Chapter 74

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or Criminal Minds or any of their characters. I do however own this story, I wrote it and I do NOTgive permission for anyone to post it anywhere else. If you want to share it post a link.

Thursday 26/3/92

Dear Spencer

I may have done the right thing in your eyes in telling McGonagall and so far, I've got away with it. Ron and Hermione haven't found out and got angry with me for tattling, but unfortunately that's because she still hasn't done anything about it. The dragon egg was still in Hagrid's fireplace until it hatched the other night. Hagrid sent us a note that it was happening and we got to watch. It was an amazing experience, though hopefully it's truly once in a lifetime. It's a Norwegian Ridgeback and the baby dragon is somehow so ugly that it's kind of cute. Hagrid thinks it's wonderful and he's even more determined to keep it. He's calling himself its Mummy and getting up to feed it around the clock. I've enclosed some photos of it, Hermione told me that she used a disposable camera to take photos of Hogwarts and the library and sent them to her mum so I asked Dean's Mum to send me a disposable camera and sent her some money to have the photos developed and sent to you. I apologise if they're not any good, I've never used a camera before. If the photos work out then I'll get some more. Unfortunately, I didn't receive the camera until a couple of days after the dragon was born. The big man with the silly grin is Hagrid, though I'm sure you could have worked that out. The redhead is Ron, the thin blond is Seamus and the chubbier blond is Neville, Dean is the one with the black afro and Hermione is of course the only girl. The picture of the castle was taken from Hagrid's doorstep and from my broom over the lake so it's kind of the same as my first sight of the castle when we arrived by boat that first night.

The dragon has already doubled in size and started breathing fire, it has burnt half of Hagrid's beard off. I'm sure he must have some magical creature blood in him that his skin wasn't burnt and he still isn't taking the danger seriously. Surely McGonagall will believe us now or someone else will notice now and do something before he loses his house. I think that Malfoy followed us the day the dragon hatched and saw it through the gap in the curtain. Horrible little sneak. At least McGonagall already knows and I did try to tell her if he tries to get us in trouble and Malfoy will probably tell Snape. Hagrid always defends him when we say anything nasty so maybe they're friends as well, though it might just be because Dumbledore likes and trusts Snape. Hopefully Hagrid won't ever find out about it if Snape kills the dragon for potions ingredients. I think it would break his heart.

Hagrid is a little simple in his thinking and his unquestioning unshakable faith in Dumbledore makes me reluctant to trust him with my secrets no matter how much I like the man. But I don't know that his desire to own a dragon was lack of forethought or just plain life-long obsession with the idea. He told me about dragons and wanting one when we were in Gringotts the day he took me to buy my stuff for Hogwarts. He said he won the dragon egg in a poker game in Hogsmeade, the village near the school, but you're right I wouldn't have thought there'd be people walking around with dragon eggs in their pockets willing to gamble them away, and I wouldn't have picked Hagrid for much of a poker player, I'm sure he doesn't have the skill to count cards and he has real trouble lying or keeping secrets so I wouldn't have thought he'd be any good at bluffing. It does sound very suspicious unless the man won it in a game himself and wanted to lose it before he got caught with it. I'm getting paranoid and am having trouble deciding what truly is suspicious or whether I'm seeing suspicions that aren't really there. I can't think of a single reason for a stranger to suddenly want to give Hagrid a dragon's egg, especially if they are as rare and expensive as we think they are. Of course winning the egg made his entire year so if you wanted to distract him from a conversation you'd just had so he wouldn't repeat any of it to anyone this would be an ideal way if you could afford it. But what could the man have wanted to talk to Hagrid about so secretly, and with Hagrid's big booming voice a pub would be a very bad choice for a conversation you wanted kept secret, you could've overhear his side of the conversation from the other side of the street let alone everywhere in the pub. Besides Hagrid can't keep a secret on the best day, so you wouldn't need to bribe him with a dragon egg to tell you something and the spell to make people forget would be a better guarantee he's never going to mention what you talked about and save you a fortune as well.

I can't believe that Hermione with her insistence on following every letter of the rules is willing to keep this a secret. I felt sure she'd go to McGonagall for help once she realised how quickly the baby dragon was going to grow into a dangerous monster. Maybe because Hagrid is also an authority figure in her eyes even if he is only the groundskeeper and not a professor.

Ron was complaining about Percy and I remembered that one of his other brothers works on a dragon preserve somewhere in Europe. We've written to him for help. Hopefully he'll get back to us or McGonagall will do something before someone gets hurt.

I laughed when I read what you wrote about Ron's family trying to pretend to be poor to hide that they're thieves or con artists or something. You're right they seem to have more money at times than Ron's wardrobe and school supplies suggest, perhaps they're just that bad with money that they spend it all on impulsive purchases or one of them is a pretty decent gambler when they win they go on extravagant holidays and over the summer he was on a losing streak so there wasn't enough money for new wands and books. To be honest as long as they're not stealing from me or being paid to spy on me and hurt me, I don't really care where they're getting the money. But surely constantly crying poor then spending money on an expensive holiday draws more attention to their finances not covers them up.

Your friend always

Harry

A/N: Thank you to all those who reviewed followed or favourited this story for your support.