Screw it. I was going to nitpick this chapter to death, but I'm just going to publish it. To hell with it. Thank you lovelies for your patience with my yo-yoing.

As usual, the creative rights behind the characters in HP are owned by JKR, and not me. The story here is original, and certainly there are OCs peppered all over the place.

Grovek26 – thank you for your review!

Pgoodrichboggs – thank you as well! I always enjoy your observations.

Chapter 38

From the darkness all around him began the slow creeping of light. A golden and sparkling blanket eked up slowly into his consciousness in the darkness, gradually consuming the night in which he lay.

Tyt'o found himself blinked rapidly against the luminous golden light which surrounded him, and winced at how his pupils stubbornly refused to adjust as quickly as he wished. It wasn't even that it was such an intense brightness, it was the stark contrast of having his field of vision so immersed in the glow around.

He hissed as he forced himself to look upon his surroundings, finding himself erect. Confusion swarmed him when he heard the rustling of feet and breathing just near him, and he swayed as he jerked his head back and forth trying to locate the source of the being near him.

A warm hand clasp his bicep and before he could react, he heard a familiar voice.

"Brother?" Hermione asked sleepily. Her voice delicately hoarse from disuse.

"Sister?" He stammered out, and her hand slid down his arm to join in his hand. "Where are we?" He cracked open his eyes to see his sisters curling hair made into a wild mane, unbound and falling past her shoulders. Her eyes mimicked his in how narrowly they were open. "I was just sleeping." He stated, and yawned, covering his mouth with his hand.

"Aye," She commented. "As was I."

A cough from near them caused the pair to simultaneously look back over their left shoulder to see both Theo, and Draco standing near them. Both wiping at their eyes as they squinted and adjusted to the bright light.

Seeing her paramour, she immediately brightened, and feeling her brother jerk her hand gently while he positioned himself between the pair as she smiled shyly and looked away slightly as she fought a bit of blush creeping across her cheeks. Draco, similarly glanced to her and away.

"What in the Gods names are we doing here?" Asked Theo, stretching his back and shoulders as though he had just stood up from his nights rest. Tyt'o loosened his grip on his sister's hand and glanced back at her. The warm glow surrounding them seemed endless in any direction in which he looked, but the light source strong enough that it seemed to blur the lines around her, and their companions in a way that seemed almost…. Dream like?

He looked his sister in the eyes momentarily, and turned back to the area surrounding them. At first observation there was nothingness in any direction in which you looked. Though it seemed to be littered with floating little glistening sparkles hovering in the air all around, neither rising nor sinking.

"I don't know." Tyt'o confessed and moved to walk the area just slightly, and he took stock of his three fellow peers. They were all still dressed in their bed clothes. Light pants with strings to draw the waist and light linen shirts. Hermione wore a simple white shift that blessedly laced up to her collarbone, and covered at least a good portion of her shoulders.

Together Draco and Theo similarly took stock of their surroundings, and each other. Though Draco lingered his gaze while fighting against the corners of his mouth when he tried to determine if any light was showing through Hermione's bed clothes. The glow of their surroundings gave her skin an unworldly warmth about it, and he desired greatly to run his hands over the exposure of her shoulders, and down her arms. Perhaps feel her jawline, and touch her lips.

Theo cleared his throat and Draco pulled his stare away reticently, but his eyes left her last as he twitched a corner of his mouth up in a little smile for her. She returned it without considering whom their audience was at the moment.

The four remained close though they looked all around for any sign as to where they were, and why there were there together when they felt a vibration. It came up from beneath them, though it did not appear they were even standing upon the terra of the earth. Only a great field of never-ending glow and shimmering.

"What in Hades is that?" Draco asked lowly as the vibrating continued, traveling upward along their legs until it reached their trunks and consumed their limbs and minds. Both Draco and Theo shook their heads as though to rid themselves of the feeling, and as it increased Draco began to crumble under the intensity as he gripped his ears and a moan of confusion and discomfort left his mouth.

Witnessing such a sharp decline in him, Hermione reacted immediately. She grabbed at his wrists with her hands and held fast to him as he bowed his back inward in a fetal gesture as she began to speak lowly to him.

"Breathe, Draco. Breathe." She assured him softly. "Shhhhh, it will not harm you. Do not fight it."

Theo had fallen nearly to his knees in the same pattern, and Tyt'o came to his side in aid of his friend. He put ahis hand on his shoulder and knelt with him. "Let it pass through you, Theo." He instructed as Theo had reached fully to the floor, nearly crumpled with the sheer weight of the feeling. He couldn't hear, couldn't see, and it felt so heavy all around him. "Relax your shoulders." Theo shook his head and Tyt'o made a gentle 'shushing' to him. "Take a deep breath Theo. Deep into your belly, not just your chest." He glanced to his sister who identically whispered to Draco as she supported his chest with a hand near his heart.

Gingerly he lay his hand at his friends shoulder and to the youth's chest and supported him from crumbling any further as a gurgling came from his companion. His own body, so used to the sensation all around him, was attuned to the feeling of Dragon call and he had no such adverse feedback from it. But their two fellow riders, it seemed, had never experienced such a sensation. It could be more than overwhelming if you were unprepared for it, and it seemed Theo specifically had found it hard to cope through.

As for Tyt'o, he felt within him a sensation that practically sung to him through his bones and muscle. Not quite a noise, and not just merely a feeling either, it was a phenomenon explicit only to a Dragon Sire.

"Breathe Theo." He said, stronger now, as his friend struggled and gasped.

"I –I" Theo chocked out as he sunk farther down, and Tyt'o pulled him closer to himself and used the muscles of his legs to begin lifting him. To force his chest to open up. He closed his eyes and created a connection between them to gently calm Theo through his growing panic.

"You are well, friend. You are safe." He assured him. "Trust me Theo." Theo's gasps began to come less desperately, and his muscles let go a little bit more and more as he tried to deepen each of his breaths. "Good, that's it." Tyt'o encouraged as his friend slowed his breathing, and he could feel the panic in his countenance recede more and more.

As Theo regained his feel, Tyt'o lessened his hold progressively, watching over him carefully as Theo straightened and began to stand once more.

The vibrations ebb and flow had never ceased, but soon even Theo was able to calm himself to the point where he was breathing and standing. Though he was slouched and his eyes still closed as he tried to adjust to the assaulting feeling all around him.

"That. The. Fuck." He breathed out inelegantly, catching the attentions of Draco and Hermione as well.

Still close to him, Tyt'o hesitantly placed a hand to his friends shoulder. "It is the Dragon Call, Theo." The young heir of the House of Nott shook his head slowly. "It is a summoning." He offered and looked back at Hermione and Draco. His arm had come around his sisters shoulders and she stood close to him with her hand still on his chest. Though they were facing each other now, drinking each other in while they spoke in gentle murmurs. Tyt'o scowled at them and Theo coughed, calling his attention away.

"What is it summoning supposed to do?" He demanded crossly. "Kill you?"

"The Calling should only be for one rider and one Dragon." Tyt'o supplied, only to have Hermione interrupt him.

"Today is Imbolc." She said simply, as though it provided an explanation.

"Why is that important?" Draco asked still lost in the copper of her eyes as she spoke, her attention fully on him as well, as though he were the one she spoke to.

"The first stirrings of spring. The time for purification in anticipation of a year's new life." She said gently, turning to Tyt'o when she spoke her final word. Realization writ across her face, and he felt it dawn upon him as well.

"Of course." He said as well. "The birthing of the spring lambs, and when the ewes first bear milk." He nodded then in agreement. "It makes sense."

"None of this makes sense!" Theo exclaimed. "What in burning hell are we doing here? Last I remember I had taken to bed for the night. Is this some kind of a dream?" Hermione and Tyt'o glanced at each other following Theo's outburst, exchanging a knowing glance at how neither Draco nor Theo could possibly understand what events were transpiring.

It was at that second that the now-acceptable force around them which vibrated and shook them down to their cores increased and sharpened fiercely, so much that even Hermione and Tyt'o both winced and cowed a moment in response, as Draco and Theo did as well.

Hermione gasped as her body buckled at the pressure within her mind, and brought her eyes up to see where her brother stood. Still wrapped in Draco's embrace, she moved to shuffle herself as the pulsation in her ears grew louder and louder. More magnanimously than she had ever heard before, shaking her body as though it was seizing.

She reached her hand out to her brother, still holding to Draco as she groaned in discomfort. The glow around them began to brighten intensely. She could feel Draco's arms now both holding onto her, keeping her wrapped up as they both suffered under the oppression of noise surrounding him. Her arm still waved out from her side trying to find her sibling until a familiar palm reached her own and held on.

Despite the increasingly bright light all around them, she squinted one last time before clamping her eyes shut to see her brothers face one more time, and he hers as the light consumed the four of them. Draco's warm breath in the crook of her neck had quickened in panic as she winced with the beginnings of a cry that came from deep within her.

Just before oblivion overtook her, she heard him say softly in her ear; "I love you."

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The warmth pattern of breath brushed over her cheek had faltered just she opened her eyes and stirred. Her head came up as soon as her eyes opened, and she looked down at the broad chest she been nestled into. His arms still reached around her affectionately, even in sleep together. After such a long time separated he desired her close to him at all times he could. His lengthening dark hair had mingled with her great mane as well, left unbound to weave through their limbs as they slept.

Loren's eyes were just as open and alert as her own, and Ursa looked deep into their depths. Her husband touched her cheek with a gentle gesture at her wide and wild eyes. He nodded in affirmative to the ebbing feeling of anticipation and dread, just before he leaned up and kissed her lips tenderly.

It was then that the faint sound of a Dragons trumpeting, from distances almost too great to fathom, was heard in the night.

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The darkness she woke to was staggeringly painful for her when she opened her eyes, as she had been plunged into the shadows suddenly out of the bright light. The softness of her bed surrounded her and the comfort of her pillows she lay her head upon were soft against the skin of her cheek.

Without lifting her head she stared at the top of her bed canopy blankly, the events of her dream fresh within her mind. The faintest whisper crept from her lips in the inky blackness.

"It is time."