Closed Snake Lying in Wait

[Mikael Nightray]

APPROVAL ID #125078​

Mikael had always meant to get even with Ayre for Eurydice since he'd found out all that had happened. It had taken a little more time though, because he did so like to take his time sometimes. He knew that the younger Slytherin had taken to avoiding him, and he'd taken to showing up in places that she would be, despite the crowd. He never really did anything. Just be there to let Ayre know that he was there... waiting. It hardly mattered to him if she'd noticed his presence. He would never be so stupid as to do anything amidst witnesses. It was interesting, however, how this semester turned out. With no legilimens on staff, the Slytherin Head of House on sabbatical, and the Headmaster hardly around, it was the perfect time for Mikael to act. He didn't act immediately, though. No. He'd been biding his time for this long; he could wait some more. Which was why he waited until after the Valentine's Dance. More than a week after, in fact. In the last couple of days, he'd spent some time wandering the castle. Not really following his target, but just wandering in the guise of patrolling. It wouldn't do after all for people to suspect he'd been following the younger Slytherin. Today, he'd decided on getting up early. It was the weekend, and it would do him well to practice his wandless magic. NEWTs were approaching after all. He left his wand in his trunk—he does that sometimes to avoid the temptation of using it when practicing his wandless magic—but it would just be best to not have it today either. In no time at all, he found himself in one of the Duelling Chambers and started to practice his spells, starting from first year of course. After else, he didn't have anything else to do while waiting—might as well be productive.​

 

[Morrie Ayre]

They were into semester two now and weirdly, Morrie hadn’t seen much drama this year yet, at least not compared to previous years. Oh, of course there was still that weirdo Mikael, but she stayed well away from him. She hadn't seen him this morning at breakfast and was fairly certain she’d overheard someone say he was studying in the library today, which meant she could lower her guard for a little while. To be on the safe side though, she'd triple checked to make sure he wasn’t following her as she stomped her way down the corridor to the dueling chamber. And when she was certain that he was not following her, she shoved him firmly out of her thoughts.

Her thoughts turned to the upcoming dueling tournament instead. Morrie had been disqualified every single year which if you asked her, said a lot more about the biased proctors than it did about her ability as a duelist. This year she wondered if she might actually win the stupid competition if she practiced more though. She'd still have to get past professors like Josephs, who had totally unfairly disqualified her two years running, but with enough practice, Morrie would be able to stop professors with their nonsense rules.

Deciding she was absolutely going to make this tournament win happen, Morrie arrived at the dueling chamber to practice. She chucked her water bottle onto a bench near the entrance and turned to face the wall for the warm up. She rolled her shoulders then pressed her arms against the wall to stretch, getting ready for combat with a practice dummy. Morrie had not noticed someone else was already occupying the chamber.