#elf partner

“Shadow?” she asks. While her voice is soft as it could be for a dragon, it was still toomuchtoomuchtoomuch. “Are you—”

He doesn’t answer.

Instead, he approaches on silent feet and ducks beneath the folded arch of her wing. Dragonhide closes around him like a blanket, the world narrowing to darkness stitched with only the faintest ember-soft light bleeding through.

The air under her wing is hot from the fire in her core. It seeps into his bones, loosening something tight and aching in his chest. Her flank is a wall of warmth, steady and unyielding. He curls up on the floor pressed flush against it, knees drawn in and digging into her hide, his forehead resting against her scales.

The scales rasp against his skin when he shifts. They're not sharp—never sharp—but rough and textured, a feeling that grounds him. He brings his fingers up to drag along valleys and ridges beneath the pads of his fingers, following the natural rise and fall of the tapestry of her scales. Each pass sends feeling shivering up his arm, a reminder to himself that she is safe, that he is safe.

Ashes hums, doesn't ask anything more. Shadow thinks she might recognize he isn't in a state to talk. He's thankful.

Her heart beats against his forehead, deep and powerful, a slow, even rhythm that drowns out the noise still echoing in his head. Not panicked. Not upset. Steady. Ba-dump—pause—ba-dump. A tempo older than language.

Her breath plays along with its own rhythm, a warm rise and fall that moves his body almost like a babe being rocked to sleep.

Shadow exhales, relaxes for the first time in hours.

A baby crying.

Shadow bolts upright so fast his head spins.

His nephew.

His baby nephew!

How—how could he forget? The only piece of his old life not torn away. The only Safe Person he has left. Small and helpless and still here.

He’s moving before the thought fully forms, scrambling out of the shadows, feet skidding on uneven stone as he follows the sound blindly. His heart pounds hard enough to drown out the whispering in his head.

He rounds a bend in the cave and skids to a halt.

Someone is there.

Tall. Slightly too tall to be an elf. The lighting paints her hair the same molten orange as Ashes’ scales, and when she turns, wings shift at her back—smaller than the dragon’s, folded close, four slender horns crowning her head. A tail flicks unconsciously behind her.

She’s definitely not an elf.

Elf-like, sure. Also dragon-like. Like she was trying to be something in-between.

Shadow’s breath stutters.

They’d been taken in by a dragon. Ashes. That name, carefully exchanged with the along with the few words they could understand between their languages. He hasn’t seen hide nor wing of anyone but her since waking here—

The patterns form a picture in his head.

It must be Ashes.

Just. A disguise?

Before he can ponder further, the baby cries again—louder this time, closer.

Shadow’s focus narrows on the lump in the woman's—Ashes'?—arms instantly.

There!

Tiny. Wrapped in cloth far too big for him. Face scrunched red with distress, fists clenched tight as he wails.

His nephew.

Shadow takes a stumbling step forward. His hands shake as he reaches out for his baby.

The world narrows to nothing but the baby in his arms—the last thread tying him to everything he lost—and for the first time since the storm, since the chains, since the darkness of the Curse swallowed his life whole—

Shadow holds his baby close to his chest, Ashes at his side.