By the ti they arrived safely at the hunting lodge, Hagrid's towering figure was already pacing anxiously in front of the clearing outside. He looked restless, clearly worried about Draco’s delayed arrival.
In Hagrid’s mind, he was torn between worrying sothing had gone wrong with the plan and fearing that sothing had happened to Draco—like getting caught by a professor.
To be fair, despite Hagrid’s sotis questionable reliability, he was the kind of person worth trusting as a friend and ally.
At least he wasn’t the type to stab you in the back.
“I’m telling you, anyone with eyes could tell sothing’s off.”
Seeing Hagrid broadcasting his anxiety as if daring other wizards to notice, Draco couldn’t help but twitch a corner of his mouth. Good thing he hadn’t shared the entire plan with him.
“Draco! Finally. I thought sothing had happened—wait, Hermione? Why are you here?”
As soon as Draco dropped the Disillusionnt Charm, Hagrid—who’d been scanning the area—spotted him right away. What he didn’t expect was the appearance of another witch who definitely wasn’t supposed to be part of tonight’s operation.
Indeed, Hermione’s involvent hadn’t been part of the original plan, which was why Hagrid looked genuinely surprised.
As for the fact that they were holding hands... Hagrid, being as slow on the uptake as ever, didn’t think twice about it.
...
“What could I do? When this idiot gets stubborn, there’s no stopping her.”
Or more accurately, Draco didn’t think Hermione would get in the way of his mission.
“Who are you calling an idiot!”
Hermione, unwilling to let Draco face danger alone, now found herself labeled as stubborn. Annoyed, she smacked his hand away and turned her head, pretending she didn’t want to speak to him.
At first glance, she looked irritated at being called stupid. But her overreaction suggested she might actually be flustered—especially considering she’d just been caught holding hands with Draco in front of soone they both knew.
As for their usual back-and-forth, Hagrid didn’t see anything strange about it. In fact, it would’ve felt weird if they weren’t bickering.
Right now, though, Hagrid was more concerned about whether the night’s operation would go smoothly—not why the two of them showed up hand-in-hand.
Before Hermione, now red-faced, could say anything else, Hagrid stepped forward and handed a rolled-up piece of parchnt to Draco.
“I’ve got everything ready. Have a look.”
Judging by how pristine the parchnt was, it was clear how much Hagrid valued it.
“This is... a map of the Forbidden Forest?”
“Yeah. I didn’t manage to cover the entire area, but I can promise—no wizard knows the parts I’ve mapped better than I do.”
While Hagrid had never ventured deep into the forest’s interior, he was more than confident about the outskirts, especially as the gakeeper.
Draco didn’t respond to the claim. Instead, he carefully unrolled the several-ter-long parchnt and began inspecting it, zeroing in on the details he wanted.
Hermione leaned in curiously. To her surprise, it seed Hagrid actually had the skill to draw maps?
What she didn’t know was that Hagrid had used a magical tool that projected ntal images onto paper—allowing him to create the map in such a short ti.
After all, Hagrid had never learned how to draw maps, and imagining him carefully sketching with a quill was... difficult.
It was said the device worked on a simplified version of Legilincy, though nowhere near as powerful—it could only record surface-level thoughts.
Before long, Draco rolled up the parchnt and turned back to Hagrid...
“Much as I’d like to spend more ti investigating, we simply don’t have that luxury.”
“You’ve made a decision? Then just tell —”
“No. I’m going myself.”
“That’s out of the question. I absolutely won’t agree to that.”
Hagrid was deeply grateful for Draco’s willingness to help a half-blood giant like him, but he had a hard line—he couldn’t allow Draco and the others to be put in danger.
“I won’t allow you to enter the Forbidden Forest.”
“Forget whether it’s dangerous for a mont—Hagrid, do you really think Norberta will listen to you?”
Draco’s words made Hagrid stiffen, his face twitching with frustration and a hint of wounded pride. The truth was known to all three of them: even though Hagrid spent more ti with Norberta than anyone else, the one she was truly close to—the only one she actually listened to—was Draco.
If that weren’t the case, Hagrid’s hut would probably have been reduced to rubble days ago.
He couldn’t help but feel a mix of envy and confusion. He’d won that dragon egg himself. She’d hatched safely under his care. He’d even made a new friend who loved dragons as much as he did. All those things should have brought him nothing but joy.
So why did it turn out like this?
...
Draco, suddenly getting an odd chill, instinctively stepped back a bit and cleared his throat, cutting off Hagrid’s gloomy silence.
“Ahem! This isn’t the ti to dig your heels in.”
“But…”
“Alohomora.”
Without giving Hagrid a chance to argue, Draco cast the Unlocking Charm and blew open the door of the hut.
Hagrid: ……………
Hermione: ……
“Let’s go, Norberta!”
“Roooar!!”
With a deep, low rumble, Norberta erged from behind the door—now so massive she was nearly the size of the hut itself. It was hard to believe Draco had managed to keep her confined in there.
But it said everything about how obedient she was to him.
She lumbered over to Draco and affectionately rubbed her head against his hand. Anyone watching could tell—this dragon treated Draco very differently.
Up until now, no one had ever heard of a dragon being truly tad by a wizard.
If not for her unmistakable dragon form—and the cold glint of her claws and fangs in the moonlight—you might have mistaken her for so oversized scaly pet dog...
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