Chapter 17 - Fired Up
The next evening, he got out of the gym just in time. Harry, Ron and Hermione, or the triple threat as he liked to call them, came round the corner only moments later. He’d come up with the nickname during a lesson he’d given them. The more time he spent with them, the more he learned their different personalities and traits. For example, Harry was the big shot, Hermione was the one in the shadows who actually did the work and Ron was the wild card that people would ignore but then he’d come up with something brilliant and completely unexpected.
Tom had expected Harry to start talking about the interview immediately but actually, it was Hermione who started. “What did you think of Harry’s interview?” she asked eagerly.
“To be honest I haven’t read it. I don’t need to. I already believed Moldywart was back.”
“You must be the only person in the school not to read it!” said Ron.
“He’s had other things on his mind,” said Hermione with a hint of disappointment in her voice.
“Oh yeah?” asked Harry, interestedly.
Hermione replied, “I saw him and Amber wrapped so tightly around each other, I thought they might merge into one person.”
Harry and Ron both laughed. Tom didn’t like the way she’d said it either. “We told each other I love you,” Tom said in an explanation.
“Oh, fair enough,” said Ron and stopped laughing.
Harry clapped him on the back before saying, “Today, we’re going to practise one on one combat. I want you to fight against me as a demonstration and then give pointers to the class.”
“Yes, boss. You sure you can take me though?” Tom replied with a smile.
“Wait and see.”
Once everyone had arrived and said hello to each other, they all formed a circle with Harry and Tom on the inside with space to duel. Harry told everyone what was going to happen and that he wanted people to be creative. The purpose of the exercise was to beat you opponent in any way you can, in practise for a real fight. Up until now, all DL meetings had been practising against dummies or on their own. This was the first time they would actually simulate combat and you could tell be the tension in the air that everyone was excited.
Tom let Harry strike first. Harry fired a stunner at him but he blocked it with a flick of his wand. Then Harry tried a freezing charm which Tom blocked with ease. For added effect, he yawned. The crowd gasped in amazement. Tom’s plan was to frustrate Harry enough for him to produce his best magic. Tom didn’t have an ego and so he didn’t care if he lost. But he knew Harry would do anything he could to win and so he was determined to bring it out of him. Again and again Harry tried to curse Tom with no success.
Once Harry looked like he was going to shout in anger, Tom pounced. He attacked with a leg locker curse, non-verbally, which struck Harry. He dropped to the floor in a sickening crunch. “You need to do better than that,” Tom said mockingly.
Harry removed the curse and got back onto his feet, looking mad. With a wave of his wand, he produced some magic Tom didn’t know he possessed. He summoned a king cobra, which made the crowd take a few steps back. He then spoke to it and it started to bear down on Tom. Tom was temporarily frozen as he marvelled in what had just happened. Harry could talk to snakes and therefore it would do his bidding.
Just before the cobra struck him, Tom’s came back to his senses and shouted, “Imperio.” Now the snake would do his bidding. More gasps were heard from the audience but Tom ignored them and made the snake turn around and slither towards Harry.
Harry tried to get rid of the snake but failed. So he then tried to knock out Tom and hence sever the connection of control. Tom was ready for him though with a shield charm he’d protected himself with before the duel began. Just before the snake attacked Harry, Tom realised he wasn’t going to be able to defend himself and so he stopped the snake in its tracks and then banished it. “Call it even,” Harry said in hope. The crowd applauded and cheered.
“I never knew you could summon a snake, let alone talk to it!” Tom said in shock.
“I said to be creative. I learned how to summon a snake because Maloney did it to me three years ago, and I’ve always been able to talk to snakes.”
“Well played. Although it wasn’t enough. I still beat you.” He said definitively.
Clara shouted, “You cheated! You used an unforgivable curse! It’s illegal!” There were murmurs of agreement and people started to turn on Tom.
Tom shut them up. “Listen! Harry said fight to win. I did what needed to be done in order to win. If I was fighting a real death muncher, none of you would be up in my grill about using an unforgivable curse. Besides, it’s only illegal when used on a fellow human and in case you didn’t notice, I stopped the snake in its tracks before it could actually hurt Harry.” The crowd stayed completely silent. Tom slowed his voice and said, “Now, split into groups of four. The room’s not big enough for everyone to duel at the same time so take it in turns in your groups and remember, do what you can to win but try not to seriously hurt anyone. We are all friends after all.”
They all did as Tom instructed and immediately Harry asked him about the unforgivable curse. “Where did you learn that? Why did you use it? Are you evil?” he said all this in a friendly way but with real intent.
“I’m not proud of it but I learnt it at Durmprang from one of my teachers. He taught the whole class how to do it.” Harry looked stunned. “I wanted to show you that the imperious curse can be lethal and it doesn’t have to be used on a person to cause harm. No doubt you’ll face it when you next meet Moldywart. Hopefully you’ll be more aware of its power now.”
“Thanks, I guess. But still, people will think your some potential dark wizard for using it.”
“Don’t people think the same thing about you for being a parselmouth?”
“Touché… Let’s split up and help the others.”
Tom spent the rest of the lesson helping others, just like every other lesson. But he couldn’t help getting distracted by certain people’s duels. He was really interested in Hermione vs Ron, Isabelle vs Clara and Fred vs George for personal and performance reasons.
In his opinion, everyone was doing really well, considering what they’d been like a few months ago. He sat back and enjoyed the proudness he felt of seeing everyone’s progression. Teaching’s not so bad after all.
Tom Collivander and the Order of the Thunderbird, A Potter Parody Page 25
