BeLonging

The storm embraced Keshet as it ought, sharp-toothed and fierce. Howling winds battered her thin body; ice tried to dig its wicked, prying claws between her smooth scales; the roar of the wind and the blinding-white of the snow made her duller senses all-but useless in the midst of the maelstrom.

She was not naturally equipped the same as a purebred Storm dragon, but she belonged to it just the same. It would not gentle its touch for her — nor would she want it to or accept it (if it somehow did) — so she would mold herself to ride in it like any other cloud laden with unpredictable fury.

So it went. Her hooves slipped, and she pulled herself back up again. She shot into the air and was sent tumbling back, head over tail, driven into fresh, hard ice and snow, and Keshet got back on all fours, readied herself, and tried again. It was hard, painful, rewardless work. Had Jack been with her, they would have suggested starting smaller, easier, but she’d had easy. Slowly learning was for the ambitionless, the content.

This was the sort of place she belonged.

She may not have moved forward, but she managed a few seconds of stable flying in the air and laughed, braying into the wind, a heavy plume of steam flying from her mouth before she landed, panting, shivering.

As if the storm had heard her success, knew she needed more of a challenge, the wind blew harder, the wind shifting another octave up in its tireless screech, and the clouds blotted out the last of the sun.

Keshet’s blue eyes gleamed, and she bared her teeth in a facsimile of a grin, a flickering orb of light appearing outside of herself. It barely did anything to fight off the dark, and maintaining that bit of magic took more attention than she liked to admit. That, she supposed, she should have practiced, but Jack would pry that admission from her cold, dead corpse.

The light caught, gleaming on two beads of pure black. Keshet’s eyes narrowed, and she lowered her head while taking a curious step towards it. If she came home with a lead on a potentially useful resource, Jack would be quick to forgive and forget that she’d run off somewhere dangerous today—

The snow cracked into thick sheets, the edges crumbling and falling to the ground, the loose snow swept off by the storm. The shape that emerged was that of a dragon, larger than Keshet even when on all fours. It opened a mouth full of sharp teeth meant for piercing and tearing and made a noise that, even though it was drowned out by the storm, managed to rattle through her bones. It swung a large, clawed paw at her, lunging forward with surprising agility, and Keshet jumped with the wind, letting it carry her farther than she would’ve made it on her own.

Her instinct was to fight back. Of course it was. Her blood ran hot, and she was in her element. But her limbs were already tired from how hard she’d been pushing herself while dancing in the blizzard. The fatigue made them tight, made them tremble. Her breaths were already coming hard, and with every one, the cold seemed to bite at her lungs, stealing some of her air.

The smart thing to do would be to run. She could jump into the air with the wind at her back. The other dragon might not be inclined to chase her down, if all she’d done was disturb a nap with her lights and her training nearby. It would be terribly easy.

The thought went through her like a spear, and she hissed in almost physical pain.

It shook its entire body, snow and ice flying off in every direction, thick velvety scales rising in their wake, spiking in anger. It opened its mouth again, the horrible, sickening noise driving through her again.

Her own anger flared in petty, childish discontent. This dragon belonged here. Whether it could fly easily in the storm didn’t matter — though it probably could because life was unfair that way. It was built for surviving the harsh cold. Hell, it had let the blizzard pile snow and ice on top of it completely unbothered, and had only gotten up to blame Keshet.

She stomped her hooves in anger, cracking the snow beneath her, and the orb at her side flew directly at the dragon’s eyes as another appeared at her side. It stumbled gratifyingly backwards, swiping at the magic as if it were a physical thing to attack.

“It’s a shame,” Keshet said to herself though some part of her hoped the bear-shaped dragon could hear it, “that I can’t confuse you as much as I’d like to. Love to make you have a whole fight against someone who’s not even there.” She jumped forward while it was dazed, hitting its face with the backside of her wing before jumping onto the dragon’s back. She bit down on one ear, resisting the urge to tear, hoping the precarious position would convince it to calm and surrender

Her mistake was forgetting that it, too, was of the storm. It snarled — she felt it vibrate through its body and up into hers — and dropped to roll into the snow, heedless of the danger of permanent harm. She kicked away, barely managing to avoid having all of her delicate bones crushed, and when it got back to its feet, it seemed to grin at her.

Keshet grinned back. Her body tried to beg for rest and reprieve, and distantly, she felt Jack growing concerned. She ignored both, mostly because the dragon was rushing her, bounding too fast to avoid — she underestimated its agility for its size — and rose up on its hind legs to wrap its forepaws around her. Or tried. Instead, it braced them on her wings, pinning her down in the snow and ice, those terrible teeth cradled almost tenderly around the expanse of her throat.

Keshet’s heart beat wild and fierce against the points of those teeth. She tipped her head back, considering the virtues of kicking upwards with her hooves — if she’d hit any organs, if the blows would be enough to drive it back, if it would bite down anyway — or if she had any last tricks left up her proverbial sleeves.

She remembered: the hearth-warmth of Threvilla’s main house; the cozy stalls — they were more like rooms — in the dragons’ home; Jack, brilliant, fun, and keyed into what made dragons and people tick, what others wanted, what Jack could give them, sometimes manipulative, but you could just as easily manipulate them back; always a belly full of warm food or a pack to hunt with, but either way, you never went hungry or alone unless you wanted to.

The memories flowed out of her, wove behind the bear-dragon’s eyes. In startled confusion, it bit, but it didn’t bear down with its teeth, not yet, listening, hearing her out, a bit dazed, entranced.

“Come home with me,” she said under the din of the storm, somewhere between the nitty-gritty of its gray matter, where it couldn’t shake her without real effort. If she had to play dirty to win, she would.