The tunnel Harmoni and the dragon went down wasn’t very long. It quickly led to a large, brightly lit cavern. The light in this one was more yellow and white than the red outside. A bit less intimidating. It was almost perfectly round, with only the one way in and out. There were stalactites, stalagmites, and other rock formations. But any rock formations in here seemed smooth compared to most caves.

And there were several young dragons in here. Harmoni could tell they were young dragons by their size and behavior. They reminded Harmoni a bit of puppies or kittens. They ran around playing tug of war, knocking each other off of higher ledges, or batting at each other’s tails. And none of them were taller than her knee.

There were other people too, five of them. None of them were older than her, and a few were younger. They sat watching the dragons. A dwarf and human briefly glanced her way when she came in, but the others didn’t look away. They mostly eyed the dragons like they were looking for one specifically, but had only been given a poor description of what they looked like.

The dragons paid Harmoni more mind than the other people. Only, it wasn’t good attention. Several of them moved further away from her. A few of them growled at her. All of them became more alert as she entered.

Harmoni tried to shuffle back at the attention, but the large dragon who’d led her in snorted, and shoved her forward with its head.

Harmoni stumbled forward, limbs flailing. She tripped over one of the smaller dragons running below her, though she managed to catch herself before face planting into the rocks.

“Oh. I-I’m sorry,” she said, turning back towards the dragon.

The little thing stuck its tongue out, tongue zipping back and forth like a snake. Then it turned and darted away.

Harmoni pushed herself to her knees, but didn’t go any farther, simply staring at the ground. She hadn’t been interested in bonding with a dragon, but this was going worse than she’d expected. She wasn’t in a hurry to stand back up and deal with more of it. But she wasn’t going to cry either. The last thing she wanted to do was cry in front of people younger than her, and dragons who seemed to hate her.

She kept her expression blank and took a few deep breaths. When she was ready, she lifted her head.

There were fewer people and dragons in here now. Maybe she could go back to Udo too, tell him it hadn’t gone very well. It was certainly true.

Then, something nudged her hand. Harmoni turned. Below her was a golden dragon, with a silver belly, about the size of a cat. It was looking up at her, blinking with big snakelike gray eyes. Its snout looked softer than the rest of its scaly body, which probably explained why the touch had been soft.

“Sorry,” Harmoni said. “I’ll be leaving in a moment.”

The golden dragon tilted its head in confusion. Then it shook its head.

“What?”

The dragon nudged her again.

Harmoni frowned, not understanding. She got up and headed towards the exit. The dragon who’d led her there wasn’t even there anymore. She should be able to leave easily. It was just before the reached the tunnel that she felt it.

The zenny was right. This was a hard feeling to describe. It was like string, or little wisps of spider web. The feeling lightly brushed against her, but like it was brushing against her mind instead of her body.

She turned back to the dragon, who was sitting there and staring at her.

“Is that . . . you?” she asked.

It nodded.

“You . . . you want to bond with me?”

It was the only explanation she could think of.

It nodded again.

He. The dragon was a he.

“Are you sure?” Harmoni asked. She took a couple steps closer, and squatted so that they were closer to eye level. She herself wasn’t sure, but that wasn’t why she was asking right now. “Everyone else is avoiding me.”

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The dragon shrugged. If Harmoni focused on the wisps brushing past her she could get . . . sensations from them. Right now, for example, the dragon really didn’t care what other dragons thought. He had a confidence in himself that Harmoni wasn’t sure if she envied, or was embarrassed by. After all, you had to care at least a little about what others thought, right?

‘Do you not want to bond?’

Harmoni jolted in surprise. And considering she was already squatting, she tipped backwards.

The dragon grabbed her arm in his mouth and pulled to stop her from slamming against the rocks. She could pick up the feeling that he didn’t want her hurt.

She’d picked up his thought too. At least, that must’ve been his thought. He hadn’t made any noise, and she knew it came from him. The voice was a boy, but probably before puberty started making the voice deeper.

‘Sorry. We don’t have to bond if you don’t want to.’

The dragon did want to bond, but he couldn’t force her. And okay, he supposed he wouldn’t force her, even if he could.

It was amazing how much easier it was to pick up on the dragon’s perspective, the longer they interacted.

Harmoni knew she could still sever the connection. The wisps fell away from here if her mind didn't reach for them. She could end this as easily as hanging up the phone. But now, she wasn’t sure she wanted to. She knew this was sort of a big deal, that things wouldn't be the same if she accepted him. But what had she had before anyway? She hadn't had a normal connection with anyone since she woke up in that destroyed town, much less a magical one. It was comforting to have another presence with her. It felt less invasive or mind altering than she'd expected.

And it was like holding the last piece of a puzzle, or the last piece of a clock. She didn’t have to slide the last piece into place, but it would be considerably more satisfying to do so.

So she did.

~~~

They didn’t leave right away. The dragon had to talk to an adult, and let them know who he was with and where he was going. It gave Harmoni more time to adjust to the bond.

They could communicate with their mind, with their thoughts, like the dragon had done earlier. But they didn’t really need to. Harmoni seemed to have some of the knowledge the dragon did. She knew which way he would turn before he moved. She knew he didn’t have any parents, but did have two older sisters, both bonded to people. She could tell he was a little smug to finally join them in having a rider. She could tell that was the emotion he was feeling, and could even feel a bit of it herself.

It was a bit odd, and the dragon certainly agreed with that.

Harmoni did get to see some cool bits of the cave this way. The craziest part was the large cavern, wide enough for dragons to take off in, and deep enough Harmoni could see only darkness. She could see a few dragons spread their wings and glide across, or one who jumped out across from them, and dove to a deeper level.

Once the dragon was done talking to an adult, they needed a bit of teamwork to get out of the cave. Harmoni knew the exit they were looking for, the one that would take her back to Udo, but she didn’t have the foggiest idea how to get there at this point.

The dragon wasn’t too familiar with that exit, but he knew the area she’d ended up in. He took the lead, bringing them back in that direction.

They reached the entrance. It was a bit of work to climb back out. First the dragon scaled up out of the cave, then he turned around and helped pull her up. Udo must have caught on because he joined a moment later, grabbing Harmoni’s outstretched arms and helping her get up.

Udo seemed happy. She couldn’t tell how Aqua felt.

Aqua was pulling a pretty good poker face in general, but she’d probably talk to him later.

Harmoni frowned. Aqua having a name, just made it more obvious her dragon did not. She had knowledge from him, and he knew her name. Surely that was something she should’ve learned.

The dragon also frowned, or at least the dragon equivalent of it. He did have a name, and Harmoni should really already know it, but most riders had trouble making the sounds for dragon names. Their vocal cords and mouths weren’t made to pronounce that. Certainly not the elves.

‘I’m only half elf, actually,’ she thought at him.

‘Oh. My bad.’

Just when he thought he had the rider species down, something had to go and be needlessly complicated.

The point still stood though. He and Harmoni would need a name she could call him out loud. Normally, they’d need one he could call her as well, but since her name was an actual word, he could just translate.

That didn’t seem fair to Harmoni, but she could tell the dragon seemed excited about getting a new nickname. She supposed, if she had to come up with a different name for dragons to call her, it wouldn’t be too bad. She wouldn’t be all happy about it like him, but she couldn’t mind it.

Well, with that out of the way, she should come up with naming ideas. The dragon thought they should pick a name that was already a word, like Harmoni’s. Harmoni had to admit she felt a little put on the spot. She wasn’t even sure if she should go with a human name, or more like what you’d name an animal. Aqua was the latter.

Well, the dragon was gold. Maybe she could do something with that. What was gold? Rays of sunlight, apples, shells? Only one of those was a good name. Gold came in bricks, foils, flecks-

‘That’s a good one.’

With their odd bond, she had no doubt which word he’d responded to, and she could feel his approval almost as if it was her own. She checked anyway.

‘You want to be named Fleck?’

‘Absolutely.’

The dragon nodded. He knew Harmoni thought it was odd, and he knew why. But he liked the name, thought it was fitting. And it was going to be his name, not hers.

Fair enough. Harmoni smiled faintly. ‘Fleck it is.’