Victor walked down the staircase of Malfoy Manor and into the drawing room.
Lucius was seated in his usual chair, calmly reading the morning newspaper. The front page was still filled with reports about the captured Death Eaters and the mysterious masked wizard who had appeared at the World Cup.
Victor stopped in front of him. "Father, I think there's something we need to talk about."
Lucius lowered the newspaper. "What is it, Victor?"
"I think it's time you gave up your obsession with Voldemort and stopped associating with his loyalists."
The words hung in the air. Lucius's expression hardened. Whatever warmth had been there disappeared from his face.
For several seconds he simply stared, then folded the newspaper with deliberate care and set it aside.
"Victor," he said evenly, "that is not something a child should be saying to his father." His voice stayed calm, but there was an edge to it now.
"Go back to your room. I'll pretend this conversation never happened."
Victor didn't move. "I wasn't asking."
"Be careful what you say next."
"I am being careful. I'm asking you to think about the path you're still clinging to. The First Wizarding War ended years ago. Voldemort disappeared years ago. Yet you're still surrounding yourself with people who refuse to let the past die."
Lucius rose slowly from his chair. "You know nothing about that world."
"Maybe. But I know enough to recognize that he was a fool who couldn't even avoid his own downfall. A man who claimed to be invincible, yet lost everything in a single night."
"Victor!" The anger in his voice echoed through the room.
Victor stayed completely composed. "Father, I don't want you following a path that's already reached its end. The cause you devoted yourself to has already failed. Even if its master returns someday, I'll make sure history repeats itself."
As the last words left his mouth, his eyes changed — pupils narrowing into thin vertical slits, serpent-like.
For the briefest moment an overwhelming pressure filled the room. Lucius instinctively took a step back. It wasn't fear born from a spell. It was the instinctive reaction of an experienced wizard sensing another's resolve.
He stared at Victor in disbelief. The child standing before him had disappeared. In his place stood a wizard speaking with absolute certainty.
"You've become arrogant."
"No. I've simply reached a different conclusion."
Without another word, Victor drew his wand. Lucius's eyes fell on it immediately.
"You would point your wand at your own father?"
"I'd rather convince you with words. But if you refuse to listen, then let us settle this as wizards." He lowered the tip into a formal dueling stance.
"You've always said that strength decides who is right. If you truly believe that, then prove your convictions are stronger than mine."
The drawing room fell silent. Father and son stood facing one another across the polished floor, neither lowering his gaze.
For the first time in their lives they weren't speaking as parent and child. They stood as two wizards, each prepared to defend the path he had chosen.
"So be it." Lucius drew his wand. "It seems I still have much to teach you."
Victor silently raised his own. The duel began instantly.
"Expelliarmus!"
"Protego!"
The red bolt struck the shimmering shield, scattering sparks across the room.
"Stupefy!"
Victor twisted aside. The Stunning Spell blasted past him, shattering an ornate vase against the wall.
"Confringo!"
He answered with a Shield Charm before immediately countering. "Reducto!"
Lucius vanished with a crack of Apparition, reappearing several feet away as the curse smashed into the marble floor.
Neither wizard remained still. Spells crossed the hall one after another.
"Impedimenta!"
"Finite!"
"Petrificus Totalus!"
"Protego Maxima!"
The hall echoed with the constant crack of magic. Lucius fought like a veteran of the First Wizarding War, every defensive spell flowing naturally into another attack, forcing Victor to react without pause.
Victor matched him spell for spell — Apparating across the room, firing a Disarming Charm, transfiguring shattered stone into a flock of birds to block Lucius's vision, then following with another barrage before the birds had even vanished.
Lucius blasted the transfiguration apart. "Confringo!"
Victor ducked beneath the explosion. "Expulso!"
The blast forced Lucius backward. He landed smoothly, conjuring a stone serpent from the shattered floor. Victor flicked his wand and it dissolved into sand before reaching him.
Without hesitation he advanced. "Stupefy!"
Lucius deflected it. "Expelliarmus!"
Victor leaned aside. "Reducto!"
Lucius blocked. The collision sent another shower of sparks across the hall.
For nearly a minute neither gained an advantage. Wands never stopped moving — attack, defend, counter, Apparate, attack again.
Finally Lucius tried to overwhelm him with a rapid succession of curses. Victor waited. Watched. Then, for the first time since the duel began, he stepped inside Lucius's rhythm instead of away from it.
"Protego!" The shield redirected Lucius's latest spell just enough to create an opening. Victor's wand snapped upward. "Expelliarmus!"
Lucius reacted a fraction too late. His wand flew from his hand, spinning across the room before sliding to a stop several yards away. Before he could recover, Victor Apparated, the tip of his wand coming to rest against his father's chest.
Silence filled the hall. Broken marble and shattered furniture lay scattered across the room.
Lucius looked from the wand at his chest to the calm expression on Victor's face. After a long moment, Victor lowered his wand. "The duel is over," he said quietly.
Lucius said nothing. He had entered the duel expecting to teach his son a lesson. Instead, for the first time in his life, he had been defeated by him.
The question that lingered behind his silence was harder to swallow than the loss itself — when exactly had his son surpassed him, and how had a fourteen-year-old reached this level of power?
*****
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