The Houses Competition
House: Hufflepuff Stand-in
Class: Ancient Runes
Category: Standard
Prompts: [Emotion] Fear
[Pairing - Positive] Charlie Weasley and Hermione Granger
Word Count: 1584
Hermione advanced slowly, her wonder lending a surreal quality to the magically-saturated cave she had found a way in after weeks of research. Illogically, for there was nothing for it to consume, fire reflected brightly on the rocky walls, and at the end of the cave, warmed by the flames, stood the dragon egg Hermione had been searching for.
In the eerie silence of the cave, broken only by the erratic crackling of the flames, the rhythm of Hermione's breathing broke. A small part of her wondered if oxygen was becoming scarce as she went deeper into the cave, but most of her attention was focused on the egg—shining like a jewel.
She took another step forward.
Finding that egg was the culmination of everything she had dedicated the last months of her life to.
A new breed of dragon, or rather, an old one considered extinct after not being seen in centuries. But Hermione had followed the signs and found what could be one of the last viable eggs in existence.
Her blood pumped rapidly through her body. Her heartbeat pulsed in her head. Her palms were sweaty and her breath short. She was in front of the egg. She could almost touch it. Just another step… A few inches more and Hermione would be able to...
The egg cracked. Hermione stopped breathing. With a sound like shattering glass, pieces of the shell fell to the ground, swallowed by the flames that had danced merrily around the egg. As Hermione stood paralysed, not sure about what she could possibly do to make the situation better, a cold burst of wind with no obvious origin put out the fire, plunging her into darkness.
Hermione was virtually blind and even sounds appeared muffled in the suffocating atmosphere of the cave. Then she saw something. A light seemed to come from inside the egg, visible only through the cracks and the holes until a malnourished-looking, hunched-over, dragon burst out with an atrocious screech that had Hermione bending down and covering her ears.
When the dragon hatchling stopped crying and focused its empty eyes on Hermione, her blood turned cold. It all happened in a split second. Hermione pressed a hand against her chest to try and keep in her wildly-beating heart and the dragon opened its maws, a torrent of fire flowed towards Hermione's face.
She threw her arms in front of herself in a last-ditch attempt at protecting herself, screaming even as the fire enveloped her—
⎰⟆⟅⎱
"Mia!" Hermione jumped at the sound of her name, instinctually struggling when she couldn't fill her lungs fully because of constraints against her chest. "Sssh, I'm here, Hermione. It was a bad dream, Mia. Nothing's happening. You're in the Sanctuary, and I'm here with you."
Slowly, the words penetrated the fog that had shrouded her brain. Hermione stopped struggling and focused on her breaths, sucking in air that didn't feel like it wanted to reach her lungs. Her throat felt scraped raw, and only in contrast with the sudden quiet, she understood that she had been screaming.
Charlie held her in his strong arms, shushing her gently and petting her curls in the way he had learnt to avoid pulling her hair.
"That's it, Mia. That's it, luv, you're alright. You're in our bed, at the Sanctuary, and nothing's happening."
Slowly, Hermione internalised those words, clenching her fingers against the light sheets and pressing her head against Charlie's naked chest. When she felt like her heart finally stopped trying to beat out of her chest, she looked up at Charlie.
"You alright, Mia?"
Gods above, was she happy that she knew him.
⎰⟆⟅⎱
After the war, Hermione had gone back to Hogwarts like a good girl. She had gotten her NEWTs and turned towards the Ministry like she was supposed to, ready to help the slow tide of change along. Then she'd realised that House Elves were still slaves, Centaurs, Merpeople and other sentient beings were still looked down on, and magical creatures were treated like expendable parts to be harvested and sold to the highest bidder.
Her pursuit of fairer practices when dealing with anyone other than witches and wizards had led her on an unexpected path — the study of highly magical creatures that the Wizarding World took for granted.
She ended up in Romania for reasons that had nothing at all to do with Charlie Weasley, and very little to do with dragons. She'd been in face-to-face talks with the representative of the local mag-vampire mixed enclave for barely two days when Charlie dropped, quite literally, on her lap.
Her former boyfriend's older brother had been part of a two-wizard team trying to herd a wild juvenile Romanian Longhorn away from the vampire enclave's land — with middling success, as evidenced by the fact that Charlie was knocked off his broom with so much force that he broke through the roof of the inn where Hermione was conducting business.
After recognising Charlie and helping to smooth over the situation with the enclave, Hermione had been summarily dismissed by the representative, who was visibly sick of dealing with dragonologists.
For lack of anything better to do now that her main reason to be in the country had disappeared (and because of a certain curiosity towards a man she had known as a teenager but hadn't seen in years), Hermione tagged along with Charlie and Vicky, the other dragonologist tasked with herding the Longhorn away from danger.
Hermione hadn't expected to be welcomed into the Romanian Dragon Sanctuary quite so warmly, nor had she expected to enjoy her stay half as much, and while most of that was thanks to the new avenue of study that had opened up to her, a big part was due to Charlie.
⎰⟆⟅⎱
Working together had led to getting to know each other, and Charlie had gone from being indispensable to her research into a breed of dragon so mythical it had been declared extinct, to being the strongest attachment Hermione had formed as an adult.
Which led to him trying to talk her down from one of the worst nightmares she'd suffered since the end of her Hogwarts career.
"I'm f–"
"If you tell me you're fine I'll send a Howler to Harry for having taught you to use that phrase when you're nowhere near being 'fine'," Charlie said.
Hermione huffed out a pathetic imitation of a laugh and flicked a limp curl away from her sweaty forehead. "Right. What was I thinking?"
Charlie readjusted his hold on her to bring one of his big, calloused hands to her face. His palm covered her forehead and was extremely effective at stopping both the droplets of sweat running down her face and the damp hair trying to curl into her eyes. He bent down uncomfortably to kiss her nose, and Hermione breathed against his chin as the anxiety of the nightmare melted away from her frame.
"I don't blame you, Harry has a way of influencing people around him. And he's the closest thing you have to a brother, besides."
Hermione thought back to everything Harry had accomplished during and since the war, and could only agree.
"But you're right," Hermione said. "I'm not fine. I worry."
"Of course you do, Mia," Charlie agreed with an impish smile, trying to bring some levity to the heavy moment.
"It's the egg I've found," Hermione admitted, and Charlie became more serious instantly.
"Removing it from the cave where you found it was the right thing to do, Mia, everyone agrees. Are you worried it won't hatch?"
The question made Hermione sit up on their sleep-mussed bed.
"If that were the only problem… I don't even know if finding it was the right thing to do." And when Hermione started speaking, all her worries spilt out one after the other. "I don't know if the egg will survive away from that magically-saturated cave, and even if it hatches I don't know what'll happen to the dragon once it's a living, breathing creature that other wizards will want to exploit. I'm afraid that putting something so precious and defenceless into the hands of people who are known for their greed will defeat every stride I've made in the right direction. I'm scared that the efforts to better the treatment of magical beings and creatures will amount to nothing–"
"Hey, hey, Mia!" Charlie interrupted her when it looked like she would only upset herself further the more she spoke. "Your fears are valid, and I understand where they come from. But we won't simply hand a dragon to the worst kind of wizard there is, alright?" He put his hands over her shoulders and stared right into her chocolate eyes. "The work you've done since the end of the war is meaningful, and it's changing the Wizarding World a little more every day, but you're not alone, Mia. This Sanctuary has been standing between dragons and remorseless businessmen," he spat like an insult, "since its inception and we'll continue to fight even if that little egg hatches and the first dragon of its kind in centuries comes out with fucking– golden scales and diamond dust on its wings!"
Hermione felt a weight disappear from her chest as she listened to Charlie's impassioned speech. He was right, she was not alone. They were not alone, and if necessary, they would fight to defend the defenceless. She grabbed Charlie's arms and smiled.
Together, it felt like they could do anything.