Disclaimer: The Harry Potter series belongs to J.K. Rowling. I own the plot of this God forsaken epic.
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Chapter 5: A Dragon in Hogsmeade
The small company left Hogwarts early the next morning. Hermione was wearing clothing that was explicitly designed for her. She wore a white under-robe and an open navy blue outer-robe over that. The under-robe had short sleeves that flared out from underneath the outer-robe that had no sleeves at all. She wore a red sash around her waist that made her robes fit her figure perfectly. Her white shoes went up to her ankles where they curled downward. They also had pointy ends. She was carrying a five foot long, oak staff that contained unicorn hair as it's core. It was from this staff that she was able to wield her magic powers: it also made a rather formidable weapon to wield.
Since she couldn't ride on a horse on her own, Hermione rode behind Harry on his magnificent white stallion, Firebolt. Ron's horse, Comet, though in perfect health, was a little too old to be carrying two people.
"Our first stop will be the village of Hogsmeade," said Harry. "Its the closest village to Hogwarts, takes less than a day to get there."
That turned out to be an understatement as they arrived at Hogsmeade in only a few hours, and they were going at a considerably slow pace.
Hogsmeade was a lovely sight. It was built entirely around a single main street and consisted of many artistic looking buildings. A large number of these were shops and it was clear that merchants flocked to the town on a regular basis. The marketplace was one of the largest Hermione had ever seen in her life. It was the perfect picture of a cheerful village lifestyle, except for one problem, it was a gloomy and melancholy atmosphere that they encountered. Curious, Hermione questioned one of the villagers about what was wrong.
"What is wrong?!" exclaimed the old man. "I'll tell you what's wrong! A month ago this village was attacked by a dragon! That's right, a dragon!"
Harry and Ron were shocked by this news. "Why didn't anyone send any news about this to Hogwarts?" shouted Ron.
"I'll tell you why," continued the old man. "The dragon struck a deal with us. If we fed him a virgin maiden once a month on the new moon, then he would spare our village. If we had sent for help to Hogwarts or to anywhere else, the dragon would've destroyed the village!" With this he sighed and pointed to an especially tearful looking man down the street. "See there? Tonight is the first New Moon since the deal was struck, and its his daughter that we're sacrificing. The poor bloke's has been killing himself with grief."
Hermione was doing some quick thinking before finally speaking up, "I fit the descriptions, I'll take the girl's place tonight."
"WHAT?!" exclaimed the others present.
"We can't just leave them alone."
"Oh that's just bloody fantastic, Hermione," said Ron. "We'll just let you be killed tonight and then wait another month for the dragon to take the next girl."
"No, Ron!" hissed Hermione. "We're going to kill the Dragon."
"Its too dangerous for you, Hermione."
"I don't care, Harry. We are not leaving this village without helping these people out!"
Harry sighed and asked, "What kind of dragon is it?"
"I'm not entirely sure," answered the old man. "I think its a Ridgeback."
Harry mumbled something like, "It would've been a lot easier if it were a Vipertooth or a Short-Snout." He sighed and said, "Well, you've got yourself a couple of dragon slayers."
"What?!" shouted Ron. "We don't have time for this, Harry. Its not part of the mission, unless our mission is to allow the mirror to fall into Death Eater hands while we become a Ridgeback's midnight snack!"
"Look, Ron," said Harry. "Hermione's right. We're Mage Knights: we can't just walk away while innocent people suffer."
Ron grumbled, but in his heart, he agreed wholeheartedly with Harry and Hermione.
"That's settled then," said Hermione. "Well, we'd better start preparing."
* * * * * * * * * * * *
That night, at around 11 o'clock, the villagers led Hermione out to the top of a hill right outside of Hogsmeade where they tied her up to a post. Hermione wondered why that was necessary since she wouldn't have run away, but didn't question the villagers about it. It was clear from the expressions on the villagers' faces that they only thought they were buying an extra month till one of their own daughters would be tied up on the post.
Harry and Ron were hidden amongst the trees just a couple of yards away.
"I just hope this works," said Harry.
"Oh I dunno," said Ron. "Maybe we should just let the dragon eat her and that would be doing us a favor."
"This is no time to joke, Ron!"
"Sorry."
The minutes were dragging by slowly, and Hermione couldn't help but feel a sense of doom coming over her. She had volunteered to become the "sacrifice" in a sudden outburst of bravery, but it was only now sinking in that this could be the last hour of her life. She felt very frightened as she started shivering. However, she completely trusted Harry and Ron and knew in her heart that they would pull through for her.
Finally, midnight rolled by and the silence was broken by the sound of monstrous wings beating through the night air. Then, it was upon them. A huge black dragon with yellow eyes, bronze horns, and bronze spikes on its tail landed in front of Hermione with a roar! Hermione couldn't help it: she screamed out in terror!
"Ridgeback my eye!" shouted Ron. "That's a Horntail!"
"Great. The worst possible scenario," mumbled Harry. With that, he and Ron darted out of their hiding place to face the most dangerous of dragon breeds.
At first, the Horntail was startled to find knights there when it had only been expecting the girl. Harry used this to his advantage as he closed in on the dragon and swung his sword into it's right hind leg. The dragon roared in pain as it flung Harry off, sending him sprawling through the air. He landed with a horrible thud. The Horntail then breathed a burst of fire toward Ron. Ron dodged this by rolling to the side. However, before he could attack, the dragon sent him flying through the air with a swing of it's paw. Thinking that it had gotten rid of the knights, the dragon closed in on Hermione who was screaming again.
"Ron! Get Hermione untied!" shouted Harry as he leapt onto the dragon's tail. He made his way up the tail onto the dragon's back where he started hacking at it with his sword. The Horntail thrashed and managed to throw Harry off of its back, before shooting another burst of flame toward Ron who was making his way to Hermione. Ron dropped to the ground, thus avoiding the fire. He then scrambled his way to Hermione. With one swipe of his sword, Hermione was free. He then tossed her staff (which he had been carrying) to her.
Hermione immediately readied herself for battle. She held her staff up and shouted "Stupefy!" Unfortunately, the curse didn't seem to have much effect on the dragon. Harry and Ron were once again hacking at it with their swords while avoiding the claws and flames while Hermione continued firing curses and hexes at the dragon.
As all of her curses simply glanced off the dragon's scales, Hermione tried to remember what she had read about dragons. "Dragons...dragons...powerful magical creatures...near invulnerable scales...vulnerable eyes...THE EYES!!!" Hermione pointed her staff and shouted "Reducto!" The explosion caught the Horntail in it's left eye! The dragon roared in pain as it thrashed about. Ron tried to take advantage of the dragon's pain by attempting to severe the dragon's left fore arm. Unfortunately, the dragon got the better of him slapped him hard onto the ground, knocking him unconscious.
"Ron! No!" shouted Harry. He tried to make his way to his fallen best friend, but he was engulfed by the dragon's flames before he could get close enough. The dragon, then, swung it's tail at him, sending him flying across the field. He had dropped his sword as the Horntail closed in on him.
Hermione screamed, "Harry!" She threw down her staff and made a mad dash for his sword. As soon as she picked it up, she ran in between Harry and the dragon. Then, before she could think twice, Hermione charged and drove the sword into the dragon's chest.
The dragon gave a scream of pain before it collapsed and died: Hermione had stabbed it in the heart!
As soon as Hermione realized that the dragon was dead, she ran to Harry and threw her arms around him, catching him by surprise. "Are you ok?" she asked.
"I'm fine. Are you ok?"
"I'm alright." She pulled back and examined his face for injuries. Her brown eyes locked onto his green ones. As she stared into his emerald pools, she felt an odd flip in her stomach and her heart rate climbed a little. She also began to notice how close they were and she barely registered that they were drawing even closer...
"Hey! Thanks for forgetting about me!" Harry and Hermione immediately sprang apart as the recovered Ron dragged himself to their side.
"Um...Er...we should get back to Hogsmeade and tell the villagers that the...Er...dragon is dead...Yeah." said Harry. He seemed to be nervous about something and his face was red. Hermione felt her face go red as well.
As they made their way back to the village, Hermione couldn't help but wonder about the sensation she felt, 'Am I falling for Harry? How could I let that happen? How can a farm girl ever fall for a noble knight?'