Previously on Chapter 8: Cold Encounters of the third kind.

"EXPECTO PATRONUM!"

From his wand, Neville saw a smoky figure rising, slowly becoming solid as more of its entirety is coming fort. The head was the first one to become recognizable followed by its body. Neville stared amazed at his Patronus, with its eagle like eyes that immediately locked onto their opponent, massive wings spanning his shoulders, talons like that of a lion, and horse liked body. His Patronus, a hippogriff, upon fully turning corporeal then turned into a real being as it slammed its body against their opponent, sending it back over the sea with a sharp crack. It seems that the fight is finally won and over.

"But the war is lost." Neville thought as he look on with sadness at the motionless form of Leaf in front of him. The fight had taken not only the life of her brethren but also her own. A piece of sharp rock escaped their guard and is now extruding out of her chest straight to her heart. He closed his eyes and tried to make the tears stop from forming.

Behind him, the sound of a beasts landing can be heard. Knowing that staying here is futile, he turned his gaze then towards the magnificent looking creature that seems to be peering into his soul. Remembering Hagrid's lessons, he placed one foot forward and bowed.

The enormous creature twisted his head at him and put one massive front leg in the air bent and the bowed back at Neville. Approaching the hippogriff which had took into a real form of its own, he quickly gazed back at Leaf and realized that it was surely her magic that had saved them and then looked at the hippogriff that was three times bigger than Buckbeak.

It also moved closer on its own and met Neville's hand with keen interest. Neville stroke the hippogriff head while feeling sad at the enormous price it took for this amazing piece of magic.

Neville had been flying for hours, they had been looking for land but the incredible mist that covered this plane made it much more difficult. Neville stroked the Hippogriff feathered neck and asked it to go down lower. Lucky for Neville the beast took his command and descended through the mist, first sight came with the vast amounts of sea in all directions.

"Damn this place" Neville muttered gripping the sword of gryffindor on his hip for comfort, the mist seem to follow behind them like it had a mind of its own. Neville peered down to the sea beneath them, a shadow the size of maybe Hogwarts loomed beneath him Neville thought, it was just too big to comprehend as the water stood placid. "What magic is this" he yelled into the cold wind while holding his wand. The water sunk to the depths below and a thunderous noise deafened Neville and the shockwave of the water almost sent him flying off Buck Beck.

"Woah, get us out of here Buck!" Neville shouted over the intense sound of the water and wind. Buck headed straight towards the horizon to the south. Neville looked down to the depths when a massive set of wings ripped apart the ocean and sent him and buck flying of course.

"Ahhhh Buck...help" Neville grimaced holding on to a bunch of his feathers, slowly losing his grip as buck swayed back and forth. The tip of the beast head emerge out from the seas then the maw lifted out tonnes of water with a horrific death scream.

Neville couldn't hold on much longer and the gust of wind the beast used to lift itself out of water made buck tumble out of control, the share velocity its wings caused them to swirl out of control even more. Buck screeched and flapped its wing in protest, they were falling too fast for both of them to level out; The beast screamed again, its blue blood shot eyes pulsated and locked on them.

Neville watched in horror as its tail come from beneath the sea and shot right for them, within inches Neville had managed to use both hands to push Buck and himself from the razor sharp tail; It pierced right were they had been but skimmed Neville's shoulder causing him to scream out in pain, the amount of force made him skyrocket towards the sea.

Neville was trying to stay calm as he plummeted face first towards the raging sea, his broken shoulder and the sheer force made it impossible for him to grab his wand. Neville tried to ignore the pain and move his arm, it just didn't want it to budge one bit. The sea was getting closer now and deep down he didn't really care about anything, was this just a dream. Maybe he would wake up and laugh about this with his friends..i miss them he whispered before slamming hard into the water.

Water filled his lungs the deeper he fell into the seas, he managed to at least get himself upright but that cost him a lot; Now Neville was panicking, he knew about the sea of... course he did but being in the sea was a different story. It was dark and he could barely see the sky, he tried fight his way to the top with one arm.

Nevilles felt his body quiver from not breathing and the coldness and soon felt a tingling sensation trickle through him, he couldn't bear to look below him; Suddenly the sword of Gryffindor began to illuminate from his hip, casting light in all directions. Neville looked down finally and screamed but no noise came too, there were a thousand moving creatures facing towards the light and in the depth of the ancient sea; limbs moved out from where the light couldn't reach and struck Nevile hard, wrapping around his body and pulling him to the surface.

Finally Neville could breath and when he felt his lungs return with air he summoned the sword to his good hand and stabbed the rubber like tentacle; it tightened its grip around Neville's ribs, cracking a few in the process. Pain surged through him again, this time severely weakening Neville's already struggling body, he closed his eyes and fought a hard battle not lose consciousness, he remembered all of his friends faces; all laughing and smiling with him in some loose dream his mind made up for him.

"You can do this Neville" Harry's words echoed through him, he always did believe in him and Harry had never quit anything even dying for the rest of them; Neville would never forgot that story Harry told the rest of them and it really sunk deep into Neville how much they truly needed him. A screeched reached his ears and Neville opened his eyes and watched Buck run circles around the massive tentacles chasing after him; the dragon had flown off towards the west of them then suddenly another limb struck out from the sea distracting Neville away from the dragon; it headed straight for his only friend left...Buck.

Neville summoned all of his courage and smashed the sword into the beasts massive tentacle and shouted "Reducto" he never knew if this would work, he thought a magical object could still act as a conduit in place for his wand and with that he could feel the raw magic coursing down his arm and into the sword. In a devastating fashion the tentacle exploded as did Neville with the huge amount of spell backlash; he sailed through the air his body moving in unnatural ways.

Neville managed to upon his eyes with amount of force pressing against him, he slowly turned his face forward so he could at least see where he was going to land; it didn't look good as the fast approaching island made it into his view. Neville looked down to his body, half his clothes had been torn apart and he was still holding the sword in his good hand and with his other broken side he made a plea with any deity to summon his wand to that hand; he had never been able to do it before even with the help of Hermione.

They must of answered him because it appeared there a second later and without even a second thought he shouted "Protego Duo" and the hard forming shield covered his body the instant he slammed into the ground, he bounced off of it and slammed through at least a dozen or more trees destroying everyone one of them; he finally hit a massive white tree sliding off of it and into the ground.

"Ehhhhh…...no more" Neville moaned, feeling the effects of the impact and his adrenaline slowly dissolving from his blood; he could barely feel any of his limbs with amount of coldness taking away the last of the warmth he had left. "Mmmm sleep" he whispered feeling his eyelids blink in and out of his disoriented state, sleep called for him and when he finally closed his eyes; it welcomed him like warm hug from one of his friends..

"Grrrrrr"

Terror startled Neville from his state, that sound didn't feel like anything he had heard before' he slowly opened one eye and found a new beast eyeing to kill him; it sniffed the air around him and then stood on its hind legs with its arms by its side, it almost looked like a person. Neville felt the real terror when he realized he wasn't holding either the sword or his wand.

It suddenly roared, definitely waking Neville the fuck up after exposing its massive set of teeth and jaw; the beast locked eyes with Neville and went straight for him. When its claws meet the ground and its back legs drove it forward, Neville moved the wrong way; screaming out in pain instead of summoning the sword. The creature lunged and swiped at him but he only managed to get out of the way because it slide on the soft dirt, it hit its head into the white tree; Neville tried to crawl through underneath its body but it backed up and it sunk its jaw into his broken shoulder making him faint with pain.

Neville awoke when he was flung into the ground hard,shaking him of his dizziness he turned around and moved his good hand out "accio sword" he said harshly, the sword glowed out in the distant foliage then sailed through the air to his hand. The beast had already charge at him again and the snapping jaw covered in blood stopped just before his face, its body fell upon Nevilles with the sword of gryffindor sticking through its heart and out through its back.

"At least i'm warm now" Neville whispered, welcoming the best feeling in the world amidst the pain that had now been forgotten, he surrendered to the sleep that had been calling him.

A few hours later….

"Im telling you Dacey, i saw a dragon" a voice said that awoke Neville "Yeah, how come no one else saw it" a new voice said. Neville tried to yell for help but all that sea water made his voice dry and weak, he could even budge the this creature one bit. " Dacey, im serious and i swear i saw it...i almost wet myself and then i came running for you and it was gone" the first voice said again, getting closer and closer to Neville.

"Gods" the second voice Dacey shouted suddenly "look at the size of that Lyanna, when have you seen bear this size...winter is coming" the voice almost sounded in pain from the last part, Neville tried to make himself notice before he passed out again.

"Helpp" he managed to moan but the horses whinnied at the dead corpses; making them not hear anything. "Woah...easy there girl, what's the matter" Dacey said stroking the horse until it calmed down. Neville heard a dozen or more riders approach them as the other two got down down off their horses, one approach the group and other approached Nevilles way..

"Dacey...there is man under that bear" Neville looked up into the little girl's eyes as she peered down at him, he mouthed a cry for help before losing his battle to stay awake.