To the east the sun burst with glowing light over the far horizon, warm and enchanting rays crawling across the bare land and endless deserts. The cool night was slowly slipping away from Sandgal to be replaced by the hot day the Red Brood treasured. Small shrubs and distant trees were silhouetted by the light, their shadows long and gloomy, while not even a stray cloud shrugged as it moved across the pale blue sky.

Standing on only her back legs, Rona stood with her great copper wings spread out to her left and right, soaking the sunlight that caught and shimmered along her scales. Relaxed, comfortable, enjoying just the beginning of what the sun would gift. Her golden eyes were closed, her decorative face leaning every so slightly towards the warm rays, always wanting to be closer. Her warm breath mixed with the still cool, morning air created a fog around her nostrils with each exhale.

Her wings were still a little sore from her travel to Eltica and her heart still stung with home sickness and for those who didn't make it out of the dreadful plague. But here, where the sun was gentle and welcoming, Rona could put aside those thoughts for now. Her forearms lay gently against her deep, lighter scaled chest as she breathed rhymically.

The draw of the desert was one that he would never understand, nor one that he could ever crave to understand. With the constant beat of the bun on your back and the endless foot-scorching that the eternal dunes and caverns offered, the Crow decided that no place would serve as a better-suited hell for him. His low, snaky slither betrayed him here, and as he crossed into the territory that smelled only of fire and sand he cursed the wayward heart that brought him here. It was not curiosity for the desert, you see- but a terrible, writhing thirst to find the great reds that had so often flown above his forests before the plague. In this dry, barren wasteland, he could not even hear the singing of the gems who called to him so strongly over his own misery. For him, the dark shadows and earthy musk of the desert was ideal- the night-songs of the hunting owl and frightened mouse the perfect lullaby.

Our tattered and battered hero slinked deeper and deeper into the heart of the red brood territory. Though he longed to take to the skies, he could only do that in his crow form- the leathery wings that were folded neatly at his sides were so torn and charred that they were rendered useless while he remained in the form of a dragon. It was to the skies he looked, until he caught a wide flash of copper from his peripheral vision. The female was large- larger than him (as most reds were), though despite her size, she looked sweet, almost tender in repose.

the sun, the sun will dry you out!

He called to her with his velveteen tenor, a voice that was not only surprising pleasant for such a hideous, inky creature, but even could be considered… attractive. As he coiled towards her, his curved claws scraped rhythmically against the rock. A small snarl curled from his throat as the unbearable heat of the desert sun insisted upon dressing his back. Slowly, he lifted his wings in an attempt to shade himself.

you look sad, dearest- from tail to snout.

Gently, so slowly, Rona brought her wings back against her sides and welcomed the heat they created against her copper scales as they tucked against her sides. She hummed gently and comfortably, the deep and alluring huskiness to the hum signifying the comfortableness she had here in the desert. She loved it and always has, but she couldn't say she didn't love anywhere else. The forests were enchanting and beautiful, the plains were endless and breathtaking, and the highlands were striking and bold. But as she stood against the sun's growing rays, the silence that had once consumed her was broken by the lovely voice of another dragon.

She felt the touch of shock race through her body: she hadn't heard him coming. So enthralled in the heat of her desert she didn't catch his presence until he called out. Rona’s eyes burst open, the golden almost a reflection of the sun that lay far ahead of her—sitting just on the horizon. Her hands dropped to the sandy earth as she turned lightly to see who was going to accompany her. She had expected another Red, it was only natural. But what she saw was the deep glow of green scales upon an unfamiliar dragon whose wings were far too beaten for him to fly. She wrestled the scorching war that was raging in her chest, the fire that wanted to blister the sky at his presence.

Her gaze, soft and naturally curious, trailed over his approaching form. She wasn't intimated by him yet, she wasn’t restless with the fact that a dragon of another brood was in the Red's land. He had snatched one of her little heart strings with his tender voice and she would allow him to grasp her interest for this very moment. She glanced away from him shyly as he noticed the sadness that had gotten past her shield she had tried to put up to hide it. "Mmmm," she hummed softly. "Yes... I suppose I am," she breathed, looking back to him captivatingly. But she wouldn't let him pick at her past yet. "Who are you?" She asked, tracing her eyes over the dark, glinting colors of his scales.

His eyes were not lovely. They were almost as dark as his inky hide, a hideous green-brown mixture that produced a color reminiscent of swamp mud that was so dark the reptilian slit of a pupil that slashed through each eye was barely visible. With a dull gleam, these eyes watched her intently, charting not only her initial chock and tentative acceptance, but also the graceful, catlike gestures and inherent beauty of her coppery skin. A soft, silky purr of pleasure rumbled in his chest as he wound ever nearer to her, his long, slender tail swinging back and forth like a pendulum.

i call myself the crow, the crow!

His voice snapped jauntily with his teeth as his chalky lips stretched in a welcoming grin. The Crow did not have an aura of sadness about him, and that was not simply because he did not wish to show the world his pain. The fever-plague had exterminated the weak, had cleared the dying overbrush with a cleansing fire to make room for the new, stronger sprouts to flourish. He had reveled in the power of the sickness, curling with satisfaction among his hoard until the call to abandon had been sounded.

and who could you be, that you are laid so low?

There was a trembling ache to his tone, one that could be interpreted as hidden heartache or sympathy. He curled not too far away from her, his long, lanky body stretching itself along the warmth of the rocks like a cat. His charred, torn wings were still lifted slightly, and every now and then flapped lazily, sending a small, smoothing breeze over his overheated back. For a moment, his neck curved to allow him to look over her home; while he would grudgingly admit that it was lovely, he found it to be a dry, monotonous lovely and soon grew bored from looking at the landscape. The Crow found the living, glowing beauty of the beast before him to be infinitely more intoxicating.

i feel trapped in this heat, forced to move slow.

He spoke with a low snarl to the sun, only partially playful in nature. His eyes returned to the fiery, copper beauty before him, bewildered that she could live her voluntarily, unable to comprehend the way she basked in such extreme temperatures. Even the thought of remaining here longer than this conversation made his skin itch with dry discomfort.

She loved the color of his dark skin, soothing on her eyes and such a contrast to the endless, brilliant shades of the desert. She did not look into his eyes, never spotting the murky bottomless color that each held so charmingly. She looked around them, she watched the way he shaded his himself from the rising sun, and she watched the movement of his mouth as he spoke his name like the repeated, yet delighted, call of a crow. "The Crow," she said in a hushed voice after letting her young gaze follow his form as he slithered ever closer to her.

The fire that licked and twisted in her chest died down with every word he chose so carefully. "Rona," she replied, her posture calm but curious, leaning just faintly towards his every devious movement, soaking in the sympathy that bathed his words. But she didn't seem to believe it.

His murky eyes lazed over the desert as he leaned against the dusty, warm rock and the copper dragon could only watch as he judged the land she so lovingly called home. Her interest for him began to dwindle and that fire in her chest rose briefly in her throat before she swallowed it down with a soft mmmm. She turned away from him leisurely to face her sun again as he snarled humorously at the heat. She smiled gently. "I'm sorry you cannot bear it," she breathed in understanding, looking to him from the corner of her golden eye. "Perhaps we can go elsewhere?" She offered, intrigued with his company and why he could douse her fire so smoothly.

She turned and faced him again, her decorated and draconian face a contrast to the gentle eyes that finally met his for a moment. "You are from the Green Brood?" She asked sensitively, hoping to confirm what she had guessed before.

He had no flame to swallow. While there was always something smoking and burning, burning deep in his belly, it was the dull, comfortable heat of embers just about to go out. The Crow could not fathom and did not desire the fiery abilities that the red dragons were so famed for. He used his fire only when it was unavoidable and there was no other opportunity for victory (for the Crow would never flee). It was, to say the least, an uncomfortable ability to have. He loathed the way the flames licked at his neck, detested the way each tongue of fire seemed to rip and tear as it leapt from his mouth. There was never a time when he did not use it reluctantly, except for the rare moments that someone infuriated him to the point where instinct kicked in and fire fairly exploded from his body, whether he wanted it to or not. The heat in this desert fanned and encouraged the fire in his belly. It irked the Crow that years of subduing the flame was so easily undone.

She repeated his name, as though it was a morsel of food that she sampled and found to her taste. This pleased him and drew him closer to her. Then she said her name, and his body shivered delicately as the word parted from her lips. It was perfect, perfect, perfect. After she gave her name, he studied her with the same lazy, apprising look that he had given her home.

"A lovely name, fit for a dragon queen."

That lazy look he observed her with instantly became sharper when she suggested another place to converse, where the sun’s intensity would not offend every pore of his body so insistently. A scaly, appreciative smile began to stretch across his lips until it transformed into a toothy grin. With a playful snap of his teeth and turn of his head, his velveteen voice bloomed from his mouth.

"Nothing would please me better- this heat is obscene."

For a moment, his hopes dwindled when she inquired to his loyalties. Had they been in the shade, he might have understood- his green hide was so dull and dark it fluttered indecisively on the border of black- but here in the sun, a sickly olive hue played across his skin. Pointedly, he looked at his hide and then back to the dragoness. A sort of strangled laugh coughed up from his throat, disrupting the usually melodic flow of his speech.

"So it would seen- I've been told, after all, that my hide is green."

She couldn't help but adore his dark, sensual company as he slithered closer to her with seemingly every word of hers that he found entrancing. She was captivated in the presence of him, enchanted and mesmerized by a dragon from another brood. She knew what her orders were, though, as they crawled along and whispered in her thoughts, battling with her emotions. Report all strange and unusual activity or problems to me or one of my Enforcers. Her golden eyes traced his dark face as he commented on her name, rolling the orders along her tongue while basking shyly in his commentary.

That lazy look that had softened and consumed his watchful expression melted away into a grateful smile that bared, faintly, his teeth. Her heart fluttered lightly at the beginning of his reply before fading back into its rhythmic, soft beat again at the awful word obscene. A low, gentle rumble rose within her throat briefly as she looked over her home, out towards the sun that hovered inches higher above the endless horizon. He disliked the desert's heat, and perhaps even the desert itself, and because he made a note of pointing it out... well that wasn’t tickling her likings for him. It only blossomed the idea of calling for Savas or one of his Enforcers. Savas, she did wonder when she would see him again.

She knew that the Green Brood was green, even the ominous olive his scales glowed, it was the fact that her curiosity for why he was in the desert if he disliked the heat had began to bloom in her mind. "Oh I know," she mumbled softly at his reply, her eyes slitted slightly as she looked him over. "But I couldn’t come to a conclusion on why you would be here if you so dislike the heat," her voice was almost innocent here, her mind conflicting with several explanations and the conclusions that would follow along with them.

"Nevertheless, you can lead the way," she added gently, stretching her copper wings briefly before drawing them to her sides again. Perhaps he was only curious. Rona did hope genuinely that that was it.

The desert no longer held interest for him- his eyes held only the cool copper beauty of the dragon before him; her vitality was refreshing in a land that held such scant opportunity for life. How was it- he wondered- that such a lovely flower could be produced by such emptiness? The inky black dragon pushed this thought aside as he coiled in on himself, clearly eager to leave the barren wasteland that was so determined to burn the scales from his poor, dark body. As she spoke, her words so cautiously knitted, his facial expression melted into something almost comically sly, though his eyes bore into hers with nothing other than the most serious type of sobriety.

"from birth, I have been cursed with a wandering heart." Mo< Great, useless, battered wings lifted in a sort of shrug, as though it were a burden that he had both realized and come to terms with. When he spoke, his tone was genuine, but whether our scaly hero meant it was of a different sort altogether. It was most likely that he did- for now- the Crow had not been on the continent long enough to begin mischief making. After all, it was awfully hard to make mischief when the straight-and-narrow had yet to be defined.

"to the delta, then- I hope you don't mind if I run, my wings are quite torn apart."

This was said with a laughing tone, as though it were a joke, as though he didn’t know that every dragon’s most prized possession was the wings that gave him flight. For the briefest of moments, something dark and sickly crackled across his eye, but was quickly replaced by the jaunty, debonair look that had been there before. He did not necessarily have to run, there was another form he could take which would have given him flight- but the Crow was not one to reveal all of his secrets in an afternoon. Sharp, metallic claws scraped against the stone beneath him as he rose once again, ready to forsake the unbearable heat of the desert.

I'm very fast- you'd best depart!

And so, with a harmonious parting shot and a wicked, laughing glance, the beast was off towards Berylmaw Delta- slithering and curling and coiling in an imaginative gait with unlikely speed.

Rona's golden eyes softened as the shadowy dragon curved away from the morning heat that bathed his green skin. She couldn’t imagine what he would turn into out here on the desert when the sun sat on its highest throne, soaking the land with burning and haunting temperatures. She didn’t really want to find out. Seeing another dragon suffer would put an awful burden on her day. But she sighed softly as he gave his explanation for why he was here, her gaze not releasing his as she took in the seriousness that blushed in his dark eyes.

Mmmm she hummed in reply, nodding gently as she looked away from him, not exactly wanting to have his solemn emotion transfer over to her. She shifted her body towards the direction of the delta, her wings parting from her strong, slender sides just faintly. She smiled, captivated by his laughter, with a touch of understanding as she ran her eyes over his beaten wings. She couldn't help but wonder how they came to look like that. With her eyes on his wings, she didn't catch the darkness that crawled across his murky eyes.

A laughing, delightful rumble growled in Rona's throat at his call before he lead the way. His sensual, slithering form was far quicker than she had expected and her amused expression drew on a slightly focused air. With a touch of grace and power, Rona pulled herself across the desert for several paces before she took flight. Powerful hind legs pushed against the dusty earth before her wings burst from her copper sides, lifting herself with ease into the warm, sun bathed air. Her wings beat gracefully and effectively against the sky but she didn't stray far from the earth, gliding just above it towards the dark figure that sped ahead of her.