"Great job Harry now we're lost, and even worse were going to be late!" Viktor complained loudly as himself and Harry struggled to find their way around the massive castle known as Durmstrang.

"Well you shouldn't have followed me!" Harry laughed.

It was nearing the end of the first week of their first year at Durmstrang Institute, Sirius had agreed with Lucian that they could be best taught there, there is no light and dark at Durmstrang, only power. Although the headmaster Igor Karkaroff was a former death eater, now that Voldemort is not longer in physical form he is no threat, and even if Voldemort were to return, Igor would harmlessly flee. There were no houses in Durmstrang, there was one student common room, and several hundred double suites for the student to live in, Harry and Viktor share one of such. Which brings us to why Harry and Viktor are in their current predicament, Harry thought he knew a quick route from the common room, to their Dark Arts class, he was wrong.

Ten minutes later found Harry and Viktor running into their classroom, with seconds to spare. The professor looked up at them from his desk, and gestured them to their seats at the front of the table. With an upbeat face, the middle aged professor sprang up from his desk and to the front of the first year class.

"Welcome to your first Dark Arts class! I am professor Maverick. Now, before we begin let me just start out by saying that, there is no such thing as light or dark magic. There is only power, and those too weak to use it, the purpose for which you use it is what really matters. Kill a hundred, or save two hundred, the choice is yours. This was spoken by Merlin himself as he completed the apprenticeship of Morgan LeFay." Professor Maverick looked around the class, gauging everyone's reaction to his speech, he sighed as he realized that many did not understand his point, all except the two boys in the front row, the two most well known as well, he realized with a hint of irony. He decided he would see what else was different with those two boys.

"For our first lesson, please take out your wands and come stand at the front of the room. We are going to be learning the severing charm." Many gasps were heard as the Professor gave out his instructions, but Maverick chose to ignore them, for the time being. "Now then, would anyone care to demonstrate this charm?"

Harry and Viktor shrugged, and stepped forward. Professor Maverick looked and them and smiled, before conjuring two separate sandbags to float in the air. "Whenever you're ready, you may begin."

"Diffindo!"

"Diffindo."

Two beams of light sprang away and hit their marks on the sandbags, both lost all their sand as the two cuts were quite large. Professor Maverick grinned at them, and gave a small applause. Gesturing to the two first years, he cleared his throat and spoke plainly. "That was as good a demonstration as any, now physically speaking every one of you should be able to cast this spell fairly easily. What will prevent most of you from achieving this for the next few lessons is the mental aspect. In other words, you will not be able to cast it, because you think you can't. I am here to tell you, that you CAN." Maverick shouted the last part, and many of the first years jumped. Waving his wand, he conjured several floating sandbags around the room. "Now, begin. You know the incantation, and you've seen it cast successfully, get to it." He started walking towards his desk, and paused. Looking back at the class, he spoke. "Oh yes one other thing, this class is not required to graduate, and you need my recommendation to take it to the next level. Which means, some of you may be advanced to a higher class before the end of the year, or some of you may not even be allowed to take it beyond this year, that is all." With that he settled into his desk and watched their progress.

Twenty minutes later found Professor Maverick coming to a conclusion. Half of his class will not continue this course. The other half will. And then the exceptional Harry Potter and Viktor Krum will be given private tutoring before being advanced up to second year Dark Arts. The two were naturals, they performed as if it was instinct, and Maverick wondered if they have already been trained before, after all it was not unheard of, and given the fact that they were raised in the House of Lucian it would seem almost necessary. He resolved to talk to them after class.

Meanwhile Harry and Viktor were already bored out of their minds. This might have something to do with Lucian and Sirius being paranoid enough to give them training on all offensive and defensive spells up to the fourth level of Dark Arts at Durmstrang. But both were rather excited from Professor Maverick's speech at the beginning of class, they hoped he would allow them both to move up a few classes. They spent the rest of the class trying to cut the empty bags into as small pieces as possible.

"For homework I want a ten inch essay on good versus bad uses of the severing charm." Professor Maverick spoke right as the bell rang, and then looking at Harry and Viktor he said "Potter and Krum, stay." Harry and Viktor stayed sitting down, eager to listen to what he wanted to say to them.

Once everyone had cleared out of the room Maverick approached them. Looking down at them, he smiled and spoke, "I must say, I'm impressed with you both. You came into this class with knowledge and power beyond what anyone in your class has, I'm very curious, what kind of training did your guardians give you prior to sending you here?" With that he pulled up a seat next to them, ready to listen attentively.

"Well," Harry began, "We live together, and our separate parents both decided to start us in our training early on, so we were taught to duel since we were five or six. According to my godfather, Sirius Black, he taught us every offensive and defensive spell we would learn up until our fourth year here." Harry then looked at Viktor to see if he wanted to add anything else, Viktor considered, before speaking. "He also had us physically trained so that we would dodge everything and only shield as a last resort."

Professor Maverick seemed to take a few moments to absorb the information before speaking. "Yes that would be very useful, would you both care very much if I asked the both of you to duel me at the same time, so I can gather a short analysis on how you duel together?"

"Sure!" Viktor and Harry answered at the same time with a grin. "Where do you want to do this, we need a bit more space," Harry continued.

"Well there is a dueling room across the hall from here for that exact reason, come with me," Professor Maverick led them across the hall and into a large room with pads on the walls, and another door in one corner of the room. Seeing Harry and Viktor looking towards the door, Maverick explained, "Inside there are muggle work out machines, you may be familiar with them if you have been physically trained as well." Maverick removed his outer robe to reveal that he was wearing muggle sweatpants and a tank top underneath.

"If the school robes are too bulky, I can conjure appropriate clothing for you if you wish," At Harry and Viktor's nods he waved his wand, and their robes were replaced with exercise shorts and shirts.

"Yeah this should be fine, thank you," Harry said for the both of them.

Once Maverick was a good distance away from the duo he gestured that they draw their wands.

"Just so the both of you know, it is proper etiquite before a formal duel to bow to your opponent, but be warned, most duelists will begin immediately afterword. With that he gave them both a low bow. As they bowed back they saw a flash of red heading towards them. Seeing that it was headed directly for Harry, Viktor immediately cast a disarming charm at it to deflect it back, knowing that Harry would immediately go on the attack. He evidently knew Harry very well.

"Petrificus Totalus!" Harry yelled before waving his wand again, "Incarcerous!" Harry then rolled to his left to avoid a stunner from Maverick, but it was in vain as he saw Viktor stop it for him, he would have to thank him later.

Maverick was in a tough spot and he knew it, as he cast the first spell he saw the near expert deflection of his stunner, as one of the pair was on the defense and the other on offense. Thinking quickly he side stepped the body bind curse, and conjured a shield to stop the flailing ropes. As soon as the ropes faded, he cast a reducto towards the ground in the middle of the two, and then another at the ceiling above them, forcing them to jump apart from each other. Step one successful.

Viktor figured out what Maverick was doing the moment Harry jumped out of the way, cursing in frustration Viktor rolled out of the way. Searching for Harry he made a small hand motion, Harry's eyes brightened, knowing what his friend had planned. Viktor then conjured a small marble, and banished it towards Harry, hoping that Maverick wouldn't notice.

Harry got up in time to see Viktor make a hand sign, a silent message for a tactic they had used successfully many times while dueling doubles with Lucian and Sirius. Searching through the air he saw the small marble flying towards him. "Engorgio," Harry whispered, causing the marble to become a much larger marble, perhaps double the size of Harry's head. With a grin Harry banished it before it could reach him, towards Maverick.

Maverick saw the large object moving towards him, and quickly vanished it, right as it was about to smash into him. Grimacing he cast a maximized lumos spell, and lit up the whole area so bright that no one could see anything. By memory, Maverick began to run towards the back of Viktor, before randomly casting a blasting hex at nothing. He ducked and lay low on the ground, hoping his plan would work.

Viktor heard Maverick cast the hex, and instinctively cast a stunning spell towards it, before being hit by a stunning spell from behind. He was out before he saw his own spell reflected back.

Harry heard Maverick cast the hex, and instinctively cast a stunning spell towards his voice, not knowing that Maverick had run right to the opposite side of Harry, so that Viktor was in between the two, he didn't know that Viktor had been the victim of his spell, nor that Viktor owns stunning spell had been reflected back, he didn't know. Until the light faded and he was able to see clearly, right in time for the stunning spell to hit him in the face.

Maverick stood up, with a big smile. He had not had this much fun in years, it had been awhile since he had came this close to defeat in a duel. Neither Harry nor Viktor knew it, but Maverick had himself been a dueling champion for some time, before being defeated by a smaller wizard, named Flitwik. Jogging over to the boys, he revived them both.

"I am very surprised, I did not think that two of your age would be able to stand up to me as long as you did." Maverick gave them both a smile. Harry and Viktor both looked confused.

"But, that duel took less than two minutes! I can't even remember the last time we had a short duel like that!" Viktor spit out almost faster than comprehendible.

"How did you do that?" Harry was more curious than anything else. Which was ironic, most of the time, it was the other way around.

"Well, probably the two of you spent all your time learning how to trade spells with your opponent, and how to out power them. Am I right?" Maverick looked at the two of them intently. Seeing their nods, he continued. "There are more than just one way to win a duel, I used the simpler, but mostly ignored method. Distraction and Diversion. I distracted you both, and made it seem like I was in one spot, so that you both would essentially knock each other out. All I did was cast a lighting spell, and a shield to deflect Krum's curse back to you Potter." As he saw their look of understanding, he gestured them back to his classroom.

"I will move you both up to fourth year Dark Arts, and from there we'll see what happens. Also, I will give you both keys to the dueling room if you wish, you may train there. I will consent to a duel a week, if you wish. I will also write a letter to your guarding in regards to private tutoring of a certain branch of magic of which I believe you both will be able to put to good use, as well as excel in. What class do you have next?"

"History of magic" They both answered simultaneously.

"Oh, well then perhaps I will keep you here, until the period is over. We have much to discus."

With that they continued to discus Harry and Viktor's prior training, and their future possibilities, for several hours. After the conversation, both boys felt that there future at Durmstrang would be bright indeed, and filled with much triumph. Unfortunately they didn't anticipate a grand tournament to get in the way, several years later.

I think ill end it on that note. Sorry it took so long to get this out, ive been busy since track started, being on varsity gives me little free time. I shall endeavor to get these chapters out sooner, as I know im just as impatient as you guys to see the story unfold. Next chapter I will be fast fowarding to their fourth year at Durmstrang. And also at that point, is where I will be making the chapters MUCH longer as well as stopping with the time shifts. For now its just to kinda get a basic ground for their childhood, to enforce their later actions and abilities. If you have any questions regarding this chapter or anything you want me to explain, please leave it in a review, and ill answer it next chapter. Until then,

~Rise Against Conformity