Youth

#71 - From Above

    "You're safe now, my Queen," Ednae said softly when the horn had been blown. 

    "Hang on, what—?"

    Before her question could be answered, the wind suddenly picked up, though in waves.  A huge gust at three second intervals, almost like a massive paper fan in the sky was beating down upon them.  The thought was silly until she heard the wingbeats from above.  [Y/n] turned her head to the sky, eyes wide as she watched a giant figure block her view, darkening the clearing in an instant. Massive reptile-like feet clung to a large rock at the side of the clearing as the colossal creature steadied itself.

    A dragon - not one of those strange, velociraptor-horse hybrid-like lesser dragons - an actual dragon as portrayed in fairytales. The only thing that differed from the dragons in her culture and the dragon that stood before her now were the feathers that appeared here and there, like on the ridge of its back, the back of its wings and around the side of its face. His body was a deep grey colour, though the light caught on his scales and occasionally green and purple hues reflected back.

    [Y/n] turned to look at Ednae, who bowed yet again. The dragon seemed to let out a gruff sigh before shifting into a form much, much smaller and more reassuring than that of a dragon. Now, in the great beast's place, a modest looking man with long grey hair stood. He wore old-fashioned clothes that were certainly more on the formal side and had piercing pink eyes, but the most noticeable attributes the male adorned would easily be the grey horns that sat atop his head, and the dragon's tail that slowly flicked from side to side, almost in a cat-like manner, as though symbolising that he was mildly agitated. He watched [Y/n] with relative suspicion, before turning to Ednae once more.

    "Ednae, what on earth is it this time?" His voice was low, as expected of someone who's other body rivalled the size of a blue whale.

Ednae turned to look at the perplexed girl beside her, before returning her gaze to the dragon-man.  "Feron, its her."

The man, who's name appeared to be 'Feron', blinked in shock.  The girl didn't seem anything impressive - yes, she matched said girl's description, but hadn't she been wearing combat clothes?  The girl described to him was confident and strong, whereas this girl looked as though her world was falling to pieces around her.  Though of course clothes could be changed and days had passed since the report on her appearance, however Feron simply couldn't believe that this... leaf of a girl... was their next queen.

"Her?  Ednae, we're leaving," Feron groaned, an exasperated huff escaping him.  Raising his hopes for no reason... 'centaurs' he thought to himself.  To his surprise, however, Ednae's eyes widened and she shook her head instantly.

"No, sir, you're mistaken!"  She quickly turned to look at [Y/n] again.  "Please, tell him your name.  Tell him how you got here."  [Y/n] furrowed her brow before meeting the judging gaze of the grey haired man before her.

"Um... my name is [Y/n]..." she said quietly.  At this, he seemed intrigued.  "I was brought to some underground kingdom a few months ago, a-and... umm..." [Y/n] struggled to find any simple way of 'summarising' everything that had happened.  Feron placed his index finger against his lip in a thoughtful manner turning his eyes down to the ground.  He couldn't be sure, but perhaps it would be in his interests to play along for a moment.

"So you escaped their regime?  We'd assumed as much, though I was curious as to how you'd ended up with the king..." he tailed off.  Noting the confused look on [Y/n]'s face, Feron let out a light laugh - almost as a form of reassurance.  He watched her try to conjure up a sentence with mild intrigue.  Thinking about it logically, if she was messing with him then she'd try to answer every question and likely get flustered, though the way she just stood and failed to speak suggested she'd gone through some serious trauma.  His eyes rested on a burn scar on her arm, and drifted down to tears and scars on her fingers.