I arrived at the empty classroom a little earlier than the appointed time. I pushed the desks into a corner, fiddled a bit with the lighting to make it sharper, creating deeper shadows. A small thing, but impressions matter. Let this setting stick in Dexter's memory.
When he entered, I was sitting on a desk with my wand in hand, as if nothing special was happening.
"Close the door," I said calmly, and he obeyed.
"So, you're going to teach me?" he drawled skeptically, but a note of doubt was audible in his voice.
"Not teach," I cut him off. "Assist. You want a rematch? Then listen carefully."
He frowned, but his pride lost out to his anger towards Burke.
"The first thing you need to understand," I continued, standing up, "a duel is not about exchanging spells."
Without warning, I shot a silent Flipendo. The red bolt passed within a centimeter of his shoulder and hit the wall with a loud thud. Dexter had not even had time to flinch.
"Too slow," I tossed out. "The winner is not the stronger one, but the one who deprives the enemy of the chance to strike."
Blackmore instantly drew his wand, and the fight began. I was not a master duelist — I had not been properly taught at home — but I had my own basics. In my past life, I had done boxing and knew how to move, how to keep a stance, how to use my body. For a wizard, it seemed strange, but it was the movement that saved me: a step to the side, a slight turn, and the spell whizzed past.
I understood the angle needed to dodge without wasting energy on a shield. I had not mastered Protego yet, but I was dodging his attacks faster than he could raise a defense.
Blackmore soon went into a full defense. His Protego flashed again and again as I pelted him with Flipendo, like firing bursts. He tried to counterattack, but another spell hit him in the chest and slammed him into the wall. Lucky he did not hit his head.
"That is the third time already," I noted with a slight smirk.
After a short pause, we changed the format: not a fight, but practice. I made him repeat every movement dozens of times. He got angry, swore, but did it. Pride and anger — the best fuel.
After an hour, he stood drenched in sweat, but fire burned in his eyes.
"Like this," I said calmly. "The winner is not the stronger one. The winner is the one who is ready sooner."
Dexter exhaled heavily and narrowed his eyes:
"And what do you really get out of this, Malfoy? No one helps for free."
I allowed myself a thin, cold smile:
"I do not need anything 'now'." I paused. "One day, in the future, I will ask you for a favor. And you will do it. No questions asked."
"You and that again…" he snorted, but did not argue.
"Then it is agreed," I said. And, already leaving, added over my shoulder: "Just remember: soon you will wipe Burke's nose in it. But you will owe me two favors then."
I saw him clench his jaw, but his eyes held not irritation, but hunger. Dexter wanted strength. Which meant he had already taken the first step towards me.
From that day, our training began. I found empty classrooms or remote corridors in the dungeons where people rarely went. We gained experience and skill through constant duels and drills, over and over, in the evenings, every day.
"If you want to be strong, you will have to repeat things hundreds of times," I said during the fifth training session, after once again knocking him down with a silent Flipendo. "Mastery is not talent. It is repetition."
"Just do not think I am your student," he snorted, taking a stance.
"Of course not," I smirked. "You are just the one who has never once beaten me in a fair duel."
"We are not using everything we know! Otherwise I would have beaten you!"
"You do not need to beat me, you need to beat Burke. Now, another round."
We faced off again. We used simple spells: Flipendo, Protego, Stupefy, and a couple of others safe for training. But even they, cast with fury and speed, could slam someone into a wall or knock the wind out of them.
I focused on speed and confidence. Dexter was not useless: his movements became sharper, his wand obeyed him better, and his gaze burned. He learned, he grasped things quickly. Every duel gave him experience, just as it did me.
And all this time, he had two goals: to beat me and to get revenge on Burke. And Burke, as if on purpose, walked past every day with a smirk, always trailed by Reid, like a lapdog, throwing poisonous comments. It was perfect; the more Burke angered him, the more valuable my help became, the stronger the threads binding him were.
"See?" I said after another round, when his Protego cracked under my blow again. "If you had moved like that against Burke, he would already be on the floor."
"Do not remind me," he grumbled, wiping sweat from his forehead.
Over time, the training became tougher. We stopped playing "soft" duels and started going all out, confident we could cast Protego in time or at least dodge. When I finally mastered that shield myself, it became easier not just in training, but in life. A simple spell, yet it gave the feeling of always having a bulletproof vest in your pocket.
"Never stand still," I explained when he again tried to 'stand and tank'. "They should fear you for your speed and unpredictability. It is not strength that decides, but the fact that the opponent never knows where the blow will come from."
Dexter learned fast. Sometimes too fast. He caught every word and tested it in practice, as if afraid of missing even the smallest grain. With each duel, he became sharper, more precise, and I saw he was the kind of guy who could grow if guided correctly.
After one of the rounds, we collapsed onto the benches in the corner of the classroom. The air was thick, smelling of spell residue and sweat. I pretended to speak casually, though this was the moment I had been waiting for:
"Beating Burke is one thing. But simply coming out on top is not enough. He will forget the defeat. He will find an excuse, like you did then: 'got lucky', 'caught me off guard'. But we need him to remember. For every step on the stairs, every breath, every laugh from his friends to remind him of you."
Dexter lifted his head, his eyes narrowing. There was not just anger there now — there was interest.
"Meaning?"
I leaned closer, lowering my voice:
"The victory will be honest. Everyone will see you are stronger. But after — a curse. Not lethal. Not life-threatening. But vile. To torment him. To make him wake up every morning and think: 'Blackmore did this'."
A smirk appeared on Dexter's lips.
"Cunning… And if he does not agree to a duel? Then what?"
"There are options," I replied, as if I had thought through every detail in advance. "Do not worry, I will pick the moment. But the jinx needs to be chosen correctly. Too light — they will laugh. Too heavy — we will be caught. It needs to be something in between. I think I know one jinx that will suit our case."
As I answered, I was running through different options in my head, from jinxes causing a cough to something more serious. I prided myself on being thorough, but all these training sessions were pure improvisation; I was generally lucky to have achieved the desired effect with such an unplanned scheme.
In just five days, I had practically tied Blackmore to myself, gained dueling experience, and thought of a way to bring Burke down a peg.
"The main thing," I added, meeting his gaze, "is that everyone knows: this is payback."
Dexter bared his teeth in a pleased grin. He already saw himself in the spotlight, and Burke in the dirt.
***
The dungeons had one pleasant property: you could always find a nook where no one was around. That is exactly where I sometimes took Dexter for full-fledged duels.
In the movies about the boy who lived, wizard duels were shown as if two wizards stand opposite each other and take turns exchanging spells, but any memoir by a famous duelist tells the reality. I learned the reality, which is much dirtier and less like a circus.
I moved, rolled, dodged. Even a simple evasion sometimes worked better than any shield.
"Are you dancing?" Dexter would get angry when my steps threw off his aim.
"I am winning," I replied dryly. "And you should learn to hit a target when it is moving."
Outside of duels, we practiced combinations like Levicorpus + Flipendo, Protego + Stupefy, and also the Petrificus Totalus spell. The latter especially: it was our first truly serious spell, and we were both eager to master it. At some point, we both could cast it confidently.
"Petrificus Totalus!" Dexter shouted, pointing his wand at me.
My body jerked treacherously and went limp. I crashed onto the cold stone floor, as if chopped down, my heart pounding wildly. I could breathe, but not move — not even blink. Panic washed over me instantly. Someone else's will bound me, and I felt like a piece of wood, a living corpse. Fear spread through my veins, sticky and heavy.
Dexter lifted the curse after just a minute, but that terrible feeling of helplessness infuriated me far too much. I sharply drew in air and sat up, breathing heavily, feeling sweat trickle down my back.
"Not bad," I rasped. "But do not do that again!"
He smirked mockingly:
"No one warns you in a duel."
I looked up, my gaze cold, devoid of all emotion. And in the same second, my wand was in my hand.
"Petrificus Totalus!"
The spell hit him in the chest. Dexter froze, his eyes burning with rage, but his body remained motionless, like a doll thrown in the mud. I slowly walked closer and crouched beside him.
"Listen carefully," my voice was quiet, almost a whisper, but each word cut the air. "Never use that spell on me again, and in general, never point your wand at me outside of duels. Not even as a joke, not even for testing. If you want to test it — do it on Burke. If you want to have fun — find a cat or a rat."
I leaned lower, so he could only see my eyes, and added even more quietly:
"Outside a duel — never. If you ever cross wands with me like that again… I will turn your triumph into the longest and most humiliating mistake of your life."
I lifted the curse, and Dexter collapsed to the floor, exhaling noisily. He gritted his teeth, his eyes darting, but I saw the main thing — he understood. A boundary now lay between us. I had slightly delineated our communication, but in that week, we had managed, if not to become friends, then certainly good acquaintances.
From that moment, our training continued, but something had changed. He knew: much is allowed around me, but not everything.
I was satisfied with the result of training with a partner. We became faster at casting. Our wands obeyed us more confidently, movements became reflexive. I taught Dexter to use words not only for spells but also for distraction, learning it myself along the way. Sometimes a simple phrase like "Watch your back!" or just the name of a spell, without casting it, could buy a fraction of a second to strike.
We started as two kids who could barely hit each other, and ended up knowing how to move, create spell combinations, and dodge danger like real snakes. And most importantly — we learned it from each other.
But besides training, all this was also done to bind him. Dexter grew accustomed to trusting me — I showed him where to strike, what was better, what was stupid. He grew accustomed to trusting me, listening, accepting my remarks. I was the leader, he was the follower. And I saw in him a skilled guy who could become a loyal fighter… he would definitely be useful to me.
Everything was ready, but we had to go with Plan B. Burke, of course, refused a repeat duel: the rules protected first-years, but for me, the refusal was not a defeat, but an invitation to play differently.
We tracked him down in the evening. The corridor in the West Wing on the third floor was empty. The dim torchlight barely pushed back the darkness, turning the corners into traps of shadows. The place was perfect.
"Are you sure?" Dexter hissed, gripping his wand as if it were a saber.
"Sure," I nodded. "Today he will learn that I get the last laugh. And you. Your task is simple: paralyze him before he realizes what is happening."
We hid behind an archway. Footsteps approached. When Burke's silhouette appeared in the semi-darkness, I nodded.
"Petrificus Totalus!" Blackmore shouted confidently.
The spell contorted his body, and Burke fell onto the stone with a dull thud. Only his eyes darted around, full of fury and powerlessness.
"Well, Marvin, how does it feel to be on the floor?" Dexter said calmly. "Send my regards to your friends, especially Reid. Let them know: Slytherins know how to answer."
I raised my wand and quietly began to curse the guy. The only curse I knew and had managed to study was, of course, from a book, not even a unique one, just a book on curses that was, in fact, not very legal. But you do not get arrested for it, so who cares. Unlike the couple of jinxes I knew, this curse was the pinnacle of my 'malefica' — I am almost ashamed to call myself half a Black… I really should delve into this branch of magic.
The curse settled on him like a veil — invisible, without flashes or special effects. Now he would start feeling dizzy, and periodically everything would plunge into darkness before his eyes. Simple, vile magic, like a shadow clinging to the soul. The result of the curse would be him fainting in a couple of hours, and it would probably wear off — it is a weak thing, after all. And casting it requires touching the victim's body with the wand, so it is not exactly a practical curse.
I nodded to Blackmore. He bared his teeth in a grin and added his own touch: a stinging and tickling sensation. It sounds like child's play, but under the full-body bind, it became a real hell — when you are screaming inside, but not even a rasp comes from your throat. Terrifying.
We left while the spell still held him. His scream only reached us as an echo in the empty corridor.
An hour later, at dinner, the long-awaited consequences arrived. Burke was seething with rage and humiliation. He kept telling everyone that Blackmore had attacked him from behind, paralyzed him, and taunted him. No one doubted that he was the one who had done it.
Perfect. I remained in the shadows, and Dexter gained a reputation as a viper that bites hard. And most importantly — he did everything exactly as I said. I will train him to follow my commands.
At dinner, I listened to half the school whispering: "Blackmore finally showed his teeth." Avery leaned over to me and whispered:
"He challenged him again. A duel this evening."
I just nodded, barely holding back a smile. Everything was going according to my plan.