It's the most obvious reaction he's yet had off the other stallion - he wonders if it's jealousy, the masculine desire to own and monopolize mares that resides deep down in every member of their gender. Tyradon has no nefarious interest in Kahlua; she's an attractive woman, but her youthful mind and hatred of him ensure he will force aside his natural stallion's reaction to her delicious body. He reserves himself for women who he sees eye to eye with - and at this, Cynder sends him an image of skull-faced mare and mongrel kitsune. With a small snort, he pushes the picture aside. His sire had always taught him that mares were clever creatures; they knew their thighs held the key to men's minds, and many of them knew how to work this to their advantage. Don't be played, his father would say - or, when he was feeling more blunt, don't let your balls rule your head.

As the compliments rain down on his emerald mind-partner, he can feel Cynder's ego expanding by the second. A typical dragoness, she thrives on attention and her arrogance is almost as potent as Tyradon's. Any remotely admiring gaze or kind word is enough to send her preening like a prized peacock, patrolling up and down her bonded's back until her claws wear a pattern of pinpricks along his spine. "And doesn't she just know it," he says in response to Dragomir's words, a throaty chuckle rising from his scarred muzzle. Cynder squawks her displeasure and shoots a sharp nip onto Tyradon's thick rump, causing his ears to slam into his mane with the sudden burst of pain. "My father was bonded to a golden queen, and she taught Cynder here how to have an inflated sense of her own importance." Another indignant squawk and another sharp nip, but the chortle in the behemoth's throat is proof enough that he's only joking - his war-dragon's arrogance is part of the reason he loves her so completely.

With another shake of his massive head, he switches his silver gaze back to Dragomir, who remarks on the usefulness of dragons. "Have you never considered seeking an egg to bond to?" he asks the younger man. In Isilme, bonding to a dragon was a rare and cherished gift - back in the days when only equines had the mental prowess to mould a proud beast's consciousness to their own. Both Tyradon and his sire before him had been blessed with eggs from a very young age, and neither could remember what life was like before they shared their mind with another. The youth speaks and the beast listens eagerly, jerking his gargantuan skull as Dragomir mentions the diamonds hidden inside stones. Oh, he's had plenty of experience of such things - in his old herd he had a 'den' of sorts, where he spent his evenings when he wasn't out warmongering. Cynder had filled this den to the brim with cracked rocks, their cores glimmering in the moonlight - she'd always had a knack of finding and breaking stones with all the colours of the rainbow inside them, and although Tyradon had been initially impressed the novelty had soon worn off when he had to shift a tonne of coloured rocks every night when he wanted to slumber.

Without needing to be asked, the jade war-dragon spreads her canvas wings and streaks silently through the air, to seek out a likely-looking rock.

The bastard turns back to Dragomir once he's watched his companion fly out of sight. "Aye, she's rather fond of using the technique you just mentioned to crack stones and hoard what lurks within. She would be more than happy to help you with what you need, as long as she can keep a couple of them to add to her collection." Now her hoard is in the Rotunda, buried under one of the bushes - she'd had to start again after her regression, but in the months since they've been in Helovia, she has already built up quite the collection of knickknacks, from gemstones to rodent's bones. "If I may ask, what objects would you fashion with access to this bounty of metals and gems?" He quirks a scarred brow, his curiosity evident.