Chapter 4

Four days later at the Dragon Reserve Charlie and the other workers had their hands full with an injured male Horntail that had just come in. some rouge trader had tried to skin it's tail, some of its scales and skin had been ripped off. The pain had made the dragon wild and the workers were having a hard time calming it down enough to treat it.

Percy leaned against the railing, watching them. Charlie had ordered him to stay a safe distance away from the dragon. So Percy watched, feeling a certain empathy with the dragon, hurt by someone simply for being who he was.

"You ok Perce?"

Percy jumped and turned. "Bill?"

"The very same." Bill smiled. "So what's going on?"

Percy looked back at the dragon. "It's hurt, they can't calm it down."

Bill nodded, glancing down to spot Charlie, then back to Perce, studying him. He seemed more relaxed, healthier. Charlie must have been feeding him up.

Percy straightened suddenly.

Bill frowned. "Perce?" he asked, reaching out.

Percy frowned deeply, staring straight at the dragon. They weren't doing it right. He quickly climbed over the railing and slid down the embankment.

"Percy!" Bill yelled, his fingers having just brushed Percy's clothes as he moved.

Charlie heard Bill's shout and glanced up, and froze when he saw Percy coming towards them and the thrashing Dragon. "Damnit Perce!" he ground out, starting towards his brother quickly.

"Hold up there Charlie!" the owner of the reserve, Vlad, said, catching his arm and pulling him back.

"That's my brother Vlad! The dragon will kill him! He's not trained!" Charlie snapped, pulling out of the grip.

Vlad grabbed him again. "Look Charlie, look at the Dragon!"

Charlie looked, only now realising that the pained wails of the dragon had eased to loud rumbling whimpers. Percy had come to stand far to close to the dragon, not even very skilled dragon tamers went that close to an injured dragon unless it was full restrained, and this dragon was anything but.

Percy stared up at the dragon. Everything had frozen for a moment, as the dragon stared back. Then the great head lowered, and the body dropped. Charlie strained forward, Bill, at the bottom of the embankment remained frozen.

The dragons head lowered until it was resting on the ground right in front of Percy, still. Percy reached forward, stroked the yellowish brown horn on its nose, and smiled.

It took a few seconds before Vlad suddenly let Charlie go. "Right, everyone, get cracking, we won't have much time!" and everyone quickly went to work restraining and healing the dragon.

Charlie bolted over to Percy, stopped cautiously just out of range of the dragon, not wanting to startle it into hurting his brother. "Percy, come here. Now!" he hissed anxiously.

Percy turned his head, saw the anger on Charlie's face and lowered his head. Giving the dragon a last pat, he turned and went to Charlie. Charlie grabbed his arm and dragged him over to Bill, far away from the dragon.

"What the hell did you think you were doing, you could have been killed! I told you to stay up there for a reason- Damnit Perce, what in the name of Merlin was going through your head!" Charlie ranted.

Percy continued to look at the ground.

Bill slowly blinked his way out of his shock.

"Perce--you could have died!" Charlie repeated. "Does that mean nothing--for Merlin's sake it's a dragon--you do not go up to a dragon like that! That was… it was… aghh!"

Bill looked at Percy, and put a hand on Charlie's shoulder to stop him. "Perce." He said when Charlie had quietened. Percy glanced up, ashamed. "Why did you do that?" he asked quietly, calmly.

"I… I had to… I just felt like I could do it…" he looked down, glancing over to the dragon, still lying as he had left it.

"Good thing to." Vlad smiled, joining them. "The tail is worse than we thought it was, any longer and we might have had to amputate it."

"Shit." Charlie muttered.

"Thanks kid, you did a good job, have you ever worked with dragons before?" Vlad asked Percy.

Percy shook his head, moving slightly closer to Bill.

Vlad looked very interested in that response, but left it at that. "Charlie, can I talk to you a minute?" he motioned they move away.

"Sure, Bill, take him back to my place, I'll be back when I can. Get him to show you his art." Charlie said, wanting to get Percy away before something like this happened again and gave him a heart attack for sure.

Bill nodded and took Percy's arm and led him away from the dragon.

"Yeah?" Charlie asked, coming to stand beside Vlad.

"He's good. He's got a natural talent with them. Not just anyone can calm an injured horntail like that. Charlie, I want you to sound him out for a job. I realise there's some issues with him, like you said before, but just sound him out, it would do the reserve good if we could have a tamer of that calibre here." Vlad said.

Charlie shook his head. "But he's… Vlad, he'd need to go through training and everything, and what if-"

"Trial by fire Charlie, almost literally. Look I realise there's the whole issue that he's your brother, but I want to give it a go. Just sound him out for me Charlie; I want him on the team." Vlad smiled. "I'm not saying he has to start immediately, after all there is that family matter you mentioned, but as soon as he can."

"Ok, I'll ask. But for the record, I don't like it." Charlie sighed.

"Good boy. Now come over here and let's get this dragon sorted." Vlad smiled.

Charlie followed. He really didn't like the idea of Percy being a dragon tamer, there were too many things that could happen that could either kill or maim him. He would be much happier with Percy in a nice safe office job… but that had proved just as dangerous in the long run, maybe worse. So Charlie would ask. But not yet, not until he knew what was going to happen about Fudge.

He arrived home two hours later to find Bill flipping through the art pad Charlie had bought for Percy, it was filled with pictures of the dragons at the reserve. Bill looked up. "Hey Charlie, Percy's making dinner, I think he's trying to make it up to you for earlier. Go talk to him Charlie, he's scared that you're really angry with him."

Charlie sighed. "I will, in a second. How'd it go with the lawyer?"

"It's going to trial, the date should come through in a little while, a week or two at most Filius said. It should be after Christmas, which is good, because I want him to have a nice Christmas before the shit starts." Bill smiled wryly. "I don't want to put him through it Charlie, but…"

"We need to get the bastard Bill, you know we do. I don't like the idea of Percy having to talk about what happened, but it's for the best, right?" Charlie looked over to the kitchen door and sighed. "I'd better go talk to him." He made his way over to the kitchen and pushed open the door.

Percy was standing by the cooker, hugging himself and watching the flames lick round the bottom of the pot.

"Hey Perce." Charlie said softly, coming to stand beside him.

Percy didn't look at him. "I'm sorry Charlie." He mumbled.

"Perce, I'm not really angry with you, it was just… well, I don't like the idea of you doing things that are dangerous, and that dragon could have killed you Perce, I just… Damnit, look, I'm sorry for yelling ok. I shouldn't have, you just scared me Perce." Charlie snaked an arm round Percy's shoulders and gave him a half hug, and peered into the pot. "So what're ya making?" he asked.

In the other room, Bill continued to flip through the art pad. He stopped at a picture, he had forgotten it even existed, he thought it had been destroyed when their first house had burned down during the first war. Maybe Charlie had it somewhere in the house, he would have to check--otherwise Percy had a photographic memory.

It was the three eldest Weasely boys, aged 10, 9 and 4, the year before Bill was to start Hogwarts; they had been down to the beach, one of the Weasely family holidays they took every summer. Bill and Charlie had just thrown Percy into the sea, and he had come back ashore, grabbed some wet sand and put it on their heads, just as the picture was taken.

Bill smiled. After that, Bill had been too caught up in school and quiddich to pay much attention to Percy. It was the picture of the last time he could really remember them being happy and together like a family.