None of those things are obvious. I’m in the lead. My turn. You’re remarkably light.
“Skinny, you mean? It’s actually really wise for a husband to always say that to his wife. Well done, my love– oh, you haven’t been married before, have you?”
His laughter resonates through me and makes me grin. I made a dragon laugh!
I really haven’t. Oh, you are the most delightful creature ever. I deem that you have won the game by leaning into the surreal and asking silly questions.
“You should be used to silly questions by now,” I tell him. “Hah. That was also obvious. Yes, I agree that I win.”
The peninsula appears ahead, surrounded by sparkling water and bathed in golden sunlight. Vyrathion banks toward it, his wings catching the light.
My husband. The words still feel strange. Wonderful. Perfect.
Mine.
The answering wave of affection from him is so powerful that it leaves me breathless.
Mine,he agrees.
Together we fly toward the slip of land with ocean of both sides, leaving the jungle, the danger, and every unfinished worry behind us.
The future stretches ahead like an open sky, and for the first time since arriving on Xren, I can't wait to see what comes next.
- - -
After a few days of bliss on the Eden-like peninsula, we fly to the crater and touch down.
Vyrathion lets me off and then takes off, so as not to scare Sage and Rosa.
I bang on their resonant log and then wait until they come out from their hiding places.
“Hi,” I greet them. “Sorry to disturb.”
“I thought you weren’t coming back here,” Sage says, a sharpened stick in her hand.
“I did say that,” I admit. “I just wanted to check on you.”
“That’s not really necessary. We’re fine here. There’s much more food for each now.”
That’s the way it looks, too - they’ve both clearly gained some much-needed weight in just the past week or so.
“Good. That dragon is my husband, by the way. We had a bit of a… misunderstanding before, and that’s why I was weeping myeyes out when you first saw me, Sage. He’s harmless. Well, he’s not. But he’s mostly nice. To me, anyway.”
“Okay. Is there a reason why you’re here?” Sage asks. “Other than showing an alien monster our home that we thought was pretty safe and scaring the shit out of us?”
“There is,” I tell them. “Sorry again. Yeah, he has a scary presence going on there. Anyway, this crater is nowhere near as safe as you think. Those tribes have spent some time making big hammers, and last time you saw me, Beth and Quinn and Abigail barely got away from five tribes. Thanks to that dragon, by the way. But I want you to know that the tribes have all the tools they need to knock down that obstacle in the tunnel and come take you. We saw them. They may be a bit shaken now, but–”
I stop as Rosa and Sage start looking up at the sky. “Is that yours?”
I turn and look up too. And where I expected to see a black and gold dragon diving down, there’s a silvery oval, slowly passing right above us about two thousand feet up.
“I don’t know,” I admit. “I guess maybe that’s it. Maybe they’re looking for you!”
“Should we wave?” Rosa asks. “What if it’s someone else? Like the Plood?”
“It’s fine,” I tell them, hoping I’m right. “We’ve got a dragon on our side. Come on, wave!” I start waving with both arms, up and down, making as much movement as I can. The two others do, too.
“I don’t think they see us,” Rosa says. The flying saucer is about to pass out of sight of the crater’s bottom.
