Felix remained standing in front of the enormous collection, his hand resting lightly against the ancient book he had just unlocked.
The faint green glow that had traveled through the shelf had faded, leaving the library silent once more.
For several seconds, he simply stared at the volume in front of him, wondering what exactly Andros Falker had considered important enough to preserve.
His eyes moved across the shelves.
There was an almost overwhelming amount of knowledge here, but Felix knew better than to start pulling books at random.
He had been given access to the High Library for a reason, and while Cassandra’s collection was undoubtedly fascinating, there were certain subjects he had no business exploring yet.
Dark magic, especially, was not something he wanted to experiment with at eleven years old simply because he happened to have access to the writings of one of the most knowledgeable dark witches in Falker history.
He glanced toward Cassandra’s shelves, and for a moment he let himself imagine it.
It would be easy enough.
The books were right there.
Nobody would stop him.
His parents had given him access, and the doors had opened for him, and if he simply walked over and pulled one down, no one would ever know.
He could skip the foundations entirely and go straight to the advanced material, and by the time he reached Hogwarts, he would already know things most seventh-years didn’t.
He shook his head and turned away from Cassandra’s collection.
That was exactly the kind of thinking that got people killed.
He knew it from the books he had read in his previous life — knew it from every story where a talented young wizard decided he was ready for more than he could handle and paid for it.
Dark magic was not dangerous because it was forbidden.
It was dangerous because it worked, and because it was patient, and because it had a way of making the people who used it believe they were still in control long after they had stopped being so.
At eleven years old, with a wand he had not yet received, he was not ready for any of it.
He could admit that to himself without shame.
Andros first.
Cassandra later, when he had earned the right to read her work and the discipline to survive it.
Dueling, however, was different.
That was something Felix could study safely.
It was something his family had always valued, something his father had already begun teaching him in the dueling hall, and something he would need no matter what else he learned.
Every Falker generation had developed its skills through disciplined practice and accumulated knowledge, and if Andros’s writings contained techniques that were far beyond anything taught to a first-year at Hogwarts, then that was exactly where Felix needed to start.
He carefully pulled the book from the shelf.
The cover was dark and surprisingly plain, with no title written across it.
When he opened it, the first page contained a handwritten inscription.
To the next Falker who seeks understanding rather than power.
Felix’s eyebrows rose.
Beneath the sentence was a name.
Andros Falker.
He turned the page.
The following chapters were not spells or advanced magical techniques.
Instead, Andros had written extensively about the foundations of dueling.
Footwork came first, followed by wand positioning, balance, reaction time, defensive awareness, and the importance of maintaining control under pressure.
Felix read several pages standing where he was before realizing he had been in the same position for several minutes.
He eventually found a section devoted specifically to basic dueling principles, and that caught his attention immediately.
The notes explained that inexperienced duelists often focused too heavily on their offensive spells.
Andros argued that a duel was rarely decided simply by who knew the most powerful spell.
Positioning, timing, observation, and the ability to recognize an opponent’s intentions were just as important.
Felix read the paragraph twice.
That made sense.
Even in the magical world, fighting was still fighting.
Knowing what an opponent could do mattered, but knowing when they were going to do it mattered more.
He continued reading.
Andros’s handwriting was remarkably neat considering the age of the notes, and his explanations were surprisingly direct.
Rather than simply recording spells, he explained why certain techniques worked, where they failed, and how an opponent could exploit predictable movements.
Felix became increasingly absorbed.
He eventually found an entire section titled The First Principles of the Duelist.
It covered stance, movement, casting speed, defensive positioning, wand angles, awareness of surroundings, and the importance of never allowing an opponent to dictate the rhythm of a fight.
Felix slowly smiled.
This was exactly what he had been looking for.
He closed the book and looked back at the shelves.
There were dozens of other volumes nearby, but Felix knew he could not possibly carry the entire collection back to his room.
After a moment of consideration, he searched through the surrounding shelves until he found several thinner notebooks containing Andros’s personal notes on foundational dueling.
These were different from the larger historical volumes.
They appeared to have been written during Andros’s own studies and training, filled with diagrams, observations, corrections, and brief explanations.
Felix carefully gathered the notebooks together.
When he reached for the final one, a small green rune appeared on its spine, and the book warmed beneath his fingers.
Felix glanced toward the library entrance, but nothing happened.
Apparently, the library itself had decided he was allowed to borrow it.
“Thanks,” Felix muttered.
He tucked the notebooks securely beneath his arm and made his way back through the library.
The doors opened for him without resistance, and Felix stepped into the corridor carrying what might have been the most valuable collection of dueling notes he had ever encountered.
He had every intention of returning them.
Eventually.
By the time Felix reached his room, his curiosity had become impossible to ignore.
He placed the notebooks carefully on his desk, pulled out the first one, and opened it to the beginning.
He expected to spend an hour or two studying.
That expectation lasted approximately ten minutes.
The first notebook contained explanations of basic stance and movement, but Andros approached each subject with a level of detail Felix had never encountered before.
A simple step forward was not merely a step.
It affected balance, casting angle, reaction time, and the amount of space available for a defensive movement.
Even the position of the wand arm could influence how quickly a spell could be cast or how easily an opponent could predict the direction of an attack.
Felix began taking notes of his own.
He copied diagrams onto parchment, then added small observations beside them.
When he encountered something he did not fully understand, he reread the relevant section until the explanation made sense.
Hours passed without him noticing.
Eventually, a tray of food appeared beside his desk.
Felix stared at it.
He had no idea when it had arrived.
He looked toward the window and realized that the afternoon had already begun fading into evening.
“That was fast.”
He ate without leaving his chair, then returned to the notebook.
The second volume went deeper into defensive movement and reaction.
Andros emphasized that a defensive spell should never be treated as an excuse to remain stationary.
A shield could stop an attack, but movement could prevent the attack from reaching its intended target in the first place.
Felix found himself rereading that section several times.
It was almost the opposite of the way many fictional duels were portrayed in the books and films he remembered from his previous life.
Here, dueling was not about standing in one place and trading increasingly powerful spells.
It was about controlling space, forcing mistakes, recognizing patterns, and constantly adapting.
The more Felix read, the more he understood why Andros’s notes had survived for so many generations.
They were not simply instructions.
They were a way of thinking.
Felix continued through the night.
The next morning, he woke at his desk with his head resting against an open notebook.
He blinked several times before remembering where he was.
Instead of going back to sleep, he straightened the papers, picked up his quill, and continued from where he had stopped.
The pattern repeated itself over the following days.
Breakfast became something he rushed through.
Lunch was occasionally forgotten entirely until someone reminded him to eat.
Felix spent his mornings and afternoons studying Andros’s notes, occasionally returning to the High Library to find another volume that answered a question raised by his previous reading.
He began discovering references between the notebooks.
One explanation would mention a principle explored in another volume, which would lead him to another shelf and another set of notes.
What had started as a single book had become an entire chain of discoveries.
Felix never touched the darker sections of the library.
Whenever his curiosity brought him near Cassandra’s collection, he reminded himself that there was plenty of time for difficult subjects later.
For now, he wanted to understand the fundamentals properly rather than rushing toward dangerous magic simply because it was available.
By the time he returned to his room again, several piles of parchment had accumulated across his desk.
Felix barely noticed.
He sat beneath the warm light of the lamp with one of Andros’s notebooks open before him, his quill resting beside his hand.
The room had become quiet, the rest of the manor distant enough that he could concentrate completely.
He reached the final pages of one section and slowly turned the page.
Another set of notes waited beyond it.
Felix leaned closer, his emerald eyes moving across Andros’s handwriting as he began reading the next lesson.
For the moment, Hogwarts, his wand, Diagon Alley, and everything waiting for him in September could wait.
Felix had found something far more interesting, and he had no intention of stopping anytime soon.