The Duelling Club

Harry unwittingly uses Parseltongue to talk to a snake in front of the whole school; the Hufflepuffs in particular are now entirely convinced he’s the heir of Salazar Slytherin.

There is a huge turnout for the first and only meeting of Lockhart’s duelling club. Snape is also there to help Lockhart demonstrate and instruct. After Snape handily disarms Lockhart, the students are paired off the practice disarming each other. Snape pairs Harry and Draco. Malfoy is quicker to cast the Disarming Spell, but Harry retaliates with a Tickling Charm. Lockhart starts asking the boys to stop, but Draco casts Tarantallegra on Harry before Snape breaks up the fight. Then Snape “volunteers” Harry and Draco when Lockhart decides to teach the students how to block spells. While Lockhart ineptly tries to tell Harry how to block, Snape whispers something to Malfoy that makes them both smile. Then Draco conjures a big black snake, which looks about to attack Justin Finch-Fletchley after Lockhart makes it angry in a pathetic attempt at getting rid of it. On impulse, Harry tells the snake to stop. He is surprised when it does, but relieved and expects Justin to feel similarly. Instead, Justin gets upset and leaves. Snape vanishes the snake. Harry realized that everyone is shocked and frightened. Totally bewildered, Harry is ushered out of the Great Hall by Ron (CS11).

Other sparring pairs:

• Hermione and Millicent Bulstrode end up in a physical, wandless fight. (This is when Hermione gets the hair for her Polyjuice Potion.)
• Ron’s broken wand produces some effect that causes Seamus Finnigan to blanch.
• Neville and Justin Finch-Fletchley have such an intense “duel” that they both wind up lying on the floor and trying to catch their breath.

Two years later, Rita Skeeter quoted Draco Malfoy as saying that Harry had gotten angry and made the snake attack Justin (GF31).