Warning: the end of this chapter will have a twist ending that may upset you. The immediate events of following that ending won't be revealed until later chapters.

Do not post hate-filled reviews about this specific chapter.

Without further ado, let's get into it.

Chapter 4: That Night Fury, Confronting

All of them stood still; how long they stood there, they weren't even sure. It might have been a few seconds, a few hours or even a few days; to them all, it seemed to have lasted an eternity before anyone made any sort of movement as they all stared, the huddled professors staring at the dragon and the dragon and the gamekeeper at the professors. The first one to do so was Toothless; breaking his eye contact with the group of oddly dressed people and moving them onto the occupant of the bed on the left of them. There, slightly-bruised but seemingly okay, was his human, his Hiccup.

He made to approach Hiccup but his movements have caused the group of people to begin to extract thin sticks from their sleeves or pockets and shuffle closer together towards the single occupied bed; Toothless backed off, his pointed, snow white teeth unretracting, his pupils narrowed in aggression, his muscles tensing and tightening and a soft purple glow was building up in the back of his throat. He really didn't like those sticks; he knew that they are a type of weapon, just one he couldn't understand. Toothless sensed that they were somewhat alive, not so alive they can think for themselves but he could feel that they had a personality within them.

All the professors stiffened; there was a dragon just a few feet away from them that can take them down without breaking a sweat. They needed to move with absolute caution; one wrong move, one false twitch of a wand and things will get too ugly for words to describe. All of them were frozen, Toothless and the teachers, and both of them were daring other to make a move. Is this the dragon that attacked the boy lying on the hospital bed? What did the boy do that provoked the Night Fury?

"Don' t'reaten 'im."

The professors flicked their heads as one towards Hagrid's direction, before swiftly snapping them towards the dragon.

"Hagrid, this isn't the time for one of your beastly fantasies of babying monsters," Snape lowly hissed.

"Tis isn' like that!" began Hagrid, "but the reason is..."

"Is what, Hagrid?" interrupted McGonagall, "Ha- Hagrid, why would you think to bring dragon, much less a NIGHT FURY into the school building?"

"Yer don't know the 'ole story!" retorted Hagrid, "I 'ave a feeling t'at t'is dragon is tame."

"A feeling, a feeling?!" cried McGonagall hysterically, "you bring one of the most deadly dragons into a school building where there could have been thousands of students, all on the basis of a feeling?!"

Thus Hagrid began arguing against McGonagall and Snape. Though heated the argument was and tempting it was to join in, Flitwick, Sprout and Pomfrey continued to keep an eye on the dragon. However, Dumbledore was too occupied riding his train of thought to given much notice to the dissents between three of his staff members; he observed the dragon before him. The argument between three of Dumbledore's staff caused the dragon to lose some of its aggression and allowed the foreboding purple glow within its throat to fade.

Occasionally, Dumbledore noticed that the dragon kept sneaking glances towards the boy's unconscious form before staring down the teachers; furthermore, Dumbledore noticed that the Night Fury kept his eyes on him longer than the others, which indicated that the Night Fury either sensed the great skill and power within Dumbledore, knew that the old man commanded all the others in the room or both. Finally, the Headmaster observed that within the aggression of the dragon were hints of anxiety and fear.

This Night Fury isn't here with murderous intent, Dumbledore deduced. If it was after the boy's blood, it would have fired a shot at the boy the moment it laid eyes on him. The dragon was worried sick about the boy, its constant glances towards him and its agitated nature told Dumbledore so. He wanted to be with the boy. "Well," thought Dumbledore, "I need to gain its trust. I need to show we mean no harm to his boy and desire to help him recover." Thus, the Headmaster slowly extracted his wand, held it loosely between his forefinger and his thumb and held it away from him on his right.

At the sight of this, Toothless reared a little and growled loudly. The three squabbling teachers halted their argument at the sight and sound of this and Dumbledore commanded, "Don't fire!" as the other three were whipped out their wands and were preparing to cast a hex, a jinx, or a curse at the dragon; all of them froze at Dumbledore's shout, all of their eyes pointed to towards him. Toothless, having calmed down ever so slightly, looked at Dumbledore and the wand in his hand; then, the dragon flicked his head (eyes still glued to the wand), signalling to the old man to discard his stick.

Dumbledore pressed his lips together only for a split-second and it was so indistinguishable, that one would think that they imagined it, but he relented and tossed his wand; the wand spun many times in the air before it landed on the bed with a soft-plop. However, the dragon was still not satisfied and looked pointedly at the other professors and, with its eyes narrowed, flicked its head in the same direction as Dumbledore's wand was thrown. All the professors caught the gesture but they were torn on whether to follow the dragon's order.

"Disarm yourselves," Dumbledore ordered.

"What!?" everyone (except Hagrid obviously) exclaimed.

"Just do it." Dumbledore commanded in a soft but strong tone.

Hagrid, unsurprisingly, had disarmed himself at the Headmaster's word and his pink, flowery umbrella was on top of bed with Dumbledore's wand right beside it. After a few moments of hesitation, the other professors disarmed themselves. McGonagall threw her wand first, Snape's was second and his was simultaneously followed by Flitwick and Sprout. Only Pomfrey dithered at acting as well, torn between defending herself, speeding the boy's healing process or complying with the dragon's demand. Only after she found the others in the staff staring at her and receiving a particularly sharp glare from the Night Fury did Pomfrey finally yield and her wand soon followed the others.

Toothless' eyes and head followed her wand and watched it land on the bed; his eyes then landed on the people before him. For one moment, the dragon remained tense; then, to everyone's surprise (though unsurprisingly, Hagrid himself wasn't shocked), Toothless' demeanor changed drastically. His entire body relaxed, he sat on his hind legs, his ear flopped loosely and his pupils dilated; all of these things gave Toothless the impression of an oversized cross between a dog and a cat. The Night Fury began edging towards the boy and Pomfrey started to go to the boy's side; however, Dumbledore raised his hand to stop her. With his hand outstretched, he started to guide his staff away from the bed.

At first, they had some resistance against moving away from the bed but then they received a look from Dumbledore. At the sight of this, the professors gave way for the Night Fury. Once the way was clear and unobstructed, the dragon bounded quickly to the boy's side and placed his front paws on the bed and pushed himself up to get a good look; he was distraught at the condition of the boy.

His skin covered in patches of ash, burns and bruises. However catching sight of deformed limb, Toothless' heart froze and from his throat came a groan of concern and despair. How did it happen? Who did this to him? Was it them, the group of people? No, it wasn't. They permitted him to get close to Hiccup; if they were the cause, they wouldn't have allowed him to come to his human's side. The Night Fury then gently laid his head on top of the boy's chest; there he felt his brother's quiet but steady beat of life along with his gentle breath.

Toothless then huffed a breath at Hiccup and groaned and moaned loudly to elicit a response from him, however, nothing came from the boy that implied that he acknowledged Toothless' actions. Pausing in distraught, Toothless looked down and once again found the few cuts, bruises and burns scattered all over Hiccup's face and began to lick and slobber all over them. Madam Pomfrey was all against having any sort live animal within the hospital wing, but the fear of a Night Fury and respect for Dumbledore made Poppy stretch her patience a little further than usual.

Slobbering all over her patient and attempting to disrupt their rest unnecessarily crossed the line cleanly from Pomfrey's perspective and it was with great self-control that she resisted casting a hex at the direction of the dragon.

"Stop it! Stop it! Shoo! Shoo!" exclaimed Madam Pomfrey, as she advanced towards the bed.

Toothless backed, highly unamused that this strange woman was forcing him away from Hiccup and showed his disapproval thoroughly with his body language. Hagrid sensed imminent danger from the first growl and rushed forwards to prevent disaster and shouted "No!" to get their attention. It worked; Madam Pomfrey looked affronted whilst Toothless looked rather questioningly at him. Hagrid made his way between and turned towards Toothless with his arms slightly stretched forward and hands raised in a placating motion.

"She jus' wan's ter 'elp yer friend, she ain't gonna 'arm 'im," Hagrid comforted Toothless. Toothless didn't like the woman's attitude; she was pushing him away from his human just because he was helping him. But it shouldn't be a surprise, Toothless thought, she didn't know the relationship between him and his human and she certainly didn't know that dragon saliva had powerful healing properties. Furthermore, from the way that she was looking over at Hiccup, she wanted to look out for him and anyway Toothless trusted the giant; he may have looked massively intimidating and wild but there was a gentleness and kindness within him that is detectable once you spend time with him.

With that Toothless withdrew from the bed slightly and permitted Pomfrey to work on healing Hiccup. She muttered slightly as she waved her stick over Toothless' human and suddenly the slobber all over Hiccup's face vanished into thin air. Toothless was quite startled; he heard of humans that could do impossible acts or "magic" as they called it but never has he witnessed it before him. Pomfrey worked dabbing two different colored ointments all over Hiccup's body; after leaving the ointments to do their magic, Toothless observed her tapping her stick close to the wound and watched it disappear with a trace.

Toothless was still saddened at the state that Hiccup was in; his heart was hurting and he laid his head on the floor right beside the bed and circled his tail around the bed, completely ignorant of the shrill screech that was emitted at he did. Everyone else (well, everyone conscious) flinched, screwed their eyes shut and clasped their hands around their ears at the horrible sound after they silently retrieved their wands. It was then after they opened their eyes did they finally notice it.

It was burned near indistinguishable amongst the black of the Night Fury's scales but closer examination revealed it to them. A saddle was strapped on the upper back of the dragon; it used to be intricate and complex in design but all the small wiring and pulleys had been badly burnt and near unrepairable. The source of the horrid screech was a long length of wire that was bent outwards in an awkward angle and was clearly meant to run along the left side of the dragon's tail. It was clearly uncomfortable for the Night Fury and thus McGonagall wordlessly unstrapped the contraption with her wand off its back and sent it soaring gracefully through the air to land on the nearest table.

A small noise from behind her made turn around and found that its source was Dumbledore, deep in thought. The sound also caught the attention of the other professors and they all turned towards him and from looking into each other's eyes, they knew that probably were thinking about the same thing. With his staff's attention on him, Dumbledore spoke.

"I think…" he began. Everyone (except for Madam Pomfrey) was holding on to his every word. "…that I have figured out our patient's identity." From the look of everyone's faces, they as well knew the patient's identity. For they had all heard of a legend centering around a young boy taming the most powerful dragon in existence. "So…" began McGonagall, "…the boy's name is…"

"RWOAR!"

The abrupt roar snapped everyone's head towards the dragon, who suddenly leapt up and reared back, knocking over a bed. Dumbledore instructed, "Do not harm him! Just prevent him from making too much disruption!"

With that the professors leaped into action: Flitwick and Sprout swiftly cast Silencing Charms on Toothless, their combined efforts only managed to dampen the noise the Night Fury was giving off; Pomfrey and McGonagall swiped their wands across the room and Vanished the remaining empty beds, removing any potential sources of crashes and bangs; Snape and Flitwick cast Shield Charms between the staff and the dragon, a plausible precaution should the dragon start firing; Hagrid rushed towards the invisible barrier as close as he can, a desire driving him to help the creature before him; and Dumbledore stood intently observing and studying the Night Fury's behavior and actions, his wand poised and readied.

The Night Fury's behavior and actions led the staff to conclude that the Night Fury had little intention to harm them but they all knew that this dragon wielded tremendous power that should not be taken lightly.

"'e's in pain, someone 'elp 'im!" Hagrid cried out, "someone 'elp 'im!"

He was right. The dragon was whipping his head around in all directions and would have been shrieking his head off without the two Silencing Charms dampening the noise. Then, his head and front paws clutched his chest and the dragon began rolling around the room, as if the pain was a physical thing and the dragon was trying to squeeze it out of its body. After rolling around the floor, he laid flat on his back and arched his chest. It was distressing to watch; Hagrid was tearing up and the other staff members could only watch in horror. Finally, the Night Fury laid flat on his side on the floor; whimpering and groaning, the dragon turned his tear-filled eyes towards Dumbledore.

From those emerald eyes, Dumbledore suddenly understood what was saying or rather pleading. It hurts. Stop it. Please. With that, Dumbledore walked towards the invisible barrier and waved his wand, dispelling the Shield Charm in front of him. Hagrid rushed to aid him, but not before a jet of brilliant red light shot out of the tip of Dumbledore's wand and briefly illuminated the room.

With that, the dragon's eyes closed as his head fell on the floor with a thud.

Sorry, for placing a cliffhanger hanger here. I know that you will hate me when I say that the immediate events of this incident will be addressed in a later chapter or later chapters.

Now for the succeeding quote from the next chapter. This one is from Madam Pomfrey:

"How are you so silent!?"

A reminder: no hate reviews. Seriously, I don't want any angry reviews sent to me. I hope that you will respect the story line that I created.

On a separate note, I will be releasing a poll. This poll concerns the make-up of Hiccup's wand; more specifically, the wand wood of his wand. To find out more about the characteristics of each wand wood in the poll, go to the Wand Wood Feature on Pottermore. Furthermore, I will be adding my own wand woods and their characteristics will be posted along side my original wand woods.

I will release the poll on a later date. The expiry date of the poll will be the Friday preceding the chapter that focuses on Hiccup's trip to Diagon Alley; I will inform you of the date on the chapter that precedes the chapter that is before the Diagon Alley chapter.

If you have any further questions about the poll, please write it to me via reviews or private messaging.

See ya, soon!