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The dragon just stared at her for a moment before reaching up to tug at the enchanted collar around her throat. “It looks… small. And unstable. If I transformed into my full size it would crumble.”
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Phaedra gave a light groan and shook her head.
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Yroth gave a sigh of her own. “You’re pouting. I can tell. Your wool is very expressive.”
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Yroth paused before glancing around to make sure nobody was nearby. She then leaned in and whispered to her. “What about the Indomitable?”
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Yroth gave a low growl, but didn’t say anything back. She suspected that was because a small gecko demon had started to make his way towards them. He gave the dragon an annoyed glare before turning to Phaedra and bowing his head. “My lady? The Transportation Pride is ready to depart. Once you and your pet are secured, we’ll take off.”
Yroth gave another growl and snapped at him, making the demon quickly back away. Phaedra reached out and gripped her by the collar, yanking her back. “Behave,” she said harshly. “Or you’ll be disciplined.” The dragon’s eyes narrowed, but she didn’t growl again. Phaedra then looked towards the demon. “Captain Xenaris, I trust you’ll inform me if there’s any problems?”
His eyes went wide for a moment and he stared at her in stunned silence. Then, finally, he nodded. “Of course, my lady. Would you like an escort to help you secure your pet?”
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Yroth reached a single arm in and came out with at least a dozen amulets on her wrist. “Who needs this many enchanted amulets?”
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Phaedra took a slow, deep breath. She never liked this part. She was grateful to not get airsick anymore, but there was always that small part of her that screamed she was going up and if she fell, she’d die. She knew it wasn’t true, in fact she’d been in at least one airship crash already. But there was always that lingering reminder that she had once been a human. Up they rose into the sky, the world falling away below them. Yroth didn’t move from her position, still clutching the wardrobe until, finally, they stopped rising and just went forward.
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Phaedra gave a light groan. “Don’t remind me. I swear I can still taste that cactus jam. Even now just the smell makes me want to throw up. Some things stick with you across different lives.”
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Phaedra gave a light snort and, after a few moments, all of the bindings were off her and neatly piled on the bed. “You shouldn’t call me Morgana, though.”
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Yroth’s eyes narrowed for a few moments before she gave a curt nod. “I see. Very well… Phaedra.”Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.
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Phaedra groaned and felt her cheeks getting even hotter. “Well… not entirely. I mean, I guess I’m scared I’d like it too much and it’ll make letting you go even harder. But honestly? You’re still a dragon. All it takes is one bad dream and I’ll be airing out my cabin for a week to get rid of the scent of singed wool.”
That knocked the smile off her lips. “I do NOT breathe flame in my sleep,” Yroth said indignantly.
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Phaedra gave a soft sigh before nodding. “Well… back home, there would be a few people who did that. Would call you him, then try and switch it to her when they realized you were a girl. But, well, they were sometimes the minority. A lot of people would just… call you him. And keep calling you him. Even when you corrected them. Sometimes they didn’t care. Sometimes they did it to deny you from being, well, you. To try and hurt you. As a kind of… refusal to acknowledge you as a girl. Usually by people who wanted to take away your right to even exist.”
Yroth just stared at her for a few more moments, her head cocked to the side. “I… do not… understand. Is there power in those words in your world?”
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Yroth gave a light snicker, a hand covering her mouth. “A-ah. I see. So you are quite dense as well.”
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Yroth gave an indignant huff before scowling at her. “I am an Ascended Dragon. Do not doubt the resources I can pull on. While I was not alive when humans still walked this world, there were Ascended Dragons who were. When I discovered that the creature summoned from another world was a human, I merely asked about them.”
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Phaedra nodded, though she didn’t entirely understand it. She didn’t feel like her memory was any better. It more felt like her memories didn’t fade like they used to when she was a human. She could already barely remember what she’d had to eat a few days ago unless she really thought about it, but so many memories of her life as a human were so clear and vivid as if they had just happened. She wondered if that was part of why she still felt so much like the person she had been, rather than feeling like just another demon with a short lifetime of memories. “Thank you.”
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Yroth stared at her for a long, long time after that. Finally, she shook her head. “Morgana, you are a strange one. You truly do know so little of our world even now, do you?”
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Phaedra shook her head. “I guess like… there’s some magic, right?”
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Phaedra nodded, though she got to her hooves and walked towards the corner of the room.
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Yroth stared at her for a moment before laying down on the bed. “I… see. Very well. Rest well, Morgana.”
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She felt guilty. She’d really only thought that Yroth was still alive. Was it possible the others were as well? Had she really spent nearly a century frittering her time away, while her friends were trapped somewhere?
She didn’t deserve to be near Yroth right now. She felt like she didn’t deserve to be near anyone. She deserved to be buried in a deep, dark pit and left to suffer alone for millennia.
Phaedra once more gave a silent prayer to the gods of this world that she would have the chance to make it up to them, to try and undo what her laziness and fear had caused. Even if she had to be the one to suffer for it.