Chapter 25: Return to Arieton

Ereza was quiet as she undressed, and she felt shivers vibrating through every part of her as cold bit at her skin beneath her fur, clung to her small wings, and pressed to the base of her horns. Her heart was trying to beat its way out of her chest from the terror that wracked her. The dragon reached forward with a paw, and she tried to hold still; she really did, but she just couldn't. She darted off to the side, and for a moment, it seemed like she might just run into the trees.

However, either the dragon had read her body language clearly enough or was good at reacting quickly; Ez found herself blocked by a wing. As she turned to backtrack, a paw scooped her up. She squirmed. "No! No!"

For several moments, nothing happened; there was a paw wrapped around her body holding her, her heart hammered in her chest, and then guilt spread through her. "I'm sorry, I'm..."

The dragon lowered her nose and just touched it to her chest. "I know, you are trying very hard to be very good. You are just fine; it's all right."

Slowly, she was able to get full breaths in, and she hung onto the very nose that she didn't want to have anything to do with when it was accompanied by an open mouth. "I'm sorry, this... is awkward. It must be difficult to want to help me, and I can't..."

"You are just fine. I did tell you it was fine if you were finding this difficult and needed to struggle with it, right? So, you are doing perfectly well." A warm breath out over her, ruffling through her fluff with a promise of the heat inside the dragon. "Close your eyes really tight, and we'll make it quick. Then you will be with Lukka, and you'll see that you are fine, yes? You don't even have to be all by yourself. It'll be all right."

Ereza took a ragged breath in, and she felt so much adrenaline that she felt nauseated. She tried to say yes, but she was so embarrassed and frightened that she couldn't manage it. She squeezed her eyes really tightly shut and nodded.

"Good girl, it's all right. You're doing just fine."

The praise helped; it put warmth where a moment before there had been nothing but crushing anxiety and embarrassment. Still, she felt sick with how much her heart was rushing. She didn't get more opportunity to think about it as she was shifted upward all at once and the heat and wet wrapped around her. She quivered, and she did not dare to open her eyes. Wet soaked into her fluff. The tongue was textured beneath her cold paws and against her face. Everything smelled sweet in a way that she couldn't place, but it was almost inviting in some ways, except nothing would make it less like a mouth. The second before she ran, she had seen all those teeth...

The tongue flexed in one big motion beneath her, and her whole body slid up and backward. She was caught against a tight tunnel of flesh that felt almost crushing around her as she was drawn into it, half pushed by the tongue and half pulled by the pressure of it.

She kept her eyes shut; compression rolled over every inch of her, from every direction, as she sank down. There were other sounds... internal sounds that made it impossible to think she was anywhere else but slipping deeper and deeper into a giant creature that had just swallowed her in one gulp.

Seconds felt like small eternities as her heart raced, and then there was a push to one side in a flex of wet muscles, and she felt focused pressure that held around her. Arms, she realized. It is Lukka.

"Gotcha, sweetie. It's all right." She had evidently heard at least part of what had been said, and Ez was embarrassed as she wrapped her arms around the gnoll and clung to her. She tried desperately to stop quivering, feeling rattled, but she couldn't manage it with the shame that she felt.

The dragon's voice was faint, muffled in here. "Are you two both settled?"

"Yes!" Lukka called, pulling Ereza closer to her, resting her chin against the top of Ez's head, between her horns.

Lukka had a floral smell that somehow made it through the overwhelming heated air that filled this space inside the dragon. The thick air here also smelled sweet, more intense than her breath. She was pressed on again from all sides: on her back, shoulders, the top of her head, and against her antler-like horns. Behind her, the velvety softness of the dragon, and to her front, the gnoll that had her arms wrapped over her even though she vibrated with emotion.

"I am going to take off," Kashira warned.

Ereza gasped as the belly tightened, and the dragon pressed them together from every side as she got into the air. Things relaxed after that. The loud heartbeat above them, the wet flexes of muscles, and the whooshing of lungs were all noises that made the whole experience so very intense. Organic. She'd spent the morning in her brother's pocket, which had sometimes felt disorienting; the fabric kept falling on her from every side, pushing her around here and there. But that was not anywhere near as close and smothering as this was.

Lukka breathed calmly beneath her and slowly relaxed her hold. "I am sorry," she said. "I put the idea in her head."

Ereza was gradually feeling better; with Lukka here, she didn't feel as isolated. She was listening to the dragon's breath so she could hear how the lungs worked hard at first and then slowed down as the dragon's flight leveled out. She could feel the movements of climbing, when she was pressed more toward her head and shoulders, and then later the downward press was right on top of Lukka. Thinking about it logistically calmed her down, though she still felt embarrassed. "It is..." She paused. What do I want to say here? She seems unhappy. She tried to consider the situation and thought, Maybe Lukka would be helped by reassurance? She cleared her throat. "I um, well, you are right, it is practical to get us there sooner without leaving clear tracks." Ereza opened her eyes, wanting to see Lukka, but it was absolutely dark in this space. She hesitated, then asked, "Are you... all right? You've, your life is changing a lot rather suddenly."

Lukka breathed out a long sigh. "Well, I can say that this was probably a long time coming. I wasn't getting along with anyone, and the situation in your hometown was just something that was much too far for me. I have grown up lucky without having to face as many hardships since my father was also a potion maker. So, I felt a little.... maybe mocked, by the people around me who saw the situation in Buetarn differently than I did."

Ereza felt Lukka squeeze her, and she pressed herself closer. I am not sure what to say. You are probably right that strength and privilege have made things easier for you in some ways. She hummed and said what she felt: "I am really glad that you were different, and I hope that, maybe, as we get to spend time together, we will both feel better."

Lukka felt Ereza snuggle in closer, and it made her heart race. "Me too. Maybe we can keep making things better for people around us, too," she whispered. She didn't know exactly how she felt. Exhilaration was part of it somehow as the smaller, naked jayune woman pressed their bodies together, and recognition of that made Lukka's face feel like it was on fire.

There was also that sense that if Ereza could still think she might be good after she had been subjected to so much bad by people that looked just like her, maybe Lukka could at least feel relieved of the crimes of her people in Buetarn. It was one thing to know that the gnolls were starving from long hardships, being pushed from their homeland by encroaching forest gods, and that it had been followed by plague and fae curses, but still...

She felt a little relief, somehow. She also felt comforted; the dragon seemed to think of her as different, and so did the jayune. It all felt slightly better, but also she still felt like it wasn't really enough.

When the dragon gets to Arieton and puts a collar on all of us, we'll be essentially her property. It will be officially recognized in our records. It takes away the right of someone to take us away from her, but it also makes it virtually impossible to get away from her. Every city will check for the collar and send us back to her. And I believe she is kind, but it feels like a dark world to think about, that things go like this, and there is so little that can be done about it. It somehow feels all wrong, to me.

The trip was long; it was hot, even more so with Ereza with her. She felt the rabbity woman relax and go to sleep, and she was not far behind. There wasn't anything else to do, and all the warmth and darkness pulled the energy out of her.

Still, she felt she knew more about what she wanted. It encouraged her that she could work toward it with Kashira. Truthfully, based on the dragon's behavior so far, she believed the dragon would be entirely behind letting her do whatever she wanted, as long as it didn't involve her leaving.

Goren had gotten worried and done his best to stay calm when he had heard Ez panicking, but he heard Kashira's reassurances very clearly, and it made it easier to keep himself calm for Tomy's sake.

Calm, but with a tight sensation of jealousy in his chest, which he wished he wasn't feeling. "Kashira?"

"She's all right; they just fit. Though, this is a bit... should I say, fuller than I like to get?" The dragon's voice was soft, relying on his collar to catch her words despite the wind from flying and bring them to him.

She also sounded flustered to him. It made him feel flustered himself because it immediately made him think about his sister and the gnoll smooshed tightly together.

Kashira did not improve it when she added, "But, I didn't think it would be a good idea to press you to your sister in this way, and I didn't want you that close to Lukka."

Don't make me think about that, he held in a huff at her. "How long to Arieton?" he asked, failing to hold back all his exasperation from his tone.

Kashira chuckled. "Well, I think five or six hours. Are you and Tomyra all right?"

Goren was glad to focus on that instead, and so he kissed the top of Tomyra's head. "How are you feeling, Tomy?"

"The breeze through the blanket is cold, but I think I am okay!" she answered brightly. "Are you talking to the dragon somehow?"

"The collar lets me hear her despite the wind," he explained after a small pause where he puzzled out why she seemed confused. He realized he could hear Kashira because he was wearing the collar and Tomy could not.

Tomy smiled. "I see! And will I get one?"

Goren felt a pang of something complicated as he recognized that she didn't understand the implications of it at all. "Probably."

She nodded and accepted that; she was too young to really grasp it. There was a brief silence. "Can you tell me another story?" she asked, clearly feeling bored, and there was not a lot of room for them to move in the hammock-like sling of fabric around Kashira's neck.

"Of course." She had already been excited by the story of how he had met the dragon in a ruined castle. He had omitted the warming him up part, or at least, the method she had used. Now, he told a story he faintly remembered their father telling him when he was still little.