Dragons and Wizards

November went by in a dull swirl of cool, cruel air and an almost never-ending drizzle of rain. To Harry, there was an almost apocalyptic note of warning in the rain, in the very nature, as if it alluded to something greater on the backbone of an unforeseen future – scorched and hazy in the cloudy horizon.

Hogwarts itself shared his sentiment, or at least it felt like it to Harry. What had once been grand and unknown now seemed cut in deep shadows and unfound, but palpable hostility – hostility of which left you marked and darkened.

Magic, as he quickly learned in school, reshaped the grasp of reality, of how the world literally could fold to his will. And yet it gained a kind of normalcy – and tediousness – to his adolescent mind. Despite his best efforts to the contrary.

He, Harry, grew used to extraordinary circumstances and events – so used to them that they became mundane.

Fuck he was bored…

To best extraordinary, and gain back some sense of wonder, he'd have to be willing to trek the borders between wizardry and insanity, he'd have to be willing to break the rules, to risk trekking on the borders of offense and moral.

He'll find a way, he vowed upon a day wherein the boredom was almost deadening to his busy, lively forever-lumbering mind.

He wasn't out and about, though. Not that day. Enjoying the solitude that such horrid weather afforded one, if you could but endure – endure the storm. No, he found himself inside the History classroom, enjoying the dusty, deadening smell of the walls and the monotonous voice of a man who had long since given up the pretence of passion for a subject to which he had devoted his life.

Harry would grow to think of Binns as the ultimate warning that everything will kill you – even that which you love.

History, he'd find, would always be a particular profound struggle for a mind such as his. For any mind, he amended, beholding his classmates and their struggles to stay awake.

Soon after their arrival, Harry discovered that you had to busy your mind elsewhere, whilst you waited for the class to die and for your life to return to you.

Luckily, for Ron and Harry, their minds were alight with thoughts and dangerous contemplation in those days, keeping the dullness at bay. This would not be the first mystery that Harry and Ron became tangled in, but – for them, at least – it was perhaps the most thrilling. Like a first love…

But time had passed, over a month, and life went onwards as it must, as it should – as all must…

So much had, in fact, happened that Harry had all but forgotten about the giant dog and the trapdoor it guarded. He hadn't forgotten about the dragon in Hagrid's home. No, good sir, not at all. And thoughts of the dog and the trapdoor would return sometime soon with great vengeance. Of that there was no doubt.

But for now it was all about the dragon.

And, as it turned out, so, too, thought Ron.

"I talked to Hagrid this morning," he whispered beside Harry, and though all could hear him saying something, none – including even Hermione, who was always ready to scold one for disrupting the class should the teacher miss it – paid it any attention.

"You talked to Hagrid? By yourself?" Ron and Hagrid still weren't the best of friends, and thanks to Ron's obvious willingness to off Norbert, Harry thought it seemed unlikely that it'd change anytime soon.

Apparently Harry had been wrong.

"Yeah, well," Ron began. "I guess he must have been looking for you; he asked for you."

"What for?" Harry whispered, turning the page of his book.

He could feel Ron's gaze on him, studying his behaviour in a way that, for some reason, only Ron could.

"Where were you by the way? This morning?" Ron asked.

"In the library," replied Harry.

"Library?"

"Library."

"Whatever for?"

Harry gave him a look, saying without saying aloud what the fuck do you think. "You know, for books and stuff."

"Stuff?"

"Mostly books."

"Mostly?"

"Books, all right."

"What books?"

"This book." He gave the book in his hands a little shake to emphasize the – to Harry – rather obvious.

Ron gave it a puzzled look. "Our History book? We've had that one since beginning of term, mate."

"A book cover can be deceiving, my friend. Observe, Watson!"

Ron blinked. "What? What did you call me?"

"Observe, Weasley!" Harry whispered grandly, then shock his head in disgust. "No, that sounds wrong – totally wrong. Why do wizards not read muggle books?" Harry said, chasing a thought aloud.

"You sure you're all right?"

"Hmm? Right. Look, I'm using the old book within a book trick to fool the professor," said Harry, voice serious as a heart attack. A healthy dollop of mirth, he hoped, was hiding somewhat clearly beneath the seriousness, of course.

"Looks like a transfiguration book," Ron noted with a surprisingly keen eye. Harry nodded, a part of him oddly pleased that he recognized the intricate spell work on the page he was reading.

Was this brotherly pried?

Was that a tear of silent gratitude for Ron in his eye?

He asked Ron if he could see his proud tears, and Ron promptly hit him on the shoulder for it.

"AW!" Harry whined loudly, then noted Binns – and the entire class – had grown oddly quiet. "Sorry, sir."

"I'm pretty sure Binns doesn't give a shit about what books you're reading," said Ron, when Binns had resumed his lesson. "Actually, I'm pretty sure he doesn't even notice."

"Oh, he notices." Harry turned another page, eyes on their Professor, who was droning along on another subject that found no interested ear. Something about goblins and rebellions – always something about goblins and rebellions. "He just doesn't care. Not enough, anyway, to call you out in front of the class. Wait until your mother sees your midterm reviews."

Ron sputtered something, eyes wide and face turning a slight, almost imperceptible angry-red. Harry laughed.

Ron didn't talk a lot about home – something that the two boys shared – but Harry heard enough to know that his mother could be a rather strict individual regarding certain things.

Harry secretly quite liked that about Ron. That he was hesitant to talk about his parents and his home. Both because, though he, Harry, was fond of Ron, and would grow to love him, he couldn't care less about his parents. And, more importantly, it proved that even a loving environment such as the Weasley household had its rough patches. It made him feel a little bit better about his own, at times, hellish upbringing.

He knew it was a selfish feeling, a dark feeling – one that could spiral into a way of madness and despair. To feel glad – relieved, even – about your best friend's pain…

But it was a natural feeling to have, as well. It was a feeling the human mind, the very soul, is very well versed with. One that tethers itself to the silent voice in the back of the head, whispering of lustful, sinful delight, promising a mind unhinged from reasonable thoughts and saneness.

Promising a character within you that stands aside the scene of life at play between us all.

For we are all playing to the tunes of society. Life is a scene made up of imaginary rules and boundaries yanked into existence by the human desire for chains… And we hold each other accountable by these unwritten rules. One risks losing it all if he dares to play to his own tune.

Dangerous. Treacherous. Such is the frailty of the human mind. The mind is lazy and vindictive and envious. Cruel.

Harry shock his head, gritted his teethes, willing it all to stop.

We know this – with intimacy – don't we, Harry Potter?

He couldn't stop it. Whatever it was – the whispers – it belonged to a force that was more powerful, less human, than anything he'd ever felt before – and it was in him…

You see… were you ever picked on as a kid? No, I don't mean at Hogwarts – of course not! You're the Boy Who Lived – before then. As a younger kind? No? Someone's a liar…

I was, anyway – and so were you. Cruelly so – like you. The other children were… pigs. One time there was… No, this is not the time for that. Kids can be cruel, though – as you know – and back then I believed it was because they just didn't know better.

Which is bullshit.

I mean, it's true bullshit – to a point – but still bullshit. Kids, I believe, are cruel because the mind is cruel. Born cruel. Fickle. Selfish. Entitled and whiny. All those mean, pathetic little things. And they have nothing, no skill or understanding, to defy their own nature. Not yet.

It's also adaptable. Our brain. And a child can be taught to ignore the basic instincts of its will. A well-behaved child is nothing more than a child that has been taught to master its will better than a lesser well-behaved child.

It doesn't change what lies underneath, Harry Potter – I see your torn soul… We – are – the same…

No. No – they were not the same. He wasn't… he couldn't…

Same with adults, really. We've learned, by the rules owed upon us by a civilized society, to defy our very nature. To be good. Kind. Whatever. Decent and humble. Doesn't mean shit when the chips are down, but we must obey them until then comes.

I've only met one person who never even attempted to fit in. Anywhere. To me… that might just be bravest thing I've ever seen. Because, trust me, I know how hard it can be to defy the expectations of those around you, Harry, and just do that which is in you.

To me, Voldemort might be the most natural, bravest human being I've ever met.

And trust me I fucking hate him.

STOP!

Harry shook his head, blinking, quenching the whispers back into the recesses of his mind. Breathing heavy, he looked to his side, eyes on Ron – he hadn't noticed his inward spiral down the winding mounting rabbit hole…

Thank god for small mercies…

It was getting slightly worse – and still the abyss approached, it seemed. There were times, when Harry lost himself in thought, that he found it difficult to discern between himself and the whispers. Where did he start and where did it end?

What was it? He had to talk to someone. He was going crazy! It had never been this bad, this sudden before, though.

He looked to his side, looked to Ron.

"Ron."

"Yeah?"

Harry hesitated, surging for a tendril of courage.

"What did Hagrid want?" he asked.

"Norbert is breathing fire now."

"Shit…" said Harry, trying to feign some kind of fear, some kind of a natural response. There was a moist field of bubbly giddiness beneath the exterior, something that could only barely be reigned in, something that wasn't entirely his own – stopplease…

"Yeah…" Ron rubbed his nose, contemplating the situation. "And it's still growing. Hagrid reckons that by the end of the next week it will already be too late to move it without someone – Merlin, probably the whole school – noticing it."

"Wait…" Harry said, excitement – masked as dread on his countenance – filling him as a thought went adrift inside the darker reaches of his brain. A terrifying thought. A cool thought. "He doesn't – shit, he wants us to help him move it, doesn't he?"

"Yeah, said he needs us. Gave me this, too." Ron reached into his robes and pulled out a torn piece of parchment on which a quick little note was scribbled down seemingly in great haste. "A spell," Ron explained as he handed Harry the note. "Hagrid wants you or me – which means you – to learn it."

"What is it?" inquired Harry, having never seen a spell quite like it before. Usually there was some kind of wand-movement attached to the spell to help facilitate the magic better, but this… thing seemed entirely beyond such shortcuts. He glanced down at his Transfiguration book, looking at the spell he'd just been studying moments before, and realized that what was seconds ago a very intricate spell now seemed like merely another schoolyard spell compared to what was written upon this little note.

Harry contemplated the note. How worlds can expand as our understanding broadens? That where there's desire, and strive, there can be no true end – he smiled at the thought.

Fascination. It filled his head. And that sheer sense of wonder was, blessedly, back for a second, clearing the cobwebs of boredom – and gnawing insanity – for but a moment.

It was a kind of love he'd never known until Hogwarts.

Ron was talking, mouth moving. Harry looked at him for a moment, wondering if he was ought to listen to him.

"Come again?" Harry said.

"It's a protection spell of some kind."

"Protection?"

"Yeah, you know, I think this one is supposed to keep things hidden and locked away."

"How do you know that?"

"I shall try not to be offended by that tone of voice," said Ron, with a very Hermione-esque huff and customary raised nose of disapproval. "But, Harry," Ron continued, his voice growing serious with a note of warning. "These kind of spells are ridiculously complicated. Hogwarts doesn't even teach you these sort of things. Not in any kind of depth, anyway. Bill, my oldest brother, works for Gringotts and deals a little with this kind of thing. Says it's one of the hardest and most dangerous line of work a wizard can do. Of course Bill can sometimes be a bit full of himself, but dad seems to agree. That spell kinda looks like some of the spell work Bill would have lying around when he still lived with mum and dad."

There it was again. Now Harry knew where he knew, but there it was again. There was that little sound of resentment in the back of his voice, in the line between his words, and in the narrowing of his blue eyes. He loved his parents and his brothers and sister, of that Harry had no doubt, but it was a love tainted.

He loved them.

Harry wasn't sure he liked them. At least – not all the time.

Right now, though, that mattered little.

"Do Bill have any books to help me understand, well, something from this?"

"Probably. But he won't lent them to me without asking why, and I'm not too keen on answering that why."

Harry shrugged. "Could always lie."

"I could, but I won't. And besides." Ron leaned in closer, as if sharing a secret. A secret greater than dragons abounding on the grounds of a school full of children. "Hagrid wants to move it this weekend."

"While we play against Gryffindor?"

Ron nodded. "Perfect cover, he says. Everybody will be there. Nobody will notice our absence and nobody will notice us moving a dragon down to one of the caves by the lake."

"Cave? He found one, then?"

He nodded. "According to Hagrid there is an entire system of caves, running for miles down and around the Lake. He will hide it in one of them."

"Ron?"

"Yeah?"

"You gotta admit… this is a little cool."

There was a pause, a lull in conversation, wherein the only thing that could be heard was the leaden, ever-lurching sound of the dead professor's voice.

"Harry?" Ron said at last – with an odd sort of awe.

"Yeah?"

"You're mental, you know that?"


Quidditch… the one sport Harry knew he'd be good at. Great, even. He'd never get the chance to play, though. Neither would Ron. They'd never be considered in their time at Hogwarts. They were just too out of place and too at odds with Malfoy.

Harry had tried to convince himself that it didn't matter that much anyway – but he knew the lie – could never truly swallow it. And yeah – he'd live… but…

It destroyed Ron's boyhood dream, though. Because of this, he'd never get the chance to play in the big leagues after school.

That was life. Harry knew it to be true after a decade of living beneath the stairs with the Dursley's – life was merely the builder and destroyer of dreams. Harry knew the secret was to sort of learn to live above them.

And hope that some day miracles do exist – like magic. Like Hogwarts and friendship and unforeseen opportunities.

Well… who knew, after all?

That day, standing on the stadium and looking down at the Quidditch pitch, as the players of Slytherin and Gryffindor ascended the sky on their, Harry imagined, state-of-the-art brooms, raised to heavens above by the roars of a tempestuous crowd, there was a longing so great that it erased all the worries of what Ron and Harry would leave in a minute to do.

In that moment Ron and Harry shared a dream.

He longed for the crowd, in a twisted sort of way. He never wanted the attention, but he wanted to revel in their awed stare. He knew he was born to fly. Made for it.

To run

To die–

STOP

But he was, as it turned out, born for other things, as well.

At times I almost dream… I, too, have spent a life the sage's way. And tread once more the familiar paths… Perchance I perished in an arrogant self-alliance an age ago. And in an act of prayer, for one more chance went up so earnest so… instinct with better light let in by Death… that life was blotted out not so completely. But scattered wrecks enough of it to remain… dim memories. As now… when seems… once more… the goal in sight… again

Please, stop

He was made to wait and run. To die and survive in a clash of equal measures. Living only because – magic willed it – dying wasn't on the table. To stand on the edges of mankind and stare back at its deprived sense of virtue – what was once impossible… now his forever.

It was getting worse… It was getting unbearable.

Ron tucked at his sleeve, signalling that it was time. And Harry's longing became fear of what they were about to face, which became resolve as he knew he'd do it, which became excitement as he knew that he'd enjoy it. Happened so fast, went through the whole gallery of emotions and settled into a quiet disposition wherein will persevered above all else.

Harry knew – it was meant to be.

He could turn it on, almost at will. Dumb, almost single-minded focus. He could achieve, even at eleven years of age, a state of mind wherein fear of life – his life – barely existed as anything other than a concept of some forgotten dream.

In a sense he could weave himself in a sphere of immortality, a state of being wherein death was merely a suggestion. He didn't know where this will of his came from – it was still in its infancy, but he'd grow into it in time. Whether it was innate or born out of some misplaced sense of self–hatred he'd installed within himself over the years of abuse at the hands of the Dursley's.

It didn't matter, either way – he'd do it.

He could walk upon a crimson line of blood where courage resided and purpose seemed carved upon the roads of God-given destiny.

Ron, who he'd do battle alongside most often, could never achieve such a heighten sense of being, but he had his own, at times, formidable courage to do battle with.

Harry followed him; they pushed through the crowd, knowing the way. And as they left behind a school celebrating its combatants in one of the most noble of sports, they found the grounds empty, as was planned, and they found Hagrid waiting for them in front of his hut.

As was planned.

"I've restrained the fella," Hagrid said as a greeting. He was on edge. Nervous. It seemed contagious, because Ron trembled beside Harry. "He's quite mad about it, too. Quite mad. But he will be all right. Yes, he will."

He was speaking to himself, Harry thought.

"Let's get on with it, then," Ron said. "We probably don't have all day. Slytherin were trashing Gryffindor before we left."

"Doesn't matter. Slytherin's seeker has no talent at all," Harry said, and if Ron heard a note of fierce revel in his voice it wasn't entirely imagined. "Nor do Gryffindor's for that matter. They will be at it for awhile."

"Even so, idiots can get lucky. Let's not push ours. I have a funny feeling."

Not that he'd ever admit it aloud, but so did Harry. All of sudden, too. Not the funny feeling you get from facing a dragon, but the kinda feeling you get when the forest has eyes, when the dark follows you, and when terror fester and tether to your horizon.

When the unknown tracks you with hungry eyes. When it crawls whilst you run – and keeps crawling whilst you stop…

"Let's go, then."


Getting the dragon, bound in cords of thick ropes, out the back door was a struggle. Getting the dragon across the fields towards the forest behind which the lake laid was a killer workout in and of itself.

Hagrid had placed it upon a cart, which was quite similar to the ones Harry had rode in Gringotts, and it wobbled unsteadily beneath the weight of Norbert. Harry thought Hagrid might have fashioned it with magic.

At one point Harry had to use an intuitive little piece of magic to render its constant struggle soundless, lest they should be heard. He wondered for a moment how the hell Hagrid had even managed to restrain it by himself, then Harry glanced upon Hagrid and realized that that might just be his kind of fun.

They came to the forest part of their little journey, sweaty and weary, and the tough going got a whole lot tougher.

"Merlin damn that fucking dragon to hell!" Ron shouted as he threw his hands up in disgust and stood back to rest his back against one of the trees.

Looking back Harry noted they had made it about twenty yards into the forest. He could feel sweat staining the back of his shirt. Thighs and shoulders were burning with the effort it took to push the struggling dragon.

"Can't we just float the goddamn thing?" Harry asked.

"No." Hagrid shock his head. "Dragons are magic resilien'. Somethin' coul' go wrong, leavin' the dragon outside yeh control."

"But Harry managed to silence it. Maybe he can levitate it too?"

"I'd rather not risk it. If Norbert breaks free because we were afraid o' littl' honest, 'ard work, then I wouldn' be able to forgive mehself."

"Don't worry, Hagrid. I'd forgive you."

"Funny, Ron," said Hagird, though Harry thought he saw a slight wry smile play somewhere behind that thick beard of his. Hagrid actually went to Ron and sat down beside him, his back to the tree – which groaned as if pained by his weight – and clapped Ron on the shoulder.

Ron winced, but did his best to stifle the moan of pain.

"Thank you, Ron. And Harry." His eyes found Harry's, and there was a fondness in them Harry hadn't seen in a while. Not since Diagon Alley, if truth be told. "Thank you fer this. Not many Sl… not many would go to such lengths to help a man such as I like yeh two 'ave." He closed his eyes and leaned back for a short rest.

Harry smiled. And though he was tired warmth twisted its way through his body to his cheeks…

Harry raised his wand.

"You don't have to thank us, Hagrid," Ron said, leaned back and closed his eyes, as well. "The least we could."

They talked, of what Harry could no longer hear, because he'd slowly left them behind. His wand alight with the subtle flow of magic before him. The dragon had been levitated and now hovered a few feet above ground, floating along merrily on his every whim.

"Ah Hagrid?" he heard Ron say, tone of voice indecipherable in the distance.

"Yes?"

"Harry's gone off with Norbert."

"What?"


Ten easy minutes of walking later found them staring into what Hagrid had deemed as Norbert's new home. It was a rather large, cavernous space on the shore of the lake, hidden in an alcove-like settlement of the woods. A small clearing led out and stood between the shore of the lake and the Forest.

From this vantage point, at the foot of the cave in between the lake and the woods, one could gaze across the lake and look upon all of Hogwarts in all its splendour.

"Have yeh boys practiced the spell I gave you?"

Ron nodded. "Harry has. Haven't you, mate?"

"I have."

He had – quite a bit actually. Asked McGonagall about it, too. She'd looked at him funnily and told him to seek the counsel of Professor Babbling, the Ancient Runes Professor – who said it was perhaps a good decade's worth of studies away from him, and he should leave the busy Professor alone.

Harry hadn't talked the witch since.

"Do you think it will work?"

He didn't – he really didn't.

"Yeah – how hard can it be?"

Harry nursed the dragon down the dragon hole gently, and his friends trailed behind him. Hagrid stood ready by his side, as he had done ever since Harry began floating the creature, ready to pull him aside should his control waver.

It didn't.

"Hagrid," Harry said, pausing as he looked down into the impenetrable darkness of the cave. "Have you checked this cave?"

"Checked?"

"Yeah. You know, that there isn't anything dangerous down there. Or how big it is? Where it might lead?"

"Dangerous?" Hagrid laughed. "'Arry, there's not too many things in this world that is a danger to a dragon."

Harry sighed. He hadn't checked it, then. What if the cave, like a tunnel, had another exit point? But then again – what were the odds of that?

"What if… never mind. What's the plan here, then?" Harry asked, trying to ascertain some kind of narrative for the fate of Norbert. "Surely, he can't stay in this cave forever, right?" He looked at Ron. "Right?"

"What are you looking at me for?"

"I don't know. This doesn't seem right." Harry shook his head, looked back into the faceless darkness, and then back into the woods. Something, he felt, was profoundly amiss. Something he felt he had seen before, done before… "I have a bad feeling, is all…"

"Harry, there's nothing down there that can threaten Norbert."

"I don't care about Norbert. If something down there decides to eat him it would ease my mind greatly." Hagrid looked hurt, but Harry shouldered onwards. "I care about… No, it's something else. Something… I can't see it, but it's… right there…"

In the back of your head.

Like a dream unseen.

Like the ghost of a voice, filled with dissent.

"What are you talking about?" said Ron.

And that was the thing. The fucking thing! He didn't know. Just knew there was something there. Whispering. He couldn't lose it – the voice inside his head.

"We're not alone," Harry said, and felt it, and dealt it, and the moment the words spilled out of his mouth, the realness of them manifested itself onto his physical awareness.

A grave tenseness clung to the heart of their little, wayward group of benevolent rebels.

"Yeh are bein' paranoid," Hagrid said at last. He sounded like a man trying to convince himself of his own delusion. "There's probably not a human soul within miles from here."

What Harry thought he felt seemed decidedly more alien than human, but he didn't voice that particular thought. Hagrid was set in his ways, as was Ron in his own dogged determination. Might as well get the show on the road.

He floated the dragon into the cave, looked upon as it was shrouded within the clutches of the blackness, and set down the beast. He felt it, like a kindred spirit in the dark, leave the grasp of his magic.

It was as if it disappeared from the face of reality.

Working fast to ensnare it before it gained awareness of its freedom, Harry set about performing the protection spell he'd been entrusted to perform.

As he weaved his wand through the air in a series of intricate movements, of which were to be done as precisely and with most careful of intentions, he had the distinct sensation of seeing a ballet performed with a wooden stick. He was caught by the idea – not for the first time nor the last – that these abstract wand motions where created as little more than to create a placebo effect in the user's mind.

Should there be an intrinsic difference to be found in a right flick compared to a left?

The magic didn't take hold.

Harry lowered his wand, thinking – no, seeing. Seeing illogical patterns form like spidery webs upon the canvas of his thoughts. Something… right there… he had done this before… more than once, but how could that be?

"Harry?" Ron said, nerve clear in his voice, but Harry ignored him, held up his hand for silence – he was tumbling along a memory of his he could remember, but not remember living.

He held his wand aloft again, sudden and true, not thinking at all – living it again.

There had been a sensation. It had been fleeting, but it was there. A sense of magic flowing, of him becoming one with the wand becoming one with the spell becoming…

There was a sense of power – the power of creation, he guessed. On the verge of being yanked out of non-being into existence and forever.

Magic was creation. Manifestation. Wizards imposed their will upon reality. They, Harry knew, stood above mere methods of science and rationality.

They were so much more than that. So much madder.

And so much better.

For a pureblood, born into magic, it wasn't really all that great and wondrous; it just was what it was. Most often, it was merely a means to an end.

For a Muggleborn, whose mind had grown accustomed, maybe even dependable, upon the limitations and laws of science… the possibility of magic astounded and overwhelmed their brain – until it, too, to protect itself, settled into some kind of normalcy.

Normalcy is the trap… be wary of its limitations…

He could feel something. There. Within. As always right there. Waiting for him to but touch it. And maybe it was just his imagination, maybe it was all just in his head, but did that make it any less real?

He followed that sense of manifestation. Followed it into a dark place in the corner of his soul, where something screamed and tethered onto him with a cold desperation for life and perverse fascination for his being – for life.

And that something knew, and Harry drew from that knowing.

He held his wand aloft – it almost felt alien to him – not uttering a word, not moving a muscle, but moving worlds within the confines of his mind, and magic spewed from the tip of his wand just as the dragon seemed to come to life.

"That was different," Ron whispered beside him, awe in his voice, even as he stepped back.

"Harry, look out!"

Hagrid had seen Norbert storm him, and jumped at Harry to move him out of its reach. But Harry was ready for it. He flicked his wand, holding onto that feeling of manifestation he'd gained from the dark being within – and, without even pointing at Hagrid, he flicked him aside like a fly.

The protection spell, as Hagrid sailed past him, flicked away Norbert mere feet before him.

Harry closed his eyes, leaned back his head, and sighed with wondrous relief.

What the hell had that been?

And though he was rattled. Rattled and elated. That sense of eagerness in the face of overwhelming power had swept him in its embrace again, and never quite at this magnitude before. Not so clearly as this. Almost as if a part of him resided aside from the rest of him – the magic he'd just yanked into existence now lived in him.

"It worked," Ron said.

"You sound surprised," Harry noted, turning his head, side-to-side, slowly, as if shaking away the sentiment of magic, of whispers of ancient and forever.

"Never doubted you for second, mate." He wiped the nervous stain of sweat off his forehead. "Nope. Never doubted you."

"Right." There was a smile on Harry's face, and that smile – the profound fondness it held – seemed to whisk away whatever lay in prey within. He cast his eyes out over the lake, looking to Hogwarts. "Let's get out of here."

"Yeah," Hagrid said, rising to his feet, even as his eyes stayed on Norbert, who was still struggling against the invisible wall of impenetrable magic. "You can still see it. That weren't supposed to be possible."

"It's not," Ron said. "At least not unless you know what to look for. Know like we know."

"You know," Harry said, smiling broadly.

"We know." Ron smiled, as well.

"Who knows?"

"What knows?" Ron said.

Hagrid smiled. "You know–"

"We know!" Ron and Harry said in unison, laughing – arms around each other's shoulders as they started walking back.

"I don't think I've ever met a pair of Slytherins quite like yeh two." A pause stirred, as neither of the two boys quite knew what to say to that. Hagrid seemed to sense their sudden hesitant nature and continued somewhat hurriedly. "Well, then, have yeh two made any friends in Slytherin yet?"

Ron and Harry shared a look that spoke of a bond between two boys thrust into plans great and unknown.

"Do enemies count?" Harry asked, reaching for a disarming smile.

"Not a single one?" Hagrid pressed, something Harry recognized as pity in the cusps of his countenance. "Not one friend?"

"Closest thing we have seen is looks of mild indifference, I think." Harry didn't like the look of pity Hagrid seemed to offer them. "Don't look at us like that. Trust me, Hagrid, you don't want to be friends with most of them."

"There must be some… somewhat decent fellas you could…"

"Maybe." Ron shrugged, entirely non-pulsed by Hagrid look and the subject. "Maybe the ones that don't care are deep down nice people we could hang out with. I doubt it, but maybe. Either way, it doesn't matter. Every time – and I mean every time – Malfoy or one of his friends has had it in for us, not a single one of them defended us. Maybe they care, just maybe, but obviously not enough to risk anything at all for us." Ron narrowed his eyes. "Not that Malfoy really ever bothers us anymore."

"That's not fair, Ron," Hagrid said, as they walked back into the woods, the enclave of trees swallowing the view of Hogwarts. Soon, as they journeyed further inwards, even the light of the setting sun was bloated out almost but not so completely by the canopy of branches over their heads. Safe for the occasional fetid streak of light that broke through the small patches in the trees, however, there wasn't much light to speak of in the Forbidden Forest – even in daylight.

"What's not fair?" asked Harry. He thought, wonderingly, that Ron had shown once more that he possessed the mind to comprehend and wonder far beyond most other blind fools. Perhaps there was a fallacy in his logic that Harry, too, shared.

"It takes a great deal of courage ter go against a bully that posses the kind of power that Malfoy-boy do."

"No."

Hagrid blinked. "What?"

"No," Harry repeated. "It doesn't take courage. It takes incentive. Trust me, Hagrid. The right motivation can make anyone – even the greatest of cowards – appear courageous."

Hagrid had actually stopped, stupefied, in his tracks, staring at Harry as if he couldn't quite comprehend the reality with which his eyes presented to that which his ears heard.

"Sometimes, Harry," Ron said, "I can barely understand you."

"You speak like an old man…" Hagrid's voice died in a kind of uncertainty that seemed almost dangerous in its contemplation. His eyes looked back, looked lost, caught in another time. "Like an old man without hope."

"What?"

"Dumbledore once told me something like that. A long time ago. Never thought I'd see it in one so youn'."

"Okay. What I meant was that if we – Ron and I – meant enough to anyone in our House, they'd defend us, right? Or talk to us like we belonged to the same species. Or at least fucking smile when our eyes met every once in a while…"

"Maybe…" Hagrid didn't seem convinced.

There was a pause in conversation from there, and they made quick work of the forest. Soon they found themselves back upon the open grounds leading back to Hogwarts and Hagrid's hut. The sun had set almost completely now, casting long and deep shadows across the fields and the steep hills back towards Hogwarts.

"What sort of business did the Sorting Hat have placing yeh in that horrible House?" Hagrid said out of the blue as they came to their final stop before they parted ways.

It seemed to think it was a necessity, Harry thought.

"I don't know," Ron said, though he cast a fleeting glance Harry's way that he couldn't help but notice. Had the Hat told Ron of its conversation with him? Or had it had similar grievances to share with the other boy. "It just sat on my head for a while and then decided on Slytherin."

"It never spoke to you?" asked Harry.

"Spoke to me? No, it spoke at me. Rambled, really. I didn't understand a word of what it was going on about. Suddenly it just stopped and went quiet and then yelled Slytherin." He shrugged, as if to say what can you do. "I hate the thing, but at least it put us both in it together, you know."

Harry smiled. Yes. At least it did that much for them.

"Well, we better get back," Harry said, noting how darkness had almost completely settled down upon Hogwarts, noting how clouds gathered above. "We're gonna have to be careful not to get caught."

"Maybe I should escort yeh two back," Hagrid said.

"No, thank you," Harry said. Though he enjoyed Hagrid's company, he felt he'd had quite enough of it for one evening. "Ron and I know how to avoid problems. We'll be fine. Besides, it will probably start snowing soon. Good night, Hagrid – see you at dinner tomorrow."

"Night, Hagrid." Ron waved as Hagrid shuffled back home. "That man is bonkers, Harry."

"Yeah." He nodded, liking that fact about him very much. "Totally."

"I mean, if he was given the choice between saving a Slytherin student or that dragon…"

"He'd save the dragon every time."

"Every fucking time."

Harry glanced at Ron, smiling. "Can you blame him, though?"

"Merlin no! I'd do the same thing. But we must be mental, too, you know."

"Perhaps. Or maybe it's because we simply know them too well."

Ron laughed, then sighed as the first fickle of snow – the first of the coming winter – landed on his forehead. "Is it too much to ask for one reasonable Slytherin?"

"Yeah. You should ask for something more realistic." Harry paused. "Like a dragon."

They laughed and turned left, heading up the hill towards Hogwarts, which towered above like a beacon of – dare he say it? – home.

Home. What a wondrous, wondrous concept.

Harry felt a profound sense of affection and gratitude within whenever he laid eyes upon Hogwarts – especially after a time of abstinence – that could never be rivalled by anything before or after it. Even now, as snow slowly started cascading down on them in ever-growing waves, he felt something that couldn't be described in mere words.

Hogwarts touched all who walked her splendour, but it touched more deeply, more everlastingly, those that didn't know what home meant before her. She swept you in her embrace and she'd never let you go again.

But at the time, as Ron and Harry walked up the hill in the now pouring snow, his appreciation of the view, and the feeling said view invoked, wilted out because…

"We're being followed, Ron."

"What–"

"No. Don't turn around. Keep walking. He came from the woods."

Harry regretted almost instantaneously that he'd told Ron of their pursuer. He could see the horror spread from the tips of his limbs all the way to centre of his body. His whole way of walking changed dramatically, becoming stiff and unnatural, his knowledge instantly detectable in the way he held himself.

Harry regretted, not because he feared Ron would freeze – he wouldn't – but because if their chaser had any sense to him, and it was indeed a man, then he'd notice Ron's change of demeanour. And he'd become aware of their awareness.

Harry chanced a glance back and beheld a man dressed in black robes, almost disappearing in the throbbing shadows of a night that seemed to have come alive with wet, malicious intent.

The man in black had changed, too. When Harry had happened to note his presence moments ago, he'd seemed content to linger, watching them. Watching Harry.

Harry knew, in his hearts of heart, that he was not there for Ron.

Suddenly, so suddenly it almost seemed imaginary – and that delusion would prove costly – the air shifted all around them, and Harry felt the man in black move. Shift into a higher focus. A greater kind, if you would.

"RUN!" Harry yelled and pushed Ron sideways, towards Hagrid and his hut, but barely had they separated – mere fucking metres between them – before he heard the dull thud of a body that crashed lifelessly onto the grass.

Harry turned, utter misery in his head, and beheld as Ron rolled back down the hill from which they came. Brandishing his wand quickly, he willed his limp body back to his instinctively and watched as Ron's roll came to a stop. As though strings held him back on the steepest mount of the hill.

A jet of bright red light, sizzling and jagged like lightning in the sparkles of snow, forked through the night, contending with the darkness for an insurmountable moment, and Harry threw himself to the ground, letting go of Ron in the process. The light missed, but only because the man in black hadn't been aiming at him.

Knowing, quite without knowing how he knew, that his meagre skills wouldn't be able to contend with that display of concentrated force, he let himself go down the side of the hill at an angle. Tucking and rolling, displaying a kind of athleticism he hadn't thought himself capable of, he managed to evade the dark figure's next barrages of spells, of which came uninterruptedly – as though weaved together, spells becoming spells becoming spell – and Harry was caught. Caught flatfooted.

Caught in a fucking hamster wheel. With no way out. Harry had been contemplating for a second too long before it all began, thinking instead of just acting, and the man in black had taken the lead, taken full advantage of his mistake.

Out of the corner of his mind, Harry felt rather than saw Ron's body disappear into the dead of the night, swallowed by the darkness as he tucked by the man in black who was advancing on Harry up the hill.

And then, somehow impossibly, somehow out of nowhere, his mind shut down and his wand glided in an upward motion of sheer physical poetry, and Harry yanked a shield of palpable force out of non-existence and into this mad little world.

Digging one foot and his free hand into the wet, muddy ground, forcefully stopping his roll and attaining proper mastery of this newfound athleticism of his, Harry came to a stand atop one knee and one foot in a crouched position, wand aloft and brandished towards his darkened foe.

The wand of the man in black, sputtering utter nonsensical destruction as far as Harry could tell, was held completely still. Beyond his slow approaching step, there was not a single gesture or sound coming from his dark foe. He was all mind and purpose and magic – and Harry was truly transfixed with his grace and ease.

His spells, while powerful, seemed to hold no deadly intent, as Harry's erected shield stood tall and steady against his bombardment. Seeing this, however, the man made his first forceful swish with his wand, stopping his array of multi-coloured lights.

There was a moaning sound, as if the earth gave way to an unstoppable force, and Harry felt something tremendous shift behind me. Turning fast, he caught a glimpse of a small tree hurdling through the air. It connected with punishing force into Harry's side – with a sickening, wet crack of bones snapping over and breaking off their sockets.

Harry fell into a world of which only pain could be found. Eyes blurry and mind half-conscious, voices of old and memories imaginary lingered in the deepest recesses of a mind that could no longer be entirely his own. Harry rose and found that he'd been hurled all the way back down the hill, coming to rest almost at the foot of the Forbidden Forest.

Harry managed a step forward, mind more than eyes focused upon the man of his misery, and fell face-first into the soft, dewy grass. Blood poured out of every orifice imaginable – and unimaginable – mingling in the snow and rain. Moaning and shaking, wondering if dying would be preferable to this shit, Harry tried to stand again.

Fell again. Snorted an obscene amount of blood and retched it out of a ruined, broken throat. Harry noted he couldn't turn his head anymore; it just sort of hung at an odd angle.

The man in black approached ever persistently. Unhurriedly.

Harry tried – once more into the fray – to get up again, to stand… to fight.

Succeeded.

He fucking succeeded!

Fell again.

Fucking shitting me!

His fingers were growing numb, his wand rolling about on the edges of his fingertips.

He stood.

The man in black approached.

Harry fell, but only to one knee, kept his cool and wits about him – seeing the world through a canopy of pure agony – and raised his wand to bear. His hand was steady, rock-fucking-solid and tight despite it all, and his mind was blank – no fear, no pain, no nothing.

He was dying… he was sure of it.

If this was to be his destiny… He was ready to go all the way.

And then, without so much as a gesture or grimace upon his barely perceivable face, shrouded in his dark cloak, he knocked Harry's wand right outta his broken, fucked hand.

"You're a fascinating creature, Harry Potter," he said, the first sound he'd uttered in the snowy night. He sniffed the air as he drew closer, sniffed it, like a fucking dog. "The hand of death lingers on you. Oh… yes, it does… You reek of it. Oh, I can positively taste it. Yes, yes – I can…" His tone of voice took on a note of eroticism, lust, and Harry shivered deep in his broken bones. Fuck! Even shivering hurt. "I wonder… would your flesh taste the same – as mine?"

Fuck you, Harry said, but no words found themselves brave enough to actually leave his mouth. He couldn't feel his tongue, and wondered, aberrantly, if you even could that under normal circumstances.

"I wonder… you shouldn't have seen the light of your second year on this Earth and yet… here you are. Here we are. Together. You. With me. All together. We – are – the same…"

He's deranged! Harry saw it. Unhinged. Mind fallen off the cliff of saneness. Harry could almost taste it on him. The mind unmade.

"Oh, and here we are, courting death. Defying it with our every breath that we can muster. Cheating it of its dues. There's so much death in you, locked away behind a door in your mind you can only glimpse at in nightmares unfound… Two in the hands of he who desires them above all… One in the ground of a shack. So much violence… in a child so young and innocent. It's all in your mind, Harry Potter – oh yes, I see it clearly. You will be – the greatest of us – the last of us…"

Harry was slipping. Mind slipping away. Slipping into fields of blackness, into fields where reality could no longer visit upon your mind with its vitriolic cruelty. And Harry welcomed it – its numbness.

He welcomed it all to end. Just fucking end!

And the man in black was upon him, standing beside him, crouching down to him, his mouth at his ear, whispering, whispering, whispering…

"Beware, child, for the gateway straight down to hell opens on the day of Christmas. And the devil will be seeking you."

And then Harry fell into the blessedly arms of untroubled, almost infinite unconsciousness.


He awoke to the sound, smell and feeling of bones mending and reattaching to their sockets, crawling beneath his skin like wet, stony worms. He cried out at the sensation and shot upward in his rather comfy bed.

The room was dark and Harry was without the sight his glasses provided him. A hand, feeling gnarly and thin, feeling old, seized his shoulder in a grip entirely too strong to be without the touch of magic.

"There, there, my boy… Rest, Harry – you'll need."

He didn't know if it was magic or fright, but he literally fell back into the bed, asleep.

When he came to later, there was light in the room, sun bathing them all with its grace, and his body wasn't crawling and mending all over the place.

To be frank, nothing seemed to hurt at all.

He blinked his eyes open against the intrusion of light, and beheld Ron at the bed beside him with the same blurry, glass-less vision. He couldn't see if his chest was rising or not, but knew that it must, for his snores seemed so great that they could rattle windows.

Harry exhaled a sigh of relief. Greatest relief he'd ever felt. He was alive! He'd thought… after Ron tumbled away in the dark… he'd feared…

"Curious thing, friendship. Wondrous, even."

Harry blinked and turned his head, and his eyes found the ancient-like, jovial face of their esteemed headmaster, Professor Dumbledore.

"Good morning, Harry. How do you feel?"


End of chapter

Author's note: I'm going through the chapters again, and finding so many flaws I'm actually embarrassed. Anyway, if this is the first time you read it, then I'm slightly happy about that. Review away, though! What did you think? Did I overdo it? Was it underwhelming? Tear into it or praise it, but please leave a thought before you go.

And now… after all this time… everything we saw, everything we lost, I've only one thing to say to you…

BYE!