Dragons, Dystopians, and Denial

"Perfect!" Aerik said. "Then I think the two of you are ready to go!"

He turned and suddenly wrapped Jerica in a hug. She tensed. This... wasn't like him. At all. Or, maybe it was, with how sentimental he could be sometimes. But he'd only hugged her that one night, and that was... she shook it out of her mind.

Aerik's grasp was strong and felt protective. She reached her arms around him to return the embrace. "Take care of him, okay? Earth is very different from our world. He's gonna need you to teach him, and be patient. Just... take care of him. And, take care of yourself too, you hear me?"

"I will." She nodded, the gesture awkward from the way her face was still pressed against his chest.

Finally, he released her and turned towards Elias. "Listen to her. I can already see that the two of you are gonna have your share of squabbles, and that's fine, but you are underestimating her. And that is going to get you into trouble if you start second-guessing her. You understand?"

Elias awkwardly watched Aerik hug Jerica. Based on her expression, it seemed like this didn't happen often. He didn't really think about that, though. Aerik's words kept poking him since it felt like he was talking down on him like he was a child or dog. Elias knew this was a thought he should keep to himself, though.

Aerik then turned to him with the same fatherly tone and eyes, and Elias simply nodded.

"I understand, sir," he said, realizing that he had accidentally said 'sir' out of habit, so he quickly added more words to not let that be the last word he heard.

"I won't underestimate her."

Somehow, he knew that was not entirely true. How bad could this kid really be?

"Great!" Aerik sighed a bit but was clearly trying to repress it. A sense of melancholy was emanating from him and filling the whole area. He turned back towards Jerica. "For the record, I have thoroughly enjoyed these past few months."

Jerica hesitated. How was she even supposed to respond to that? She took a deep breath. "You're acting like I'm about to die. It'll be fine, Aerik. I can handle myself, you know that."

"And when you're finished, where are you gonna go?"

It suddenly hit her, like a blow to the gut. This was it. This was the moment of her freedom. She could use Aerik's gold to buy a horse and be back to Atraya by tomorrow -- forget Elias and Crevon altogether.

"I... don't know," Jerica answered.

"Well, I do."

"You don't," she said indignantly. Aerik treated her far better than nearly anyone at the palace. She actually had some autonomy here. The ability to train when she wanted to, not when Biryn said she had to. Which left her time to garden and read and practice the R'hyk and anything else she wanted to do.

Aerik lifted an eyebrow.

"Screw you," she snapped. "I'll be back within the month."

"I hope that's true," Aerik said. "Come on, let's get you kids out of here before it gets any later."

It was rather nice to listen to the two of them bicker, like father and daughter. Elias thought that Aerik was her father figure, but he said 'these past few months' rather than years, so it made him rethink that. Why wasn't she staying with family?

Well. Elias could empathize. It wasn't like he had a family, either. He only had his sister, but even she was taken away from him. Or, rather, he was taken away from her.

He decided to ignore the fact that Aerik called him, a grown man, a 'kid,' and followed them out of the house.

"If you decide to come back," Aerik said as they reached the edge of the forest next to the gardens. "All you have to do is step foot inside the forest again. Kaidren will know."

As if on cue, a great gust of wind him them out of nowhere and Kaidren came soaring down over the tree tops. He landed heavily, the entire ground shaking under his massive weight. His emerald scales glimmered in the sunlight.

He looked at Jerica and snorted a small puff of smoke.

She stiffened but resisted the urge to hide behind Aerik.

Kaidren turned his head towards the forest, and all of a sudden a clear path appeared before them, about a hundred meters, that ended in a meadow.

Good-bye, rude one Kaidren said, voice stabbing straight into their brains. He angled his head a bit to look at Elias. And rude two.

Elias thought he had everything under control.

But then a giant motherfu—

He took a step back and immediately lost his balance, landing on his butt while staring up at the giant creature that caused the ground around them to shake.

"Wh—wha—" was all he managed to get out, but it was drowned out by the noise around them.

Suddenly a clear path was shown ahead of them, and the creature bore its menacing voice inside their heads, which made Elias go nearly insane.

"WHAT IS THAT?!" he finally sputtered out, staring wide-eyed at the creature.

"Dragon," Jerica answered, glancing down at him. "Who doesn't like me. Or you, it seems. We should go."

She re-settled her pack on her shoulders and looked at Aerik. "Bye, Aerik..." She hesitated. She wasn't good at emotions and stuff. "I'll miss you."

"Kaidren." She acknowledged, being sure she was safely behind Aerik before she spoke. "I won't miss you."

A low growl emanated from him. Likewise.

"Right, well..." She tried to play it off cool, as if she wasn't still terrified of him, but couldn't seem to quite manage walking towards the clearing without veering towards the left to leave a wide berth between herself and the dragon. "Thanks for the path. Good day."

She back towards the path until her shoulders were even with the trees, as if by seeing Kaidren she could have done anything about it if he'd decided to beat her up. Again. Then whirled around and started forward as quickly as she could while still claiming she was "walking"

Jerica was so nonchalant about this, but this was her world after all, so maybe dragons were common.

Elias slowly got up, still staring at this dragon with wide-eyes. Dragon? Like, in the fantasy books? He didn't read much as a kid, but his teenage friends did, and they sometimes told him about it.

They were real? In other realms? He couldn't believe it.

... Did they breathe out fire?

He didn't want to be around to find out.

Elias walked alongside Jerica, trying to wash away the terrified look on his face next to her, but he didn't do a great job of it. At least, not until they were far away from them to not let it affect him anymore.

He cleared his throat. "So," he began, trying to shake away the fear. "Dragons."

That was it. That was his entire thought process.

His brain was still trying to keep up.

"Yeah." She cleared her throat. "Well... dragon anyway. I... don't really know if there's more."

She was studiously avoiding looking at him, and continued under her breath. "But good gods, I hope there's not."

"I don't either," Elias muttered under his breath. "Are there lots of fantasy creatures in this world?"

His mind was so frazzled, he didn't even notice that he associated Jerica's world with being a fantasy.

Jerica hesitated a moment. Her pride was aching at the thought of having to admit she didn't know something, but there was no other way to answer his question if she didn't know what he meant. "What's... fantasy? Do you mean are there other Beasts here?"

"I—oh," Elias stammered as he realized that he associated her reality to the fictions of fantasy books. He sighed.

"Dragons only exist in book on Earth," he explained. "Specifically fantasy books, I think. They usually include other mythical creatures, too. So, I don't know, are there other creatures in this world I should know about?"

So I can better prepare myself next time? he wanted to add, but didn't want to appear as a wimp.

"Oh, I know the myths. Like unicorns!" Jerica said proudly before sobering a bit. "But... these aren't myths, Elias. These are real. And yes, there's more. Like, Chijurru. Those are..." S

he shuddered, remembering the one that she'd killed... Just before it almost killed her. Nasty thing. "And I hear there's more Beasts in Crevon, but I have no idea what. We'll have to see when we get there, huh?"

Elias was still trying to play catch-up.

"Unicorns exist?" he sputtered out.

"No... unicorns are a myth," Jerica said. She wasn't trying to look at him like he was stupid... but he sure was acting like he was. "Which is what it sounds like you're trying to call my whole world."