AN: It's finally here! xD this is the second story in a wider arc I intend to write so I suggest that you read The Dragon's Key first or else most of this will not make much sense. I have had this particular chapter in the works for months now but prevailing ill health kept pushing it out of my to do list, hence the massive delay. I will try to keep the ball rolling on this project as consistently as I can.
While going back over a few things in the previous story to refresh my memory I noticed a lot of typos I didn't catch in my proofreading… I will endeavour at some point to go back and fix that. I also came to the realisation that my word processor seems to think the colloquial Irish term for idiot is spelt 'egit' and before I blindly accepted this without question, but I have since found that it should in actual fact be spelt 'eejit'. Its good word for how I feel right now xD that is another thing I will be editing in the future so I apologise for the discrepancy.
HeartofFyrwinde has been a massive help to me in the past and continues to be so :) much of the revised plot for this story was done with their help and support, so you can thank them for helping to keep the story afloat so far!
The disclaimer in my profile accounts for the elements I have filched from other works in this story; only my OCs belong to me.
And this opening totally isn't a rip off of How To Train Your Dragon 2 and I haven't been fangirling about the film since it came out. AHEM.
Prologue
The sky was that clear, beautiful, invigorating blue. The only mars to its countenance were the odd streak of fluffy white cloud far off on the horizon; a vast expanse of nothing but wind and sun and endless possibility. The air was so cold up here, made even more so by the speed with which they moved.
A large dragon sped through the lower atmosphere, going as high as he dared while his rider lay flat against his back, nestled in a purpose built saddle that helped keep her seat with the minimal aid of straps and buckles. He was covered in black, raven hued feathers, with patches of purple ranging from light to deep in a pattern not unlike that of a butterfly's on his wings, and in soft streaks along his spine down to the two rhombus shaped fins at the end of his tail that changed shape slightly and turned to compensate for the change in airflow over his body and kept his flight stable. A thick crest of short, stubby purple feathers encrusted his lower jaw, and the upper part of the front of his neck was also purple but the feathers were smaller and finer like the rest of his pelt. Two curved horns protruded from his skull and curled over the back of his head; eyes of liquid amber gazed straight up into that endless blue firmament.
The small rider on his back was clad in bright armour of silver and amethyst hues, etched delicately with stylised feathers and with a helmet that echoed the headgear of the dragon she rode. She grabbed a hand rest at the front of the saddle and carefully drew her knees up to her chest so that she was crouched on the seat as the dragon tilted himself backwards, as though to perform a loop. As they hung there upside down in the endless sky, mother earth below – a welcoming sea of green – the rider let go of the handles and pushed with her legs, launched herself down into earth's embrace.
The dragon jerked his head back further and followed her descent in a straight line to the ground. He roared with gladness and pride as he heard a wordless scream of delight from his rider, her arms out stretched as she rejoiced in the weightless feeling of the dive. He angled his body and spread his wings just enough to slow his own descent so that they fell at the same rate. His considerable weight would have pulled him down faster otherwise, and they would not have been able to share in each other's moment of joy.
They both turned their heads to look at each other; the dragon opened his mouth and made loud chirruping noises, almost like a bird, before deepening his voice to a more guttural, rasping sound a bit like a bark. Although a helmet hid her face, he knew she was grinning at him, and he could just hear her laughter over the roar of the wind. She twisted her body slightly and stretched so that she slowly revolved like a graceful dancer in the air, without spinning out of control as she had done in the past. He pulled away a little to give himself room, and did the same, contorting his body into fantastic shapes to show his flexibility and imagination.
As the ground came closer and the sky loomed ever higher, the armour-clad rider tilted her head upward towards the forest below, as though looking up with her eyes closed and just enjoying that moment in time. Then, before their altitude became critical, she reached for the saddle that was already being twisted towards her, and grabbed at the handle across the front, tucking her legs into the grooves made to fit her legs that helped to keep her in the seat.
The dragon twisted and unfurled his wings, maximising the size of his tail fins and spreading each limb to their fullest extent to catch the air and slow their descent. The force hit them like a solid wall, and they slowed right down, before levelling out to skim the tops of the trees. The dragon roared aloud with jubilation, relishing every sight, sound and smell as he sped across the top of the forest. Then he pulled up into a tight loop, spinning in a barrel roll as he did so, and made a sound that was almost like a human 'whoop' of delight as his rider sat up in the saddle, hanging on to the hand holds with her head thrown back, making the same sound in delight.
They spun and twisted together towards a flattened outcropping of rock, where he threw out his wings yet again to slow them down, and then landed rather abruptly but smoothly. He sat back on his haunches, and then stretched his front legs out before him and dipped his forequarters as he yawned and rolled his shoulders. His rider slid from his back, laughing and giddy from the rush of adrenaline still coursing through her body.
Reaching up, she unhooked the helmet she wore and cast it aside so she could hug the dragon's muzzle close to her. He whined and made a grating sound deep in his throat as he licked her cheek and nuzzled at her chest.
Her long blonde hair fell in corkscrew curls, and was partially bound up in different, small and elaborate braids surrounding a larger waterfall braid, ending in small beads of carved wood and bone, and with a few black and purple feathers woven into them. She was fair skinned, high cheek boned, with brilliantly green eyes that somehow seemed to collect the light around her, and somehow reflect it back out again.
"That was a good run," she said breathlessly, kissing the dragon's nose while he closed his eyes and grated to her. "Well done, Leo!"
The dragon lifted his head a little and took a small step back, making a keening sort of noise in his throat and dancing on his toes, tail thumping against the ground.
"Come on, we should be getting back. I'm starving," she rubbed his muzzle one last time before she bent to scoop up her helmet and pulled it over her head. She expertly climbed up his side into the saddle that stretched quite a long way down his back, but was segmented and hinged to allow him comfortable and flexible movement. He rolled his shoulders again and stretched his back legs while she found her seat, and then took off from a stand still, back into the sky.
This time, they skimmed the treetops and flew over a valley that rounded a small mountain, and there in the distance was a castle built into the landscape: the home of the Keyblade Masters.
XOXOX
In a deep, dark cavern somewhere far beneath a forsaken looking mountain range shrouded in thick mists, there slouched a man against a deep basin set on a plinth of roughly hewn stone. The water within the basin kept jumping and spitting, but it was ice cold to the touch; the man barely noticed as he prodded the surface with the fingers of his right hand. The image of a tribal swallow was clearly inked into the skin on the back of this hand. He was dressed in long robes of heavy fabric that usually completely covered him from sight, when the hood was up and the sleeves were not rolled past his wrists.
He had a thin, narrow face with an unpleasant sort of expression because there was no warmth in his pale grey eyes. Every so often, from below the surface of the water an image would emerge before it fragmented and fell into a small cascade of spitting droplets again and again. Always, it was a young woman with blonde hair against a shifting black background that sometimes morphed into more discernable shapes, like a long snout or black, purple-flecked wings. She was smiling, laughing – clearly happy.
The man straightened up sharply as the image boiled and once again fell apart, and re-emerged strongly with the face of a man. He was grey eyed, with shoulder length hair and a single thin lock that hung right down the front of his face; his expression was formidably grim.
"Ahh, Cain." Someone spoke from what passed as the threshold of this particular room. "I didn't know you were still here." He spoke pleasantly enough, but Cain's reaction spoke otherwise. "Please, don't rush on my account." The man said politely, gesturing to the plinth. He was rather broadly built, and under his heavy cloak he wore what looked like a uniform of office in white with a sash around the waist like a belt, with some more colourful sashes draping themselves from his waist down his front and side in warm oranges and browns. There was an official looking crest made of straight lines forming diamonds on the sashes. He bore a very carefully trimmed beard of a style quite foreign to this place, and his eyebrows were somewhat bushy and prominent but well kempt. His tone and inflection were very eloquent, speaking of high education and influential status; he could have been a vizier or even a prince. In combination with his attire, something about him just seemed to cry 'politician'.
"Can I help you, Gongora?" Cain asked sardonically, giving the man the merest, most arrogant of glances.
"Alas, you cannot." Gongora put a hand to his brow and shook his head sadly. "What I require is more magic energy to power the generators in our magic engines. I am afraid, you are unable to assist in my particular endeavours. You are, however, perfectly placed for another important task set by our distinguished leader. You would do us all great benefit by completing your assignment-"
Cain threw his head back and marched out of the room, making sure to barge past Gongora, knocking hard against his shoulder to show his utter contempt. Gongora waited for the footfalls to cease before he cast his gaze to the ground, closed his eyes and shook his head as he slowly began to walk forward to the basin. He too gazed into its depths, and the scowling face reappeared larger and clearer than before.
"I'm watching you, Kaim Argonar." He told the image, and all at once his pleasant demeanour fell away, leaving a very malevolent smile in its place.
XOXOX
Master Rhiannon heaved a great sigh, her eyes closed, and tried to ignore the turmoil around her. Merlin's study was in disarray, and a handful of individuals from the Committee were in a corner, arguing. Rather loudly come to think of it. And then in the other corner there was a small group of youths were bickering. Again, rather loudly. The tallest and eldest – and admittedly the most immature – was getting very wound up, until the other Keyblade Master stepped in and dispersed the group with a few quick but kind words, and a couple of snipes directed at one of the young lads. They left with varying degrees of reluctance to fulfil whatever errand that had been asked of them, and the noise levels dropped a little.
Evie turned to find Rhiannon watching her as she ushered Kyo out of the front door, and gave her a scowl.
Rhiannon merely folded her arms and sat back deeper into the armchair she had commandeered and waited for her old friend to join her. So knowing that she was waiting, Evie naturally took the longest route there was to get there via the biggest bookshelf in the room. Once she had found the two particular books she required, Evie plonked herself down on a smaller wooden chair on the other side of the tiny little coffee table, and proceeded to start reading without even a glance in Rhiannon's direction.
"Bitch." Rhiannon said dully into her mug.
Evie looked up with much feigned surprise, her disconcerting eyes wide with colours that Rhiannon was still not used to and never really would be (they should be a bright, cheerful Christmassy sort of red – but instead one was blood red and the other was a creepy lamp-like yellow).
"Oh good morning Rhiannon. How nice to see you. How is everything in your neck of the woods today?"
Rhiannon wrinkled her nose and bit back a curse. Her ship had been the target of hooligan graffiti artists and Evie hadn't come back last night. It made her panic every time though she was not inclined to admit so out loud to anyone. Of course, Eaves knew that…
"Where the feck were you last night than, eh?"
"Err, last night…" she did that thing where she closed her left eye and the right one looked up to the right – the creepy yellow eye Rhiannon struggled to make peace with. "Where was I…? Ah yes. I was up all night rewriting computer code – badly – and then I got stuck into some really rather interesting journals Rose found for me about the effects of Mist on flora and fauna in case there were leads on our little friends." They both grimaced at the thought of the horribly deformed and deranged creatures that kept cropping up in places, and that by all medical accounts appeared to still be alive purely out of spite. "And then I was compiling that stack of notes Aqua gave me into the journal, and looking at the x-rays and CT scans and trying to think about how to write it up all professional like." She pulled a poker face and went on, "And then I started reading that document on jellyfish migration. What? It was interesting, I don't have to justify myself to you." She added in a rushed snap.
"Whatever ya say pet…" Rhiannon rubbed her temple like she was nursing a headache. Evie was fascinated with ecology and natural history, which were her chief passions after Keyblade lore and archery.
"And somewhere in between these activities – I must have fallen asleep, because I closed my eyes for like a second and then there I was, lying under the table with the book plastered to my face. It was a really interesting read, those jellyfish-"
"I'm sure it was…"
"You know how many other animals rely on them for sustenance? And that they prop up the rest of the wider oceanic ecosystem after plankton?"
"I can imagine…" Not.
"And total weight for weight they out number any other organism in the sea?"
"That's nice."
"What's eating you then?"
Rhiannon looked up with exasperation. Evie's hair was too short – the right shade of brown but chin length on one side and even shorter on the other. And her eyes were wrong, and she insisted on going by 'Lynn'. But she was still Rhiannon's Evie, no matter what.
The ranting about ecology was enough – bless and curse those infernal jellyfish.
"Didn't occur to ya to drop in and let me know you were wastin' your time on that, flower? Just so I knew where you were?"
"I thought when you told me to sod off the other day you were expressing the sentiment that you wanted me out of your hair." Came the amused response as Evie rubbed absently at her jaw.
Rhiannon sighed, and she heard Evie do the same though her face was currently planted into the palm of her hand. They stayed very quiet for a long time, by which point the rest of the hubbub had subsided as people left to run errands. Finally, Rhiannon broached the subject and asked, "So, did you find anytin'?"
Evie exhaled loudly and rubbed her eyes tiredly. "No," she bemoaned. "Nothing new, at any rate. Mist doesn't alter physiology the same way our little friends have been. It causes an actual evolutionary shift, over a number of generations. Probably just in the dozens, but it depends on the complexity of the organism in question – plants are more susceptible, for example, over…let's say a felid. And the mutations in question are very unique to the particular environment the organisms are living in. Ivalice is a great example of localised Mist induced changes in the physiology of its critters. This is a whole other kettle of fish we're looking at here."
Rhiannon blew her cheeks out, disturbing the locks of hair framing her face. "Another dead end…" Maybe they could try hitting their heads against the wall – make at least some headway…
"Yeah…" Evie sighed, but the brightened a little. "But it was still a nice idea. Actually," she fished in her pocket and pulled out a slip of paper. "I had a bright idea, but I need a book of Master Yen Sid's to do a little research first,"
"What book would that be?" Rhiannon asked, thinking of the halls of the place they had grown up in, similar to Land of Departure but very far from this place. It had occurred to her that maybe they should go back home and check the library there for clues…and knowing their luck if they did their old comrade in arms Kenneth would arrive here looking for them. That would be just Rhiannon's luck, to run in circles after the pair of them…
"I dunno yet. That's what these are for," Evie patted the leather bound cover of one of the books she had pinched from Merlin's shelves. "I need to check up on a couple'a things. But I reckon it might point us in the right general direction."
"As opposed to the vague direction…" Rhiannon grumbled, and stifled a yawn.
"You are such a kill joy." Evie said conversationally, opening the book and straightening up to read.
"You strange person. Reading scientific journals for fun."
Evie looked over the top of her oh-so-interesting book with an arched eyebrow, a familiar light flashing in the mismatched colours. "It's called a hobby, Rhi. I like my ecology and shooting at things, and you like weapons craft and covering yourself in body art and yelling at people."
Rhiannon made a rude hand gesture at her, and Evie responded by trying to kick her under the coffee table. It worked because her limbs like the rest of her were very slender and very long. The silliness and immaturity of it all had the pair of them giggling amicably before they settled down for some quiet time now that the house was empty but for them and Merlin, who pottered around his contraptions and experiments God only knew the use for, almost as bad as Ansem's own lab up at the castle, apparently oblivious to their presence.
She leaned back in the comfortable chair, and took a deep, relaxing breath. Slowly opening her eyes, she turned to look at Evalyn, who was already making copious amounts of notes in an old sketch pad that Mel had doodled all over at some point in the past.
"We're gonna get'em." Evie said in an undertone, scribbling a furious brainstorm over one page and linking the different thoughts together with different coloured inks. "We are so gonna get'em."
Rhiannon rolled her eyes, shaking her head, before turning to sip at her cooling tea. If anyone could, she supposed, it would be Evie.
XOXOX
It was one of those lazier days spent by the Keyblade Masters in companionable quietude. Gathered in the castle library in the Land of Departure, the High Master was reading a most excellent book she had borrowed from an outside source, while her student was quietly taking down notes beside her from a very large tome into a smaller notebook. Aqua was reading A Brief History of Magickal Etymology, thoroughly absorbed in its content while Mel did her utmost to ignore Leo. He was lying awkwardly on his back – something he didn't usually do because the joints of his wings made it acutely uncomfortable – and kept making tiny little noises at the back of his throat, gazing first out the window and then longingly at his rider, tail wagging pathetically. Mel was too intent on her work, or at least trying to be – when Leo wasn't looking her gaze would flicker momentarily in his direction.
Aqua glanced up, dispelling the hair that had crept over her shoulders as she had bowed her head to read. She twirled a lock of blue around her fingers absently, pulling it out straight for inspection and wondering vaguely if she should get it cut. She kind of liked it this length, but she had yet to make her mind up on the issue. She knew Terra wasn't especially keen on it because when he tried to cuddle up with her at night he would sometimes end up accidentally inhaling it. Aqua had started tying it back to sleep, which helped a bit. He had pretended to make a big thing of it, and Ven had at first teased and then chastised him over it. The whole argument had ended with Terra shouting with sheer frustration, "It's just hair!"
Right now Terra was doodling opposite Aqua, drawing something vague in a sketchbook of carving ideas with his head in the clouds somewhere. And oddly enough Ventus was actually working hard, reading and memorising some sheet music while his fingers plucked at the strings of an imaginary lyre. With everyone's attention completely elsewhere, Aqua took a few moments to study them all.
Ven's hair seemed to be reflecting the sunlight streaming in through the open windows, and his mouth sketched the names of notes and chords soundlessly as his fingers worked the air, clear eyes dancing across the surface of the pages in front of him. Aqua turned to watch Terra when she saw his expression draw into a frown; he stared down the rough sketch he had just made, before scrubbing it out with a vengeance and bending over the paper to draw with much more attention focused to detail. He eventually sat back, brushing the page down and giving his work a critical eye as he ran a hand through his rather scruffy chocolate brown hair that was definitely in need of a hair cut. The picture he was drawing looked like a long necked horse to Aqua from her vantage point, and Terra was too absorbed to notice her for the moment, so she turned to look at Mel and Leo.
Mel looked, as ever, the picture of tranquillity. Her expression was soft and calm, as were her tones when she spoke; her very green eyes darted back and forth from her writings to her source, and occasionally to Leo when the dragon wasn't looking. He was right now lying on his back, tilted sideways towards them with his wings brought down and close to his body to avoid the pressure of the weight of the rest of his body. With one wing all but pinned underneath his centre of gravity, it seemed a bit of a defeated objective. Leo's golden eyes caught Aqua's, and he wriggled appealingly like a puppy, thumping his tail on the floor and made another whine at the back of his throat.
Mel deliberately turned a page, and kept on taking notes.
Aqua smiled. Nice try… Leo groaned and flopped backward dramatically, until it became too uncomfortable and he lurched forward onto his front, right into a patch of warm sunlight on the floor by the bed they had made for him from cushions and mattresses padded with blankets. Leo snorted and heaved himself up before dragging himself back into the shade, where he settled down and tucked all four paws under, wrapping his neck and tail around himself and rearranging his wings so that the only visible parts of his face were his amber eyes staring out of the mound of black and purple.
Turning, Aqua saw Terra and Ven watching as well while Mel kept studiously close attention to her notes. Terra smiled and shook his head; Ven rolled his eyes and sighed loudly. Aqua just looked down at her hands and turned aside so Leo couldn't see her biting her lip to keep from smiling.
Leo was making the sort of stand a teenager would, and despite he was just under a year old now, that's more or less what he was as far as his species was concerned. Some of what they knew about Keyblade Dragons had come from an old book they had found in the attic. It was ancient lore so obscure Master Eraqus and Master Yen Sid had never thought it relevant to teach them as students. Leo wanted to be more independent, more like a grown up – which was pretty difficult for him because his only role models were human; there weren't any other dragons for him to look up to and emulate.
There were other species of dragons, granted; generally with mail like scales and scalding breath that were usually quite belligerent and seldom domesticated or trained for anything, if at all. There were precious few cultures Aqua knew of where dragons lived and worked alongside humans; one such World was the Viking settlement of Berk, with whom they visited often and traded their time and skills with; the head of the Berk Dragon Training Academy had redesigned Leo's saddle, in exchange for a valuable metal ore Mel knew where and how to mine that made exquisite and durable jewellery – highly prised by Viking women and raked in the trade for Hiccup's mentor and Berk's master metal smith.
It couldn't be easy for Leo, but he was completely devoted to Mel, and she treated him tough but fair at worst, and smothered him with love and affection at best. She had to be his mother and strict at times, like now where she was ignoring his pleas for attention because he knew full well she was busy, and she wouldn't reward his bad behaviour with her attention. He pushed at those boundaries, but it was to be expected in one so young. His shoulder stood about a foot and a half above Terra's head now, and he was heavily built with lots of powerful muscles that could easily break bones if he threw his weight around. Mel had always raised him to be careful and mindful of others, and to know that if he wasn't careful he could easily end up seriously hurting someone.
After a while, Terra tossed his pencil aside and slid his sketchbook closed before he got up to go and start on dinner. Mel left her things where they were and silently got up to help, since it was her fault that they had a lot of food to process. Since her birthday in the spring she had obtained, among other things, a beautifully crafted bow and a quiver cast with a spell of holding to carry a great number of arrows at any given time.
While Terra and Mel were busy in the kitchen, Ven and Aqua brought the washing in from outside and carefully folded it neatly for redistribution. Everything was placed on the beds of the correct owners; Aqua hesitated as she lifted a stack of Terra's shirts and her own sashes, not knowing where to take them. She and Terra were engaged, and had been intending to move into a room together – the guest room down the hall from the Master's room, instead of the Master's room itself, which should have been Aqua's by right, the idea of which she was uncomfortable with. Mel had suggested the guest room instead, and some of their possessions had wound up there, but they hadn't really moved in fully. Sometimes they slept in Aqua's old room, and sometimes in Terra's, which had lead to a couple of the other older Keyblade Masters currently residing in Radiant Garden to pass around the sarcastic remarks that they were 'sleeping around', much to their combined chagrin.
Fingering the hem of one of the shirts, Aqua decided to take the laundry to the old guest room, but left it on the bed rather than try to file it away in the large chest of drawers in the corner. Ven must have noticed her detour, but he didn't say anything, and they walked to the kitchen in comfortable silence. He was prone to winding up Terra, but when he wasn't around Ven didn't pick fights with Aqua as much, for which she was grateful.
They arrived to find the kitchen permeated with delicious smells, and populated with more pots and pans than Aqua had initially thought they owned. Mel insisted that everyone start eating while she continued draining and decanting stock, and carefully started the process of making bone broth in another pot before she even thought about sitting down to eat. Leo curled himself into his usual corner and ate his share of the stew, along with larger chunks of various meats, and all topped off with a mammoth thighbone he spent the evening extracting the marrow from with great relish.
As the evening drew in a chill descended upon the mountains despite high summer, so they lit a small fire in the hearth of the common room. Aqua lay on her side on the couch reading her borrowed book while Terra and Ven held a Command Board tournament on the floor before the fireplace. Mel was hit with the sudden and inextricable urge to sew, and curled up by Leo's side to sort beads of various size and material into a pattern on a large piece of leather that would eventually be turned into a bag, far out of the firing line. It was doubtful Ven and Terra would ever lose that competitive and antagonistic streak of theirs; Aqua liked to think she was mature and had more self-control, but the pair of them had known her since childhood, and knew exactly how to get under her skin and pull her in, dragging her down to their level. As such, Aqua declined to take part in their tournament, knowing full well how it would all end.
While Terra and Ven argued about the rules and flicked accusations of cheating at one another, Mel became more and more absorbed in her work. She was a speedy seamstress, but even so it was a laborious task to sew each individual bead to leather. After marking out with chalk and laying all the beads on another piece of fabric, Mel set the project aside after a couple of hours, and started on something else; by then Leo had fallen asleep and curled up in his unconsciousness. The finned end of his tail hid Mel mostly from view, and Aqua wasn't really paying attention until she went over to say good night while the boys were in the kitchen, arguing about each other's hands and how many joker cards there were meant to be in the deck. Aqua would not have noticed if Leo hadn't shifted in his sleep and moved Mel's things around with a twitch of his hind leg, dragging a pile of cloths over to uncover something she had been looking for all week.
Mel gave her best and most blank look when Aqua brandished the white fabric under her nose. Aqua gave her an unimpressed look with a quirked eyebrow and her best 'the Master is not amused' look.
"What?" Mel asked, like she had nothing to hide and not looking Aqua in the eye.
"Stop stealing my clothes." Aqua said firmly, patting Mel's head with the sash. "I was looking everywhere for this…"
"I only took the one," Mel said quietly in her defence, raising her hands in surrender and tilting her head down, looking away.
"Again." Aqua said, with a liberal dose of amusement.
Mel had pilfered one of the white sashes Aqua usually wore either side of her waist a few weeks back, and embroidered a beautiful stylised wolf in silver thread on it. This one in her hands now had an orca done in a similar style, again in silver thread.
After Mickey had brought Mel to them – about this time last year – she had slowly assimilated into their lives, giving at least as much as she was given in return, usually more. So comfortable with each other were they, that she had started giving things artistic makeovers unannounced and unasked for. Things like Aqua's clothing. There were also the stylised images she had made from coloured paper and card all over the kitchen cupboards, the cushions scattered around the common room, their bedrooms and Aqua's study, and blankets and quilts of various fabrics and wools dotted around on beds, couches and chairs of all kinds. Between her training and keeping Leo properly fed, Aqua didn't quite know how Mel managed to produce it all, but she did. Probably in the evenings when Aqua was reading or arguing with Ven and Terra.
Mel pulled a very mild expression and turned aside to fix the pile Leo had knocked over – and was promptly knocked over as he again shifted in his sleep, and trapped her in place with a forepaw before she was buried from sight by his wing as he snuggled inward into a ball, snoring contentedly.
"Okay in there?" Aqua asked, inspecting the orca more closely with open approval now that Mel couldn't see her.
"Yeah, you go on ahead. I'll be…up in a sec."
Aqua smiled to herself and left Mel to her own devices. She bade Ven goodnight, and Terra followed her upstairs soon after. Tonight they settled in his room, and she was asleep almost as soon as her head hit the pillow, waking up late the following morning to find Terra turning the room upside down. She tossed the wayward clothes that had landed on her aside and gave Terra a quizzical look.
"Welcome back to reality." He said in a huff.
Aqua raised an eyebrow at his tone. "Good morning. Are you looking for something?"
"Yeah. My shirts? Didn't you do a load of laundry yesterday?"
"Oh, yeah…" Aqua rubbed the last remnants of sleep from her eyes as she sat up and slid out from under the covers. "They're up in the guest room."
It was Terra's turn to raise an eyebrow. He sat down beside her on the bed and asked, "Why up there?"
Aqua didn't speak for a moment, and in the silence Terra groaned and flopped on to his back on the bed. She shrugged and said slowly, "I don't know. But…maybe we should think about actually moving in together?" she turned to look at him. Terra had propped himself up on his elbows and was giving her a quizzical look. "I mean," she pulled a face and absently touched the delicate little silver ring on her left hand. "We are engaged. Maybe we should settle more permanent sleeping arrangements?"
Terra groaned again, throwing his head back for a moment before he made a great show of heaving himself up. He got right in her face and said dully, "I'm sorry I'm not organised enough for you."
Aqua closed her eyes, stifling a giggle, and responded when she felt his lips on hers. They both look up at the door when they heard Leo's impatient roar from down the corridor – moments later they heard another door slam and Mel ran past calling, "I'm coming, Leo, hold on-!"
They looked at each other, both stifling their laughter as Leo keened very loudly, and got up from the bed to prepare for the day ahead. It was a slightly less lazy day than yesterday, and they focused mostly on practising katas in the great hall before taking to the outdoors for some magic practise.
None of them had focused much on command styles in a long while now, and it was something that until recently had been completely foreign to Mel. Her command of magic was not the same as theirs; she was far more adept at energetics and subtle entities, and things like dowsing and card readings. Her control over elemental magic was sporadic at best, although her curative and protective spells were rather effective.
As such, when Aqua had first started teaching Mel how to perform command styles, they had hit a brick wall. It took a while for them to work around this block, but when they did they found that she was still working on a different plane to them in terms of magic. Ven, Terra and Aqua could perform the same basic forms, but each had their own niche that only they could perform. Oddly enough, Mel was not surprised to see for herself who commanded which element in terms of magic – and they in turn were not surprised to see how her command styles manifested when she finally figured out how to initiate them.
The first incorporated her Medicine, which she did not usually call upon in battle, which in turn was why it took a while to make the connection. Within the Shamanic tradition, 'Medicine' is merely something that makes you feel good and empowered (and could be described as either 'balanced' or 'unbalanced' depending on the context). Though each animal has many layers of symbolism and qualities to offer, each was assigned one Medicine in particular – Mel's personal Medicine was the Wolf: the Teacher. It was little surprise to anyone that when she first made the shift into a command style it was amid a pack of wolves made of light that danced around her, startling and distracting Terra enough that she actually managed to knock him to the ground despite her small stature. Each time the animals were different, though they were always one of her nine main power animals.
The other command style cloaked her in a nimbus of shifting light that always corresponded with the colours of the chakras, and made her look as though she were dancing through a misting rainbow. Again, the seven power points that followed the central column of the body and passed through the colours of the rainbow were not something Mel had usually thought about when fighting with Keyblade in hand, so making the connection had taken a while. She was incapable of performing any of the command styles Aqua or the others could, but in the wider scheme of things it didn't really matter.
After a good half an hour or so of non-stop sparring (Aqua calling on every spell she knew to initiate each form in turn – Mel gliding through a haze of different colours and energies, and ghosted by several racoons, followed by a lithe fox that blasted Aqua off her feet quite unexpectedly, much to Mel's amazement and dismay) the two women took a breather and sat on the ground leaning against Leo's side, hidden from the sun in his shadow while Ven and Terra chased each other around the practise area. They were trying to quench each other's particular element with their own, and were more focused on having fun than they were on actually working.
Aqua made a show of rolling her eyes, shaking her head, and then hanging it in a state of despair – Mel plucked some long stems of dried grass and started braiding them absentmindedly as she looked through the pair of them like they weren't there. She did that sometimes; you just had to wait for her mind to return from wherever it had wandered to this time before you could get any sense out of her. By the time Mel floated back to reality, she had twisted the braided grasses into a heart shape, which she secured with a hair grip from her pocket, just in time for Leo to decide that it was far too hot for him, and the three of them all got up.
While Leo trotted off to the stream to quench his thirst, Mel and Aqua decided to leave the boys to their own devices and go back up to the castle. After a quick wash and a change of clothes from training, they went to the music room and spent the rest of the afternoon playing together. Aqua played the violin, and Mel could play the piano, the flute, the guitar – and a few other instruments they didn't have at their disposal here, though she made do. They were merely harmonising with each other around a simple tune Aqua had made up years ago when Terra and Ven came back inside. Mel was trying out different keys at Master Eraqus' old piano while Aqua carefully retuned her violin – and then she noticed Ven's sun burn as he yelped from Leo's advances. He liked to lick cheeks and groom hair by way of a friendly greeting, and his rough tongue aggravated the man's smarting skin.
Ven sat at dinner, staring moodily at his food while Terra didn't try very hard to mask his amusement. Terra hardly ever got sun burnt. Instead, he simply tanned deeply, unlike Aqua. Her skin was so fair she had to be extra vigilant, and despite her best efforts she usually ended up with a red nose more than a few times every summer. This year, however, she had managed so far to avoid sunburn – possibly because Leo made a rather excellent sun umbrella.
Watching meditatively from across the table, while Mel was liberally smearing a sort of gel mixture of lavender and aloe vera on Ven's sunburn, Aqua reflected that Terra was quite handsome – especially at this time of year. He caught her in her daze, looking up in response to her gaze, smiling at first but then smirking at her probably dreamy expression. Aqua rolled her eyes and looked away, wanting to scowl but smiling anyway, and caught a glimpse of Terra's expression as he turned aside and got up to check on the water boiling on the hob.
"Ow!" Ven whined, trying to wriggle out of Mel's reach. She stood there by his chair as he tried to lean back as far as he could without falling off the seat, her hands in the air covered in her sunburn solution and looking for her quite exasperated. "It's hurts!"
"Then let me put this on the burn and it won't hurt tomorrow." She spoke gently and patiently.
Ven sat up straighter in his chair, and continued to grimace though he didn't pull away. He scowled fiercely at Terra's snigger, and when he continued to not so subtly tease Ven while Mel was washing her hands in the sink, she flicked her wet hands at him so the droplets caught him in the face. Terra made as though to rush her, and she stepped back lithely into a ready stance, arms raised in anticipation.
"I'll set Leo on you."
In answer, Leo gave a soft bark from his accustomed corner of the kitchen, and his tail thrashed in the available space, knocking against a table leg and upsetting the cutlery and bowls stacked on the polished wood. Terra let it drop, but he couldn't stop himself sniggering as supper progressed. Mel and Aqua exchanged glances before looking away, pretending to be absorbed in their own thoughts. They would have to try and separate the boys tonight, or they could have a real row on their hands.
XOXOX
The island of Berk jutted up out of the restless sea, defiant of the cold, bleak and wind swept clime. As Leo made his descent they were met in midair by a local dragon, and together they dived towards the land and alighted in the town square. Astrid was especially happy to see them – and gave Mel a warm and very genuine hug, but she knew what the Viking youth was after. While Stormfly, Astrid's blue Deadly Nadder, greeted Leo affectionately by fluffing her wings and delicately nibbling at his jowl, Mel handed over the thing Astrid had been waiting for. Vikings prided themselves on their prowess in battle, and every good blade needed a quality whetstone to keep it in top condition. As long as Mel didn't say directly that they came from a distant place in a completely different World, she wasn't technically breaking the rules of World Order.
"Oh, thanks Mel!" Astrid gave her another great big hug.
"You're welcome. And thank you for getting the leather for Leo's saddle,"
"Oh, it was nothing," she said a little flippantly, brushing the hair out of her eyes and giving Mel an amused look. "You should go find Hiccup. He's dying to know what you think of all those adjustments he's been making." She hefted her second best axe over her shoulder and gave them all a small wave. "C'mon, Stormfly!" the Nadder cocked her head in Astrid's direction before she followed, responding to Leo's call over her shoulder as she went.
"To the forge!" Ven said, brandishing his right hand and blazing the trail up the steep slope on which the village was built.
They were there today to do some trade – Mel owed Hiccup and Gobber a debt for the time and resources that had gone into Leo's newest saddle, and she owed the young dragon trainer a full report on its durability and functionality for his notes. Aqua had as ever reluctantly allowed just the three of them to go, not that Mel could hold it against her… It had after all been on the return journey from Berk that Maleficent had managed to capture Leo.
The Scions Bahamut and Leviathan – in the current form of two heavy summoning crystals – were in their pockets, and both of them had an eye and an ear each on constant guard, just in case. Leo also kept his nose on guard, scenting the air for any trace of Heartless or other monsters lurking in the background.
Mel wanted to say she felt confident since the last time they had seen Pete skulking around the periphery Leo had pounced and roared so loudly he had scuttled away into a dark portal too quickly to really see properly, but…
Like Aqua said: better safe than sorry.
Hiccup was as always pleased to see them, as was Hiccup's dragon. As they talked outside the forge, the only known Keyblade Dragon played around with the only known Night Fury. Toothless bounced around Leo's feet and danced over his tail as it was swung hard at him; he then lithely stepped onto Leo's tail and ran up along his back before standing his hind legs on Leo's shoulders and placing his front legs just behind Leo's head. Leo kept his long neck out straight at an unusual but nonetheless comfortable angle, and opened his jaw wide to let the warbling, grating sounds out while Toothless did something similar with his own voice. It sounded almost like they were singing a duet together; a couple of Terrible Terrors sitting on a nearby rooftop joined in and a Viking came outside and shook his fist.
The three of them turned to watch for a moment with a smile each, before they returned to the topic at hand.
"How's the saddle?" Hiccup asked expectantly with no more preambles.
Mel put her hands together and looked up at the youth over her fingertips. "It's perfect."
It really was. The wooden segments were shaped just so and hinged and padded so that it would allow for Leo's spine to flex as he ran and flew. More people could be comfortably accommodated on the saddle because it was longer, and nifty little hand holds and straps were tucked away in strategic places so that you could hang on securely if Leo pulled any stunts or performed more drastic manoeuvres. The hand holds also served another very important function: thick, durable rope could be cunningly woven through and around them to hold saddle bags in place, or lash larger objects to the saddle for transport. It had been a godsend on the odd occasion where Mel had managed to fell a rather large deer that needed to be transported home before she could begin working on it. Most importantly, the problems with the straps that held the saddle in place on his back had been rectified; buckles and clips held fast, and didn't give way for people to get arms and legs tangled up in them.
"Great!" Hiccup spread his arms wide in delight before clapping his hands together and all but dragging her inside to get her to tell him just exactly what was perfect and what could potentially still be improved upon. He was a perfectionist in his work, and was always making adjustments and improving things, and often venturing into new territories that required a lot of trial and error. Like Leo, Toothless had a pair of fins at the end of his tail that helped in steering and stabilising his flight, though these were comprised of thin, delicate spines covered in a thin membranous skin, whereas Leo's were thick rod like protrusions from which grew flight feathers. One of Toothless' fins was damaged, so through an awful lot of trial and error Hiccup had built Toothless a new tail fin, connected to an ingenious mechanism that was then controlled by the rider, so the pair could fly together.
By the time Mel had finished, Ven was dancing around outside the forge with a few of the village's children, playing with a pack of Terrible Terrors. These were the smallest species of the Berk dragons, about maybe the size of an iguana when they were fully grown, with big eyes, limited fire range, and possibly one of the loudest voices comparative to their body size. A little girl with blonde pigtails and a horned helmet was holding Ven's hands and teaching him a Viking dance while the others laughed and sang a nursery rhyme, the Terrors squeaking and warbling along in practised tune, sending all the adults within range scurrying away with their hands over their ears. Leo was curled up in a patch of sun, cooled by the brisk wind coming straight in off the sea, with Toothless curled up on his back – both oblivious to the world for the moment.
The rest of that day they all helped out with chores around the village. Gobber had a lot of demands on his time and skills; he also taught the youngsters about dragons and weapons craft, as well as making all sorts of weapons, tools and equipment for the village. He was also the chief's oldest friend and closest advisor; the man had a lot on his plate at any given time. Whenever Mel couldn't give him metal ores, tough leather or any more whetstones (he was up to his beard as it was by this point) she instead traded her own time and skills. Berk didn't have a currency so to speak; coins did exchange hands but mostly with people from neighbouring islands and the odd traveller like Trader Johan, and Stoick didn't command taxes of his people. Instead they were all expected to contribute a portion of any food they harvested or reared to the village stores for the season they referred to as 'Devastating Winter'. With no money to tax or trade with, time and skills were highly prized, and Mel had plenty of them to go around.
While Leo careened around the eastern face of the island with Fishlegs and his dragon Meatlug, herding sheep while they saw off wild boars and kept the twins Ruffnut and Tuffnut out of the paddocks where they were trying to tip yaks, Ven helped break up the earth in a field ready for sowing crops as Mel stalked a couple of deer with some other hunters. Her competence with a bow had gone up with all the practise she had been getting in recently, and she rarely missed these days; if she could get close enough without being detected, she could kill with one shot. Once the deer had been hauled back to the village Mel went to help with some fishing. Gobber had said he would help fix the man's boat, but he hadn't had the chance yet, so instead Mel helped him with his quota for the day. Most of the fishing happened at sea, so the fish in the lakes and mountain streams weren't too shy about humans. Dragons definitely, but Mel was surprised by how easy it was for her to walk up to a fish resting on the river bed, and pluck it from the water without having to be too precise about timing.
Mel also noticed a collection of plants and herbs that had useful medicinal properties and made wonderful teas, so she dug up a spare handful of each from different places along the way as she trekked back with her catch of fish (tied to a long cord by their tails and slung over her shoulder). The plants went straight to the village elder and shaman, a very small, mute woman named Gothi who then proceeded to drag Mel all over the village until well into the afternoon administering medicines and attending the scene of many an accident. Ven found her just as they were wrapping up the last casualty of the day, and he tried not to snigger too loudly when he saw Snotlout waving his free arm in the air and shouting at no one in particular about his disobedient dragon. There were six young Vikings in total that made up the vanguard of the Academy, and of them all Snotlout was the one Ven got on with the least. He was certainly brave and had heart, and gave his everything in the defence of his home – but he was fairly arrogant and not especially smart, and he liked making arguments and picking fights for no real reason other than for the sake of it.
Right now, Hookfang the Monstrous Nightmare was capering about willy-nilly, only sitting up to pay attention after Gobber had grabbed him by the jaw and slammed his head into the ground. It looked quite brutal, but dragon skulls were thick, and it was hard to do any real damage to them with you bare hands. Hookfang rarely responded to anyone unless they could exert a measure of dominance, and apparently, Monstrous Nightmares liked it; it had some sort of calming effect, a little bit like holding a shark upside down. Leo avoided him like the plague because this particular breed could set themselves on fire at will, and his feathers weren't impervious to flames. Snotlout knew that, and a few times when they had taken part in a joint training exercise he had not actively discouraged his dragon from flaming up right next to the feathered dragon mid-flight.
"What happened this time?" Ven asked, helping Mel to pack everything away neatly as Snotlout stomped across the square, yelling for his absent dragon after he had shoved his way through the crowd.
"I think Hookfang hit him with his tail and he landed on that fence. A loose nail got him on the arm," she demonstrated on her own arm with a vague gesture. "He's fine." She was about to ask after Ven's day, but Leo bounded into their midst and knocked her over with his enthusiasm. He crowed and barked and ended by pinning her to the ground with his head resting on her torso, banging his tail against the ground like a happy puppy wagging its tail. Ven did try to move him, but it was something of a lost cause – he was just too big and heavy, and had his own mind…
Leo decided to get up suddenly when Toothless bounced past, and they chased each other around the square. While they did this, Stoick came over to talk to them about the village's fortifications against the Heartless. They were as good as they could be, and the chief was aware of the potential short comings, but they seemed happy with the figures so far; no sightings in little over two months now. And no sightings of those creatures whose energy was so warped it made her skin crawl.
Stoick was just trying to convince them to stay for the evening and partake of their feast in the great hall, and then probably for the night too, when a ruckus broke out over the usual low level clamour of the Viking settlement. Another breed of dragon – far less easy to train – was zipping by at an alarming rate, and several people yelled for Hiccup. Mel found Whispering Deaths fascinating; the way they undulated, even while hovering in midair, the constant corkscrew movement of their long sinuous bodies, lacking any limbs but their wings, and the arrangement of their jaws. She wondered what Lynn would think of them, what she would make of these bizarre creatures. They had been pouring over a book detailing most of the known species in the Dragon family across the Worlds – and there was no mention of any of the Berk dragons in there. Lynn kept threatening to come visit and take readings to determine which lineage they belonged to, but she had a few too many demands on her time back in Radiant Garden. Mel had thought about bringing back some samples or pictures, or something for the Nobody to look at, but every time the thought occurred – like now, for example – something would happen. Something was broken, or on fire, or (as in this case) down a deep hole in the ground.
Whispering Deaths liked to tunnel through earth and stone with their odd jaws, which they were doing now. Leo yelped and danced sideways, swinging his front quarters around as he balanced on his back legs to avoid the shifting earth that heralded the underground passage of a Whispering Death. Stormfly was perched on his back fanning her wings with Toothless under his feet snarling defensively at the raised lined of shifting earth.
"I got this," Hiccup said confidently to his father before he pelted across the square yelling over his shoulder, "It's under control! Toothless-!"
"We shoulder probably get going," Ven said into Mel's ear so she could hear him over all the noise. Mel nodded, thinking about how Aqua would feel if they got back after dark.
They thanked Stoick, asked for their farewells and good wishes to be passed on to the others, and they set off for home. Leo often left Berk with a certain measure of reluctance, and he flew to a safe distance away from the island before they dropped into the Lanes Between without any exuberance. Berk was one of the few places he could exercise his full strength in play, because there were other dragons around about his size that weren't especially delicate that could take the full force of his weight. Even the smaller species were quite robust; Gronckles like Meatlug were rather short and very compact, but extremely robust.
Dusk was just starting to fall as they landed in the courtyard in front of the castle. The armour that protected them in the Lanes Between was banished in a glow of soft white light, and Leo stretched his neck and shook himself down before he mounted the stairs and pushed the doors open with his nose to let himself in. They disembarked inside the atrium and removed the saddle, placing it on a special rack Mel and Terra had created and mounted on the wall for the purpose.
And speaking of Terra, he was coming down the stairs to meet them just as they finished putting the saddle away. Leo looked up and croaked a greeting, pressing his muzzle against Terra's hand as he raised it to pat him.
"I thought you guys might be spending the night in Berk," Terra said, running a hand through his hair. Mel detected a jittery quality to his energy – he was planning something.
"We didn't want to worry Aqua, so we didn't stay." Mel explained, scratching Leo's jaw when he swung his head back towards her.
"That and a Whispering Death was on the rampage," Ven laughed. "We figured we'd get out of everyone's hair."
"Right, right…" Ven and Mel exchanged looks before turning back to Terra and waiting. He eventually managed to work out exactly what he wanted to say – probably after a lot of inward debate – and said rather delicately, "We kinda have plans this evening. You know, just the two of us, and…"
"And you want us out of your hair, right?" Ven asked, kicking on his back leg and folding his arms behind his head with a smile.
"Right! Err, I mean-"
"We can occupy ourselves," Mel said, leading Leo by the head towards the stairs.
"Just stay inside!" Terra asked, a pleading note in his voice.
Ven smirked and started making kissing noises in Terra's direction. Much to his chagrin. Leo drew his lips back in a snarl, rumbling deeply in his chest and swung his tail before Mel could stop him, and clipped Ven round the back of the head.
"Ouch!" he jerked forward and instinctively ducked to avoid the recoil, rubbing the back of his smarting head,
"Leo…what did we talk about?" Mel said quietly, arms folded with a hand pressed against her forehead.
Leo snorted hard and glowered at Ven, who scowled back before stalking off ahead of them towards the kitchen. Mel shifted her weight and withdrew her hand before she gave Leo a long-suffering look that he did his best with all good conscience to ignore.
"I'll keep an eye on them both." Mel assured Terra as the dragon stalked off after Ven with stiff shoulders; Terra gave her a grateful look before he disappeared in a great hurry.
The pair of them dined on a quick stir-fry, and Leo on a haunch of venison with assorted raw vegetables with a bowl of apples and pears for dessert. Ven found a stash of chocolate bars in the kitchen that Mel was fairly certain belonged to Aqua, but she accepted half of one anyway with Ven, with the intention of replacing it later, and they retired to the common room. Leo curled up in his accustomed corner and fell into a doze while Mel laid out a selection of bone and amber beads over a loose shirt of soft buckskin. Ven pulled out his lyre and settled himself in the armchair by the hearth and started idly plucking at chords until he was thoroughly absorbed in what he was doing.
With her cousin's journal, Mel had been able to figure out how to return to some of the Worlds she had visited in her eleven years away from home. A lot of people had been hostile towards her in that time, but many had been very welcoming, and she was starting to establish trade with some of those people. This project she was working on was a commission for someone's grandson who was getting mated at the end of the summer. The society in question was somewhat primitive, they had some metal tools but many still used flint blades; Mel knew the patterns used by both families concerned in this matrimonial ceremony well enough, and she was working on that while keeping the grandmother's insistence that she also add her own distinctive artistic flare to the design in mind.
The basic pattern had been set out already, it needed embellishing… Mel took from one of her pouches a deck of cards, shuffled through them while watching Ven play, and picked one at random, laying it face down on the floor to the right of the shirt. She shuffled through again, picking another card and laying it to the left, and then again, placing it at the neck line. She put the rest of the cards away and stared hard at the shirt, thinking of the materials she had to hand. She had porcupine quills, assorted feathers, seashells and the teeth of rabbits, hares, and deer; beads of various materials, and a lot of amber – which was held sacred to these people, and which she had been able to obtain from a great many different sources…
Mel flicked the cards over in the order in which she had drawn them, and stared at them for a long while. Bear, Otter, and Eagle.
She could work with this.
It had to be approaching midnight when Ven knelt beside her, and she looked up with a blink. Leo was fast asleep, it was pitch black outside, and the fire had burned very low. The three animals were only barely visible in vague shapes and the basic outline, nowhere near finished yet.
"Bed time," Ven said, grabbing her under the arms and hauling her to her feet. "It'll still be here in the morning."
They stared at each other for a long moment, and then Mel looked away in defeat. "Fine then…"
Ven grinned and gave her a nudge towards the door. He had learnt that if she was left alone to 'pack up' she would just continue working, and it had been a long day. He was quite good at protecting her from herself when she didn't look after her own needs.
Along the dormitory hall they bade each other goodnight and turned in for the evening. Mel slung her satchel onto the floor by the foot of her bed and dressed for sleep. She paused before dumping her clothes into the laundry basket by the door and looked around her room. There was a cupboard in the corner, and a small chest of drawers; in the diagonally opposite corner there was a desk littered with papers and little boxes and bottles of beads and various other decorative pieces. Slung over the back of the chair was a pile of leather and animal skins. One wall was entirely plastered with sketches and paintings she had made over the course of time. Propped against the side of the wardrobe was the guitar they had given her for her birthday in the spring; it was beautiful, inlaid with a design of three mother-of-pearl dragonflies around the sound hole, and made of a warm honey coloured wood. Mel smiled at the instrument she had been given, and the thought of the friends who had given it to her. It would be Ven's birthday in a couple of weeks, and she couldn't wait to give him the present she had found for him.
Mel undid the braids in her hair, carefully collecting all the trimmings into another box that lived on top of the chest of drawers, and ran a bush through it carefully before she got into bed. She had to get up again when she remembered she had to take her earrings out; one of them she had made with a lot of coiled wire, holding Leo's egg tooth in place with a black and purple flight feather hanging underneath, with a couple of carved beads here and there on a braided piece of leather. It was placed very carefully on a metal screen with lots of holes in it for the purpose of storing earrings, along with the small studs she had been wearing that day, and then she jumped into bed again.
There was a shelf on the wall above the bed, where a few more precious objects were stowed. There was a floppy, stuffed dog that she had acquired on her journey that had been her security blanket for many years, and beside that there now stood a cuddly stuffed owl with a black and yellow scarf wound around it's neck with an envelope propped behind it. It had been Ven's way of giving her a birthday card – the letter told her about how the owl with her Hogwarts letter had gone missing, with much apology for making her miss the drop off year, before wishing her a very happy birthday regardless. He had gone to great pains to make sure it was on very parchment, written in green ink, and she appreciated the time and creativity that had gone into it. Next to the owl were two photo frames Terra had carved for her; the first carefully engraved with delicate leaves, and had a photo of her, her brother Kyo and their cousin Tom taken a few weeks ago. Kyo had tried to hug both of them, but Tom wasn't really one for hugs, so he was smothering Mel instead while Tom stood a little apart from them, his smile small but genuine. The second showed Terra and Aqua, and Mel and Ven standing either side of Leo's head (since his body was far too big to fit into the picture with them all). Terra had an arm around Aqua, and she was leaning her head on his shoulder, while Ven and Mel were hugging Leo's neck and muzzle respectively; everyone was beaming, and the wood of the frame had been carefully worked to look like fish scales.
Mel pulled the sunset coloured blanket over herself before she shuffled around into a comfortable position on her right side, facing the wall. She thought about the guitar, the owl and those photos – thought about her life now. It wasn't easy; keeping Leo well fed was quite demanding, and keeping up with the trade of the products from her kills on top of her continued training was difficult at times. But despite that, she knew exactly where her brother and cousin were and that they were safe and looked after. And she was surrounded by people who accepted her as she was, who loved and supported her. And she had Leo.
What more could she ask for?
Before she fell asleep, Mel fiddled with something on a long, delicate chain around her neck. She wore two necklaces: one had a pendant of a baying wolf that sat just below her collarbone, and on the other hung two rings that usually remained tucked under her clothes. One was plain and made of gold; the other of silver, with an amethyst surrounded by a trio of diamonds. Tom had been carrying them with him all the years he had been searching for her, buried deep in his rucksack. They had been her mother's rings, and she had wanted her daughter to have them.
Mel brought the engagement ring to her lips, thinking of her mother, before she relaxed into the mattress and let sleep claim her. Some things about her old life she still missed deeply, but for everything that she had gained, she was truly grateful.
She slid into a deep sleep that she only half remembered when she awoke the following morning, to a loud banging on her door and Ven's enthusiastic voice telling her there was bacon. Mel would reach sleepily for the diary under her bed and a pencil; eyes still closed, and write down what she could before the full light of day made her forget.
XOXOX