“Aren’t our sheets gonna’ get wet if it rains? I don’t know any waterproofin’ spells yet.” In reality Noah hadn’t learnt how to do many spells they’d been taught since September. The only ones he could really do where them his parents had taught him before school and the ones in his really awesome book about battling evilness in 6 easy steps. Listening in class was overrated.  But now the young boy suddenly found himself wishing he had paid attention after he and Gwenna had considered it a good idea to bring their bedding outside (amazingly unnoticed by any of the castle's inhabitants) in order to create a fort/dragon keep in anticipated arrival of the dragon they were planning to procure and raise as their own.

Unfortunately, as the fort was completed, it became very clear that this would not be a practical home for their new dragon pet. He’d get wet when it rained, as soon as he started breathing fire the sheets would turn to cinders and within a few months he’d have outgrown their lovingly created fort. Not to mention the fact that the future dragon handlers didn’t have replacement bedding. Noah hadn’t even considered what he would sleep on when he got back to his dorm that night. That had been an oversight and a half!

“And do dragons even use pillows?” The Yorkshire boy demanded of his friend as he peered into the fort staring ruefully at their pillows piled up on the ground. He liked his pillow. He didn’t want to just give it away. But wasn’t keeping a dragon supposed to be a selfless act that would make him and Gwenna better people? And super cool of course! Who else at Hogwarts raised dragons, after all?

Face screwed up, Noah stood back up and turned to the young Miss Trevelyan.
“I don’t think Benedict is going to like this much.”

The young Gryffindor heaved out a long, dramatic sigh, shooting an impatient look at her partner in crime.  "He's not going to need a pillow once he's a dragon," she said, drawing the words out as if they'd been over this a million times before.  They hadn't, but she would have expected Noah to connect the dots properly.  They'd only been talking about getting a dragon for at least a day.

"It's for when he's an egg.  So that he doesn't crack preturmaturally," she said, scorn obvious in her tone.  "Then we can take the pillows back, Noh.  But we wouldn't be very responsible dragon-keepers if we let him hatch too early, would we?"

Now that they were getting down to the details, it seemed like a brilliant scheme.  It had all started when Noah had suggested that they ought to have a secret fort in the forest -- but what good was a secret fort if it didn't have a dragon to guard it?  And pet dragons, Gwenna was certain, had all sorts of handy uses.  She had spent most of breakfast daydreaming about riding Falkor over the trees of the Forbidden Forest, urging him onwards as he let out an earth-shattering roar and then swooped downwards to blast his fiery breath at some skeletal invaders.

It would be a glorious moment -- but for now, she was stuck planning the details with Noah Pratt, who was still refusing to call their dragon by his proper name.

"Falkor will love it, he will," she said with conviction, searching through her bag for her quill.  For something so large, it was amazing how many times she lost it.  "And I reckon we'll learn a waterproofing spell soon, don't you think?  Here," she said triumphantly, finally brandishing the enormous feather.  "Do you want to write the letter to Missus Raynor?  She knows me dad best, so I think she might recognize me handwriting."

Regardless of the fact they had to protect the egg until the dragon hatched, Noah still didn’t understand why they had to use all of their pillows to do so! It wasn’t as if the egg was going to be that big. But that was Gwenna, she was always more bothered than him. Like she actually did her work and passed her classes. Noah just spent him time cooking up more exciting things to do for when she’d stopped being boring and working.

“Falkor!?” The boy exclaimed for the gazillionth time that day. “He ‘ent called Falkor. That’s just…stupid.” It sounded more like a dinosaur. Benedict wasn’t going to be a dinosaur. He was going to be a dragon. And he was going to help Noah take down the Storminator when he was fully grown. Storm wouldn’t be able to fail him if Noah had a dragon to chew him all up and spit him out. In fact, Benedict would eat all of their professors! And dark wizards! And he’d fly Noah to Romania to capture more dragons. Then they’d have an army.

Now that the fort was complete, Noah proceeded to crawl inside, waiting for Gwenna to join him.
“But if she sees yer handwritin’ I don’t think she’ll respond nicely. Pa said she don’t like yer dad.  She don’t like Cornish Leprercoorns, he said. Best I write it.” The boy pulled some parchment from his bad and crossed his legs. “It were my idea to build the fort.” So from here on out, everything else was no his idea as well!

Gwenna eyed her friend with something akin to disgust, her upper lip curling to show her teeth.  There were times when she regretted having sworn off biting; sometimes, it seemed like it would be much easier to simply pounce on Noah with a mighty zombie growl and wrestle him into submission.

Especially now, when he was saying ridiculous things like Falkor was a stupid name and that Missus Raynor didn't like her dad.  None of which was obviously true.

She gave a sniff, just like her mum would, and turned her nose up at him.  "We're not going to argue about something dumb like names," she said huffily, and obviously they weren't.  The dragon was going to be named Falkor, because she'd already decided -- it was either that or Draco, but Draco had died at the end, and she didn't want her dragon sharing his heart with some stupid old prince.  Gwenna was inherently suspicious of the entire prince/princess construct.  She much preferred warriors and monsters to royalty, and besides, she wanted a dragon she could ride and go flying off on to fight skeletal zombie hoardes or maybe the Nothing.

"And does Missus Raynor ever come over to your house for dinner?  Because she comes over to ours," she said, with just the faintest hint of smugness.  "Sometimes even twice a week.  She likes me dad way better than yours.  Dad said your dad almost quit, there's no way that anyone likes him.  No, wait --"  She held the quill out of his reach, suddenly reconsidering their scribal prospects.  "If you write it, then no one's going to be able to read it.  Maybe I should do it.  Me handwriting's a lot bloody neater than yours."

For the few moments that Gwenna’s mouth was moving without anything sensible coming out Noah found himself wondering why he put up with her as a friend. She was quite obviously doolally because she thought that her dad was cooler than his. But Noah knew different. His dad, as annoying as he may be, was the best auror that there was. His mam had told him that and so did all of his pa’s scars. There were hundreds of them. All Eddie said Auror Trevelyan had was freckles and tomato hair. How would Missus Dragonlady prefer that??

But instead of revealing this real truth to Gwenna, Noah decided to take the higher ground and leave her to her doolally weirdness.

Oh who was he kidding?

“I don’t want her at me ‘ouse for dinner. Pa says she’s a eegositcal wench with a height comp licks!” Not that he knew what any of it meant but it sounded good! But Eddie had also said Tamis Raynor was a dragon lady. Noah had never met a dragon lady before

The frown on Noah’s face softened when his handwriting was insulted. He knew that much was true! A grin twisted his lips and he shoved the parchment in her direction. “Fine. But I’m drawing a picture of what we want! And this letter needs to sound smart. Like a couple’o adults wrote it.”

"Your dad called my dad a leprechaun, and he's not," Gwenna pointed out sourly.  Noah annoyed her sometimes, but he was still all right; he was a far better conspirator than her younger brother Artie, who had mostly not understood her plans.  But she was not feeling nearly as sympathetic toward Noah's father, who seemed to say all sorts of awful things about people that she mostly liked.  "He's not even from Ireland, and even Muggles know that that's where leprechauns are from.  So I don't reckon that we should believe what he said about Missus Raynor's comp links."

She was glad when at least Noah agreed to her version of the plan.  "Right," she agreed, looking satisfied as she accepted the parchment.  Adding a picture didn't seem the best way to convince Missus Raynor that adults had sent in the letter, but Noah didn't have to know if she didn't put it in the envelope.

"So let's see..."  She sucked on the end of the quill for a moment, and then put the nub to the parchment.  "Dear Head Auror Raynor... A-U-R-O-R," she began, spelling it out as she started to write.  "What color d'you reckon I should enchant her name to be?  We are writing to you as two concerned citizens," she continued, narrating out loud as she carefully printed out the words.  "There is something that we feel --" 

She broke off, quirking a look at Noah.  "There's something that we feel that what?  That you ought to know?"

What did they feel? Hmmm….. Noah’s face twisted in concentration, his lips pressed and eyebrows knitted together.

“Dear Missus Raynor…There’s summit’ we feel should be brought to your attention.” He dictated slowly, as a spider crawled up and over their pillows. A smirk twisted upon his lips and he reached for it, grabbing the great furry thing and holding it between two sweaty palms to prevent escape. This would be used when the silly Gwenna refused to call Benedict by his real name. And next time she tried denying that her dad was a leprechaun becuas ehis dad says he was and his dad was a clever man.

“Ye ‘ave two amazin’ aurors workin’ at the ministry and they don’t get the…the…” once more the young boy’s face screwed up in thought. “the recog…recoge….recogshan they deserve.” A pause before Noah rattled off more of a letter Gwenna should be writing. “I…we think you’ll agree that they should be the new ministers of magic.”

Noah frowned. “Or is that too much? My dad’s head would get too big if he was the ministry for magic. Mum always says his head won’t fit through doors soon… But it doesn’t look that big.”

"It's re-cog-ni-tion," Gwenna corrected importantly.  She was biting her tongue, attempting to keep up with Noah's speed of speech and still keep her handwriting neat.  Even on her worst day, though, her printing was still a bajillion times better than her classmate's, whose Herbology homework she had once mistaken for an attempt at a Surrealist sketch. 

She finished writing the end of the second to last line -- "The re-cog-ni-tion they deserve" -- and then stopped, considering their options.

It was important not to overshoot here.  Too big of a request, and it was never going to happen.  Too small, and their plan wouldn't work.  The stakes were high:  Falkor's health and future happiness were on the line here, and Gwenna didn't want to think about the possibility that her dragon might end up getting raised by someone else.  If they didn't get this right, they'd have to come up with another plan.

"You can't have two Ministers of Magic, can you?" she asked with a frown.  "That'd be like two Prime Ministers.  Besides, I don't think Missus Raynor can promote them to that.  We want them to be, uh..."  She wracked her brain, wrinkling her nose.  "Senior Aurors.  We think you'll agree..." she began to dictate again, as she resumed transcription, "that they should be AT LEAST Senior Aurors -- how's that, Noah? -- for the following reasons."

Whatever a prime minister apparently was, Noah didn’t think he’d care for it if there was two. Maybe his dad and Auror Trevelyan couldn’t both be Minister for Magic. It was therefore far more sensible to have his dad as the minster and Gwenna’s as a deputy because she was a girl and he was a leprechaun. Eddie Pratt had already been the head auror for a bit so he had the experience. All Mr Trevelyan did was annoy his colleagues, according to his dad.

Senior auror was sort of acceptable, Noah supposed. It was a start and would get their dads more money to give to them so they could afford to look after Benedict properly and be responsible owners.

“Senior aurors. Ok.” He glanced at the parchment before back up at Gwenna. “don’t go making this all sparky and looking like a fairy’s pooed on it. She needs to take this seriously or Benedict will never be looked after properly.” He knew what Gwenna was like. Every sodding note she sent him ended up covered in glitter and sparking and the glitter very often ended up on his black robes. Why was he friends with a girl!?!

“So reasons…” concentration creased the boy’s youthful features and he scowled at the parchment. “One, they are the best and no one is better than them. Two, they are now old. Senior aurors are old. Three, they have families to look after. You pay them rubbish.  Four, you hold Benedict’s life in yer hands. Do you want him to die?”

Noah did not have enough appreciation for sparkly things, Gwenna had long since decided.  She half-suspected it was only because he wasn't nearly as good at the charms as she was -- the notes that he passed her in class were always boring looking, with barely a special effect or anything!  Maybe it was a boy thing: maybe he was still too young to have a sense of the proper dramatic.

She gave a huff as she continued to transcribe.  Getting the reasons right were important, she knew.  Missus Raynor did not seem the sort to just promote people on a whim.  From what Gwenna had seen of her, though the Head Auror was extremely short, she was still very intimidating.

"I don't think we should mention Falkor in this," she said dubiously, wrinkling her nose.  For now, she'd ignore the way that Noah still refused to refer to their dragon by his proper name.  "What if she decides that's a reason not to promote them?  Maybe she doesn't like pets.  And I think we should be a little nicer -- You pay them rubbish is kind of mean, don't you reckon?  Hm..."  She chewed on the end of her quill, which was delightfully sugary, as she thought.

"They have families to look after, and they ought to be able to support them?" she ventured, glancing at Noah before she began to write again. "And maybe if you give them a raise, they can give their children an increase in allowance, which will help stimulate the national economy," she finished importantly, continuing to record her words with neat, bold strokes.  "Because everyone knows that's a problem right now.  Maybe that way, she'll say something when she promotes them and put the idea in their heads right off."