Mallangi
Tell me.
Tell me.
Setting the headache-inducing stories aside for now, I decided it was time to show off my little dragons.
Today’s friend is Mallangi.
By my standards, Mallangi was already about the size of a big calf, but by dragon standards, this was still a tiny kid who tripped over its own wings while walking.
The defining trait: a soft, squishy belly from eating way too much.
"Aigoo… seriously."
"Grrrr."
That same little one had been clamped onto the hem of my clothes since morning and refused to let go.
It was a clear demand to play.
"No. Mom’s busy."
"Kiii."
"Even if you cry that cutely, no."
"Kiing?"
"…If you cry that cutely, that’s half a yes."
In the end, I lost.
I was already weak… but I was especially powerless against a baby dragon that still smelled faintly of eggshell.
"Here I go. Mom’s ultimate tickle attack."
The moment my fingers dug under the hatchling’s neck, it stared blankly for a beat, then started squeaking and thrashing its front legs a second too late.
"You’re laughing, you’re laughing. Dragons get ticklish too. I need to record this…"
Right then, the baby dragon twisted its body hard.
There was no malice in the movement.
It had simply turned because it was ticklish.
If it had been a human child, it would have been nothing more than a little squirming in my arms.
But this one was a dragon.
Even a baby was still a dragon.
Its tail brushed past my thigh.
Thud.
"Ugh."
I tumbled across the ground a couple of times, my vision flipping through sky, rock, sky, rock before I finally stopped.
The gorge went quiet.
The baby dragon froze. The young dragons chewing meat in the distance stopped mid-bite. Alduin’s head snapped up. Somewhere nearby, Masor made a soft sagak.
Still lying on the ground, I slowly raised one hand.
"I’m fine. Not dead. Mom’s tough."
I was not fine at all.
My thigh stung, my side throbbed, and a dull pain climbed up my right hand—I must have twisted my wrist when I caught myself.
Still, I had to smile.
If I didn’t, the baby dragon in front of me looked ready to burst into tears on the spot.
"I said I’m fine. You didn’t mean to."
The hatchling flattened itself against the ground until it was nearly one with the rock.
I reached out with my left hand and gently touched the bridge of its snout.
"Gentle by my standards. Got it?"
"Kiing……."
"If you understand, be careful with the tail from now on. And tickle attacks are banned for a while."
I said it with a smile, but the smile didn’t last long.
This little one had twisted its body without a single thought.
It was just play.
Its tail had simply swung while it was laughing.
And I had gone flying.
One baby dragon, with one small movement, had hurt me.
That didn’t mean the child was at fault.
Which made it even worse.
Even without malice, this was the result.
Not anger. Not fear. Not even the intent to hunt. And still, this happened.
So what about when an adult dragon was terrified?
What had it been like when that reddish-brown child was stabbed by humans, bound, and filled with fear?
I am weak.
Truly weak.
Living among dragons for so long, I had forgotten.
These children stop because I am their mother.
They lower their heads at my voice, pull back their breath at my gesture, and still their tails at my words.
It isn’t because I am strong.
It is because these children trust me.
But if a moment ever comes when that trust cannot reach them—
if instinct moves first, if fear flares first, if rage bares its claws first—
with what will I stop these children then?
"Gargantua."
At my call, the wind in the gorge lowered a little.
Kurrrrr.
The mist parted, the clouds shoved aside, and a colossal shadow covered one side of the gorge.
Gargantua looked at me, then at my wrist, then at the baby dragon heading toward the water’s edge, one after another.
"Mother."
"Did you see?"
"I did."
I let out a long breath and looked up at him.
"I want to learn Dragon Speech."
All three pairs of Gargantua’s eyes turned to me at once.
Holding my wrist, I spoke.
"I… if one baby dragon just wags its tail in play and I go flying like this, then if someone really goes wild, I can’t do anything."
Gargantua was silent for a long time.
"Power… Sbauklun. Do you desire it?"
I couldn’t answer right away.
Power burned homes, split wells, and buried people’s names in ash.
Because it was dangerous.
Because it was frightening.
Because you were hurt first.
Because you wanted to protect.
Even if every one of those reasons was true, wherever power passed, things appeared that never came back.
"Not the power to burn. Not the power to destroy either."
I looked down at my wrist and said,
"I need the power to make things stop."
Gargantua lowered his head further.
"There is such a thing."
"Teach me."
"It is dangerous. Human organs were not made to hold Dragon Speech. Your throat may be damaged, or the pathways of mana may twist."
"I still want to learn."
In Gargantua’s eyes were worry and, just a little, relief together.
"I have waited a long time. For the day Mother would desire power."
"You were waiting for that?"
"Yes."
Whoooosh…
Gargantua quieted the wind in the gorge. When the young dragons nearby tried to approach, a single glance made them withdraw.
Alduin already had his head raised in the distance. Masor was invisible, but he was clearly nearby.
"Masor."
Sagak.
The sound came from right behind my left shoulder.
"I told you not to stand behind me without a sound. And if you laugh today, you’re in trouble."
Sagak.
That last sound definitely felt like a laugh.
Absolutely.
I cleared my throat.
"So. What exactly is Dragon Speech?"
"Human words… carry meaning. Dragon Words make meaning real."
When Gargantua drew in a breath, the air in the gorge pressed down once.
"When spoken with mana, the content touches the world. The world hears the words and, for a moment, accepts that meaning."
"Isn’t that completely broken?"
"That is why it is difficult. Meaning, mana, and voice must become one."
He said dragons produced Dragon Speech with their entire bodies.
Not only lungs and throat—the mana of horns, scales, wings, and heart all became the root of the sound.
With human organs, most of it could not be produced; the rest would only reach my ears as a roar.
"Levero."
When Gargantua briefly demonstrated Dragon Speech, the air in the gorge flipped.
There seemed to be syllables, but my ears could not catch them.
The sound of rock splitting deep in a mountain range.
The sound of thunder, long pressed under the clouds, opening an ancient door.
The sound of the sea drawing a single breath from very far away.
To my ears, all of it was simply a roar.
But my body knew it was speech.
"Then what’s the first word I can learn?"
"You have understood and continued studying Dragon Speech for five hundred years… simple ones should be possible. Something like Frainaim."
The pronunciation was shorter than I expected.
Frainaim.
Of course, the sound I actually heard was a little different…
"Meaning?"
"Stop."
"Just stop?"
"Withdraw your movement. Lay your breath down. Halt the claw that has gone ahead. That is what Frainaim means."
I rolled the word around silently in my mouth.
"It suits me perfectly."
"A first Dragon Word must be a meaning already present in that person’s life."
I drew a breath and spoke carefully.
"Frainaim."
Nothing happened.
Masor made a small sagak.
"Don’t laugh."
Sagak.
"You just laughed."
Sagak.
Gargantua spoke calmly.
"The sound is similar. But there is no mana."
This time I focused on mana.
I tried to draw the warm current up from inside my chest and push it into my throat—and my throat stung for an instant.
"Ugh."
"Stop. You forced the mana into your throat."
"Then where do I push it?"
"Do not push. Let it flow."
"That’s the hardest thing anyone can say."
Gargantua lowered his head.
"When Mother tells a child to stop, do you force it through your throat?"
I paused.
"No. I just think, it’s dangerous, you mustn’t get hurt, you have to stop right now. And then I speak."
"That is it."
I almost laughed from sheer absurdity.
Learning words the world itself listens to, and the method was a mother’s scolding.
But I tried again.
This time I did not force the mana up.
I thought of the moment the baby dragon’s tail had struck me, the face it made when it flattened itself in shock, and the heart that said it had to stop before anyone got hurt.
"Frainaim."
This time the wind stopped for the tiniest moment, then moved again.
The fine dust on the gorge floor fell a beat late through the air.
"Just now."
"It reached. Very faintly."
At that moment, the baby dragon washing its front legs by the water caught the scent of meat and prepared to dash toward the feeding ground.
Its tail was lifted high, and behind it a even smaller hatchling was nodding off.
Without time to think, I raised my hand.
"Frainaim!"
In that instant, the gorge stopped.
The baby dragon’s tail froze in midair. The tip of the dozing hatchling’s ear went still. The low rumble rising in Alduin’s throat cut off.
Masor’s scales tried to make a sagak and stopped at the very beginning of the sound.
Wooong…
And Gargantua stopped as well.
One of his six pairs of wings had been folding with infinite slowness; that enormous wing hung motionless in the air.
Time had not stopped.
But for a brief moment, movement itself seemed to have slipped out of the world.
Whoooo.
Then the wind began to flow again.
The baby dragon’s tail lost its strength and dropped with a soft thud. Masor’s scales made a delayed sagak.
I looked down at my own hand.
"Did it work?"
Gargantua did not answer for a while.
"…Mother. I stopped as well."
"You too?"
"Yes."
"Is that a good thing?"
"For one who has only just gained a tongue to do something as absurd as reciting poetry—it is Skiman."
I touched my throat.
Gargantua spoke low.
"Mother learned Dragon Speech for the first time today. Yet the meaning of Frainaim is something you have already been teaching for five hundred years."
I could say nothing.
The first Dragon Word I learned was neither fire, nor storm, nor blade.
Stop right now.
It was the phrase I had taught the children more than any other for five hundred years.
I rolled the word quietly in my mouth.
"Frainaim…"
This time I put no mana into it.
Just the pronunciation.
And yet Alduin flinched, Masor reacted with a sagak, and several baby dragons tucked their tails under their bodies.
I narrowed my eyes.
"I haven’t even used it yet."
Krrr…….
Sagak.
Kiing.
Wronged little sounds spread through the gorge.
Only then did I smile a little.
"Good. I’m going to use this a lot from now on."
Gargantua quietly lowered his head.
"It is the Dragon Word that suits Mother best."
I carefully cradled my right hand and looked around at the children of the gorge.
There was still a long way to go.
Dragons kill easily, destroy easily, end things easily.
I had to teach them how to stop those easy things.
And now, small as it was, I finally had a way to make that word touch the world.
"I should learn magic too from now on."
A body already called a witch.
Since things had come this far, I might as well become a real one…!
"…But who am I supposed to learn from?"
A problem from the very beginning…
Kuuung…
"Gargantua?"
"If it is a mage… Nefiantelene. There is one I know."
"Oh… who?"
"Saturunus. An elf who reached the peak of magic—one whom even death could not take."
The Old Elf. Carnepisara.