Orion withdrew his wand and explained. "What we are going to be doing is a very risky undertaking. Taking on a dark lord is inevitably linked with great losses and suffering. Choosing the right allies is vital for our success. I had to be sure that you were trustworthy, that if we were to work with you, you would be willing to see it through to the end."
"I understand… I think," Harry said slowly.
"Good, good." Orion returned to pick up his glass. "Now, I have heard from Bellatrix that you have been working with her on your duelling skills?"
"A little," Harry admitted.
"If this war is going to escalate into open fighting, I would very much like to be certain that those closest to my family know how to take care of themselves." Orion cleared the remainder of the furniture away from them with a casual wave of his wand. "Why don't you show me, then, what you are capable of?"
"I'm not sure I should," Harry replied apprehensively, perplexed by the ease with which the elder wizard apparently changed topics, and the ease with which he had gotten out of having his brains picked because his false identity had been revealed. Or maybe I've just been hanging around Dumbledore too long, Harry mused.
"I insist," Orion affirmed. "If you truly wish to make good on your oath, then it is in both our best interests to make sure you are as well-prepared for that task as possible."
Harry fingered the yew wand inside his robes. Ever since getting it from Ollivander, he had tried to avoid using it as much as possible. Even when forced to use it, he had attempted to limit the spells he had cast. Harry knew it was utterly illogical. Voldemort wasn't corrupted through his wand. If anything, the wand was just a tool, something incapable of being inherently good or evil; it was the wielder who made it such. But something held him back from using the wand that Voldemort had used in his time. Despite this, whenever Harry did cast a spell, however minor, he couldn't deny the fact that it felt utterly right, just as his holly wand had. It felt as if it was his, as if it belonged to him .
"Why the hesitation?" Orion asked curiously. "You had no trouble working with Bellatrix."
"Nothing," Harry finally replied after a few moments, and slid into a basic dueling stance that he'd picked up from Bellatrix during one of their sessions. "Just some silly thoughts."
"Really? I have found that most thoughts are anything but. They may appear that way first, but upon deeper inspection, they reveal that they are far more." Orion responded in kind, raising his wand. "Would you like to talk about it?"
Harry wondered if he should as he reflexively parried a casual stunner from his opponent's wand. It couldn't hurt to talk to someone about it, especially someone as knowledgeable as Orion. If it had been Dumbledore, Harry would have been much more leery; there was no doubt that the Black patriarch would clearly wonder why Harry was asking this particular set of questions, but given their recent conversation, he felt much safer that Orion wasn't going to press the issue.
" Protego," Harry called up a shield as he side-stepped a hail of fist-sized bolts of magic. "Sure, I guess."
"Interesting choice of spells," the elder wizard commented idly as Harry's return fire splashed harmlessly against his own shield.
"Hypothetically speaking, when two wands share the same core, but go to two different wizards-" Harry stopped short as he wordlessly ducked underneath a barrage of spells, then pointed his wand at the ground. " Effumidus," he muttered, causing a billow of smoke to erupt from the tip of the yew wand. The smoke quickly grew to darken his side of the room. Using it as cover, he slid around to the side. A flick of his wand sent random trinkets from around the room flying at his opponent.
Orion arched a curious eyebrow at the smokescreen, then side-stepped the counter-attack of flying knickknacks, his keen eyes taking in every move Harry was making. " Ventulus," he replied, the spell parting the smoke easily, leaving Harry exposed. "Keep going," he said.
"What does it mean when a wand picks a different wizard?" Harry finished, dropping to the ground to avoid a staccato of icy javelins that disappeared harmlessly before they could hit the wall behind him. He leveled his wand at the other side of the room and summoned it to him. Physics caught up, and caused him to be displaced instead, as he slid across the ground along the floor. "The same wand, I mean," he explained before hastily leaping to his feet and causing the floor to break upwards with a wave of his wand.
The makeshift barrier tore up the ground of the living room, but went up just in time to intercept a massive concussive blast the elder Black had sent at him. The loose rock, marble, and dirt held together by Harry's magic wavered and crumbled around the edges, but held firm as the blast expended itself against it. Harry let out a relieved sigh, having caught the wand motions his opponent was making just in time to put up his frantic defense. Orion was clearly aiming to escalate the fight, forcing him to use more of his instincts and more devastating spells.
Orion cocked an eyebrow in interest. "One wand, two owners, you say?" He idly deployed his own shields around the room, watching from behind the translucent barriers as Harry's spells pounded his defenses. "Curious. Is this the situation you find yourself in? I thought Bellatrix had you acquire a new wand from Ollivander's."
"I did." Please don't pry any further, please don't pry any further, Harry thought to himself as he banished loose pieces of debris towards his opponent. "I was just asking hypothetically." He followed the makeshift missiles in with an actual magic missile, before apparating across the room.
"Interesting hypothesis, then," Orion smirked as he batted away the renewed assault with ease. He found himself rather impressed with Harry's abilities. While he was obviously lacking variety and had clearly never been officially instructed in the dueling arts beyond basic training, he was more than making up for it with the raw power he could throw behind even the most basic of offensive spells. Not to mention his creative use of non-combat spells. While the attacks were doing very little to whittle down Orion's shields, the barrage was intense enough to force him on the defensive. The Black patriarch wasn't sure if that was intentional because most of his opponent's fighting tactics seemed to occur on an instinctive level. Keeping that in mind, the elder wizard decided to up the ante.
Harry opened his mouth to utter the incantation when the room erupted into bright white light. Reflexively, he dropped to the ground as an ultrasonic shriek pierced the air, his eyes clenched shut against the impossibly bright flash of light. He couldn't see or hear anything, but had the presence of mind to scramble away from his current position. His ears still ringing, Harry forced his eyes open, but the only thing he could see was pure white. He could feel the searing heat of a fire spell passing by him as it missed, and hastily threw up the most powerful shield spell he knew. He could feel it crack and whine under the strain as Orion opened up and went on the offensive, and knew that he was in trouble unless he did something… right now .
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