An Enlightening Duel

After a moment, he comes to a decision.

"It would seem to me that the issue of my qualifications must be put to rest."

Lifting his wand, Harry flicks it this way and that, silently casting magic that causes the entire class to tense up and reach for their own wands in response. Of course, if they'd really wanted to stop him, they should have reacted much faster than that. At the end of the day, Harry might be casting in their general direction, but he's not casting anything harmful at THEM.

The middle of the room suddenly opens up as all of the desks are pushed to either side, along with his students in their chairs. A crowded lecture hall becomes a little more crowded, but there's no way for them to put their desks and chairs back where they were, not with the dueling platform that's rising up in the open space between them.

In mere moments it's ready, and Harry steps up onto the platform at his end. The class looks rather surprised, and there's quite a lot of interest. In a few faces, he even reads excitement. Some of them are hoping he'll leave an open challenge for them. But no, not right now. He's already made up his mind.

"Ms. Greengrass. Ms. Granger. Please step up onto the dueling platform."

Both witches jolt at that, neither of them looking entirely interested in dueling. However, when they hear the other's name and exchange glances, smug smirks spread across both of their faces. They think they're dueling each other, and while Daphne's smirk is more wicked than Hermione's, there's no doubt that his brunette friend is also excited at the idea of potentially putting the Slytherin witch in her place.

As the two climb up onto the platform, Hermione even gives Harry a look and a nod as if she understands what she wants from him.

"Don't worry Harry, I'll show her what someone who's learned from you can really do."

Daphne lets out a bark of laughter at that, even as she twirls her wand between her fingers.

"You sure you want her as your Champion, Potter?"

"No."

Once again, his tone takes them both out at the knees, though they don't have seats to drop into now and instead can only stand ramrod straight as they and the rest of the class stare at him in befuddled confusion. For his part, Harry stands at one end of the long dueling platform and turns his body as he raises his wand, showing off a perfect dueler's stance and offering a smaller profile that will allow less in the way of magic to hit him.

"This lesson will be one of inter-house cooperation. Put bluntly, it'll be the two of you against me. Take up your positions and get ready."

The interest in the classroom rackets up another notch at that, while both Hermione and Daphne look absolutely flummoxed at the idea. When Hermione opens her mouth to object or complain, Harry just lifts one eyebrow… and silences his brunette best friend. Flushing in embarrassment at the realization that she's arguing with an authority figure, even if that authority figure is him, she reluctantly makes her way to Daphne's side, seeming much more uncertain now that she's working with her nemesis rather than against her.

Daphne, on the other hand, recovers in about the same amount of time, but without needing to move from where she's already stood at one end of the platform. Her wand is thus out by the time Hermione reaches her and pointed in his direction. She's no longer smirking or smiling, but instead frowning, eyes narrowed as she glares daggers down the platform's length at him.

Taking in a deep breath, feeling the eyes of everyone in the classroom on him, Harry is reminded of his Second Year. He has no intention of emulating either Lockhart OR Snape, however. Offering the two witches a smile, Harry begins to speak.

"Now then, to-!"

"Incarcerous!"

Mid-word, Daphne jumps the gun. A coil of magical rope flies out of her wand and leaps through the air towards Harry, clearly intending to tie him up. Acting purely on instinct, Harry flicks his own wand right back… and the rope shivers as it comes to a stop in midair. Daphne's eyes widen as Harry's eyes narrow, and a moment later the rope is turned back upon her.

Little known fact among wizarding kind, but one did not need to always shield against magic. If you knew what you were doing and the spell being used against you, then it was just as good to try and usurp the magic for yourself. Of course, then it became a contest of wills and magical power. Depending on how strong a witch or wizard you were, an opponent may or may not be able to turn your magic back against you.

… Harry had always been very powerful when it came to magic. In the wake of Voldemort's final defeat… well, not to toot his own horn, but he'd started getting even stronger. And that was without getting into the journals and grimoires he'd found waiting for him in Potter Manor. His knowledge of magic had actually grown quite extensively in the last few months, even if he didn't feel nearly prepared for this position all the same.

But even if he wasn't feeling prepared for teaching Defense Against the Dark Arts, that didn't mean he wasn't prepared for a magical duel. Even two on one.

Seeing the magical rope flying towards them both, Hermione reacts before Daphne can, the muggleborn's own magical wand coming up as she cries out.

"Protego!"

A faint, shimmering protection charm comes into being in front of them, causing the magical rope to bounce off. Harry allows it to do so, and watches both witches as the defunct Incarcerous spell unravels into nothingness on the ground at their feet. For a moment afterwards, a tense silence falls over the room as the three duelists stare one another down. Harry smiles.

"Begin."

To their credit, both Hermione and Daphne immediately go on the attack.

"Stupefy!"

"Stupefy!"

Except, as the two red stunning spells fly through the air towards them, Harry can't help but think that's what they shouldn't have done. Rather than deflect or protect against the two spells, he ducks under them and then comes up again in one smooth motion, his wand pointed not at the two witches at the other end of the dueling platform, but at their feet.

A moment later and the whole of that part of the platform is iced over, turning glassy as it becomes undesirably slippery, like the surface of an ice rink. At the sight of him jabbing his wand towards them, both witches instinctively try and take a step back, even as they attempt to defend against his magic.

"Prot-oof!"

"Pr-eep!"

Like that, fly up in the air ass over end rather comically, flopping down HARD on their backs as Harry flicks and swishes his wand twice more. The silent Expelliarmus followed by an equally silent Accio results in both of their wands ending up in his empty hand, slapping into his palm at the same time as he closes his fingers over them.

As Hermione and Daphne groan on their backs on the rapidly melting ice, Harry turns and looks to the rest of the class.

"Can anyone tell me what Ms. Granger and Ms. Greengrass did wrong?"

Hands shoot up, and after a moment Harry points at one Draco Malfoy. He wouldn't have normally, but there's a healthy respect and fear in Draco's eyes that makes it clear Harry won't have to deal with any backtalk from the blond, at least not today. Whether or not Draco will turn out to still be a ponce under his current attitude in the future is still up in the air, but for now anyways…

"They didn't work together. If they had, only one of them would have attacked, while the other defended."

Giving his former school bully an approving nod and boy did that feel weird, Harry smiles simply.

"That's exactly right."

"But you also cast silent magic! That's incredibly advanced stuff, isn't it?!"

Lavender Brown's voice from the crowd doesn't come accompanied by a hand raise, but Harry decides to let it slide. He doesn't want to say that the blonde has always been a little slow… but, well… no, she's smart enough. Just in things she actually cares about, which hasn't always involved schooling.

Harry inclines his head towards Lavender as well.

"Indeed it is. So advanced in fact, that it hasn't been part of Hogwarts curriculum for some time now. Needless to say, that will be changing. While not all of you may have the aptitude for silent casting, those of you that do will be ferreted out and provided with advanced lessons if you desire them. It will be a lot of extra work, but if you're willing to put in the time and effort, so am I."

And with that, he swishes his wand, and the dueling platform disappears back into the floor, the classroom returning back to the way it was before. Daphne and Hermione are left in the middle aisle, still recovering as Harry returns to the front of the class. However, Daphne is quick to get to her feet once there's no longer any ice under her, and she most definitely notices the absence of her wand from her hand.

"You still have our wands… Professor Potter."

It's a start, but Harry just smiles as he nods his head in acknowledgement of her words.

"Indeed I do. Ms. Greengrass, Ms. Granger… see me after dinner tonight for detention. You'll earn your wands back there."

Both Daphne and Hermione jolt at that, though Hermione looks decidedly more betrayed than Daphne. If anything, Harry would say that Daphne looks… calculating for all of a moment, before she's hiding it behind a blank face and simply giving him a nod to show she's heard. Hermione, meanwhile, looks embarrassed as all hell as she sits back down in her chair and keeps her eyes averted to the desk for the rest of the class.

It's not like Harry wanted to give her detention… but she needed to understand that he was the Professor first now, and her friend second. He hoped she could forgive him…

-x-X-x-

Hours later, after dinner, both Daphne and Hermione show up at his door. Harry lets them into the classroom in silence, admittedly still thinking about their punishment and how they would be spending this detention. If he couldn't come up with something soon, he'd probably just have them both work on homework or something in silence until he'd decided enough time had passed and he could give them back their wands.

Except, Daphne derails any plans he might have had from moment one when she saunters up to him and adopts the most lustful leer that Harry has ever seen, giving him a wicked grin as she leans forward to show off her cleavage.

"So then, Professor. What are you going to have us doing for tonight's detention, hm? Will we be polishing any wands, perhaps?"

As Harry blinks owlishly at the sudden personality switch from the mulish girl who'd disrupted his class earlier, Hermione gasps, clearly taking offense to Daphne's insinuation… and very much understanding what Daphne was getting at.

"W-What the fuck, Greengrass?! Don't be ridiculous, Harry isn't LIKE that!"

Turning her gaze to Hermione, Daphne lets out a laugh.

"Professor Potter is a growing young man our age, Granger. He and every other boy of that age are EXACTLY like that, don't be ridiculous. And besides, you picked up what I was putting down quite fast… perhaps because you're used to thinking of your precious 'Harry' in that sort of light?"

Daphne's teasing voice leaves Hermione red-faced and sputtering. Meanwhile, Harry is forced to admit that both of them are right. Hermione was right in that Harry definitely wasn't like that, and he had had no intentions of demanding sexual favors from either Daphne or Hermione for tonight's detention. That was… really disgusting, at first glance.

But also, Daphne was right in that he was a 'growing young man', and as Andromeda and Nymphadora Tonks had proven, he was very much susceptible to beautiful witches' womanly wiles. While it would definitely be gross for Harry to demand sexual favors from his students for their detention activities… it was a whole other thing entirely for Daphne to be propositioning him like this. If she wanted it then…

Except no, he couldn't do it, right? Not just because it was morally wrong, which it was. But because something was off about all of this. Daphne… Daphne was acting way too brazen here. Turning away from Hermione, having clearly won that verbal joust, Daphne gives him another lecherous grin and tugs a little bit at her top, showing off more of her pale skin and nearly popping out one of her breasts then and there thanks to how lowcut the top she'd changed into was.

"What do you say, Professor? A quick suck, a quick fuck, and you make my detention go away?"

It was tempting in the extreme. DAPHNE was tempting in the extreme. Meanwhile, Hermione was cutely flustered in the extreme as well, and seemed to be unable to speak up against it again, as she fidgets and squirms and averts her gaze whenever he tries to meet her eyes.

He couldn't possibly go along with this, could he? Something was undeniably fishy about this. What were Daphne's true motivations for coming on this strongly after her earlier disrespect in class?

Most importantly of all… did he care?