Alice lifted a scarlet egg in trembling fingers. The egg was feverishly hot to the touch. It was as deeply saturated red as a drop of blood. When she held it up to the light, she saw faint thin golden striations threaded through the shell.

Do you want to hatch this dragon?

"Yes," Alice whispered, closing her eyes, and thinking of what she needed. A defender.

A jagged crack split the egg down the middle. The dragon inside was not shy at all and a red snout burst out of the crack, nostrils flaring as it inhaled. Then, with a loud crack, it punched its head through the top of the egg.

Immediately, Alice could tell that this dragon was male. There was just something masculine about the set of his square jaw, and the bony protections over his eyes as well as the beginnings of golden, swept-back horns.

Within a few seconds, he had crawled out of the hole he had made — and it was apparent he had a different body-shape than Prim and Numi.

His body was long and snakelike with short limbs and a long, thick tail that only tapered at the very end. As with his egg, he was scarlet in color, his scales gleaming like a red drop of blood, but the accents were gold: from his horns, a line down his back, to his golden-tipped claws. Lighter, wheat-colored hair sprouted around his neck like a lion's mane. He was beautiful and utterly fearsome at the same time.

And very much like a dragon Alice remembered seeing in a puppet show when she was a little girl.

It was a memory she hadn't thought about for a long time. Following her mother as she went to work, Alice's attention had been caught by an open-air puppet show. Lots of children of high-born families sat in a group in front of the stage while the puppeteers manipulated their puppets into amazing feats and told the story. This one was of a terrible dragon that attacked and ate an entire city. Long and snakelike, it had a body shape like her newly hatched dragon, though the puppet had been blue with water powers.

Remembering that, Alice felt a moment of fear. That ended when the newly hatched dragon's eyes met her own, golden and fierce and so, so protective and loyal.

Alice knew he would never turn on her. That he would be loyal forever and always. "My name is Igcendiorum," he said, in a deep rumbling voice. "Give me orders so that I may protect you."

"Oh," Alice said, startled. Igcendiorum was someone who got to the point. And just like the other dragons, he also had a tongue twister of a name. "Do you mind if I call you, uh, Iggy?"

The dragon thought for a moment, exhaling a breath of pure heat that Alice felt, even though he was only as long as her forearm. Newly hatched, he was already bigger than Numi, though their eggs had been about the same size.

"Yes, that will be acceptable," he said.

"Great, hi. I'm Alice, and this is Primordialis – I call her Prim. Over there sleeping on the pillow is Numismatis. I call her Numi."

"Welcome," Prim said, "I expect great things from you."

Numi only let out a slight snort in her sleep.

Iggy nodded with great dignity to Prim, then turned his attention back to Alice. He clearly wanted his skills. Alice looked into his stat sheet.

The first thing she noticed was that like the other two, Iggy had been born with an ingrained skill.

Primary Skill: Fire Breath

And, just like the others, she had a choice from the other two.

Burning Claws

Danger Sense

Ultimate Armor

Venom Bite

Well, there was little ambiguity about these.

"Oh dear," Alice bit her lip and looked down at the small, but already quite intimidating dragon. "Well… What would you like?"

"Anything with fire."

That meant Burning Claws would be one of them. Looking at his gold-tipped claws, Alice had to admit that it likely fit.

There was room for one more skill. Danger Sense, Ultimate Armor, or Venom Bite?

She rejected Venom Bite right away, something in her recoiling at the idea of having a dragon with venomous abilities.

Danger Sense could be very useful, especially as this was a whole new world to Alice, and she could see herself blundering into a dangerous situation all too easily.

But on the other hand… Iggy already had Fire Breath and Burning Claws. If he had to defend her, Alice didn't want him to get hurt.

He was there to protect her, but she had some obligation to protect him as well. "Ultimate Armor," she said, with a firm nod.

The golden highlights along Iggy's back, claws, and, weirdly, even his teeth now as she looked at them, glowed brighter briefly as the skills sunk in.

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Iggy flexed his claws; he looked quite pleased. "Now, point me to your enemies and I will dispatch them at once."

"They're out there," yawned Numi, waking up enough to point at the balcony.

"Excellent," Iggy rumbled. Then, he flicked open wings that, much like Numi's, seemed a little too narrow and sharp for his body. When he leapt into the air it was more like he swam through it than flew, somehow using his long, horizontally and vertically flat tail to help propel him.

"No!" Alice reached out and thankfully caught Iggy before he could make it to the balcony. The little dragon wound around in her hand to look back at her.

"You don't want me to fight your enemies?" He sounded put out. "Aren't they a danger to you?"

"Well…" Alice hesitated. "I mean… You can't just go out and chase them away." Though somehow she suspected that Iggy didn't have chasing in mind. "You don't know what they look like," she added, with relief, finally settling on an actual excuse.

Iggy hesitated at that. "Then point them out to me, and I can… chase them off," he said, sounding reluctant at the last part.

"Yes, later perhaps. We have to be careful," Alice said. "It wouldn't be safe for me if people knew that I have dragons. We have to be as quiet and circumspect as possible. But, I do want to be safe."

Iggy swelled a little as his chest puffed out. "I live to serve."

That made Alice a little uncomfortable, but at least he wasn't trying to fly out of the balcony in search of who knew what.

"Are you hungry?" she asked, remembering how hungry Prim and Numi had been right after hatching.

Sure enough, Iggy hesitated for a telling moment.

"You can't defend me on an empty stomach,” Alice said.

“Yes, you should eat something," Prim agreed, in a commanding voice. "Then you may grow larger and stronger so that you may better defend Alice. Right now, you're only big enough to poke someone's eye out."

"I’d rather burn someone’s eyes out," Iggy said, but Alice could tell that the loyal dragon was tempted by the thought of food. Thankfully, she still had the remains of the meal as she hadn't set it outside the door like she had seen other people do.

Tom’s plate, of course, was so clean it was possible to use the plate again, but Alice had set some of her chicken aside for the dragons later.

She offered it to Iggy, and he fell upon it and gobbled it up so fast that Alice decided it might be best to order a midnight snack from the dumbwaiter.

She sent the message down to order more sandwiches — turkey this time, and wondered if she was waking any poor Cook up. Well, sandwiches would be easy to put together. She was just writing down her order when Prim spoke up.

"Alice," Prim called, "I also have a skill to assign."

"You… What?" Turning from the dumbwaiter, Alice looked at her dragon in shock. Then, she swiftly opened the menu.

She had been so focused on Iggy that she hadn't seen that Prim had reached level 5. Likely due in part to all the Concealment she had been practicing recently.

"Prim… That's amazing. Congratulations. Wow, you have another skill."

She was amazed. She had leveled up as a General Laborer but had never been allowed to gain more skills. That was one of the main limiting factors of the lower classes. The higher classes, of course, had more skills available to them. It was partially what made them so powerful.

Quickly, she opened up Prim's available skills. She had three in total, including one from last time:

Common Sense

Logistical Planning

Illusion

Alice bit her lip. It seemed that Prim certainly had a good amount of common sense even without the skill for it. Or she was just bossy and tended to sound like she knew what she was doing.

Logistical Planning was useful. Prim was clearly intelligent, and it would be nice to have someone help Alice organize her life.

The last one. Illusion. That seemed promising. Prim had certainly got a lot out of her Concealment skill, but it wasn't perfect.

After all, Prim had been caught by Dolly and by Tom by surprise.

Hadn’t she just told Iggy that they needed to stay secret?

"How do you feel about Illusion?" Yes, Prim was her dragon, but Alice felt she should have a say as well.

Prim cocked her head this way and that and then once more before she nodded. "Yes, I think I would like the Illusion skill."

So, Alice added it, and Prim's scales brightened.

"Give me a skill too!" Numi called.

She had woken up completely and was chewing on a copper piece that she had somehow come up with — Alice suspected from her storage stomach.

Alice checked but… "You don't have a new skill yet, love."

"Aww," she ducked her head. "But I thought I was doing good."

"You are. Prim has been hatched for over a week, and she only got her first skill now. You're well on your way."

Sitting right next to her, she patted the little green.

The dumbwaiter rumbled a moment later with their sandwiches. Iggy fell upon them almost at once. Prim took one half sandwich of her own, splitting it with Alice. Numi, of course, preferred coins.

After finishing her last bite, Alice placed her hand over her mouth in a big yawn. This had been an exhausting day, and she didn't even know what time it was. She hadn't dared to turn the light on yet to check the wall clock.

"Prim, dearest, do you see signs of Law Enforcement? Or anything going on around the courtyard?"

Prim fluttered to the balcony window to look out. "No, all is well.”

Then the man with the top hat hadn’t discovered the theft. The longer it took, the more likely Alice was in the clear.

"I think… It's time to go to bed. It's been a long day." Exhaustion fell on her like a heavy blanket.

Again, Iggy flew to the balcony. But this time, he didn't try to escape. He only sat on the edge, his dark red scales seeming to blend in with the night even though he didn't have a Concealment skill. Probably something to do with the color red.

"I will guard," he said.

Alice wanted to object. He had just hatched, after all. But, on the other hand, Numi had gone out searching for coins when she had just been a hatchling. Guarding seemed like it would be within his wheelhouse.

“I’ll order us a big breakfast tomorrow,” she said, and she only had enough time to shift her clothes into something more comfortable before she crawled under the sheets. She fell asleep almost at once.

----------------------------------------

"Alice… Alice…" A soft, insistent voice woke her up. She blinked, feeling like she'd only been asleep for a bare few moments.

And for a second, she was confused. It was still dark in the room. What was going on? Her eyes fell on Iggy, and though she had only known him for a very short amount of time, it was like resting her eyes on an old friend. He had flown to her bed, and seeing she was awake, he slithered over. "I have a report."

"Hmm?" she asked, still muddled.

"Prim described the Workers to me. I have spotted them along the street. And they have captured someone."

That jolted Alice awake. "Captured someone?" she repeated, horrified. "Who?"

"Two children. A boy and a girl."

A feeling of premonition hit her. "Is the boy about twelve years old? Sandy blonde hair? About this high?" She used her hand to measure the distance.

He nodded.

It was Tom. The false Workers had captured Tom.