Life for Harry at this moment was probably as bad as his best day in Gringotts. He was lame, the dragon was lame, and they were both in foul moods to the point they weren't even looking at each other. Harry sat against a tree with a small fire crackling and burning by his side. The smell of fresh wood was relaxing, and he watched the smoke float through the trees and out of sight. The heavy mist continued to blanket them, and stilled the air so not even birds made a sound.
He hadn't taken more than a dozen steps since their crash yesterday morning. Neither were capable of leaving their thicket of trees to go find food, so for a day and for half they starved. Harry was ready to start munching on twigs like the dragon was doing, but he just settled for ignoring the pain in his stomach as well as from his feet.
He tended his wounds the best way he knew how. When locked up and Voldemort's curses would cause him harm – or when he'd just gotten too close to the fire – he'd press his wounds against the cold metal wall or floor and wait for the swelling or burn to subside. He had an unfortunately large amount of snow to work with now, but even so, he wasn't ready to start doing more than hobble on the edges of his feet.
He wished he had shoes – for the thousandth time he wished that. And a coat.
Nothing really caught his attention about the dragon smoothly lifting its head and staring off into the black woods. He never would have noticed if the atmosphere weren't so silent that he could hear the scrape of the dragon's scales against each other. He looked over and saw the great white beast seeming intent, ears perked and forward facing.
He arched his neck around the tree trunk and looked behind where the dragon stared.
Nothing.
He didn't have an idea about what could have wakened the dragon from its rest.
He turned back to staring at his fire, and then he saw that standing right there on the other side of it was a great large arachnid.
His heart absolutely stopped. His body wouldn't move.
Shhhhhpppt! Shhpppt! Shhpppt! Sounded the furry black spider's massive pincers.
When Harry blinked, the spider leapt with all eight legs forward over the fire and onto his chest.
"AAAHHHHHH – !"
Immediately fire lit the gloomy woods and blasted heat into the chilled air. The gust of wind from it tousled every leaf on every tree nearby, sending thousands of them scattering to the forest floor. Spiders had jumped the dragon and it had lit the world up!
Harry was on his back fighting off the arachnid. Its pincers were inches from his neck, but Harry took his cue and exploded it into ashes with fire of his own. He rolled onto his stomach and crawled on his hands and knees over the expanse to the dragon.
He saw at least a dozen spiders already charred on the ground, and dozens more were scurrying around to avoid the dragon's flames or attacking tale. When they spotted Harry with their many eyes, they charged him. Those who got too close were dispatched like the others; the arachnids hadn't expected him to breathe fire as well.
"We have to get out of here!" Harry shouted.
Crawling wouldn't cut it; he took to his feet and covered the distance to the dragon easily. By his side, Harry did what he could to crawl up its leg to its back. The spiders had flanked them and they were now surrounded.
"Can you fly?" Harry asked, bellowing fire onto the many that were jumping to get him.
It was belatedly he remembered he had two goblin wands in his pocket, and now he grabbed one out and fired curses all around the dragon to protect them.
The dragon kept swiping its tail and breathing fire all around, and when one spider leapt high into the air it snapped its jaws around it, splaying Harry with red blood. Three of the spiders great legs and its head fell far below to the burning ground.
"Yes, I can fly!" The dragon grunted and growled. "But I'm hungry!"
And with that, it swallowed the arachnid it had chomped.
Harry held tightly to the dragon's spines and watched it swallow two more spiders that were leaping through the air.
"We have to go!" He yelled urgently, unable to keep up cursing the now hundreds of spiders that were coming for them. Harry could imagine the sort of feast a dragon would supply the arachnid family, but wondered if it was worth the loss of life.
Harry knew if this were Voldemort's crew, the Dark Lord would have no qualms about the numbers. Other people's lives were meaningless to him – that Harry had learnt well.
The dragon might have stayed there the whole day eating up those spiders. But what got the dragon to fly was one spider that had made it past all the defenses. It had crawled up a tree and fell onto them from above. It landed on the dragon's left wing and sunk its poisonous pincers into the tender leather.
The dragon roared in pain. Harry sizzled it dead with a curse.
"Let's get out of here!" Harry screamed, grabbing two large chunks of the dragon's mane.
At last the dragon clawed up the sides of several trees and took flight. Harry held on for dear life once again as they flew several miles away. The end of that flight was the same as before, and they crashed by a flowing riverside onto large stones slick with sleet.
What's an adventure story without lots of action, right?~