As they traveled, Drache practiced every day at changing to and from her hawk form. She kept her eye on Zoro, but he treated her no differently from the other crew members, so she slowly and painfully decided that night they'd had was a fluke, and that she might as well give up on him. So she forced a smile onto her face and asked Nami to teach her about navigation. As the days passed, she would wake early, and spend an hour practicing flying within eyeshot of the ship. When Nami wasn't actively steering, she would tell Drache about tides, reefs, sandbars, and weather patterns. The navigator gave her map-drawing exercises and constantly quizzed her on her knowledge. Though she was a harsh teacher and had a quick temper, the redhead was also quick to smile and laugh. Drache found it easy to be around her, and spent most of her days with her.
Asking Nami to teach her had not been entirely driven by curiosity. Though she had tried to convince herself of his disinterest, Drache still had trouble keeping her eyes away from Zoro. She had her mind in control, but her heart still beat faster when he looked at her, and when he spoke, she couldn't help a little flush rising in her cheeks. He continued to give no indication of interest. He spent little time with the crew, mostly exercising or sleeping.
Weeks later they found themselves, exhausted, at the end of a lengthy and painful adventure on Skypiea. Drache had found herself to be mostly useless except when she flew around the overgrown upper yard and helped crew members find each other. The fights she'd gotten into she had lost or escaped from, mostly unharmed, until she'd been shot in the foot by a Shandian warrior's pistol. After that she really couldn't fight, and had helped Conis get the islanders to evacuate, scouting out paths to the blue sea.
After Luffy successfully rang the golden bell and defeated Enel, and the Skypieans had reconciled with the Shandians, they had begun to celebrate. By this point Drache just wanted to have a good time, because she was tired of fighting and worrying, and her foot was starting to ache. She wanted to dance, but she contented herself with playing a drinking game from Shandora with a group of Sky people. It was a dice game with complex rules about when to drink. The rules were so difficult to follow, in fact, that after a few rounds they devolved into a game where everyone got a number, and if your number was rolled you had to drink. That was far easier to handle, but it was dangerously difficult to stay very sober. Drache forgot entirely about her foot, and laughed and joked with some Shandian warriors late into the night.
Some time later, she found herself reclining off to the side with a drink in her hands. She felt happier than she ever thought she could. She was drunk, and tired, and she knew her foot would be in pain for a little while but she didn't care. Nami had been dancing with some Skypiean, but when she saw Drache sitting alone, she smiled a huge smile, waved, and jogged over to sit next to her. Drache, looking at Nami's flushed face, knew what Emily had been attracted to in the redhead.
"What are you doing over here, Drache? You should be dancing or something!"
"I would," she replied, "But my foot is killing me."
"Oh no! Should I go get Chopper?"
"No, no, I just don't think I should dance on it tonight. Don't let me interrupt your dance, I'm just taking a little break. I was thinking of going to bed soon anyway, I'm pretty tired."
"Oh don't! There'll be plenty of time to sleep later. You should come with me and we can play that dice game with the Shandians again!"
"Thanks Nami, but I should really take a break from drinking, I don't have nearly the tolerance you do. I'll just go on a little walk through the woods, then turn in."
"If you say so," said the redhead, then she scampered over to the girl she'd been dancing with before. Drache was happy she'd found someone to hang out with on this island, because Drache was clearly not going to be any fun. She pushed herself to her feet, gave herself a moment to steady herself against a tree, then walked out into the darkness of the woods with her backpack. It was slow going, as there were tree roots everywhere, her foot hurt, her eyes were dazzled from looking into the fire, and she was far from sober. She reached a clearing, sat against a tree, and looked into the clear starry night. She had made it far enough that the sounds of laughing and yelling from the fire were muffled, and the heat from the fire was conspicuously absent. She shivered and pulled a blanket of her backpack. She wrapped it around herself and relaxed.
Much later, she half awoke as a twig snapped nearby. Deep down she knew that any enemies had been ostracized from the island, so she didn't panic, but she half opened her eyes when a roughly calloused hand touched her face. Blurry though her eyes were, she could clearly see that the trespasser's hair was a light, mossy green. Not awake enough to process anything, she murmured "Hello," though she enunciated poorly and it didn't come out as a word.
"Shhh," said her visitor, then "Are you cold?" in a deep voice with a touch of worry.
Another noise came out of her mouth, this time in the affirmative. She was very cold, very tired, and though she tried to move and clear her eyes, she realized she felt very weak. She tried to push herself off of the tree she leaned on, but found her arms to be useless, then let them flop back to her sides. Her sluggish mind started trying to think of what could be going on. She looked down at her injured foot and found that the would had reopened, probably when she had staggered drunkenly to this tree. It had been bleeding slowly since she'd arrived, the ground soaking up the blood. She looked up at Zoro, who returned her gaze with concern, then she passed out.