The cry of invitation rings in her ears, and despite herself the golden queen is tempted. It would be so easy to give up on her hell-bent quest for domination and follow the male as equals, to relinquish her desire to be the best and be content with being the same. Must she always be so competitive, so ferocious? They could just enjoy each other's royal company and fly together without the crippling exhaustion of their ongoing battle, and Vadir can't help but wonder what that would be like.

Alas, her great pride is overwhelming. She is born to rule, to crush everything put before her just like her mammoth bonded, to rise beside her black king as his golden queen. After all, of all the males of any species, only Volterra is her true equal, and that's why she often listens to his commands where she'd willfully ignore a lesser man. He's urging her to follow Dramyrth's invite and give up on her hellbent desire to assert herself upon him - the Indomitable adores the queen's dominant side and usually encourages it, yet he's growing bored of her behaviour that is distracting him from his precious time with Amaris.

Vadir's wings twitch, her horned features twisted in an expression of great indecision as she hovers where she is, staring after Dramyrth as her body and mind wage war against each other. She's truly torn, and unleashes a frustrated blast of flame as she yo-yos between her options.

As it turns out, though, the decision is made for her. The queen is suddenly aware of wingbeats behind her, and flips her massive bulk to see what dares approach her and interrupt her musings. A loud bellow erupts from her clenched jaws as she claps eyes on the beast soaring towards her; it is a huge vulture, larger even than her, its great feathered wings so wide she wonders how it can possibly fly. She's no stranger to the Throat's resident scavengers, but they usually leave her well alone - her flame is enough to deter all but the stupidest of creatures. Indeed, this particular vulture doesn't appear intent on attacking her, and is perhaps simply minding its own business. But, like Icarus, the vulture has flown too close to the sun, meaning her, and she can see an opportunity.

She stares at Dramyrth, and this time it's her cry that is full of invitation. Hunt with me, it says in its lilting, powerful song; show me what you can do. At the end of the day, hunting is one of the most important things a dragon can do. A male must prove his ability to provide for his potential mate before she even considers engaging in the sky-dance with him, and Vadir's eyes glow with cold passion as she contemplates watching the other gold at work. This is an opportunity to put their squabbling aside and see how they work together at the expense of an unfortunate vulture; the queen turns, begins to fly after her chosen prey, her wingbeats slow as she waits for Dramyrth to catch up.

Oh, she adds to him in the form of another haunting roar; no breath. Hunting is too easy when she can immolate her prey with a single breath, so she's keen to see what the male can do without his flame. It's not long before she is above the vulture, swooping down to grab it with her claws into its wings; it screams, flapping against her iron grip and thrashing its massive beak to try and bite her. It's so big that killing it without her breaths would be a difficult task, which is where Dramyrth comes in.

Down below, Vérzés watches the events above him with evident interest. He's keen to see Vadir taken down a notch, but appreciates that is unlikely to happen, so is content to see two golds working in tandem instead. Volterra feels his red's excitement thrumming through their bond, mingling in with the raw predatory lust of Vadir. He's so distracted by these twin emotions that he almost misses Amaris' laugh and her following words. His ears flip towards her, surprised at her easy dismissal of something that is a part of life, especially a mare's life. Foal-carrying is just one of those things that they will inevitably do, in Volterra's mind anyway.

Her addition that her dragon is enough work causes him to snort an amused half-agreement, but he's not fully sure he thinks the two can be compared. "Raising a child is vastly different to raising a dragon, Amaris." With his inability to correctly articulate his point, he leaves it there; he can't put into words the differences between the two, how his dragons learned from his mind but his foals needed to be taught by his body, how there's a world between the shared consciousness of a companion and the unconditional love of a child. There's similarities, yes, but the two cannot truly be compared.

The Diviner's Fire is close, and Volterra takes the lead as he moves towards it. He dips his head in the direction of the inferno, a silent gesture of respect to the Sun God, before hearing Amaris' question. "She is, yes. I do not see her around much, but she is still the Throat's Diviner." He looks between the dragonmare and the fire. "How will you transport the flame?"