Hello, my lovelies and thank you for all the kind reviews. I hope you will enjoy this next installment.
Potter's quiet curse did not draw the notice of the wargs, consumed as the beasts were in tearing apart the small clearing. Inching closer to the still child, Draco kept his voice low and his head tilted away from the creatures.
"I told you my words were warranted, Potter. Now keep quiet and start climbing. We need to be hidden when we start casting offensive spells."
Pulling back a few inches, Draco waited till Potter gave a small nod and then started moving up and over towards the back side of the tree. The branches were close enough now that they did not need to cast wingardium leviosa to help them to the next tier.
Three branches up Potter pulled him aside into a thick clump of blue green leaves to rest. He rubbed at his chest and frowned at his shortness of breath. The pair had been in Arda for over a month already. Draco's body should already have recovered it strength.
"You shouldn't be this weak, Malfoy. Stay hidden and I'll take care of stunning them, alright?"
Potter's voice broke into his thoughts. If the mutts hadn't been ransacking their camp a mere forty feet below the two, Draco would have laughed.
"Stun, Potter? A stunner is not going to take theses things down. You cut them, you break their back or you avada them. You do not stun them. We leave them alive and they will track us down. Can you do that? Can you cast an Unforgivable?"
Had Harry been asked that a year ago, he would have been vehemently spitting back the answer no. But a year ago he had had no training and a year ago he had been sure he could stop Voldemort and his followers without the violence and cruelty of the Unfogivables.
Now that he had fought the battles he had and used that violence and cruelty to save so many, Harry realized he no longer had the luxury of that naivety. With a quick nod, he gave his answer.
"Yes. Now stay here while I move around to the other side. I'll take care of them."
The smile that crossed Malfoy's moon pale face would have disturbed Snape himself.
"Kiss my arse, Potter. I'm not a damsel in distress."
As Potter moved around to the left side of the trunk, Draco turned his attention to the now destroyed clearing. The cooking rabbit had been quickly devoured and the firestones scattered in the ensuing battle for scraps. The toadstool seats created weeks ago had been shattered and the smallest of the wargs was busy chewing on a stone shard.
Draco frowned. He had heard 5 distinct howls by the time they had made it to the second branch yet only three had appeared in the clearing. A flash of movement from his left distracted him. Potter was starting the attack.
Whatever it was caused the warg with the rabbit carcass to drop its mouthful and release a high pitched yip. Again Draco frowned. That was a stinging hex if ever he saw one. Quickly raising his arm he quietly cast avada kedavra on the beast chewing toadstool shards. The deep green of the spell sped through its body and dispersed into a puff of mist.
The sudden thump of their companion's body drew the attention of the larger wargs. Curious, Draco withheld his next spell wondering what the creatures would do. Sniffing the corpse, the warg stung by Potter's hex turned to the last of the three. A great coughing, hacking noise unlike any Draco had heard before issued from between its teeth.
With a sudden start, he realized the warg was speaking…not any language familiar to him but never the less, actual words were coming out of the creature's great maw. The unharmed warg gave a shake of its tattered mane in response to whatever the other had said and quickly sprang away, disappearing into the shadows.
Looking around with its teeth bared and its mottled gums showing, the large beast slowly backed away from its fallen companion. Stopping only when it had reached the shadows at the edge of the clearing, it sank down onto its haunches. The only thing the scattered remains of the blue fire showed of the creature were the eyes, yellow orbs scanning back and forth for the threat the had felled a pack mate.
These things had more than a hunter's viciousness and instinct. These things had a human intelligence. With a shrug, Draco dismissed the thought. Whatever the case, the killing curse worked just as well on them as on humans.
Watching the warg he had hexed wait in the shadows, Harry wondered why the ugly thing hadn't been scared off by the stinging hex.
"He knows we're here, Malfoy."
Malfoy gave a huff from the other side of the tree. His voice reached Harry in an angry hiss.
"Of course it does, Potter. If these things have their own language, they are smart enough to know one doesn't just drop dead. Why did you cast a stinging hex of all things?"
Harry gave a small wince. He had hoped Malfoy would let that one go.
"I thought a hex would scare an animal away."
Malfoy leaned around the narrowing trunk and glared at the back of Harry's skull.
"How in the hells did you survive the war, Potter?"
Turning around to snap back a reply, he stopped when Malfoy held up a thin finger. The other child disappeared behind the trunk of the tree and a whispered spell shot off, shooting over the creeping body of the warg which had come closer to their tree during their whispered conversation.
"That was a rhetorical question, Potter."
Draco cursed when his spell missed. Damn Potter for distracting him. The warg moved quickly through the clearing, and started circling the tree the pair was crouched upon. More coughing, hacking sounds issued from its mouth as it hunched down for a moment and then sprang upwards.
The scrabbling of its claws against the bark and the harsh scrape of its garbled words made Draco want to cover his ears. Shrinking back into the nearly black foliage, he resisted the urge to climb higher into the branches. Steadying his hand once again, he cast at the moving form and missed again when the beast darted to the left, giving what sounded like a harsh cackle as it did so.
Whatever the sound, it was cut short when Potter's flickering green avada slammed into the large body and knocked the beast onto its side. When the body hit the mossy ground, a series of howls were let loose into the air from some distance away. Again they sounded and again once more, slowly moving farther away each time they broke through the air.
After waiting an hour to see if the third warg would return, the pair descended from the trees and started repairing the damage inflicted to the clearing. Once things had been to put to rights they laid the two corpses out next to the gathered fire. With a shiver that went unnoticed by Malfoy, Harry had cast a charm on the fire reversing the color from blue to a warm gold. His shoulders lost their tension when the light reached farther than the cold blue light had.
Malfoy had quickly cast cleaning charms across both corpses, a small twist of the lips signaling his disgust at having to touch the greasy clumped fur along the bodies. Once clean, the child kneeled down and started to examine the teeth and claws of the wargs.
Spreading the paw of the smaller one, Malfoy had singled out one of the five claws and used a slicing spell to remove it from the body. Casting another cleaning charm, he held it up to the light and turned it this way and that. Looking over towards Harry, Malfoy threw the claw to him.
"Those could come in handy in the future, Potter. Should we be without our magic at some point, the fangs especially could be helpful."
Harry tested the sharpness of the claw against the pad of his thumb. Placing the tip against his flesh drew an instant bead of blood to the surface. With a small smile, Harry placed the claw on top of the toadstool he had been sitting on. Going over to the bigger corpse he started the process of removing teeth and claws from the wargs.
As his hands became slick with the nearly black blood of the beasts, Harry neatly set each fang and claw next to his knees. While the night was still quiet the sounds of insects were slowly starting to trickle through the air. Still, something nagged at the back of his thoughts.
"Malfoy, do you think the third creature will come back?"
Draco paused in his examination of the small warg's corpse. If these things were truly as intelligent as he suspected, the majority of the pack had most likely stayed behind.
"No doubt, Potter."
"We should move camp now, if so…someplace more defensible and with more room to spread out than this."
Draco nodded absently, running his bloodied hands against the rough fur he had cleaned not moments ago. Though the spell had removed the debris and greasy residue from the fur, the spell had unfortunately not removed the smell.
"No, Potter. Someplace small and contained would be better. These beasts are large and heavy, though quick. With our small sizes we could easily fit into tight spaces, too tight for them. The mountains would be perfect."
The raven haired child frowned for a moment, then sighed and looked over to the fire. Potter's mouth thinned as if he wanted to disagree.
"Fine, Malfoy, but you should know I don't do well in tight spaces."
"You're the size of a midget, Potter. I doubt you'll have too much trouble."
More faint howls interrupted their conversation, and Draco's head tilted to the side as he listened. A nasty grin flickered across the pale face and his lips pulled back, showing faintly pointed teeth. Turning to Potter, he gave the other child a considering glance.
"Tell me Potter, have you ever hunted large game?"
Be warned, everyone. This story may include time skips since there are so many years between this and when the Fellowship of the Ring begins. I'll try to make it as painless as possible.