Barry gave a sly smille even Cela couldn`t distract him from this now, well perhaps she could, but it was something else "Don`t expect me to be easy on you" he said drawing his wand and he stood back to back to Chalice took three steps and then said "Now we duel! Remember the sheild charm!" he called as he sent the jelly legs jinx over his head.

"Protego!" Chalice yelled as Barry jinxed her. Just a minute too late, she fell to the ground. "Impedimenta!" she shot at him.

Kayla walked into the duelling arena, dumped her bag on one of the benches and strode into the middle of the arena, wand in hand. She checked her watch and realised that she was a little early but she was excited about this duel. Copernicus, had been the only person to give her some real competition and so that is why she had asked him to partner her as part of their homework.

"Am I late?" Copernicus glanced at his own watch as he entered the arena and dropped his bag. He had wanted to be early... oh well. "Nice to see you again, Prefect Winters. I'm looking forward to this rematch. I... must apologize for my terrible behavior the last time we met."

Kayla turned to face Copernicus and she smiled, "No you're right on time and you can just call me Kayla." Being called Prefect Winters all the time seem to unnerve her a little. "I am rather looking forward to this re-match myself" she agreed. "And it is I that should apologise to you, I was way out of line with what I said" Kayla moved forward and held out her hand, "No hard feelings?"

"No hard feelings," he agreed, taking her hand and shaking. "And to be fair... there was probably some truth to that. But let's just let it be." He let go of her hand and smiled sheepishly. "So we're going to practice focused shield spells?"

Kayla returned his shake and opened her mouth to say something but decided against it. "As you wish" she replied. Yep liking someone was never just that simple. She took a step back from him, "Yes we are and it's actually not as hard as I thought. So long as you concentrate, it's really quite simple and effective. So do you want to defend or attack first?"

"Ladies first, of course," he bowed before striking up a dueling pose, his arm in front of him and his leg forward for balance. "Be gentle. I'm still so young and innocent."

Kayla raised her wand and stood in her defensive stance also. "Yeah riiiight" she scoffed, giving him a small wink. She made a small X movement, concentrating on sending the trip jinx to Cope's right.

"Protego!" Copernicus flicked his wrist and created a small shield, less than half a foot across. It was rather a good one, although he'd want to try again with a non-verbal casting once Winters had gone. The spell cast harmlessly to her left.

He followed that up with a small x-shaped motion of his own, sending a Babbling Hex her way.

Ah...he's still as good as ever. "I see you got your wand fixed" she remarked never taking her eyes off Cope for a moment, watching where he directed his wand next. "Protego" she murmured, casting the shield charm directly at the oncoming hex and was pleased to see that she had successfully blocked his hex with only a two foot radius.

Giving her wand a quick wave and directing it at Cope's knees, Kayla sent the Sponge-knees curse towards him.

Oh, a challenge. Excellent. Copernicus focused on wordless casting, dropping his arm just wider than a ninety-degree angle against his body so he could cast downward. Wow, that was harder than it looked. The shield was a bit bigger and more unwieldy than he'd intended, but he was happy to have created a shield at all. The spell zinged wildly.

"Nice cast, Kayla! Now where did you learn to hex like that?" He lifted his wand and pointed it at her non-wand side arm. With a flick of his wrist and a "Confringo!", he changed up at the last moment, sending the blast toward her wand side shoulder instead. He tried to remember what they'd learned about how the spell would move based on where he pointed.

Kayla was concentrating so hard that she thought she might just pop a vessel from the strain of it. Copernicus, had managed once again to block her curse and she was rather pleased that this was turning into a real competition.

"My grandmother taught me lots of things" she answered, watching Cope's wand at all times. He pointed to her left and she was almost tempted to release her grandfather's wand from her wrist sheath but decided that would probably be cheating. She waited on tenterhooks for his next spell and when it came it was heading for her right hand and she quickly changed direction of her wand movement and cast the shield charm just in time. But it was larger than her first and decidedly weaker but it held nevertheless.

Flicking her wand towards Cope, she aimed at his heart. "Confundo" she cried and just like he did, she changed direction at the last minute and flicked her wand towards his head.

He tried the Protego non verbally again, aiming it back at her this time. This time, his spell was nice and tightly focused, and he had a feeling she'd at least have a little trouble from it. He followed it up with a swift bout of Twitchy Ears.

Kayla too cast a shield charm at his oncoming one and although she was focused, his shield was really strong and it shattered hers and pushed her back a couple of steps. She growled softly in frustration and concentrated really hard as she cast another shield charm to block his oncoming hex. This time her shield blocked his hex and it remained tightly in that one spot.

She waved her wand again and sent a stinging hex to his left and then with another quick flick of her wand she sent the babbling curse to his right.

cedric went to the dueling arena and he said

Woohoo! A challenge! He stepped into the spells, casting a small shield to block the stinging hex and then shifted the shield to block Kayla's Babbling hex. It was a close call, but he blocked it. "Perhaps we are evenly matched, Kayla."

Maybe so, but he wouldn't throw down arms first. "Confundo!"

"Perhaps" Kayla agreed. But he was going to have to carry her out of here before she gave up this duel. And although she hated her grandmother and everything she had done, it was her voice that echoed instructions in Kayla's head at that very moment.

She moved forward and raised her wand and cast her shield in that one spot that his spell came to her and she pushed the shield back towards him with all her force and she raised her wand one again, pointing it towards his stomach and cast the hurling hex towards him. With a quick X motions of her wand, she sent the jelly-legs jinx to the left and just as quickly again she sent another babbling curse to his left.

Copernicus figured they were done with the focused shield charms, so he opted instead to drop to a crouch and let the spells zing past him. He wasn't too proud to dodge and save his strength. As soon as the spells passed, he flicked his wand, sending a Rictumsempra and the ropes from an Incarcerous at her. No holds barred.

"Oi Kettleburn, that's cheating!" Kayla exclaimed as she watched him duck her spells. So obviously the homework part of this duel had just gone out the window and quite frankly she couldn't be happier, now she could really move around. "Impedimentia" she cried, slowing down both of his spells, she deftly moved aside. Pointing her wand at the ground near his feet, Kayla sent the reducto spell at the floor and then she crouched low as well and flicked her wand casting the hair thickening charm at him.

Copernicus grinned fiercely as he stepped back to block her casting. She was fast... should have been a Ravenclaw. He handled the first spell by stepping out of its path while he blocked the second with a shield. This was absolutely exhilarating, but...

"Winters! What do you say we call a truce? I want to talk to you about Toussaints." He held his wand in front of him to indicate he wasn't done fighting until she agreed to the truce.

Bugger!! He had blocked her spells once again, he was the most competitive person besides herself that she had ever met aaaaaand it was bloody fantastic!!

Wait! What? A truce? Kayla lowered her wand a fraction and she eyed Copernicus warily wondering if he was underhanded enough to hex her while her defences were down. OMG!! He wanted to talk to her about the Toussaints, oh well now this was very interesting indeed. "Truce it is then" she said walking over to him slowly and eyeing him with curiosity. "What is it you want to know exactly?" Oh please, please don't ask her for advice on how to woo Cela, because Nico would definitely throttle her if he found out.

"Uh..." He glanced around. "Has she talked to you about kissing and candy?" He was going to have to obliviate himself later over this whole conversation.

Oh yes this was going to be one of those conversations. "Er...well yes sort of." Oh that it explained it all Winters. "She asked me what it was like to...um...kiss..."Kayla was about to say Nico and then thought better of it..."someone and I sort of gave her an explanation and she compared it to candy." She was pretty sure that's how the conversation went. "Don't tell me she asked you the same thing?" When that girl did her research on something, she went all out.

"Erm... she told me about her hypothesis," Copernicus agreed. "And I told her it was a shame it wasn't one she could test because she has a boyfriend and you only kiss one person at a time. But she said she was going to find... volunteers..." He looked distinctly uncomfortable. "I'm obviously just worried about Plymouth in all this," he added in a hurry.