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Atlas was relaxing in his room, carefully tuning a wing harp. The musical instrument was a flat rack of hollow tubes in decreasing lengths--with a gap in the middle dividing the instrument into two. One half went on one wing, the other half went on the other wing, then a wing harp was played by a dragon flapping their wings. Each flap would force air through the wing harp's hollow tubes, which resonated to produce melodic sound, while specific movements of the flight control scales altered airflow over the wings and hence changed the pitch of the music.

The wing harp was strapped to his back, but not for playing right now. Instead Atlas put his snout close to one of the wing harp's tubes and blew air through it to listen for the sound, then he tweaked a knob, slightly adjusting the length of the resonator tube to get the pitch right, before moving onto the next tube. He didn't own this wing harp--it was school property, borrowed as part of music class for him to practice on. The instrument was of decent age and middling condition, which meant it required frequent tuning. But once properly tuned, it was still fully capable of producing quality music.

A heavy thump on his door made him pause. Raising his head, Atlas wondered for a moment if he had imagined the noise, then he stood up. Still with the wing harp strapped to his back and wings, he took the few steps needed to reach his room door. With a sharp motion he unlatched the door and pulled it open.

Outside was another dragon fledgling, similar in size and age to him, but with scales of vibrant amber colour in contrast to his own sooty black. She had been slumped forward and dejectedly resting her head against the door, so she tumbled forward when he opened it.

It would have been an exaggeration to say that Atlas caught her in his arms--he was a crippled dragon missing his left foreleg, so he didn't even have arms, just the one arm, and he didn't manage to catch her with that--more like she crashed into him and caught herself, using him for support. His eyes widened from surprise. "Jarz?"

For a moment Jarzyl leaned against him, then she put her wings against the door frame and righted herself. Her neck frill was drooping slightly, and she didn't make eye contact. "Sorry. I don't want to bother you, but I need you."

"You're never a bother. Is something wrong?

"Can I come in?" Jarzyl didn't wait to be invited, but then he'd never refused her anyway. Stepping forward, she gently nudged Atlas back into his room, then shut the door behind them. Finally Jarzyl looked at him. She hesitated, noticing the musical instrument strapped to his wings. "Were you in the middle of something? Did I interrupt you while you were playing a song?"

"I finished my daily practice already." Carefully he put his wings flat down and unbuckled the harp, placing it on the floor before furling his wings back up. "I was just tuning the instrument."

For a moment Jarzyl's expression lit up, and her frown turned into a cheeky grin. "Oh, in your room by yourself, you having fun tuning your instrument?" she muttered in a slightly suggestive tone.

Atlas chuckled. They hadn't used to joke like this, but now they did, and it felt so easy. "Not as much fun as I have playing with my instrument."

"Hmm, I like listening to you play."

"I've noticed, yes," Atlas replied.

"Maybe I should watch too. Have you put on a performance for me. Hah." Jarzyl laughed, but her smile faded quickly back to an uncharacteristically sombre look. She sighed softly. "But seriously speaking, I need to sort out my thoughts. Can we talk?"

"Here?" Atlas gestured around. He was a clanless dragon, and he lived in a sheltered home for young dragons who were clanless like him--which accordingly meant that he had little space. Even as a fledgling, it was considered a privilege of his good behaviour and strong academic grades that he was allowed a bedroom for himself rather than sharing a communal dormitory room with a dozen other fledglings and hatchlings, but his room was still tiny. All it could fit was a floor mat for sleeping or sitting on, and a storage chest with a flat top that doubled as a desk. The window let in some sunlight and some air, but it was too small for even a skinny fledgling to fit through, compared to how most dragon architecture was designed for them to takeoff and land from window balconies.

And to top it all off, the wing harp that he'd borrowed from school took up most of the remaining floor space. There really wasn't much space in this room. Atlas glanced at his friend. "We could go for an evening flight around the city if you want to talk?"

Jarzyl was quiet for a moment, then she nodded. "Yeah, let's do that. I'll leave my harness here?"

"If you want."

Reaching up to her shoulders, Jarzyl grabbed the quick release straps of her flight harness and yanked them. A flight harness was a grid of belts and pouches for a dragon to carry things while walking or flying, and now Jarzyl shrugged off her harness and let it drop lightly to the floor. She wore nothing else, except for a pair of wingtip pennant flags which were dyed the same orange shade as her scales and had the Clan Mintaka insignia sewn into the fabric. The one thing she took from her flight harness was a small pocket watch with a metal chain loop, which she dangled around her neck.

Jarzyl's wings were a little oversized compared to the rest of her body and she had a lean form, as was common for fledglings as they grew rapidly--no longer flightless hatchlings, and now getting closer and closer to fully adult drakken size. Atlas stared at his friend for a moment, then he looked at the window to check the weather. "Doesn't looked cloudy. Should be plenty of thermals for soaring."

Jarzyl twisted her back in a loose stretch then nodded. "Let's go."

---

---

In the air, Jarzyl let Atlas take the lead as the two dragon fledglings flew together. Rather than pumping his wings hard to climb quickly, Atlas flew at low altitude until they reached a large warehouse with a big flat top, which caught the evening sun and created an updraft of warm air. The two young dragons circled each other, gliding lazily upwards in wide spirals.

"So what did you want to talk about?" Atlas prompted.

Jarzyl didn't answer. For a while they flew in circles, riding the updraft--they climbed past all the nearby building towers, then even higher until they ascended above even the tallest skyscrapers in the city. Although Avaeria was always bustling, it was mostly the lower airways which were filled with dragons flying from point to point, or the occasional airship powering its way across the city. High up here, everything else looked small, and there was no one else but them.

So far from the city's sun-warmed surface, the updraft began to dissipate so Atlas stopped circling to instead fly straight ahead. Jarzyl followed him, trailing behind his wingtip where it was easier to fly. Finally she spoke. "Do you remember my Aunt Mira?"

"Mira? Your cousins--Maycor and Demmy--she's their mother, right? I recall we met her a few months ago, during the launch of the new city sector?"

"Precisely. Aunt Mira. Shipmaster in the Mintaka merchant fleet. She's easily the... third most inspiring influence on my life, behind my parents." Jarzyl sighed softly and went quiet again for a while. Atlas slowed his wingbeats just to make sure that he could hear what she was going to say. "She's leaving the clan."

"Oh." Of the various possibilities Atlas had been thinking about, this hadn't been one of them. "Why?"

"During the Sector 49 launch, her airship, Recursive Grey,_was hit by a floating boulder--I'm sure you remember that? We _saw it. All the crew survived, and my aunt wasn't injured in the crash, but the airship is a complete write-off. It's being salvaged for parts. They'll pull the power cores out and put them into another new airship coming off the production line, and name that Recursive Grey instead. But Aunt Mira won't be shipmaster anymore, because command postings have already been decided for the next year of airship production. So she's leaving the clan."

"Doesn't your clan have plenty of airships? Can't she be assigned to another craft?"

"Recursive Grey was a Stormrider-class clipper, the newest design from Mintaka Heavy Industrial. Those airships have shields, they have speed, and they are top of the line. All the other available postings are for far less valuable, far less advanced airships. Yes, she could take a lesser posting, but it's about pride. She's one of Mintaka's top shipmasters, and she doesn't want to settle for a less important job. Grah!"

Jarzyl made an annoyed grunt. Suddenly she flapped her wings hard, pulling ahead and speeding up. Atlas let her take the lead and smoothly dropped behind her wingtip to follow. She continued, her voice increasingly agitated. "But do you know who does have too many advanced airships and not enough experienced shipmasters? Clan Taslin. Taslin! I can't even describe... My aunt is going to fly one of their airships, a Kabita-class mark six. They poached her! She's taking her whole family too! Uncle Decarn, as well as little Maycor and Demmy--all of them, leaving Mintaka to join Taslin. Can you believe it?!"

Atlas was rather impressed. "Going from Mintaka to Taslin, apex clan to apex clan? What a power move."

Jarzyl looked over her shoulder and threw an irate look at him. "Shh! Shh! Hey! I know you're clanless, so if you were to join another apex clan I can understand that. But my own aunt! We've been Mintaka dragons for my whole life, and now she's leaving. Betrayal!"

"You'll still see them. Just maybe they'll be wearing different clan flags."

"We were all having lunch together at home today--me, my parents, Aunt Mira and her family, as well as my grandfather. Then afterwards I was going back to my room, but my father calls me back and says we're having a family meeting. I thought... I don't know what I was expecting--maybe that my parents were going to discuss name ideas for the egg? But no. Aunt Mira suddenly announces that she and her family are going to leave the clan and join Taslin, and no one sees this as odd except me! My parents just nod along, and my grandfather doesn't even react at all. Everyone has gone insane."

"Oh?"

"It gets worse. The whole clan is changing. There's streamlining and cost-cutting. My father's department--the... the design and strategic planning office--it's being restructured somehow. My father admitted that he got an offer from Taslin too, and he might just consider going over to _their_architecture and planning department. Which is insane! Those Taslin poachers are coming after all of us!"

Atlas laughed. "Recruiters, you mean. I sure wish that recruiters from apex clans would come hunting after me..."

"They already stole my aunt and her family! Now they're trying to steal my father! And my family are all just letting this happen! They are being encouraging and supportive and it's disgusting."

That made Atlas laugh even harder. "You're going to join Taslin too? Jarzyl Mintaka becomes Jarzyl Taslin." He flapped his wings to pick up a little speed, then he stuck out his head and nipped at the pennant trailing from Jarzyl's wingtip, which had the Mintaka insignia. "Time for you to change your pennants?"

"No!" Jarzyl snapped her flight path left then right, shaking him off. "I'm not going! I'm a Mintaka dragon. Mintaka is the best clan. Why would I want to join Taslin? Jarzyl Taslin... don't you dare even _say_that. I will bite you. No, this is bad. Everything different! I don't want to change my name, or change all my clothes--if my family joins Taslin, we'll have to move out of the Mintaka area and into the Taslin area."

Atlas tried to be sympathetic, but he did find this all amusing. "The Taslin neighbourhood in sector one is right beside the Mintaka area anyway. It'll be even faster for you to fly to school each morning."

"Nope, no thank you!"

"Are your parents really considering the idea? Leaving Mintaka to join Taslin?"

"My father is. He's calculating and analysing all the differences between the clans, and even asking his contacts within Taslin to get a feel of the whole situation. He might really do it. And my mother doesn't care. She thinks that all the apex clans are the same and that it doesn't matter. She says that if Taslin makes a better offer to my father for his work as an architect, he should just accept it. I don't understand."

"What's confusing? There's nothing wrong with Taslin. They're an apex clan just like Mintaka. Taslin has good facilities, good jobs, good management. You already know plenty of dragons from Taslin. Knaster's from Taslin Clan, as is Reylin, and Graye too. I mean, Caden is from Taslin, and she's your best friend."

"Caden says that her clan sucks and she hates it," Jarzyl replied.

"Caden says that all clans suck and that she hates the entire clan system of power brokering and politics," Atlas retorted. "If you ask her what she thinks of Mintaka, I'm sure she'll gladly tell you that your clan sucks too."

"Yes, I know, but... but... arrghh!" Jarzyl flailed her wings about, making her briefly enter a vertical drop before she returned to a glide. "Loyalty! Loyalty to the clan, loyalty to your clanmates. My grandfather used to always teach me that loyalty is critical. You have to trust your clan to protect you, and you protect the clan. You don't just switch clans like you're taking off a flight harness and putting a new one on."

"Your grandfather?"

Jarzyl casually nodded. "Yeah. He always loved reading me stories when I was a little hatchling. I learned lots of morals from those stories, but key amongst those was that loyalty is important."

Atlas recalled something he knew about Jarzyl, but which rarely got brought up. Sometimes he could almost forget just how different his and Jarzyl's backgrounds were, if not for the occasional reminder. "Your grandfather, North Mintaka, the prime wingleader of your clan? _That_grandfather?"

Jarzyl nodded. "Yes. Yes! Exactly! If it somehow gets out to the newssheets that the direct family of Mintaka's own prime wingleader are choosing to go to Taslin, that would be... it would make our clan look so bad. But he just... he didn't even seem surprised!!"

Atlas got a suspicion. "If your grandfather wasn't surprised, do you think he already knew this was happening?"

"I don't know. I don't get it, I don't understand. Why Taslin?! Mintaka is a great clan--the best clan. I believe that." She flew right alongside Atlas and glared at him. "Do you believe that?"

Atlas smiled. "I believe that you're the best."

"Atlas!" Jarzyl's neck frill perked up a little, and she half grinned, half frowned. "That's not the question."

"I believe that your clan is a good clan. Out of the five apex clans, Mintaka is one of them."

"Which clan is better than Mintaka?" Jarzyl challenged. "Name it!"

"Does my opinion really matter?"

"Your opinion matters a lot to me."

"Very well. My opinion is that the apex clans are all of comparable quality. I wouldn't say that Mintaka is any better or worse compared to Taslin, Hasilt, Dirak, or Krin."

"Mintaka is the best! We have... history and significance--we were the clan that founded this city! We built the drakken empire!"

"I seem to recall that Avaeria was founded by three clans, Mintaka, Dirak, and Taslin, so you don't have grounds to claim that Mintaka is special in that regard. Jarzyl Dirak or Jarzyl Taslin--that would be interesting, don't you think?" Atlas teased her.

"I will bite you," Jarzyl muttered, but she couldn't make it sound like a threat.

"Hey, it could be worse. At least it isn't Jarzyl Krin. Imagine that--you joining the smallest of the five apex clans."

"Grrr!" With a playful growl, Jarzyl tilted her wings to pull sharply upwards, then she swiftly reversed and flew downwards, so that she crashed into Atlas's back from above. It wasn't a hard impact at all, rather a very aggressive mid-air hug. Still, having her wings close to his immediately disrupted the airflow over both their aerofoils, throwing them both into a stall.

Back when they'd first learned how to fly, a stall would have caused panic and immediate, frantic instinctual flapping just from the sudden sensation of falling. Now both fledglings were calm and confident in their flight skills. Atlas only made slight adjustments to his wings as he felt his flight control scales flutter, keeping himself level as they both dropped straight down through the air. "Look what you've done now."

Jarzyl was clinging to his back, holding the leading edge of his wings with her forepaws. Because Atlas was falling straight downwards, his body and his stalled wings created a swathe of turbulent air in his wake, which actually made it easier for Jarzyl hang on to him. "Grrr...!" She growled again and tried to bite at his neck.

For a few seconds they remained together as the buildings and streets rapidly approached, then in smooth unison they separated. Jarzyl pushed off him and flared her wings, while Atlas flapped hard and pulled out of the stall. Together the two fledglings levelled off and then touched down on the roof of a medium-height office tower that happened to be nearby.

Jarzyl went over to the edge of the roof and stood sideways on the ledge, balancing on her two left legs while tucking her two right legs against her body, and with her wings still held open. Wind gusted up the side of the building and blew across the rooftop. Jarzyl used her right wing to catch that breeze, letting her stretch further off the edge than would otherwise have been possible. If the wind stopped blowing or even changed direction, she would lose balance and fall off the roof.

That possibility didn't worry her. Raising her head, Jarzyl peered out across the city, staring wistfully at the wide urban landscape--so many buildings, so many dragons. "What do I do? My aunt is going to Taslin, and her family too. If my father goes, my mother will follow him. Of course, my new little brother will be given membership for Taslin, whenever he eventually hatches from the egg. I have to go with them. Or do I? I almost have my magic. If I can show the use of magic, then I'm an adult and I can choose whether to go to Taslin or stay in Mintaka." Still standing on two legs, she glanced at her friend. "What should I do?"

Atlas came over and sat down--not right at the edge, but a safer distance back, just close enough that he could pull Jarzyl back if she started to lose balance. "Definitely go with your family. Your parents are such kind, understanding people. Are you ready to be fully independent and live on your own?"

"Not at all. But my grandfather is staying in Mintaka... My family is tearing apart and half going to another clan." Jarzyl stood properly, but then she turned and instead balanced on her right legs instead of her left, stretching off the rooftop in the other direction. "Maybe my father will turn down the offer from Taslin and stay with Mintaka. Then I don't need to choose at all. Things will stay as they are right now."

Atlas nodded agreeably. "Just take your time and think about things. There's no rush. And don't worry."

Still balancing on two legs with wings spread open, Jarzyl closed her eyes. Now she was balancing without even using her vision, as if tempting fate to send a gust of wind to blow her off the rooftop. Atlas sat forward on his haunches, ready to lunge forward to grab her if she started to lose balance. But the wind, and Jarzyl, stayed stable. "Thanks."

Something else occurred to Atlas. "Question. You said your new brother? I thought it was impossible to know if a hatchling was male or female until they've cracked the egg?"

"It's impossible, yes. But I've just decided to guess it's a brother. If I'm right, then I have precognitive powers. If I'm wrong, then... whatever."

Atlas laughed, and Jarzyl did too. For a moment things were quiet, then Jarzyl blinked her eyes open. "I didn't mean for this to happen."

"What?"

"I didn't come find you because I wanted to talk. It was a good talk and I feel a lot better now, but that wasn't my plan." Standing up properly, Jarzyl stepped away from the rooftop edge and approached Atlas. "I came to find you because I wanted you to distract me from all this life-changing clan crisis stuff."

"It's not a crisis. Plenty of dragons change their clan. It's just a thing that happens in life, not a crisis or emergency." Atlas tilted his head. "Wait, distract you?"

Jarzyl's neck frill perked up from her head. She briefly looked down and checked her pocket watch, which was dangling on a thin metal chain around her neck, then her gaze focused back on him. "Yeah. I thought I could get you to distract me, in a way which... only... you... can." With each word her voice got softer and her snout got closer to his, until finally Atlas gave in. He darted his head forward and kissed her gently. "Mmhh hehe, yes..." That made her sigh and giggle, her mouth pressed against his, then Jarzyl slipped forward and got her wing around his back, pulling him closer till their chests were touching. After the exertion of the flight, Atlas felt warm and he could similarly feel the heat from Jarzyl's body as she stayed close to him.

That quick kiss lasted a second, then dragged on to five, then Atlas tried to pull back, but she resisted. Jarzyl reached out a paw and grabbed one of Atlas's horns, holding his head close. It was a hungry embrace as the two fledglings kept kissing, licking at the other's snout and tasting each other's scales.

It was pleasant, but not quite satisfying. For normal eating, the consumption of food eventually made you full, even if it was just small bites adding up one by one. Yet this sort of hunger wasn't sated so easily. Atlas nibbled at Jarzyl's scales, and he licked at her throat, but that only intensified the need he felt--it was a deep want to be closer to her, to keep touching Jarzyl and having her touch him. Each small touch was pleasant, but it didn't satisfy.

And this wasn't solely a mental desire. It manifested physically too, making his hearts beat quickly in his chest and causing all his scales to feel warm, while his whole body felt tense and energetic. That warmth and tension started to concentrate in one specific area, but Atlas clenched down muscles in his underbelly to hold back that pressure.

There came a point where it became too much. "Mmh. Wait... enough." Atlas finally pulled back and withdrew from their shared embrace.

"Aww." Jarzyl made a slightly disappointed sound, but she grinned and her neck frill was all perked up.

Atlas took a few steps, pacing around the rooftop to calm himself down, and flapping his wings to get some air against his body, countering all that warmth.

Then Jarzyl clicked her tongue, drawing his attention. She was holding that small pocket watch which had been dangling around her neck. "Two minutes."

Atlas blinked. "What?"

Jarzyl waved her watch for emphasis. "Two minutes and a bit extra. That's how long we were... touching. I don't normally take a tongue bath, so at some point I'll have spent more time licking your scales rather than licking my own. Do you ever think about how much time we spend just licking each other?"

Atlas hadn't been aware of the passage of time. He'd been distracted. "Is it time well spent, or time wasted?"

"Well spent, obviously, otherwise we wouldn't do be doing it." With a shrug, Jarzyl let her watch dangle and she scratched at her side with a hindleg. She looked around. "Where are we?"

Atlas chuckled. The sky was still blue and hadn't yet started to turn orange, but the afternoon warmth was fading and the buildings all threw increasingly long shadows. Evening was well underway, even if dusk hadn't arrived just yet. "We're in sector nine."

Jarzyl nodded. "Want to go get dinner? Oh, but I can't. I agreed to have dinner with my parents. They said we have to talk things out, and I definitely want to yell at them about all this changing clans foolishness."

"You should be getting home, then?"

"I'm not in a rush. And I left my flight harness at your home, so I have to go pick it up." Jarzyl unfurled her wings. "Shall we go?"

Atlas flipped open his own wings. "Let's go."

"Yah!" Jarzyl bent low on all four legs, then she sprinted forward and side flipped off the rooftop, twirling once through the air before spreading her wings and dropping into flight--a move that was smooth, graceful, and entirely unnecessary.

"Show off," Atlas muttered, as if he wasn't impressed. He followed her off the rooftop and into the air, but without the flip.

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TO BE CONTINUED