Of Leaf and Scale
Second Day of the Eleventh Month 293 AC
"Reva, did you hear what they are saying about the king?" asked Liset as they walked along the wooded path, her dress flaring and rippling behind her yet somehow not getting caught on either weed of bramble. Whether it was foresight guarding their steps or the will of the Old Gods moving that which would trip them from their path, not even the Singers for whom the skill came as naturally as breathing could tell for certain.
"Lis... we are here to talk to the beasts and the trees, not carry every rumor in the city with us," Reva replied from the lofty seniority of being the elder by half an hour, as well as the more literal height of the branch she was perched upon. "I'm sure whatever the king's done now can wait at least a little while longer..."
"Volantis has knelt," the younger twin cut her off, still a little breathless from her run. "The king and Queen Mother Rhaella, Lady Saenena and ah... Lady Nettles." She paused a moment at the persistent strangeness of a dragonrider named after a weed. "Anyway, they sky-danced above the city and then the king gave some speeches like he always does, and now Volantis is part of the Empire, the High Speaker swore it. Maybe we could..."
"No," Reva snapped, dropping down the the ground with practiced ease. "They tossed us out like a rotten tooth. We are not going back there..."
"When we are dragon riders?" Liset sent silently along their bond as she came to place a hand on her sister's shoulder.
"Proper ones, I mean, with dragons that can hold us."
Reva gave a sort of mental stutter that could not really be described in words, disdain at the idea of returning to Volantis tripping into sharp-edged glee at the thought of how the distant kin who neither knew nor cared about their fate would react to seeing them returned upon the wings of dragons.
"That would be... good," Where the feeling ended and the words began, neither sister knew nor cared.
"How is your egg?"
It had been nearly seven months since they had received their eggs. Seven months of slowly turning the eggs in the hearth then burying it in sand, of pressing bloody hands upon the surface of the egg to summon the beast within by the subtle call of heritage that spanned the ages. Lord Vanor had said that they were close, but that he could not name the day nor the hour when the eggs would finally break.
'I've never known of one of our blood to possess magic quite as you do, nor the favor the the Dreaming Gods,' he had said, and though he had clearly not meant it as a rebuke, the twins had still slept uneasily than night. What did it mean for them to serve the Secret Gods of the Deep Woods who sought not worship but drank deep of fiend's blood.
"We can hardly be any stranger dragon riders than the king," Reva replied, obviously following her sister's deeper thought. "Imagine a dragon in the shape of a man, riding atop a bigger dragon, with a little dragon curled around his shoulders."
"That does not make him strange just more er... dragon-y," the younger twin said, valiantly trying to keep back a giggle at the image that brought to mind.
"That is not even a real word," Reva scoffed.
"Yes it is! I just said it, so there..." One playful push later, Reva was sitting in the grass while her sister launched herself into the woods in an unexpected game of tag. They chased each other through the woods for a good long while, thoughts of trees and dragons gone from their mind for the moment at least.
OOC: Not a lot happening, which is partly why I chose the interlude, no mechanics to mes up from writing late. Not yet edited
