Disclaimer: All characters and many of the creatures are property of JK Rowling, and no copyright infringement is intended by their use.

Author's notes: This in some ways parodies the number of ridiculous Harry Potter pairings I've seen, although the idea to make sure there's at least one "fantastic beast" in each pairing was born out of sheer boredom. As a parody, this was written no more to make sense than it was to be serious. I will accept flames, being made fun of, and (more mature) forms of constructive criticism, the former two of which I will laugh at. And, without further comment, I present the fanfiction.

Buckbeak's Test of Patience

A Chimaera clopped steadily up the mountainside, her heavy form barely dislodging anything under her mountain goat balance. She had the amber eyes and catlike head of a lion, the cloven hooves, body shape, and fur texture of a honey-colored goat, and the brown-scaled tail of an adder. While her forms changed smoothly, she looked distinctly weird plodding up a British mountainside.

A black dog appeared from a cave and started down the mountain. The Chimaera paused, sniffing. She smelled something or someone other than the black dog.

She paused again the moment she started on. Dragged to Britain as a small cub, she had been unsure the entire time what to do with her adulthood, and she wondered if this might be the scent of another Chimaera. After a moments pause, she wandered into the cave.

It was not another Chimaera. It was a huge creature with the head, wings, and talons of a giant iron grey eagle and the body and hind legs of a large, dapple grey horse. Tethered inside, it glared at her imperiously out of large orange eyes.

Intrigued by this creature, she took another sniff. He smelled male.

...

Buckbeak glared impatiently at the Chimaera circling him. He could do little more than glare, after all, being tethered. She was strange and unwanted, this mix of creatures with her smokey breath and amber stare.

Finally, the Chimaera finished circling and walked up, bumping her nose against Buckbeak's steely beak. The hippogriff backed up a few paces. The Chimaera stepped forward again.

Buckbeak ruffled his feathers and squawked disdainfully.

Apparently startled by the squawk, the Chimaera backed up, her adder's tail and lion's head drooping. She let out a low, mournful croon, from which fire emerged from her mouth, lapping at Buckbeak's talons. The hippogriff prudently backed up some more.

The Chimaera lowered the upper half of her body, outright whimpering. Accustomed to the dry heat of her breath, she didn't need to blink. Both of these appealed to Buckbeak's nature.

Perhaps he felt sorry for the young Chimaera, obviously frightened and confused. Perhaps her youth appealed to some hippogriff parental streak. Perhaps he thought if he approached, she would run off. At any rate, Buckbeak approached the Chimaera and nudged her head with his beak.

The Chimaera looked up as if in heaven and licked his beak. Buckbeak backed up again at the feel of her baking hot tongue.

Now, however, the Chimaera could not be deterred. She approached him again, rubbing up against his feathery chest.

Buckbeak let out a squawk-like sigh.

...

Sirius wandered up to the cave, two yellowing newspapers between his canine teeth. For being in hiding, in a bad position, and dealing with his godson's being mysteriously entered in a dangerous contest, he was in a fairly good mood— meaning he was neither brooding nor ready to bite someone's head off.

After glancing around, he slid into the cave and became the thin, dark- haired man he usually was. Both papers no longer fit in his mouth, and so one fell to the floor. Sirius removed the other paper from his mouth, glanced at the front page, and looked up to see the Chimaera rubbing up against a fairly disgruntled looking Buckbeak.

"What in the hell?" he asked.

The Chimaera's eyes narrowed as she looked at Sirius, and her adder's tail beat the ground. She pulled her ears back, and in a dramatic finale sent a spire of fire from her jaws.

"I take it you want to be left alone," Sirius commented hurriedly. He returned to the form of a dog and hastily slipped from the cave.

...

The Chimaera was allowed to rub up against Buckbeak and bat at him for nearly an hour after Sirius left them alone. Eventually, however, he got tired of her affections, and wanted this strange creature out and on her way.

He lashed out with a talon, causing a flower of blood to blossom on one lion's cheek.

The Chimaera stumbled back. Her amber eyes shown with hurt— she looked near tears— for a whole half a minute. Then her lion's eyes narrowed as she regarded him with an entirely new emotion and expression.

Never make a Chimaera mad.

...

Sirius came back about thirty minutes after the Chimaera left. He turned back into his usual form, cautiously glancing around. Most of the yellowed Daily Prophets had been incinerated, the ashes of which were strewn across the cave's floor and walls.

In the middle, glaring resolutely at the cave wall, was a soot-stained, slightly singed Buckbeak. With his experience with disgruntled hippogriffs— most of which had been gained with this one over the past few months— Sirius was very glad he was not that wall.

Surprisingly, both the papers Sirius had brought in earlier that day were yellowed, dirt-stained, but still readable. He picked one up and started leafing through it. "She decide she didn't like you?"

Buckbeak shot him a moment's worth of his disgruntled glare.

"I'll take that as a yes, considering the state of things," Sirius answered, glancing announced. "Any idea why?"

Buckbeak added an extremely disgruntled look to the irate one.

Perhaps because he spent a good deal of time as a large black dog and was used to animal thoughts, perhaps because he was, from a hippogriff point of view, smart for a human, or perhaps because he'd had some bad experiences with girls, Sirius got the meaning of that pained look. "I take it no?"

Bucknbeak evaded Sirius's stare and let out a low squawk.

Sirius returned to his paper, a grin spreading across his face. "She didn't have a mane, big guy— she was a girl Chimaera. She never would've made a bit of sense to you."

Buckbeak returned to visually murdering the wall. Author's note: For a full discription of general Chimaera behavior, check out either "Fantastic Beasts And Where to Find Them" (which I have read cover-to-cover no less than three times, which is how I come up with this stuff), or a decent reference to Greek myths, of which it would be nice if you informed me one exists. If you want to flame me, I won't wonder. If you liked it . . . apparently you have my sense of humor.