Meddle Not In The Affairs Of Dragons

This is the first part to a challenge i was set by Turathionen and is different to what i would normally write. It was inspired by a picture by Mad Carrot (deviant art) of Walden Macnair getting Pwned by a dragon. Now come the disclaimers and foremost, the WARNINGS

There will be slash and Charlie Weasley WILL be involved. This is the precursor to it mostly to ease myself into it. Somehow, i know it will end up fluffy beyond belief...sigh...i will try.

Chapter 1

The pain in his shoulder was white hot agony, lancing down his back and up his neck in a fresh wave of torment with the slightest of movements. Feverish sweat already dampened his brow, dappled his top lip and shivered down his muscular torso. He had bound it as best he could with the charred scraps of his shirt, having lost his wand to the consuming flames of the foul tempered dragon now roaring it's displeasure to the cloud-scudded skies. Crimson blood left a strange sheen on the black cloth, damp patches appearing where he perspired. Slumped against a rough cave wall his over-sensitive flesh could pick out every lump and pitfall in the pock-marked rock, the drying line of blood where a needle-fine point had stabbed at him, the grazes twinging along his ribs.

His boots felt too tight as his pulse thundered through his feet, his wrists and head, adrenalin still traversing the organic pathways. The loss he had endured so far was apparent by the dark stains congealing on the igneous cave floor and sticking the make-shift banadage to his pallid skin. Breathing was becoming difficult. It was laboured and erratic, and each floundering gasp reawakened numbing injuries. His vision was clouding at the edges though whether from losing pints of blood or through the dying sunlight he was not sure.

For once in his life, Walden Macnair felt a prickle in his stomach, a fluttering of chilly fingers running down his spine. For once in his life, he knew what it was to truly feel fear. This was going to be the end for him, to die alone in a hole of some unknown rockface.

A part of his mind hoped it would come quietly, black out and go in his sleep. He doubted that he would be that lucky however. There was one thing Macnair's were and that was stubborn. His body would hold out and he would stay deleriously lucid, aware of every single twitch and complaint it made only to be consumed by fever and lack of nourishment. At thirty-five he was in the prime of his life, strapping and healthy, at least he had been until his encounter with the sharp barb of the bull Horntail.

As the day darkened, so too did his thoughts sway. He was not only alone in person but his imagined escapings. He had no-one to return home to, nothing to stay alive for save for his own phobia of death. He had his share of lovers, true enough, non-commitent and easy to forget which had been perfect, at the time. Now he found himself wishing he had a partner to miss, a wife to leave and know he would be immortalised in whatever children they had, his biological legacy. In the very least, an embrace he could think of in his final moments, a kiss, a whispered name.

Swallowing a lump in his throat, Macnair trembled. Lonliness left a bitter taste in his mouth and a knot of slime in his stomach, oily and cold. No-one would remember the kilted bounty hunter, the executioner and valiant death-eater he had been. No-one would remember the nights drinking, the feel of his fist when he was angry or the passionate hunger he tried in vain to feed with women.

A strangled whimper left his despairing lips, mingling with ever-distant pain. His sight had become hazy and he could make out less of his surroundings. His head felt heavy with the dull throb heralding illness. No longer could he hear the bone-quaking roars of the reptile outside. His eyes slipped closed.

-

When he came back into consciousness, he was aware of an ache in his lower back where he lacked support from where he was lying. The pain had subsided in his injuries however, remaining at a dull throb. His head felt a little clearer too though his throat burned with thirst, his lips cracked and dry. In all he decided he was better than he had been, either that or close to the end. He was undecided however, whether he should open his eyes or not.

It was warmer now, so it must be day time, but what light he could see through his lids was muted. Then what had he expected in a cave? The dragon was still out there too, flapping its great wings, probably still searching for him. He supressed a shiver. To know your last moments would be at the merciless teeth of a dragon was something he could not bare to think of and was one of the main reasons he hadn't crawled outside to end his suffering that and not being able to move.

"...not yet..." the words pierced his awarenes from somewhere to his left but the rest was lost in the dragon's wing-beats. A thought crossed his mind that he might be delerious still. "...what was...there...unauthori-..."

Macnair tried to open his eyes but found them to be heavy and took more effort than he would have liked. His vision was still bleary but not tinted with the glow from the cave entrance. He groaned as it stung his awareness, making him scowl and pulling at the cuts on his face. He drew in a breath with a hiss. The sounds of conversation stopped.

He tensed, listening, straining his ears. His mind was running at top speed, wondering if there were people and if they had gone, not knowing he was there. All he could hear was the dragon and it renewed the despair that had lulled him into fevered sleep. His eyes closed again.

-

"...you awake?" Macnair jerked awake, his eyes wide and immediately wished he hadn't. The voice beside him was definately not his imagination and was to be identified imediately. Though his shoulder screamed at him and his various wounds complained he turned as best he could to see what it was. "Good," It stated.

"Wha..." Walden began. His voice was croaky, as if it hadn't been used for some time.

"Don't try to move," The person used a pleasantly cool hand to gently urge him back to his lying position. The flapping had stopped. Hope surged through him then, safe in the knowledge he had been found, he had been rescued from the grasping hands of death. Obediently, Macnair lay back. He still couldn't see clearly but it didn't matter, this person did not seem threatening, a welcome relief after the Horntail.

"You were pretty bad when I found you, you need to take it easy," The voice was calm and laced with the dusky tones, soothing although Macnair would have been happy to see the pompous ass Lucius Malfoy at that moment. See. He couldn't see who it was. There was dim light seeping through but he could make nothing out. Panic began to snatch at him.

"I can't-" He tried to raise his hands but found others restraining him easily. Weakness and fatigue prevented the bounty hunter from putting up a fight and instead he resorted to trying to speak with a burning throat. "My...my eyes," Ravaged vocal chords protested at the strain on them though it failed to stop the tremour in them.

"They were smoke damaged, Dragon's fire can do that if you get too close," And that seemed to alleviate all fears. Macnair couldn't explain it but he trusted this person. Whoever it was had already saved his bacon and was now tending to his wounds with practised hands, so far as he could tell anyway. They were moving somewhere around his shoulder, undoing bindings, Macnair assumed. A moment later proved him right as he felt the bandage loosen and then the cold touch of metal as a pair of scissors brushed his arm to start cutting it away.

He heard the sound of metal on wood as the tools were put down to one side and then tensed as the same gentle hand as before slipped beneath his neck. "Take it easy, i'm going to use magic to raise you up a bit so i can clean your shoulder." To acquiesce, Macnair twitched his head and forced himself to relax.

It was the strangest sensation, tingling down his back and setting every hair on edge and very slowly he felt himself lift from the bed pallet and the bandage was removed with such care, it tugged at heart-strings he thought to be stone clad. Why should this person care for him so well after everything he had done?