I find myself waking up in a pile of bodies. I don’t know how, but despite all of my siblings going down different paths in their magic, and their personalities slowly reflecting that, they’re all still absolute cuddlebugs. I am on my back, with my wings pinned by my siblings. Can’t move, can’t roll away, so I just reach over towards Spots’ head and start giving him scratches. Some squirming ensues and suddenly all my siblings are awake, grooming each other, playfully nipping and nudging like children. Very scaly children.

They are absolutely adorable. They are also changing scents, which is mildly worrying. Up until now we’ve all had our own unique yet mundane smell, meant to help us distinguish each other better, but we also had the scent of mixed mana. I smell a bit more like chaos since I keep going to the pillar to train, but they smell like flame, earth and water respectively, despite not going daily to the pillars. They can waste their entire pool playing or hunting, yet they recover mostly their own element than the mix, despite doing nothing to ensure that, like I do. It’s like they started filtering it innately.

Their understanding has also grown. They speak of things we don’t yet have words for, using their body, gestures and witty ways of interpreting the few words we do know. I’ve listened in on the whispers of their mana every now and then, and it became clear just how their minds advance so fast. The whispers are constant, directed and focused. This mana doesn’t speak of the math, physics or chemistry behind their effects, but it does speak of just about anything else. The way it feels to lay on a warm rock, how exciting it is to explore the depths of the ocean, the riches one may find if they go deep down enough, anything even remotely related to their element is whispered in their ears, filling up that sponge-like brain children have.

Man… chaos sucks in this aspect. It says only random, useless stuff, that’s why I tuned it out in the first place. What is “angry red man”, “sparky spear” and “wheat hunts” even supposed to mean? Normal mana is also plenty useless. Sure it talks a bit about things related to it, but doesn’t really impart anything vivid, if that makes any sense. The living mana makes you feel like you’re there, like you understand, while dead mana just tells and occasionally gives some hallucinations.

I can’t help but sulk at being unable to get a powerful specialization, but there is little I can do. Despite the time passing, none of the remaining pillars react to me, so it must mean that either I need to wait for mother to find a different kind, or I need to figure things out for myself. It would be a problem if I am stuck without an affinity or an identity. Or at least I think that it would be. Mother… how should I say this, she has so much mana that she actively forces it to stay inside, and the way beasts grow crystals in their core… I think that a properly attuned core eventually means getting free mana and not having to fear becoming a very frail living rock out in the wilds.

I am pushed from my own head by apparently becoming the target of all my siblings, the little killing machines knocking me back down and nibbling me all over in spite of my struggles. I laugh and forget my envy, remembering my own talents, even though I know they will catch up on those too eventually. They are impressive, adorable… And I fear that at some point they will become horrible creatures… I can’t even blame them, not really. All the voices… all the instincts… everything is designed to make them think of life as cheap. Hell, it’s worked on me. I’ve eaten wolves and bears, animals I know are smart, and I had quite a few close calls with the humans. It’s obvious that if they don’t learn differently, they will see people and whatever other sapients exist in this world as food.

And that revelation is what begins my days of doing what I can to get them to like people. Basically, I’m like a cat trying to bring other cats to humans, but I am larger than the humans and the humans have nothing to keep them safe and… I have my work cut out for me.

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Over the weeks that pass I hold to my goal, despite the difficulty. When they aren’t training their magic, hunting, or just being lazy, squishy things, I take them with me to play. Understandably, the humans aren’t eager to interact with my siblings, especially considering the look they have in those reptilian eyes, but my siblings, children that they are, see the board games and instantly flock to see what we’re doing. I do my best to explain without words, pointing at the designs on the chess pieces, showing how I move them, and even playing a match against Ayrah for demonstration. As I lose, not really putting in my all, they go from statues that barely inched their heads side to side, to a full blown gallery at a tournament, losing their minds over the game, and at least one of them might be eager to beat me at something since they have yet to beat me in a fight.

I show them marbles, thinking games, running games, hiding games, everything they can do that can include the humans, and the second I see one of them going even a bit hard or getting frustrated I nudge them into not making a “mistake”. It takes a while, but slowly some kind of rapport is built. Weeks pass and they seek out people to play. A month passes and they eat together. We are approaching summer and they start to nibble and lick the humans as if they were soft, scaleless dragons.

Really it was as much a struggle for the humans as it was for the dragons. Of course, it was Alek that made the biggest push, namely giving Red Tail his very first pat. The dragon has since spent many nights curling up to get pats and scratches from the boy, who never seems to get sick of doing it. Crown had been bribed by the vines the old lady makes when she’s bored, and Spots was really just interested the entire time, but even as we approached our birthday (or at least my estimation of it) he had yet to get too close to anyone.

It was… surprisingly easy. Mother did not push back any as I worked this out, really she even gave us words that helped me make things easier, like a word for relations and links, which even included “family” and “friends” under its umbrella. She taught us how to say friend when I was trying to teach them friendship… is that… intentional? Probably not. Don’t read too much into it, you moron called “me”.

…

Why did I not try this earlier? Would it have worked if my siblings had simpler minds? Would it have been better or worse? Each day I feel like I understand myself less… Like my mind splits itself apart without my knowledge or will. I fear for what happens next time I lose track of myself… After all, I spent so much energy in this that I’ve been somewhat stagnant in my own training… improving at a rate that can’t keep up with the raw power I’ve seen from them…

At least they are stagnating too, and not just because of the time spent playing. The inner parts of the pillars are tougher, more defined and take a long battle to even chip. They are also shaped strangely and uniquely, showing the pattern that the crystal follows as it grows. Much like pyrite is cubes within cubes, so are these gems, taking on strange shapes similar to their runes, looking almost polished after all the devouring my siblings have done. At least there seems to be a bottleneck that is keeping them from really taking it all in… I may actually start doing whatever they’re doing by the time they figure out how to continue… hopefully.

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I look up at the sky, tilting my head, narrowing my eyes, eventually realizing that I can indeed see the gap between the suns lessening. At least compared to my memory from the first time I saw them, they drifted a bit closer, but not enough to overlap quite yet. At this pace… it might take a few years before they cross, with the yellow aiming to stand in front of its larger brother. I wonder what that’ll be like…

My thoughts are interrupted by quiet footsteps. I look back to see Edith walking out of the cave, alone, just barely managing to take the steps needed to reach me, before curling into a ball next to my basking rock. She narrows her eyes, probably from the strong light, which makes me deploy my organic umbrella over her, tilting my head. I do not understand why she’s here, she isn’t usually the proactive type, only waiting for me to come before following along.

Yet here she is, looking exhausted yet not tired, lifeless eyes staring at the dirt in front of her as she draws something with her long, frail, charred index finger. Amusingly enough it is similar to my own drawings… just as rushed, just as bad, just as easy to understand regardless. It is her home and two figures that are probably her family. That… Ah, she’s homesick. My birthday is coming sometime in the next couple months, meaning she’s been here for close to a year. Away from family, away from everything really.

Poor girl.

Wait, I know where her home is, I remember with certainty, the town I saw that day was certainly hers. I just need to take her there… Maybe mother would be mad if I left her there, I am still unsure about that, so I can only offer her a small reunion, not a full ticket home, but it should raise her spirits. My mind freezes, as I realize… didn’t I promise…

“Useless/Thoughts!/March!/Thoughts??/Jumbled, very/Burn, burn/Coming!/Feed earth. Eat Earth.”

I scream and snap at the mana coming off of me. This is why I keep these whispers silent, there’s nothing useful here…

“S-sorry…” I hear a weak cry. Edith looks at me in shock, as if remembering that I am a monster. My pupils narrow, I can feel my focus being reduced to only her face, her expression, a painful nail driven through my heart. I snapped at her… No, it looks like I did, which is just as bad.

I let out a sigh, reaching in, slowly, to nuzzle against her cheek, which she accepts, but far more cautiously than before. I promised to myself that I’ll get them home, and yet I forgot all about her little town. This is not normal. I can remember the exact position of the suns months ago, but not something so important… My mind is wrong. I don’t know what happened but something’s messing with my mind. It might be mother? Maybe her spell lingers… It may have messed with my brain enough to forget… Did I promise before or after I lost months on that? It’s all so frustrating!

And there’s nothing I can do, so I accept it and move on. In this case moving on looks like me going into the cave and changing out my mana. Edith looks disheartened as I leave, but it doesn’t matter. She will be happy soon enough. It takes hours to charge fully on air and electric mana, but it is enough that I should easily last the trip to the town, and then I can sit out in the woods for an hour to charge back up enough to make it back home, at least if I take the gems with me, which I obviously do.

I go over to the human room, carrying a decent quantity of crystals in my mouth and arms, taking them to the half bag half basket Old Yvonne made. It takes borrowing a bit of the mana coming off of her to make the thing just a bit tougher, so it holds the crystals without breaking. Once that is done, I hold it in my mouth and pull Edith to follow, shaking my head at anyone that tries to come with. I take the girl ousted, and with little warning, I take off and grab a hold of her with my six available limbs, holding her tight in spite of her momentary struggle.

“Please don’t! Little Hearteater, I am sorry! I didn't mean to annoy you… Please, please don’t do this!” Ah you poor girl, thinking such scary thoughts after just silently begging to see home again… Also, really, how did that name take? Why did they name me before mother has!? I don’t know what sort of weird traditions dragons have, but it feels pretty weird for your thinking kid to still not have a name, especially now that all of us are thinking, not just my abnormal self.

Edith goes quiet about a minute into the flight, seeming to let her limbs free against the wind. Huh, she’s enjoying it. I guess she realized I’m not about to drop her. I just hope it lasts, but I know it won’t. My wings flap quickly, electricity courses through my veins, the green sea rushes below me. My mind blanks as I feel like I am on the highway. I am startled awake who knows how much time later by the town becoming visible.

“Home… Mama… Papa!” I follow her gaze and I see… a simple house, much like the others. This village… it really isn’t a town at this size… is very poor. Still, they have farm animals, a field of grain over on a particularly flat hill and multiple gardens all over. I landed a while away, not eager to be seen, but I still made sure we were close to her apparent home.

I feel sluggish once on the ground, my legs having fallen asleep holding Edith, but it seems that hers are still very much awake. Please don’t make me run after you… You’re making me run. Damnit… I walk after her, keeping my eyes open. There’s a pit growing in my stomach… a while back I was eager to see how the people here live, but I really don’t want them to see me around. That could turn into panic quickly.

Edith, girl… Please don’t mess things up… I’m a tired dragon and you’re a beacon for mother’s unwanted attention… I see her figure a bit further ahead, just at the treeline. Good, she’s waiting… and waiting… and waiting… I reach her and look up, confused about the freeze. She is in pain. I see a terror in her eyes that I haven’t seen since the time she was meant to be food. I wonder what could scare her so…

I see a beautiful woman carrying some old wooden bucket filled with water over to a gathering of birds. Ducks and chicken roam freely and swarm her as she pours the water into a large flat bowl for them. I wonder why the fear, then I see the woman turning around, a baby in her supposedly free arm. A baby she is rocking gently while wearing a most precious smile.

I also see a man, thin but toned, with reddened skin from staying out in the sun. He laughs as he hugs her from behind, just barely keeping his muddy hands away from her. They look happy. They also look a bit like Edith. And yet Edith looks horrified still. She looks at her hand, then back at the happy couple… and she walks away. Not even towards the town, just back where we came from. Why would-

The baby is young. Very young. My head turns towards it and I see… yeah, I am certain. At most a couple months old, probably younger… meaning… there’s a good chance they had it after she was taken.

They replaced her.

I wish I could hug her, or take her away, but I think she needs space at the moment. I almost give it to her, but I find my body moving on its own, spreading its wings and grabbing her, ignoring her screams.

Really, they are easy to ignore, considering that hers aren’t more thunderous than a storm. They also don’t bear the order to rush back home. Mother’s angry and I fear it might be my fault…