The stablehand was not satisfied with merely believing Waver was right about dragons. With a fervor that they’d shown none else before, they gave their all towards expanding their mind. From listening to enough dragon tongue, they had intuited that something was fundamentally missing from it.
But how to breach that gap? Ficus was not a researcher, a linguist, or even especially good at speaking normally. They had only a basic education, but even if they could afford more, there wasn’t a single scholar in the world who could teach them, as far as they knew. Maybe if a dragon could speak in human tongue, there would be some chance, but that would be ridiculous for similar reasons. So, essentially, Ficus was out of luck. Until some miracle occurred, they would have to satisfy themself with merely paying very close attention to dragon body language.
But Waver’s visit after so many years away lit a fire in them. No, if Waver could manage it, then why couldn’t they at least try?
Plus, it didn’t stop after that day. It became commonplace to see Waver at the stable every single week, to spar with the master of the house but also to catch up with the dragons there. He even sometimes brought Valor (which meant Ficus could, with Valor’s permission, tie a purple silk ribbon around one of their horns). Ficus asked Waver for help, and he, seemingly overjoyed, acted as translator a few times just to help them train their ears.
Human words, Ficus came to decide, have a maximum depth of something like five layers of meaning and undertone.
The first layer was the meaning of the words used.
The second layer, sometimes empty, was any other possible meanings in the words used.
The third layer was something like singing. What did the pitch pattern of the sounds mean?
The fourth layer was the emotions the speaker tried to convey.
The fifth layer was the emotions the speaker did not realize they were conveying.
But as Waver translated, and they tried to compare the sounds they heard to what Waver said they meant, Ficus realized that every layer in dragon speech had a sublayer. They imagined words as ripples in a bucket of water, the surface distorted up and down by large, gentle curves. Then they imagined further into the ripples, closer, smaller, where the water within the ripples itself was rippling, making a delicate pattern like lace if you could catch all the tiny waves in your eyes.
And there were five buckets of water.
So what all did that really mean? Did it mean they had to listen more carefully, like they would have to look more carefully at the water?
No, that wasn’t right. They were already hearing all of it, they realized. The moment they put conscious thought into their own hearing, with the image of the ripples in mind, the dragon words insisted on their right to be heard no matter how hard or lightly Ficus listened, as if by magic. The lattice of waves massaged their human mind wider with every new conversation.
It wasn’t long until at least some of the sublayers revealed themself. Not all of them at once. No, frustratingly, the fifth sublayer still eluded them, and each sublayer was married to its corresponding layer. But the fourth sublayer was obvious, and the first three came in order afterwards.
Still, the work wasn’t over. Now that they could hear all the words, they still had to learn all the words.
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For that, Ficus didn’t need Waver’s help, at least not directly. He had asked Prince, the carrier spark with the brass scales, to help Ficus practice by translating Ficus’s human words to dragon words when Ficus asked her to. Even though this was a form of studying, it gave Ficus a rush, a real rush. They had spent their life learning how to take care of dragons. They could only imagine how it would be to know how the dragons felt!
It had taken five weeks to train their ears to listen to dragon tongue at all, but understanding it only took another two -- partly because Waver didn’t need to be around, but it seemed that learning to recognize the sublayers really was the hardest part. In fact, they weren’t even sure they knew all the sublayers -- they had come up with the “five layers” idea on their own, after all. But the euphoria of understanding was intoxicating.
“Alright. As usual, please give me commands, and if I perform them successfully, please nod. Okay, Platon?”
Platon snorted and nodded. The potash drake hadn’t agreed to train Ficus the way Prince had, but all the dragons in the stable were (at the very least) amused by the stablehand’s efforts. Platon herself had said, in no uncertain terms, that if humans could be taught to listen, stablehands wouldn’t be necessary in the first place.
Which, while a slightly threatening sentiment given her audience, was a little bit sweet, Ficus thought.
Ficus looked at her incredulously. She glared back.
Ficus sighed, and picked up their satchel. They had been expecting something more like “shine my scales” or “sweep my stall”. “Well, I did ask. I’ll be right back,” they confirmed, and they walked out confidently.
Luckily for them, they did have enough trust with the family to pull this one off. It wasn’t unheard of for the stablehand to provide dragons with treats on days when more complicated husbandry procedures, like groomings or stall deep cleaning, took place. It was necessary to provide reward and punishment for animals, but the more Ficus thought about it, the more they wondered why that was the case for dragons. Did dragons really not understand the need to let humans clean their living spaces? Or was a deeper resentment the source of any disobedience?
It was simple enough to procure the prize. The apple wasn’t especially fresh in this season, Ficus noted with a wrinkle of their nose, but Platon would have to deal with it.
As they walked back into the stable, as confidently as they’d left, Valse, who was up and about, snorted and nodded to acknowledge them.
Ficus started. Even after the old drake had approved of their studies, they still hadn’t worked up the courage to talk to him very much. Most of his husbandry was actually taken care of by the knight herself, and he always seemed distant, above everything. Even if Ficus weren’t intimidated by his scars and wicked teeth and claws, the dragon had an air of peerless nobility and grace.
Ficus bowed deeply. “Hello, honored Valse. It’s good to see you.”
Valse laughed breathily, in the way Ficus had come to recognize an unfettered dragon laugh.
Ficus winced.
“Um, no, it’s just that... actually, I felt that way before, too, but never really had a chance to say it. After all, you’re a war hero, and Valor’s father, right?”
Ficus blushed. “A-anyway, I have to get this apple to your daughter. It’s part of my training.”
Valse laughed again.
“Oh,” Ficus said, immensely embarrassed. Keeping their face down, they continued past the old dragon, conspicuously walking in claw range. Just as they were trained not to by their predecessor. Dragons were beasts, after all, and they couldn’t be trusted not to maul someone on the slightest whim.
Ficus the stablehand had a lot of unlearning to do.
One day, they found a piece of parchment lying on the floor of the stable. The parchment was inscribed with what looked like an ink made from ashes, and it only contained a single symbol. The symbol was an angular spiral, with finer details on each line resembling the tendrils that spiral off of a vine. No dragon or human around understood what it meant, but when Valse saw it, his expression hardened.