A week's dose of Calming Draught.
The moment Malfoy heard those words, his first instinct was to drop his wand and run.
But facing Cassandra gave him just enough courage to stay.
After all, she was only a first-year — how much magic could she possibly have learned in a week?
At best, she might know a basic Levitation Spell or a simple Transfiguration Spell, right?
He, on the other hand, had been studying at Hogwarts for a year already and had even learned a bit of Dark Magic from his father at home.
No matter how he looked at it, he had to be stronger than some little first-year girl.
"You said it yourself, no backing out now!" Malfoy said, trembling but excited — he was sure this time he could escape unscathed.
"Of course. I never go back on my word," Louis replied with a calm smile, glancing from Malfoy to Cassandra.
Cassandra, however, looked at Malfoy with undisguised disgust — and then at Louis with mild annoyance.
"You've got quite a lot of faith in me," she said dryly.
"Obviously," Louis said with a grin. "Now go on — good luck."
He raised his hand slightly, giving the signal.
"Duel—begin!"
Someone in the crowd shouted it aloud, startling Malfoy so badly he nearly dropped his wand.
Panicking, he scrambled to raise it and immediately shouted his first spell:
"Densaugeo!"
With a proper wand flourish and clear enunciation, a flash of spell-light shot toward Cassandra.
It was the same hex Hermione had once used on the troll — the Tooth-Growth Jinx, which made the victim's front teeth grow uncontrollably, sometimes even piercing through the lower lip.
Cruel and humiliating, especially when used on a girl.
Still, one had to admit: from a student's standpoint, Malfoy's form was textbook-perfect.
If this had been in Professor Flitwick's Charms class, he'd have gotten top marks for precision and pronunciation.
Unfortunately, dueling wasn't about textbook form.
Big gestures and clearly spoken incantations only gave your opponent more warning — and more time to react.
Cassandra didn't panic. She didn't rush to counterattack, either.
She simply stepped gracefully to the side, her skirt swirling lightly around her.
The spell whooshed past her shoulder and hit an unlucky spectator in the crowd instead — whom Louis casually healed with a flick of his hand.
"Everyone watching, spread out to both sides," Louis called out like a proper referee. "Give the duelers space so no one else gets hit."
The name Louis Wilson carried weight. Within moments, the onlookers obeyed, forming two neat lines with Cassandra and Malfoy standing between them.
Cassandra still didn't rush to strike back. She seemed almost bored, her eyes flicking toward Louis as he organized the spectators.
Malfoy, meanwhile, was starting to lose his nerve. His first spell had missed, and Cassandra's calm indifference was making him sweat.
He was used to turn-based, tit-for-tat duels — you cast, the other defends, then they cast back.
This… silence was unnerving.
"D—damn it!" he yelled, lifting his wand again in another exaggeratedly perfect flourish.
"Tarantallegra!"
Another classic student spell — the Dancing Curse, forcing the target's legs to flail uncontrollably in a frenzied tap dance.
But this time, Cassandra didn't dodge. She stepped forward instead, meeting the spell head-on.
With a sharp crack, she brought her wand up just in time — the spell-light burst harmlessly against the magic radiating from it.
In the same smooth motion, she pointed her wand straight at Malfoy.
"Impedimenta!"
The spell shot out like a beam of light, solidifying into a force barrier that raced toward him.
Malfoy's face turned pale. He yelped and dove sideways, rolling across the ground in a plume of dust — hardly the graceful duelist he imagined himself to be.
When he finally scrambled up, he looked more like a refugee than a pure-blood aristocrat.
The Impediment Jinx slammed into the sandy floor of the Quidditch pitch, blasting out a shallow crater.
Had that hit Malfoy directly, he would probably have been lying on the ground sobbing by now.
"Impedimenta!"
Hermione gasped from the sidelines. Cassandra's execution of the Impediment Jinx was far smoother and sharper than Hermione's had ever been in her first year.
"She's a pure-blood," Louis said quickly, reassuring her. "She's had more exposure to magic at home. It's natural she'd pick things up faster."
His words carried over the pitch and reached Cassandra's ears. She shot both Louis and Hermione an icy glance, gave a short, cold snort, and missed the perfect chance to press her advantage.
Malfoy scrambled back to his feet, his face blotchy red and pale by turns. Humiliated and furious, he decided to use the dark spell he'd only just learned over the summer.
Pure-blood families didn't really care about the Ministry's rule forbidding underage wizards from practicing magic outside school; many even trained their children in Dark Arts deliberately.
Malfoy raised his wand, making a series of complicated, precise gestures before shouting:
"Serpensortia!" (Serpent's Out!)
Gasps rippled through the students as a thick, venomous snake burst from the tip of his wand, slithering onto the sandy pitch and gliding toward Cassandra.
Its movement left rippling tracks in the sand. The snake lifted its head, black tongue flickering, and hissed menacingly at her.
The students all took a cautious step back.
Even the Slytherins didn't want to get too close. They were from the House of the Serpent, not an actual nest of serpents, and no one fancied being bitten.
As for the students of other houses—they'd already retreated as far as they could.
"Serpensortia, huh? That should be a summoning variant of Transfiguration," Louis murmured thoughtfully, rubbing his chin.
Transfiguration was a massive branch of wizardry—summoning, vanishing, and transformation all fell under its scope.
And one key fact: a Summoning Spell could never create something from nothing. It merely pulled the object—like that viper—from somewhere else.
"Another piece of magic that defies logic," Louis mused. "Sounds even more impressive than Accio or Apparition."
A snake—terrifying to most people, and doubly so for girls.
Cassandra instinctively stepped back when the serpent hissed and coiled before her. Then her gaze flicked toward Malfoy.
She hadn't learned any Vanishing Spells or incantations capable of destroying the snake… so she decided to go for the source instead.
"Expelliarmus!"
Cassandra lifted her wand and fired the Disarming Charm faster than anyone expected.
A flash of red light hit Malfoy square in the chest, hurling him backward and sending his wand spinning through the air—right into Cassandra's waiting hand.
"I win," Cassandra said coolly, holding his wand up.
"Wooooah!" Cheers erupted from every side.
It was technically an internal Slytherin fight, but that didn't stop the crowd from celebrating.
Maybe they were just having fun watching the spectacle.
But the sudden outburst startled the snake. With a sharp hiss, it lunged toward the nearest target—Cassandra herself—fangs bared.
Cassandra's composure finally cracked; her face drained of color as she stumbled backward and fell onto the sand.
The cheers died instantly. The entire crowd froze, holding their breath as the snake leapt at the victorious girl.
Just before it struck her face, a bolt of lightning split the air—so fast it was almost invisible.
Crack!
The flash hit the snake's head dead-on, vaporizing it in an instant.
Cassandra stared blankly as the ashes scattered across the ground, then looked up to see Louis standing nearby, the tip of his wand smoking faintly.
It was the Lightning Eye, the fastest attack among the talismanic powers—near light-speed, and capable of firing from any limb, including the wand.
In fact, all talisman powers could be channeled as spells through a wand—quite convenient, really.
…And, well, theoretically, from any other body part too.
But Louis wasn't nearly mad enough to make his little brother do unnecessary extra work.
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