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“Thanks for coming in, Harry. We aren’t really sure where he came from or what happened to him, but so far, we haven’t been able to even get close enough to try to assess him. There is a pretty bad wound on his neck that we can see didn’t heal right, but that shouldn't cause such irritability.” Mike, a tall, dark man, said, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck as he walked next to Harry, showing him the direction of the problem dragon’s territory.
The beast had arrived over a month before, and while this was not an unusual place for migrating dragons to pause to rest, they rarely stayed longer than a few days. The current theory was that it was injured and could not fly, though it was absolutely vicious, and none of the handlers had been able to even get close enough to throw a diagnostic at him, much less offer any kind of help.
Harry, who had followed Charlie to Romania for a few years after the end of the war, had fallen in love with the overgrown lizards. His experiences in his fourth year, and freeing the dragon from Gringotts, had taught him quite a bit, but getting to understand and handle them had been the best thing in the world.
Now, nearly ten years after he had defeated Riddle, Harry was called in to work on a small reserve dedicated to bringing back spaces for dragons in Britain. They monitored migrations and nesting areas, warding them heavily to keep people—wizarding and Muggle—and the dragons safe. In all his years working with dragons, there had never been one that Harry could not eventually get to settle down and allow him to help. He had been called the Dragon Whisperer, and though he laughed it off whenever the nickname was brought up, it hit remarkably close to the truth. Harry, a Parseltongue, could speak to dragons.
There was a bit of a language barrier; he thought of it like very different dialects of the same root language, but more often than not, he was able to get his point across after only a few hissed words. The dragon would calm—usually—and he could solve their problems.
“Don’t worry. I will see if I can’t get close enough to figure out what’s wrong,” Harry replied with a smile, not actually hearing the last half of the conversation, too lost in his own thoughts.
“Do you want the local team to accompany you?” Mike offered, clearly not knowing much about how Harry worked.
“No, thank you. I work better on my own.” He replied, already planning where he would set up and how close he could get before the dragon tried to set him ablaze. The man shrugged before turning away, leaving Harry to his fate, just the way he preferred.
It took Harry nearly a full day of hiking through the reserve to find where the dragon had settled. Keeping himself a very comfortable distance away, he set up camp for the night and kept an eye on where the beast had bedded down.
In the early morning light, Harry finally got a good look at him. The black scales that faded into a deep grey in places were a bit dull, and the eyes looked too dark to be healthy. He could not see the wound that the handler had told him about, but Harry did not doubt that it was there. He could see quite a few old scars crisscrossing along the animal's hide, more than was usual for even a mature male, which this appeared to be. Fighting over food, territory, and mates often had dragons riddled with old wounds, but rarely did they leave scars as bad as these. For a horrible moment, Harry wondered if this dragon had been tortured, either as a juvenile or by someone extremely powerful, or both.
For a full day, Harry stayed in the background, watching the dragon, seeing if he could spot the reported neck injury or whatever might be keeping him grounded. It hadn’t taken Harry long to become extremely confused.
The dragon did not behave the way a dragon should. It was the little things that stood out the most. The male would hunt in an unusual style, holding still and ambushing his prey instead of stalking and chasing as the others did. He did not seem to care if other dragons came close, but he would hiss and growl at any that revealed themselves as potential mates.
The weirdest by far was that he would share with the very young dragons. Twice, a young juvenile that had failed in their own hunt had crept up to him, hoping for scraps, and had been allowed to eat from the carcass. To Harry’s great amusement, when one of the younglings fell asleep under his wing, the dragon huffed at it, but did not move.
The male—Harry really needed to name him if he was going to be working around him so much—was highly unusual, but he could only hope that would work in his favour. Worst case, he had a secret he was willing to reveal if it got this magnificent beast back in the air, but he thought he might be able to play on the fact that the male did not mind the young being near. Harry’s speciality was getting the young dragons to befriend him.
Another day passed, though this one felt more productive than his previous day observing, and he packed up his camp to set things in motion. Harry had never been good at sitting and doing nothing, even if that’s what was needed of him. Perhaps there had been one too many quiet nights in that tent.
Befriending the juvenile that had already managed to get close to the large male was simple. Easy enough that Harry had to make a note to keep an eye on the jewel blue male as he grew. He had the potential to become a nuisance or a danger if he was willing to be around people so readily.
“Hey there, little guy,” Harry crooned at the young dragon, running a hand over the narrow nose and having to side step to prevent the young dragon, who weighed at least three times what he did, from rolling over on him. “Will you help me out?”
Harry didn’t even have to speak in Parseltongue to get the juvenile to accept his attention and for the young male to lead him to his new protector. The little dragon was very pleased to show off his new friend.
“Young one, you trust the humans too easily. You must not allow them so close ” The large dark male chastised the young blue dragon when he jumped into the clearing where the adult had settled. The juvenile did not seem cowed in the least and was quickly distracted by a rabbit racing by.
Harry was left standing well within striking range as the large male looked him over. He was prepared to cast the strongest shield he knew, but the dragon merely eyed him, highly unimpressed, and snorted before turning away to look at where the blue juvenile had gone.
“Will you let me help you?” Harry asked, not moving any closer, but unwilling to leave now that he was close enough to speak. The dragon did not acknowledge him, but he saw the shoulders tense at his voice, and he stepped forward again.
The drawn-out hiss made Harry freeze, but when there were no other signs of aggression, he sat on the ground where he had been standing and waited. The dragon, still pretending he was not there, remained still as well. Harry couldn’t be sure how much time had passed before the juvenile returned, the rabbit clamped in his jaws. The young dragon pranced around, making sure everyone saw his catch, before he flopped himself down, half on top of Harry.
Normally, this would be a rather awful predicament for a person to be in, for even as a young dragon, the little blue juvenile could very easily hurt a fragile human. For Harry, it was not quite as bad as it could have been, but it was still rather uncomfortable.
More surprising than suddenly becoming a cushion for a baby dragon was the low rumble and large jaws that wrapped around the juvenile and lifted him off Harry without causing either of them any harm.
He had just been rescued by the dragon that had been called a menace by all the handlers at the reserve. Not normal dragon behaviour.
He might have thought less of the entire encounter had he not heard the hissing tones of the dragon as he berated the juvenile and caught an odd bit of the conversation.
“What? What did you just say?” Harry asked in Parseltongue as he rolled to his hands and knees, abruptly done with tiptoing around and trying to make sure he didn’t offend the dragon.
Part of Harry hoped he had misunderstood or perhaps mistranslated the snippet of conversation, but his heart was already racing as he looked at the dragon, who was focused back on him, dark eyes trailing over his form, obviously checking for injuries. Dragons didn’t do that. This was just a dragon, wasn’t it?
”I said that it is unbelievable I am forced to rescue you even now,” The dragon replied, blinking at Harry, apparently done pretending now.
A slow chill worked its way up Harry’s spine as he stared at the dragon, looking at the dull scales, the dark eyes, the poorly healed neck wound and the many, many scars. This was not an ordinary dragon at all. Things clicked into place with an ease that should not have been possible.
“Why are you here?” Harry asked instead of any of the million other questions that were swimming around his mind.
The dark dragon huffed again in irritation. Harry was sure he would have rolled his eyes if he were physically able to do so. Even with scales and claws, the man was a bastard, it seemed.
“I refuse to converse with you. You are speaking a different language, and misunderstandings are far too easy because of it.” The dragon snapped, opening his jaws in a rather threatening manner.
Harry looked blankly at the beast before him. He could not believe that he was using the language barrier as an excuse not to talk to him. He might have just let it go then—however unlikely that was—if the dragon had not looked so smug.
Harry stood up slowly, never breaking eye contact with the dragon before him, and shifted. In the blink of an eye, where Harry Potter had been, the form of an emerald green dragon stood. He was quite a bit smaller than the large black dragon, but raised his head, unafraid and determined to get answers.
”You are not the only one hiding something, I just have managed much better than you.” Harry said, tilting his head, eyes gleaming with amusement.
”Very well, Mr Potter. It seems I have been outplayed… this time anyway.” Severus Snape responded, his voice very similar to his human one in this form, now that Harry could hear it correctly.
”Tell me what happened, and I can make sure no one questions anything when you leave here. We are both hiding our animagus forms, so it's not like I plan to tell anyone you are unregistered.” Harry offered, moving a little closer, wanting more than anything to understand.
The dragon—Snape— settled back down in a comfortable position and checked back on the little juvenile before turning back to Harry, ready at last to tell his story.
When the next morning a patronus message was sent to Mike, telling the man that he had solved the issue and was moving on, no one thought anything of it. Harry was known for arriving and leaving again without much fuss.
The handlers all watched as the large black dragon, apparently able to fly just fine when he wanted to, soared through the sky, a smaller green dragon at his side, and just behind them, a very young blue juvenile followed, rushing to catch up.