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Deep, deep in the Down-Below of a tropical forest, a sleek ruby dragon stalks the footprints of a giant avian. The footprints stop at the mossy, mushroomed roots of an ancient tree. The dragon, Vharr, studies the end of the tracks, puzzled. He lifts his innately shadowed head and scans the blanket of lush canopy overhead. Vibrant magentas and citruses of barbed vegetation pepper the heights. But what captures his gaze, teetering down, twirling as artfully as a lotus flower, is a grand feather of ebon.

The feather lands on his nose, kissing it with body warmth. Freshly shed. The ruby dragon closes his eyes and makes a cordial purr. Wiggling his nose free of the feather, he climbs the tree with his dark, dexterous forepaws.

He gathers nimbly onto a megalithic branch, settling atop it with a flourish of his ruby wings, their membranes larger than him, the color of sunwashed flesh. Ahead of him there lies an empty expanse, and beyond that lies, on a large tree limb, a nest of twig for a beast larger than Vharr. In that nest rests the beast herself, a beautiful raven-gryph.

Her awesome, black coat of feathers contests the shadows. Yet, it reflects still the environment’s neon colors in quiet spatters as fluid as Mood.

Sometime into marvelling at her, Vharr jumps to a crackling of wood against his wings. He’s startled himself. The ripple of sound from the lumbering branch caused by his astonishment alerts the gryph of his presence; her head bursts up from the perch of her breast. Bright magenta eyes fill with the ruby’s form, shrink. A clap of frantic flapping goes off. With her wings crashing toward the next tier of forest canopy, the gryph pumps herself up, up —

And Vharr pedals over empty space with his forepaws, having almost fallen in pursuit of her; he calls out to her with a soft roar, his wings holding him aloft. He toddles backward, planting his forepaws to compose himself, then bows his head in thought.

A telepathic message pulses out to the raven-gryph. It has a soothing timbre, like a flute played to the tinkle of a stream. The raven-gryph’s pointed ears perk. For a couple of heartbeats, her wings cease to beat. She free-falls, her plumaged breast swelling with wonder. Then, flight resumes; she circles a grand elder tree, perching on a branch positioned thirty yards ahead of the ruby dragon.

They stare. The calls of cicadas and reptiles fill the air, but neither of them hear. The ruby dragon hears the heart-song of the gryph, a strange ambient warble. It tells him: she’s only communicated with kin of her own kind before.

Vharr, weaving his thoughts carefully, sends out a mental impression of his snout pressing against her beak, nuzzling her cheek.

A pulse of fear surges through the raven-gryph. She recoils. Then, the feathers hawking her head slowly recline. The ruby’s friendly, velvety telepathy calms her. This he does as he recollects with her flashes of flames, flickers of large claws tearing into his — her — feathery breast. Thinking of it makes her belly sick. Trauma resurges.

Rumbling in his throat, Vharr sends her a medicinal telepathic touch. He is not like that one. He won’t ever be like that dragon.

She’s uneasy.

A phantom of herself tiptoes into Vharr’s mind, testing the waters . . .

His avatar appears by her side, greeting her with a nosing and a warm, nasally ululation.

The raven-gryph wakes from a state like daydream. There’s trilling in her throat. She gazes into the ruby’s eyes then snaps her beak at the air, signifying her approval. Wings fwoosh, becoming her crown, and then her cloak: she nosedives eagerly to the forest floor.

The ruby hisses nicely. He swoops down after her. They meet again in a colorful circlet of exotic plants. They circle one another, studying one another, echoing one another with tame, rasping, slowing breaths.

They pause, closer now. The moment is atemporal. Muzzle and beak open and close/open and close, the vents of their lips only as thin as film when opened. Both hearts pound powerfully, soberly. Both beasts gravitate toward each other. They drink in each other’s eyes. Through this exchange comes clarity. Familiarity. Change.

They nose each other’s cheek with slow glides. There’s a sagely grace to this. Through their mind-picture dialogue, they uncover relics of each other.

Fractals of the raven-gryph’s past dance over Vharr’s mind. Her, overpowering many a jungle creature. Her, receiving much praise as a warrior amongst her kind. Her name is Shi'yawk.

Through this exchange of pasts, Shi'yawk relaxes. She has found in the ruby dragon a fondness for displays of raw, physical power by large beasts. Among a few, this includes avians.

All this information, they absorb in a single stroke. A single stride. Something is different in the air. Slowly, they round on one another, their eyes twinkling with clearness and intellect.

Shi'yawk smirks. Vharr watches as Shi'yawk turns. She then backs toward him, lifting her tail to reveal her fleshy tail-vent and female anatomy. The ruby dragon blushes to the intimate display. Every one of her steps adds to the thrill of the heart beating in his chest. What is the raven-gryph up to? Then, Vharr notices how her stride accentuates the ripple of her thick, muscled haunches. He gets a glimpse of the avian’s beastly hindpaws . . .

. . . when her tail swooshes over his head. Vharr’s eyes follow the tail with curiosity. Suddenly, it curls around his scaly neck, ushering him to lay himself down. Knowing the gesture to be of good nature and not of hierarchical statement, he does so. Calming down, he feels the cords of his muscles unwind. He stretches his forelegs straight in front of himself. Even the dimmest of Down-Below light refracts off of his resplendent limbs. He then presses his belly flat against the ground. And after a moment’s hesitation, his slender tail and his wings follow suit, the wings sprawling widely enough to cover the whole diameter of the clearing. The motherly earth eases his bones. Eases his mind. Eases all.

Stepping close to the dragon’s face, the raven-gryph displays her rear feet.

His first sight of the marvelous hindpaws. He drinks in their majesty with his eyes. She has rich black talons, and marble black padding on the bottom of each paw. The paw pads lay testament to the hybrid nature of the raven-gryph. One of the hindpaws [the left one], she carefully lifts up and presses into the ruby dragon’s muzzle, pressing amazing pressure over the top. The fold of her marble paw-padding, the pads of her foot hugging over Vharr’s snout, the footpaw smooshing over the dragon’s nose . . . the feathery, fluffy smell of her sole . . . her pacifying feminine smell . . . basking in all of these sensual pleasures, the ruby dragon makes a silvery crackle in his gullet. Turquoise flames harmless to the raven-gryph’s resistant paws sputter from his nostrils, and the dragon’s head-fans flutter with joy.

Sensing Vharr’s content, the raven-gryph tilts her face back to him with a smile crooking her beak. She pedals deeper into his face with her foot some more, pressing his skull flat against the ground. His head’s pinned down.

Vharr experiences a dichotomy of positive emotion: happiness from being able to connect with this creature of differing language and culture; thrill from the same creature asserting herself into a playfully dominant role. The dragon’s talons dig deeply into the ground, and he makes a near-invisible rumble. Shi'yawk curls her large claws under the ruby dragon’s chin, squeezing his jaws together, releasing them, and repeating this consecutively. Then, Vharr pushes his tongue out of his mouth, drawing the tongue over the nicely musked pads of the gryph’s paws, rubbing his snout into them — they have a natural cooling, lower in temperature than the rest of the gryph’s foot. The cool spot is welcome amid the fluffy raven’s body warmth.

The experience is sensual for Shi'yawk, as well; having the dragon’s muzzle wedged firmly between the ground and her foot, she feels this dragon snuffing out her hate and fear of his species. By taking a position of pseudo power over the dragon, she symbolically conquers this hate and fear, while bringing enjoyment to both herself and Vharr.

The dragon’s barbed snout does not hurt her tough paw, but pleasures it; the fire-snorts of his arousal do not hurt her tough paw, but tickle it. The bad memories she has of dragon-fire are like Vharr’s nose-flames. They flicker away.

She steps away from Vharr momentarily then replaces her hindpaw with the other hindpaw. This one the raven-gryph presses deeply against Vharr’s face, the fresh sole radiating fresh body heat and texture. The dragon gives a grumble to the change, lightly fanning his wings over the clearing, stirring the heads of flowers and mushrooms.

He flourishes in a positive feedback loop between himself and Shi'yawk, not simply from their physical play but from the friendly back-and-forth of telepathy. Green and magenta mental energies weave and wind together in a mesmerizing dance. Lost in the ballad of shared thoughts, Vharr feels the bond between them gripping tighter . . .

. . . though, partly this is due now to an event of the physical. The raven-gryph coils more of her tail around Vharr. It seemingly never ends, wrapping him in its giant, serpentining loops, which clutch and squeeze on the dragon’s belly. The strength of Shi'yawk’s tail proves itself by almost immobilizing the ruby dragon. And once done wrapping his main body, it goes on to twine around his tail, and the feathery, plumed end of Shi'yawk’s tapping against the scaly end of Vharr’s, a friendly gesture.

So now, the gryph has the dragon masked with her large taloned foot, and trapped in the bindings of her longest limb. Vharr has nowhere to go, and Shi'yawk knows this very well; just like their material bodies, their thoughts are now very much laced together. Because of this, Vharr feels no doubt or distrust for the gryph. Though he knows little of her history, her present state of consciousness is as readable as fresh animal tracks.

Vharr watches the large bone running up the raven-gryph’s heel flex in front of his face, along with the surrounding muscles. The act requires him to go a little cross-eyed, and seems to mesmerize him. His eyes grow heavy, heavy with relaxation. Yet, though he grows calmer, a part of his mind remains energetic, active, awake fully to the tantalizing act.

As time wears on, the last light of the sky that had whittled its way down into the Down-Below disappears. Mushroom caps circling the stumps of the trees start to glow, shining over the ruby dragon and the shadowy raven-gryph at a low intensity, which spices the mood without interfering with either of their night visions. The large avian’s muscled legs appear even more magnificent, highlighted by the shine of an array of colors. Especially does the leg in front of Vharr’s face, its strong calf rippling, shivering with every squeeze of the avian’s toes over his feral muzzle.

Vharr loves the attention. He returns to licking against the gryph’s padding, gradually breaking the tempo of the gryph’s flexes by working his way down to her toes and licking over them, indulging in their dark, gamey, birdish taste. His nostrils steam under Shi'yawk’s flexing foot, which elicits more of her natural flavor out of her pores.

Shi'yawk’s beak parts into a broad grin. Her head bobs, and she closes her eyes as the ruby dragon licks over her, indulging in her flavor.

Yet again, her tail curls around his body tighter — to the extent that she may not be able to set him free later, should she wish; her mythic frame locks with his, the mighty dragon’s; and she can feel the dragon’s power, pulse, and heart pounding nearly in sync with her own, the tempo of each only separated by the subtle differences in the patterns of each species’ heart.

The two great jungle predators — the larger avian and the smaller dragon — now feel an almost perfect sensation of oneness. Being able to satisfy the different facets of one another — the gryph’s vengeance [playful, here] upon a dragon, and the dragon’s own fondness for that play — they create a self-sustaining, echoing harmony of solace between themselves.

Then suddenly, Shi'yawk’s tail loosens. Not entirely — as she’s wound herself dozens of times around Vharr. But slowly, she twists her tail free of the ruby’s, then of the ruby’s body, rope after rope of muscle and feather leaving Vharr, leaving only the feeling of absence. Suddenly, he knows the chill of the forest’s night.

Then . . . then the press of Shi'yawk’s paw lifts away from Vharr’s face. He sees the raven-gryph stepping ahead of him, and he reaches out with a forepaw to clasp her ankle. It eludes his grasp. A sad growl echoes through the ecosystem. Does Shi'yawk leave so early? Does she return to the nest? Does she depart to join again with the Down-Below’s other raven-gryphs?

Vharr’s wings waken from their slumber, numb from lack of use. He begins to rise, begins to flap, begins to take a step after her . . . until Shi'yawk treads around, facing him. He stops, heart still racing, but calming. Striding toward him, the raven-gryph lightly butts into his shoulder; initially, Vharr seems confused. Then, she sends a warm mental impression to him, completing the meaning of her deed.

Nodding, Vharr allows Shi'yawk to nudge him onto his backside. His wings fall back into a position of resting over the forest floor. Then, the dragon watches with curious, attentive eyes as Shi'yawk paces around him, till she carefully treads over him, her footpaws stamping the ground in his radius, coming closer and closer to his head. Vharr sees his first close up front view of her forepaws. He mouths silent awe at the grand talons, his tongue lolling out.

Approving of his countenance, she croons sonorously, and then she raises one of her forelegs, the shadow of her big avian footpaw drawing over his face. She does not immediately let it down, instead easing it down, building the anticipation in her scaled friend. She then pushes the forepaw powerfully into his snout, compressing the snout with an awesome force. Obviously, she has more control with the amount of pressure she forces down on Vharr than she did with her hindpaws, in addition to the amount of movement in her rubbing, kneading and grasping.

Out of the corner of Shi'yawk’s feet, the ruby dragon makes the occasional gasp of content, growl of joy, or gurgle of bliss. His head constantly moves as his nose treads the marble pads and his tongue tastes the delicious folds of flesh outside the paw pads. He notices Shi'yawk’s back feet had a slightly saltier taste, while the front feet taste sweeter and smoother. The new tastes in his mouth get his tail curling, scything from side to side.

And the raven-gryph smiles and slowly eases herself down on him. She slips her own tail around her left back and then her belly, looping it around the resplendently scaled belly of the red dragon before resting herself upon it. Now, Vharr realizes, she does not simply embrace him with a part of her; she pins him against all of her weight, conveying how large she is to him with her heaviness. She has the weight of a dragon and the squeeze of a great forest snake, the strong clutch of her tail causing Vharr to rumble.

The raven-gryph’s magenta eyes glow into the ruby dragon’s piercing golds. In the swapping of gazes, the two share a moment of asexual intimacy not often had between the forest’s high hunters of differing species. The raven feels safe; the dragon feels safe; to taste each other’s raw power without combat truly is a treat.

Shi'yawk savors every second. She tightens the coils of her tail around the dragon’s body until her tail visibly throbs to the dragon’s pulse. Ensnared in the loops of her mighty, lengthy limb, Vharr imagines this must be how the prey of large anacondas feel, when the anaconda does not wish to suffocate or wound their prey: merely to feel them squirm, wriggle, writhe, wrestle, do what they can to escape, only to find that they have no such liberty.

Not that Vharr desires to escape. There’s the incredible force of the gryph boring down on him — and Vharr — he knows the raven-gryph — he knows this may be their only meeting — that everything that happens here and now is temporary, and will with time come to an end. No, he desires no escape: he hardly desires for the time to end. Seeing Shi'yawk’s talons spread over his muzzle, pulling back and returning, flashing in the glow of the dark so closely to his eyes . . . feeling for himself how it must feel to be prey, yet living it at no cost of his life . . .

The raven-gryph lets out an alien call. Whether Vharr hears this with his mind or his ears, he isn’t exactly sure: the sound echoes and distorts halfway through its life, yet resonates with a tangible quality. Her coils slacken from Vharr yet again, and the ruby, confused, tries to discover what the matter is by sending her a string of inquisitive mind-impressions. But the raven-gryph, she simply shakes her head, proceeding to free herself from the reclining dragon with a sudden tug. His resting state spikes into a state of alertness. She senses this. She gives him another, more docile call. So he relaxes, watching her feet shift over the ground. Presently, Vharr has another view of the gryph’s hindlegs. But now, resting comfortably in the dark, he can appreciate the lustrous sheen of the feathers, the cords of power that twitch and ache on her lithe frame with but the sleekest of movements. A faint, dark, fleshy musk brushes Vharr’s nose as the gryph’s tail-vent clicks wetly between her spreading legs. Muscle twitches over her glutes, and then she lets up one of her hindpaws, easing it down on Vharr’s muzzle.

When she does, Vharr instinctively raises his forepaws to catch her foot, but it’s too close to his face for his paws to reach; when she starts to smoosh and smother his face again, cool pads and warm feathers massaging over his nose, he wonders why he reacted so to begin with; the ruby dragon growls eagerly, tongue gliding over that paw. Sparks of flame crackle from his nose. He feels the heel of her foot press against his temple, push his head further against the ground. His horns make a soft scraping sound with his guttering throat.

Vharr and Shi'yawk weave each other’s emotions together with telepathy. As she smooshes her paw over his lips, he feels part of himself in her place, his raven-body sleek: it’s only slightly heavier, despite her larger size, due to her super-long tail; it’s also warmer, despite him being a dragon, due to his natural body cooling. The warmth he’s already experienced against his own scaly body, but feeling it emanate in his own blood, his own bones, his own talons. He feels the tail of the raven-gryph wrap around his own body, faintly, the feeling ethereal.

And some part of Shi'yawk feels herself wrap around Vharr’s body. She blinks golden eyes, sees and feels her own talons digging delicately into the chin of the dragon’s barbed snout. And she feels horns projecting from her skull; seemingly infinite, leathery wings cast out at her sides to embrace the clearing entire; white, razor-like teeth in her jaws; a Flame of Life ebbing throughout her majestic self. Then there’s her raven tail, spiralling with a blaze of ebon feathers around her dragon belly, clutching firmly enough to feel both her raven-warmth flowing through his scales and his dragon-warmth releasing itself faintly against her.

As the night wanes on, the two of them elate in the textures, the sounds, the shapes of each other, linked like the sun and moon.

There comes a time when the Shi'yawk slips away from Vharr yet again. But Vharr, who’s become accustom to the raven slipping away to readjust herself, simply sighs, his eyes closed as he patiently awaits her return.

The wind grows chill. More body heat escapes him. When finally he opens his eyes, he is sad, for Shi'yawk no longer anywhere to be seen. He scans his surroundings with his bright yellow eyes, his pupils large and characteristic of his past youth.

Ruuuwr?

With an easy grace, Vharr rolls to his feet. He prowls the area. His snout stumbles into a couple of feathers, which guillotine through the air from above. Looking up, he sees Shi'yawk’s mysterious silhouette. It’s cloaked in the glowing colors of the night, colors which come and go like pictures in Dream. The raven softly calls out to him in her mystic, undulating way. Going to her, Vharr scales a tree with his expertised paws. He realizes: it’s the same tree he climbed when he was tracking the raven earlier.

Watching the ruby dragon reach the top, the raven fans her wings in delight. She calls to him again with a flare of positivity, shuffling enthusiastically over her branch adjacent to his. She then turns his rear to him then hops off the branch, taking flight through the vegetation. He leaps off after her, flying. They wing themselves around a grand elder tree then ascend toward a large branch. As his view of the branch enlarges, Vharr realizes . . . it supports a nest. The nest of Shi'yawk.

They alight on the branch, the ruby dragon less gracefully than the raven. He’s still perplexed by the sight of her resting place. Why did Shi'yawk bring him here? He’s answered by her eyes and her telepathic voice mingling together: the nest is where her raven friends have lain before for comfort. Its twigs are sewn together with a wonderful craftsmanship, one which, she hopes, even Vharr might appreciate.

For a dragon to lie in a nest strikes Vharr as odd. However, he imagines she would think the same if invited to his own home. He accepts the gesture as a well-meaning one, and grins at her, his dragon’s teeth flashing in the dark. She opens her beak. No sound comes out; her eyes blink together in a friendly manner.

With a sacred carefulness, he steps into the nest, the twig floor whispering under his feet. He brings the rest of himself inside, and then slowly eases down, feeling no pointy twigs or rough edges pluck his belly or flanks. Truly, it is a bed that beasts should sing of. He rumbles, the nest shuddering. He settles completely into the bottom. He rolls onto his back in the bowl-shaped of the nest, the walls and floor plush and gentle. Peeking up from the nest, he sees the raven-gryph making her patient way to the edge of it. Shi'yawk lifts one of her muscled legs over the edge, then with a sudden pulse of wing-flaps hovers a few feet over Vharr, before lowering herself down.

The dragon produces a merry hiss as Shi'yawk lays herself on him, her body nestled in the half-sphere of warmth with him. Her tail sways just over his head, her posterior hitched over his face. Her lovely, natural feminine scent and warmth wrap him in a cocoon of pleasure. He shifts happily. Her tail constricts him — constricts him until he can barely move but still breathe: the air is thick with their warm frames wedged together, the feathery musk of the nest and his own dragon scent circulating in the half-sphere. As she binds him, Vharr sees her hindleg lift up before his very eyes, flexing with all its profound power. Then, her foot and big talons smother his snout. It adds another layer of warmth to the experience. Her cool, cool soles. Her feathery flesh around him. Offered to him within the safety of her own twigged sanctuary.

The wings of the two beasts frolic against each other playfully. Vharr’s wings fold and hug over the larger raven-gryph’s. Twigs crackle in soft murmurs around the two of them. Their twig bed shudders with the rareness of the moment.

Vharr moves his snout down the raven-gryph’s paw to her claws, licking over one of them, relishing its texture, ruggedly smooth; its taste, salty and sweet. Tickled by his tongue, her claw flexes over his tongue, and the rest of the claws follow suit with a rippling cadence. Vharr licks over another of the claws, licks between the claws . . .

The tender touch of his blue tongue seems to surprise Shi'yawk; she’s startled with shivers, but as he progresses she eases into the act, sending him positive emotional feedback and flavorful mental pictures. Having never had a creature bring such a moist appendage between her talons before, it gives her a stimulating pulse, which cascades up through her leg and throughout the rest of her body. She sways to his tasting. Her tail swings like a vine, and her body bounces dully. She can feel her foot pressing and lifting in rhythm to the dragon’s affection. She can feel herself involuntarily curling and flexing her claws at a consistent pace, letting her instinct guide her movements. She lowers her head, her throat burbling in a melodic croon.

Vharr smiles. He licks over the claws more steadily, the tip of his tongue peeking out from the crevices between her claws and curling over them, slurping and suckling over the sharp beastly ends. They greet him with increasingly pleased reflexes, the claws stroking under the dragon’s muzzle. The warmth of his dragonbreath rolls over Shi'yawk’s foot and he lavishes in the breath himself, the moisture misting over his own nose. His nostrils poke through the raven’s toes, steaming with sparks of elegant dragon flames.

The raven-gryph’s trill echoes through the sleeping forest. She flutters her wings at a quickening pace. There’s a shake of the nest, the warmth of her foot gone from the dragon’s nose. She pads around a bit clumsily around the dragon, then presses down on his snout with her other rear foot, then pushes his head back into the nest, allowing him to lick over each of his claws and savor them with his tongue.

The night wanes on.

There comes a time when the glow of the forest’s exotic plants grows its brightest, contrasted with the dark of the woods. And at this time both of the beasts’ eyes begin to grow weary and to flutter. The raven-gryph lifts her rear foot off of Vharr’s muzzle and lets it rest on the ground next to him. She sinks over him, her tail wrapping over him tightly and blanketing him, keeping the warmth of his body insulated in a friendly squeeze. She roosts over him . . . and the dragon lets out a low, pleased yarr . . . the medley of emotions fading away, drifting off with the mind of both raven and dragon, putting them into an easy, honeyed sleep . . .

Dreams run wild.

But even Dreams tire.

The morning sun: made even fainter by the filter of dozens of layers of canopy, it finally pierces into the Down-Below. The raven-gryph stirs. Quietly, she stretches her wings over the sleeping dragon, rustling sleep away from herself. Then, she looks down at her friend, her scaly friend. The one who her taught her not all dragons will burn her. Not all dragons will tear into her breast. A solemn chirp stutters out of her. She stares down at his sleeping face. She reaches a forepaw toward his shoulder, but restrains herself; for he sleeps so well. Best not to disturb sweet Dream. She nods, then says a goodbye to herself.

She steps out of the nest, spreading her wings fully to the chill, waking atmosphere. The fwoosh of her wings and tail brings a breeze to the ruby dragon, and he awakes. As she’s bracing her legs to take off, the dragon sees her, and releases a forlorn, feral sound; he reaches out for the raven-gryph, who turns to him, the line of her beak curled into a slight frown. She bows her head, sending him pictures. Herself journeying. Herself crossing a great distance. Meeting with a group of raven-gryphs from long long ago. It is time for her to go.

Vharr and Shi'yawk gaze deeply into each other’s eyes, the dawn sun slowly creeping between them, splitting them with its faint radiance. Every detail of the raven-gryph, Vharr tries to remember and to preserve in some lockbox of his mind. Shi'yawk, too, tries to do this. But a new matter pulls her away.

A proud, beautiful cry flashes from her beak, dispersing through the forest. And then she’s off, wings a-beat, feathers exploding from her, tornadoing fervidly around the astonished Vharr’s head, before their energy, like Shi'yawk herself, leaves the air; and those feathers, those grand feathers of ebon teeter down, down, down, down . . .

The ruby dragon catches one of the feathers on his nose. He sniffs at it. He preserves the smell of it in his memory, then dips his head, letting it fall.

Time passes. Many days pass.

Some time has come and gone. Vharr visits Shi'yawk’s nest. A smell still perfumes it, slipping like Time. It brings back his memory of the raven-gryph, renews his certainty that she will return. They will play once more.

The days pass. Every time Vharr visits Shi'yawk’s nest, her smell has grown fainter. One day, the dragon returns to find the nest gone. He smiles, bittersweet tears in his eyes. Maybe someday they’ll meet again. Maybe not. But what Time cannot take so easily is his memory of their Frolic. Many suns and moons it takes for a dragon to forget.