Harry Potter: Dragon Whisperer

The Council Speaks

10:15am

Friday, 28 July 1995

Romanian Dragon Sanctuary, Romania

.

The sound of jaws snapping behind him had Harry twisting about. The fact that the dragon that his gaze pierced instantly froze in place, one front leg raised and her mouth wide told him that she knew exactly what she was doing.

§Speketh§, Harry said warningly.

§But Speaker§, the fledgling replied, §it looks so fun to play with§.

Harry's eyes darted to the magical tape that was flitting around Painzz while the enchanted quill took notes, Obviously, the way the tape was flying about, measuring different parts of her sister emulated an insect or a bird, definitely something that would warrant a dragon's natural instinct to snap at and – hopefully – eat.

§Just a little longer§, Harry told the eldest of the four. §The tape should be just about finished measuring Painzz so that I can see exactly how big she is. And I'm mostly through my measurements of Potteth. As soon as we're done, we can go play§.

§Yes, Speaker§, Speketh replied but Harry noticed that her eyes never once left the tape as it moved about.

Turning back to his own task, Harry tapped Potteth on his side, reminding the fledgling that he was in the process of measuring how wide his wingspan was. Instantly, the wing that had half-furled snapped back out to full stretch.

Ordinarily, Charlie'd told him, this was a task that would involve no less than four dragon handlers. And their first task would have been to stun all of the fledglings before they'd even begun. And even then, one of the handlers would have been tasked with keeping a careful watch at the mouth of the cave to ensure that neither their mother – in this case Ramaranth – or any other dragon, came near while the others were getting the measurements as quickly as they could.

Today, though, Charlie had simply grinned, slapped Harry on the back and handed him the equipment, sending him off to do the job all by himself.

"You're the Speaker, aren't you? Not to mention a sort of surrogate uncle to those fledglings," Charlie'd said. "I'm sure you won't have any problems."

Snap!

Harry spun, expecting to see the magical tape cut in two by sharp dragon teeth. But that hadn't happened; the tape was still happily doing its job, in this case, measuring the length of Painzz's tail. His eyes darted to Spekith and, seeing the end of a feather dangling from her snout, he sighed and looked across the cave.

§Spekith§, Harry said, trying hard to keep his voice even, §I needed that quill§.

§I'm sorry, Speaker. It was too tempting and you'd said not to eat the flying worm-thing§.

The sound of Harreth's hissing laugh did not help matters.

§I guess that I can do the rest by hand§, Harry sighed, §but we won't have as much time now to go flying together§.

The light from the entrance to the cave disappearing combined with the sound of heavy footsteps turned Harry's head. But instead of Ramaranth, who he expected, it was a Ukrainian Ironbelly blocking the entrance.

§Grouleth§? Harry questioned after his eyes had adjusted enough to the dim light to let him recognise the first dragon that he'd met when he'd first arrived here. §Is something wrong? Did Ramaranth send you§?

§No, Speaker§, Grouleth rumbled in his deep voice. §I was sent to bring you to the Weyr Council§.

Harry blinked and cocked his head at the unfamiliar term. 'Weyr', he knew was the dragon's name for their group that lived here at the Sanctuary. But 'Council'? That didn't make sense at all. He'd never picked up on their being an official hierarchy amongst the dragons, let alone something like a ... a government?