Me and Fleur entered the Room of Requirement and I just could see Fleur’s curiosity bubbling behind me. The place is mostly the same, except that the decoration feels slightly… girly now, probably because of Fleur’s existence here.

“So this is your real nest?” Fleur asked as she looked around, touching everything she saw. She walked towards the shelves and took one of the books, reading the title.

“I wouldn’t say a manhole…” I murmured. “Besides, I just discovered it like three days ago.”

“Three days ago?” She was a bit surprised. “You mean at Halloween?”

“Well, yes…”

“So that is why I can’t find you anywhere…” She murmured, but I caught it.

“You’re looking for me?” I asked teasingly. “Why? Want to seduce me then? Show me your ‘Veela charm’?”

Fleur snorted at my jab. “Very funny.”

I chuckled at her response as I walked towards the empty spot at the corner of the room. “So a duel?”

“Well that is why I’m ‘ere I suppose.” she said, following me to the spot. “Unless… you want to do something else?” She wriggled her eyebrows towards me, trying to pull some reaction.

“Sure, let’s do it after this.” I said casually, making her actually surprised.

“W-What?” she stuttered, stepping back a little.

I raised my eyebrow, it appears she never really had any experience with this. “What do you mean? You're the one who initiated it.”

“I-I was joking!” she refuted, blushing heavily apparently.

“Don’t worry, we’re all alone here Fleur.” I smirked evilly, making her shiver at the sight.

She gulped a bit, but her face eventually turned to a frown. Without warning, she took out her wand, and shot a nonverbal spell towards me. The spell pushed me back a couple of feet, hitting the wall behind me.

Damn that hurts. I’m massaging my back because of the impact and I heard a crack… but it’s nothing I guess… “I deserve that…” I murmured.

“Not funny.” Fleur snorted as she helped me stand up. “Any bones broken?”

“I don’t think so…” I said, stretching my body. Some bones snapped to the right place, and boom, back to normal. “Sorry about that, I’ll never say it again, I promise.”

Fleur just nodded meekly as she went back to her spot. “Ready?” she pointed her wand at me again, preparing for a duel.

“Shouldn’t we bow first?” I said with a smirk, which made her snort. We both bowed at each other rather half-heartedly, and took a stance.

It's time to d-d-d-d-d-d-d-duel!

Okay that’s not funny…

Fuck I’ve never done this before… Whitlock, help me here mate, this is supposed to be your problem!

“No referee?” I jokingly asked because I was nervous, but suddenly, a bloody magical puppet came out of the wall, great… The puppet looked at the two of us like a robot, and raised its hand, signifying the start of the duel.

“Expelliarmus!” Fleur shouted, a bright red light shot through the air towards me. On instinct, I just raised my wand in defense, and apparently I conjured a shield charm accidentally, nice one Whitlock…

I could see Fleur’s eyes went wide, surprised about my accidental magic, she’s probably going to try harder huh…

“Stupefy!” I countered. The spell shot through the air and almost hit Fleur, but she avoided it.

“Flipendo!” she casted back.

“Protego!” I defended myself, blocking Fleur’s spell. “Petrificus Totalus!”

Fleur quickly blocked it and seemed like she was serious right now. Oh fuck… she raised her wand again, and started blasting spells at me, nonverbally… a barrage of spells with various colours. What the fuck man… What did I do to deserve this…

I desperately block every spell that Fleur casted. I was so overwhelmed that I even started to step back from the empty spot, towards the library behind me.

“Stupefy! Flipendo! Rictumsempra! Mimble Wimble! Impedimenta!—” Fleur kept casting spells towards me, she’s casting spells more than she said it, moving her wand like a true dueller. Fuck, this is no joke, I might pass out from exhaustion because of blocking the spells she’s throwing at me. I could feel that I’m starting to sweat as I cast Protego repeatedly, verbally and nonverbally alike.

I started to think rapidly as my adrenaline pushed me through this. I kept stepping back, and Fleur seemed like she wasn’t stopping unless I gave up, a strong headed woman…

I looked around to the shelves, and I suddenly had this stupid and destructive idea popped into my head, I could probably mess with Fleur with it as well.

“Titillando! Colloshoo!—” I’m starting to hear spells that I didn’t even know, at this point I just believe that Fleur just wants to say every spell she knows.

I started to back off again, positioning myself in between two rows of shelves. Fleur just kept casting sort of harmless spells towards me, and I could feel the strength of her spells started to weaken.

So I quickly started my plan. I conjured a stronger version of Protego so it could block more spells, and I pointed my wand at the shelves.

“Depulso!”

A banishing charm, not strong enough to knock back the shelves, but strong enough to push the books out of the shelves, scattering all over the place. As Fleur realized that, it was already too late. The books fell towards her, disorienting her completely.

As I could hear her girly shriek, I pointed my wand at her. “Aqua Eructo!”

A strong jet of water shot through the air from my wand, soaking Fleur completely, and she shrieked even louder at the cold touch of the water.

“Merde! Why did you do that!?” She complained loudly as the water jet calmed down, she had fallen down to the ground, I could see the books around me already gone from the banishing spells, and the place was soaking wet.

“That is what I should ask you!” I complained back. “Do you want to kill me, woman!? I’m a bloody student! Not some professional dueler!”

“It is a duel Archibald, if you cannot take it, just give up.” she refuted. “I wanted to hold back, but it seems you are more capable than you show yourself to be.”

“Well great, we just destroyed the library.” I grumbled as I walked to her, helping her to stand up from the wet tile.

“That is your fault, I have no fault in this.” she huffed, slowly standing up.

“You pushed me to the library.” I said in a deadpan expression.

“If you would just give up, this would not happen.” she defended.

“You seemed awfully adamant on forcing me to give up.” I pointed out. “It’s rather petty that you beat up a boy that is 3 years younger than you.”

“A boy that is to become my husband.” she raised her eyebrow. Okay, that’s a good point…

I just sighed. I looked at her, her robe was soaked, and I could see the silk clothing hugging her body, revealing her curves.

“Like what you see, Archibald?” she snorted in amusement as she quickly dried herself with magic, show’s over… As she tidied her robe, she finally relented. “Fine, I am sorry, I have pushed you too far. Veela are passionate and fiery creatures, so I usually overreact to these sorts of things.”

I just smirked at her as I patted her shoulder. “Apology accepted.” After that, I walked past her and I could hear her huffing in annoyance. “Help me tidy this mess please.” I said without looking back.

“No, do it yourself.” she snorted, walking quicker than me, only to sit on the sofa, warming herself up over the fire.

I just sighed and quickly picked up the books one by one, using both magic and my hand. As I slowly filled the shelves again, I encountered a peculiar book.

Ancient Bloodlines

I looked over the cover, it was plain and probably over 100 years old as the parchments were dirty. I took it and skimmed through it, I saw the Gaunt name, the Peverell name, the Dumbledore name… this sounds interesting…

Are you intentionally showing me this Room? Or am I just lucky?

I put the book aside to read after this and quickly put the books back. Thankfully none of it got wet because I used the banishment charm and it got thrown off quite far away…

When the book had been tidied up, I grabbed the book that I saved and walked towards the sofa. I sat down, crossed my legs, and opened the book.

I checked the family name list, and boom, I saw ‘Whitlock’ on one of the entries. I quickly searched the memory of Whitlock and saw that he doesn’t know a lot of things about his family… There are no memoirs of anything that can make him catch up, and his parents died when he was really little. There are a lot of paintings of the family, even a family tree, but he didn’t know the history of the family specifically.

“What are you reading?” Fleur suddenly asked me.

I turned around a bit, she was now sitting beside me, and her face was really close, peeking at the book. “Family history apparently.”

“House of Whitlock history?” she repeated, and I just hummed.

I turned the page to the Whitlock entry and read it:

House of Whitlock is a pureblood family that is originally from France. They had come to Britain in the early 1890s, settling in the highlands of Scotland. The Whitlocks quickly became one of the most powerful families in Britain as they had brought their wealth from France and started many successful businesses. They are particularly famous for making unique locks that cannot be opened using simple spells, and the now long-lost protection necklace that is highly valuable in the Modern Pureblood community.

Similar to the Gaunts’ ability to speak to snakes, and the Dumbledores’ connection to Phoenixes, Any Whitlock is immune to mental abilities such as Legilimency and the Imperius curse, and they have an almost impenetrable mind shield that will protect their minds until their deaths, there are rumors that every Whitlock members are natural-born Occlumens, and that is not far from the truth…

Huh…

“That explains why you are immune to Veela’s allure.” Fleur suddenly commented and I could feel her breath touching my skin.

“And why I could arrange memories easily…” I murmured to myself.

“What?” Fleur questioned, unable to hear my words.

“Nothing.” I said, closing the book, making Fleur back off a bit. “It’s almost evening, we should get going.”

“I’m famished… we skipped lunch didn’t we?” she said as she stood up, stretching her body in front of me. “At this point, I can just devour ‘ogwarts’ greasy food…”

“You’ll get fat.” I said casually, putting the book on the couch and walked towards the door.

Fleur frowned. “Excuse me?” 

“Nothing.” I hummed, opening the door to the corridor. Fleur rushed towards me, following me outside.

“No, I heard you loud and clear.” she said accusingly.

“What did I say?” I asked innocently.

“You said that I will get fat.” she narrowed her eyes, following me.

“I didn’t say that.” I shrugged.

“You did!”

“You’re imagining things Fleur.” I rolled my eyes, amused by the situation, it’s fun doing this to be honest…

“I will get you later for this.” she huffs, and she just continued to follow me downstairs, towards the Great hall for dinner.