>>5367890>>5367849>>5367621>>5367581>>5367443>>5367421>>5367395>>5368183You order your forces to stay close to base, resting and drilling in turns to prepare to support the Herbalist’s plan of action. Either she will live up to her end of this bargain, band they will need to be ready to coral and contain the sopor-stupefied (but still dangerous) dwarves, OR she will fail or betray you… And your forces will need twice the vigors and three times the vigilance.
For your part, you spend YOUR rest in the Novice Fleshweaver’s chambers.
“Oh?” she scoffs as you enter. “I thought you would be busying yourself with your new ‘personal physician’, Degenerateborn.”
“You mean the Herbalist?” you ask.
“I mean your sex-slave, yes.”
You are startled by her blunt analysis. Have you been so obvious?
“Did you really think you were subtle, you perpetually-aroused oaf?” she laughs. “You are lucky that sex is not so front-of-mind for PROPER Reptilians, oh Grandson of Gorillas. But never forget: -I- know what you are. What you REALLY are.”
It has the air of a threat… And the vague hint of jealousy. The Novice’s tail threshes the air, but she shrugs and turns away, returning to her work.
You can see that, apart from having removed, spread out, and pined down the wings of one deceased dragon-hatchling, she has also begun a rough-but-skilled sketch of the working mechanics of their flight.
“Have you made any progress on granting my <Dragonshape? Wings?” you ask, unable to hide the excitement from yoru voice.
“The flight of dragons is a complicated matter,” she replies. “it is as much metaphysics as physics. But… We are making progress, I suppose.”
“We?”
She gestures to the chained—now too large to cage—Junior Novice, a steeltalon-sized creature of mangy fur, bare and scabrous skin, and ever-increasing array of mismatched dragon addendum. His grafted wings ARE blending better into the terrain of the skin around them, stitching disappearing into the scarification that symbolizes their unnatural origins. They are filling out—appearing almost functional! As with an ACTUAL dragon, though, they ARE too small to logically support their host’s weight… But that never stopped dragons! The secret MUST be magic.
“Progress has been slowed,” the Novice points out, “by your constant demands upon my attention for LESSER projects.”
