Pieces Falling into Place -S.B

Ch. 10 Duel

"Pass me the salt, would you." Lily asked me tiredly as I heard the usual buzzing of the Great Hall.
Lazily, I clumsily handed her the salt. We were knocked off from last night. Today just so happened to be the only day of the week where DADA was on the agenda and Professor Telstrode was not waiting around for anybody.
Today was also the day I was going to confront Sirius and give him Leslies letter. I had definitely not forgotten that.
"So, my darling Lily, how was your midnight stroll yesterday?" James managed to squeeze in next to Lily as the Marauders just so happened to pass by our place at the breakfast table. Lily just rolled her eyes -her usual response- and began eating her eggs silently. James looked proud, probably because he had gotten a reaction out of the girl he so 'very much loves' and began to shove food into his mouth. Although I did catch a glimpse of sadness in his eyes, probably of the second-long connection they had had yesterday in our common room.
"Well, hello there, charming young lady." Sirius. I didn't even have to look to know that he was so effortlessly  flirting with me. I never minded of course, sometimes when I was confident I wouldn't melt under his gaze, I'd even flirt with the guy. But today was different. I was still jealous and upset from the letter from Leslie, but I haven't found the time to talk to him about it. It had only been yesterday. I don't very often get the chance to talk to Sirius Black alone, either he was with his mates or chatting up a girl, always around people. And around the girls- who I felt truly sorry for- who thought the bloke'd truly love them. Sirius could be disgusting and charming at the same time.

I am not thinking straight. Get your brain working. Right now you're bloody angry at him.

"Hey Sirius." I mutter and pick up my fork, not making eye contact. "Is everything alright?" He asked from beside me. "I need to talk to you about something, please meet me after DADA in the fifth corridor." "Um...ok...sure.." I detected worry in his voice as I ate another slice of toast. I looked up, Remus looked concerned and Lily did too. I assured them with a quick glance that I was fine and that they didn't have to worry.

The rest of the breakfast was spent watching Peter try to swallow three chunky pieces of toast, which were all disgustingly shoved in all at once by James. The worst part was that he had managed to eat them all, and nothing was left on his plate at the end of breakfast either.

................................................

As I had known I'd get a chance to talk to Sirius today, the letter was firmly stuck between the book I had once opened; my Herbology book. Thankfully, we had Herbology right after midday, I could just leave the letter in there. I was going to show Sirius exactly where I had found it, to see why on Gods Earth it had landed in there.

"Alright everyone, quite now!" Professor Telstrode arrived at the front of the class, this time with a happy expression, which was a bit strange to be honest. He was never happy.
But apparently, the tides have changed and he looked delighted. "So today we are going to be duelling."

Oh, this'll be fun.

Excited whispers were exchanged as we had only duelled twice in class, or anywhere in fact.
"Partners have been picked by me-" Low moans, we weren't very impressed. "- and you will stick with that partner for the next hour as well, seeing as we will practice next lesson too. "But Professor, we have no room." Came a voice from a Slytherin (we sadly have DADA with them)  at the end of the room and was greeted by nods. It was Derek Yaxley, one of Slytherins 'best' as the House would say, who had commented on the lack of spaces. I looked around. There truly was no space at all, even if the tables moved. "Thank you for asking Mr Yaxley, I was about to explain: today we will go out of the castle, seeing as the weather is rather lovely today. "But first, I shall explain what you will be doing outside." "Duelling!"came from our end of the class and was greeted by laughter. Telstrode looked annoyed and disappointed of the joke, as was I, and continued with the lesson. "We will only  be using the spells we have learned in the past few weeks and you will be watched very carefully by myself so that no one does anything even remotely dumb. I saw him stare at the Slytherin and Gryffindor troublemakers, and continued to further explain the upcoming task. I sneaked a glance at Sirius and saw that he was rather proud of getting a glare from the Professor.

What an idiot.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity, we made our way out of the crowded, darkened classroom into the sunny, beautiful green that lay around Hogwarts. "Gather 'round, gather 'round."he waved his arms, calling us over more enthusiastically than I have ever seen the wizard." When I call out your name and the name of your partner you will make your way over to the darker patch on our left." We all nodded and he started throwing out names. A lot of excited squealing could be heard, which was thankfully not overthrown by the disappointed moans.
"Mary McDonald and Remus Lupin." Oh this just got good. "Lily Evans and James Potter." This just got sooo good. I glanced over at James and Lily, one looking more excited to be working with his partner than scoring amazing in his O.W.L.S and one looking absolutely mortified. I internally laughed. These were going to two great DADA lessons. My name hasn't been called and I look at Sirius, who, as usual, had girls fawning at him all around, who doesn't have one either. "Amberle Raylander and Sirius Black."

Goodness gracious.

He smirked at me, went through his hair and walked over to me, hi wand sticking out of a leather jacket he wasn't supposed to wear. "Hello." I smiled shyly.

Darn it Raylander, you're supposed to be angry at him, not blushing.

"This'll be fun." "Alright, come on." We walked to the darkened patch as the Professor had told us. I was feeling the glares of the jealous girls on my back. My friends smirked at me knowingly before returning to their partners, some happier than others. "I think its fine here, isn't it?" Sirius asked me, pointing to an empty space between our classmates, who were already starting to duel, some better and quicker than others.
"May the best wizard win." Sirius said sarcastically and dramatically bowed.
Suddenly, I remembered the love letter that was still stuck between the pages of my Herbology book in my bag.
"Yes he shall."

—————————————————————————————————————————————

Hellooooo,
I hope you've liked the story so far, thought I'd put a nice little Hermione Granger quote in there for y'all and a badass ending, because I feel like Amberle is badass. But we'll see in the next chapter. Who did you think will win the duel? And will there be a winner?