Adulthood.

It grips him; it hardens his muscles and sends shockwaves to his balls, it arches his thick neck and it bids his stout legs to prance, fractious. He is a colt no more; he is a man. His second birthday passed without remark, although his dragon fetched him a shiny stone as a gift. A thoughtful present from his mind-partner, and truthfully he hadn't thought the predatory, primitive red capable of such empathy.

But he knows the gift he really wants. Needs. A woman writhing beneath him, for him to bury himself inside and take, take, take. He'd thought his hormones were mind-controlling and powerful when he was a yearling, but now stallionhood grips him like a curse, his urges are ten times worse. He thinks of it all the time. The titan is angry at himself, at the petty, primal needs that engross him and control his mind. He is so in charge of his own body, so dominant over himself, that he is filled with inward self-loathing about his own cravings. This only adds to the fact he is a bundle of frustration and rage, with his eyes permanently narrowed and bright with anger at the world, his jaws twisted into a scowl.

Vérzés, joined as he is to the stallion's lustful mind, is also afflicted with the same hunger as his bonded. His need manifests itself in the form of hunting, and he spends his days viciously savaging any living creature that makes the mistake of wandering across his path. Blood permanently drips from his lethal jaws, flecks of meat hanging in strips from his teeth. The bonded pair are rage and manhood personified; it is only a matter of time before they snap completely and rip the ever living fuck out of some unfortunate creature.

The giant comes to the Deep Forest, a place that usually puts him at ease - this is where he found his dragon's egg, where he hatched, where he often blends into the shadows and preys upon deer and the like to practice his talents. Today, in his pissed-off, testosterone-fuelled mood, his spiritual home has no such effect on him. Being here in solitude only fuels his temper, and with a savage snarl he kicks out at the nearest tree, shattering it clean in two with his colossal hooves. The needless violence does little to sate his real appetite, and chips of bark bloody his hindlegs. Sweat coats him, and he smells of musk and man. He decides to find water; perhaps that will help cool him off.

Alas, the pool he finds is occupied. He sees a white filly, ducked beneath the water, her mane spread around her like angel wings. She is the brave little doll from the God fights, and she looks very, very dead. He snorts. Like he cares for the fate of a drowned child that isn't his own - but, he reasons, she may not be dead. One day she will grow into a fine mare, and then he may reap the benefits of saving her in her youth. The thought sends heat to his groin, but given that she is currently only a child and he isn't into that, he quickly smothers his urges.

With a resigned huff, the monstrous stallion pushes his way into the cool liquid. It laps against his sweat-doused undersides and cools the raging heat in his loins, granting him temporary relief from his own desires. With his face still twisted into a mask of fury, he ducks his head under the water and attempts to hook his scarred nose beneath her forelegs, to try and lift her up and out of the pond. "Get up, child," he growls, his voice pure manhood with guttural, sharp edges.

Well, she's alive. She's also an ungrateful little brat, and the stallion's ears slick back against his head with irritation. She coughs violently, spraying black ooze everywhere - ahh, the one thing going right for him in his lust-filled life at the moment is the fact that at least that god-awful black tar is gone from his face. With it has gone his batlike hearing and his snakelike smell, much to his delight. If he still had that painfully heightened sense of smell, he would be able to scent a mare in heat from miles away, which would only drive him to higher levels of need. If he still had his acute hearing, he would be deafened by the sound of his own blue balls swinging against his thighs.

She shrieks at him, and he blasts air out of his nostrils in anger. Water has splashed against his face and trickles down his white blaze in determined rivulets, whilst his eyes remain narrowed and full of fury. "Oh, the gratitude," he hisses, stomping one irritated hoof against the murk of debris at the bottom of the pond. He sidles backwards and out of the cool liquid, away from the apparently-not-drowning filly. "You looked like you were drowning. Next time, I'll just leave you to your watery grave, shall I?" His face is a picture of abject disgust as he huffs at her again, stomping his colossal frame onto the edge of the water and shaking the liquid from his pelt. It looks like his chances of getting into her pants when she's older have just lessened by a zillion.

Flat-eared and cantankerous, Volterra continues to glare at the white filly. Lashing out with her words is likely her reaction to fear of a watery death, but he doesn't have it in him to feel any pity for her with the mood he's in. "The fuck were you doing in there if you weren't drowning? Did your mother ever teach you not to float face-down in ponds inside predator-filled forests? What would you have done if a pack of wolves had marched in to eat you alive?" Perhaps it's wrong of him to fill a little girl's head with nightmares, but he'll be fucked if he cares. Her eternal thanks and promise of favours when she ages would have at least have lessened his foul mood, but as it is her sharp reaction has only increased his ire.

She chases him, a feral puppy on his heels. It seems like only yesterday that he was as small as she, so innocent and unplagued by the wants of adulthood. Back then, all he'd had to worry about was which bit of grass to shit on and which to eat. How times have changed. I was not dead, she points out. "You don't say," he drawls. He thought he was above slanging matches with little girls, but apparently no, he's really, really not.

An insult to his scent is not honoured with a reply, but he remains standing tall and stiff with pinned ears and angry eyes. Fucking children. The only downside of his desire to breed is the fact that one of these little shitbags might be the result of his ardour and the heat in his loins. He's barely out of childhood himself, certainly not ready to be a father. If he does manage to procure a woman to take out his lusts upon, he will have to be careful to spill his seed well outside her body, so as not to accidentally conceive a mouthy little mini-me. Spending time with a foal is the biggest advert for abstinence that ever existed.

She maintains that she is not afraid of wolves, and the titan humours her by not objecting to her statement. She then threatens him with her mother, and his ears unfurl slightly with interest. Her mother... A fine-looking mare, no doubt, to create such a pretty little child. He feels desire rise again, and he's almost tempted to push the filly back into the water so her dam comes running...then he'd grab her out of the pond and act like the knightly saviour, and this mystery mother would tumble with open legs into his waiting embrace...A faraway expression drifts across the stallion's face, before he jerks himself back to the present. "Yes, I'm sure your mother will be positively furious at me for trying to save your life." Heaven friggin' forbid.

She catches sight of the wolf tooth that he keeps stashed in his mane, a memento of the last God battle. For her age, she'd fought admirably. Her luck must surely run out at some point, though - if there's any more God fights, she's due a serious injury with all the ankle-biting she does. Not that he'd wish that on her, of course, but it is an occupational hazard of being small in big fights. "I did," he rumbles, the memory bringing a dreamy look across his stern eyes. Ah, the sweet bliss of battle! Hell, if he can't find a mare maybe he should just wait for another battle and pull an Odë. At least that would give him some semblance of release.

A small smirk spreads slowly across his jaws as she asks if he knows a dragon. Her demeanour changes, from rage to dragon-happy bliss. He knows that feeling well, given that he had been a veritive dragon fanboy until he obtained his red. "He's a he, not an it. And I do know him, yes. Very well, actually." Oh, Vérrrrrrrrzés, he mentally beckons the crimson beast in a sing-song voice. Vérzés breaks through the canopy from where he's hunting in the distance, beating his wings and soaring at top speed towards the stallion and the filly. The light glints off his iridescent red scales as he swoops, circling Volterra once before landing in front of the filly. Both he and the black monolith remember the Bear battle, when Volterra had ordered him to guard the child whilst she collected crystals. Not out of any particular empathy, but because the Spark God had asked her to do it and therefore it had to be important.

"This is Vérzés." The ruby dragon arches his proud head and looks the filly directly in the eye, his gaze glimmering with macabre, draconic intelligence beneath his stern, horned brow. A small blossom of frost chills the air in front of him as he exhales through the nostrils at the end of his refined muzzle, tilting his skull slightly to scrutinise her more closely. With the blood of his last meal dripping from the corners of his mouth, he looks far from a friendly, benevolent saviour of children, yet his expression is not entirely unkind. He might be prone to being a vicious little bastard, but he does not direct his ire towards the children of his bonded's species unless ordered to.

She's positively giddy at the sight of a dragon, and it pleases him. Unfortunately for her, she will never be able to bond to one, unless she has some equine blood in her veins. Although the giant isn't racist, he does think equines are superior purely for the fact they can bond to dragons, the greatest of the companions. His dam's kitsune is feral enough in his own way, but in the stallion's opinion he lacks the sheer ominous presence of a dragon.

The filly enters a frenzy of bucks, and the red watches her with an impassive, sharp eye. If Volterra wasn't so worked up, he would likely offer a smile as well, but his face remains stony and impassive. She thanks him, and the red's draconic pride bids him to swell and preen, arching his powerful neck. The stallion feels like pointing out that the dragon only protected her at his bidding - without his instruction, Vérzés would have flown into battle alongside his bonded to ice the hell out of the Bear God. Being relegated to 'protect the little girl' duty had made the ruby beast bristle, but being thanked for his daring deeds certainly helps ease the pain. "He says you are welcome." It is an accurate, if rough, translation of the dragon's mental throb of smugness at receiving gratitude that rightly should have gone to his bonded.

Being described as pretty only increases Vérzés' inflating ego, and he croons audibly whilst releasing another blossom of frost. Volterra glares at him. Don't know what you're so smug about - a little girl thinks you're pretty. Pretty. Not ruggedly handsome, pretty. Flowers are pretty. Are you a flower? But the giant's mental jibes to his bonded fall on deaf ears, as the blood-dragon flares his mighty wings to bask in the filly's adoration some more. "'Pretty' still good word. Vol-ter never get good words. Vol-ter get 'stinky'. 'Stinky' not good word." The irascible stallion flattens his ears and wrinkles his nostrils, silently fuming that even his own mind-partner is lining up to shit-talk him. Their bond might be watertight, and they might gleefully be willing to kill or die for the other, but they are both young men, with tendencies for harsh banter.

It takes him a moment to realise that the filly is directing a deluge of questions towards him, not his dragon. Despite his foul mood, a smirk threatens to break through the iron-hard facade of his face, as her barrage reminds him so much of himself when he was her age. Dragon obsessed, eternally curious and hungry for knowledge. "We met when I was about your age. To be bonded is unlike anything you will have ever experienced. We share every emotion, every thought, every desire. Imagine a part of your soul, shaved off and placed inside the body of a sentient, intelligent creature. A creature who loves you unconditionally, who fights for you, kills for you, and would die for you. That, and more, is what it is to be bonded." Passionate? Yes, because the passion in his loins is second only to the passion for the sharer of his mind. They may bicker like children, but they are one.

She speaks of her sire, and Volterra cannot possibly know she talks of his uncle. She mentions a Vlasi, an unknown creature, but a quizzically raised brow is the beast's only sign of interest.

Ah, yes, companion envy. He knows that feeling very well. Now he has his dragon, he cannot imagine coveting something ever again, but he knows he will. He's just greedy like that. "Perhaps one day you'll get one." Fuck knows why he's trying to reassure her, because he doesn't give a hairy rat's ass whether she gets a companion or not, but the words just slip away from his tongue like slime from a leaf. "Vol-ter going soft," comes the red's sing-song voice, and the stallion's ears flatten in irritation. The dragon simply continues to preen beneath the girl's gaze, expanding and cleaning each leathery wing. "Not a dragon, though, unless you have equine blood." And, given her wings and horn, that seems unlikely. She'll have to settle for a far inferior companion, like Mongrel.

Her description of a shape-shifting creature does sound intriguing, though. He racks his brains as to what it could possibly be, but his encyclopedic memory only refers to dragon facts. A creature who can turn from a many-headed dog to a deer...could it perhaps turn into a dragon, too? The behemoth knows not. "I have never heard of anything like that before. Companions cannot usually switch between forms - it must be a rare and unusual sort of creature." He looks towards Vérzés. I bet you transform into a fluffy little bunny, don't you? At least, you're acting like one. His mental banter is a sharp arrow into the ruby blood-dragon's mind, but Vérzés studiously ignores him and continues to display every inch of his magnificent, glistening anatomy.

He's quiet for a moment. Jesus, why he is even still here, trying to make conversation with a kid? But it's not like he has anything better to do. Unless the heady aroma of a mare wanders past for him to pursue, he's better off occupying his mind for as long as possible here, because talking with this filly has meant he hasn't thought about his ten-tonne balls for approximately four and a half minutes. That's a damn record for him. It's far healthier than attacking inanimate objects or trying to work out how the hell Ode had managed to relieve himself, so he could copy. "When I got you out of the water before, you felt like a chunk of ice to the touch. You dead inside or something?" He turns his grumpy gaze on her, finally deciding that yes, talking with her is far preferable to wandering around, alone and horny as hell. At least she is occupying his mind for a precious few minutes.

She grooms her wings, and he thinks back to a few days after his birth when he met Auriel. She had been a hybrid mix of unicorn and pegasus, and her wings had been an object of great envy to the wobbly-legged young colt. Not anymore; they're pretty enough, but he is accustomed to remaining with all four stout legs firmly on the ground, save for when he throws his consciousness into his dragon to take to the wing in the red's mind. He does, however, think that Auriel is bound to be grown up and hot as hell now. Maybe he should seek her out...

I don't think so. He bites back a comment about how dim you need to be to not know whether you're dead or not. He glances at the droplets of water, frozen to her frigid skin. She then asks if she looks dead, and he looks her over quickly. "Nah. The dead are a lot less mouthy." Despite the barb, there's no real venom in his voice - it's a lazy, throwaway comment, like the sort of boyish remark he would make to his dragon. Whether she takes it seriously or not will say a lot about her. He can sympathise with her hatred of normality, though. Oh, how he'd envied Shida and Auriel, with their wings and horns and magic when he'd been a simple equine colt without powers or dragon! He decides to reassure her a little bit that she will grow out of her self-hatred.

"You never know. You might have magic inside you that you just haven't discovered yet." He'd thought he was magic-free and boring, until one day he wasn't. To prove his point, he fixes his gaze on the ground under Vérzés and bids it to lift into a small tower. The red squawks in surprise as he is lifted into the air upon a plateau of stone, but quickly realises what's happening and relaxes back onto his haunches. Volterra slows the flow of magic when his dragon has been lifted up higher than his own height, leaving the ruby beast perched atop a great tower of ground. "This lay dormant in me until one day it didn't." How helpful is he - reassuring her (slightly) and getting an opportunity to show off, too.