Thin Ice and a White Flag
Sylvia's mother had insisted on leaving a reward, though my father refused it with everything he had, and only then did she take her leave. It was payment, she said, for the warm meal, the change of clothes, and the bed we had given her daughter—and an apology, besides, for reducing our yard to a wreck. Sylvia seemed satisfied with the compromise I had offered and followed quietly in her wake, and at last our house found its peace again.
"What are we supposed to do now..."
That, of course, was a lie. I was the only one at peace. The shock of having met a dragon must have run that deep; Father and Mother were still doing nothing but sigh, hard enough to sink the floor beneath them.
I couldn't bear to keep watching.
"It's not like she ate us, and it's not like she crushed us to death with her tail. Isn't that enough?"
"Emil. Do you truly not know what you're saying?"
Mother answered without ever lifting her face from where it lay buried in her palms.
"You've never told me anything about dragons."
And I really didn't know—so what was I supposed to do about it? From the time I was small I had learned plenty about this world through my parents, but none of it had covered a dragon's temperament, or just how dangerous they were.
"Then tell me now. I'll sigh right along with you."
That dragons were frightening was common knowledge anyone could recite. The knowledge in my head stopped exactly there, and naturally I had no idea why my parents were still carrying on like this.
"Yes. Better you learn now, if nothing else."
And so began Mother's general-education lecture, What Kind of Being Is a Dragon? Enrollment: one.
"To begin with the conclusion—the only reason we are still alive and in one piece is pure luck."
"From what I saw earlier, she was polite enough to speak formally even to me."
"Because we were the ones who kept her child safe. She decided that even a mere insignificant creature was worth a measure of respect."
Dragons, true to the epithet they bear as the strongest living creatures on earth, hold every being but their own kind in contempt, and they do not hesitate to abuse that power. Now and then a gentler kind, or a gentler individual, will settle into human society and live quietly enough—but those are nothing more than rare exceptions.
"Then what about the part where she said, with her own mouth, that she married one of those insignificant creatures and even had a child with him?"
"She may look down on humanity as a species, but she acknowledged the man who became her husband. We have simply earned her goodwill in much the same way. Even people look down on beasts, don't they—and still treat the ones they take in as pets like family."
It all makes perfect sense, doesn't it, Mother. I nodded hard.
"But that goodwill extends only to you, to me, and to your father. Every human besides us, she will regard as an insect, just the same. Even if her nature is gentle by birth, she merely will not go out of her way to do harm. A dragon, my dear, is a being who can stamp you dead the moment she sets her mind to it."
"...And if we make some mistake, and fall out of favor?"
At my question, Mother only shook her head from side to side.
In other words, to tidy up one brief moment of confusion, I had chosen to spend the rest of my life walking on thin ice—and I had dragged Father and Mother out onto it with me.
"Ah."
Now I really understood. This wasn't a shanked shot. This was an own goal.
"You're right, on the whole. Even so, it isn't certain we'll be crushed flat under a dragon's foot, or burned to death by her breath."
Father, silent all the while, cut in. His face was still pale, but he seemed to have pulled himself together, at least a little.
"You know what your mother used to do, don't you? An adventurer lives through every kind of horror there is, so they fall into the habit of assuming the worst about things that haven't even happened, and trembling over them."
He strode over to me, dropped to one knee, and brought his eyes level with mine.
"Above all, Emil, what you did came from a genuinely kind heart. It deserves praise. You found an injured child and saved her, and you were the first to reach out a hand to a lonely one."
His broad hand settled over the crown of my head and tousled my hair.
"And this counts as the first friend you've ever had, so see that the two of you get along from now on."
"Haa... Fine. What else can we do? It's already come to this."
Father, encouraging me—and Mother, at last choosing to accept reality.
Perhaps the childhood friend the Reincarnation Center had seen fit to assign me was that little Half-Dragon girl after all. The thought came out of nowhere. Or perhaps not. It wasn't as if I had ever specifically asked for a half-reptile childhood friend.
"...So, dear. What are we going to do about this?"
One more problem remained: the thing Sylvia's mother had left behind, calling it a token of thanks.
"What else? We use it, and we're grateful. Try to dispose of it in secret, or refuse it, and there's no telling what will become of us."
Where Father's and Mother's eyes had gone, a gold bar sat on the dining table, large enough that it had to weigh several kilograms. Hello. I'm Emil. I offered the greeting in silence, gazing at that lustrous mass of gold as it poured forth light.
Far removed from human society lay the Dragon's Nest.
The tightly shut entrance eased open a crack, and through that gap a silver-haired dragon mother and daughter returned. The mother, a Pureblood Dragon, at once released her polymorph and returned to her original, colossal form, yet the child, looking upon that overwhelming figure, showed not the slightest hint of surprise or fear.
"I indulged your stubbornness because there were eyes upon us. Do not imagine, even for an instant, that you may go on like this without end."
"...Yes."
No—afraid she was. Only not as a frail human before a dragon, but as a young daughter before a scolding mother.
"So. How did you teleport so far, all in a single instant? Even your father would have to put in considerable effort to cross a distance like that in one leap."
"I just... thought that I wanted to go."
At her daughter's answer, the mother rolled her enormous, blood-red eyes, and a rumbling breath slipped through her slightly parted maw.
"Magic is not my field, I will admit. Even so... I know at least this. The loftier the magic, the more the caster's will matters."
She lowered her head until she met her daughter's eyes. Even with the dragon's great, elongated face resting fully against the ground, it still sat a little higher than the gaze of the child standing on two feet.
"So. Are you confident you can reach that place on your own?"
"Yes. I remember it clearly. Anytime."
Another answer, swift and without a single stumble, as if she had been waiting to be asked.
"Good. You will be going often to the lands of humans from now on, so we must find you proper clothes to wear."
The clothes the girl, Sylvia, had on now had originally belonged to Emil. The fit was wrong, of course—the sleeves dragged, and unless the waist tie was cinched, the trousers would simply slide straight off.
"I-I like what I'm wearing."
"They are not even clothes that fit you."
"They're cozy, and they smell nice."
"That is because they were washed clean with a thing called detergent, and dried properly in the sun."
In truth, the mother had begun to feel ashamed that she had never once bought her daughter proper clothes. However much she had met a human and borne his child, she still did not understand the whole of how an entirely different creature lived.
"At any rate, before long we shall go to a city where humans live, and buy you clothes of your own."
"Yes!"
Another instant answer. Her feelings were so honest they verged on pure innocence, and in the end the mother burst out laughing despite herself. Well. While I am at it, I ought to learn a little more of how humans live, she thought.
"Have you considered when you will call on them? When one visits a human home, one does not go empty-handed. It is proper to bring a gift."
"T-tomorrow. Right away. No—this very moment, even."
"That will not do."
"Hiiing—"
However tearfully she looked this way, what would not do would not do.
"..."
"Eeeing—"
Astrea, a Lunaris Dragon who had lived for hundreds of years, felt the emotion called fear for the first time in a very long while.
"..."
"Hweeeing—"
A young child's tears are simply too lethal. Astrea raised the white flag.
"Very well. I have lost. Let us go at once."
"Mom, you're the best!"
Sylvia came running at once, the words nowhere near sincere, caught the very tip of that snout in both arms, and rubbed her cheek against it. The scheme was all too obvious—and precisely because it was, it struck all the harder at the heart.
"In exchange, all we are doing now is going out to buy clothes. Visiting your friend's house is for tomorrow. I will yield no further than this."
"Yes."
The negotiations were settled. In truth, she had merely taken the human boy's way of putting things, adapted it as needed, and found that it actually worked. Thank heaven for that.
Astrea let the faintest breath slip from her nostrils, just enough to make Sylvia step back, and polymorphed into human form once more. At once Sylvia came scurrying over and latched onto her arm.
"Th-this—!"
Cheeks as white as her hair flushed red in an instant. Meeting those bright, sparkling eyes only made it harder to endure.
"But, Mom."
"Wh-what is it?"
"If we're going all the way to the human village, wouldn't your real form be much faster, and more comfortable?"
It was, in all truth, a perfectly valid point. Astrea could not possibly bring herself to confess that she had polymorphed on purpose, merely to stage a moment like the one just past.