FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Story and all characters (c) 2006-2007 Yancarlo Ramsey. Please do not redistribute without written permission.

This is a work of adult fiction. If you get caught reading it, don't blame me.

• 6 -

I arrived just after sunset, the sky still light, but quickly darkening toward twilight. Making my way from the landing cliff into the mountain-city's tunnels, I took the most direct route toward my lair, one I was quite familiar with. But it was also familiar to others, and well-traveled. On my way, I happened to pass Shalindra.

"Dorani," my sister said to me in greeting.

"Indra," I replied. And as far as I knew, that should have been the end of it, as we were going opposite directions.

But she paused, and watched me go by, drawing a deep breath... and then turned and caught up to me, walking beside me and moving her head close to mine to say quietly, "So who is he?"

I wasn't sure why she was following me, and looked back at her in confusion as I continued to walk down the tunnel toward my lair. "Who do you mean?"

She reached out with her wing and batted at me playfully. "You know who! The male! The one you've been sneaking off to be with so often recently! I'd been wondering where you were going, but this explains it... You finally found someone! I'm so happy for you, Dorani!"

I was shocked, and continued walking only out of inertia. 'The one I'd been sneaking off to be with so often recently' was Adrian! He was a human! Had she smelled his scent on me? But what kind of reaction was this to smelling a human? It didn't make any sense. No... Wait! I froze in place suddenly.

Shalindra took another two steps before she realized I'd stopped. She backed up, giving me an odd look. "Dorani? What's wrong?"

Could she mean...? "Nothing's wrong! - What do you mean, 'found someone'?"

She sat, right there in the tunnel, dropping her rear end to the ground and tilting her head at me in a baffled expression. "A male, of course! You've mated... I can smell it on you! I had no idea... I don't think anyone did. Why didn't you tell me?"

She didn't know anything about Adrian... She obviously thought I'd been meeting with some male dragon! She thought I had mated! I cursed myself for not thinking to wash in the lake before returning. But hindsight was no use now. What could I tell her? 'No, there's no male, I just smell like I've mated because this human used a pleasure spell on me'? Right. She'd go crazy. Or she'd think I was crazy. Or both. I wasn't sure which would be worse.

But if I told her she was right, then what? Unlike humans, dragons always take a lot of time to get to know each other before they're even capable of mating. Saying he'd just happened to leave right afterward would be extremely suspicious. And if I didn't say something like that, she would want me to tell her about this supposed mate of mine. She'd expect me to be able to tell her about him! I couldn't just make something up. So where was I going to produce a dragon?

And then, as she watched me, waiting for a response, and I stood there staring back at her, I realized something. I didn't need to produce a dragon. I just needed to produce someone she didn't know, someone I did know fairly well, someone I could tell her about... someone I could pretend was a dragon. Someone I could pretend I had mated with.

And then another thought occurred to me. Could a dragon actually mate with a human? It was such a bizarre thought that I almost shivered, but fortunately I managed to control myself.

I had to say something, and quickly. Or do something. Shalindra was waiting expectantly. And then inspiration struck again. I broke my frozen stance and lowered my head, looking away from her. "You know how I feel about my appearance... I wasn't certain. I didn't want to say anything. I was afraid I'd find out later that it wasn't going to work, and then I'd have to tell everyone that."

It was perfect. She moved closer and spread her wing, putting it over my back like a blanket and rubbing the side of her head against mine. "I'm sorry... You know I don't agree with you, but I'm sorry you felt like that."

I leaned against her side and sighed. "Thank you, Shalindra... I know I should be more confident, but it's hard..."

"Well, don't be sad... After all, you did find someone! So tell me about this male!"

I rubbed my head against hers now, trying to cover up the fact that her attempt at cheering me up, which should have worked fine if things were as she said, actually had the opposite effect. I forced myself to play along, though. "His name is... Adrianfarshallan."

"Hmm... An odd sounding name..."

"Yes, isn't it? But he's not from anywhere around here. He's traveled a long ways from where he was hatched." I straightened up and began walking again. "Come, I'll tell you more at my lair. I'd prefer not to talk about this in public."

"Of course." She rose and followed along next to me, and in a few minutes we'd arrived.

I curled up in my sleeping bowl, and she laid down next to me, just outside it. She watched me silently, expectantly, and finally I began to speak again.

"He's a real loner, likes to keep to himself for the most part... I met him while hunting. He'd gone out farther than usual, apparently, and so had I. We were after the same herd, and hadn't expected to meet anyone else. We ended up surprising each other, and, well..." I didn't like lying to Shalindra, and I couldn't keep making things up. What I'd said was good enough. I felt guilty about letting her fill in the blanks, but the less I said, the lower the chance that I'd be caught in some lie.

"I see... Go on..." She sounded amused, and patted my foreleg with her foot.

Now for something that would let me talk about the things I'd learned from him without giving too much away... I hoped she wouldn't react too badly. "One reason he lives so far away is that he studies humans."

She was startled, that's certain, and pulled her head back a little, looking at me in surprise. "Humans? Why would anyone live far away just to study those pests?"

I tossed my head to the side slightly, expressing uncertainty. "He does, though. He even talks to a few of them."

She blinked at me a few times, settling down slowly, trying to take in this information. "Wait... So that's why you have all those books about humans lying around! I was wondering..."

I glanced over at the neat stack of books, and the one that wasn't stacked with them. It wasn't that many! "Yes, that's why." And then I decided to take a chance. If this worked... "And I've even met one of them. He was a mage, like Adrian, and he spoke our language."

"You've... met... a human?" I wasn't sure if she didn't believe me or was just stunned.

"I have. He was a friendly person, and he spoke very well. He even made jokes, and showed me a bit of his magic." Well, that much was certainly not a lie! It was how I'd gotten into this mess, after all. I just hoped I could get out of it somehow...

"Wow. A human who talks to dragons instead of stealing from us or hunting us... Are you certain of this?"

"I am. I trust Adrian, and he has known that male for years." Again, this was certainly true... "He considers him a good friend. They talk, compare opinions, discuss magic, all sorts of things..." This was also true, other than the fact that it was me doing those things with the real Adrian, and not Adrianfarshallan the 'dragon' doing them with this unnamed human mage.

"Well... That's certainly... unusual," she replied. Apparently she was willing to believe what I was telling her, as unlikely as it might seem, because doubting that could cast suspicion on everything else I'd said as well. She wanted to believe that I'd successfully found a mate, though, and to do that she had to accept my story, despite the cracks in it. She did.

I spent another hour satisfying her curiosity before claiming that I was too tired to continue and needed to sleep.

"Oh, I'm sorry Dorani... Here you are, just come back from a mating flight, and I'm keeping you up with questions... You should have stopped me earlier." She got up and moved toward me, laying her head atop my shoulders and spreading a wing across my back for a moment. It was the equivalent of what I'd learned the humans called a [hug].

"It's alright, Indra. You understand now why I was... reluctant to say anything, don't you?"

"Of course, of course... A mate who is friends with humans... It is rather hard to believe. If I hadn't smelled you myself..." She looked at me again, in that sisterly way she had that made me feel cared for even when I was sad. "I hope you sleep well, Dorani. And may your first clutch be large and healthy!" She stepped back and turned to go.

"Thank you, Indra... We'll just have to wait and see, I suppose."

She paused near the exit of my lair to look back at me again with a smile, and then without another word, departed. I curled up, and despite the fact that I truly was tired, it took a while for me to fall asleep. I was nervous. I knew my sister would tell others. Everyone would probably want to say 'I told you so' under the guise of congratulating me. I nearly felt sick. What was I going to do? I'd turned Adrian into a dragon in my mind... and I couldn't back it up with reality. I needed to talk to him. He would know what to do. He had to.

Somewhere in the middle of trying to decide what I would say to him, I finally fell asleep.