“{Mother, I do not consent to your mad agreement with—}”

“{Synthra, have you ever stopped to consider what happens next?}”

Synthra furrowed her eyebrows at her mother’s words, and shut the door to Sinalthria’s office at the top of the Guild House reflexively behind her. What happens next? That was an odd choice of diction, and Synthra couldn’t discern what was meant by it. There was a general meaning and a more nuanced one, but the former was too vague and she had no context for the latter.

“{I don’t understand.}”

“{I know,}” Sinalthria said with a sigh, and settled herself down into her luxurious chair. The Terrans called them ‘executive chairs’, and they were a delightful discovery upon coming to the new world they called home. “{But it’s time you started considering your next steps, not just as my daughter, but as an Adventurer in your own right.}”

Synthra blinked at her mother in surprise.

“{Mother, are you saying…?}”

“{Yes, Synthra. I’m going to let you go Delving.}”

Synthra let loose a joyful laugh at her mother’s words, and clapped her hands together in delight. “{That’s wonderful! Thank you, mother! I just need to find a party and—wait…}” Synthra frowned abruptly, and then eyed her mother critically. “{Hold on just a minute, mother. If that’s the case, then why did you say what you did to Achilles?}”

“{The Terrans have a phrase that struck me after I saw the way he fought against you, and after I recalled his Assessment: ‘Ride the Lightning’.}” Sinalthria said with a thoughtful tone. “{That boy, whether or not anyone else realizes it, is going to shake the foundations of everything we know to be consistent about the System, and about the natural hierarchy of power—unless someone murders him before he manages to.}”

“{Okay, and what does that have to do with letting him court me, mother?}”

Sinalthria sighed at her in a way Synthra knew to be both affectionate and exasperated, and the half-dragon woman that had raised her put her long legs up and rested her shoeless heels on the edge of her massive desk.

“{You have always been bored of everyone in your peer bracket, Synthra. Bored, and disinterested. I cannot say it’s wholly your fault, either, given your prodigious skill and talent.}”

Her mother tilted her head in the way Synthra knew meant she was being thoughtful, and Synthra moved forward and seated herself on the edge of Sinalthria’s desk, with one foot on the floor and the other hanging idly. She could sense that a long-winded explanation was coming, but she had no intention of trying to circumvent it. She knew better than to make the attempt.

“{You were born to be a Sorceress that redefines the term, daughter, and your comprehension of Fire magic is powerful even among Draconic Inheritors. Your grandmother was always so proud of your talent, especially given how diluted your blood is—and yet I know you lack so much when it comes to knowledge of your own nature outside of Magic…}”

Synthra raised an eyebrow at her mother, and Sinalthria looked away toward one of the high, floor-to-ceiling windows. There was the same thoughtful and inflective look on her mother’s face that she’d seen before, when the Guild Mistress spent time staring at her father’s paintings and reminiscing about the only man she’d ever loved

“{When I had you, Synthra, I did so as much out of love for your father as I did out of duty.}” Sinalthria said after several moments of thoughtful silence, and inspired a surprised blink in Synthra. She hadn’t expected that tangent.

“{I had to breed,}” Sinalthria continued bluntly, “{it was my imperative as a Draconic, and my desire as a woman. To feel a child within me, to continue my legacy, and to create life with a man I loved—it was a simple, pure, and genuine desire… and I could not be prouder of the child, now woman, that I created.}”

Sinalthria looked back at her lovingly, and Synthra smiled at her mother.

“{But I’ve failed you in so many ways, Synthra.}” Sinalthria said with a quiet and regretful sigh. “{I’ve sheltered you too much, I’ve spoiled you too much, and I’ve overlooked key lessons that were taught to me by my own far wilder upbringing. Dragons are not beholden to the mortal precepts of child rearing, and your grandmother ensured that I was always the Predator, and never the Prey when she raised me. I deprived you of that.}”

“{Mother,}” Synthra said carefully, “{I don’t think this is relev—}”

“{The truth is,}” Sinalthria continued right over the top of her, “{that you now have the chance for a wild adventure that I otherwise deprived you of, and the only thing that I can do—as a mother, yes, but also as Blood of the Dragon—is to throw you headfirst into the tempest. You need to learn to fly on your own strength, my love, and not shelter under my wings anymore.}”

If Sinalthria were leaning into the Dragon metaphors, Synthra knew she was serious. It was an affectation from their time on Altera, when Sinalthria would take her to see her grandmother, and the three would talk about magic, and nature, and the legacy of Dragons in a world deprived of them to some great extent.

The lessons in magic she’d learned at her grandmother’s feet, and upon her immense back, had given her the knowledge and potential to be one of the most promising Sorceresses in an Age—at least according to her tutors and seniors in the Guild.

“{What does any of this have to do with Achilles?}” Synthra asked a moment later and with genuine exasperation. Her mother was rambling again.

“{He’s going to be the tempest, Synthra,}” Sinalthria said insistently, “{and you are my daughter. I fell in love with your father for his warmth, and kindness, and fierce courage—but I was drawn to him because he did something no one else could do: he scared me. His power, his promise, his talent… he was a prodigy among Haelfenn, and he made me, the Dragon’s Daughter, feel vulnerable. I have always been a woman that made men quiver, and yet when we fought, he made me feel like a maiden under threat…}” Sinalthria sighed wistfully. “{Dragons of Eld, I loved that man.}”

“{Your baffling ideas of romance aside, mother, this tangent is even more confusing.}” Synthra said impatiently.

“{I saw your face, Synthra, when you realized what he was.}” Sinalthria said with keen insight. “{I saw the shock, the fear, and the disturbed realization. I know you understood, more than anyone save for me or Ceruviel, what Achilles represents… and I know your pulse quickened, and your desire blossomed, and you felt the tingle.}”The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

Synthra scoffed at her mother’s words, but looked away all the same, and felt her cheeks heat again. How had Sinalthria known? She’d hidden her reaction so well, but it was true, even if she detested to admit it. There was an incomprehensible sense of exhilaration to her fight with Achilles, and a sense of primal wonder at how powerful he might become. His level still shocked her, and the thought of how terrifying he might be at her level…

More than that, something about his Core had called to her. It was inexplicable, and powerful, and magnetic in a way she couldn’t truly describe. In the instant before he’d touched her [Draconic Manaforce], when he’d been suffusing his power in a way she only belatedly understood he’d done, some essence or frequency of his Core had connected to her—and captured her focus.

She hadn’t told her mother, for reasons she couldn’t quite define, but something about Achilles’ inner power had bridged to her Draconic blood and bewitched her. If nothing else, that alone made her insatiably curious about his anatomy.

Synthra gripped the edge of the table, and exhaled a calming breath while several traitorous thoughts about his phrasing of ‘pinning her down’ raced through her mind, and she wanted to slap her own brain. Hormones and Draconic Nature combined to mock her, and Synthra growled in anger under her breath. She was not some easy strumpet, impressed with a few meager showings of power.

She was not!

“{You are my daughter, Synthra.}” Sinalthria said with an amusement and understanding that made Synthra’s annoyance flare into full-blown sulkiness.

“{I birthed and carried you, as my mother birthed me, and I know you. My father was a Dragonslayer that won the love of a Dragon he was sent to kill, and instead chose to spare.}” Synthra nodded at that. She’d heard the tale from her grandparents directly. “{Your father was a Bannerlord that won the love of a headstrong Adventurer he wrestled into submission, and let go after she tried to beat him half to death.}” Sinalthria’s tone was notably amused when she recalled how Synthra’s father had won her affection.

Varian, her father, had always told it a little less savagely and more romantically—but that was her father. He’d been a poetic, gentle, and loving man.

“{The women of our family have always wanted strength above all else, incontestable and supreme, in the men we choose—and Achilles, Synthra, is the first man I have ever seen make you act like a blushing girl.}”

“{Power is not everything, mother.}” Synthra said as firmly as she could manage. The conversation was surreal, but she couldn’t deny that it tugged at an animalistic and savage part of her that hearkened to the draconic lineage of her blood, so influential as it was despite her majority Haelfenn anatomy. “{I am a Sorceress, and now a Bronze License Adventurer. I do not need any man to define my path, nor to give me purpose.}”

“{Power defines so much of how we approach the world, Synthra, as the Blood of the Dragon.}” Sinalthria said in a tone that was as patient as it was amused, as if Synthra’s objections were more funny than compelling. She knew her mother well enough to know that Sinalthria wasn’t being condescending or patronizing, but that she was simply expressing what she saw as fundamental truths—regardless of whether or not Synthra wanted to hear them.

“{We cannot abide weakness, and yet we are weak to greater strength. Many call it a denigration of our greatness, to admit that we go weak for the man that conquers us—but I learned, long ago, that such generalization is made by the insecure and the ignorant.}”

Sinalthria chuckled when Synthra looked at her, and she saw a faintly wistful and sad expression on her stoic mother’s beautiful, and savagely wild features.

“{I was exactly one of them, in fact, until your father made me see.}” She raised her eyebrows, and Synthra found herself unable to look away or interrupt.

Sinalthria looked back at the window, and Synthra saw her reach up to brush tears from her eyes. She said nothing, because she knew her mother would want her to say nothing, but she took note—and she moved around the desk immediately to slip into her mother’s arms and hug her tightly.

“{I miss your father, Synthra.}” Sinalthria admitted while patting her hair affectionately. “{What greater love is there, my daughter, than to be able to wholly trust yourself to another, and know they will defend you and your offspring better than you ever could? What greater partnership is there in this world, than to give yourself to a lover, and know they will break the world to keep you and your children safe?}”

“{Mother, I’m barely past my twenty-third summer. I don’t need a man to define my future. What you and my father had was special, but I—}”

“{Tch. You still don’t understand,}” Sinalthria said while lightly pinching her cheeks in the way she used to when Synthra was a child. “{This isn’t about defining your future, it’s about understanding the flow of the world. Achilles will stand at the forefront of great change, Synthra, and he will need partners—partners he can trust, and who can support his Ambition.}”

“{You know his Ambition?}” Synthra asked while ignoring the rest. That inspired a genuine curiosity, after all. She had been wondering about the Terran’s Alphas herself.

“{I have a sense of it,}” Sinalthria confirmed. “{Ceruviel let some things slip, and Dragons know power, Synthra, and we know the truth of a heart. That boy will not stop until he creates a place where those he loves can be safe, and if he has to build an Empire at the end of a blade to do it, he will, without hesitation. What you saw on that sparring field is a mere shadow of what is to come…}”

Her mother brushed her hair back and looked down at her with a sly smile. “{Do you truly have no interest in being part of his journey?}”

“{What did my Aunt say?}” Synthra asked instead of answering.

“{She wants him to be an Archon,}” Sinalthria replied meaningfully.

Synthra stared at her mother for a moment, and then bit her lip. She knew what that meant, thanks to her time learning from Ceruviel and hearing her stories. The Dusk-Lord and Guild Mistress had been Adventurers together, before Sinalthria had taken over the Eldormer Kingdom’s Capital City Adventurer’s Guild branch, and that friendship was part of why Sinalthria had transmigrated along with the people of what was now Dawnhaven.

“{An Archon…}” Synthra murmured thoughtfully.

“{Join his party, Delve a dungeon, and see how you feel,}” Sinalthria said simply. “{Explore the strange new feelings he’s awakened in you. Let yourself be free, but remember: You are the Blood of the Dragon, Synthra. You are my daughter. Regardless of what you think of my consent for him to court you, you are your own woman now.}” Sinalthria kissed her forehead, and Synthra snuggled into her mother’s embrace.

“{If he wants you, Synthra, make him earn it. Be the Dragon. But if he manages to conquer you…}” Sinalthria grinned in a way that made Synthra feel embarrassed just to see it. “{...make sure he knows exactly how lucky he is to have done so.}”

Synthra felt her cheeks enflame, and mumbled her agreement quietly.

She could, she supposed, at least do a Dungeon Delve with him.

Her mind flickered back to his regal stance, his strong jaw, and the sure way he’d held his bastard sword—the strength of his fingers, and the broadness of his shoulders. Her lips parted in anger at her mind’s treason, and she sighed shakily.

“{Fine,}” she murmured. “{Just one Delve.}”

Synthra closed her eyes against the Draconic warmth of her mother’s body, and steadied her breathing.

Blue eyes followed her into her dreams.