then she realized she was interrupted. Prince turned to the other girl.
The other girl's eyes raged with evil intent.
Selene started up. "You know what? You can go boil your/"
"Save it for the field!", MacGonnogal snapped. "Isn't this what you wanted when you forced my hand to participate in this barbarism?"
Prince grew silent.
"Now, the weighing of the wands.", the woman informed. Selene cautiously placed her wand on her side of a simple balance scale and raised her hands to rest on top of her head.
Delphini placed a knife on the table holding the scale, then her wand on her side of it. At everyone's raised eyebrows, she explained. "It's cursed but a family heirloom. I cannot let it out of my sight."
Selene nearly stopped concentrating on the match trying to remember where she could have seen that dagger before.
MacGonnogal circled the two girls and started casting, interspersed with instructions. "Lift your left sleeve." "Jump. Higher." The search for magical items came up with nothing except..."What's this?"
"Oh!", Selene exclaimed. "It's a cellular phone - a muggle communication device. Please take it."
"You cannot receive counsel during the duel, Madame Prince.", the woman warned.
"I know.", Selene stated a bit too resentfully. "But I still need you to take it, because with the magic I expect to be thrown around and the electricity it needs to function I'm somewhat surprised it hasn't exploded yet."
"The detection charms I've been casting are standard and simple, Ms. Prince.", the woman warned her. "These are not."
The two girls kept still.
MacGonnogal tapped a piece of metal on the front of Selene's robes. "What's this Madame Prince?"
"The titanium part of my sarong?", she suggested.
The Headmistress sent a quick stinging hex through it followed by an Episkey. "Doesn't seem magical.", the woman surmised as Selene rubbed herself over the metal. MacGonnogal stopped again, tapping on object hidden beneath Selene's robes on her back. Selene handed it over and MacGonnogal cast a few more charms on it. "What is this?"
"An FMDA DD17.2.", Selene recited.
The woman raised her eyebrow. "It has tentative whiffs of transmutation."
"Oh.", the girl realized. "It isn't transfigured. I did however transfigure some of the tools I worked on it with, like hand files and the like."
MacGonnogal frowned. "It's not magical.", and she handed it back to the girl.
"Now the second step. Are you both here, participating in this duel, of your own free and uncharmed will?", the woman continued.
The two girls looked in each other's eyes, Delphini not taking the invitation. "Yes, ma'am.", they both announced.
Another series of spells were cast. If anything other than the Impervious had been cast, it went unnoticed by the headmistress of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. But, some things were unforgivable for a reason.
"Terms?", the woman asked.
"To the death. No quarter asked, none given.", Delphini announced.
Selene frowned. "Third blood, then yielding. Death risked but not required."
"I'm the challenged!", Delphini reminded.
Selene swayed her head. She looked at the knife on the table. "I'll accept your terms if you accept mine?", she offered.
Delphini laughed. "I get to kill you and you'll demand that the referree spare me if I give up after a whalloping?"
The girl's eyes narrowed. "Will you accept that?"
Delphini grinned. "Sure. I'll accept."
"That would be highly unfair.", MacGonnogal stated.
"We both accept the terms.", Selene reminded.
"Fine." The woman resigned herself to her fate. "The field is defined by the wards of the school, excepting the castle where the children are kept and the known exclusive domains of the creatures within. I will announce the signal."
The two girls walked off into the grasses of the campus. Delphini's formal dueling vest tight around her with pantaloons also close to her skin, only the sleeves of her shirt allowed to flow. Selene's dueling robes were more like think Quidditch robes and leathers. Delphini's gaze bored into Selene. Selene seemed to space out, thinking of only a single concept.
MacGonnogal's wand sent up sparks.
"Bombarda Maxima!" and a spark of red flew through the space Selene's body was occupying. Fortunately for her, she had thrown the metal block on her waist and herself to the ground. Her wand drew on the block as she pulled the 3d printed pistol from behind her and shot in the general direction of her opponent. Delphini banished the first shots, and then Accio'd the very ground in front of her to defend the other bullets.
"According to plan so far.", Selene mumbled. Before she ran out of bullets, a titanium sword with an empty pommel lay before her. She jammed her wand into the pommel and pulled out the cap to the newly transfigured shape to lock it in. Picking herself up, she charged toward the wall of dirt and then clamored over it.
Jumping down from its topped, Selene swung her sword to cleave the other girl's skull open with a near battle cry of "Protego!" Her wand followed the movements inside her sword's pommel and the Protego took hold, deflecting Delphini's nigh instinctive "Stupefy!"
Delphini jumped back and then jumped back again, getting her enough space for a breath. Much more calmly she cast directly at Selene, "Incendio." But her aim was off as she dodged to her left to keep from being skewered by the sword. An "Expelliarmus." crashed into the ground as she ducked Selene's swing for her head. A full fledged blood boiling curse passed through empty air when Delphini stepped to her right to avoid the downward slash that Selene leapt behind. Delphini did not even cast as she dodged backwards as the sword swung for her entrails.
Selene charged directly at Delphini to run her through but Delphini grabbed the blade of the sword and felt it cut into the skin of her off hand, leaving both of Selene's hands on the pommel that contained her wand but Delphini's wand hand and wand free. Delphini smiled but wasted no breath saying anything but her next incantation. Selene thrust with the might of both her arms against Delphini's already cut hand, driving the hilt of the sword she transfigured into the girls nose.
"Do you want to count that as first or second blood?", Selene asked as Delphini covered her face with her bleeding hand.
Selene did not wait for an answer.
That did not matter.
Delphini growled. And in the next moment, Selene was swinging her sword through the beginning of a pillar of black smoke. The girl looked to the sky and traced the path of a witch using magic to travel under Hogwarts anti-apparition warding. The path of black smoke solidified into Delphini entirely too far away on the field.
Selene took off running towards her. Muggle exercise helped. Having only done a same material transfiguration and a single Protego helped as well. But that distance... She could not even hear Delphini Episky her nose. She thought she might have heard the Episky for her hand, but that could have been just because she could see the lips move.
Delphini calmed into a very formal dueling casting stance. Selene was already running forward but now ran her sword as deep into the ground as she could. She did not even pay attention to what Delphini was cursing her with. "Accio sword!", Prince yelled as hard as she could when she ran past and yanked on the pommel. Maybe it was placebo effect, but it felt like it helped. A shower of dirt sprang into the air in front of Selene. Time seemed to slow down as she saw the few worms that came with the dirt expel their entrails, identifying exactly what curse she kept from connecting.
But that was three spells. And Delphini seemed to just be getting warmed up. On the other hand, there was a reason Selene was keeping her spell count.
Delphini was about to try to cut her legs out from under her, so Selene jumped over the Sectumsemrpa. The upcoming Confringo was ducked under with a dodge to the left. Delphini narrowed her eyes, assessing the movements of a Selene on a near suicide run. But Selene had still managed to stab the sword into the ground behind her rather than run headlong into an Expulso.
Selene's gut instinct was to match the Arithmancy and she was within hear range of Delphini's casting. She charged head long forward. Delphini was deciding how many shots she had left before she had to smoke away. What if she had an added advantage after she coalesced out of the smoke? She decided on "Locomotor/"
Selene cried out "Locomotor Wibbly!"
"Mortis!" and the two curses spell locked into another dancing lightning bolt between the two of them. Delphini laughed triumphantly - there was no where for Selene to flee to, and as this was a legal duel. Selene collapsed all the time from running her natural gifts all the time with no off switch: after a hard day in Charms back to back with Transfiguration, after their first fight. It would only be a matter of time until Delphini ran her out, the winning spell immobilized her, and Delphini used whatever other dark magic the Death Eater that taught her how to smoke around a battlefield had instilled in her.
So Selene kept running as fast as she could up the spell lock, liquid sparks spashing around her. After all, her wand was encased in the sword she transfigured. And if Delphini wanted to avoid getting cut or even do that smoke thing again, all she had to do was take the hit on the Jelly Legs curse. Selene did not know whether a caster would not be able to jump into the smoke pillar or simply smack their face on the ground coming out of it with non-functional legs. But she did not have to - she was the one with the sword.
It was not her fault that Delphini did not move. Delphini should not have been pouring every ounce of power at her, trying to force her defeat. It was not her fault that Delphini was jerking her arm back, having dropped her wand in shock, covering her new wound with the other hand to staunch the bleeding. It was kind of Selene's fault that she drew back her sword so that when she slammed bodily into Delphini at the full momentum of her run, her pommel landed in the other girl's eye socket.
"Third!", Selene yelled out while Delphini was still covering her face with her off arm. She stomped on Delphini's empty wand hand and stabbed her sword through her wand arm. While Delphini screamed, Selene desperately unscrewed her pommel from her sword to retrieve her wand, hoping to forestall Delphini's one out by yelling over her, "Fourth blood!". Selene turned away to grab Delphini's wayward wand, but the girl was already stretching out her remaining free hand. "Accio wand!"
Selene dropped her pommel and with her advantage of not having an armed pinned through the dirt, she managed to catch the flying wand even if she landed with an elbow to Delphini's newly mended nose. Delphini though had caught her neck with the hand that expected the wand. While the older girl's nails pierced her skin as helpless rage tried to choke her to death, Selene now purposefully threw that elbow into Delphini's face over and over. Only a few blows were necessary to loosen her grip and Selene was able to punch her arm away.
Selene quickly hip slid out to mounting Delphini and despite holding a wand in either hand, started throwing haymakers into Delphini's head. She did not quite have the strength to crack the older girl's skull, or even properly concuss her unconscious. But there's only so many blows to the head a person can withstand before their perception wanders.
When Delphini seemed truly lost to the real world, Selene tested that by stomping the sword down so that the hilt pressed against Delphini's arm. The girl screamed but when she reached for what was left of the hilt she kept missing. Selene decided that was good enough to give her time for what came next.
She centered herself and then non-materially transfigured her pommel into the largest bowl that would not come apart when filled. She took another deep breath to make certain that she was not woozy from expending that much magic so close together. Then she went down to the lake, filled her bowl with cool lake water and lugged it back up to the slowly coming to her senses Delphini.
Selene pushed her good arm down and kneeled on it. She grabbed Delphini's jaw and tightly held it closed. "No quarter asked, none given, huh?" Selene used her own wand to cast a quick "Incendio" at Delphini's wildly kicking legs that may have done something other than catch fire if one arm was being held down and the other was not stabbed into the ground. Her voice might have communicated something if her lips were not smashed together, muffling any word.
Selene used her hand on Delphini's jaw to hold her gaze. And she just stared into the other girl, the wounded girl, the burning girl. Screams hushed. No last words.
And there it was. The dropping of the trained Occlumency shields that allowed her natural Legillemency in.
Delphini was somehow not resigned. She was not panicked. She certainly was not regretful. She was hysterical.
Further down.
Delphini had been trained by a Death Eater to pick up that smoke-a-port and a bunch of other dark curses she had not dare use in front of the headmistress if she hoped to keep her cover, but when a sword is coming at your face from out of the blue combat instincts kicked in. Combat instincts honed by the tortures of Rabastan LeStrange. That is where she had gotten the knife, the knife Selene remembered from Hermione Granger's memory of being tortured by Delphini's mother.
Further down.
Delphini knew she was not Rabastan's daugher. She was descended from the Dark Lord himself. Another back up plan to thwart death. Between her mother's research into continuum manipulation and her training at the hand of surviving Death Eaters, she was going to burn this world apart in a quantum backlash by changing the past.
Further down.
Because that was her fate every timeline. The nightmares she day dreamed were consistent. Sometimes it would be the child of the Boy Who Lived that stopped Delphini. Sometimes the spawn of one of his weakest followers. Sometimes they faced her together. Sometimes the Aurors caught on. But every timeline she was stopped. She constantly failed to bend the entire universe to the whims of a man she never met and a mother who bore her out of obsession to a cult leader and whatever murderer of the weak tried to torture another attack vector into her. And her reward was to experience all the timelines in which she failed over and over again.
Selene rose up and threw the bowl of water over Delphini's trousers. "Aguamenti.", Selene cast and a burst of water from her wand extinguished the lingering smolders. Selene fell to her knees but managed to slap herself back to alertness. "Okay, no attempting to conjure things out of thin air just yet. Good to know."
Selene marched back to the adults. MacGonnogal stood in her way. "You chose this, child."
"Check the magic.", Selene spat back. "I was insulted by Delphini Diggory. House Prince challenged a Diggory. That", she pointed back at the wet yet burned girl bleeding into the grass and dirt, "is not Diggory. She may be a LeStrange. She may be a Riddle. She may even be a Guant or a Black. But she's definitely not a Diggory.
"So either Madame Pomfrey can go save a life or at least an arm before or after I walk back inside the castle to step out of bounds for this match."
"And if you're wrong?", MacGonnogal challenged.
Selene physically swallowed the scoff of "Me, wrong?". But she did promise, "If magic says I'm not done and doesn't allow me back inside? Then I'll come out here and kill to your hearts content."
The castle let Selene Prince back inside.
