>>5715122The two of you arrive at your destination—the top of a high-lightly-forested hill which you have spied from your guest bedroom’s window.
‘Why are we here?’ Natvodosk asks you.
“That is one of life’s great mysteries,” you rely.
‘Father,’ he signs back, seemingly annoyed, ‘that is not what I meant.’
You laugh, the augh deepening as you shed the false face of Long Wang and assumed <Dragonshape IV>, complete with your majestic wings.
“Today,” you say, “you will learn something new. Flight, Young One!”
Natvodosk shakes his strange, membranous wings a few times, as if stretching, and then spreads them wide. Theya re still rather small to carry his weight.
‘I cannot fly,’ he signs.
“Maybe not,” you acknowledge, “but your wings are still growing. When I was your age—even now, in my true form—I HAVE no wings. I gained mine through the Serpent Queen’s magic, and this…”
You hold up your Amulet of the Dragon.
“…Which contains the blood of the Red Dragon King. This is the same blood which she infused you and your brothers with. When you are older, by biology or by magic, you may have wings as well. When that day comes, it will hep if you know the proper technique to make the most of them.”
‘Okay,’ he signs, and you sense he’s unconvinced.
“Come,” you instruct him, spreading your wings wide and looking down over the hill. “Do as I do!”
The remainder of the afternoon is spent in blissful respite from your greater responsibilities. Together, father and son, you run down the hill and jog back up the hill—again and again—flapping your wings, spreading them out, and occasionally taking flight or gliding. At first Natvodosk merely runs and hops after you, but soon the Unknowable One is screeching with predatory glee as he glides short distances, from hilltop to valley below, and hurried running back the other way. It is good to see the ‘bookworm’ (to borrow the Blackpine Baron’s curiously-appropriate human aphorism) engaged in some healthy physical activity that isn’t directly related to killing and eating someone.
Alas, it can’t last forever.
“I’m going to be going away for a while,” you tell him. “Somewhere you can’t follow, unfortunately.”
The Unknowable Oen regards you curiously, not complaining or even questioning why he cannot come. Instead he asks:
‘I am going back to Bloodrise?’
“Yes.”
‘With my teacher?’ he adds, hopefully.
You laugh, and nod, then tell him: “I wan you to know that it is not any fault of yours that you are not coming with me. You are simply too fearsome for humans at this point in time. Eventually, they will learn to understand and accept you.”
‘Or I will be so big they cannot stop me,’ he suggests.
“This is also possible,” you agree.
