A painful thing

That fire, had -hurt-. It hadn't killed him, but Viletongue -hurt- after that. It had been explained to him that it would, very likely, hurt quite a bit, but he didn't feel so bad when he realized that both Squarejewel and Kai-Kai had gotten caught in the blast as well. No, his pain melted away, replaced with rage.

He needed to kill something. Having chased after the largest giant that Imane had also followed, he had been utterly disappointed that he hadn't gotten to kill him. As he landed on the roof, he waited for Kai to unevenly weave through the air and settle down next to him, burned black and bleeding as the charred parts of her flesh broke and oozed. He opened his mouth to say something as she glanced over, and choked on his words for a moment as she rasped out a few of her own.

"Hey, we match now."

"Match. We -Match-. You're bleeding and burned and all you can say is that we match now?"

"Well, yeah. You did good. An' next time, I'll be prepared a bit better. 'S not the last we seen've him. I'm proud've you."

"I didn't save anyone. He breathed into the building-"

"Yeh. One building, not th'whole town."

"The giants-"

"Yeah, Imane was s'posed to thin'em out, but he took off after that big one looks like. Big one's dead now."

"Yesss. The Dwarf killed him." Viletongue growled low, though the sound was cut short as he hacked and coughed.

"Did. We got one alive, though, and I dunno anything more intimidating than you an' the big guy. Could prob'ly carrot-stick'im." She closed her eyes, stretching out on the cobblestones with a faint grimace and wheezed slightly.

"You should see a healer."

"-You- should see a healer."

"You both should see a healer." The Eidolon settled on the ledge, peering down at the giant. "You are both unacceptably wounded. But I am proud of you both. Keda-Kai, you did not die. I expected you to, against a red dragon. Viletongue, you did not flee. I had thought you might, after the conflagration."

"I probably would have, except he was an idiot and also hit Kai-Kai. Nobody hits Kai-Kai. I thought that was your -job-." The dragon settled down, resting against the stone of the roof and folding singed wings against his body.

"My job is also to protect you. You know she wished for me to do so more than to protect herself."

"Hey now, I'm right here, yeah?" The charred half-elf muttered weakly.

"Hush, squishling. Dragons are talking." Cheekily, Viletongue lightly bapped her on the nose with his tail, before rumbling a low sound. "... I need to get stronger. I need to get bigger. I need… I can't fight him again like that, even for my territory."

"He did hit fairly hard. Harder than I do, at least." The Eidolon inclined his head, still watching the proceedings below. "But what tipped the tide in his favour, is his breath weapon. We must prepare for it next time. I managed to utilize my wings to funnel the worst of it away from me, however I do not believe this is something you can do with your composition. You are simply not made of the same material I am."

"I'll work on it. I'm fairly certain 's somethin' I can do, but I just gotta practice."

"Rest, Kai-Kai. Once we find the Dwarf, we will see to it you get healed." Viletongue frowned over at the prone half-elf, and received a grunt in response.

"Am restin'. Just talkin'."

"Why don't you seem to feel pain? Though all the years, even when I accidentally hurt you, you've always been like this. You look hurt, but you don't act it." There was an accusatory note in the dragons voice, and he huffed as she cracked an eye open to peer over at him. "You should be screaming in pain. -I- feel like screaming in pain. I'm only not because you're not."

"How do I put this…" She pondered it for a moment, before closing her eye. "... I used to worship the God of Pain. This? 'S bad, yeah. But you learn to put pain in a lil' box and keep goin', 'cause even if it hurts 's nothin' I can do to make it -not- hurt. Not right now. I hurt, an' then I think about you an' Squarejewel in danger, and my hurt fades, 'cause I'm more scared've losin' either've you."

"But growing up, you weren't losing me if-"

"Think've it. You accidentally hurt me, a' I fall to the ground screamin' like a banshee. You'd balk, sure, the next time you almost hurt me. Might save me from pain. But you're a -dragon-. If you balk at hurting people, you'll just end up losin' every fight you get into. And I want you to -live-."

Viletongue frowned faintly, before lowering his head to rest, muttering quietly as the half-elf took a moment to do the same.

"... But I want -you- to live, too…"

A moment before the flames

Keiaku saw the jaw open, knew from instinctive experience granted by the great dragon it was a fragment of what would happen next, and felt the heat wash over it. It was still up, by the end of infernal gout, and barreled through with its summoners choked sounds of pain echoing through its head while its ward's bellow of pain twisted to rage.

-Protect him. I can't… I can't be here anymore. I'll die, and you'll disappear, and then he'll kill Vee-Tee.-

=Hide nearby, then. No farther than a hundred feet. If I go down, you know what you must do.=

-Good news is I got lots've blood to use for it.-

The eidolon scored a few more strikes against the red dragon, only to feel its corporeal form disintegrate after a particularly deep claw strike across its torso, and as it fragmented it braced itself for the disorientation that would come. It knew nothingness, and then came screaming back into existence and barreled towards the red drake, renewed even as its vision swam.

Such was very likely why it almost overshot the parapet, and had to waste precious seconds righting itself to keep from going over. As it recovered, it heard the red dragon address Viletongue, and it made sure to relay every word back to its summoner-

"I invite you to join me, to serve me."

"You come into MY territory, harm MY people, and you EXPECT ME TO SERVE?"

-And then the red dragon was gone. Several things happened in that moment. They caught sight of a stone giant and flew down to attack it, only for it to surrender. It hadn't expected the black dragon to give up that easily, though on reflection realized most of the fight had been knocked out of him.

Keda-Kai sent Viletongue to help Imane, though the dragon returned shortly stating that the large giant the aasimar had been fighting was dead, killed by the dwarf with magic of some kind while they settled onto the rooftop they had started from once it had busted down the debris that had kept the humans trapped inside the burning barracks.