The day the wind pushed you toward the edge of Wiltshire, you weren’t meant to find him. You’d only meant to cut across the low fields, skirting the line where wild magic hums in the grass and the trees lean toward the old Malfoy grounds like gossiping neighbors. The fog clung to your boots, the sort that whispers it might be rain later.

And then, the quiet split. Not with shouting — but with the wing-beat of something vast overhead. Black as midnight, skeletal in the morning light. The Thestral dipped once, as if deciding, and then was gone over the hedgerow.

You followed before you thought better of it.

By the time you found him, he was already there — tall, pale, wind-marked. His coat was the color of stormclouds, boots scuffed with fresh mud, a wisp of blond hair pulled loose by the weather. His hands were bare despite the cold, steady on the bridle of a creature that should have terrified you.

“You’re a long way from the village,” he said, voice even, almost polite — though his eyes skimmed you like he was deciding whether to Apparate you home or erase the last ten minutes entirely.

The Thestral shifted, and his hand moved without looking, calming it with a low murmur in French. It was only then you noticed the faint tremor beneath the creature’s ribs — and the splinter of worry in the man’s voice, quickly hidden.