Dragon's mate (Psionic and I)

During the following week, Talver was kept quite busy with both tending to Sya's wounds to ensure they healed properly, going out to hunt for food when she wasn't, and gathering more wood for his little constructions around her cave. The half-built walls that would become a cozy little shack/cabin just outside the entrance to the cave were well-established. There was still a lot of work to be done, but progress was being made. As the would-be mini-cabin was to have space for a fireplace, once finished, both he and Sya would be able to enjoy warm nights together in it if she wished.

At the moment, Talver came back up the crest of the hill to Sya's cave, dragging another bundle of woo. As he got closer, he noticed Sya standing outside, in her shifted 'humanoid' form. His face brightened and he called out while waving. "Oh, Sya! You're finally able to change again! Feeling better today, huh?" Talver was especially glad she would be able to talk to him again. Over the week, they had gotten to learn how to read each other's moods and general attitudes to approximate communication as only people who spent a lot of time together could, but Talver actually liked to hear her voice. And he'd also be able to really talk to her about the matter of his sword...at one point during the week, he'd gone out to get it out of the muddy grass where it was left, cleaned it off, wrapped it up, and hid it in a place so that it wouldn't rust or degrade from being left out, though he of course didn't bring it anywhere near Sya's cave. If she really had a problem with it, he'd just send it back to the village. He still had his spear and bow, after all.

Sya nodded as she met him. "I feel much better." Her voice is gravelly just like when she had first taken him from disuse, but it would smooth out again once she speaks more. Him avoiding bringing the sword into the cave is a good thing. It would have caused Sya undo stress to see the weapon. Of course she had been helping to build his den as well as gather materials for when she lays their eggs. It's good for him to have a place to go to escape the heat of the fire needed to hatch pips.

Right at the moment she doesn't feel like going about gathering materials and what not. "Let us go to the river. I do not feel like work today. I think some play shall do us good," Sya suggests, liking the idea of splashing around a bit in the water and perhaps catching a few fish as a snack.

Talver smiled back at Sya when she confirmed she was in better health. "That's good, I'm glad." He walked over to her side, and affectionately rubbed her arm, glad that he could more closely interact with her again. When she then suggested what they should do for the day, Talver's head tilted in surprise, and then his face spread into a wide, eager grin. He was looking forward to having "fun" with her again, and after working for several days, a dip in the river sounded perfect. "That sounds like an excellent idea, Sya. We both could use some downtime after the week we've had..." Letting Sya lead the way, Talver then followed her out into the forest towards the river.

Sya knows that this time of year the water of the river would start to warm up because the waters from the snow melt higher in the mountains had already gone down stream. Or at least it's warm enough for her to spend a fair bit of time in. Talver, on the other hand, might have to take breaks or not go in so deep so that he doesn't get cold. Though he does have a nice warm body to cuddle up to.

For being bipedal Sya surprisingly makes few noises as she leads him towards the river. Every now and then she steps on a twig, startling up birds and rabbits from their hiding spots. She leads him to where the river widens a out a little bit, where later in the summer the broad stones that make up the river bed can be seen. Already out in the water Sya can see a few fish glinting in water. Without hesitation Sya wades deeper and deeper into the water, until it reaches just under her magnificent breasts. She uses her tail to flick water over her head and shoulders, getting them acclimated to the cold water. After a couple more splashes Sya dove under the water, a thin membrane going over her nostrils to keep water from going down her throat. As far as vision goes she can just as well as Talver under water. Luckily the current here isn't to strong, seeing as dragons are made to fight against air currents instead of water. Easily Sya lets the water take her for a bit before popping up a few yards down stream. Doing the dragon version of a doggy paddle Sya made her way to swallow water before wading back to where she had left Talver with a grin on her face. "The water feels good today. It will be nice when the sun rises some more."

Walking with Sya through the forest proved to be a peaceful and pleasant experience. The spring season was well underway, and though there was a slight chill in the mountain air, there was warmth from the rising sun that filtered through the treetops. Lush greenery was all around, and there was the chatter of morning birds and animals filling the forest. Sya herself was also quite pleasant to watch (though Talver tried not to stare too much), with the way her nude, scaled body swayed confidently as she walked, and to him her mottled-grey body was enhanced by the scenery. More and more he thought of her reptilian features as attractive, and he'd even come to appreciate her full-dragon form after spending a week with her like that.

Eventually they reached the stream Sya had spoken of, and while Talver was familiar with it, he hadn't been this far upstream before. He observed as Sya took to the water first, wading in and letting the water wash over her, which made her scales sparkle brilliantly in the morning sun. The way she stopped with the waterline just below her breasts--as if to highlight them--was quite alluring, and already Talver could feel the beginnings of arousal. The water was crystal clear, and he was able to watch her as she dove underneath the water to snap up some fish before she popped up again. Talver smiled at her, and made his way to the shore of the river, where he knelt down to feel the water before he looked back out to her. "So, now that we're here...did you have anything in mind for what we should play in particular?" He asked with a slight waggle of his eyebrows. "And should I come in after you now? Water's a bit chilly, and though it will warm up later, with the fire inside of you, I'm sure your body would keep me warm enough if I stuck close to you..." He suggested with a smirk.

Sya shrugged, not really putting any planning into today other then relaxing and playing around like a hatchling. "If you want to. Take the water slowly at first so your body can get used to it if you don't want to be carried." She really sees no reason why he wouldn't want to be carried. With him flush against her body it would help combat the chill of the snow melt flowing through the river. She does however give him a grin and lightly splash him up to his knees with an almost lazy flick of her of her tail. "I have seen some of the village children playing in the sand along the river and making mounds. What is that they do?" Her obsidian eyes sparkle with curiosity. She knows he wants to play "wrestle" again, but thinks that he can stand a bit more anticipation.

Talver chuckled at Sya's suggestion for the water. "You're about the only person in the world who I'd be fine with 'carrying' me..." He said while flashing a smile. Being held close to her body like that did hold quite an appeal to him, and she was strong and well-built enough for it to be possible in the first place. He then jumped with a yelped-out playfully indignant "Hey!" when water was suddenly splashed up at him. "You're a naughty dragon, you know that?" he teased her, before hearing her subject-changing question. He tilted his head and put on a thoughtful expression. "Ah...oh! That, right. It's an activity children enjoy; making sand castles. Wet sand can be used almost like clay while still being very easy to work with, so kids will shape the sand into various shapes, with 'castles' being traditional, and they'll often compete with each other to see who can make the biggest and strongest castle. Then when you're finished, you can kick it over and start again. Adults sometimes enjoy it too, it's a nice and simple form of artistic expression. Though most don't admit it, and kids just love tugging on their parents anyway to help make their sand castles bigger and better." While Talver explained, he shifted position along the riverbank to lie down on his belly and fold his arms under his chin. He wondered where Sya's sudden curiosity came from...but then he found himself curious, too. "What kind of games do dragon children play?" The brown-haired man asked in return.

Sya chuckled at his outburst. She shook her head like he should know better by know with a grin on her face. She takes in all of that information, searching through her memories for something that dragon young do similar. "Dragon young games are used to teach. We play wrestle to learn our fighting skills, we learn to forage by playing search games, we do something like human children by building the biggest mock den." Of course he had also learned that they do dares, such as when Sya had ate a snake. With her tail she starts to push mounds of sand together, creating a ripple pattern. As a youngling she had never put to much thought into playing with sand, other then it was a good cushion for her broodmate's and her wrestling. She moved her tail to the other direction, creating the dragon version of a sand angel.

Talver nodded as Sya explained the kind of games that dragon children played. It made sense, in some similar ways, some human children games help teach coordination and physical skills necessary for a rural life. After contemplating the subject for a few moments, he then took notice of what Sya was doing to the sand with her tail. "Heh, that's pretty neat..." He commented as her carving took shape.

Talver paused for a moment, thinking things over, then decided 'oh why not' to himself and settled into a good spot of wet sand and began carving and shaping it up himself. He started with a boxy-pyrimidal keep, added an outer wall, and finished it off with a good moat. After spending a few minutes working, he then knelt back and regarded his completed sand castle. "Ta-da!" He said to Sya. Then a section of the wall collaped. Suddenly cursing under his breath and blushing from looking like a fool, Talver scrambled to reconstruct the broke wall, while saying "Er, you didn't see anything, it was supposed to do that...ah, I haven't done this in years..." Talver admitted.

Sya watched curiously as he formed his sand castle. She had never seen this behavior up close, just from far away with her extraordinary sight. She gave a hearty laugh when his little sand structure feel apart and his cheeks flamed red. "What ever you say Talver, what ever you say," she said still laughing as he scrambles to fix the sand castle. Sya decided that more playing around in the sand would wait. Grinning she easily picks him and before heaving him over her shoulder and heading for the water. Of course behind her her tails is twitching in amusement as she keeps her grasp on him steady.

As Talver worked to fix up his little castle, he heard the crunch of wet sand underfoot as Sya approached him. He started to look up to her, but not quickly enough and he was unprepared for being suddenly picked up by Sya's deceptively strong frame, and slung over her back. "Hey-whuf!" He exclaimed, as Sya started to wade into the water with him. He couldn't help but still be amazed at just how strong she was in her humanoid form. Cheekily, he noticed how sexy it was to watch from above Sya's round, scaled ass and tail sway with her gait. As she walked deeper into the water, Talver grinned and reached down to pinch Sya's ass, seeing if that would get any reaction out of her, and then he tried poking around her sides to see if he could find out if dragons were ticklish.

Sya gave him a cheeky grin of her own as she felt him enjoy the view of her posterior. It seems to her that males of all species could be amused with a good view. She gave him an amused snort when he pinched her ass, even though it doesn't have that much of an effect, nor does his poking and prodding. Deeming them deep enough, she grinned again and start to slowly lower herself into the water, playing with him as the water gets closer to his own body. She can't wait to see if he does anything because of how cold the water is.

After poking at Sya for a few moments as she waded deeper into the water with him slung over her shoulder, Talver began to pout. He hadn't gotten any real reaction out of her. "Hrmph! You don't seem ticklish in the usual places...but everyone's got a ticklish spot. I'll find yours someday!" He declared boistrously as the water rose up around Sya closer to him.

When Sya lowered herself down enough for the chill water to reach Talver, he recoiled slightly with a small yelp, and ended up flopping right off of Sya's shoulder to splash loudly into the water. Moments later, his head brke the water again as he stood up, shivering in his soaked clothes and hugging himself with a comment of "Brrrrrrr! Oh, that's brisk!"

He looked over to Sya and reached out to grasp at her...and, feeling how much warmer she felt than the water, Talver quickly wrapped his arms around her body as he pulled her close. "Oooooh, that feels much better..." He said as he rubbed his body up against Sya's front as his arms rubbed up and down her back...but after a few moments of enthusiastic cuddling wherein Talver warmed himself up with Sya's inner body heat...his hands then slowly began travelling lower...until he began shamelessly clutching at her buttocks while he more ground his pants-covered hips against Sya's own instead of rubbing his torso against her for warmth. "Heh, thanks for sharing your heat with me, Sya, it feels real great...how's the water to you?" He said in a coy voice with his head resting against her shoulder, as she was a bit taller than him.

****

Meanwhile, down in the village, a loud debate had been running through the town for the past few days. After learning of the dragon's intelligence and how she and her 'husband' never actually meant the village any harm, a number of the villagers wanted to try and make amends. Where they disagreed (aside from the minority crowd who stubbornly refused to stop thinking of the dragon as just a beast that would do best to stay up in the mountain) was on how precicely to go about that; some of the vllagers wanted to collect up all the scales, teeth, horns, claws, and other pieces they had taken from the body of the dragon they had slain last year and return the remains to the dragon called 'Sya'. The other villagers, on the other hand, were afraid that such a thing would be a gravely dangerous insult considering that...well, most of the claimed remains had been carved into ornaments or worked into jewelry.

Ultimately though, no better plan could be devised, so on the same day as Sya was able to retake her humanoid form and went with Talver to the river, the villagers went through the town and gathered up everything they could possibly find of Fairrith's remains. Some of the housewives also cooked a few baskets of meat for the dragon as an additional gift. Norman himself had gone through the collection, looking for as many unworked pieces of the broken remains as he could. Since yesterday, he had been trying to fit them together like a puzzle, trying to complete a whole tooth, horn, or talon, to at least have -something- whole and undefiled to return to Sya. He ended up with an incomplete horn, two incomplete talons and two incomplete teeth...but, with pride, he finished the morning managing to remake a single complete, whole tooth. Once it was sealed together, Norman gathered up some of the other villagers, and together, they began to take a cart of gifts up the mountain.

Sya's laugh echoed around the small area as he came up sputtering water. She looked down at him amused when he pressed his now cold body to her natural warmth. For a moment as his hands travel down her backside, she wonders if he would brush them over her abdomen, and thus notice the tightness that's beginning to take place there. She does feel the first stirrings of arousal as he rubs his lower body against hers. "It is very soothing. I have been feeling some discomfort in my stomach since changing back," she says softly. Sya looked at him, hoping that he would start to get what's happening within her.

***
Miranda herself had contemplated what to do with the remains that had come into her possession. She had received a couple hard won metalic green scales, which are said to be great for detecting poisons, alleviating aches and fevers among other things. She sat in the fire light of the tavern as the rest of the villagers debated about what to do with the remains, moving the scales about and watching the light change the color. The male must have been splendid when seen in the full sun light she thinks to herself. He would have blended in well with the forest, versus his mate who blends in with the rock of the mountains. She walks silently along slightly behind Norman, thinking on what to say to the dragoness as they head into the forest and up the mountain towards the den.

The softly running water of the stream was very chilly around Talver, but with his body pressed up to Sya's and his head over her shoulder, her warmth was enough to keep him fairly comfortable. But when she mentioned that her belly had been feeling odd since changing into humanoid form again, Talver furrowed his brow and leaned his head back to look into her face with concern. "It does? Did the cut on your belly heal properly?" He qasked as he broke away from the embrace slightly to look down into the clear water between them. He brought his right hand around to Sya's belly and gently felt over her scales with his fingers, feeling for any kind of scar or abnormality that might explain her discomfort.

The dragoness nodded to reassure him that use, the wound on her stomach had healed properly, even if that area is still a bit tender. Her heart beat picked up when he ran his fingers over the scales of her belly. Sya brought a hand up to press his hand against her belly, where he can probably feel the hardness of her womb already starting to change in this form. Sya folded her wings and tail around him, and with one single word informed him what's causing her discomfort. "Pips."

When the thought that maybe Sya hadn't healed fully after all crossed his mind, Talver focused all his attention in that moment on Sya's scales as he drew his fingers over them, trying to find the remnants of any of her wounds. He didn't even notice right away that Sya was moving one of her own hands towards his until she was already pressing his palm against her belly. Very strangely, he could feel something hard and knotted just beneath her flesh, something harder than her insides should be. Talver's heart jumped a beat, it couldn't be a good thing. "Sya, what--" Talver started to ask as he turned his head back up to look into her face, just in time to notice her wrapping her large, blanketing, batlike wings around the both of them, binding Talver to her and mostly isolating them from the cool stream. He even felt her tail curling around his legs. Under other circumstances, Talver would have found this to be very intimate and enjoyable, being held so closely and completely to her, but at the moment, he was mostly confused.

Then Sya said the one word that would forever change the rest of his life.

"...Pips?" Talver scrunched up his face in bewilderment, before his eyes suddenly opened as round as coins. "Wait, you don't mean..." His mind began reeling as the implications of what Sya just said began to register with him. Pips. Children. Against all the odds in his mind, she was telling him he had concieved with her. "You mean...you're gonna have...we're gonna be..." A father. He was going to be a father. Talver was breathless, as if he had just ran through the woods for a mile. He couldn't feel his heart anymore. Everything around him seemed to slow down, he couldn't hear the birds in the trees or the running of the stream. He took in every detail of the woman holding him to her; the shine of her scales, her pearly and jagged teeth, her strong ivory horns...and her infinitely deep eyes. Talver was already resigned to, and in fact happy with the idea of living out the rest of his life with Sya in penance, even if they never created a legacy. But now she was going to bear his own flesh and blood, something the rugged and battle-hardened militia commander had never considered before in his life, always dismissing it as a prospect that didn't suit his comfortably simple life. But in that moment, he loved Sya more than he ever had before, more than he could possibly say.

Slowly, Talver brought up his free hand, trembling with a storm of emotions, to caress the side of Sya's face. Bit by bit, almost as if in a daze, Talver began to lean his head in closer to Sya's, until they could feel each other's breath. Then, with a tentative curiosity but a barely restrained passion, as if everything was new again and he was exploring a whole new world, Talver pressed his lips against Sya's own, sharing his first kiss with her while knowing that she was going to be the mother of his children.

Sya could feel her heartbeat keep up its attempt to make its way out of her chest as she made the announcement of their future. "We are going to parents," she says softly. She watches keenly, taking in his reaction. When she had told Farrith before of her thoughts, he had been delighted, and acted almost like a hatchling himself. She keeps a sharp on his body language. She knows she had just told him something to change both their lives.

She tips her hand in order to meet his caress. She's quite relieved to see his acceptance of their offspring. A glorious, warm buzz spreads through her as they lean even closer to each other's bodies. In response to his passion, Sya gave a deep rumble as she kissed her mate and the father of her offspring. She can almost picture her blood flowing to her womb clearly, nourishing her little ones as they form their protective shells around them. Her tongue eager laps at his, asking permission for entrance to his mouth.

When their kissed finished Sya drew her head back again. "If you wish to celebrate our children we should move out of the stream," she teases him, a rumble in her voice.

A tingle ran all up and down Talver's body as his dragoness lover rumbled into the kiss. He opened his mouth without hesitation to fully allow her tongue to explore him even as his own tongue pressed forward to tangle with hers, in the way that he loved her snakelike tongue wrapped around his own.

All too soon, the kiss was broken off, and Talver leaned back slightly to look into Sya's eyes again. He still seemed dazed and breathless, but he had enough presence of mind to register what she said. "Y-yeah. That's a...good idea." Rather reluctantly, Talver broke out of the warm and wonderfully comforting embrace of her wings and tail to stand alone in the riverwater again, as he waded towards shore. Once he was back on dry land, he tried to shake as much of the water off of himself as possible, which didn't do much good as he was wearing sopping wet clothes. He shivered and hugged himself. "Hey, let's, uh...let's go back to your lair, so I can take this stuff off and leave it out to dry..." He said as he waited to stand and walk beside Sya, before an idea came to him. "Sya, you can breathe fire, right? I wonder...could you breathe hot air without flames? Enough to uh...dry me a little, just until we get back?" He smiled sheepishly at Sya with his odd request.

****

Norman with the other villagers and cart finally reached the place where they had done battle with Sya only a few days ago. With his tracking skills--not that it was particularly difficult--he found Sya's unmistakeable dragon-tracks leading off into the woods, towards her lair unbeknownst to him, and decided following them was as good a chance as any of meeting up with the dragon again. Onward the small band of humans continued.

Sya waded back to shore right behind him. She gave a chuckle as he tried to shake off water like a dog. "That won't do you much good." She chuckled again. "Or you could walk back naked." She tipped her head back, her mouth forming an O and her nostrils flaring like she's going to breath fire. Instead, hot air visible in the way it waves and twists as it comes out.

"Could you stand that hot of air? I cannot lower it anymore." She doesn't want to roast him. However, the attention to his clothing brings to mind something for Sya. He has a limited set of clothes, and very thin ones at that. Even though the landscape is pretty and flowering around them now, that doesn't mean Sya has forgotten about the winter and it's driving snows. They would need to take care of that in the short summer and fall months. Now that he had accepted her pips as his own she isn't going to lose him.

Talver ruffled up his soaked brown hair to get some of the water out, and chuckled at Sya's suggestion for walking back to the lair. "As tempting as that is, I think I'll wait until getting somewhere that I can comfortably lie down after getting this stuff off..." He said with a wink at his dragoness lover. As she then prepared to breath out hot air, he moved slightly closer and experimentally held out his arms slightly to catch the shimmer in the air that she made, which caused him to shudder from head to toe. "Ooooohoohoo, that felt good...yeah, in just a short burst like that, it's not too bad." He then stood up taller, already feeling less chilled in his still-damp clothes. "But let's get back to the lair...then we can really keep each other warm." He said with a slight mischievious glint, before his faced softened into sincere affection. "I want to show the mother of my children-to-be how much I care for her."

Talver began walking back in the direction of the lair with Sya, while he likewise turned his thoughts more towards the future. Winter was going to set into the mountain soon, but that wouldn't be too much of a problem if he and Sya could hunt to get some deerskin, or better yet bearskin, that he could fashion easily enough into simple clothing. He mentioned this to Sya as they walked, telling her how he'd like to hunt for a bear sometime soon, as he could make good use of all of a bear carcass for supplies, and would give them a good stockpile of meat to boot, or at least one or two good meals for Sya in her full-dragon form. But as they approached Sya's lair, Talver heard some voices through the trees, and furrowed his brow in confusion, trying to figure out who could be up this far in the mountain. By now, his clothes had half-dried-out, so he wasn't as ragged-looking as he had been after coming out of the water. And when he finally passed through the last few trees into the clearing in front of Sya's lair...he saw Norman, Miranda, and some of the other villagers with a small cart.

The villagers all alertly looked up at Talver's approaching footsteps, and Norman took a step forward as his former leader came into view. "Talver! We were hoping you'd come back this way, we--" And Norman then froze in place as Sya stepped into view. He and all the villagers gaped wide-eyed at the dragoness's humanoid form. "Talver, is that...her? Sya?" Norman asked with a distant voice.

"Yeah, that is, actually...what are you all doing here?" Talver asked, looking between the villagers.

It would be easy for her to bring down some large animal, though she can't promise what shape the hide would be in afterwards. Though she would try her best to help him hunt and prepare for the colder seasons. The sound of human voices so near her lair alarms Sya. Her experience with large groups of humans haven't exactly left her with a positive feeling about them. She lets Talver go forward first, taking the situation in from the cover of the trees.

Hoping the humans wouldn't do anything stupid, she stepped out of her coverage. She holds her head high and her tail curled around her lower body. "Yes, I am Sya," she answers Norman's question, shocking the villagers even more, and driving home the point that she is quite intelligent and can indeed speak. Her eyes take in what the villagers have brought with them, from the seeking the smell of meat when he eyes land on the cart of remains. She waits for the humans to make their next move.

The villagers all stared wide-eyed at the human-shaped talking dragon, while Norman was blinking until he finally shook his head to clear it. "Um...right. Well, uh...damn, this is really awkward...but, well, after what happened last week we thought we'd...try and make up for it. Or at least give back what we could." Norman spoke hesitantly, with a stammer that showed some kind of fear of what he was saying. "You remember how we took most of the dragon's...er, Sya's husband...how we took most of his remains, last year? Well, uh...we've brought back everything we still have. I know this is gonna look bad, but please tell her not to eat us..." Norman said, as he then reached for the tarp covering the wagon they had brought, and pulled it off, revealing what it carried to Sya.

The wagon was filled with ivory figurines and tools, along with various articles of fancy clothing that shimmered with a vibrant color. But if it wasn't already obvious what everything was from the look of them, even though the remains had spent the last year in human company, once the tarp was lifted, the scent of Sya's long-dead Farrith reached her nostrils. The various tools and carvings were made of his bones, claws, and teeth, while the tunics and vests were made of his scaled dragonhide. There were also broken and scattered bits, here and there, clearly bits that had been discarded originally, now gathered back with everything else. Norman then indicated to a small grouping of items, the ones he had been working on; an incomplete horn, two incomplete teeth and talons each, and one cracked but whole tooth. "I managed to get some of them back together...but it's been a year, we don't have most of what we started with anymore...we just...thought we might return all this to you." Norman said, actually turning to address Sya this time, regarding her with a nervous, but resolute gaze.

Talver, standing beside Sya, was shocked himself. In truth, he had almost forgotten about all the things that he and his fellow villagers had harvested from Farrith's body back when they killed him, and with guilt, Talver recognized a number of items were made by him, of 'material' he cut from the body with his own hands. It was sacrelidge of the highest order to desecrate the remains like this, but they didn't know...

"Sya..." Talver said hesitantly, as he turned towards the dragon-woman he had just recently found out was carrying offspring he sired himself. He reached out with a hand to try and place it on her back and shoulders reassuringly, calmingly, and tried to draw her towards him to comfort her as he spoke to her in a slow voice, hoping that she wouldn't fly into a rage at his fellow humans. "Sya, I know this is awful, but we didn't know...I did some of this myself, and I'm so sorry...don't hurt them, think about what we have together now, what we're sharing, they just wanted to make what amends they could..."

Sya returned the stare, staying perfectly still. What adds insult to injury by them showing up at her den is Norman speaking to Talver and not to her at first. Her eyes darted over the contents of the wagon and her nostrils flared wide, catching the familiar if a bit altered scent of her first mate.

She walked forward to the cart, the surrounding villagers backing up a couple feet just for safety. She reached a clawed hand out to touch the repaired whole items. Seeing the things that the humans had done to her beloved's remains just made her sick. She had of course seen the damage done to his body, knew that it hadn't all been done when he was alive. She found Miranda's unbroken scale, and did what Miranda had done. She turned it over in her hand, let it catch the light. She can still picture him clearly, how beautiful he was outline against the blue sky or dappled in the shadows of the forest on the lower part of the mountain.

Sy aspoke loud and clear so that every one of the humans would hear precisely. "We will take the broken things to his grave. You will put to them rest properly." She would keep the more solid pieces somewhere close, perhaps in a crevice in the den. She turned away, putting a good bit of distance between her and the group of humans before changing into her dragon form. She would probably pay for it later, for the stress on her now pregnant body. She looked at Talver, expecting him to climb up again. She knows it will be a hike for the humans, but they had made it up the mountain to kill Farrith they would make it again to return the things they took.

As Sya approached the cart to examine the remains that had been brought to her, the silent tension in the air between all the humans present was almost palpable. When she finally spoke aloud her decision, showing that she wasn't going to harm anyone, everyone let out a held breath in relief, even Talver. He didn't think he could bear it if the future mother of his children were to attack the people he had lived with for years. They all watched her as she walked a short distance away, with everyone but Talver looking on astonished as she changed form right before their eyes. They never knew or expected dragons to have any shapeshifting ability, and Sya was quite the novel experience for them.

When she turned her head to look at Talver and waited, it only took him a moment to realize what she was waiting for. She wanted him to ride on her, like they had done once or twice recreationally when she was healed enough to fly. He moved over to her and gingerly clambered up to straddle the base of her snakelike neck, and clung tightly to her when she took to the air. Meanwhile, the small band of villagefolk complied with Sya's wish, and began pulling the cart further up the mountain to the location she had specified. It took them some time, but they eventually arrived after Sya and Talver did.