Dragon's Apprentice (8)

Part Eight

Lynn stood slightly apart from the other girls who had clustered together behind the curtain of the stage that had been erected in the town square for the sole purpose of the bridal auction. With her hands clasped tight behind her back she leaned against one support beam and watched them as they milled about nervously like cattle ushered into too tight an enclosure. As of yet she hadn’t peeked beyond the curtain as each of the other girls seemed to do in shifts, but she didn’t really care to see all of the village boys, decked out in what amounted to their finest garb, milling about as their fathers glared. Even Lynn’s sisters didn’t seem immune to the nervous peeking of the others and normally Lynn would have made at least a token effort to cluster with them, but since none of them had said a word to her since she’d glided down off the stairs in the dress their mother had horded for her she didn’t want to push her luck by trying to hang on them like the an annoying kid sister.
Lynn rolled her eyes and dared to hope that all of her sisters were purchased that day or life at home would soon be a greater hell then it ever had been. If nothing else, Lynn thought, her mother knew how to insure that all of her daughters felt ostracized from one another. Oh, the glares Lynn had gotten from Gypsum as she’d left the house. If their father hadn’t been there Lynn was positive that her oldest sister would have beaten the crap out of her and ripped the dress from her body. As it was she might still loose the dress if she had to walk home if the looks she was receiving from the other girls, all of them older then her, none of them as well dressed.
She shook her head and looked away from the others at last since their nervous fidgeting was making her nervous. She just hoped that she was right to not worry.
She flexed her hand again and felt for her rings by touch, counting each one slowly. She hadn’t bothered to remove them after she’d gotten home the night before, but had simply cast a light don’t-notice-me spell across them to keep anyone from asking questions. She didn’t need anyone noticing anything else odd about her…like spontaneously appearing rings.
She clinched her hands into fists and looked longingly in the direction of the forest even though she couldn’t see anything other then tree tops over the buildings. She couldn’t help but long for Vaden’s singular company, for the peace of the forest. By contrast the voices around her sounded discordant and loud. It was disturbing to ears no longer accustomed to it.
At long last the town magistrate began to speak beyond the curtain and one of the older married women of the town, a matronly woman that Lynn didn’t know personally, bustled back and began to form all of the young women into some form of a line. Lynn somehow ended up fourth in line, crammed behind Milsy Longsdaughter who was a husky, tall girl who looked the part of the farmers daughter, and Jamsis Millsdaughter, a very slight, fragile girl who’s health had always kept her out of the fields.
Lynn hugged herself and wished desperately that she could get a deep breath around the girdle crushing her ribs. The people were suffocating enough without help.
Somewhere beyond the curtain a gavel banged and the world fell to silence before the name of the first girl in line was called and she disappeared through the curtain in a swirl of blue fabric.

Dragon's Apprentice (7)

Part Seven

The day of the bridal auction dawned hot and clear even though the past few mornings had been slightly foggy. It was a little unusual for that time of year, but those that saw it read little into it and Lynn wasn’t awake to take note of it or she might have thought better about participating in the day’s events.
“Get up!” Lynn’s mother shrilled up the stairs to the loft where, in a rare moment of bravery, Lynn had gone to her own bed in her sisters’ room the night before. It had been a brave move because her sisters were prone to loud arguments, which often degenerated into throwing things at one anothers heads with Lynn’s bed smack in the middle of the line of fire as hers was the center, and smallest, bed. It was why she so often slept in the coal cellar with the mice.
The night, however, had been remarkably uneventful. There had been one short squabble over who knew what, right after the lights had been doused, but one uncharacteristic shout from their father had squashed it in its tracks.
“I said up, all of you! Everyone up or there won’t be time to get ready before the auction starts and how would that look?! I’ll tell you how it would look! Like I can’t mind my own girls, that’s how it would look so UP!!” Their mother yelled again up the stairs and Lynn’s sister’s began to groan slowly into wakefulness. Lynn herself, who had been awake for the better part of an hour and just waiting for someone else in the household to stir that so that she wouldn’t get accused of sneaking off, sat up and swung from bed before any of them could start shouting at one another. She made a dash for the door, her bare feet as silent as cat’s paws across the hardwood.
With the ease of someone used to dashing through a wild forest she hitched her night gown up around her hips and slid, all dignity forgotten, down the stair railing and swung off before hitting the ornate ball at it’s end. Her feet firmly on the ground floor and away from her sisters, who were already starting to argue, she paused at last to stretch the kinks out of a back not used to sleeping on so soft or lumpy a surface as the mattress on her old bed. Of course the condition of the mattress probably had not been helped by the fact that it had first been the mattress of all of her sisters before her. Only her sister, Nan, had a new mattress, being the oldest and all. Her bed frame was also new and would be part of her dowry as a wedding bed assuming one of their other sisters didn’t do something spiteful to it beforehand.
Lynn cracked her neck first one way, then the other, then it cracked again as she returned it to her natural position and she put her hand on the back of her neck as a crick threatened to form, putting pressure on the knot before it could take shape. The cramped muscle released readily enough and, at last, she moved on through the sitting room to the kitchen where her mother was busy fixing a feast that would barely be large enough to feed the hoard that would descend upon it before long.
Lynn’s mother turned with a pan large enough to fry a baby in, which she’d been using to cook scrambled eggs, and jumped just enough to send a plate full’s worth of food into her hair when she spotted her youngest daughter who seemed to have just materialized at her back.
It was because she moved so blasted quietly, Molly decided to herself. Not like her sisters who all stomped and yelled about. She’d fetch a good price at auction, especially since she’d lost the ghastly tan which she’d developed who knew where. Molly also had it on good authority that this would be one of the biggest turn outs for an auction in Gold Spring’s modest history with men coming from as far away as the capital. She hoped that most of her daughters would go. Eight mouths were somehow a great deal easier to feed then eleven. A house with one daughter would also be a hell of a lot quieter, that was for sure and certain.
She smiled. “What were you doing up stairs, dear? I just sent your father down into the coal cellar to wake you.”
Molly didn’t think of herself as a neglectful mother where Lynn was concerned. After all, the girl had lived long enough to be old enough to participate in the auction. That was more then some families could say and if Lynn got less attention then her sisters it was because she demanded less, though perhaps she wouldn’t have if Molly hadn’t let the girl run wild. For just a moment Molly experienced a painful desire to have gotten to know her youngest child before it was too late, but then it was gone again, replaced by the pragmatism of a woman who had lived almost her entire life by the rules of a small town that didn’t encourage free thinking. She continued her trip to the kitchen table with the pan of eggs. Once she had placed them down she stepped outside the open kitchen door to shake the egg off of her hair and clothing before she returned to cooking.
“Any of your sister’s stirring yet?” She asked as Lynn slipped into her chair and began to heap food across her plate. Toast, eggs, bacon, ham, beef tips, fried red potatoes, hash browns, two hot cakes, fried green tomatoes, piping hot bread, cold apple pie and a carrot somehow found space on the plate before she smothered it all in butter, salt and pepper and began to shovel it down with a fork that seemed way too small for the job.
“ ’ibble,” Lynn managed around a mouthful so big that her cheeks bulged.
Molly watched in amazement as the girl somehow got it down and repeated the process with a second bite of what looked like butter, apple pie, hash browns and hot cake liberally sprinkled with pepper.
Out of all her children Lynn was definitely the most expensive to feed, especially in the morning. The girl was always the first to the table when she joined them at first meal at all and ate as if she hadn’t seen food for at least a year or more.
How could a girl so slight possibly eat so much?
Molly shook her head and patted her daughter’s unusual black hair, currently a tangled mass around her head, and added sausage to the girl’s plate. Out of all of her children Lynn was the only one that Molly didn’t have to nag into not dawdling through the morning even when she was eating for an army.
“Once you’ve finished eating, and after your sisters get up, I need you to come with me so that I can fit you to a dress,” Molly said just as Lynn’s father stomped into the house. With a smile at Lynn and a grunt to the world in general he threw himself down into the chair across from Lynn and began to shovel food onto his plate without a further sound.
Lynn grunted in response to her mother’s statement and went on eating. Her father watched her over his own food, wondering if she ever came up for air. Not for the first time he regretted that she hadn’t been one of his sons. Only people who worked hard ate like Lynn did and he had the feeling that she would have taken to the farm craft far better then any of his other children ever had.
He held his plate out for a few fresh strips of bacon as Molly walked by and they both stared in amazement as a whole hot cake disappeared into Lynn’s mouth with the accompaniment of three sausages and a slice of toast. In one gulp it was gone and she chased it with half a jug of orange juice.
“Leave some for the others, dear,” Molly said and eased the fresh bacon onto a plate in the center of the table with a fork.
“ ‘na ‘ooze ‘na wooze,” Lynn managed to say somehow around cheeks full of bacon, eggs and toast slathered in butter.
Her father grunted a laugh as Molly frowned at her.
“Now dear, please leave some for the others. I don’t want to have to cook twice,” Her mother said and Lynn shrugged, but didn’t add any more food to her plate even as her hand kept twitching toward the serving platters as if she wanted to.
“GET UP, YOU LAZY CRETENS, OR I’LL LET LYNN EAT YOUR SHARES, TOO!!!” Molly bellowed up the stairs one last time before she also took a seat at the table and began to fill her own plate with far less then either her daughter or husband.
Within moments there was a stampede of noise as not only her sisters but all five of her brothers came tripping over themselves down the stairs in a rush to reach the table. Lynn, her cheeks stuffed full of a little of this and a lot of that, stared as her siblings made a mad rush for the table faster then she’d ever seen any of them move in her life. She hadn’t realized that she was such a motivation to get her brothers and sisters moving.
With a growl she snatched her pitcher of orange juice away from her oldest brother, Jacky’s, reaching hand and took a huge gulp straight from the clay spout, insuring that no one else would try to take it. She plunked it down solidly in the place where everyone else kept their glasses and glared around at everyone before resuming her meal. Only her oldest sister, Gypsum, glared back, her eyes narrowed, but since this was normal Lynn ignored her completely.
Having inhaled her breakfast faster then anyone else, Lynn took herself outside the kitchen door and sat down on the low step just outside the door. With her chin in her hands she stared out at the forest. Ancient pines reached massive branches out past the boarder that her father so meticulously maintained to keep the forest from encroaching on the back door. The long needles spread upon the branches like fingers reaching desperately, it almost seemed, toward her as if calling her home. A high wind stirred the top most branches and a sound almost like a low, lonely moan passed through the boughs.
Lynn shivered and looked away even as she wished she could go comfort her forest, but that was silly. Why would anything in those old trees, besides Vaden, miss her?
“Ready, my dear?” Molly asked from her back and Lynn turned her head to look up at her mother.
Molly was not, by most standards, an attractive woman. Short and dumpy with limp, muddy brown hair that always seemed to escape from the bun at the nape of her neck she was the type of woman someone might look at and say “There goes a sturdy woman.” She wasn’t the kind of woman who would have ever fit in amongst nobility, but as a farmers wife she was the perfect choice. Once, before the boys had been old enough to work, she had held her own at her husbands side working in the fields. Now she was perfectly happy to be a house wife and do nothing but cook, clean, mend and accomplish other motherly tasks.
By contrast her youngest daughter looked more as if she belonged on the arm of a king then working in a field somewhere. With long, rich, thick black hair that seemed to shine almost purple, of all the colors, in the light and eyes the exact shade of amethyst crystals she was a sight to behold, even when her hair was a tangled mess. Tall and slender with a sinuous, quiet strength, the girl often seemed more predator then farmer’s daughter. She was beautiful and Molly knew that if any of her girls sold that day it would be Lynn, though she doubted that Lynn knew that. The girl had the oddest misconceptions about herself.
Molly shook her head to herself and motioned for her child to follow her back into the house. As the rest of the family continued their breakfast, Lynn stared longingly at the remaining food as they walked past, Molly lead her up stairs to the room she and her husband shared. Leaving Lynn standing in the center of the room, staring at a room that all of the children had always been forbidden access to, Molly went to the wardrobe and, from the dust on top, took a single, flattish box wrapped in a dusty brown paper.
She blew the dust off and carried it back to the bed.
“I bought this for you on your second birthday when it had become painfully obvious to us all that you would surpass all of your sisters in both height and beauty,” Molly said as Lynn stared. “We knew when the day came, since you weren’t the oldest, that we would be unable to send you off with anything except a dress so your father and I decided to have this made for you.”
With that she cut the paper away with one of her husbands knife. Carefully she pealed the paper away from the cloth within and, slowly, exposed a swath of what appeared to be white crushed velvet. With reverent hands Molly lifted the gown from its wrapping by the shoulders. It unfolded in a graceful line into the most beautiful dress Lynn had ever seen. It must have cost her parents a small fortune.
Molly shook it out and laid it carefully across the bed before she lifted the hem of the skirt for Lynn to see. There, and in a couple of other places Lynn could see, the heavy cloth had been folded over more times then was necessary to make a seam.
“There are gold, silver, and copper coins hidden about the dress. The copper coins are hidden here, in the hem of the skirt, the gold ones are hidden in the cuffs of the sleeves and the silver are in the seams along the back. There are four gold coins, six silver and twelve copper. Even if you’re bought by a slaver it’s illegal for them to take your bridal dress from you so it is the safest place to hide anything you may wish to keep,” Molly explained as Lynn stared. A small fortune had been squirreled away for her within the seams of that dress and they both knew it.
She looked back up at her mother in surprised puzzlement.
“But, why?” Lynn asked at last and Molly met her daughter’s gaze evenly.
“Because, my dear, you are both beautiful and smart. While smarts may serve you well in this world as a poor country girl, as a younger daughter beauty will not. If you don’t learn how to take care of yourself, protect yourself, no one is going to do it for you. This dress is the best your father and I can do for you to help you on your way to learning the skills you are going to need when you leave Gold Springs behind,” Molly explained and reached for her daughter to pull her night shirt off over her head where she dropped it on the floor for disposal later.
With her naked daughter standing in the middle of her room Molly began to scrub her down with cold water from the pitcher she’d brought into the room earlier. Lynn screamed as the cold water hit her, but Molly ignored her completely, scrubbing away like a mad woman unleashed.
Once the girl was scrubbed from head to foot and the knots had been yanked from her hair with a bone comb and that same hair had been braded behind her into a single thick band, Molly dried her gruffly with a rough towel and yanked a girdle down over her head. Positioning it just right she had Lynn grab hold of the bed post before she jerked the strings in as tight as they would go. Lynn gasped even as her lungs were constricted and clung for dear life as her mother continued to pull the strings tight.
“Mother,” Lynn gasped, “Mother, I can’t breath.”
Molly ignored her and, with one final tug, secured the garment tight around her. Lynn moaned as Molly pried her hands free and spun her to face her once more. Next she helped Lynn into the appropriate three petty coats before, at last, she pulled the dress down over the girl’s head. While Lynn was definitely thin enough that she didn’t need the girdle, and the dress would fit her just fine without it and she would, undoubtedly, leave both the girdle and petty coats far behind her the first chance she got, Molly wanted to insure that she was dressed in all propriety that day.
Last, but not least, Molly helped her daughter slip into soft slippers that matched the dress. They were completely impractical for walking or riding a horse, but for the occasion they were just right.
“Alright,” Molly said when she was at last satisfied with her daughter’s appearance. “Go pack. Just remember, if it’s not a part of the dress anyone who buys you can take it from you.”
With that she chased Lynn out the door and toward her own room. Still a little in shock, she went without question as Molly turned to the task of getting the rest of her daughters ready for the day.

Note

Part seven is turning out to be longer then expected and while I could break it into a couple of parts I won't for the sake of keeping "chapter" breaks smooth. Another words, for those of you that may read my posts, I will have the next part up next Friday and apologize to anyone out there who reads my humble posts.

Dragon's Apprentice (6)

Part Six
“Give up yet?” He asked as he returned. He was once again in dragon form, though no where near his true size, and at least ten fish strung on a peace of twined tree bark hung around his neck. They’d already been gutted and their scales were blackened char as if he’d breathed fire at them. Lynn knew from experience that this meant that, once the scales were pealed off, the flesh underneath would be perfectly cooked and tender. She’d watched him cook them only once before and still had to wonder how he had enough control not to turn her dinner into so much fine ash.
He dropped the fish beside her and continued on to the fireplace. It had burned down in his absents and, resuming his full size, he tossed several tree sized logs into the red embers before huffing a fire ball into them. They lit instantly and, with a sigh, he settled into the heat, the spines at the tip of his tail almost in the flames.
She removed one blackened fish- might have been perch or maybe bass?- she couldn’t tell, and fingered the line the fish had been strung on.
“I always wondered what form you took to fish in,” She wondered aloud as she scraped the scales off with her work knife.
He shrugged his scaly shoulders.
“A little of this, a little of that,” He said and put his head back on the back of his hands as he watched her pick the cooked fish from the bone with her fingers. Like a bird swallowing a fish whole she tilted her head back as she swallowed, her long, brown-gold hair flowing around her as she moved.
“Did you just lay in the water and let them flow into your mouth again?” She asked, remembering the one time she’d actually watched him fish.
He chuckled.
“No. I didn’t actually eat fish this time. I had a doe before I went to the river. Eating that many schools of fish too often really tends to deplete the resources of an area and I’d like to be able to remain here for at least a bit longer,” He said and closed his eyes.
“Only a bit longer?”
He chuckled without otherwise moving. “A bit, my dear, could be centuries for a dragon,” He rumbled. “Have you figured out those rings yet, my darling?”
Lynn heaved a sigh. “I’m afraid not. You win this one,” She said softly. He opened his eyes and stood as gracefully as any cat rising from a pool of sunlight.
“Oh? Let me see how far you got then,” He said and moved to join her, shrinking down to almost the height of a man as he approached. He sat down besides her like an oversized dog and looked over her shoulder.
There on the floor before her crossed legs remained only five rings. He stared. She had gotten closer then he had ever expected her to.
“You are so close. Why give up now?” He asked and looked over into her face. She was frowning down at the little bands where they formed and arch before her.
“Because I can’t figure out if you meant monetary value,” She said, pointing to one. “Emotional value,” She pointed to the next ring in line. “Spiritual value.” She pointed to the next. “Magical value or memory value,” She said, pointing to the last two.
He stared at her and blinked.
“And how did you make your choices? Most of these rings look as if they could be anyone’s rings,” He said and narrowed his eyes at her.
She sighed and picked up the fist one. Closing it in one fist she closed her eyes and her brow furrowed as if in great concentration.
“Forged within the deepest mines of the First Great dwarven empire, fallen so long ago that even the mountains that were their home don’t remember them, it is made from the rarest of metals. Impervious to tarnish or damage it will shine through time, long after the name it’s creators gave it have been forgotten and the mettle itself can no longer be found within the earth in its raw form. The jewels it’s delicate filigree is twined around are three of the purest blood red rubies ever found,” She intoned in a voice that was almost not her own. It sounded old and far away, a voice that knew centuries more then it should have. She held the ring up into the light so that it’s beautifully polished coils of wire so fine the ring looked as if it would crumble could be seen and the rubies set within it glinted like fire cast eyes.
She set it down carefully and, without opening her eyes, picked up the next one. Her brow furrowed further and her skin took on a decidedly white look. She took a deep breath that caught in her chest.
“SHE gave you this ring. It’s copper, though lovely, without a jewel, the copper molded to look like the leaves from her favorite tree. She wore it on a chain around her neck until the day she gave it to you as her last breath left her.” She sat that ring down faster then the first and picked up the next.
“Polished silver with emerald chips for eyes this ring was created to look like the first fox you ever spoke to. It‘s also dwarven made,” She said and put it back down.
She was defiantly turning white, he decided as he watched her pick up the next ring. Blue light began to glow from between her fingers as soon as the gold band was closed in her fist.
“Elf mage,” Was all she said before she put it back down. “Even you don’t know all that it can do,” She said without opening her eyes before she picked up the last ring.
“The first ring you ever put in your hoard.” She held it up so that the six sapphire chips set around it gleamed. “It’s also an enchanted ring with spells of protection so old and powerful placed upon it that it’ll make the barer impervious to anything harmful from spells to arrows.”
She placed it down carefully and, at last, she opened her eyes. They were practically glowing.
Vaden stared at her with wide, surprised eyes.
“Well, that’s a new talent, my dear. How long have you had it?” He asked.
Her color still wasn’t returning. She didn’t look ill exactly, but more as if something had eaten all of the coloration from her skin.
She shook her head and leaned forward until her head rested on her folded legs.
“I don’t know, Vaden. I didn’t know I could do that until…I don’t know. Today. When I started sorting through the rings I saw a little bit, but the longer I tried to figure it out the stronger it got.” She sounded breathless and exhausted.
There was still no color in her skin. Even her hands had become the same bone white as her face.
He turned her to face him and, sitting back on his tail, took her face between his hands and forced her to look at him. She met his gaze evenly and her eyes were still inhumanly bright, though he doubted that a human would really notice.
“Hmm,” Her rumbled. “Use it a little every day, but don’t push it so much again…Can you turn it on and off at will or do you get constant flashes of information?”
“It seems to be a little of both, though it feels that if I work with it the control will get better. Like working a muscle I didn’t know I had,.”
He nodded and let go of her. “Well, my Lynn, it seems as if you won our wager…By a land slide. Since I promised you the most valuable ring in my hoard, plus one of your choice, and you were able to locate all five you may have them all plus one so take your pick,” He said and wondered back to the fire, growing larger as he went. He eased back down before the flames and watched as she lifted a sixth ring he hadn’t spotted from the shadows of the trunk.
“Which one is it?” He asked and she held it up for him to see. It looked like a brightly polished silver band but nothing more remarkable. He squinted at it then his eyes widened as he recognized it.
“One of Merlin’s rings,” She supplied before he could say anything.
“Which one?” He asked.
“The one that opens all locked doors while, oddly enough, also keeping anything that the wearer has from being taken from them under any means…I suppose if you’re going to go burglarize someone you want to be able to hold on to what you take.” She slipped it onto the thumb of her right hand before she began to slip on the others. The ancient dwarven ring went on to her right index finger, the silver fox ring went on to her right middle finger, followed by the elfin magic ring, then the first ring he had ever acquired, and, lastly, the copper ring went on the littlest finger of her left hand.
She held her right hand up and wiggled her fingers in the light. “Not a bad start,” She said and grinned.
He turned his head to look at her fully with one bright eye. “Start to what?” He asked.
“My hoard,” She said.
He threw his head back and laughed.
“Your hoard? Your kind don’t hoard,” He said.
“Oh?” She arched one brow at him. “I beg to differ. I’ve seen more human houses then you have and they all have small hoards stacked somewhere in their homes collecting dust.”
He laughed again. “Alright. Fair enough. Where are you going?”
She stood and stretched her arms high over her head, yawning.
“It’s late. I need to get home. I’ll be back tomorrow after the bridal auction.” She cracked her knuckles and dropped her arms.
“Aren’t you in the least bit worried that someone might want you?”
She shook her head. “No. I’m too strange and, as I told you, strangers are rare in Gold Spring.”
“I hope you’re right,” He said and shook his head. “G-.”
“Don’t say it,” She cut him off. “Goodbyes are bad luck. See you tomorrow, Vaden.” And with that she was gone, slipping out the tunnel and then out of the cave before he could say another word.
He watched her go, a little worried by the fact that, while her cheeks had taken on a pinkish cast, none of the rest of her skin tone had returned.
After a moment he shrugged to himself and pulled out the book he’d been reading before his ring search had distracted him from it.

Dragon's Apprentice (5)

Part Five
It was hours later when the sound of her stomach rumbling loudly cut through the silence of the cave and the dragon, whom she had assumed to be asleep, his head on the backs of his hands, opened on bright eye to look at her. He smiled at her and rolled sleepily onto his back like an overgrown cat, stretching muscled legs up into the air as he moved.
“Hungry?” He asked and arched one expressive brow.
Lynn laughed. “Obviously.” She added yet another ring to the growing pile back in the trunk. “It’s your turn to hunt.”
He yawned. “Is it now?”
“You know it is, you great lazy lizard.” She held one ring up to the light and turned it so that it shone.
He jumped to his feet and glared down at her. “Lizard am I? Lizard!? I’ll show you lizard!” He bellowed and, to her great astonishment, vanished in a cloud of bright pink smoke. She blinked and waved the smoke away from her face. It was tasteless and odorless, but still stung her eyes.
Once it cleared she saw that the dragon was gone and in his place seemed to be an arm length, pink lizard attached half way up the cave wall by small, suckered feet.
It was the first time she’d ever seen him shape change to such and extravagant extent.
Lynn laughed. “I didn’t know you could change your color,” She said and stood to approach him. He grinned, exposing teeth that were far too draconic for a true lizard. Long and sharp they looked exactly like the teeth that always filled his mouth only now small enough to fit into the head of a lizard. Somehow the little needle like teeth were still slightly out of proportion.
“Only to some degree,” He said and turned on the wall to look down at her. “Impressed?”
As she drew closer she could see that the pink was splotchy in places and the entire tips of his toes were white with tiny, white talons on the end of each suckered pad. Little flecks of gold shone in his skin as if he’d been powdered with flakes cleaned from a jewelers file.
Since he was a primarily white dragon with gold tips on his scales neither the white nor gold surprised her. The hot pink did.
“Yeah, I’m impressed. Now how about some food?” She asked, smiling, and put her hands on her hips as she looked up at him with amazing amethyst eyes.
He threw his head back in a very unlizard like manner and laughed a laugh much too loud and powerful to ever come from such a small reptile. Even if she hadn’t recognized him already that laugh would have given him away. She’d have known that laugh anywhere.
“Alright, witch, I’m going. If you got it in your head to do so you could take over a kingdom with those eyes, I hope you know,” He said and scuttled up and around the ring of light that filled the cave before he disappeared along the ceiling of the passage that she had come in through. She watched him go before returning to her ring sorting.