what are you doing here?

[small_magics]

Isibel has never seen an odder collection of fauna. She has not traveled extensively, but she is sure that creatures of this size - lizards as heavy as ten elves together, beavers eight and nine feet long, turtles with shells the size of small houses - are not customary. Yet the island is riddled with them.

The creatures have no particular fear of elves, but nor do they seek them, and none of her party have been attacked; she feels safe enough traveling through the forest on her own, stepping lightly, looking for the sweep of the treeline and any springs that might be useful for settlers if elves settle here. Besides, she is a student of the small magics, some of which may be cast quite rapidly if there is need; she could frighten away an animal that took too much interest in her. The ribbons tied around each of her knees and ankles (blending seamlessly with the rest of her travel outfit) are some of her finest small magic, guiding her steps so that she may place her feet as elves ought to be able to and bring no embarrassment to her House. They don't make her truly graceful, but she can walk, and care will do the rest.

She's deep into the forested part of the Unknown Island when she starts finding statues. Old statues. The trees have grown up around them, it looks like, they've been here that long; they're worn and weathered and have lichen growing on them.

And they're all of unicorns.

The oldest sculptures are none too skillful, but as she proceeds inward towards the center of the island, they become newer and better and it's plain to see that they're not of unicorns, but a unicorn. A unicorn with a broken horn; this is not, it soon becomes apparent, random damage to early statues. Someone has carved a specific unicorn, dozens - hundreds? thousands? - of times. And the art has been made with such intense love, and the newest of the statues are so delicately done that they look almost like real unicorns, with all the magic that implies, though they hold still and are on closer inspection all still carved from stone.

Someone loved this unicorn, and lived on this island, and made a thousand statues of her, and now the place is inhabited only by giant animals that certainly could have done no such thing. Isibel wonders what happened to the sculptor. To the unicorn, too.

On she walks.

Comments

[small_magics]

Perhaps this would be easier with paper and pencil?

She has those. She's started a fresh book recently; there's nothing sensitive in what she hands him even if he's deceiving her about not knowing the language.

[endragoned]

The pencil seems to puzzle him.

He peers at it, rubs his thumb over the point, sniffs it, and only then deigns to make marks on a page.

An extremely crude map of a continent she should be familiar with. The shape is vague and partly wrong, but he gets most of the mountains right, and he draws Shadow Mountain up in the far north where it should be. From there, the point of the pencil wanders down over the continent in a meandering pathway. He mimes people, then himself hiding from them. This, apparently, was his primary method of navigation: flee from anyone who walks upright.

After some time spent doing this, he ended up deep in a forest (indicated by gesturing around them and patting a tree, then pointing at the map).

He turns the page.

He draws a dragon, crude but unmistakable.

He touches his face, the pad of his thumb just under one eye and his first two fingers just under the other; he brings that hand down to touch the dragon; he makes a circling gesture, then brings it back up to touch under his eyes again.

Then he stretches his wings, and draws the dragon in flight with a winged bipedal figure beside it, and turns back to the map and drags the pencil right off the edge of the continent and over the ocean and around the edge of the page to pass under the flying figures and end in a small blob shaped more or less like this island.

[small_magics]

Isibel blinks at the dragon drawing. She thought that all the known dragons were those living in the Elven Lands, most bonded to one Elf and one Wildmage or occasionally a High Mage. Not that the Dragonbonded have any strong attachment to any location, with the ability to travel so far, so fast, but they do regularly stop in the Elven Lands and maintain residences there.

(Isibel thought long, long and hard before deciding not to present herself to any of the young unbonded dragons, or any of the old dragons with old bondmates. The trouble is - whatever power they offer, however much she'd like to wield it - the dragons read their bondmates' minds. She has met dragons, but only dragons who are not due for a handoff anytime in the near future, and keeps her distance from the others.)

But apparently there is another. And if the dragon is not Bonded, of course he's immortal -

No. That's not the only way.

If the dragon is bonded to something immortal -

Her eyes fly open as she realizes that this dragon may not just be this Endarkened's friend, but his bondmate. Could that be what he meant? It's never happened before that she knows - there have been dragons fighting on the side of demons, but only at the command of Tainted bondmates -

If this Endarkened is actually bonded to his dragon then he's some kind of mage, and he's got an unlimited wellspring of power.

And he's chosen to live on an island with his dragon completely alone fondly sculpting Tialle for at least the last two thousand years.

Isibel does not understand.

[endragoned]

The (potential) Dragonbond Endarkened watches her curiously.

Then he hands her back her notebook and pencil.

[small_magics]

She purses her lips, and draws a little stylized dragon - she is not an artist, but because she knows this, she draws as simply as she must to achieve a reasonable result. And she draws a little stylized demon next to it. And then she draws a line between them.

[endragoned]

The (apparent) Dragonbond Endarkened smiles wryly, and nods.

[small_magics]

Isibel processes this.

She taps the dragon-doodle with her pencil, and then mimes looking around.

[endragoned]

He smiles, and closes his eyes and furls his wings and hugs his arms against himself and nestles his head on his shoulder.

The dragon is sleeping, apparently.

[small_magics]

Isibel nods.

...And then she draws a stylized little elf.

And then another and then another and then a lot of dots. (This number of dots does not represent the size of her expedition.)

She circles them, then turns back to the map and taps the island.

[endragoned]

He throws up his hands, gestures to himself, touches wings, horns, the dots on the page, tips his head to one side and looks at her challengingly.

[small_magics]

She flings up her hands and looks away, biting her lip; she doesn't know what to do. Most people would have killed him on sight.

[endragoned]

He sighs.

[small_magics]

Isibel draws a stylized little demon - clearly female, no wings, not this particular demon. Then she draws a book, page around the illustrated Vestakia: this is a legendary figure. Then she draws the little demon again with a unicorn's head in her lap, and then the little demon among little elf figures, everyone standing around and nobody killing anybody else.

She taps the paper with her pencil, thinking; this demon is not the Legendary Vestakia, but there is some precedent for red-skinned demonic-looking entities living peacefully among elves.

[endragoned]

He looks from Isibel to the drawing to Isibel to the drawing and back to Isibel, frowning in obvious confusion.

Touches the Vestakia figure. Touches the unicorn's head in her lap. Touches the burn on his hand.

[small_magics]

Isibel nods. There aren't any live unicorns around anyway. She draws a mini family tree for Vestakia: demon doodle plus human doodle equals Vestakia with Shalkan's head in her lap. She draws circles around the demon father's horns and the human mother's heart. Then she draws this demon under all that, and an arrow from him to the family tree, and crosses it out firmly, and throws up her hands again, he's not Vestakia, he can't prove himself like Vestakia could, she doesn't know what to do.

[endragoned]

He laughs and nods.

[small_magics]

She turns the page; this one's out of space. She doodles his dragon meeting the elves, no demon in sight.

[endragoned]

He studies the drawing.

He nods, but hesitantly.

[small_magics]

She then draws an elf with a dragon, turns back to the map and describes a path between Elven Lands and the island, and doodles the two dragons facing each other, mouths open to speak - might they share a language, she wonders.

[endragoned]

He shakes his head.

He touches his dragon on the page; touches himself; brings his hands together in front of him and makes a wide sweeping palm-down gesture to either side, like a vast emptiness. This dragon has never met anyone else.

[small_magics]

Oh well. She shrugs. She doesn't have any better ideas.

[endragoned]

He nods.

He taps the picture of an elf with a dragon.

He points to Isibel.

He points off into the distance, past the pond.

He looks at her expectantly.

[small_magics]

She nods. This dragon doesn't need a new Bondmate; it has an immortal partner already. She should be quite safe.

[endragoned]

He smiles at her, then turns to lead her through the forest.

As he walks, he starts talking again; it's not clear whether he's addressing Isibel or himself, but the distinction isn't all that relevant.

[small_magics]

She listens in case she recognizes any words from somebody's name, but she doesn't. Oh well.