>>5327266The other unavoidable matter which must be addressed is a more personal one: that of Glowie, and her—YOUR—brood.
With the greatworm female recovered, she can once more wear her own amulet, appearing as a darker, faintly purplish variation on the Novice as she usually does—as she did when the fateful deed was done. To your relief—you think—her own <appetite> seems sated by the one instance of coitus… Though as the two of you walk to halls of the kobolds’ mountain lair in search of privacy, she takes every opportunity to hold fast to your arm, or to coil her tail around you. You are careful to command her to maintain distance when others are watching… But otherwise, you permit it, for it seems to bring her comfort.
“You have done so much,” Glowie notes softly, leaning against you as you find an occupied chamber.
She breathes of you, sighs happily, and looks up at you with her green eyes—the only commonality between this form and her natural one which is plainly visible, though in THIS guise she has only the two rather than four.
“Well… You have been an invaluable ally as well,” you acknowledge. “I may well have been slain by the berserk human in the horned helm, had you not paralyzed him.”
Glowie just hums happily in acknowledgement of your praise, pressing herself to you—not lewdly, though you cannot help but stir somewhat, but in chaste appreciation of your closeness.
“I have to ask,” you say eventually, gently pushing her back to regain some emotional distance, “why are you so… Physical?”
It is quiet foreign to your Reptilian upbringing, after all. While you have learned that many mammals are quiet ‘social’ in this way, that bugs should be such as well is a surprise.
“At home, we are all… Connected. By the vibrations—by Mother’s mind, by Grandmother’s gifts.”
“A hivemind?” you ask, surprised and a little concerned. What does this mean for your sons? It hardly seems becoming of a dragon.
Glowie shakes her head. “No, each thinks alone, but the vibration makes us all… Aware of each other. We sing, we sway, we understand. Your race is so… Closed. Each lizard is… Island. Guarded. Closed. And so…”
She reaches out, and takes your hand, and hums happily, swaying slightly.
“My Dragonborn’s heartbeat and breathing, his pulse, his voice rumbling through the air… It is your song. When you speak to your lesser, it is your mind-voice, your soul-vibration. It is… Connection.”
It’s… odd, foreign, but you think you conceptually grasp it. But it was idle curiosity, a delay. It isn’t why you brought her here, and you both know it.
