"Actually, I was planning to try and do a dungeon or something for fun," Carl said. "Mina said she knew where things were, but she's been gone a while, so I ended up just sort of driving aimlessly."

I was correct; he does enjoy driving slowly. I believe I am coming to grasp how Carl thinks. Although… Dungeons. Father—

{Yes, I believe he speaks of the dragons' ancient pastime. The methods they employed to guard their hoards.}

Ir'alith nodded her agreement. "Ah, so you have this inclination," she said. "Such things are no longer as common as they once were, but—"

{Alith, you must use this opport—}

Ir'alith sent a barrage of tired irritation to her father for his continued pestering and rolled her axe backwards to plant it into the ground behind herself with her tail. He was behaving in such an exhausting manner since they had been reunited!

An idea occurred to her. Papa, I will send you with Carl to assist him with his dungeon. I—

{WHAT?!}

I cannot fully overcome this madness unless I can devote my entire being to it, and I cannot do such a thing so long as you are nearby.

{Alith, I sought only to—}

I need me time, Papa. Thus resolved, and ignoring her father's continued protestations, she returned her attention to her savior. "Carl, I would ask a boon of you. In exchange, I will assist you with your dungeon endeavor, and I will provide you with a guide."

Carl moved about restlessly, then rose to his feet and out of the car.

Ir'alith stepped back with haste as he performed a series of stretches. Remaining in that large form while seated in the confines of that car for any amount of time would be painful. I would not do it.

"Alright, what do you need help with?" Carl said when he was done.

{I will not!} Her father's voice resounded through her mind.

"I thank you, Carl," she said, disregarding the annoying voice of her father and instead feeling relieved that she would have time for herself without the possibility of interruption. Her time on the car during their drive had opened her mind to what she now needed, and that did not include the occasional random comments and nagging from her father.

"My request is simple," she continued. "I…" She paused as she realized what she was about to do.

To willingly separate from her axe, which she had been in possession of since her twenty sixth year? To be without her father's guidance should she require it?

She steadied herself.

She was Ir'alith, daughter of Seth'tith and Ira'unne.

She was the strongest.

"What I require now is me time," she declared, "and I would only grow distracted if he remained with me."

{In what way am I distracting?! Am I not silent when you wish it? Do I not offer sound advice when you need it?}

I plan only to meditate, Papa. Your advice is sound, and you are… You sometimes are able to remain silent. But now I need solitude. I must find my strength and harden my resolve, just as you advised. I will leave no opening for weakness to find its place in my mind.

{But you would be nearly defenseless if a human hero with one of those blessed, magic-nullifying—}

"Yeah, I guess I can do that," Carl said.

Ir'alith smiled widely at him, feeling an all new appreciation at having someone else with great strength she could rely upon. She could create a gate back to the Great Tree and leave her axe upon her ceremonial throne, but she did not wish for her father to be alone. Not after the time he had already spent thinking himself lost in the between-space. If madness could assail her, surely it could reach him as well.

Carl would not allow such a thing to happen.

"I thank you," Ir'alith said, trying to infuse her words with a sense of how pleased she felt at his immediate acceptance. They were friends, as he had said, but she could not deny the growing feeling that she regarded him as more. She ferried her weapon around with her tail and placed it to her right, just to the side of where they stood facing each other.

Carl crossed his arms and stared at her axe, meeting her father's glare. "Don't you need a weapon?" he asked after a moment.

"No, I—"

"Can't be going around without a weapon," Carl said. "That'd be like not having good armor." He turned to his right and pulled the spear of the primordial sea god out of the pocket dimension he used for storage and casually jammed it point-first into the ground to her left.

Ir'alith stared.

"You can borrow this for now, and we'll switch for a bit," Carl said, as though he was not offering her the most powerful known weapon in existence to casually borrow. "Just don't lose it, or I won't be able to go fishing anymore."

He… He makes jests at the prospect of misplacing it?!

If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

She felt as though the world was spinning around her. "You…" She struggled to adjust her opinion of a being who could behave in such a manner. "You would swap arms with me?" she asked at last, unable to even formulate the words needed to encompass her confusion, awe, and shock.

"Wouldn't it be dangerous wandering around without any weapons? What if you ran into one of those fang-spikes, or a hydra, or…" Carl trailed off, leaving the obvious humans unsaid.

Ir'alith spun around quickly, feeling her skin already growing hot as her hearts raced each other inside her chest. She floated her helmet over and settled it onto her head for good measure, feeling that her eyes must have changed to the same glowing pink hue that her mother's had when she looked fondly upon her father. He… He cares this much for me? I…

She could not conceive of it. Carl had known her for not even a day, yet he pursued her so fiercely despite even her initial rejection. He was reliable, he was understanding, he was powerful, he brought her joy even when she imagined it to be impossible, and, she reluctantly admitted, even his too-large human form was pleasing to her eyes.

She had thought to struggle against his steady advance—to take stock of him and ensure that he was truly who he claimed to be—but resisting him seemed futile! He complemented her too perfectly, always saying what needed to be said, doing what needed to be done, and always with the casual feeling that he would never consider any other course of action.

"I th-thank you for your concern, Carl," she said, resisting the urge to spin around and ask him for a short name—short though his name already was. She quickly brought her tail up over her shoulder when she felt it begin to curl back on itself and reach towards him to caress his face once more, the realization causing her emotions to run even more wild.

"Don't mention it," Carl said, deliberately pretending to ignore all of the signs she knew he must be aware of given how perceptive he had shown himself to be.

It was another of the things she…

It was another of the things she appreciated about him.

My decision to assist with his knowledge of this plane's magic has yielded more significant results than I expected. But I am not yet done here. She focused herself, deliberately not thinking the soft, warm thoughts she had been comfortably resting her mind on, and turned back to Carl once more, finding him to be standing facing her axe with one hand on its shaft. "I…apologize, but I will keep my helmet on for a time."

"It's okay," Carl said, just as she knew he would. "Your, uh, axe is pretty heavy."

This was true. Few among her people could lift the axe her father had forged for her over the course of nearly two decades, let alone wield it as a weapon. It had taken her years to sufficiently deepen her connection with the conduit of magical energy which flowed through her in order to even lift it for the first time.

"It must have weight to have power," Ir'alith said, reciting the words her father had told her so many times as she wept by the side of the weapon that he had become, too weak to even raise it from its resting place. She looked to the spear of the primordial sea god and placed a hand on it, then lifted.

Her eyes bulged. How heavy can a weapon be?! It did not move even the slightest, reminding her again of the first time she had attempted to lift her own axe. She shifted her form, taking on even more muscle and embracing fully the magical conduit which fed her power.

She strained herself, once more attempting to lift the glowing spear that Carl had so casually handled. This time, the spear moved. She poured every remaining bit of her magic into her physical form, and the spear rose easily in her hand until it was held over her head. "Ah, it was a jest," she said with a laugh, realizing that Carl's weapon must have a weight of at least twice hers.

Ir'alith spun the spear around, then began to work through one of the short forms she had learned for such weapons when she had trained under her father so many years earlier; the spear had been the weapon she had begun fighting with before she had chosen the axe for its unbeatable raw power in close quarters—the distance she had come to prefer once her sorrow at the early death of her friend Jungrathol's parents had turned to fury.

When fighting one of the human heroes, if one lacked the power to land a killing blow, death or capture were the only possible outcomes. Magic could not be relied upon given the potency of the artifacts bestowed by their deities, thus it became necessary to master many forms of physical combat in order to reach even a stalemate.

She completed the series of thrusts, parries, and swings, ending with a stab that she executed with all her strength. The heavy weapon's thrust created a satisfying amount of force, exceeding what she was capable of producing with her own weapon.

That the spear felt warm in her hands and reminded her of Carl had no relation to her appreciation of it. She held it tightly, but this was the natural way of treating such a valuable armament.

"This is a powerful weapon!" She grinned happily, though she refused to admit that her feelings were the result of knowing that he regarded her as being important enough to him to lend such a powerful weapon after having already gifted her armor so powerful that it could prevent disruptions in any magic she used, including the barrier she still maintained to safeguard her homeland and people.

{I… I will go without further objection, Alith. But you must not seek out trouble! I still worry for you.}

Papa, I seek only to be alone for a time. There is no cause for worry.

"Yeah," Carl said, again meeting her father's eye.

"My axe is not the equal of this," Ir'alith said, "but I hope you will care for him until I am ready."

"Yeah, I definitely will," Carl replied. "One, uh, sec though. Key board."

Ir'alith gasped softly as she watched him invoke his dragon-magic once more. His key board materialized before him, and he wielded it with the experience of one who had honed a skill for decades. Now that she was of a clearer mind, she noted that each of the keys possessed its own glyph inscribed on it, and the device's function became apparent to her.

The idea shocked her mind to even comprehend a small portion of what Carl was capable of. He uses his key board to directly craft spells as he needs them?

His fingers moved over the keys, invoking glyphs at a speed she could not possibly match even were she to focus her entire being on the task.

She had never heard of such a method of using magic, but the genius of it was undeniable. Glyphs were the foundation of enchantments. A single one inscribed on a location and imbued with a touch of magical energy would grant an effect for the duration of the provided magic. Complex inscriptions—those which required more magic and more glyphs in sequence—could create the same effects as spells, but they took longer to produce given the strict precision necessary to craft the glyphs. Her own improvements to the durability glyphs earlier had been an example of this: she had corrected the glyphs which were drawn with imperfections, not created more complex ones which would have granted a stronger effect.

But Carl could create those complex glyphs faster even than she could cast comparable spells! He needed only to move his fingers to invoke whatever magic he desired! It was no wonder he refrained from using such a thing; surely any deity could detect it with ease!

Abruptly, he tossed his key board up and over his head. It vanished a short ways behind him, and he nodded, seemingly satisfied with himself.

Then he lifted her axe. "Yeah, has good heft to it," he said. He moved it around carefully in the air.

Ir'alith's eyes widened with understanding now that she had felt the incredible weight of his weapon. He was invoking some form of spellcraft to ensure that his strength did not accidentally shatter my axe! And he risked detection to do so!

She averted her gaze as she felt again the telltale sensation that her mother had described when asked what it felt like when her eyes turned pink.