"It's a rather nice day, isn't it?" Charlie questions, making yet another weak attempt at conversion as she winces as the carriage hits another bump. She truly didn't understand why her mother had insisted on a carriage ride, at least with Hiccup she could pretend that she needed to pay attention to control him, but carriage rides were the worst. When Santana doesn't answer her or blink, she swallows, this wasn't going well at all. She wasn't sure what one talked about, she wasn't much for talking while sober. She points to a place, "They sell fresh bread there, I mean the couple that runs the bakery always give me the slightly hard bread in the mornings if I happen to be in town in the mornings."

Santana tilted her head, her ears flattening slightly, "After your nights in a whorehouse?" There was a gentle teasing tone in her voice, as she watches as Charlie turns a bright red and she immediately stutters.

"I—I don't spend—" Charlie blew out her cheeks. Her mother had given her instructions to make sure that she knew by the end of the night how she felt about Santana, and really she could already tell that this was going about as well as her other forced dates. It didn't help that Santana made her dizzy and placed her on the backfoot constantly.

"I don't bite," Santana says after realizing that her playful jibe had sent her mate into a state of panic, she's rewarded with a raised brow from Charlie. "Okay you caught me in a lie, but it doesn't hurt that much."

Charlie snorts, "I've probably been bitten by worse."

"Really?"

"The moment that Hiccup was bigger than me he tried to take my arm, like the whole arm was in his mouth." When Santana looks interested, she wiggles her left arm. "He's very stubborn, and wanted to be the one in charge, you have to be firm with him sometimes, or he will escape and he will terrorize the townspeople. He likes going swimming and terrorizing the fishing boats and raiding their nets. He is aware of all the chaos he causes, he just doesn't care, that's why I take him out as often as I can."

"He protected me when I went near the drake dens. I thought he was going to eat me, but he didn't eat me. I assure you that I'm grateful, do you know how embarrassing it is for a predator to get eaten?" Santana sniffed, she really had no idea why Charlie's drake hadn't attempted to eat her.

"I'm surprised he didn't, but I'll talk to him and the rest of the drakes so they know to leave you alone, the drake pens are dangerous. You really shouldn't go without a member of my family with you, or someone that they're familiar with. Hiccup is—trouble." Charlie admits easily before biting her lip, she wanted to know more about Santana. "Maybe tomorrow we can go riding, unless you have other things that you like to do for fun?"

There was an almost predatory grin on Santana's face when Charlie asked her what she enjoyed, but instead she looked outside. "Now that we're no longer around any prying eyes, do you think that we can finally walk? As you said earlier it's a nice day outside."

Charlie looked outside and quickly assessed the area, before knocking her fist against one of the carriage walls, and opens the window so she can talk to the driver, "We'll be walking from here," Charlie informs him, reaching for her coin purse and pulling out a large golden coin, "If my mother asks for a report, tell her things are going well—they are going well?"

Santana smiles at Charlie and opens the door when the carriage comes to a complete stop. "Keep up."

Charlie blinks and looks at the driver helplessly, she really didn't know what was going on anymore but she quickly follows Santana out of the carriage. She flushes when she realizes that the folks of the capital are all giving her odd looks but she focuses on Santana who is standing on one of the weird poles that stick out of the water near the pier. "What are you—"

"You wanted to know what I did for fun, keep up," Santna repeats as she balances on the beam before jumping to the closest one. "Scared?"

Charlie looked at the pole for a moment and then at the ease that Santana had jumped from one pole to another and removed her coat. If she went slowly she probably wouldn't fall into the water. Swordsmanship was mostly in the feet but she'd never been graceful, nothing like Santana. She slowly puts her foot on one of the poles, testing it to make sure it could hold her weight before she hops on and tries to regain her balance, she immediately looks up and grins at Santana. "I did it."

Santana tilted her head, "How can you be so good at dancing, and so bad at this? Like I said keep up," Santana grins as she hops onto another one.

Charlie eyes the next pole and looks back at Santana, there was no way she was making that jump anywhere as gracefully as Santana had just made it. Maybe if she had a running start but her jump wasn't anywhere as smooth as Santana's. Still she swings her arms and jumps. She barely makes the jump landing on her toes and nearly falling backwards only to be grabbed by Santana who had come to rescue her. "You saved—"

"You smell awful," Santana informs her mate, letting go of Charlie's belt and watching as Charlie just drops into the water. Santana watches as Charlie surfaces and spits out some of the sea water, before deciding to get to move to the pier, a bath would do wonders for the smell, and she liked the smell of the sea. She shifts into her panther form, causing a few townspeople to immediately back away as she lands on the pier and waits for Charlie to swim over, when her mate surfaces she leans forward and takes another sniff, before placing her paw on Charlie's head and pushing her back down. She still smelled.

When Santana finally takes her paw off and she surfaces again Charlie glares at her, "What was that—" A massive paw immediately pushes her back under water. Without giving it much thought and wanting to get out of the water Charlie reaches up and wraps a hand around Santana's paw, and uses her strength to pull Santana in the water.

It doesn't take long for Charlie to immediately regret that decision as Santana flails in her panther form, claws coming out and striking her in the shoulder and chest as Santana tries to find something to grip onto. Which unfortunately for her was not the pier but her body, and under the weight of Santana's jaguar form she's being pushed down deeper into the water, as the salt water begins to sting her wounds.

~ O ~

For the first time since she had met her mate Santana was at a loss. She had hurt her mate. Her claws had torn into Charlie's body, shredding it easily, she hadn't lost control to her instincts like that for a long time, and while she had wanted to get Charlie naked at some point tonight, she hadn't been expecting to patch up her mate until after they had mated, not before!

"I'm sorry."

Santana glances up at Charlie who winced as she bandaged up an ugly looking gash on her forearm, "Why are you apologizing? I hurt you."

"I mean I knew that cats weren't huge fans of water, but you had jumped into the bath's with me so I didn't think you'd mind, I didn't mean to scare you."

Santana let out a loud throaty growl at the word, "You didn't scare me. I wasn't prepared for it, and my instincts kicked in, I thought you were a predator trying to lure me into the water. Alligator beastkin are a thing, and they have no problem dragging you under. Don't apologize, you didn't know," Santana interrupts Charlie who opened her mouth to apologize again. "Now you know not to pull me in, and I know that you're an awful swimmer."

"I can too swim," Charlie huffed this. "But you were totally trying to drown me."

"I was giving you a bath."

"I already bathed today! They scrubbed me raw," Charlie huffed at this. The bleeding had already stopped and some of her wounds were already healing, "I'll be fine Santana, I was dropped off a castle and I'm fine."

Santana tilted her head, "I mean you didn't know that you have a dragon core, and you didn't know that your grandmother was a dragon—I mean how can you not feel it? And you talk in draconic, like I really don't know how you didn't make the connection."

"I forget things, sometimes, and my family treats me like I'm the butt of the joke at times, well my sister's do. And everytime I think about it too hard, my head hurts so I don't think about it. I still don't really believe that I'm part dragon. I mean maybe if I could transform into one, but I can't."

"Perhaps one of our shaman's could help, there are cases where a prime is born and they get stuck in one form or another," Santana muses, as she runs a finger along one of Charlie's wounds, they were already healing and closing up, it would leave a scar, it had been deep and she had seen scars all over Charlie's hands and back. "This wasn't how I wanted our meeting to go," she admits. "I just didn't want you to smell like you'd been attacked by flowers, it was giving me a headache."

"Well, I expected this."

"You expected this?" Santana motions to Charlie's sopping wet clothes, and blood soaked bandages.

"Well not this exact thing. I expected this to go badly. These type of things always go badly for me, if you storm off and start ranting about how inconsiderate I am, then it'll be like all the other times my mother forced me on these outings," Charlie let out a laugh as she rubbed the back of her neck and winced as she feels a cut on her neck. "You're not going to leave and start telling everyone how inconsiderate I am."

"You're my mate, I know that it doesn't mean much to you because you aren't beastkin, but it means something to me. It's not just about the sex, you're supposed to be my partner. It's like marriage, but far more intimate. I can't be with anyone else, I wouldn't even want to be with anyone else—and I hurt you even if it was an accident, I'm surprised that you aren't declaring war."

Charlie snorted, "War? Over this? Do you have any idea how much paperwork I'd have to do? I'd be chained to my desk if a war broke out between the beastkin and our kingdom."

"That's the only thing that's keeping you from attacking us?" Santana questions, trying not to smile at how ridiculous that sounded. Sansa had made Charlie out to be this mastermind, but really she just didn't want to do the work involved.

"I don't want to have to kill people, if I can help it. Monsters and crystal scorpions are one thing, but people. I want to protect my kingdom and if there is a war, then I can't do that. My people will die, or get hurt or maimed, and for what? Your people aren't a threat, and you've made excellent partners at the border. Plus I've got beastkin friends, some of them have even been knighted," Charlie explains. "I wouldn't want them to have to fight their brothers and sisters."

"A prime beastkin is dead, and his body desecrated—and you still haven't given us a why? Or a who?"

"Quinn is working on it, all her spies are everywhere. But I think we're asking the wrong questions. Slavery is illegal in the kingdom, and beastkin aren't discriminated against, at least not like in the Holy Empire. I'm sure there are some hard feelings but most people are happy so they're not looking for people to blame. You've been here for weeks now, you've been treated well by our staff and our people, it is against our laws. Criminals will always break laws, but we made it very clear and have done checks to make sure that this problem wasn't endemic."

"It wasn't the Holy Empire, and the draconic kingdom no longer has any ties with the beastkin. The dwarves are neutral and the elves have been our allies for generations," When Charlie's brow furrows at this Santana narrows her eyes. "The elves? Why would the elves be behind this?"

"Because they're pretentious—" Charlie inhaled, "Have you met the elven royal family?"

"No. They barely leave the forest."

"The King and Queen are twins, and have a brood of children," at Santana's absolute look of disgust Charlie nodded. "Their oldest, Prince Joffrey is an ass, cowardly and cruel and incompetent. No one listens when I tell them that they are a problem, I don't have a problem with elves, I mean I don't trust them as a general rule, but the royal family is another thing entirely. I don't have any proof, but I do think that they're the ones behind all of this. "

"But what do the elves get out of it?" Santana questions, taking Charlie's insight seriously.

"I don't know, maybe it has something to do with magic being corrupted, I don't have all the pieces but it's probably the elves."

"Magic is being corrupted?" Santana repeats, this was the first she'd heard of it. "How do you—your grandmother," when Charlie nods, Santana hums there were certainly pieces missing and it was an accusation but without proof, they couldn't just launch an accusation of that magnitude. Before she can start asking more questions the loud sound of her mate's stomach rumbling causes her to raise a brow and turn to her, watching as Charlie turns a bright red. "Can we continue this over dinner?"

Charlie nods, flashing Santana a grateful smile, she hadn't eaten all day. "There's this nice place near the ocean, they have really good fish, and other food from the sea. I don't know, I asked the locals about it. They all told me the same thing." She wasn't the biggest fan of fish but seeing Santana grin at the idea, made it all worth it. She could suffer fish if it meant that Santana was happy. It was still meat.

~ O ~

Kara turned in her seat as the door to the restaurant opened. It had taken her calling in the favor that Quinn owed her, to figure out where Charlie was having her date. But considering where Charlie usually spent her days, this place was a step up. She scowls when it's just some random citizen. "You don't think she figured it out and decided to bail, do you?"

Lena shot Kara a slightly irritated look, "I know you miss your best friend—" Lena held up her hand before Kara could start arguing with her, "But I don't know why we can't just have a nice night out without you plotting her downfall. Charlie likes her, for whatever reason Charlie likes her she wouldn't have danced with her all night otherwise, she wouldn't have come to ask for help otherwise."

Kara blinked, judging from Lena's tone she had stepped in it, but she really didn't like how Lena was taking Charlie's side in all of this. "I—" Before she can finish the door opens once again distracting her as Charlie and Santana finally enter the tavern. Her eyes usually lock onto Charlie the moment that they were in the same room together but Charlie hadn't noticed her yet, instead her eyes seemed to be glued to Santana.

"What the hell happened to them?" Lena questions noticing the bandages around Charlie's arms, tilting her head.

Kara tilted her head, Charlie didn't seem to be in any sort of distress or even nervous, she had expected her to be nervous, Charlie was always nervous around beautiful women. "I mean, did you expect anything differently from Charlie? Anyway lets get out of here, before she sees us."

"Are you finally acting your age?"

"I am mature," Kara insisted, raising her voice ever so slightly, outraged by Lena's impression of her.

Santana spotted them first and groaned, "I should have gouged her eyes out when I had the chance," she muttered under her breath.

"You tried to gouge out her eyes?" Charlie repeats in slight awe, deciding in that moment that
Santana was going to be her queen and she would do anything to keep her from ever getting angry with her. "I love you," she blurts out.

Santana reached down and pet Charlie's hands, her mate was so innocent it was rather precious, "Wait until after tonight to tell me that," Santana informs her. "Now about that fish, we'll just ignore them. I want all the fish."

Charlie nodded wordlessly, and shot a look at Kara, they would settle this later she motions to the empty seating as she offers Santana her arm, grinning like an idiot when Santana wraps her arm around hers. She immediately stands a little bit straighter. "All the fish," she repeats to the hostess, once Santana has taken her seat. "Every last piece." Whatever Santana wanted she would get it for her.