#ugly baby dragon like a newly hatched bird

[shirecorn]

hhrhrgh. the Scungle

[wyrmoftheweb]

I think baby dragons should be small, ugly, and wrinkly (like newly hatched baby birds are) but also somehow adorable (like newly hatched baby birds are)

[xaz-fr]

The Story So Far

@deadpool-scar-bro @hikayelastoria @cornsnoot-fr @redlion-fr @mushroomdraggo @murdoch-fr @tales-around-sornieth @frxemriss @rainhearts-hatchery @rexcaliburr-fr @onikuma-fr @serthis-archivist @fitzfr @reanimatedfr @voltaic-ambassador @sirensage-fr @journey-taken-fr @ally-fr (let me know if you’d like to be added to the lore pinglist)

dragons are humanoid unless said otherwise

Spayar is a mean asshole which mmmm, accurate

Three Foot Casket pt 6

Astra arrived at the Tangle with Aten and her children to the druids gathered in a circle, talking. She swallowed. They were surrounding the obvious shape of a hatchling. Aten put his hand on her shoulder. “I will take him, you talk to them,” he offered and she was glad she could relinquish her son to her brother. She took a deep breath and approached the adults.

They stopped talking when she got near. “Astra,” Spayar said, hardly a greeting, almost an accusation of what the fuck had she brought a dead hatchling to them for.

“Hello,” she said wishing she felt braver than she was.

“That wildclaw who came said this child belonged to you,” Tassa said and she looked so disappointed. Astra wanted to run and hide. Far more than Savathün Astra considered Tassa as a surrogate mother. Tassa had cared for her and Aten when they’d been children, treated them like her own children. Tassa was kind and wonderful despite her usual disposition towards others and seeing her disapproving look hurt more than Astra was expecting.

“Yes,” she said taking a deep breath.

“What is it with your children that you just can’t keep them?” Spayar asked, being unintentionally cruel. Tassa smacked his arm and hummed angrily at him. He just rolled his eyes.

“I know you— he needs to be buried,” she sniffed and stood up straight. She knew what everyone in the Hall thought of her. That Stitcher girl who’d been taken in by Savathün and who knew what had been done to her over the years. All anyone knew was that now and then her children appeared in North Face for Johanna to find homes for amid her numerous contacts and allies. “I know the druids handle such affairs.”

“We do,” Spayar said, crossing his arms.

“Don’t be mean, Spayar. Her child just died,” a blonde haired man she didn’t know said. He hadn’t been here when Astra had been taken in. That or she didn’t remember him.

Spayar didn’t move. “Anything we need to know about this body?”

“I assure I don’t know what that means,” Astra said tightly. “He was murdered what do you want from me?” she demanded.

The blonde jabbed Spayar in the ribs and Tassa pushed him out of the way. “Of course, dear. I’m sorry for your loss,” she took Astra’s hand. “We’ll have to speak with Fjord about a box to be made.”

“Thank you,” she bowed her head a little.

“How did he die?” Tassa asked.

“Magic. I don’t know,” she shook her head slightly. “I didn’t hear the spell. His throat was just crushed.” Tassa pet her hand.

“No necromancy?” she asked.

“I don’t know. Probably not. The monster who killed him wanted him dead, not a puppet.” Azazel had wanted to make sure she suffered and make her watch just so she knew just how powerless she really was to him.

Tassa nodded. “I’ll take care of it. You can go to the Conservatory if you’d like. Better than that hole in the ground.”

“Thank you. I— yes, I need to not be underground.”

“I don’t know how you do it as a Wind dragon. You have more fortitude than I,” Tassa said to try and make her feel better. Astra didn’t have it in her to tell Tassa that more than once she felt she’d been driven mad by the tunnels and underground and she’d blindly sought the open sky before she suffocated.

“I— yes,” she just said.

Tassa looked around, “Moon, Moon!” she called to a young woman barely older than Astra who was weeding in a herb patch a ways away.

“Aye!” Moon called back.

“Come here, please.”

“Aye!”

“Moon will get you situated in the Conservatory. Someplace you and your children can relax until you figure out what you’re going to do with them.”

Astra went cold. She hadn’t thought of that until just then. Naively she thought that she could keep them but of course she couldn’t. Of course she couldn’t have her children close by. Azazel would kill them too. She nodded and Moon came over to them, a slight spring in her step. “Hey-ya, what’s up?” she asked Tassa.

“Moon, this is Astra. Please take her into the Conservatory. She has two hatchlings with her,” Tassa said.

“Sure thing, boss lady,” Moon was still bright. The men had picked her hatchling up and taken it somewhere and Moon hadn’t seen him. For the best. “Just come with me, Astra, we’ll find you a nice room,” she promised.

“Thank you,” she said and motioned for Aten to follow her. He brought the children with him and followed after her and Moon to the big building— really the only building— in the entire Tangle.

It was oddly cool in the bird cage-looking building despite the green house-like ceiling. Dense foliage grew all over the walls. Creeping vines and plants sprouting from cracks in the mortar. Flowers filled every crack and crevice and she’d never seen such a bright and lively building. It was a stark contrast from the home she lived in now. “Oh,” she said to herself, looking around.

“It’s nice, isn’t it?” Moon asked. “So here’s a lounge, you can stay here until Tassa is ready for whatever it is she’s doing for you.”

“Thank you,” Astra entered the room. The furniture was nicer than anything she’d ever seen in the Warren. It was new a with soft wood that felt like it had been molded into the perfect comfortable shape by druidic magic and then padded on the seat and back. The other was a lounge couch almost the same color as her wings.

“Of course. Don’t know what Tassa has you here for but it’ll work out. Tassa always gets things done, even if she has to beat Spayar over the head to do it,” she giggled. “See you,” she waved before gently closing the door.

Aten set the two hatchlings on the couch before shifting into his Imperial form. He just barely fit in the space and that was only because he wasn’t a fully grown dragon yet. Not yet. Not for his breed. “Come here,” he said gently. She went over to him and he dragged a big pillow over, setting it under his forearms. She crawled into his embrace and he coiled his neck around her. She pressed her face against the top of his head, her hands in his ruby mane and after a few seconds started to cry. Fat and ugly tears rolled down her cheeks onto his hide and into his mane. He said and did nothing except to nuzzle her the best he could.

When she could control herself she let go of Aten and wiped her eyes. She couldn’t help but laugh when Aten licked her face, getting rid of the tears easily. “Stop that you big oaf,” she said, batting him away. He just rumbled in amusement. She wiped her face with her tunic and looked around at where Aten had left her children. Her neck tightened. The sofa was empty.

She attempted to get up with a lurch but Aten held her down. “Relax, they’re exploring,” he said. “Over there,” he used his head to indicate and pointed at part of the room with different chairs. She relaxed. He laid his head down against his chest and forearms so he was eye level with her. “So Tassa is… taking care of it I guess. Now what?”

Her lips went thin, her neck tight. “They can’t come back with me to the Warren,” she said softly. “Azazel killed one, he’ll kill the others if I let him get close.” He hummed a little.  “Johanna-

“Is powerless,” he said. “I told you what happened to that one who stayed in North Face too long.”

“Yes,” she said softly, looking away. She didn’t care about that child but knowing how they’d died was still traumatic.

“There’s someone Azazel can’t touch, though,” Aten said.

“Who?” she asked and touched his eye ridge.

“I… made friends with the Progenitor, you know-

“You did?” her eyes were wide. He’d never told her that!

“Yes. I— it’s complicated.”

“Did you tell her everything?”

“I did. She’s so easy to talk to I just did it.”

“You trust her?”

“Of course! She’s the Progenitor. She also doesn’t like Savathün or Azazel and is the only reason Savathün didn’t burn the skin off my flesh. She likes it even less knowing what’s going on there, what’s in her territory.”

“Savathün always said the Progenitor was weak.”

She… has her issues, but I assure you; she isn’t weak.” Astra said nothing and turned to put her back against Aten’s neck, watching her children. They explored the room and she whistled to them sweetly. They looked and bounded over to her. Aten lifted his forearm so they could climb into the circle with her.

“She’d protect my babies?” Astra asked, stroking the hatchlings’ heads.

“If you asked, yes, probably.”

Astra frowned. “I will.”

She held them to her, filling her nose with their new baby smell and her fingers with their soft fur. “You have names for them?”

“I hadn’t had a chance to name them properly. I was too excited when they hatched and I was thinking of them and then… Azazel came,” she squeezed her little boy who squeaked after a moment.

“Well you have time now. What will you name them?”

Astra stroked the girl’s crest, tickling behind her horns. “Her name is Ilia.”

“That’s pretty,” Aten said approvingly.

“And Ado,” she rubbed her thumb against his newly healed gem with a soft smile.

Aten huffed. “Just cannot escape the A names, hmmm?” he teased her.

“It’s a nice name,” she protested.

“It is,” he agreed with a snicker. “Ilia and Ado… I like it,” he butted his nose against Ado’s head gently. “The… other one? Did you have a name for him?”

“No… but I do now.”

“What is it?” he asked.

“Usha,” she said.

Aten frowned. “After our father?”

“Yes.”

“Astra— why?” he grimaced.

“Because the irony is sweet,” she said bitterly. Their parents had been proponents of the light, brilliant paladins of the sun. And they had sent them away and they’d ended up far from the sun and only escaped under pain of death.

Aten frowned. “I guess,” he said softly.

“He’s dead anyway, just like our father is to us.”

“Astra—

She gave him a hard look, “What?”

His bright Wind eye searched hers and after a moment he just nodded slowly. “Okay,” he put his head down again. “You have Ado and Ilia now so I guess that’s what matters. I just wish you… weren’t so volatile with your emotions sometimes.”

“Aten, please,” she closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

“I worry about you. You could just leave-

“And lose all those books?” she demanded. “There are books in Savathün’s library I will find no where else and those books are giving me such… power.” Aten frowned but said nothing. “Power enough that no one will ever think to do this to me again. So no lowly worm would think he can bend me to his will. I cannot lose that now.”

“And Sobek? He said he was done.”

“I will feed it to Azazel slowly until he can’t fight back. Then— then you can rip his throat out,” she smiled at him and he growled approvingly.