Brilliant platinum haired swayed in the wind, eyes of ice staring in the direction she was heading a girl of fifteen walked, her posture impeccable and confidence radiating as a grin sat upon her rosy lips.

If there was one thing Ceres Dione Malfoy loved more than flying (she was very proud to be the most excellent seeker Slytherin has had in the past forty years that Slughorn had been teaching, he'd said) it was duelling.

Duelling simply gave her this thrill of danger and freedom, much like flying, but also giving her a chance to prove herself in something that all people could admire.

She finally reached the Defence Hall where the Duelling Club was to be taking place and couldn't withhold her smile from growing larger at the mass amount of students that had flocked the hall.

All the more people to see her triumph.

Looking around she began to scan the groups, judging the competition before her.

A seventh and sixth year male Slytherin group consisting of Rodolphus LeStrange, Hayden Mulciber, Thantos Avery, Kavern Crabbe and Gordan Goyle stood in one corner. Out of all of them Rodolphus would probably prove the best challenger but, like the rest of them, was also more brawns than brain and while he was powerful and had his ancient family spells behind him he was not strategic and that put him at a great disadvantage.

Then there was the fifth year males: Regulus Black, Rabastan LeStrange, Harson Avery, Victor Selwyn and Anthony Fawley. Harson and Anthony were easily dismissible, much like the others despite their ancient family spells but Victor, Rabastan and Regulus, too, would prove challenging.

Scanning the room for other good competitors she also picked out Remus Lupin, James Potter and Sirius Black, the latter of the two who were turning the Slytherin boy group's hair different colours and writing rude sentences on their foreheads (not that Ceres would admit it but she couldn't help but laugh when James Potter wrote on Thantos' forehead 'I kiss Moldy-Short's sexy booty'); Carina Nott who was a fellow fifth year Slytherin well known for her DADA skill; Antonio Zabini from Ravenclaw along with his close friend Pandora Celeste; Marlene McKinnon and Hufflepuffs Ned Abbott and Amelia Bones.

Finally sizing up her most challenging opponents she turned her attention to Professor. Hapworth as she began her introduction, talking of not using spells that cause serious harm (Ceres knew well enough that the sixth-seventh year and some fifth year Slytherins would pay that rule no mind) and enjoying themselves.

She finally put up a list of randomly selected pairs upon the boars and to what order they would battle.

Scanning the board she found her own name near the middle: 57: Ceres Malfoy VS Hayden Mulciber.

It seemed that Hayden too had seen their names as she heard him turn to Thantos, "beating little Malfoy will be no trouble," and found herself rolling her eyes at his comment. He wouldn't even get anywhere near beating her.

First up was James Potter VS Ned Abbott. Both were very skilled and Ceres saw that she had observed right when she had put them on her greatest competitors list; but James Potter eventually overpowered the Hufflepuff boy with a rather amusing hair growing spell – taking him by surprise – before using a swift expelliarmous.

Strategy, Ceres thought with a smile upon her lips, to many it seemed like a funny joke but Ceres couldn't help but admire his strategy.

Many, many duels were fought before hers, out of her little list only Antonio Zabini had been defeated, and that was only because Crabbe had miss fired his wand and sent himself flying into the boy, knocking the Ravenclaw over and being crowned the winner as he had knocked out his opponent.

But now it was her turn. The youngest Malfoy approached the duelling stage with confidence, smirking at the older boy and clearly making him uneasy.

Rule 1: never let you opponent put you off.

After the required bow Mulciber was quick to fire.

"secare!" Mulciber yelled to which Ceres easily swerved to the right and the spell went flying past her.

Frustrated Mulciber screeched, "íllico cápite plecti!"

"MULCIBER!" The defence teacher yelled at such a harmful spell, one that would decapitate anyone it hit.

Ceres merely laughed as she swerved to the left, casting, "stupefy!"

Not focused in his frustration he did not have the time to block the youngest Malfoy's spell, going flying backwards at the power behind in, unconscious.

She heard somebody bring him back around as she got off of the duelling stage, the Professor telling him to go to the Headmaster's office, enraged by his use of spells.

She heard some people discussing his use of 'dark, evil spells' and frowned.

It wasn't the classification of the spell that made it good or evil, it was the intent. Lumos was a light spell and could easily blind someone with the right amount of power; avada kedavra was a dark spell but could easily be used to put an unrecoverable person out of their misery.

It also depended on your family which made you more magically skilled in one area of magic, for example to Blacks, LeStranges and Malfoys were the darkest side of magic making them exceptionally skilled at dark magic, other families like the Greengrass' and Parkinson's were dark but not as so, but that still made them more magically skilled in the dark department meanwhile families like the McMillians, Abbotts and Potters were as light as they came, therefore extremely skilled in that area of magic.

This was the only reason why she could understand some of the ideals of Voldermort, after all, their Samahan had become Halloween, their Yule become Christmas and the muggleborns who assumed dark was evil created their bigoted society.

Ceres rather liked the idea of becoming someone to do with wizarding politics and law but also found her call in duels.

Sighing she watched the rest of the duels, wondering who her next competitor might be.

Five hours later she had fought and beaten Thantos Avery, Luca Bell, Xeno Lovegood, Petunia Parkinson, Carina Nott (though she put up on great fight), Remus Lupin, Rodolphus LeStrange, Peter Pettigrew, Lily Evans, Marlene McKinnon, Arielle Greengrass, Gordan Goyle, James Potter (who had also been a very good opponent), Pandora Celeste, Amelia Bones and Harson Avery.

Gulping down her pepper-up potion she looked up so see only two names written upon the board for the final battle: Ceres Malfoy VS Sirius Black.

They were soon both called up to the stage where Ceres used her usual intimidation techniques but Sirius seemed to find them amusing if anything, even letting a chuckle escape him as she pouted.

That was a mini-victory.

Rule 2: don't soften your heart towards your enemy

They turned and started walking, back to back, the eldest Black having at least six to seven inches on the blonde.

Turning swiftly the two bowed low to one another, he shot her a grin – seemed he too was trying to work against her rule number 2 – and she shit him a smirk.

"1, 2, 3."

"Stupefy!" Sirius had casted but Ceres ducked down as she spell went whizzing over her head.

"Avis!" Ceres casted the spell that had enabled her to win her eight minute long battle with Carina, by distracting her with the birds as she could barely see past them, but Sirius seemed to know better and banished them.

"Levicorpus! Supefy! Pulsate!" She swiftly threw herself out of the way of every single spell, throwing a barricade of her own back and watching as he had to use a shield for each and every one of them.

Rule 3: work on your speed, you waste magical energy if you're constantly putting up shields.

After recovering he quickly sent back, "fugit!" and a swarm of flies came soaring towards her, she quickly mimicked the spell he had used earlier but before she could either offend or defend Sirius was quick to cast, "omnis visio!"

Which caused Ceres' world to turn black and white, however, while she had been training her great-grandmother had sent much worse curses at her and found herself managing with relative easiness but the disadvantage was that is he switched to non-verbal then she wouldn't know what spell was coming at her as she couldn't see the colour.

But he didn't do that.

Rule 3: always use your own spells to your advantage.

Those watching could only watch in awe as the two so easily dodged (in Ceres' case) or blocked (in Sirius' case) and danced around one another, even swapping side during their diving and moving; they were like experts, always knowing the other's first move.

Finally, however, Sirius' magical strength was starting to slow, not as much power behind his spells with all of the shields he had been putting up, so when Ceres sent some ten spells his way he was finally hit, "obscurum."

Causing his vision to turn obscure, he found now that not only a lack of energy was his disadvantage but also clumsiness as he could see about five Ceres'.

Ceres grinned, she had him all but defeated.

Rule 4: always find a way around your enemies spells

He could easily have used a spell tracker than would inform you where your enemy was – or used a hearing improvement spell as to where she stepped.

"Stupefy," he managed to put up a shield but it was lacking power, if she fired quickly she could break it before he had the chance to put up another one, "expelliarmous!"

And with that Sirius Orion Black's wand went flying out of his somewhat tan hand and into her porcelain one.

She grinned in victory as everyone clapped or cheered at the youngest Malfoy as the teacher quickly counterspelled all of the spells that had been put upon one or the other.

Sirius had a little scowl and she couldn't help but chuckle slightly; so Black was a sore loser.

Walking up to him she saw him turn to her with an annoyed look, clearly believing that she was about to begin gloating but instead she offered the Hogwarts Weekly voted 'Most Handsome Wizard of the Year' three times over (lost once to Amos Diggory, twice to James Potter) her hand.

He looked at it questioningly before deciding to shake it, clearly having no care for Wizarding custom making Ceres roll her eyes. He may be disowned but he was still a Black.

"You were brilliant, Black, very powerful and you know a lot of spells, but try dodging instead of constantly shielding them as it takes up too much energy and remember there are always spells that can help even if you don't know the counter curse – like with the obscure vision one you could have enhanced your hearing."

If it weren't for the genuine look she had worn then the notorious Sirius Black might have been annoyed, especially when his pride was wounded from looking the battle to a Slytherin girl in the year bellow him but instead he nodded.

"Thanks, Malfoy," he stated, as he smiled at her, though his eyes were questioning as if he did not know why she was being nice to him.

Nodding Ceres Dione Malfoy walked away from him, heading out of his eyesight and into the crowd leaving, and leaving him rather confused.

"What did Malfoy want?" James questioned as he ran up to Sirius with a grin, "came to tell you how handsome you are whilst face planting the ground?"

James imitated one of his falls when his vision was obscured causing Sirius to shove him with a grin and stated, "Well she beat you, didn't she?"

The Potter boy shrugged, a grin still upon his lips even when talking of his loss. In contrast to Sirius, James Potter was not a sore loser.

"She was damn good."

Sirius couldn't help but agree, mind still hung on the youngest Malfoy that had been strangely nice to him. He decided that Ceres Malfoy was a mystery; and merlin knows that when a mystery was going on, Sirius Black wanted to be the one to solve it.