Chapter 520 - Hereditary Ⅴ

Finished explaining, Reginald says, "Excellent, let us begin by seeing exactly what the two of you are capable of. Professor Adric should have taught you to adequately duel in your second year at Hogwarts. However, unlike those times the instant I say, 'go,' the two of you will begin. But unlike then anything goes, and the duel is not over until one of you has clearly lost the match."

Rowan and Severus stare at the serious expression on their grandfather's face, before walking a few steps away from each other with their backs to each other. Fiercely gripping their wands in hand, they hold their breaths until Reginald says, "Go!"

Whirling around Rowan says, "Immobulus!" While Severus says, "Expelliarmus!"

Rowan's spell harmlessly missed hitting Severus as her wand goes flying out of her hand. However, before Severus can smugly claim victory, Rowan had already slid forward and swept her foot under him. Severus gawked as he painfully fell onto his backside as Rowan painfully slammed her knee into his stomach causing the air to go out of his lungs.

Unable to breathe, Severus does not realize he had lost his grip on his wand until he feels his wand vibrating warmly under his chin in a rather deadly fashion. "Give up?" Rowan asked with a cold gleam in her eyes.

Severus lets out a pained grunt, "Yes."

A loud clap causes them to look up as Rowan helps Severus to his feet, before handing him his wand back. Trotting over to grab her wand, she quickly returns to find their grandfather studying Severus with a critical eye but does not heal him.

Seeing his grandson's puzzled expression, Reginald calmly says, "When dueling against other's one is often injured by a successful hex or curse. And when that is the case, your opponent will not simply just stop because you are injured, and you will both need to train your bodies to keep moving despite the pain. As such not until training is done for the day will any injuries be healed. And so, it's best that the both of you learn to properly dodge and not get hurt."

Severus eyes are wide and aghast before he fiercely glowers back at his grandfather. Reginald ignores the expression and turns to Rowan. "Well done," Reginald said with a crisp nod. "Most wizards and witches don't know what to do when they lose their wand. You reacted accordingly and took your opponent by surprise. It is an excellent surprise attack, but that unfortunately will only work once. And did you notice your glaring weakness, Rowan?"

Rowan presses her lips into a thin line as she unhappily admits the truth. "Severus is far more powerful than me and his reaction time is absolutely superb."

"Exactly," Reginald murmured in satisfaction. "In the Prince bloodline the best attributes tend to be inherited with each male generation. And not that the females of the family do not inherit anything, but the males always inherit more traits. It was not so noticeable before, but now that the two of you are older, it will become even more apparent with the passing of time. And if that is indeed the case, what must you do, Rowan?"

Rowan is silent for a long time, before finally saying, "I must outwit, Severus, at every turn."

"Correct," Reginald said with a brisk nod. "However, that is easier said than done. It will be rather difficult to accomplish such a feat."

"Again," Reginald said earning another glare from Severus, and a pensive glance from Rowan as they walk to their prior dueling station.

To be perfectly honest, Rowan had not quite realized just how powerful Severus naturally was until now. But then again, he could rival Dumbledore and Voldemort, he just never saw himself that way. After all, he did fool the greatest wizards of all time…...

On the other hand, the potential growth of her own body was rather limited at best. And even with the additional death surge magic and an extraordinarily powerful wand, she still was on the losing end. It came as a bittersweet feeling really. If she should ever falter there would always be another capable of stopping her, but at the same time, she was weaker than her enemies. And that was both fortunate and unfortunate for her. Then again, she had one trump card that could more than even the match, but she would never reveal her ace until it came time to do so.

Rowan is startled out of her thoughts as she hears Reginald say, "Go."

Rather than casting a spell, Rowan rolls to the side as purple sparks miss her and hit the stone ground. Without even faltering, she wordlessly thinks, "Petrificus Totalus!" All the while, while jumping back to her feet.

With a loud grunt, Severus falters back onto the floor unable to move thanks to the full body binding spell. However, his lips still move despite his wand having fallen onto the ground. But before Rowan can stop him, Severus wordlessly removes the bind on himself as he rolls back to his feet having scoped up his wand from the ground as he did so.

Having taken a page out of twin's playbook, Severus smirks back as a spray of blue sparks flash towards him. Without saying a single word, a glowing shield appears around him as the blue sparks shatter harmlessly against it. Severus playful motions his finger at his sister as if saying, "Is that the best you got?"

Rowan sneers back before pointing her wand at him when suddenly a blast of water emerges heading right for Severus. The defense charm worked against spells not actual substances. With a groan, Severus suddenly finds himself blasted off his feet and onto his back by a terribly strong force of water.

Sputtering cold, and wet, Severus tries to cast a spell to no avail as he almost drowns under the spray of the water. Raising his hand up in sign of defeat, the water finally trickles to a stop as he still chokes on water on four legs. Soaking wet with his clothes and plastered, he glares at his twin before wordlessly performing the drying spell on his own body.

Left a bit stiff, and with a bit of a chill, Severus grabs his wand off from the floor to see Reginald nodding in approval. "Very good, Rowan," Reginald commented. "You utilized what you are good at and turned the tables on Severus despite his ability to perform both wandless and wordless magic."

Severus glares at Rowan again, who pensively nods her head putting another plan together. Turning to Severus, Reginald says, "You are much more powerful than Rowan, Severus. Calm your mind and listen to your instincts, they will guide you."

Severus grunts in reply as he walks back to his positions. With both ready in place again, Reginald says, "Go!"

Severus instantly whirls around and says, "Levicorpus."

Rowan manages to dodge, but not before firing back a spell. Severus instantly ducks and shouts, "Langlock!"

Rowan glares back as she wordlessly casts the counter spell causing her to lose valuable seconds. But before she can counterattack, she is forced to defend herself with a defense charm spell to protect herself from the spray of hexes from Severus. Unable to counter without bringing the shield down, she notices that Severus is steadily advancing towards her.

Furrowing her brow, Rowan allows the shield to drop only to be hit by a Confundus Charm. Feeling suddenly dizzy or confused, she forces herself to break the spell by biting her own tongue. A spray of blood can be felt in her mouth, but she moves to the side wincing in pain as a hex hit her causing her toenails to grow rapidly fast.

Hopping on one foot, Rowan wordlessly causes the hex to stop, before pointing at Severus and saying, "Immobulus!"

Severus suddenly finds himself hit by ice that freezes him to the ground. But with hand still in hand, he points his wand down as fire erupts from the tip of his wand towards Rowan. While Rowan deflects the flames, Severus has time to escape from the ice.

The two continue in this fashion at a stalemate until they are both panting and exhausted. Still neither of them refuses to lose the duel until Rowan points her wand and says, "Diffindo!"

Severus's eyes widen at the severing charm headed for him, and casts the Shield Charm, "Protego!" The cutting charm flashes away into the stones to suddenly a blast of flames hit the charm obscuring Rowan from view.

With the flames gone, Severus raises his eyes to find that Rowan is gone from view. Without any hesitation he sends a wandless spell behind him forcing Rowan back. A grunt of pain can be heard, but suddenly he finds himself flat on his face as his wand clatters onto the floor.

There loud pants can be heard echoing in the chamber as Reginald says, "You both lost."

"Why?" Severus panted as Rowan is laying on the ground not too far away in exhaustion.

"The two of you fought for so long now you are out of stamina," Reginald matter-of-factly explained. "When dueling you will not always be fighting against one individual at a time but rather multiple. If you used all your power to defeat only a single enemy than the next enemy will easily cut, you down."

Reginald furrows his brow and says, "Both of you did well in using wordless magic it saves time and energy, but your wand movements are much too big and wastes precious. But more importantly, why did the two of you drop your shield spells?"

"He was getting closer," Rowan gasped tiredly. "I knew he was going to try break the shield, so I thought to put space between us."

"Not a bad idea," Reginald admitted. "However, Severus is not attacking you with curses or dark hexes. You never drop a shield until your opponent is in range, and Severus was not. Now you've wasted precious time and energy, which you could have used."

Before Severus can even gloat, Reginald whirls around. "And you, Severus, you have everything on your side, but still you do not take your sister serious. However, she does, have you not noticed the spells she has been using against you?"

Severus reluctantly nods his head as Reginald pointedly says, "Then stop playing around! Take her out because she won't hesitate to do so!"

Seeing that they look rather tired now, Reginald says, "Go wash up for dinner. I will expect the both of you in here after lunch tomorrow. You will practice dueling against me."

Both Severus and Rowan go entirely pale as Reginald calmly adds, "And I won't be going easy on either of you two. Defend yourselves, seriously."

Rowan and Severus can only groan in pain as they unsteadily climb back to their feet to make their way upstairs. Limping and rather bruised they make their ways upstairs for a hot bath, and to raid the medicine cabinet. They would each be taking a pain potion as well as a muscle relieving one. They had the feeling they were going to need it.