The Bleeding Tree

"It's time," Severus spoke gently, his voice carrying over the quiet lapping of the waves. The snow crunched softly beneath his feet as he waddled over the ice to settle next to me.

I could feel his little body nudging along the length of my thigh, and I reached down to run my fingers along his spine without looking. He rumbled softly as he lay down upon the ice, fluttering his dorsal fins and sweeping his tail across the ground to curl it around my leg.

The waves were crashing gently against the icy shore, shifting the large chunks with each push and pull. The sun was cresting the horizon behind me, alighting the sky in glorious colors, and my breath was fogging the air with each exhale. It was quiet out here; the only sound were the waves and parts of the ice shelf breaking off and refreezing. It could almost be considered peaceful, if not for the reason why I was out here in the first place.

"We should get going," Severus spoke again, lifting his head from the snow to rest it on my knee. He blinked slowly at me, twisting his head to look out upon the water. Neither of us looked at the dead sea serpent…or what was left of it.

I sighed in annoyance, leaning back on my hands to throw my head back and look up at the lightening sky. I could feel the cold of my palms pressed against ice and snow, and I knew I would need to lift them soon or cast a heating charm, but I ignored it for now. I was no longer in danger of freezing, not with the sea serpent hide I had harvested.

It took a long time to skin the available section of the serpent. Most of it was still far beneath the water, slowly getting picked apart by sharks, fish, and seals. But the upper section, the head and neck, those I tore through with a vengeance.

Severus had to teach me severing charms normally used in battle for disembowelment in order to slice the hide open. It took ages, and many days before we saw progress, but I got through. It was easier, once I was able to get a starting point. My magic had been stretched thin by the time I had peeled back all the available hide. Severus had disapproved – I could feel it through our bond – but hadn't tried to stop me.

It was cathartic, and I think he knew I needed to work out my anger and grief in something productive.

Though we didn't need the meat, the dragons had taken to hunting the creatures that fed off the dead serpent. Their success was more hit than miss, but it was definitely a learning experience for them, even though every time I saw them near the water, I got severe anxiety. In order to combat this, Severus taught me a proximity spell that would warn me if anything larger than a whale came within a kilometer of where I cast the spell.

I started to send red sparks the second something breached the proximity that might have been large enough to take on the dragon whelps. I worried at first that the dragons wouldn't listen to my warning, and that I would have to bury more of them, but my worry was for nothing. The moment the red sparks exploded in the sky, all the dragons retreated from the water and returned to fly tightening anxious loops over me until I gave the all clear.

Shockingly, even Loki obeyed when the sparks burst in the sky.

We had been lucky so far. Nothing breached the ice to come after us, though there were a few scares when the ice shelf started to lift as if something was pushing it from underneath. Once, even the dead serpent moved as something massive tugged at it from beneath. Severus confirmed several days later that some creature had taken a large chunk out of it, severing the beached section from the body and tail that were still underwater.

Neither of us would say it, but with the size of the bite he described, we were certain it was another sea serpent. We were much more careful after that, but whatever it was, didn't bother to visit again.

We never did find out how large the serpent had been, though from the size of its head – larger than Aunt Petunia's house on Privet Drive – it must have been several kilometers at least. Severus did lament the loss of possible potion ingredients, as the section we had access to had no organs but the eyes and brain. He also ignored my perfectly logic argument of having no reason to keep them as we didn't have anything to craft with them nor potions to brew from them.

All the same, the section we did have access to left us with more than enough of the white opalescent hide to last for years. The absolute first thing I did was craft clothing.

My tank top was in ruins, the repair charm no longer as effective after it had been used already so many times…and wasn't that something to learn. The more something is repaired with magic, the more degraded it becomes. My top had now become useful as bandages, and I moved onto serpent hide.

Tanning it had been just as an ordeal as dragon hide at been, and twice as frustrating. This time, I knew vaguely what I was doing, but sea serpents and dragons were very different creatures. I bathed it in layers of rune work and left it out in the cold for nearly a month before it was finally ready for crafting.

In the end, I now had several sets of skintight leotards and body suits – for lack of a better term – and I hadn't felt the cold since. Like the dragon, the serpent hide kept me at exactly my own body temperature. And unlike Lavender, I didn't exactly have anything near what you could call fashion sense. Instead of trying to be creative, I crafted the hide into my exacting measurements, and cursed like a sailor every morning while I struggled to pull the surprisingly pliable but still skintight outfit on.

I kept wearing the dragon hide pants, despite the fact that I technically didn't need them for warmth when I wore the full body suit. Although my fashion sense was severely lacking – according to all of my dormmates – I did know that I looked quite ridiculous in just a skintight suit. There was also the fact that Severus had been annoyed beyond belief when he no longer had anything to grip when he climbed up to perch on my shoulder, and the pants got him at least halfway there.

I also loved that the skintight suit happened to make it look like I had something resembling breasts, so I was quite a fan.

Severus, on the other hand, wouldn't look at me for days after I started wearing the leotard. He only would give me a withering glare and then asked why even bothered with clothes if I was going to dress in something that was so skintight, I might as well have been naked. To which I replied that I only bothered wearing clothes to protect his modesty.

He eventually got over it, but it took a long while and a lot of glaring and derisive remarks. It was worth the days of sullen silence and heated glares when he spluttered and stuttered after I asked if he was allowed to body shame an impressionable young woman when he taught at Hogwarts.

A few days later, he attempted a sort of apology that he failed to get through due to my cackling. I was laughing so hard I thought I might have pulled a muscle. Snape was embarrassed and angry, but we both agreed to never mention the incident and pretend it didn't happen at all. In the end, he allowed me to dress as I pleased and made no comment, and I stopped teasing him about it.

All of my new outfits were long sleeved, coming to rest over the back of my hands and covering my fingers up to the second knuckle but keeping the majority of my fingers and palms free. The necklines were baggy and went up to the where my hairline started and just under my chin. If I got too cold, I could pull the stretchy material over my mouth and nose.

Most of my new tops didn't extend passed my groin and hips, but some went as far down as my feet, with holes for my toes, keeping the balls of my feet and heals exposed for grip. Learning to go to the bathroom in the full suit was an interesting experience that I eventually was able to work around with overlapping sections that stuck together with a handy little spell and would stay stuck until released.

Severus had been equally parts amused and embarrassed while we tried to work around the problem but work around it, we did. They were surprisingly cozy, breathable, kept me from sweating, and more importantly they kept me warm. I hadn't been so comfortable since we got sent here…but the price for that comfort was too high.

My eyes slid to the side where the massive serpent lay. It still contained a lot of its skin and most of the meat, and we could be harvesting from it for months to come…but neither of us wanted to stay in this place any longer.

Some of the dragons didn't come down to the water line anymore. Guinevere would occasionally accompany me, when I made my morning walk to the water and sat on the ice until the sun rose. The others would come down for hunting, when most of the whelps were going down as well – with the exception of Gemini who hadn't left the camp since his brother was eaten and Ophelia who was still recovering from having half of her wing severed – and the whelps made certain to stay close to each other when they did.

Romulus and Solar were the most successful in hunting as they always did it together, and I added quite a few seal pelts to my ever-growing collection. They always presented their food before digging into it, as if to show off – Solar would preen, dorsal fins fluttering and head high – and would let me skin their kills before the burned and ate it.

Guinevere, Hera, and Roan hunted both alone and as a group depending on what they were trying to catch. They had less success when going after larger prey like Romulus and Solar, but individually they were great at catching small fish and the occasional seal pup. They were also less inclined to share, but occasionally they would leave me skin their kill.

Loki, on the other hand, wouldn't let anyone get even a dozen meters from his kill, and always hunted alone. He could be found near the water even if the others decided not to go down to the edge. He didn't seem at all put off by what had happened to his siblings, and I would have thought it hadn't bothered him at all if he wasn't the last one in the tent every night.

He slept in front of the tent door, and I had to step over him on my way outside every morning. The way he positioned himself made me believe he was guarding it. He would hiss and snap at me if I woke him, but I stopped fearing his bite a long time ago. The worst he could do through the dragon hide pants and serpent skin outfit was bruise me, and he dare not unless he was willing to face Severus' wrath.

Though smaller by nearly a fourth of size of the whelps, they all feared the tiny dragon. Severus refused to tell me why, but I believe it was a combination of his increasingly aggressive attitude and cutting tongue. I could hear him talking to them, when he thought I wasn't paying attention. Quiet warbles and clicks that the whelps would respond to.

He was the one that coaxed Gemini out of the tent a week after his twin died. He was also the one that got Ophelia up and wobbling around camp with hesitant steps. Despite how much he denied caring for the whelps – and how often he commented on leaving them behind to survive on their own – Severus was always there when they needed him most.

"Hari," his voice drew me back and I returned my attention back to the sea. "We need to go."

I sighed again, pulling my hair over my shoulder to plait it into a sloppy braid. "She could still be out there," I argued, though we both knew it was a weak attempt.

Selene still hadn't been found. Two full moons had come and gone since the attack, but she never came home. Every morning I got up early and made my journey to the waterline. Severus argued at first, when he found out what I was doing. It took a surprising amount of time before he discovered where I spent my mornings.

Days into my ritual, he finally joined me. Sometimes he still would come with me or showed up later to sit by the icy edge and watch the waves or walk up and down the water line looking for a little white and blue dragon. Selene was never found, but the ritual stayed the same…at least until today.

"She's gone," he replied, shifting to climb up my arm and onto my shoulder. He had more difficulty now, when I wasn't wearing the robe. The serpent hide had no give to dig his claws into, and it was too tight for him pinch it between his thumbs without pinching me. I would have to give him a hand up, not that I minded, but I could feel Snape's frustration every time I tilted my arm to give him a perch or placed my hand underneath to pull him up.

"She could still be out there," I argued back, watching the waves push at the ice.

"She's gone," Severus intoned softly, his nose near my ear and thumbs gripping tightly at the loose hide near my neck. "Selene could be alive, improbable though that is, but she is gone."

"If we leave, how would she find us?" I was pulling strings at old arguments…arguments that Severus and I had already had a dozen times.

"If we stay, how can we protect the others," he replied back, words familiar and tone exasperated. "We are leaving, it's time to go."

I rose slowly, pulling myself up from the ice and snow, looking at the waves once more before I turned my back upon them. I returned back to camp, leaving the dead serpent and the hope of ever finding Selene again.

The tent had already been shrunk and packed away along with everything else at camp. The sled lay on the ground, fully packed, with my – Hermione's – bookbag sitting next to it with Snape's robe on top. The only proof that we were ever here was the indent from the fire and the steaming pool that was slowly refreezing as each second passed.

I grabbed the robe, throwing it on and ignoring Severus' angry hisses as he climbed out from underneath to settle in the hood, and then I picked up the bookbag. Turning, I saw the whelps, all eight of them, staring up at me from where they were lounging next to the sled.

Flicking my fingers, the sled started to float, and Ophelia pulled herself on top with no competition from the others. Even after two months, she was still moving slow, her right wing torn apart near the joint after the thumb. It pained her to put weight on it for too long, and her attitude diminished when she could no longer walk.

Ophelia would snap at her siblings, hissing and spitting if they approached her when she was in a great deal of pain. The only exception was Severus and Loki. Not because she cared for them more than the others, but simply because she knew that neither of them would let her get away with that attitude turned on them.

She had also learned that if she was less of a brat to me, I would rub at her aches and sing or read to her until she could sleep.

I flicked my fingers again and the sled started to move. I didn't announce our leaving like I had when we left the cave – back when it had been a happier time – instead I just started walking.

Most of the dragons immediately took flight. Now the size of large dogs, they could fly for a few hours without tiring. Gemini and Hera stayed grounded, Hera chirruping at Ophelia as the black dragon settled herself down for a nap. Gemini warbled and clicked at me and I turned to look down at him, tilting my head as I tried to make out what he was asking.

"Up carry?" He repeated his call, and I was only able to discern part of his request. I only fully understood when he lifted a wing and grabbed at my pants with his thumb. I chuckled softly but bent down to pick him up all the same. He really was starting to get too big for this, but Gemini had been extra clingy since the death of his twin.

"You shouldn't indulge him," Severus hissed in my ear as I propped Gemini on my hip. Gemini tilted the bright red head back to keep it away from the smaller dragon as Snape snapped at him.

"Stop that," I raised my free hand to flick the white dragon on the nose. "He's lonely, Severus, and he wants to be held. Play nice."

Severus hissed a low growl but settled once more. As a last act of defiance, he shifted from my hood to drape himself around the back of my neck so he could glare from his higher perch. Gemini shifted lower, settling his feet on my thigh so I had to adjust my grip to his back instead of below his tail. It wasn't comfortable, and I knew he wouldn't last long in that position, but no matter how I tried to lift him back up, he refused to be budged.

"Really, Severus?" I hissed, lifting my leg to try and get the awkwardly perched dragon to settle back where he had been on my hip, where it was comfortable to hold him as I walked.

"I did nothing," he replied, but his voice was smug, and he didn't stop glaring down at the red whelp.

I grunted in disbelief but decided not to argue. Instead we continued on and soon we were back on actual ground, keeping the ice shelf in sight as we headed further South.

It only took a flick of the wand to set up camp at the end of every night, and as we settled in, piling on the tent floor, I would pull a book out and begin to read. I had already read all the books in Hermione's bag, but that didn't stop the dragons from huddling close as I opened one and began to read aloud.

Snape's favorite was the potions book, because of course it was. And while the grey book had the best story line, I still liked the dragon book best. It also was adorable how fascinated the whelps were with the illustrations of their counterparts. Roan would tilt his pale gold head and chirrup curiously at each drawing, but he didn't care for the fact that the pictures moved.

He would poke his nose at the page, as if he could coax the illustrated dragon off of the paper if he irritated it enough. I was constantly shoving his head aside to be able to read, and if I didn't wave my wand to get the illustrations to be still, we wouldn't be able to get through a single chapter in a night with his aggressive grumblings and angry hisses.

Ophelia and Loki were above such things, preferring to listen from a distance. Guinevere would hiss at Roan and Hera would headbutt them until they both quitted down, while Gemini would nudge and push until he could worm his way beneath my arm and curl up under my side.

He had scarred deeply from the wounds he sustained from the sea serpent. His left horn broken, left eye intact but milky, and long white scars stretching from the side of his face all the way down to his neck and the upper part of his chest. The broken horn had grown out some, originally broken off at the base, there was now an inch of growth before the break.

It would always be broken, but the older he got, the less noticeable it would be. It was his eye that I worried about. He could still track movement with it, but anything with detail seemed to be compromised. I hoped it would get better as it healed fully, but Severus believed Gemini would just have to learn to live with it. Without special care and potions, it was unlikely it would get any better.

Severus would remind me that we were lucky it wasn't getting any worse, and that Gemini could see anything from that eye at all.

We traveled for a long time, one full moon turned into two and then three. We would travel several days in a row, setting up camp at night and breaking it down before sunrise every morning. Every few nights we would set up camp and stay for several days to recuperate. Our food stores seemed almost never ending, between the whale, seals, and the sea serpent, the meat we harvested could last us for several more months even with how quickly the dragons were growing.

Preservation spells were a godsend. And once I learned how to pull the salt out of the sea water, I was able to season it at least a little.

We even had enough food that I could leave out a few chunks every night for the lone she-wolf and her pups that trailed us. She had given birth to three pups, all white with grey patterning, one much darker than the others. They too were growing fast.

Severus stopped complaining when he realized that I was going to keep feeding them despite his aggravation. I wasn't stupid about it however, I knew that these were wild animals, just as likely to kill and eat us as they were to leave us alone. I still laid heavy wards and layered proximity spells over them every night, but so far, nothing came close enough to set them off.

My warding and rune lessons were expanding, and Snape had begun to teach me occlumency. He said it was to help with my memory and maybe keep the nightmares at bay – of which I have had many since the attack – but I just thought he loved to torture me. What the hell did he even mean when he said, 'clear your mind'? Clear your mind of what?

Occlumency was slow going.

My Latin lessons more conversational now that I had a good grasp on the language, and the theoretical potions were an ongoing aggravation. I was always a more physical learner than anything else, and despite explaining this multiple times to Snape, he continued to drill me on ingredient reactions and stirring times.

We were just in the middle of an argument about ingredient collection – which I thought was a useless topic as we were nowhere near where any would be found – when we came upon a copse of trees. Actual fucking trees.

I think I might have cried a little.

They were short and had very little greenery on them, but they were trees. We set up camp and stayed for nearly a week before we moved on. A few days later, we found more trees, and I got so excited that I accidently knocked Severus from his perch with my hand that I had thrown up to get his attention. He had gone face first into a snow drift and I laughingly helped to dig him out of. He was not amused, but the rest of us certainly were.

We had been traveling through what I realized was a forest for several days before I realized that I could perhaps find something to eat other than meat. It took some more lessons, and a little bit of spell work, but I found roots and nuts that I could eat. Severus taught me several spells to identify if something was edible, which dived into a lesson on spells for detecting poisons, because of course it did.

I was learning Severus was a very paranoid sort.

We were packing up camp after a three day stay when I noticed that the meat I left out the night previous had been left untouched. "She must have decided to find her own way," I mumbled.

"It's about time," Snape grumbled, darting down to light a smaller piece on fire and gobbled it up, though he was still rotund from his breakfast. I scooped him back up before he could go in for seconds.

"Stop that," I hissed at him as he struggled in my grip. "You'll get fat."

Snape growled and feinted a bite towards my fingers, but I knew better than to fall for such a bluff and stuffed him in my hood instead, flipping it over him so he would be trapped while I made my way back to camp. He struggled, hissing and spitting in anger as he finally clawed his way free just as I had started to pack up camp.

"Thirty points from Gryffindor!" Severus shrieked as he launched himself from my shoulder and onto the sled as the ties came up around the covering hide.

"What did I do this time?" I asked, trying to sound indignant but failing to hide my amusement.

"For implying a professor was gaining weight!" He hissed, head low and fins raised. "And for manhandling me!"

"You are gaining weight," I replied, not even bothering to hide my laughter now. "You're a growing dragon. And you will get fat if you keep eating like this. Honestly Snape, your stomach is ballooning, how can you even fit any more food in there. But I will consent to the manhandling. So, I will allow fifteen points."

"This is not a negotiation!" Snape growled, his fins fluttering in his aggravation as the sled lifted and he was forced to the edge as Ophelia climbed aboard. She could walk most of the day without any difficulty at this point, but she was notoriously lazy. The only other dragon that fought her for a ride on the sled was Gemini, but he was too busy bothering Guinevere to notice.

"You're right, fifteen is too much. How about ten?"

"You are impossible," He ground out, shaking his head.

"And your punishment system is useless" I replied.

He was still arguing when I stopped suddenly, flicking my fingers to halt the sled that Ophelia was sleeping on. White and red caught my eye and I turned to look as Severus continued to drone on with his useless argument. It was only when I started walking towards it did he finally stop speaking and take in what caught my attention.

"Is that a tree?" I asked approaching the massive white tree with red leaves. "Severus," I hissed, flinging my hand up and whacking him unnecessarily on the chest. He snapped at my fingers and growled at me, but I ignored it. "Severus! It has a face!"

And indeed, it had. There was a face that looked as if it had been carved into the trunk ages ago, and from the eyes it cried what appeared to be red blood. I stepped forward hesitantly, distantly aware that the sled was back in the trees and all the whelps were out of sight. It had been a long while since it was just Severus and I, and it made me feel uncomfortable and a little anxious.

Once I was standing in front of the massive tree, I reached out and touched the dripping red liquid with slightly shaking fingers. It coated my fingertips, the texture thick and sticky. Wiggling my fingers, I brought them close to my face and sniffed. It smelled earthy.

Severus shifted down my arm and his dark blue tongue darted out and tasted it. "Sap," he answered my unasked question. I held my hand up curiously to catch the sap in the light. It really did look like blood.

"Why's it red?"

"Why is it red," Severus corrected, and I groaned in annoyance. Aside from my Latin language lessons, he had also taken it upon himself to correct my English as well.

"Okay, yes…but why?"

Snape bobbed his head in what I understood as a shrug. "Some trees just have red sap, like the eucalyptus tree, for example. There is a tree in Africa, commonly known as bloodwood that bleeds red sap when cut. It has something to do with the high amount of tannis. As to why this one is bleeding tears of red sap, I cannot say."

He tilted his head as he looked at the face of the tree in curiosity before he launched himself from my shoulder to land on a high branch. Severus was nearly invisible amongst the bark, and I wouldn't have known he was there if I hadn't been looking for him.

"What are you doing?" I asked, tilting my head up and watching his small form crawl further out on the branches.

"Looking for a long, straight, and thin stick," he replied, the leaves fluttering in the wind and obscuring him from view.

"Okay?" I pushed my hair aside and shifted around the trunk to catch sight of him again. He was nearly completely obscured by the leaves, far out on a large branch and making his way even further. "Why?"

I could hear his snort even as he ascended higher. "For your wand, you dunderhead. This tree clearly has magical properties. We might be able to use the wood to fill the gaps of your broken holly or replace it entirely."

"Oh, right," I replied, blushing in embarrassment. I had completely forgotten about my broken wand. Even though I had two wand holsters on my forearms, they were both invisible and easy to forget until it came time to change for the night. And even then, I would forget that only one holster actually contained a wand.

I returned to the face of the tree, blinking at the eyes that seemed to stare back at me. In fact, it actually felt like it was staring back at me. With my limited occlumency in place, I reached forward to set my hand against the face, to try and see if there really was something in there watching me.

My fingers were barely against the wood when I felt a blade against my neck.