Author's note:
Dear readers,
Here's another little chapter, I know it's not the normal length either, but I had this ready and I was happy with it, and I thought, let's post it and keep them in wait and in want for the big happening ;-)
I promise, you will like it!
Read and review! And thanks for reading everyone, you can't even begin to understand how much it means to me ;-)

love,
Saphire.

At The Den (Charlie's pov)

Waking up after a night from tossing and turning, a night from restless sleep and night terrors, I felt horrible. I was more tired now then when I went to bed and I felt like was about to crumble down. I was weak.

Not long after I had woken up Max came to check up on me, said he was worried but that we had to leave soon. That my broom was still somewhere in the forest and that that was the place he had instructed everyone to start looking. I let out a watery smile, what would I do without him, how would I function? I guess I would just cease to exist.

I took a quick shower, ate a light breakfast and then made my way over to the command-post where Max was still coaxing the troops. He was saying how important it was for both the girl and Bast to be alive and bla bla bla. I zoned out. I couldn't bare think about a possible scenario where one of them might be hurt. I only heard, today is the day we are bringing them home.

When all the trainers took their jobs and left, only me and Max were left at the Command-center. I saw the pity in his eyes every time I looked at them, so I just avoided looking at them. And when he was ready, we apparated over to the clearing. Shivers ran down my spine and I could barely keep down the bile that came up my throat. I looked at Max and saw he was breathing heavy too. This was just horrific.

I looked for my broom and found him exactly where I left it, next to a tree and a big rock in the beginning of the clearing. As I found it, I took it and flew up in the sky, hoping that the wind in my hair would erase the memory of the clearing. Without even knowing it I was making all sorts of weird twists and leaps on my broom, I was speeding up, making looping's anything to get rid of feeling like this. After a while I had calmed enough, but as it seemed I had lost Max completely.

When I looked around I could see a lake and some mountains from afar, and woods, a lot of woods.

At The Lair (Hermione's pov)

After the bath and the beautiful sunset, I felt quite happy with how her day had turned out. But I was quite tired nonetheless. So I prepared myself for bed, made I was over to the bed, talked to Ariel a little, to sooth her and calm her and then we both fell into a peaceful slumber.

Not much later, I woke from the screeching noise the wards were making. The intrusion was much closer and much stronger than last time I noticed someone on closing in on my wards. I got out of bed as quietly as I could, I was trying not to wake Ariel, but to no avail. She awoke anyway, probably from my anxious state of mind and started poking her head into my side. So by force of habit I started to stroke her snout while I was walking to the end of the cave, naturally she followed.

Looking out on the land, I saw two people flying across the water of the lake on broomsticks. I was wondering what they would see if they looked at the cave. would they see a cave, or maybe just rock, or would they see us standing? No I had put up every protecting enchantment I knew, there was no way they could see us standing here.

The two men kept circling the lake, flew up the mountain a few times, I even looked into the eyes of the black-haired one. He had the bluest eyes I had ever seen. But while he was staring down the cave that was supposedly empty, I was still holding my breath, hoping he wouldn't catch a sound, hoping that he wouldn't catch a whiff of my scent.

I suppose they were looking for something or someone maybe, the way they were acting, looking quite thoroughly too. But when they finally moved on and flew away, I let out a breath that I knew I had been holding.

After that, I was too tense to go back to sleep, so instead, I made work of keeping Ariel calm by talking nonsense to her and petting her snout, rubbing her back and washing her scales. After all that was done she seemed more relaxed and so was I, so I decided that I needed to get a little rest, before I was to read a little more about dragons and dragon-folklore.

Dragons are giant winged reptile-like creatures who breathe fire. The wings ensure that they are able to fly.

Dragons live all over the world, but as they are hard to conceal and extremely dangerous, the ministry of magic has made sure that they are almost extinct except for the ones that are kept in Dragon-reserves.

Dragon-reserves are meant for the breeding and safekeeping of dragons and muggles. They are run by dragonologist or dragon keepers.

There are several different kinds of dragons which all have specific looks, breeding processes and needs.

Okay, so this is just a basic text, maybe I should skip a few chapters and just read the chapters that are strictly about you, since that is actually what I need to know right now.

The Chinese Fireball, also known as Liondragon, is a dragon native to China mostly. In the latest century however, it is almost extinct there and it's existence is almost confined to the mountain-region of Tibet and Dragon-reserves.

The Chinese Fireball is a scarlet red dragon with sharp golden spikes in the form of a fringe around it's face and smaller golden spikes along his backbone. It has a short snout ending in a hooked beak. The female dragon is usually bigger than the male dragon, in this particular breed.

The Chinese Fireball is a very clever and fast dragon, when angered they emit a mushroom-shaped flame through their nostrils. However it is worth mentioning that Chinese Fireball can live well with other dragons, they are more tolerant than most of it's own kind and are known to share their territory with another dragon.

The eggs of a Chinese Fireball are crimson in color with golden speckles. Chinese wizards prize their shells.

The food of this very noble animal consists of most mammals. Although they have a slight prefferation for pig and deer.

That were all known facts on the Chinese Fireball. I was actually very proud of Ariel, that she was being described by a book as clever and fast.

At the lake(Charlie's pov)

Looking out at the lake, I waited for Max to catch up with me, and while I was waiting, I figured that a lake this big was a good spot to hide. You had fresh water in the vicinity, you could find shelter near the mountains, it was bloody perfect. So when Max had finally caught up with him, I told him I thought Hermione might have hidden herself near the lake, or maybe Bast might have. So the two of them began searching.

Max had found a cave in the mountains and looked in through properly, but found nothing. I had looked everywhere near the waterside. I was so sure that someone would be hiding here, it was almost like I could feel the magic in the place, like I was expecting it, anticipating it.

But when Max called me over I knew I had to say something, so I proposed we'd try one more thing, homenum revelio. But Max said it was useless, we hadn't found anything pointing towards Hermione or Bast having been there. We had to go look somewhere else.

So we got back on our brooms and left the lake. Maybe it was just the beauty of the place that got to me, but I had the feeling that I needed to visit it again. Maybe I would, maybe I should. I wasn't really paying any attention anymore to my flying and to my surroundings, until it became dark. Max had been quiet all day, but I guess it was to give me some space with my thoughts, working out my own stuff. But I felt like I needed to confide in him, like I needed to tell him something. Maybe that I just found out that Hermione was a werewolf? Or maybe that I had had a little crush on Hermione when she was about 15 years old, but she looked so beautiful in her Yule Ball dress. Or maybe that I just couldn't bare to close my eyes because all I could see was a fight between two girls I care for. But where to start, maybe just at hello.

"Hey, Max, can we just stay down here for a little while and talk?" I asked in a little voice.

"Char, I was wondering when you would be ready to take the first step. I'm here you know that, so spill it. What's on your mind?" Max said in his deep voice.

"I need you to promise me something, I trust you with this, and I trust that you keep this a secret, because I can't keep it to myself anymore. Hermione, I...I just found out from my family that she was bitten by Greyback during the final battle. When she found out she ran away... That's why she didn't recognize me... She's on the run, has been for about 3 months now. Please don't judge... " I said fiercely, except for the last sentence, that came out timid and small.

- "Why would I judge Char? I don't know the girl, she might be all you need right now, she might be all you ever need."

"I thought, well because she's a werewolf and all... People are still freaked out about werewolves usually." I completely ignored the fact that he was trying to figure out if I was in like or in love with Hermione, because if I wasn't ready to admit it to myself, I was definitely not ready to admit it to him.

"Oh, well, I would like to meet her, and I hope someday soon, we can find a way to handle it all, maybe we can even train her, if she's interested?"

"Haha, Hermione interested in Dragon taming, I don't think so, when I knew her best, she was a bookworm, she studied a lot and was always reading. I don't think she will be in for taming wild and fierce beasts. But hey, we can always ask. Hahaha..."

Oh, how he couldn't be more wrong ;-)