(Of course he would ask. That would be just her luck.) Nymeria let out a low, slightly pained sigh, letting her red irises settle back down on Kid’s pink ones. Why don’t you come down, Lil? The dragon flexed his primaries—and then, with a muffled whoosh, swooped down, hooked claws extended as he came in for a landing. Others (her brother included) always wanted bright, big, beautiful dragons—but she’d come to realize that even her small black was heavy enough to warrant a grunt of exertion and a shifting of her balance. A gold, weighing far more than Lilómiel, would be rather heavier than was necessary.

Claws met scarred skin and the black squirmed into place on her shoulders, wings rustling a mournful tune. “I don’t remember anymore,” she admitted. “I found him when I was only a few days old. Now… now his name is truly his own. It doesn’t mean blood or bruises, but my dragon, black and feathered.”

Her movement forward is perhaps unwarranted (what has he done to warrant her affection, after all? What has he done to squirm his way deeper into her heart?) Except she does it anyway, ignoring the obligations and symbolism behind such a gift. As she’d told him, family sticks together, especially her family. The way he’d spoken of Colt, of Sabre—it stung at her.

No mother should pick favorites, but thankfully she was not a mother. If she wanted Kid to be her darling, nobody would be the wiser for it.

Yes ma’am, he said to her, and a ghost of a smile plays around her mouth. How strange it feels to be called that, when in reality she hardly felt full-grown herself. She didn’t belong in that position of respect, even if she did love it—even if she wanted it with an ache that ground itself through her every bone. “No ma’am,” she scolded carefully, almost lovingly. “Aunt, if you want, or Nymeria—but I’m not a ma’am, Kid. I’m not that old.”

The conversation shifts away from Volterra and back to him, and she looks at Kid thoughtfully, head tilting as if she were sizing him up. “Of course,” she said. “It wouldn’t be easy, but it’s possible, and you wouldn’t be as good in both as a horse who specializes in one or the other… but you could do it.”