AN: Guest: Thank you SO much for your wonderful review! The first one did not post to the story, but that's ok! I totally saved it because it was a lovely thing to say, and I was VERY touched you took the time to write it! I will continue to try to make this a quality story for you, and anyone else enjoying it!

I also do not have a beta at this time. All errors fall squarely on my shoulders.

Chapter 8

The gradually increasing brightness from the rising sun did not have nearly the same irritating effect on Draco as it had the morning before. This time he found himself pleasantly enveloped in a softness that reminded him of something, but he could not pinpoint what it was. His face was pressed into what was certainly some kind of cloud that had been captured from the heavens, for he could not remember feeling anything quite so luxuriant. He smiled as he rolled his head around, nuzzling around like a tiny infant kitten into the side of its mother.

Draco allowed himself some more time to bask in the resplendence that was this fantasy-like comfort beneath his head, and the even and warm comfort wrapped around his body as only the perfect bed cover could. As his mind gradually became more awake, and therefore aware, the question as to where exactly he was formulated in his mind. The bed he had occupied at the Gresham rat-hole had not been nearly so divine. Had it all been a dream?

Upon opening his eyes and slowly adjusting to his surroundings, he realized that he was, indeed, still in the bedroom within the Gresham House. As his mind adjusted, his memories of the night before returned to him as well.

Draco had fallen asleep, exhausted, in the bathtub in his room. He had awoken as the light in the sky was but a small ember across the mountaintops, his hands and feet wrinkled and withered as an old man. His bath water remained comfortably warm, and it appeared that the dirt and grime had been washed away. He had sleepily removed himself from the water, dried himself on a warmed towel situated nearby and been alerted very suddenly following his return to the realms to the conscious and wakeful that his being was in fierce need of sustenance.

His stomach howled its indignation. So much so that he clutched it as it rolled around in a noisy wail of desolation.

The cries of his body were met quite excitingly by the aroma of what he was certain was ambrosia from the gods. The scent of food was thick and he eagerly sought out the source.

To the side of his bed had been left a meal with a still-steaming plate and bread that had surely only just been taken from an oven. The divine bouquet of its freshness caused his mouth to water quite unceremoniously. Not bothering to dress himself beyond the towel at his waist and paying no regard to any semblance of manners, he sat himself upon his bed and took to devouring the fare with a vigor that would have left him with discipline at his own families table.

Here, alone, there was no such need for pretenses, and though is muscles still ached from the days overuse, his body insisted that it required this meal, and at a breakneck pace to boot.

It did not occur to Draco to question who had provided the meal, or how it had arrived in his room. Lord Loren Gresham could have delivered it personally with his personal guard in attendance and Draco wouldn't have given a horse's rear end about it in that moment.

In his exhausted and depleted state he had still registered that his meal had indeed taste as delectable as it had smelled. Despite his overall low regard for the family of Gresham overall, he begrudgingly recognized that the morsels he was inelegantly cramming into his mouth felt as fitting to his needs as a perfectly tailored set of breeches and waistcoat of the finest quality.

It had not been long after his ravenous consumption of that meal that Draco had lain himself horizontally and soared rapidly into slumber. However, unlike the morning prior, he had experienced no ill comforts this time. His previously too-hard bed was no longer comparable to sleeping on the floor, and the bedclothes he was sheathed in were no longer irritatingly rough. The items that caressed him as he slept were in perfect harmony to his preferences, and Draco sighed with relief audibly.

Unlike the previous morning, he found himself in a better countenance overall. His deep sleep and hearty meal left him feeling, well, most excellent. He donned his clothing after performing his normal toilette routine within his room, and found himself shortly thereafter waiting this time for Theodore to emerge from his own rooms.

There had not been any spoken arrangement as to whether they would accompany each other, or when, only that it seemed implied given they were the only outsiders here within the House, and assuredly ones who were still holding no favor to the Lord and Lady. This, Draco was fairly certain of, biting back a grimace at the bastardly words he'd spoken to Hermione the day before with his little outburst at her over the sodding Dragon's blood. In exactitude, while he knew that Dragon's blood was guaranteed to bring the possessor gold and riches to buy their wildest whim, he himself did not factually know that blood was what his father was even interested in.

Draco recounted the conversation that occurred with his father in the late night before he had departed for the Gresham lands. First, by apparition to the boundary of Loren Gresham's homeland with Theodore as his companion side-along with his father Lucius. The experience left the two young men much worse for wear, and Draco had mortifyingly found himself heaving as soon as his feet touched the ground again. His fathers disappointed half-frowning sneer pointed down at him from the very top of his nose.

That midnight conversation had been less than enlightening as Lucius had pointedly withheld the background mechanics of why Draco and Theodore were to travel to their Houses political adversary, to be effectively assimilated as a member of the Gresham House until their Dragon chicks had hatched and the two agents were soundly in control of the Dragons.

Draco lacked the information to understand logistics of it then, and in the space between that day and his present moment he still hadn't worked it all out. Too much still remained unknown about how Dragons behaved, and what the purpose of all this training the members of Gresham House harped on about relentlessly. Couldn't you just mount a beast and take to the sky? What difference did it make as to who rode it? Horses certainly did not have any discernment as to who rode on their backs; why was a Dragon any different? Offer a horse a little treat after a job well wrought and it seemed eager to provide you its loyalty. Beasts were all but the same, he wagered, and why would a Dragon be divergent?

Amid Draco's musings Theodore emerged from his own room and closed it securely behind himself; the previous days expenditures on his person restored and repaired as Draco's were. He bestowed a nod along with a salutation and the two consigned to enter the informal morning hall together, their unspoken unity as outsiders bound them, though they found themselves unable to offer and words of friendliness.

As the day before the family members had selected seating with no arrangement. Hermione was brushing Tyt'os hand from the cream as though she were batting away the explorative paws of a tiny kitten, admonishing him with, "No, you great warthog, you've had your portion. You can't drown your food in cream!" Ursa was vaguely trying to cover her own light laughter, and Loren had moved his own hand strategically to shield his own as Tyt'o then fully reached behind his sister to tap her opposite shoulder, catching her gaze for a mere second, before pilfering said cream on the other side. Her exclamation of having been bested by his surge in cunning rung out into a further escalated strife complete with her attempting to reach over him to get it back.

With her brother's greater size, this was not possible, but Hermione refused to abdicate in the face of any task, no matter how surmountable. Being unable to compete with him in sheet force and domination, she adjusted her tactics to poking him repeatedly at the side of his ribs, causing him to crunch at his side to try and shield her assault. He still held the cream she desired, which she had no hope in winning at this rate.

Less effected by the intimacy of the setting, and immature display playing out before them the two took their seats offering still-formal greetings to the Lord and Lady both. Ursa grinned delightedly to Theodore, who had gravitated to a seat closer to her rather than Loren, leaving Draco closer to Hermione and Tyt'o who remained locked in battle over the remaining prize of the cream. He took to customizing his breakfast as he saw fit and noted that this morning, there was some manner of roasted animal flesh and what appeared to be a portion of eggs.

"Good Morning Theodore. Draco." Ursa addressed, and Theodore found himself smiling in return to her friendliness. From his seat, Draco emulated but his eyebrow pricked up subtly at his fellow guest at Theodore's clearly friendly engagement. He chided himself mentally for having missed any goings-on the night previous around the formal table. He noted that, exhausted or not, he would enforce his commitment to maintain a presence while in this House, if for nothing else that to glean any possible telling facts about the Greshams.

"Did you rest fully, Theodore?" Ursa inquired, sipping daintily from a steaming cup, which contained something strong and scented. After his mouthful, Theodore smiled and responded.

"Quite, my Lady. You were most correct about the elixirs. I slept quite deeply."

"I am pleased to hear it." Theodore tried not to keep smiling, even though it felt very much like he should. Though, he did find himself grow conscious then of what his repeated shows of friendliness might interpret as, given the silent scrutiny of the Lord Gresham while at the family table. Theodore mentally brought himself back to his nature state of passivity, feeling himself discomforted at the idea that he might have overstepped his boundaries with the Lady of the House. Such mistakes were inexcusably in poor taste, not to mention the Lady Ursa Gresham was indeed old enough to be his own mother, and by no means did he wish there to be any misinterpretation to his return of her gestures. It simply felt comfortable, and right.

Though Loren kept a stern eye to the two young men at his table, he himself felt keener to observe the Nott youngster more so than the Malfoy. Once the upset had quelled in his Lady's chambers the night previous, and his distressed daughter had been seen to her rooms, he lay with his beloved wife in their marital bed, spending great care in each other's arms reaffirming their love and affections for the other well past when they should have been seeking their dreams. In the afterglow following, nakedness unrestrained and limbs practically useless, she has spoken then to him of her observations of the two boys; how in her heart she felt such empathy to a young man devoid of the love and affections of a mother.

As she had confessed her empathy for the young man, Loren had been saturated with the reminder that while she had conceded her ability to conceive more of his heirs, and done it without complaint, it was at his ardent request, not hers. Their two children were brilliant and capable and Loren was filled with endless pride and joy over them. He truly could not desire any greater gift, and their lives had been filled with blessings aplenty through the years as the two of them grew more and more into adulthood. His wife's near-death during childbirth had rocked him to his very core.

He had not railed, and he had not caused a scene; he had simply appealed to her on a level she could not refute: He applied to her logic. In the deepest vault of his heart, he knew that he did this out of nothing more than selfishness for himself. Upon her recovery, he built a case that she could not deny, and in her consent, he successfully repudiated the dreams they has shared to conceive again.

Ursa had understood it from a logical position; it had been a burden to hear heart she had carried without complaint. Any sorrow she felt through the years she poured into focusing on the blessings she had achieved. Their love had never suffered for it, but Loren could feel the tinges in her demeanor over the years, when her eyes grew wistful and longing. Or when the cries of a newborn rang in the halls in the fellow Guild Houses they visited, Loren could see his wife's joy darkened at the reminder of what she had given up. Though he loved her with ever speck that was his being, he knew well and good how reprehensible it had been for him to take that from her.

Ursa had spoken that night of how she knew he was to be regarded warily, but that she deduced, no, she was certain, that they young man suffered loneliness and knew no true warmth of love in his life. For this, Loren felt himself vigilant for his wife: Her brilliant mind was methodical and unrelenting, but her heart was such that it loved without restraint and was prone to blind her to ill intent. He could not bear any possibility where his wife grew to love this young man, only to have it turned against her duplicitously.

Loren witnessed his paramour as she carefully cultivated her conversation with young Theodore exuding kindness, while the bickering between his own children having subsided into companionable exchanges that they excluded their other House guest out of pointedly. It seemed this left the two of them on the outskirts of what transpired at the table, though that hardly seemed reason enough to engage him. Unlike Ursa, Loren had no interest in developing any quid pro quo with this young man, and allowed a choice under different circumstances he might be debating with fellow Guild Houses in which manner to return him to his own home; in one piece, or many?

The notion having come to him in an uncharacteristic spell of dark thoughts, Loren chuckled in spite of himself. His conflict was exactly with the Lord Malfoy in specific and not young Draco at all. Rationally he recognized that his feelings stemmed from the ever-present unease at how vulnerable a position he was in, and not borne of any direct malice to the young man. As Draco had shown absolutely no interest from the get-go in his daughter, he had eased back in the discomfort of believing any conflict would arise from that potential. And from the tale Hermione had told her mother, Ursa had assured him that his daughter entertained no notions of affection for the young light-haired lord.

He didn't even have to disguise his pleasure with that; should this venture prove disastrous at any turn, he was comforted that Hermione would not slip serenely through his fingers and into the bedchamber of the young Malfoy, and in a House with a father-in-law whose allegiance was sworn to a man who had vowed to destroy their Guild.

The tinkling laughter of his wife broke Loren's reverie, as it did that of his son. Tyt'o was a dutiful boy and most concerned where his mother was concerned. Loren questioned if the unanticipated interest Ursa took in the Nott youth would cause any subterfuge between the two young men should she continue this pursuit.

Loren cleared his throat and looked at his wife's captivating face. She noted his reach to her dutifully, and bade Theodore luck and strength for the day ahead of him, insisting that the four of them pack more food than the day prior to ensure their energy as they continued. Loren found himself aware then that the expressions he witnessed from this boy that her concern was not lost on him. He agreed to her dutifully, and Loren rose from his chair without word.

Having captured the attention of the table, Loren addressed the youths before him, his own included. "Eachan the Horse Master returned night last and has informed me that the masters come presently." He spoke to his daughter and son. "No more than another two days, and you two will use the time wisely in continuing to instruct our guests in their riding." He looked then to Draco, and Theodore. "Tyt'o and Hermione will share their knowledge to bolster you. The masters available soonest are Warlock Black and Necromancer Mora."

"Father," Hermione started. "What of Warlock Alastor?" Loren smiled at his daughter without reserve. The great Warlock Alastor Moody was his daughters personal favorite; the only tutor she'd ever had that seen her not as a female, but a competent student. Any challenge laid for her brother, he had also emulated for her. Most of their tutors had some level of trepidation with instructing a female, not personally viewing it as an effort of great worth to him. Though, Loren Gresham minced no words in explaining to them that he wished them tutored in all things, together as equals.

"Warlock Moody will be at least a moon hence to arrive as he has been otherwise detained in other trainings." He explained to his daughter, and Hermione resigned herself to a nod. As she would later tell her brother, she looked forward to seeing how strenuous the gnarled Warlock designed his approach to their fellow pupils. Knowing the Warlocks adamant refusal to tutor any children within the coalition House Gaunt had formed; Hermione suspected that the direction he would design for these two would be of particular interest. It would certainly pose no easy feat to accomplish.

"We will use our time wisely, and efficiently, father," Tyt'o told his father dutifully and rose to leave the hall. Hermione followed suit, and kissed her father's cheek affectionately before they left, leaving the Lord with a smile reminiscent of his daughters carefree early youth when kisses from her mama and papa were something she couldn't get enough of. These days it seemed they were fewer, and far between as she crept closer and closer to the independence of true adulthood.

Draco and Theodore, though he kissed over Ursa's knuckles respectfully whereas Draco only bowed to her, followed them once again into the breech that was riding horses.

Upon arriving at the stables again, it was Tyt'o that procured the needed riding tack to adorn their steeds for their riding lesson, and Hermione this time spoke a little more to the pair than she had the day prior, and seemed less on edge concerning the details. She pointed out first to Theodore that he had to ensure to double check the buckles, speaking with confidence and knowledge from years of her own experience. With Draco, she commended him, though a bit tersely, in the gentility he'd shown his animal the day before, relating that to how he inserted the horses bit into the mouth.

Draco would not speak to this, but he preened a moment that she had noted it; he had not realized she had seen it. He also questioned why such a thing would matter to him, and further examined in his mind why he should care.

As he presented the joined metal pieces just before the horses lips, carefully working with the horse rather than against him (or her, he didn't yet know) to move the metal behind the teeth at the back of the mouth, he quietly enjoyed the velvet snout once more with his palm. The horse was gentle and pliant and professed no objection to Draco as he placed the bridle over the forward-facing ears, connecting the buckle together under the jaw. Draco found himself trying to determine if this horse was the same one who had whimsically battled with him when Draco tiredly attempted to defend the animals' careful examination of his person with a horse brush. Admittedly, he could not tell. Though the horse seemed sedate and kind, it had not exhibited the same uniqueness in personality. Must be a different horse, he thought to himself.

The four riders had affixed their riding gear along with two extra horses to trail behind, and walked their animals across the bailey and bridge, out into to the same barren and dusty riding arena they had utilized before. There were a number of other places that Tyt'o and Hermione could have selected to bring a change of scenery, but they had agreed to keep their environment predictable to keep distractions at bay.

Hermione had secured more fulfilling meal options from the kitchen prior to leaving, and hung the sack of food on a stubby tree branch in the shade to keep it from the warm sun along with several bladders of water. Together, she and her brother paired off with the young Nott and Malfoy individually; Tyt'o and Theodore together, and Hermione accompanying Draco.

Despite her earlier praise of his treatment of their animals, the young Gresham had not forgotten her wards lack of couth, and had resolved that through the rest of the ridings they would supervise, she was going to ensure that he rued his slicing commentary. She acknowledged it was likely to be pettier than she should deign to confess aloud, but she decided to justify it "for the greater good".

In this exercise, the two siblings had split the open area into their own halves in which they walked their pupils through a series of turns, and circles throughout, and then returning to the start point. As Draco walked Hermione took liberty at poking the end of a stick she'd found at him in various places, pointing out where his posture was failing and out of alignment. At the fourth jab, Draco wheeled on her with vexation. "Must you insist in prodding at me incessantly?" he hissed at her. Hermione donned a smug smile in response.

"Yes. It is an absolute necessity, in fact." She straightened herself primly as her own horse walked smoothly beside his own. Draco rolled his eyes.

"The pointlessness of this is in fact quite painful." He commented, and Hermione poked him hard in the arm causing Draco to hiss and wince away from her.

"Hold your tongue then; it is not!" She exclaimed.

"Then pray tell, what precise purpose do we have in learning this?" He challenged. His lighter eyes were squinted with annoyance, and Hermione had noted to herself that she had never seen eyes so light before. While she found the color to be quite a fascination, she agreed to herself that the bearer of them was entirely exasperating. Much like a young colt who had been spoiled without a lead and allowed free-run for too long. She rolled her own copper colored eyes at him, but realized that without a reason it was likely he wouldn't find inspiration in the materials he was instructed.

"Dragon riding is quite like riding a horse," she began semi-conversationally. Her normal imperious overtones quelled intentionally in an attempt to draw his interest. "Form is important to hold as the body must be strong to combat the forces of the winds. Though, there are obvious exceptions." She added. "There motions are a bit different and not quite as many chances you'll slip off and fall to your death. " Draco balked.

"What?!" Hermione waved a hand at him as thought to pacify his valid concern, as though it were truly no problem.

"Oh, that rarely happens. Father has ridden his Goldoduur for nearly two score and he's never fallen!" The mention of the name peaked Draco's interest.

"Who is Goldor?" He asked, Hermione shook her head and corrected him carefully.

"Gold-o-duur." She emphasized the last vowels carefully. "It's very important you learn names properly; Dragon's appreciate courtesy, and he is fathers bound Dragon; His name means 'The Mammoth'." She said without hiding her pride. The Dragon was, truly, a mammoth indeed and Hermione secretly felt a thrill zip through her at the fantasy she played in her mind when their two wards laid eyes on the colossal Dragon for the first time.

"Appreciate courtesy?" Draco challenged, presenting his token sneer, which Hermione had come to find herself in absolute loathing of. "A Dragon is little more than a large beast," He patted the shoulder of the horse he rode. "No more brains than this steed I sit upon now."

In shock, Hermione reigned her horse to a complete stop, which Draco mimicked once he noticed her. Her face was positively incredulous towards him, and she gave him a disgusted once-over. "You truly believe our Dragons to be mindless leviathans, then? No more brains than that of a horse?" Draco sensed in her statement and reaction that, though his information had come from a source he had presumed to trust, his father, that it was in fact vastly inaccurate.

"Aren't they?" he asked, a little quietly. Hermione wanted to soften to him at that question. It seemed then that he had been informed most incorrectly in what he faced, and for that she discovered she found a little pity for him. Thought not much, the boy remained a complete sod, and she had already vowed she would outwardly maintain her scorn for his very existence.

Rather than answer him directly, she elected a more informative path. "Recall you when you cared and cleaned the horses we rode?" Draco nodded. "The one you I floated you the carrot for?" She patter her own animal, identifying him for Draco. "When he and you parlayed, did you think he a mindless in his quest for delicacies upon your person?"

The young Malfoy considered her implication, and recalled that despite the pliancy of the animals previous, they had been both easy to direct and docile to care for. The one she now sat astride had displayed interest in his person and the interaction had showed intelligence in that the beast had no fear of his pitiful attempt to use a horse comb in defense of a creature whose primary diet consisted of vegetation. Draco shook his head side to side.

"All animals, magical and non-magical have feelings, Malfoy. Some possess the capacity for more complex higher thought and communication than others, but they are not mindless." Hermione stroked her dark horse with tenderness. "My noriker is a good and proper mount; he is dutiful without much mischief and gentle to the stable hands."

"How does he then compare to the back of a Dragon?" Draco inquired, and Hermione winced a little, knowing that an honest answer from here would reveal how autocratic she had spoken of riding Dragons. She, in fact, had only once sat astride a Dragon. It remained the single most terrifying and exhilarating experience of her young life. Never mind that it hadn't even involved flight, because she had been too tiny to maintain safety at the speed at which a Dragon flew.

Hermione's very first, and sole contact atop a Dragon, was in fact Goldoduur. While she and her brother had been young, the Dragons had taken a keen interest in making contact with the pair. Small children tended to have a great deal of significance with Dragon kind, her father had explained, especially those who belonged to their riders. Dragon magic was naturally quite attracted to early childhood magic; historically when a rider produced offspring, the immense animals found themselves drawn close to their riders young, as they would their own. Something about those early buds of magic within a child captivated a Dragon in close proximity to a human being, though Hermione did not understand what the mechanics behind this was. Not yet, anyway.

Hermione concluded that truth was logically a better option than farce. "Only a bonded rider can take a Dragon to the sky," Hermione met Draco's eyes, even though she felt herself embarrassed and deflated admitting this. "We will all get our chance when the chicks are hatched and grow." Before Draco could get to his next question, Hermione deflected clumsily with segueing into their next moves. They had lingered without riding long enough. Tyt'o and Theodore had been working much harder through their courses as the opposite pair had stopped to parry their debate.

"This time through the course, I want you to bring your horse to trot through one round, then up to canter and hold."

Draco did as bade, and through the course of that morning, Hermione grew pleased to witness his progress: His posture improved, and his confidence had grown a little more in his ridership. The sun had not been nearly as hot as it was the day prior, and fluffy little clouds had begun to dot the skies above them. As summers wore on, rains were common in the afternoons, which could put a slight damper on riding outdoors, but for the time being the weather held beautifully.

Permitting only a short break for water, and an apple for each rider, the cores of which were given to the horses who gobbled them up greedily, and they pressed onward with their designated partner. This time for Draco though, Hermione bade him to bring the horse to gallop and showed him how to press himself into the animal without unintentionally goading it to run faster, but to ease the bouncing as he rode. The efforts intent were to strengthen the muscles of the body, and elevate a rider's confidence.

True to her intent, Hermione worked Draco hard, and then pressed him and his horse for more. Amazingly, Draco bore it without complaint and question, and at the midday, the four took a rest while Hermione and Tyt'o tied their own horses up, and walked Theodore and Draco's to cool them down. Once the horses settled, they switched their saddles to the two spares they had brought along, who had waited patiently at the edge of the clearing.

Theodore and Draco ate and talked intermittently, discovering themselves again ravenous for sustenance and traded tidbits together that they had learned throughout the morning. Draco was fascinated to learn that there were only two adult Dragons here in Morvan Rove, and not some great flock. That the female, Imri, currently brooded her nest and had not left since she started instinctually nesting, which had begun during Ostara in the previous year. Theodore further told him that Dragons, while nesting and brooding, became dangerously feral and protective to their territories; to the point that they would defend them violently. Tyt'o had shared cautionary tales handed down from his ancestors of how careless warlocks of old had discovered this by apparating into Dragon territories trying to cultivate and capture Dragon chicks.

They found themselves beset aflame and devoured by the Dragons, who then tracked and followed the invaders to their homeland, and besieged those lands with fire and terror. The Dragons had only ceased when the last body had stopped its thrashing.

Draco shivered at the telling of this. This explained why they had not apparated into Morvan Rove, but had been transported quite painstakingly by carriage the whole dreadful trip. Theodore commented as much as well in agreement.

Tyt'o and Hermione joined the pair for their own lunch, though it was not as much work to teach, it was still an effort to ride. Along with meats, cheese and fruit, Hermione had pilfered a smallish round loaf of bread and a small bladder of churned cream that she split into four quadrants. Though she had originally intended to secret it away greedily to split with her brother, her conscious got the better of her. Theodore and Draco had ridden so well, and presented much less obstinacy that she split her victual delicacy into four quadrants and handed each boy their own portion.

The two newcomers might not feel the warmth of friendship to her or her brother, but as they bit into the bread, discovered the concealed delights of walnuts and dried mountain berries, their eyes lit up like they were children tasting their first sweets. That alone gave her a little boost of happiness, and Tyt'o smiled with gladness that she, quite literally, had broken bread with them.

Once the morsels were consumed, and horses mounted, the riding continued. Repeatedly the Gresham's ran their fellow pupils through the courses, this time joining them through many runs and altering the directions to keep them from sinking into a routine. Tyt'o paired with Theodore to ride parallel on some runs, and then switched to ride aside Draco while his sister brought up the rear behind. The spotted clouds from earlier that morning had bloomed into foreboding thunderheads, which lingered along the tops of the peaks that surrounded the valley that was their home. As the afternoon wore further on, the heat of the sun made the air quite stuffy and thick, so much that the dust the horses kicked up grew oppressive and caustic. Bolstered by the successes of their day, Tyt'o convinced Hermione to agree to head the crew back early, but with a detour along the way.

Neither young man had any additional chances to inquire further with their curiosities over Dragon behavior and lore, but this presented the perfect window in which to do so.

Retrieving their two spare horses and tethering them to his sister and himself, Tyt'o led the troupe through a yonder path they had not traveled. As with the entrance to their hidden arena, the woods were thick but the air cooler, the direct sun blocked by the canopy of intermingled deciduous and coniferous trees above, it accentuated the mosses and low-growing vines that littered the forest floor.

Tromping carefully through the single-file path, there was a heavy feeling of magic through those woods that whispered along through the trees and brought light tingling to Theodore and Draco as they traipsed through it. Birds calls they could not recognize rung through the air around them and split the silence as the two wondered and observed, catching the faintest hints of movements beyond trees far from them, or the occasional twinkling of lights that sparkled before disappearing.

Hermione watched as both Theodore and Draco craned and stretched to get some sense for what lived and moved around them, their mounting questions quite evident in their curiosity.

"Hyter sprites," she said pointed out. "Silkies and lulls, spriggans sometimes, even, nearer the waters." She explained. "The forests here are filled with them. Dragon magic pulls them close, especially the small ones." Just as she finished, the whizzing of miniscule wings zinged past like a hummingbird and she laughed gently.

"Dragon magic?" Theodore turned his upper body, though his muscles objected, to hear her better.

"Aye, Dragon magic," she confirmed. "It's elemental, and where the Dragon calls his home, their magic feeds the lands." Hermione gestured around them. "'Tis why this wood is thick with fae; they swarm to it. It tingles at your limbs; Can you feel it?"

Theodore looked down at his hands, the reigns of his horse still held within them. He could. Very much so, even. The deeper they delved into the woods, the less inconsistently he felt the lapping of the magic in his surroundings. Draco felt it to. It was as though a mother cat was cleaning her kitten and it lapped at his own magics within. "Yes." He squeezed his hands open and shut, absorbing and considering the feel of it, and looked around. "It's everywhere in here."

Hermione smiled at him and looked around as well. It was unguarded and shared the awe that Theodore felt, and showed her love for the place she called her home. Theodore was stuck then at how that smile lit up her face and how her copper colored eyes danced while she looked through the trees0, her face normally set into an intentional grimace when she looked at either himself or Draco. The smile was much like her mothers, he concluded.

Draco had glanced back at the two, though the horses all continued walking beneath them, and caught a brief glimpse of the smile she had shot to Theodore, and felt an unexpected pang within himself. It was a feeling he did not recognize, only that he distinctly didn't like it. The wonder and awe he felt only moments ago felt tainted slightly after that, and he righted himself within his saddle to glare into the back of Tyt'o Gresham as they continued to plod through the thicket.

The light making its way through the trees increased as they neared a break in the tree line, granting more space as the steeds exited to allow them out of their single-file line. Knowing where they had come to, both Hermione and Tyt'o dismounted their horses, as Theodore and Draco were struck dumb by the sight before the. The parting of the trees revealed an obscure clearing that was pressed against the side of a mountain, from a stone overhang covered in wild vines and moss cascaded a modest but plentiful supply of water. The flow gave off a tranquil sound and a light mist floated through the air, catching the rays of sunshine that slipped through the trees, sending rainbows and glittering droplets of area all around. In the daylight, the floating droplets appeared as floating jewels that floated along the air.

The opening was just large enough to fit all six horses and their four riders without cramping the space. Knowing the area well, Hermione and Tyt'o dismounted and tethered their horses with enough slack that the animals could help themselves to the moisture.

Dropping their hoods behind them, the Greshams both negotiated their way over slippery and jagged rocks that bordered the stream the waterfall gave birth to, and each reached their hands to the water to pull back a drink within their cupped palm. Hermione motioned to their guests to dismount and join them while she wet her hands again and cleansed her face with the waters.

Theodore was captivated by the feel of magic that flowed through his surroundings was palpable here, and he dismounted in kind with his companion. As he approached with Draco, he noted that the floating mist around him was, actually, not mist at all, but the twinkling lights of tiny flying creatures with within the air, and they were dancing around all four of them. Hermione and Tyt'o shared a furtive smile together.

"Our ancestors christened this place 'Dragons Tears' when first the Greshams brought the great gold Dragons here to Morvan Rove," Tyt'o told the other two males. "When first a Gresham child is brought into the world, the family gathers here beneath the stone to baptize the child." Theodore reached out to the water and felt not only the wetness of it, but also the tenacious concentration of a magic he had never experienced before. It was like what he felt in the air, yet it left the flesh of the part of his hand in contact alight with sensation, and he pulled it away to examine himself.

"Dragon magic." Hermione smiled at him, and in turn touched the water again.

"How does it get here?" Theodore asked in his attempt to disseminate the workings. Her copper eyes were filled with wonder and delight as she spoke to him, surrounded by a supernatural power she had known the whole of her life.

"The Dragons have lived with us in these mountains, and their magic permeated into everything that surrounded them. This water-" She offered him her cupped hands filled with it, and he opened his own beneath hers to accept her offering "Comes here from the Upper Mountain Reaches, and fills the valley with their magic. When a Dragon makes a home, their magic rests there and in it grows a place of great reverence. It becomes part of the earth, and part of the people as well." Theodore drank in her words as he drank in the water, and felt warmth sweep through his innards as though he had drank from a warmed bowl of soup. The unfamiliar magic danced through his core, and teased at his own mirthfully. He found his body shivering in response, though not unpleasantly so.

"In the days of old, important ceremonies were performed and concluded in places like these within the mountains, for there are many such as this that bring fresh water from the high mountains where the Dragons nest." Tyt'o supplied, excluding the subtext of how the area that the four of them now stood, feet and ankles atop the wet stones of the creek had been used by former Lords and Ladies as a place to conceive their future airs, dancing together in the woods filled with Dragon magic. Hermione knew what her brother omitted, and a blush crept unexpectedly to her cheeks that Tyt'o noticed, but drew no attention to.

Hermione brought yet another handful of water to Draco in offering, and he accepted it as Theodore had, lifting it to his lips tentatively as both Gresham's copper eyes witnessed it expectantly. When he hesitated, Tyt'o gave him a friendly nudge with his hand.

"An offering of Dragon waters from a member of the House is a symbol to us of kinship and belonging." Draco brought the waters to his lips and as he drank in the liquid, his light eyes widened at the sensations he experienced within his body. "Our ancestral mothers would bring their sons and daughters to such a place to bless her children with this magic in prayers for long lives, healthy sons and daughters of their own, great prosperities for the House."

"Before we take our pilgrimage into the mountains to seek the great nest, we will bring you to such a sacred place again and father will bless you as he did us, when we were young children." The daughter of the Gresham house touched again her hands through the falling waters, the wetness darkening her sleeves down to her elbows, yet her expression had turned so dreamy upon her young face, it was as if she intended to sink herself into the falls and simply drift away with them in absolute bliss.

Their first introduction to Dragon magic completed, the Greshams' collected their wards and returned them all back through the wooded paths, leaving the sacred and enchanting mountain clearing behind them, and back to the paths taking them to the castle. The trek back was, as always, sparse on conversation; Both Draco and Theodore found themselves unexpectedly cowed by their experiences that afternoon. The residual sensations within their magical bodies was unlike any sorcery they had ever embraced before.

As the two of them lay in bed and the night overtook the land, the stars and moon brightening the vast sea of dark, each of them toiled in their minds the greatly unexpected revelations they had that day.

For Theodore, it was the lore and history of the great Dragons and how he felt a deep yearning to sit for hours into the night in the firelight, and hear Ursa Gresham recount the same tales she had told her children. The stories of the Gresham line to the beginning and the first riders and how the Dragon magic had changed everything around it. With Draco, the sight of the floating fae folk within the deep of the mountains, and the vibrant magic that had enveloped him as he stood there listening to the Greshams as they spoke of their lands. Even though he was an outsider, the force he had consumed had infused his very nucleus with its presence, uncaring and undiscerning as to his allegiances and his own House.

As his last conscious thoughts left his mind that night as he drifted into sleep, satiated by another nights warm meal infused with restorative elixirs, a vision of the copper eyes of Hermione Gresham flashed before him, ablaze with magic from her homeland as she basked in the water which fell from the mountains.

…

AN: So here are a few familiar characters. They might all be a little OOC from canon (but so is most of this story, so it's no big shocker there, right?), and there is an OC with the necromancer, which you'll just have to stay tuned to learn more about!

And lol, Dumbledore quotes.

Also, also, jebus what a behemoth of a chapter!