After finding and confronting the wrong dragon, Russo is faced with the difficult choice of pleading for her help. Truly, this will be the most difficult challenge he has ever faced. How can he hope to conquer such difficult and abstract concepts such as; Humility, Courtesy, and MANNERS?!

Holy crap I felt rusty writing this. I apologize for the significant delay between this chapter and the last and can only hope my quality hasn't gone downhill in the interim! As always, thanks for those of you who read.



Icon is © to  Radku

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Chapter 40

“Gyyorkith. You’re looking for Gyorrkith.” This one was different. Much to her surprise, the human had yet to display any hostility. A significant amount of emphasis placed on the ‘yet’ part.

Russo’s hood and now short hair blew back from the snort of hot air directed at him. He hadn’t been reduced to a pile of flesh and marrow clinging to molten cinder, so hey, that was a start.

Pulling back her broad scaled snout, the mica dragon looked over the mage once more in distrust. His cooperation was an anomaly. “And Gyyorrkith actually spoke to you?”

Good Lord, what consonants hadn’t been mashed together to make that. “He’s not really much of a talker. All we did was swap a couple insults.” Pulling back up up his hood, the human grunted when a clawed scaly finger poked it back down. Tempting as it was to be surly and uncooperative, the reptile seemed just as wary of him as he was of her. That was… unexpected. Maybe just this once he wouldn’t press his luck.

“Even so…” The dragoness’ neck stretched as her head circled round the mage, her pearl eyes drinking in everything they could. Crimson cloak. Black gloves and boots. Crumpled tunic and vesting. He didn’t look to be anything special. For Gyyorkith to acknowledge a mortal implied otherwise though. “You said your name was Russo?”

With a nod, the human pulled back up his hood. “I take it you’re not the one who’s been doing fly-bys then?”

“I thought we got this out of the way when we clarified you could distinguish between primary colors,” she grumbled. “Besides, I don’t even breathe fire.” Turning her head away from the mage, ribbons of magic coalesced around her lips. Stretching open her gaping maw, mist crackling with energy poured forth. Those same ribbons of magic dancing upon her scaly lips were drawn into her mouth, knotting and clumping together to form a dull grey orb. Clamping down on it with jagged teeth, steam bursting and popping with energy wafted up from her nostrils. Ripping open her mouth, a soft beam of light surged forth, disappearing into the forest and leaving a trail of stumps in its wake. “You’re not the first to accuse me of doing so, either,” she said in a weary and frustrated tone.

Just what the hell have they been telling the other slobs they’re tricked into coming to help them? Shit, pointing people towards a mountain and telling them to kill whatever dragon they found there sounded right up their alley. His gaze lingered on the flakes of bark peeling off a stump glowing white hot with radiant heat and magic. “You’ve made that plenty clear.”

Turning tail, the mica dragoness trudged back towards her cave.

“Hey hey hey hey wait! So where do I find Gyro… Gieger… Greg?”

“Gyyorkith?”

“Close enough. Know where I can find him?” Hesitant to chase after her, Russo remained locked in place, calling out to her with hands cupped around his mouth.

“Other side of the mountain,” she replied without even bothering to look back.

“Ummm, thanks?” Tilting his head back, Russo’s lips curled down. Staring up at the crags of rock piercing into the darkening sky, he let out a sigh and slumped his shoulders. Christ, it could take a whole nother day just to circle round this thing.

Without a word, the mica dragon slunk back inside her cave. Russo bundled his cloak tight around his frame in response to a gust of wind kicking up. Tree limbs overhead creaked noisily while his clothing flapped. Blackening silhouettes of clouds thick with moisture loomed overhead, patches of the pale sky peeking through here and there. Shivering in the cold, the mage’s mind sifted through the options available to him.

1. Fumble around in the dark and return to Jem
2. Circumgate this monstrous mountain while it’s pitch black and fr-

A mixture of hail and snow started pelting down on him.

2 (Again). Circumgate this monstrous mountain in the dead of night in white out conditions to pick a fight that I can neither win nor lose.
3. Throw out any semblance of rationality and press my luck with you know who.

A flick of his hand brushed off the layer of ice accumulating on his shoulder. Dammit. In a flash of blue light, Russo found himself at the mouth of the dragoness’ cave. “Why do I even bother?” Concentrating magic at his fingertips, a soft glow surrounded his hand. Holding it out in front of him, his impromptu lamp illuminated a path littered with shattered stalagmites. Thoughts of the rough collie bubbled to mind. Treading carefully, he slipped his feet in between gaps in the stones strewn all over. Pebbles and slabs of rock kicked aside in the process clinked and reverberated loudly throughout the cavern.

“What are you still doing here?” The mica dragon’s dismissive voice echoed loudly around him.

“I need to chat some more with you.” A gale of snow and ice blew into the cave and pelted at his back. “That and not freeze to death.”

“Then talk.”

Keeping his eyes towards the ground, Russo continued to tip toe along. “A friend… no. Okay, it’s a long, stupid, and fairly convoluted story. I need your help.”

His request was met with deafening silence.

“Alright, look. My best friend volunteered for some bullshit mission. Something seemed off about it so I tagged along to keep an eye on him. We show up to fight one thing, turns out it’s another. I tussle with Greg-”

“Gyyorkith.”

“Whatever. I slug it out with however the hell you pronounce his name and we reach a standoff. He can’t kill me but I can’t kill him. Greg bails and I’m left to pick up the pieces with my friend. I opt to ditch the people who led us there on false pretenses but my buddy wants to stick around and do the right thing.” A broken off stalagmite rolled under his feet, throwing off Russo’s balance. Stumbling forward, the mage barely regained his balance. “Whatever that may be.” The mage kicked at the offending and rubble and sent it clinking loudly into the darkness. “I mosey over to your place, find out you’re not who I’m looking for and am left with the knowledge of where to find someone I can’t possibly take down on my own.” Stepping forward, Russo could make out the sheen of the mica dragon’s shimmering grey scales. “My friend is too stubborn to abandon them. And… and I’m too stubborn to abandon him.”

Half-open, the dragoness’ shining eyes drifted towards him.

“I guess this is turning into a really roundabout and awkward way to request for help, is what I’m trying to get at.”

The dragoness blinked slowly.

“Humility is not my strongest suit,” Russo wryly noted. There had to be some other approach she would be more receptive to. And one he was less bad at. Rubbing his hands together, the human resumed speaking. “Wellllllllll…” His tongue remained pressed against the roof of his mouth, dragging out his l’s until his thoughts were somewhat organized. “Lllllllllook at it this way. If you help me take down Georgia, you’ll quit getting harassed!”
Scales scraped against the craggy floor as the dragoness shifted in place.

“You mentioned earlier you kept getting pegged for crap you didn’t do, right? Chances are all those people who have been knocking down your…” Shaking his head, Russo gnashed his teeth. Screw it, he’d just talk through his mistakes. “Okay, so people have been barging in here unannounced and that’s gotta be infuriating.”

“Much like how you just did?”

“Yes. Wait. No.” Goddammit.

“You’re not very good at this, are you?” Crossing one scaled arm over another, the edges of her lips curled up into a subtle smirk.

“ANYWAY, all those people lining up to exact justice on you are too stupid to realize that there’s more than one dragon that calls this mountain home.”

“Like how you were?” she said dryly. Wry laughter echoed around the mage as his arms draped to his sides. “You just keep walking into these.”

“Stop that.” Russo swatted at the air, waiting for her chuckling to subside. “Those stream of do-gooders are bound to trickle off to a halt if said crimes quit being committed.”

“What are you implying?” She lifted her head off the ground and eased that long neck of hers towards him.

“Essentially, help me help yourself. We take down that unpronounceable jackass, people and places quit being set on fire, and you quit getting bothered! Seems like a win-win to me.”

A broad snout breached into the pale light. Eyes that glistened like pearls hovered behind it. “I’ll pass. It’s less trouble to let things stay as is.”

“You can’t be serious.” Jerking her head forward, the dragoness nudged forcefully at his chest. The blunt force pounded against his ribs painfully, sending Russo stumbling back and smarting.

“Even with Gyorrkith raising hell, it’s significantly easier dealing with what should be his problems than him directly.” She gulped down a pocket of air. Coughing softly, a fine mist roiling with magic floated up, a soft smoky white pallor illuminating the cavernous room. Dissipating upon contact with the stalactites draping down from the ceiling, arcs of magic danced between the rock formations. “Not like it takes much effort to do away with those nuisances anyway.” A wave of the hand and turn of her head drew Russo’s attention towards a large pile of bodies tucked away behind a prison of stalagmites, their armor, blades, and shields casting long shadows in the bursts of magical light.

“HAHAHA WOW. THAT IS… THAT IS NOT SOMETHING I HAVE BEEN DESENTIZIED TO YET.” A mental picture of Dark shrugging suddenly came to mind. “Keh, so impatient. Give me some time and I’d be delighted to fix that for you.” That was far more accurate an imagining than it needed to be.

“Calm yourself. I destroyed their egos, not their bodies.” Puffing out her cheeks, she belched out another batch of stale air. Oversaturated with energy, its glow illuminated the discarded and shimmering batches of equipment.

The swarm of thoughts buzzing at him to bail subsided.

“Only the more persistent ones end up as such.” Pulling her neck back, she rested her chin on her hands. “Much less messy this way. That and it doesn’t stink up the place.” Little more than a swipe of the tail or flick of a finger was required to disarm them. Her eyes traced the trajectory of the last overzealous fool she sent smashing into the craggy walls of her home. Now how had that last one played out?

“…Am I being persistent?”

Ah that’s right. She plucked the knight errant up in one hand, dangling him by a leg. A clawed finger dragged around his waist, scraping loudly against the metal plating. Sliding right out of his greaves, he slammed into the floor. The dragoness glanced back over at her pile of trophies, those same greaves sitting proudly atop the pile. It didn’t take much convincing after that to get him to screw off.

“Hello?” Those swarm of thoughts telling him to haul ass buzzed back up again as the scaly female took her sweet time mulling over whether or not it was worth stripping him bare.

“You’re getting to that point.” Tilting her head to the side, the dragoness measured up the human once more. Not a single trace of metal on him, clearly a traditional practicioner of the magical arts through and through. Hmmph. Nothing worth taking. Nothing shiny.

The human exhaled through clenched teeth while his eyes bounced against the side of his sockets. “Oooooooooookay.” Clapping his hands against his legs, Russo forced the the growing frustration out of his tone however he could. “Is there ANY kind of help you can provide?”

Her lips subtly creased upward.

“I…” Russo dragged a gloved hand down across his face, pinching his nose between a thumb and forefinger. “Alright, what am I about to walk into this time?”

Scaled around her mouth parted just enough to reveal traces of her imposing teeth.

Fuck it. “Can you help me?”

“Certainly.” Her tail flicked back and forth behind her.

“Will you help meohhhhhh my god why am I even going through with this.” Burying his head between his hands, Russo couldn’t help but groan.

“You’re never going to get your answer unless you ask.” Sniggering, it had to have been decades since she had this much fun poking at a mortal.

Fingers dragged down along his cheeks, pulling his skin taught. Squinting his eyes, Russo glared at the dragoness between half-shut eyelids. “Will you help me?”

“No.” Rising to her feet, the dragoness strided towards the immeasurably frustrated human. Projecting a palpable sense of smugness, she circled around him. “Why are you still even here?” He stared down at his feet, a scowl plastered on his face. Anytime now he’d leave with his tail between his legs, scrambling to salvage what little of his pride remained. “I’ve made my intentions more than clear.” His shoulders slumped. A sense of curiosity stained the air around them, much to the dragoness’ chagrin. “Knowing that… still you remain.” Stubborn, no doubt. Desperate, surely. “Why?”

“Because this is the only choice I have.” Russo shook his head side to side. No, that wasn’t true. “*Sigh* This is the only choice I have that doesn’t make me feel like an asshole.”

“Those other options boiling down to abandoning your friend or returning empty handed?” She came to a halt and cocked her head to the side.

The human crossed his arms about his chest and grunted, irritated at having been spoken for. “More or less.”

Loyalty. So that’s what drew him towards and keeps him here. “What's your name again, mage?”

“Russo.” He pulled at the thick cotton sleeves feeding down into gloves. “You?”

Jaws open wide, her forked tongue pressed against the side of a cheek before lalling out of her mouth. She blinked once and stared down at Russo before reeling her appendage back into her mouth. “I can already tell you’re going to bastardize the pronunciation.” Snorts of hot air wafted from her nostrils while she mulled over giving him a moniker she could tolerate hearing. “Kaya.”

“Hmm?”

“My name, an abbreviation of it anyway. I don’t trust you with anything longer than two syllables.”

Russo’s brows flattened. Wait. Hold on. “Don’t open your mouth, Russo, you’re already zero for three.”

“Moving on, Russo,” the mica dragon continued to entertain her curiosity, “I can’t help but notice that our conversation has been, how do I say this, surprisingly civil.”

“Well I’m not exactly eager to piss off the only person that might be able to help me,” he retorted.

Person. It was difficult determining whether or not such syntax was indicative of subtle tact or an utter lack of it. Not like he had been exhibiting a penchant for thinking before speaking thus far. “Awestruck, intimidated, terrified,” Kaya counted off the myriad ways mortals usually acted in her presence, “…infuriated, those are the reactions I am accustomed to. Total indifference? That is… unexpected. ”

The response she received was a shrug. Russo had shot the shit with let’s see: giants, demons, sentient artifacts, and gods. At this point chatting up a dragon felt more like ticking off some inane footnote in a journal than some life defining accomplishment.

Admittedly, Kaya acknowledged, this was a wonderfully refreshing change of pace. Now how could she drag things out… The mage was unlikely to leave of his own volition, lest she turned outright hostile. Flakes of snow and ice hurtled into the cave. They melted upon contact with her scales, Kaya’s mica scales shimmering in the fading light. Having someone who spoke with her and not at her was, well, nice. “Care if I inquire why you’re so determined to slay Gyorrkith?”

“At this point it’s about the only way I’ll get my best friend to leave this place.” It really wouldn’t be all that hard to just blink the both of them back home though… “Willingly, anyway.” Unconsciously, Russo’s jaw clenched as he recalled the multiple attempts made on their lives.

“You have to admit those come across as fairly trivial reasons to take a life.”

“Gyyor… Gargel… screw it, I’m done trying.”

Kaya smiled down at him smugly. Holding up a scaled hand, she wiggled two digits at him. “Now how many syllables did I say I could trust you with again?”

“Don’t start.” Zero and four now. “Greg did try to set the both of us on fire multiple times so there’s that. Oh, and I guess taking up a scorched earth policy against that no name village out there warrants… something.”

“At least you’re honest about it,” she snorted.

Russo arched a brow and pointed a finger at her, spurred on by her dismissiveness. “You don’t seem all that concerned or offended or anything that I’m even trying to off a dragon in the first place.”

“Should I be? Your goal is a laughable one.” Kaya motioned back towards the pile of armors nestled in the corner, her trophies forming a mound of metal that could easily swallow the human whole. “And in the off chance you succeed, I’m certainly not going to complain about Gyyorkith’s absence.”

Now that was something he could work with. “The two of you don’t get along very well?”

“Tch. Dragons such as myself and dragons such as Gyyorkith don’t get along in general,” Kaya murmured in disgust. “Ruby, Opal, Emerald, Topaz, Obsidian, Diamond; Dragons bestowed with any sort of elemental affinity act as if they’ve been touched by the gods themselves.” She brushed a hand against the rocky floor, her talons ripping up small boulders.

Shoot. “Never realized there were formal names for all the differenct colored ones,” Russo noted. While Kaya fumed, he took a crack at mentally categorizing them. “Rubies were probably the fire-breathing ones like Greg, being red and all. Yellow dragons tended to be able to roil up lightning like it was nothing, so Topaz for them. Opals are blue so water or ice or something I guess? What kind of magic would go with green?”

“Mica, Onyx, Amethyst, those dragons are just as magically capable as the rest. Nowhere near as flashy, perhaps, but we don’t need to be!”

“What is with you all and naming yourself after rocks?”

“We have a penchant for stockpile-”

“Hoarding?”

“No, dragons merely have a penchant for stockpiling luminous objects, alright?” Kaya shuffled along the floor, conveniently positioning herself between the human and the entrance to her home. Almost as if she was purposefully blocking his view of the mineral encrusted walls that led into the chamber.

Russo couldn’t help but roll his eyes.

Smacking her tail against the ground, its loud whap commanded attention. “Gyyorkith, and plenty of others like him, are completely full of themselves. Lesser dragons, if you believe such a distinction to be an accurate one,” she rattled off mockingly, “tend to be less so. I prefer dealing with you mortals in a reactive fashion, whereas Gyyorkith would take a more proactive approach. If someone trespasses upon my domicile, I’ll deal with them and them alone accordingly.” Kaya flapped her wings gently, Russo’s cloak flapping in the gust she kicked up. “If Gyyorkith believes mortals have even a potential to prove to be a nuisance, he’ll gladly go out and quash the possibility entirely.” She smiled down wryly at the mage. “Tch, his efforts are what are encouraging them in the first place which only serves to further reinforce his mindset. Fool.”

“So why not just tell him to cut that shit out?” Please be an easy fix, please be an easy fix, please be an easy fix.

“Since I’m not of the same caliber,” Kaya’s slitted eyes narrowed, “he feels I’m not worth acknowledging.”

Godddddddddddddd dammit. “So there’s nothing you can help,” he exhaled in exasperation, “-will help me with?”

“Helping you would imply I am doing so out of the goodness of my heart. And why would I want to?” Kaya dipped her head so her eyes level with his own, chin brushing against the ground.

Russo froze. They could hardly be called friends. Hell, acquaintances would be a stretch.

“I’ll admit, you’re the least annoying mortal I’ve run across in ages. Tolerable, even.” Kaya reared her head back, returning to Russo some sorely missed personal space. “But that doesn’t entitle you to anything from me, least of which my generosity and goodwill.” The dragoness’ expression softened as the mage broke eye contact. “Returning a favor though, now that’s something you’ll find I would readily agree to.”

Really? Russo tossed up another shrug at her only to get a smirk in return. “You couldn’t have mentioned that from the get go?”

“Not my fault you don’t know the right kinds of questions to ask.” Kaya remained silent for the next couple minutes, watching on amusedly as Russo struggled to compose a retort. Abrupt pauses, copious amounts of stuttering, and a palpable sense of defeat reverberated throughout the cave’s chamber. “Care to hear what I have in mind?”

“Fine.”

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“Why the hell can’t you just blast your way through!?”

“And risk bringing this place down on my head? I think not.”

“This is stupid.” Rubbing his palms together, the gathering magic turned fluid and malleable from the friction wearing down on it. Brushing his hands over his knees, a layer of soft blue energy clung to his form, hardening into a basic barrier. With a clap of his hands, the mage felt his fingers go stiff as the same spell covered his gloves. He slid down into the remnant of a subterranean creek bed, surrounded on both sides by stalgmites. A faint trickle of water splashed against and ran down along the sides of his boots. Turning his head, Russo could see where the shadow of the ancient stream emptied out from. A tunnel, no taller than his waist and its walls worn smooth by the once steady flow of water. Dropping to his hands and knees he crawled into it, the barriers providing light and some basic protection against scrapes and bruises. “What if the place has already been cleaned out, Kaya?” Squeezing his shoulders against the walls, Russo sighed and dropped down to his stomach.

“Not likely. During my stint as guardian not a soul got past me,” she stated with a hint of pride in her voice.

“Wait. What?” Russo blinked a couple times. “You’re wanting me to loot the temple you’ve been guarding?”

“Was guarding. My tenure expired two decades ago and I was never asked to renew it.”

“There’s a process in place for stuff like that?”

“For the more heavily frequented temples and dungeons, definitely.”

“And what about the forgotten ones, like what I’m dragging myself into now?” Russo extended a hand out the exit of the tunnel and curled his fingers around the edge of its mouth.

Kaya plodded down into the creek bed, her thick tail knocking aside countless stalagmites. “Given that I’m trying to claim what I once guarded as my own, I think you can figure that out for yourself.” She dropped her head low to the ground and shoved her snout up against the tunnel’s entrance. Grunting, the mica dragoness turned her head to the side to try and get a better view. There were some fine spoils in there to be claimed. Shiny things to be added to her already impressive pile.

“Still, who the hell even builds a temple hidden inside a freaking mountain?” Pulling himself through to the other side, Russo rose to his feet and wrung out his shirt the best he could. “I mean, sure, it’s impressive when you think about how they did it.” He looked around at his immediate surroundings. Darkness, darkness, and more darkness. Snapping his fingers, an orb of light manifested in his palm. “Just makes you wonder what special kind of crazy explains the why behind it,” he morbidly thought as he took in his newly illuminated, and cavernous, surroundings.

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