There was urgency in Irinia's voice when she spoke again. She had started to put the pieces together and it frightened her. The young woman didn't know what to think, what she was allowed to think, and she was frightened of what she was about to see. She shouted off into the mist.

"Azara please!"

"Yes?" Azara called back. As she said this, several small sparks of light began to zip around within the mist, as if there were fast flying little fireflies dancing above the hot spring. They were red at first, glowing with warm light, and then became blue.

"I- I don't know if I want...if I want to-"

A massive flood of light from the mist followed by a powerful shockwave in the air stopped her from completing the sentence. The wind blew in great gusts from within the pond, briefly separating the mist enough for Irinia to see a strange and luminous form in the middle of the pond. It was as if someone was burning like the sun there. Another shockwave followed, this one more powerful than the first, and it caused Irinia to fall back onto her rear. The wind then died and the light dimmed. Now there was just a warm glow in the middle of the pond.

"A-Azara?" Irinia said, as she stood again.

She heard a low rumble from within the mist, and the warm light came a little closer. An enormous dark form appeared, silhouetted within the fog. It was tall, its head higher than most buildings Irinia had seen. The dark silhouettes of wings spread out from its back, their expanse so large Irinia was certain that the tips of them would not be obscured by the hills or the fog.

"Is that, is that-" Irinia began, before she swallowed the words, unable to bring herself to saying them. She silenced a cry in her throat. She suppressed the extreme desire to run. Instead, she stood still and waited. She saw two golden and glowing eyes peering out of the mist towards her, and she shut her own eyes in fear.

She felt wind warmer than the air around her blow across her. She thought about opening her eyes, but refrained, she didn't want to. Something large and pointed touched her shoulder, and she almost turned and ran then, but didn't. After that, there was a rumbling sound so loud that Irinia clamped her ears with her hands. It was terrifying, her heartbeat fast in her chest, and her breath came short. She soon found herself fighting her own body to keep from passing out.

And then, all was still. She heard the crashing of water, and the air cooled down a little. Again, all was quiet. She peeked out of one eye, only for her vision to be flooded with light and have close the eye again. The light caused the darkness behind her eyelids to appear bright orange for a few seconds, and then it vanished. There was a loud 'thump' sound in the air, but not as powerful as the first two. This time, air rushed from behind her and towards the swamp, rather than outward.

When at last she opened her eyes again she felt as if she had been standing in the spot for hours. Her knees shook and ached, and her whole body felt tired.

"Irinia?! Are you alright?" A quiet voice asked, so faint to Irinia's ears that she did not recognize it as Azara's for a second.

"Yes? Azara, is that you?"

"What do you mean? I've been here." Azara replied before she stepped into view. She was dry and had redressed herself, all while Irinia was standing with her eyes closed. Irinia stood staring out at the pond in front of her in awe for a moment. The water level had actually decreased due to the disturbance, and even more steam clouded the area.

Soon, Azara began to walk away, and Irinia followed. No questions were asked, but as they began to near the city, and time to ask questions with no one else around ran out, Irinia spoke.

"How?" Irinia said, confused. "I thought that...you said that Ezmeralda was your mother, is she also a-"

"No," Azara replied. "My mother found me when I was very young, just...hatched. She killed my original mother in a terrible battle, but one I think she was justified in. The trauma of that battle so close to myself and my sister caused us to break out of our shells. Our parents were the descendants of Apotheos, and were dragons that believed it was necessary to wipe out all of humanity in retribution for Sitari, the sun, killing so many of our kind. Our father was intent on destroying all humanity, starting with the smaller races, and moving on to the larger ones. Thus, he attacked the -"

"The Veyorn." Irinia finished the sentence. "So Lady Ezmeralda spared you?"

"I had done nothing wrong, and she felt remorseful for handing out in-kind what my father had done to her, making an orphan out of a child in a cruel world. Ezmeralda was the first being we saw after being born, and we shifted our appearance to meet the look of a human. I actually look a little bit like her as a result of that, though most of my features are unique and the resemblance is only minor at best." Azara explained. "I've grown up like this for the most part, though naturally Astra and I discovered our differences from most people, eventually. As we grew up our mother took us to the other dragons she had discovered in her travels, few in number as they are. They helped with raising us on that side of things. Those were some of those adventures I talked to you about before. That was when I was able to speak with Isiya, who still lives. She is ancient now though, and slumbers most of the time."

Irinia nodded, the facts sinking in. "So, you...you aren't human? I don't mean to sound - well rude, but, there aren't any scales or horns or anything on your body so...are you like Isiya or different?"

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"Different," Azara responded promptly. She then smirked. "I'm better than Isiya. So is Astra. Since we took on our forms so young - we are perfect, minus our hair and eyes, which are unusual. Though, to be fair, any dragon’s transformation is still complete. We do truly transform into whatever being we are trying to become. We dragons can just as much die in these forms as we can create life in them. These forms are also unique. Once we've formed them, and placed our souls within them, they can't be altered anymore, just exchanged with other forms. I'm pretty much completely human right now, I just have a dragon's soul, which gives me some...interesting features. That is how people were born with dragon blood in them years ago, and still are in rare cases today. They were literally born of dragon mothers or fathers. A few of us still choose to live in secret among society, and that is how some dragons have survived, lived, and died in this world."

"Ah, and so that is how Isiya couldn't change her scales then,” Irinia said, and then stopped walking. Azara stopped as well and wondered what realization had just hit the girl. She had been taking all of this relatively well, and hoped this wouldn’t be a turning moment where Irinia was going to freak out.

“When you said that you saw your mother back at the church...which did you mean?” Irinia asked.

Azara frowned. “Sitari.”

“The South Sukarran name for the sun?”

“Yes, that is the name she prefers over Aerician or Usulan names.” Azara explained. “I think I saw her. At least, she looked the same way my mother described. Though you couldn’t see her since you don’t have my sight.”

“Your sight?” Irinia asked. "Is that also form being a dragon?

Azara sighed. This would be a lot of explaining.

“Yes, as I said I can see a glimmer of people’s souls. It is a power that comes with-”

“Wait, how does that make-”

“Let me finished,” Azara said, and put up one finger up to halt Irinia. “Dragon’s like me, and others blessed by celestial beings, also obtain some of that celestial being’s power. Celestials, the stars, are capable of many things. Knowing the future, the fate of someone’s soul, able to appear in any form they wish, and so on. The power I possess are derivatives of those. A tainted or weak version, if you will. Shapeshifting, for example. Stars don't actually look like humans, for example. They just shift their forms to look similar.”

"So what does that mean for you?" Irinia asked.

"Well, it means I can turn from a human to my natural form, a dragon, as well as a few other things. However, after getting stuck as a squirrel for a week, I've decided to not do that anymore," she explained. "It feels strange, unnatural, and frankly I don't know what I can and can't turn into. Most things, try as I might, I just can't. Even the stars still possess angelic wings when in their earthly forms, so I've decided to not try and push the power."

“You speak with a lot of familiarity about light’s angels. How do you know this?" Irinia said.

Azara shrugged. “My human mother has done a lot of research on them, and has even met Sitari on more than one occasion from my understanding. That is where most of my knowledge comes from.”

“Hmm, I see,” Irinia replied, pausing a moment to take in all that she had heard. They were within the city now, and the topic would have to change. Talking about being a dragon here, or flippant talk about the nature of divine beings would make them look crazy if someone overheard.

"But why tell me this? Why show me this? What should I do now?" Irinia asked, confused by everything she had heard.

"Because sooner or later you would have to know. I mean, another one of the reasons I'm helping you all hunt this dragon is because I would like to know who they are. I may be able to negotiate with them if all else fails. However, more than that, I revealed this because I wanted you to know that so that I wouldn’t be keeping any secrets, and that I understood you and trusted you. This entire country was founded upon hunting my kind to their end Irinia. I've lived all my life in a different way than my ancestors, in a different way than is natural for me, because to do any different would have meant that I would be hunted down and killed. I understand you are in a hard place full of hard choices because of who you are, but you have a chance to change that. Take it. Go, kiss that stupid prince or something. Tell him ‘consequences be damned, by the heavens I’m going to make a stand for my people too!’."

For a moment neither of them said anything, but slowly Irinia's eyes started to well up with tears, and she reached out and hugged her teacher. Her hands and arms trembled a little, as she had some newfound fear and respect for Azara. Nevertheless, she still hugged Azara tight, and it made Azara felt her own eyes tearing up a little.

The stress of revealing her secret started to break away, as she realized that Irinia was fine with it. Memories hit her like a flood, of the few other people she had revealed this secret to. She remembered how Andreas, her own little brother, and not spoken to her for weeks. She remembered how Konrad had reacted - he had never touched her again after that day.

It made tears well up in Azara’s eyes, hot droplets of water that made their way down her cheek.

"Also, thank you for not screaming," Azara said, and smiled. “Men much bigger and more powerful than you didn’t manage that.”

Irinia laughed. "I - I didn't even open my eyes that long to be honest. I kind of regret it now. The story said dragons scales are beautiful, I'd like to have seen what color your- "

Azara clapped a hand over Irinia’s mouth. "Shhh."

"Oh, right," Irinia said, looking embarrassed as a few passerby's looked quizzically at the two women dressed in white, one in the gown of a noble and the other in more common church-going attire, hugging each other while crying.

"They’re like a sunset," Azara said, not missing the chance to brag.

Irinia smiled. “That sounds wonderful.”

“Well, if I do say so myself…” Azara said but kept herself from speaking more on the subject. "It’s ok that you closed your eyes, I don’t mind. I'm surprised you didn't faint or something. You looked like you were about to."

"I think I was...Azara, one more thing, and then I think it is about time for us to hurry up and go meet with the governor. I know he wanted to meet with you this morning, but it is obvious you didn’t." Irinia said, observing time on a clock tower in the city square.

"Yeah," Azara said with a smile. "We shouldn't keep him waiting."