I hope our story has a happier ending

all the things that we once loved

A/N: some exact text from the books

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"Tell me the truth," Ron yells over the roar of the wind and the dragon's wings flapping. "I'm dreaming aren't I?"

"I don't think even your imagination could come up with this one," Harry calls back, a wide grin across his face.

It should be overwhelming, but they're all still running on bounds of adrenaline, so they're more exhilarated than anything as they soar over the city. Hermione had worried the dragon wouldn't be able to fly very far, or carry such a heavy load, after so many years of enslavement without any sort of exercise or sun exposure, but he's more resilient than that.

(that is, Ron keeps insisting he knows dragon anatomy well enough to determine it's a he.)

As the buildings become more scarce, the dragon shows no sign of stopping; Harry motions for Hermione to pull the dragonfruit from her bag, and she passes it off to Ron, who spikes it down toward an empty patch.

The dragon immediately nosedives toward where the fruit hurtles downward, and they all scream more than they'll ever admit until he slows down at the last second, coming to an abrupt stop just in time even as he grasps the fruit from the grass.

They've landed in the middle of an open field.

"Charlie said if we use all four of our magic to ward it in, it'll be strong enough to keep it from going anywhere until he and his coworkers get here."

Harry sighs with relief. "Good. The last thing I want to find out if we survive past tonight is that we're the reason a farm was set on fire, or something."

The casting takes twenty minutes or so, and really it should feel like a waste of their time when things are so urgent, but this is important.

And then, when they've all finished casting and take a few minutes to breathe, Hermione snorts—and then bursts into laughter.

"Er...Hermione?" Harry questions, one eyebrow arched. "Care to let us in on the joke?"

She only laughs harder, for a moment; the incredulity of it all, the exhaustion and fear and anxiety all swirling together into uncontainable laughter. When she calms down enough, she manages to stifle the reaction long enough to get out, "Wingardium leviosa,; and then she's cracking up again, letting herself fall to the grass and just allow the silly amusement to overtake her.

But as soon as the words escape her, Ron joins in too, and once it hits Harry all three of them are laughing and crying, laying shoulder to shoulder in the field, just yards away from the warded dragon.

Sirius raises a hand to cover his eyes with a shake of his head. "I can't with you lot."

(Therapy, he thinks to himself, as soon as this is over I have got to get them in therapy.)

"Can—can you believe," Hermione begins, turning to Ron with a bemused smile, "the spell that brought us together, all those years ago, because it was difficult to do in a controlled environment with a feather—and we just used it to levitate Harry's ex-con animagus father in the middle of a break-in, while we're currently Britain's most wanted, so he could help us steal a piece of You-Know-Who's soul from the most secure level of Gringotts?"

He guffaws in response, "From trolls to this—how the mighty have fallen!"

"She still yells at us constantly because we're doing something wrong," Harry teases, "At least some things never change."