What could she possibly do?
Eupraxia begins to spasm.
Come, I say. This is it, the end. She’s large enough she could do you harm, and this isn’t your fault.
But Liz shakes her head, and she cries out, loudly. “No! Jörð, why did you bless my swords? Why did you give us the heart? Why rename me, and bring me back, and give me all these people to help and protect if you won’t help me actually do it!?” She screams then, loudly, painfully, like the sound’s being ripped from her throat.
And then she starts to glow.
Not yellow light. Not blue. No, she glows a variety of colors, susurrating, like a dizzy rainbow. And then the light explodes out of her, shooting into Eupraxia. I blink, and then Euphrasia’s sister’s just gone.
“Where’d she go?” Sammy asks.
I glare.
Gordon grimaces. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have come, I guess.
If she had died in front of the little hatchling, that would have been bad, too. Gordon needs to think more.
I’m still here. A small human walks out of the edge of the water, clad only in a simple sky-blue dress. “I’m. . .Eupraxia.”
“You’re—you’re human now?” Sammy asks. His eyes widen, and he says a word I’m sure Liz won’t like.
“Samuel Chadwick,” Liz says. “What did you just say?”
He slides off Gordon’s back and jogs toward her. “Do it to me next. I want to be a dragon.”
Liz’s mouth drops, and then she laughs. “Sammy, what are you even saying? It’s not a party trick.”
What should I do? Euphrasia asks.
“She can clearly still communicate as a blessed,” Liz says. “Maybe have your bonded bring her some food.”
Euphrasia’s bonded is the smallest, quietest human I’ve ever met. She also has silvery-blue hair, like even her hair wants to hide. She’s tucked away inside the small shelter Euphrasia had Gordon and Rufus build for her on the edge of the coast. She darts out, holding something in her hand, and extends it to Eupraxia. “Here.”
The blessed-turned-human eats whatever’s in the bowl, and then turns to face all of us. She shrugs. “I feel fine.”
Moments pass, and she still looks fine.
“She appears to be alright,” Liz says, “much as the earth dragons were fine before Freya forced me into that lousy deal.” She swallows.
She’s talking about how they were before she got them the wings and larger sizes, rendering them beholden to the same curse as the other blessed, an inability to eat and procreate.
“The heart did this for her,” Liz says. “I wonder who else we could do the same thing for.”
“Can she change back?” Sammy asks. “Or is she stuck?”
Liz shrugs.
“Let’s see.” Sammy steps closer to Eupraxia. “Gordon can tell you how to do it, but can you turn back into a dragon?”
Gordon’s a blockhead, I say, shifting into my human form. “And he can no longer shift. I’ll do a better job explaining.”
Euphrasia’s eyes widen. You can—again?
I nod. “For a while now, and it’s. . .surprisingly interesting.”
“You liked being human before,” Sammy says. “You kept sleeping in the same room as Liz and following her around like Fluff Dog wanting a treat.”
