"Hah, that was harder than I thought," Ben said, taking a deep sigh. It had taken all of Ben's limited charisma to convince Dobby.

After a lot of back and forth, Ben managed to convince Dobby that he would protect Harry Potter from any harm at Hogwarts. In exchange, Dobby would have to stop causing problems for Harry.

But Dobby was not easily convinced.

"How is you going to protect Harry Potter, sir? You is a child," he had asked.

"A child I may be, but I am also a wizard," Ben replied, and a giant swirling portal opened up, startling Dobby.

A giant lizard-like claw came through the portal, followed by a dragon's head, and then the rest of its body. Norene, the Norwegian Ridgeback, now occupied more than half of the room, making the house feel even smaller than it was.

Smoke escaped her snout along with deep growls of displeasure that seemed to be saying "You finally remembered me huh?" This made Dobby cower behind Ben's armchair.

"It's a D-Dragonnn, sir! We must run!" Dobby exclaimed in terror.

"Oh, stop being so dramatic, will you?" Ben said to both, unhooking a dried goat leg from above the fire pit and throwing it to Norene.

As the crunching sounds of bones being crushed in the dragon's mouth rang in the room, Dobby's large orb-like eyes were filled with terror. There were not many creatures more terrifying than a dragon, especially when its bright orange eyes stared at you with a hungry look.

"Please, sir, don't feed Dobby to the dragon. Please, anything but the dragon," Dobby pleaded, realizing by now that his magic was not working here.

"Rubbish, she's not going to eat you! Norene's a nice little dragon, aren't you?" Ben said, throwing another goat leg to the not-so-little dragon and she showed her agreement by wagging her tail, knocking down everything from the walls.

"Besides, there's hardly any meat on you," Ben remarked, unhooking a mammoth snout from the wall and throwing it at Dobby. "Here, feed her this."

Dobby dropped the snout at once. "You is saying Dobby doesn't have any meat and then you is giving Dobby meat! I think you is wanting to get rid of Dobby, sir."

But just because you don't go feed the dragon doesn't mean that the dragon won't  ̶f̶e̶e̶d̶ ̶o̶n̶ ̶y̶o̶u̶ feed from you.

As Norene's smoke-filled snout closed in on Dobby, the poor elf snapped his fingers repeatedly in terror, but it produced nothing but sparks.

Dobby finally gave up struggling and closed his eyes, accepting his fate. But the pain of being crushed between the dragon's menacing maw never came. When he opened his eyes, he saw Norene wolfing down the mammoth snout.

Just when Dobby was feeling relief, the dragon swooped down on him again, making him fall backwards. Dobby put his arms in front of his face on instinct, but instead of her sharp teeth sinking into his skin, he felt a wet, slippery tongue on his face.

Norene nudged him up and rubbed her beak-like snout on his face affectionately, making Dobby question if he was dreaming.

"Told you she's a nice dragon," he said with a smile. "Norene, be nice to Dobby. He's our friend."

Since Dobby still looked a bit scared, Ben sent Norene back to Romania.

"So, do you think I'm capable of protecting Harry now?" he asked, not sure if scaring him had been such a great idea now.

"You is a great wizard, sir, worthy of being Harry Potter's friend sir, Dobby is convinced of your power, but-"

"But?"

Dobby's voice dropped to almost a whisper, ". . . there are powers even you can't. . . powers no decent wizard . . ." He suddenly jumped and grabbed a bottle of ale that had dropped from the shelf and started hitting himself on the head.

He didn't stop even after Ben took the bottle away and started banging his head on the wall.

"Dobby, stop! You don't have to punish yourself," said Ben.

He felt really bad looking at the poor elf harming himself. He only stopped when he was too dizzy to even stand straight. Dobby had slammed his head on the wall with such intensity that even Ben could see stars and planets orbiting around him.

"Sir is too kind, but Dobby is useless, Dobby cannot tell sir of the terrible plot,"

"No! Dobby, you are not useless! You are a very brave elf who's willing to go even against his own masters to do the right thing," said Ben, trying to reassure the poor elf.

"Dobby is not as brave as he thought, sir, Dobby was very scared by your dragon, sir," said Dobby, looking a bit disappointed.

"Well, who isn't scared of a dragon?" 'Oh wait, there's Hagrid who thinks they are cute.'

"Ahum, I was scared of one too when I first saw it," said Ben, fibbing straight through his pristine teeth.

"Really?" said Dobby, looking at Ben with his big, orb-like eyes.

"Yes, and you don't have to tell me anything. I already know," said Ben.

"Sir knows?"

"Yes, do you not know what they call me?" said Ben, puffing his chest.

"Eh, Harry Potter's friend, sir?" said Dobby, and a vein bulged on Ben's forehead.

"They call me The Ravenclaw's Seer," he said with gritted teeth.

Dobby's wide eyes opened even wider, and he gave Ben a deep bow.

"Forgive Dobby for not recognizing you, sir. Dobby's heard great things about you, sir," said Dobby.

"You have?" asked Ben. 'That couldn't be good,' he thought, as it was never good news if Malfoys were talking about you at home.

"Yes sir, you is predicting all the matches, sir, and you is even predicting Harry Potter's win, sir, you a real seer, sir," said Dobby.

"Well, let's hope your masters don't gift me cursed items then," he said wearily.

A look of realization came over Dobby, and he suddenly started banging his head on the wall again. "Bad Dobby! Bad Dobby!" he said.

"Stop, why are you hitting yourself now?" said Ben, pulling him away from the wall.

"Dobby had to punish himself, sir," said the elf, who had gone slightly cross-eyed. "Dobby almost spoke ill of his family again, sir. . . ."

DreamyApe

--Dreamscape--

If your family had a house-elf, would you free it? And if you would, what would you give it?