The Sunday morning following the disastrous Quidditch match dawned with a heavy, grey sky that perfectly reflected the mood at the Slytherin table. The Great Hall was a cacophony of hushed, frantic whispers, but for once, the topic wasn't the humiliating defeat of the Snakes.
Orion sat methodically buttering a piece of toast, watching the five stages of grief play out in real-time beside him.
Draco had spent Saturday evening in absolute denial, blaming the wind, the Bludger, and a vast, anti-Slytherin conspiracy. Sunday morning brought anger, aimed primarily at the house-elves for overcooking his eggs, and bargaining, where he muttered about demanding a rematch from Madam Hooch.
But as the morning wore on, and the reality of the 150-point swing settled in, Draco finally hit acceptance. It was a painful, grudging acceptance, but it was there.
"I wasn't looking," Draco admitted quietly, staring down at his plate. His usual swagger was entirely absent. "I was too busy mocking Potter's broken arm. I had the Nimbus 2001. I was faster. And I didn't even see the Snitch."
"A humbling realization, brother," Orion said, his tone devoid of mockery. He took a bite of toast. "Hubris is a heavier anchor than gravity. You let your ego fly the broom, not your skills."
Draco's hands clenched into fists. "It won't happen again. Next time, I'm not even going to look at him. I'm going to catch the Snitch so fast he won't even know the game started."
Orion nodded approvingly. "Good. Channel that humiliation. Use it. A Malfoy learns from failure; a fool repeats it."
"He's actually growing," Sparkle's interface flashed a tiny, digital thumbs-up. "You might make a decent person out of him yet."
"Let's not get ahead of ourselves," Orion thought back dryly.
But Draco's epiphany was quickly overshadowed by the real news of the day.
Pansy Parkinson hurried down the aisle, her usually impeccable hair slightly messy, her eyes wide with terror. She practically threw herself onto the bench opposite the twins.
"Did you hear?" Pansy gasped, leaning in so close her nose almost touched the marmalade. "It's not just the cat anymore!"
The surrounding Slytherins leaned in, the Quidditch loss instantly forgotten.
"Who?" Blaise Zabini asked, his dark eyes narrowing.
"That Gryffindor first-year," Pansy whispered, shivering despite the warmth of the hall. "The one with the camera. Colin Creevey. He was found last night near the Hospital Wing. Petrified. Solid as a rock."
A heavy silence fell over their section of the table.
"Petrified," Daphne Greengrass murmured, her ice-blue eyes sweeping the hall. "Not cursed. Not hexed. Turned to stone. Just like Mrs. Norris."
"The Heir is hunting," Draco breathed, a mixture of fear and twisted excitement returning to his face. "It's really happening."
Orion kept his face perfectly impassive, chewing his toast methodically. He didn't look surprised, because he wasn't.
The timeline is holding, Orion calculated internally. Creevey is out of commission. The message is clear: this is not a prank. This is a targeted purge.
"The professors are going to panic," Theodore Nott observed quietly, pushing his plate away. "A cat is one thing. A student is an escalation they cannot ignore."
"Indeed," Orion agreed, finally entering the conversation. "Expect security to tighten. Expect curfews. And expect the faculty to realize that telling us to 'stay in our dormitories' is an insufficient defense strategy against an unknown, paralyzing entity."
"Which means...?" Sparkle prompted.
"Which means," Orion thought, a cold smile touching his lips, "they are going to try and teach us how to defend ourselves. The Dueling Club is imminent."
For the next week, the atmosphere in Hogwarts was suffocating. The corridors were patrolled constantly by anxious teachers. The students moved in tight, nervous packs. The library was packed with people researching dark curses and protective charms, though most were looking in the wrong sections.
Orion, however, was not reading about basilisks. He was preparing for a very different kind of confrontation.
He spent every available free period in his abandoned fourth-floor classroom. The heavy oak door was locked, silenced, and warded.
Inside, the room was a localized war zone.
"Expelliarmus!"
A standard, bright red jet of light shot from his Hawthorn wand, striking his battered training dummy squarely in the chest. The dummy wobbled but remained standing, its transfigured wooden wand clattering to the floor.
"Again," Orion muttered, retrieving the wand with a sharp Accio.
He had made a conscious, tactical decision. The emerald-green, serpentine Expelliarmus he had developed was a masterpiece of personalized magic—a true reflection of his perception. But it was also terrifying, highly suspicious, and screamed 'Dark Arts Prodigy'.
"If I walk onto a dueling platform and fire a green, hissing curse at a twelve-year-old," Orion reasoned to Sparkle, who was watching his form with clinical detachment, "Lockhart will probably faint, Snape will interrogate me, and Dumbledore will start checking my brain for dark secrets."
"So, you're nerfing yourself?" Sparkle asked.
"I am applying camouflage," Orion corrected, adopting a standard dueling stance. "I must appear exceptionally competent, but entirely conventional. A prodigy, yes, but a safe prodigy. Red sparks. Blue shields. Textbook execution."
He spent hours drilling the basic aesthetics of the spells, forcing his mind to perceive the magic not as a personalized extension of his will, but as a generic, rote tool. It was frustratingly restrictive—like forcing a concert pianist to play 'Chopsticks' on a toy keyboard—but it was necessary.
Between the physical training, Orion also finalized his intelligence network.
He summoned Dobby one evening, pulling the velvet curtains of his four-poster bed tight.
"Master Orion calls?" Dobby appeared, looking exhausted but fiercely determined.
"Sit, Dobby," Orion commanded softly. "We need to adjust the parameters of your surveillance on the Weasley girl."
Dobby hopped onto the end of the bed, his ears twitching. "Dobby is watching her, Master! She is very sad. She writes in a little black book all the time."
"I know," Orion said, his face grim. "That book is the weapon. But Dobby, listen to me carefully. The entity controlling her is using a beast to attack the students. A very large, very ancient serpent."
Dobby gasped. "A snake? Like the ones the bad Master Lucius talks about?" Wait, was he not aware of what was attacking the students, only that the diary was involved?
"Worse," Orion said. "If you look this snake in the eye, you die instantly. If you see its reflection, you are petrified. It is lethal."
Orion leaned forward, ensuring the elf understood the gravity of the situation.
"You are to monitor Ginny Weasley, primarily when she approaches the second-floor corridors, specifically near the out-of-order girls' bathroom. But Dobby... if you ever, ever hear a strange, echoing hissing sound... you close your eyes immediately. Do not look for the source. Do not try to fight it. You close your eyes and you pop out of there. Do you understand?"
"But the mission—!" Dobby protested weakly.
"The mission is useless if you are a statue," Orion said firmly. "Your life is more valuable than a piece of intelligence. The diary is the goal. Do not engage the snake. Promise me."
Dobby swallowed hard, nodding vigorously. "Dobby promises! Dobby will close his eyes and run!"
"Good," Orion relaxed slightly. "Now, two logistical requests."
He handed Dobby a small slip of parchment. "I need you to fetch these specific volumes from the Manor library. They are texts on magical creatures and obscure magic. My father rarely reads them; they are in the lower east wing."
"Dobby will bring them tonight!"
"And one more thing," Orion said, pulling a pouch of Galleons from his bedside table. He tossed it to the elf. "I need you to go to Diagon Alley. Go to a reputable magical tinkerer or an antique shop. I need you to purchase a Wizarding Wireless Network radio. A high-quality one."
Dobby blinked, thoroughly confused. "A radio? Master Orion wants to listen to Celestina Warbeck?"
"I have use of it," Orion smiled, a sharp, calculating glint in his eye. "Just get me the radio, Dobby."
"Dobby will buy the loudest box!" the elf declared, vanishing with a sharp crack.
Orion lay back on his pillows, staring up into the dark canopy. Plotting was so much fun.