...a sudden shadow will blot out the sun and a large taloned hand will close around her waist?

That probably isn't the result she was expecting.

The dragon, scales shimmering fiery red in the afternoon light, leaps back into the sky with Saveth held securely in a foreclaw.

This was not a result she was expecting! Well, there's only one sensible way to react to this change in circumstances.

She screams.

The dragon laughs.

Once she has adjusted to the situation of 'being carried away by a dragon,' she stops screaming. It's not really helping anymore. She looks at the ground below and thinks about how this is completely impossible and should not happen, and also how she should probably not struggle because she would definitely die from that drop. Or really, really want to be dead. She clearly needs a different solution to this problem than the immediately obvious ones.

"... Excuse me!" she calls, after a few moments of adjustment. "Have you considered the social and economic benefits of putting me back?!"

There is a somewhat disbelieving pause.

"...can't say that I have, no."

"Okay, well, they exist! I will be more than happy to tell you all about them! Presumably there are things that you might want that you can't get just by being a dragon and taking them! I'm a princess, put me back and I can help persuade people to - to - what do dragons do, do you sit on a hoard of treasure, going out and fetching that must be annoying, it'd be much easier to pay people to do it for you."

A long wingbeat. Her palace recedes behind them.

"I do not sit on a hoard of treasure," he says, amused. "I don't know how that rumour got started. If a dragon makes a habit of sitting on a hoard of treasure, they'll soon go from having a hoard of treasure to having a gold-plated floor."

"Well, okay but, but - you probably do eat, what about regular food deliveries, super convenient, don't need to go to the trouble to find your meals at all, everybody's lazy sometimes!"

Snort.

"What sorts of things are inconvenient for a dragon, do you get bits of sheep and maiden stuck in annoying places in your teeth and need dragon sized floss, are you bothered by how your scales aren't polished enough and need little helper servants to polish the hard to reach places, do you want artists to be paid to paint giant impressive murals of you all over your - whatever it is that you live in?!"

The dragon laughs.

"I think your argument would sound a lot better if you had any idea what I wanted in life," he says. "As much fun as it is to listen to you guess wildly."

"Yeah, probably, I'm kind of panicking because I got snatched by a dragon, what do you want?!"

"As it happens, one of my favourite hobbies is kidnapping pretty girls!"

"What, are we prettily decorative or something, do you make us sing to you, I will be really annoyed if I'm going to be relegated to sitting around looking decorative and occasionally fanning you with an oversized fan or something, I would get so incredibly bored!"

"Boredom is not the usual complaint, no."

"Do we make entertaining squeaking sounds when you toss us off cliffs, are you trying to coax dragonslayers to where you live for the entertainment, do you like the smell of our perfume, I am really not seeing the uses a giant flying lizard has for pretty girls!"

"You're very creative," he says, laughing.

"If you think I'm creative it's a - a waste of my creativity if you just eat me -"

She's been remarkably intelligible under the circumstances, but now she's started to devolve a little into hysterics.

"Who said I was going to eat you?"

"I - I don't - I don't know what else you'd even do, you're obviously not interested in ransoming me!"

The dragon snorts again.

He's a fast flier. She was already pretty close to her southern border, but in their short conversation he's already carried her most of the way across the next kingdom. Now, making the final approach to his mountain lair, he stretches out his wings and glides in for a landing on a very pretty cliffside balcony, setting Saveth down very gently on her feet on the polished stone—

—and then he sort of shimmers and folds inward, and the next moment there's a tall and rather attractive human standing there, hints of fiery red glimmering subtly in his messy black hair and lively black eyes, raising his eyebrows at her.

"Do I really need to spell it out?"

"oh."

"Now she gets it."

- Well now she's more insulted than scared.

"Hey, let's see you get carried off by a dragon and see how quick on the uptake you are!"

He giggles.

"You're - you're a dragon, why would you even be attracted to human women?!"

"You're so small and fragile and helpless! What's not to like?"

"The fact that we are physically incompatible, that's what! I mean unless your, your shapeshifting is complete enough to - to - but as a dragon you would not fit!"

He laughs. "My shapeshifting is as complete as I want it to be."

"And what, there aren't a lot of available female dragons flying around, and it's just easier to snatch up a princess instead of going looking?!"

"I'm not actually sure there are any female dragons right now."

"Have you checked, you should check, if dragons are shapeshifters I'm sure the both of you would have lots of fun, no need to bring silly humans into it, I definitely can't compare!"

He shakes his head.

"I'll tell you a secret," he says, "we all start out as humans. Dragon, griffin, unicorn, whatever, we grow up human and only get mythical later."

"I, what, how?!"

"Magic?"

"But - then - why do you often go and cause trouble and need slaying, why don't you live with your families with some major lifestyle changes and otherwise be the neighbor who also just happens to be a dragon, or whatever!"

"...well in my case my family's been dead for thousands of years," he says.

"Okay, but why hang out in a mountain palace and kidnap girls, why not fly down to some out of the way town, turn into a human, walk in and introduce yourself? I can't imagine you have many friends, being a dragon that kidnaps girls."

"I really hate lying. Pretending to be a nice harmless ordinary human and then having people be terrified of me when they find out does not sound like my idea of a good time."

"So be the, the, friendly neighborhood dragon for a while, chase away wolves or hostile armies or something, then once everyone is sure you're not evil introduce yourself?"

"Yeah, that does sound like what I'd do if I wanted to go out of my way to get people to like me."

"So you're just okay with people hating you, sending the occasional doomed dragonslayer after you, as long as you pick up some unfortunate girl for - what could generously be called companionship?"

"I mostly just want to live in luxury in my stunningly beautiful mountain lair," he says. "And I apologize if I've left you with the impression that I don't get anything out of kidnapping girls in particular, I absolutely do. I'm not going to assume out of hand that it's definitely better than the other option, but it's nice."

He leans against the ornate stone railing.

"The trouble is that I really can't just go looking for companionship of the non-kidnapped kind, not casually. As you've pointed out, I could sink decades of work into it first, but I don't see that I have a good reason to. And I think you're underestimating how attached people are to their preconceptions. I've been 'the evil dragon on that mountain' for longer than any neighbouring kingdom has existed. It's not uncommon for me to go half a century without so much as snacking on a stray sheep, let alone kidnapping anyone, and yet when I do I always find my reputation has persisted in my absence."

"... That sounds really lonely and sad," she admits, a lot of her fear and indignation bleeding out of her, precisely like she'd just been stabbed in the emotions.

"Yeah, maybe a little," he acknowledges wryly.

For a few moments she's just quiet, wondering what she could possibly say to that.

"... Do you want - help? Figuring out something that's less..." She waves a hand, awkwardly. "Lonely and sad?"

"Can't say that I've thought about it," he says. "You're, uh, being much more sympathetic than most kidnapped people."

"I was hiding behind my sardonic wall of emotional protection, so now that I've actually poked my head out from behind it to feel emotions, I'm not reeling as much as I could be. Plus I seem to be slotting myself into a category you don't know what to do with?"

"...I'm not sure that's quite the right way of looking at it," he says. "If what you mean is that I don't seem like I'm going to rape you, well, you're not wrong. But it's not like you're - some kind of fundamentally incomprehensible thing. I enjoy your company and you're not terrified of me, that's fairly straightforward."

"I was referring to the - um, the change in plans for me more than anything else. I'm glad I'm not fundamentally incomprehensible to you, that sounds like it'd make things super complicated?"

"Just a little, yeah."

"Also that it's sort of - it seems like you haven't had a person just be sympathetic before? So there's not an obvious thing to do with me like with your previous maidens."

"...yes...?"

"... And that might be confusing for you?"

"Not really, no."

"Oh. Well. All right then. ... Can I have a way to contact my parents to try and explain the situation, they're going to be extremely worried about the whole kidnapped by a dragon thing."

"...I don't object to you contacting your parents but I don't actually have a good way to get in touch with them. I suppose I could at least build you some stairs but that only gets you as far as the bottom of the mountain, and not very conveniently at that."

"Um. No. And I'm not sure I could get a message to them from the bottom of the mountain with anything resembling speed. Is it too much to ask to be put back and then picked up again later after I've explained myself?"

"...I try not to go out too much, or to the same place too many times too fast, or linger anywhere if I can help it. People panic."

"... Yeah, fair enough. Hm. I suppose it's tricky to be stealthy when you're a dragon, but maybe we can pull it off if we're clever? I can think of a few places to land that would help disguise you."

"Hard to avoid being seen in the air."

"It - seems like it'd be possible to fly high enough to look like a big bird? But I suppose they'd be on the lookout for dragons after their princess got kidnapped, wouldn't they..."

She frowns and looks vaguely fretful.

"Yeah. Sorry."

"I - drop me off somewhere closer to home than the base of your mountain, from where I send a letter? I would like to not freak the populace of my country out but I really think things will be handled better if my parents know I'm okay. I don't think they could go, 'Hey guys, the princess is handling the dragon problem, chill,' but. You won't get a bunch of hopeful dragonslayers out to save or avenge me on your doorstep in a month."

"...starting riots is still not my favourite pastime even when nobody comes to bother me about it afterward, but..."

"I think a riot could be avoided if you land, I walk imperiously up to someone who knows and therefore recognizes me, hand them a letter, and say I am handling the dragon problem? And then we immediately fly off. But you do admittedly know more about how quickly you incite riots than I do."

"Yeah, and it's not just where I land, it's where I fly over. People don't panic every time they see me making two flights in the same day, but it happens. Near the mountain especially."

"Do they really freak out that easily?" she wonders, a little miserably. "But most of the populace isn't even your targeted kidnapping demographic."

"There's not actually anything stopping me from flying to the nearest city and burning it to the ground. Most dragons, you can safely assume they won't lay waste to the countryside on a whim because somebody would kill them for it. I am famously immune to that solution. So anytime I look like I might be doing something new, well, maybe it's harmless or maybe I'm about to destroy everything, no way to know except to wait and see."

She winces. "Right. Okay."

"Sorry."

"Mm."

"S-so the stairs, then? And I try to send a letter as quickly as possible?"

"Sure."

He walks to the far side of the balcony and puts his hands on the cliff face. Glimmers of red light spill down the stone, pouring like water and licking like flames, until they reach all the way into the foothills far below. Then the fiery shimmer spins outward into the shape of a broad spiral stair, and fills with stone like a glass filling with wine. Last of all, the section of railing where the stairs join the balcony peels outward to merge seamlessly into the railing on the stairs.

She... looks at the stairs. Those are a lot of stairs. Horror and understanding slowly dawns as she sees just how many stairs there are. A lot. There are a lot of stairs. She's going to have to go down those, and then back up. This might be it, this might be how she dies. Not from the dragon that kidnapped her, from the dragon's stairs.

"Thank you," she says, anyway, because it's nice of him to make them even if they're possibly going to kill her. "Um, could you point me to some paper and a pen?"

Red light flickers between his hands. He holds out some paper and a pen that didn't exist a moment ago.

"And if you want somewhere to sit and write you can come inside," he says. The doors in the cliffside swing open.

"That would be great, thank you."

Is that a smile from the princess? It looks like one!

He leads her inside.

...it's stunningly gorgeous. He's had thousands of years to work on this place, and it shows. Everything is designed at a dual scale, comfortable for either dragon or human, and as a result the rooms are really, really big. The balcony on the outside is mirrored by another one on the inside, overlooking a cavernous hall with a high vaulted ceiling and a floor so far down that the light from the open doors barely reaches it - but there are magelights everywhere, and sections of cliffside artfully thinned so that sunlight can come through them even though from the outside the whole thing looks solid.

"Oh," she sighs, enraptured. "No wonder you don't get out much, why would you. You built all of this?"

...he grins at her. "Yep!"

"It's lovely," she breathes, still staring. "And I live in a palace, it's slightly harder to make me gawk than the average person, excellent job."

He giggles.

She indulges in a few more moments of staring, then:

"Okay. Let me pick my jaw off of the floor and go write a letter, before I lose my nerve to tackle the stairs. Direct me to a table, please?"

He takes her down a turn of stairs and into a human-sized side room with more of those thin stone 'windows'. There are tables and comfy chairs and beautiful decorative lamps.

Pretty!

But she has a letter to write, so she sits down and starts writing it. It's a hard letter to write, she ends up revising it twice to make sure the implications are exactly where she means them to be. She'd rather avoid her parents misinterpreting a sentence somewhere and worrying that she's being mistreated.

The dragon gives her some space; he flops into a chair across the room from her table and closes his eyes.

Saveth finishes writing her letter soon enough.

"Okay," she says, half to herself, "now to brave the stairs."

"Sorry about the stairs. I can carry you down but down isn't really the hard part, and I don't know when you'll be back."

"It's okay. It shouldn't take very long, maybe an hour or two at the most. Though, I would love to dodge the stairs if I can, I'm pretty sure I might just die trying to climb them, even if I took breaks. We can coordinate a meeting time?"

"I can wait for you at the bottom in two hours," he says agreeably.

"Okay. Thank you, that'd be great."

Wry smile.

She smiles back!

"Right then," she says, standing. "Carry me away, oh great dragon?" Pause. She looks around at the room. "... We need to be in a dragon sized room, don't we. Okay, shuffle thataway, and then carry me away, oh great dragon."

...he giggles.

He leaves the human-sized room and goes out onto the balcony again and returns to dragon form and waits for her there.

(His dragon form is... really pretty.)

She follows him out, ambling towards his foreleg so she can easily be picked up.

(It is really pretty. It's much easier to admire it when she's not being carried off. Not that she indulges in much of an admiring gaze, she's still a little nervous about being this close to a giant dragon, especially after being carried off by him not too long ago. She's clamping down on the urge to flee.)

He gently scoops her up and hops over the railing into a spiraling glide that lands them at the base of the stairs. There's a path winding away through the hills.

She makes a little squeaking sound when he hops off the railing, but this seems more like an expression of squeak than actual dismay with her situation.

"... In retrospect I should have asked how far away the nearest town was. If it's super far away I will need to change my earlier assessment."

"...suppose you would've had other things on your mind when we were flying here," he acknowledges. "It's not that far, I don't think? I could fly there in a couple of minutes, I think you could walk there in less than an hour. Maybe not by much."

"Ah. Let's shoot for three hours, then? Just to be safe. And not have you waiting around impatiently while I'm walking back."

"Sure."

She smiles at him, pats his forelimb in a friendly fashion, and then turns to go walk to town to send a letter.

Is this a complicated procedure? She can spare some jewelry to uncomplicate it, if so!

It's a little bit complicated, but she does not need much jewelry to uncomplicate it. She will be back in plenty of time to meet the three-hour deadline.

She supposes she could attempt to flee and get home if she wanted, but there are a number of reasons why she won't be doing that. For one, it's not very realistic; she doubts very highly that a lost, destitute princess stranded in a foreign country could safely make it back home. More likely something awful would happen on the way back, and she'd rather avoid that. For another, she doesn't exactly want to leave the dragon without a princess, since he'd probably just snatch someone else and probably be much less inclined to be as pleasant to them, since his last one ran off. If he has to have a maiden around, it might as well be her, since he likes her so much. Besides, maybe she actually can help him.

Or maybe she's just a stupid girl willingly wandering back into the dragon's lair. She guesses she'll find out.

Here she is, at a time comfortably before the end of the deadline.

The dragon is curled up at the base of the stairs. He lifts his head at her approach.

She gives an awkward little wave, feeling slightly self-conscious about actually coming back to the aforementioned dragon's lair.

In an effort to get over this self-consciousness: "So I realized on the walk to town that I didn't actually know your name, or tell you mine. I'm Saveth, hi."

"Zekanare." He makes an expression that might be a dragonish smile, mostly visible around the eyes.

"Pleasure to make your acquaintance, Zekanare," she says with a polite curtsy. "Will you please carry me off to your lair?"

He giggles, and scoops her up and—climbs up the cliff face, with Saveth tucked securely against his scaly chest.

She tries not to squeak when she's scooped this time, but she fails. Being scooped up by a dragon is kind of a squeak-worthy affair.

"I swear I will stop squeaking eventually. This just, um, takes some getting used to."

"Not every day you get carried off by a dragon," he agrees, depositing her carefully on the balcony.

"Today is just one of those days," she says, sagely. "Thank you for sparing me the stairs."

He snorts. "You're welcome."

Smile.

"So I am actually really curious about the food situation. If you can go half a century without snacking on a stray sheep, then surely you have some way to feed yourself up here. And, um, presumably me. Please feed me regularly."

He shifts down to human form and holds out his hand toward her, red light sparkling in the air above it; by the time he completes the gesture, he's holding out a beautiful little porcelain plate with a slice of cake and a silver fork.

"Oh." She looks at the cake, blinking. Then she takes the offered cake with a polite, "Thank you. That's very convenient, all right."

Well, no point being hesitant about offered foods. She has a bite of cake. Then a second, more enthusiastic bite of cake. "... And delicious!"

Zekanare beams at her.

She smiles back, and has another bite of cake. Because it really is pretty good.

"Do you actually eat stray sheep, or is that just a silly rumor?"

"Once in a while, if I'm bored and I happen to spot one. And I go out hunting, sometimes, have an elk for dinner or something. Nobody panics as long as I'm not making two flights in the same week."

"Huh. All right. ... What's the appeal of it, when you can just." She waves a hand. "Make food?"

"Of hunting? It's fun!"

"Huh. Okay. I suppose I'd make a terrible dragon, wouldn't I. Or at least a very un-dragony dragon. 'Why would I go hunting, I have a perfectly nice mountain right here.'"

He giggles.

"Is there a reason most dragons tend to hole up somewhere and cause trouble? Or is it just - they have no choice but to hole up somewhere because they are dragons and therefore everyone's afraid of them, and we only pay attention to the ones who cause trouble?"

"I don't talk to other dragons much," he says. "But from what I can tell - when someone turns into a dragon, or whatever, they turn into the specific kind that suits their personality best. So dragons tend to be the kind of person who'd hole up somewhere and cause trouble. On the other hand, I'm that sort of person and if people were less afraid of me I'd probably cause less trouble, so..." He shrugs.

"Huh," she says, blinking. "Okay. So it's partially part of the system and partially provoked by society. That's interesting." She has a thoughtful bite of cake.

"I was the first dragon," he adds. "I've been around a while."

Blink.

"The first dragon? So did you set the standard of what a dragon is supposed to be, or did you slot into a category that hadn't been filled until you became a dragon, and you just happened to be first? I suppose you wouldn't know, I'm just curious about the mechanics of this all."

"Kind of hard to tell from my perspective, yeah. And I don't talk to other dragons that often. But all the ones I've ever met... reminded me of me, but not all in the same ways."

Saveth tilts her head, thoughtfully.

"Not in all the same ways? Like, they resembled you more than they resembled each other, or?"

"Yeah."

"Huh. That's... I'm not sure what that is. I suppose that implies you did set the standard for dragons, though."

"Yeah, it does."

"This is really interesting, though. It's tempting me to do something ridiculous and crazy like find and poll all of the mythical creatures in the world to see what the personality types are like. If that were at all a safe and rational thing to do and would not definitely get me killed, anyway."

Giggle.

Smile.

"I should probably distract myself before I'm tempted to figure out what the hypothetical set of questions would be, uh - do you have a place for me to sleep? I assume you can just make clothes to go along with the food making, so that seems handled."

"Yeah, this place has way more bedrooms than it needs, I like decorating 'em."

"... That's adorable. Any you're particularly proud of?"

He laughs. "Yeah, but it's a bit of a walk from here at this size, should I carry you again?"

"Sure, why not. Let's see if I can successfully avoid the indignity of squeaking."

He scoops her up.

She successfully avoids the indignity of squeaking, in that she instead makes an undignified eeping noise. Being scooped by a dragon is very different from being scooped by a dragon in human form. For example: wow, she sure has been confronted with the fact that in his human form he's rather attractive. That's a thing, yep. Also that he sure did that effortlessly. This is also a thing she's now aware of. Yep.

"... I think I'm done with my cake," she says faintly, blinking up at him like she's just seen him for the first time. "W-we should probably do something with it so I don't, um. Accidentally stab myself. With the fork." This is very clearly not at all what she's thinking about right now, but she's saying it anyway, because the rest of her brain is not up to saying things and she feels like she should say something.

"Wouldn't want that," he agrees. He shifts his grip on her slightly, freeing one hand, with which he touches the fork and plate; they and all the attached cake crumbs flicker with red light and disappear.

He can effortlessly carry her with one arm how is that fair did he steal his strength from the rest of mankind with magic oh wait no he is magic, he's a dragon and he is naturally this strong and can effortlessly carry her wherever he likes in his large pretty mountain palace -

"... Good. Good, that's. That's taken care of." She swallows. And now she is out of words, whoops, she's just. Going to be here. Being held. With one arm. By a pretty human-shaped dragon. Yep.

...he carefully sets her back down on her feet. "Are you all right?"

"Um." She clears her throat in an attempt to clear her thoughts. "Yes, I-I just. You're, um." She gestures vaguely at him, like this will demonstrate her point.

"I can't possibly be scarier as a human than a dragon, can I?" he says, perplexed.

"Thaaaat is not my problem," she asserts, with a self conscious little laugh. "Um. Being picked up and carried at all is - is a new one, people don't actually go around carrying royalty, it's. Not practical, for. For most people. It's - it's not that you're scarier, quite the opposite, it's. I-I don't really have any context for a dragon picking me up and carrying me off, it's a thing I hadn't expected to happen. I - admittedly didn't expect a man to pick me up and carry me off either, but there's. There's some social context there and it's. I'm. You."

Her ability to finish sentences seems to have stopped. Is she blushing? She's pretty sure she's blushing. She tries the sentences again, that was almost going well until her ability to finish them just evaporated. "So that just completely caught me off guard and because I have the - the romantic experience of freshly fallen snow I am, um. Making a complete idiot of myself, sorry."

"...oh."

Well, it looks like she somehow actually managed to communicate successfully while stammering and failing to finish sentences like an idiot. Excellent. She gets an imaginary cookie for this impossible achievement. Now that she has this prize, she's going to shut up and stop making an idiot of herself. Okay? Okay.

Instead she fidgets nervously with her hair, face still a faint shade of pink, eyes darting nervously to assess his reaction. She's not quite brave enough to meet his gaze.

"...um..."

Yep he's got nothin.

She doesn't really have anything either. Shouldn't he be the one to say something now? She said many things, it seems like it's probably fair for him to spare her the embarrassing words, right?

...

Okay, fine, she'll. She'll attempt to form a sentence.

"So um," she begins, wondering if she sounds as inane as she feels, "... how's the weather on this mountain? Do you get, um. Snow. Up here?"

Hey, it's completely irrelevant to everything, but it's a sentence!

...he starts giggling.

...

Yeah, okay, that is admittedly pretty funny.

She giggles, too.

"Should I carry you to the room as a dragon instead, or would that be just as bad now?"

"Um. It - it should be fine, I think?"

Oh look it's a return of the shy.

...he turns into a dragon to see if this helps anything.

She startles a little when he is suddenly a dragon, but then recovers herself and offers him a smile.

Oh good.

Scoop?

She does still squeak at this (and then snort self-reproachfully) but she doesn't shut down into shy and flustered mode again.

Oh good!

He carries her through the mountain. Everything is outrageously beautiful. The detail in the stonework is exquisite.

Eventually he reaches a room where long spirals of floating magelights illuminate a sheet of falling water that pours from a slot near the ceiling all the way down to a broad channel in the floor. The human-sized stairs that climb the walls are interleaved with dragon-sized ledges and clawholds, all carved in beautiful patterns. And halfway up a wall, placed precisely where it will get the best possible view of the waterfall, there's a balcony leading into a charming little sitting room. He deposits her on the balcony and curls up on a nearby ledge to watch her reaction.

Oh.

Yeah, this is a good way to get over her ridiculous social awkwardness, look at all of the pretty.

She needs to take a minute on the balcony to just gaze at everything, because wow. It's so - magical. None of this feels real, except here she is, standing in the middle of it, alive and breathing and looking at it with her own eyes.

"I haven't even looked at the room yet," she mock-complains, awestruck.

The dragon giggles.

She giggles, too, then looks at the scenery some more and indulges in a little sigh.

"Okay," she announces after a minute. "I am ready to see the actual bedroom now. I promise I won't be weird if you're human shaped to watch."

He reaches up to put a claw on the balcony railing and shifts, so that by the time he finishes hopping over it he is human again. "All right."

Saveth beams at him, then - off to the bedroom!

(It's likely that if she hadn't gone and gotten distracted by the pretty, this would register as an innuendo, but as it is, she is quite distracted and doesn't notice.)

With the balcony doors open, the charming little sitting room has a lovely view of the waterfall; another door at the back of the room leads on into a bedroom.

The bedroom is gorgeous. The walls of the octagonal room are decorated with a single continuous picture of the surrounding landscape as seen from the top of the mountain, the image formed from inlays of different stones and jewels and precious metals; at the top of the domed ceiling, a strong magelight behind a layer of thin marble does a pretty good impression of the sun softened by clouds.

Zekanare is grinning at her.

Yeah she's going to need a minute to be fit for conversation again.

"I - you're - this is -" She gestures impotently at the room, clearly unable to express herself.

"I'm glad you like it!"

"I do, it's gorgeous, you're ridiculously talented, can I hug you?"

"Yes, you can absolutely hug me."

Excellent, now he has a princess hugging him!

Hug!

She giggles into chest, delighted.

It's so pretty!! He's so happy about seeing her smile. She adores how personally invested he is in her delight, it's wonderful.

Hug. Hug hug hug!

Giggly cuddly hug!

Yes! That!

Eventually she pulls back enough to look at him instead of giggling on him. "You're - not what I expected. I mean - besides the - the obvious, anyway."

"Oh?"

"You're ridiculously talented, you're way better at being nice than I would have ever expected, and you - you light up every time I smile."

"I like it when you smile."

"You do! I can tell! You broadcast this opinion very well!" Snuggly hug.

Eee snuggly hug. Best kind.

She giggles a little, snuggling him. Then her Princessly Sense Of Decorum kicks in, and she notices that this hug has probably gone on a little too long for propriety. She - notes how absurd this thought is, she's in a dragon's fucking castle, she can clearly do whatever she wants, who cares what is decorous or not, but - the thought niggles at her. Habits are a bit hard to break.

Saveth squeezes him, then gently steps away and smiles at him.

"This feels a little like I'm living in a dream, you realize," she says, a little fondly.

"So what I'm hearing is that you'd like this room."

... She cracks up.

"Yes. Yes, I'd like this room."

He beams at her.

"I was talking more about the situation than the room, but yes, I do like the room, I'll be happy to stay in the pretty landscape waterfall room."

"Then you can do that! The lights change, look—" and he shows her a little turnkey on a little post next to the bed, placed to be comfortably within reach of someone lying down: the little clock-hand currently points to a round yellow sun made of coloured glass, with a little magelight shining behind it, but there's a silvery moon next to it and a scatter of pinpoint stars in the third position. He clicks it over to the next picture, the little magelight moves appropriately, and the sun overhead becomes a full moon, shining silver behind the thin stone clouds; again, and the moon is dark and the ceiling-dome dotted with tiny stars that only barely illuminate the room; and then back around to the sun, which returns as bright as ever.

She laughs, delighted.

"You're a ridiculous show off. A really talented one, with fantastic ideas and better execution of them. So I guess you've earned it."

"I can't imagine how I would've managed to make it eight thousand years without learning something about how to move rocks around unless I was a rock myself."

Giggle. "If you didn't have any interest in moving rocks around, maybe? Or didn't care if you lived in a dingy cave? Or if you didn't have a good sense of aesthetics and weren't interested in improving how things looked past a baseline threshold, even if you could move rocks around? There are more explanations available here than 'is a rock,' anyway."

"You learn a lot of things in eight thousand years, even if they're not things you're interested in for their own sake!"

"Okay, but do you have a similar mastery of, of - of cake decoration, what about ice sculptures, or glass blowing?"

"I'm good at making things." He holds out a flicker of red light that becomes a delicate pink rose sculpted from perfectly clear ice with just a hint of colour.

She looks at the rose, then looks at Zekanare.

Then she throws up her arms in surrender. "Fine! Fine, given enough time and personal inclination I guess you just get a pass for being good at making things! You ridiculously talented, absurdly magical, gleefully cheating..." She searches for the appropriate noun for him, then finally grumpily settles on, "dragon." Huff. "You realize this means I will be terribly disappointed in you if you ever make anything that isn't considered gorgeous."

He giggles.

"I was all set to give you reasonable expectations, but no, you went and were great at many things. Now you get to have high expectations, and you'll be expected to meet them," she sniffs.

"Seems reasonable enough to me."

"Well, yes. I am very reasonable. But high expectations are often not reasonable in most circumstances, it's only because of my good judgement that I've adapted to these trying times."

Snort.

... She giggles.

"I should probably actually pay attention to practicalities, if I'm allegedly so reasonable. Could you make me some spare clothes so I'm not, ah. Stuck wearing the same dress while I'm here?"

A flicker of red light, and he hands her a dress - the cut is very practical, the fabric exquisitely soft, the colour a deep blue that would look stunning on her.

"Thank you, this is lovely. Also, why are you so good at making things pretty this isn't fair."

"I have a lot of practice."

Another flicker, another dress, this one a little fancier.

"Right, right, but dresses have very different requirements from stonework, do you have a lot of practice with dresses in particular?"

There's a place to put these away, right? Because then she can start doing that.

Yep! When she opens the wardrobe he starts filling it with flickers of red light that turn into assorted articles of clothing.

"I have a lot of practice with clothes. Somewhat less with girls' clothes but not none; you're hardly the first one I've kidnapped."

"... True," she acknowledges, elation deflating slightly.

"Sorry."

She considers him. When she'd used the word 'princess' before, it had been almost casual, airy. It hadn't had the weight of the responsibility or the demands involved pulling it down to reality. None of the dignity. She was a girl who just so happened to be a princess. For a few seconds, the woman standing in front of him isn't the holder of a casual title. She is a woman who might one day be a queen - a woman who will be worthy of being a queen. It's the expression of someone who understands, and is not taking him lightly.

"Thank you," she says, with a hint of a smile.

...he smiles back.

Smile!

"So!" she says, back to her more cheerful default, "What about bathrooms? And is there an easy way to find you if I need food, or a way to acquire food without you actually making it for me right then, so I don't necessarily have to bother you about it?"

"There's bathrooms! And a garden! I bet you'll like the garden, it's very pretty."

... Head tilt.

"Is it a vegetable garden?" she wonders, slightly puzzled.

"Not exactly. It's magic," he explains.

"Huh. Is it magic where it grows food that isn't typically found on plants, or magic in some other way?"

"Well, I don't know what exactly you're imagining when you say 'food that isn't typically found on plants'... it might be easier just to show you."

"I could also guess wildly for your amusement! But yes, probably easier just to show me. We can go now, if you like?"

"Suits me."

Smile.

"Which way to the garden then? And can I get there easily without being carried there by a dragon?"

"Down, and yes."

He leads her out into the waterfall room, and down to floor level and through a door that follows the water, and on the other side there is another, smaller waterfall pouring down into an indoor river that winds away between small, attractive indoor hills.

The room is the biggest one she's seen yet, its ceiling splashed with sparkling clusters of magelights that do an excellent job of mimicking the warm glow of the sun, and it's less like a garden than like a particularly clean and beautiful patch of wilderness. The walls curve away in an irregular shape, some parts carved and decorated while others look more like part of a natural cave; there isn't any single place you could stand to see the whole garden at once.

There is fruit on all the trees and berry bushes, and here and there a patch of recognizable vegetables; but there are unfamiliar things too, a tree whose drooping willowy branches bear clusters of dark blue-and-purple berries, a vine that climbs the walls and dangles round soft-skinned fruits streaked red-orange-yellow in interesting patterns.

"Can't promise you'll like everything but none of it's poisonous," he says.

What was that thing she was doing before? Awed staring? Yes she'd like a second helping of that, please, thank you.

"Edible's the important part. It seems sort of unfair to demand that every food thing you make be to my taste."

He beams delightedly at her.

She beams back, then goes to try the unfamiliar things. What do the berries from the tree taste like?

Sweet and a little tart, with a mix of flavours she doesn't recognize.

Ooo, neat! She thinks she likes them, actually. She has a few more, then proceeds to go and explore the garden to try the other things she doesn't recognize. Whee!

There turn out to be kind of a lot of those things! Some are weirder than others. There's a little plant that grows little round white berries that turn out to be hard brittle shells filled with caramel. There's another plant whose fat pleasant-smelling leaves are almost like little green rolls of chewy bread.

This turns out to be great fun. It's - it's like exploring in a storybook, like stepping into a daydream, except better, everything is real and solid and wonderfully strange and she's free to just wander around and explore. It's fantastic, she keeps giggling and she can't seem to stop smiling. She feels a little silly, but she doesn't care; it's too enjoyable to handicap with worrying about what is and isn't proper for a princess.

When she's out of things to try, Zekanare can have a giggly hug!

Giggly hug!!!

"You," she declares, "are amazing. Your mountain is amazing. I adore your magic food plants! They're adorable and whimsical and silly and great!"

He seems to have trouble finding words, and just beams at her instead.

She beams right back! For a few seconds she's distracted by his smile - it's such a lovely smile, so blatantly directed at her. His arms feel wonderful around her, his smile is addicting, the garden is beautiful and she just wants to - to smile at him because he's just that adorable.

Eeeeeee.

Eeee!

She giggles again, then snuggles closer because he's warm and comfortable and she wants to.

She is so cozy and huggable and good.

She is! And she's warm and snug and safe. Is it insane to feel safe in a dragon's arms? Eh, who cares, he's so nice to snuggle. She nuzzles him, then smiiiles up at him. He's such a cute dragon!

He is! He is a very cute dragon and he is beaming adoringly at her.

"You're adorable," she informs him, very seriously. "Just. Completely adorable. Where did this come from, have you just been secretly adorable up here the whole time?"

"I don't know! No one's ever accused me of being adorable before!"

"Mm..." She shifts to get a better look at his face.

"You've probably been doing it for a while, since you have had this garden for a while." Saveth reaches up to caress his face, looking a little sad. "It's... it's such a pity that you and all of your wonders are up here, unknown, that you haven't gotten to see anyone light up at your creations or get lost in wonder staring at what you've made. I mean, I suppose there were your previous victims, but I doubt they were in much of a mood for it?"

"They really weren't, no."

She nods sadly, reaching up to comb his curls with her fingers. It wouldn't help if she said, 'Well, don't do that, then,' she thinks. The loss of a thing he clearly loves probably speaks much more than a moral condemnation. He's probably heard a lot of those, over eight thousand years. If they'd worked she wouldn't be here.

Is it still a loss if you never knew you wanted it in the first place?

He hugs her.

That's probably up to him to decide.

You know what, screw propriety, she got snatched by a dragon. Clearly she is in an abnormal situation for a princess, her ingrained habits aren't helping her here, she should ignore them when she thinks it's appropriate. Like with hugs. He can have hugs for as long as he wants. And hairpets, if he seems to like them.

He likes both of these things very much.

Oh, good. Then she'll just keep doing them.

... It is slightly awkward to just keep standing here like this, though.

"Do you want to move to a place where we can sit, or... something?" she offers, after a little while. She's not really sure where people go to cuddle, it's not like she's an expert in these arts. A couch, she guesses? That's probably a possible function of a couch.

"Mhm," he says indistinctly, but he doesn't appear to be going anywhere.

Um?

"Are you okay?"

"I'm—"

He lets go of her, slowly and reluctantly.

"Yes. Sorry, I... got caught up. Do you want to sit down?" He gestures to a cozy hillside.

"Sure," she agrees, looking at him with concern. She's not entirely sure what's going on or why he's apparently shut down, but she can offer some extra comfort by... uh. Holding his hand? That's comforting, right?

Doing that while sitting down is tricky, but maybe he'll cooperate with it so they don't have to stop.

When she sits down, he curls up next to her and rests his head on her knee.

He can have more hairpets. So many. Pet, pet, pet, such a soft pettable dragon.

Yes. He is so pettable and so soft.

He is! And this princess will take advantage.

She's a little bit concerned for him, but it's becoming increasingly obvious that he hasn't had much human contact outside of raping maidens. She'll just. Keep on petting him, yep, that seems like the thing to do. Pet pet pet.

He nestles next to her on the hillside and doesn't say anything, unless you count an occasional quiet sigh.

Pet, pet, pet.

...

This is nice and all, but she kind of wants there to be more snuggles. Petting him is pleasant, she definitely likes petting him while his head's in her lap, but she misses the snuggly hug from earlier. She'd been envisioning that, but without the hassle of having to stand up. This is not that without the hassle of having to stand up, this is a completely different thing. A nice thing, but not the thing she wanted. She considers how to get from point A to point B. It's not an obvious solution, she doesn't have a lot of cuddling experience. Or, uh. Any cuddling experience, actually.

She hovers in indecision for a few moments, then decides that she's being stupid.

"Hold on," she murmurs, brushing his hair out of his face again. Can she just - turn and scootch forward so he can rest his head on her shoulder instead? Does this earn her snuggles?

A successful maneuver! Now she has a snuggled-up dragon.

Excellent! This is precisely what she wanted. Now she can just snuggle him while petting his hair.

Yep. That's a thing she can do. He seems to... like it? Maybe? He seems very emotionally affected by it in an at least partly positive way.

She's... just going to keep doing that. She guesses. Nice comforting human contact of the consensual variety, so nice and snuggly. She's a little worried for him, but he definitely doesn't seem like he wants to stop? He just seems overwhelmed.

Overwhelmed is a good word for it.

Yep. That's. That's sure the thing that's happening.

She's just going to try her level best to be as reassuring and comforting as possible in his time of, uh, adjustment. To snuggles. Snuggle, snuggle, pet, pet. Such a snuggly princess.

Snuggle. So much snuggle.

Mm. Even if her snuggling partner is maybe having an existential crisis over there, this is very nice. And it's been kind of a long day - she got kidnapped by a dragon, she did a lot of walking, she gleefully explored a lovely garden... it's somewhat tempting to nap. If he doesn't stir or disentangle himself, she just might.

Her snuggling partner has no objection to this plan.

Well, then the hairpets slow and soon fall still, her breathing deepens, and the princess slips into slumber.

He snuggles the sleeping princess. Snuggle. Snuggle snuggle. Sn—

—why is he crying. why this.

She was asleep enough to stay asleep through quiet snuggling; she is not asleep enough to stay asleep through quiet crying.

"Mmnh?" she mumbles, blearily.

He hugs her and hides his face against her shoulder.

... Oh dear. She's sleepy and disoriented, but not so much that she doesn't notice. Her arms were already loosely draped around him. They can be less loosely draped, now, in favor of holding him. Hairpets can resume.

She considers a question in the vein of 'Are you okay,' or telling him that it's okay, or something, but decides that it's not a good idea to demand eloquence right after a nap. Instead, she gently kisses his hair.

He cuddles up and tries to calm down. It doesn't make any sense to be crying.

Saveth doesn't really know what to do about a dragon crying on her, but she's going to try her best to handle it anyway. She runs through what sorts of things were nice whenever she was crying, and then starts humming a lullaby one of of her nursemaids sang to her when she had trouble sleeping.

...yep that dragon sure is crying.

Fuck.

Well. It doesn't seem like this is a bad cry, and she doesn't think he wants her to stop. So she's just going to, um. Keep doing this for the foreseeable future. She's going to snuggle him, petting his hair and humming half remembered lullabies all the while.

"—thank you," he says eventually, when he thinks he can trust his voice to work again. "For - for - I don't know. For this."

"You're welcome," she murmurs, squeezing him and kissing his hair again. Snuggle.

Yes. Snuggle. Good.

"You can snuggle me later, too," she adds. "This isn't a, a one time kind of thing. At least not if you don't want it to be." Nuzzle.

...he smiles. He nuzzles back.

She hums, happily.

"Though if we make a habit of this I might like to read," she muses, petting his hair thoughtfully. "Or something in that vein, anyway."

"Not a lot of books here," he murmurs. "No good way to get them."

"Oh." Snuggle. "... Do they sell any in the town over?"

"...probably?"

"Well, then I could go into town and acquire them for you. Maybe trade things you make for them, or something."

"...maybe."

"Granted, there are a number of practical limitations. I can't exactly walk up and say, 'Hi I'm a princess from another country, your local dragon kidnapped me, but I like it there and he likes me so this isn't really a bad thing, can I trade some of the nice things he showers me with for books,' or something."

Snort. "No. That would be a bad plan. And you might have to go farther than the closest town to find somewhere that has books to trade, I wouldn't know."

"Yeah. And I'm... nervous about being a single pretty woman alone in a foreign country. It was fine to just send a letter, but. I really don't know the area, and. I mean, I am not exactly bursting with life experience, you know?"

"Well. You're welcome to say you belong to the dragon if you run into trouble."

... She shivers a little, at the phrase 'belong to the dragon.'

"I. I'm not sure they'd be inclined to believe me? It's an, an unbelievable sentence, you know."

"...I don't mean—I'm not—I'm not claiming you," he says. "Just saying that if you told people you were mine, they'd be too terrified to bother you. And, hm..."

He conjures a necklace, a flicker of red light solidifying in his hand into a fiery red scale hanging from a golden chain.

"Wear that and you'll have no trouble convincing anyone."

"Thank you," she mumbles, taking it and putting it on. Is she blushing? She is probably blushing.

"I, I um. Didn't think you were - um, claiming me, I just. The. The phrasing was - evocative?"

"Oh. Um. Sorry."

"It's okay," she murmurs into his hair, snuggling closer. She's just - she's going to pack up her reaction to the phrase 'belong to the dragon' into a box to be dealt with... later. Yep.

Snuggle.

She's a little more... Squirmy than before. Less still and relaxed, more keyed up. Putting her feelings into a box is not working out as she planned. When he's this close it's a little hard to think of things that aren't, aren't picking her up and carrying her away, saying that she belongs to him -

"So um. What other things do you do for fun, here?"

...it's kind of hard to ignore her squirminess. He takes a few seconds and still can't think of any hobbies to admit to.

"I mean I suppose all the other hobbies probably take up a lot of, of time," she observes. Her breath catches in an odd way while she speaks. "What with how much there is to build, um. Around. What happens when you run out of mountain, do you, um. Start over? Make it bigger?"

"I change what's there, usually. Whatever I'm least happy with, or wherever I think I can make something better."

"Ah. So - so does the layout change much, or will I have to eventually find my way around a new layout?"

"If you stayed here a hundred years, you might."

... She kisses his hair.

"It's becoming increasingly tempting," she admits, fondly. Wince. "But I don't think I'll, um. Live that long."

...he wraps his arms around her and squeezes.

"I don't - I've never tried to keep anyone that long before - I don't know if I can. I have some healing magic, but..."

"We'll figure something out," she says, with absolutely no proof of this at hand. It just seems like the thing to say.

...snuggle.

Snuggle.

Yyyyeah she somehow gets the feeling that he wouldn't handle it well if she either disappeared or died. She's astute, that way. Able to put it together from context clues.

She is so clever!

He curls up and rests his head on her shoulder.

She pets him, pensively. Pet, pet, pet.

"I do like it here," she offers, after a pause. "You're, um. Really sweet, actually."

...he laughs.

She snorts.

"Not used to being described that way?"

"It doesn't happen often, for some reason!"

"I'm shocked."

Giggle.

Snuggle.

"You are sweet, though. You just - don't really show people."

"...yeah, I guess."

Snuggle.

"... Maybe I should introduce myself as - um." She can't actually bring herself to say 'belonging to you.' "As under your protection. And um, maybe try to persuade people not to have riots over you just upon seeing you, without you having to fly around being the friendly neighborhood dragon or anything else you wouldn't like."

"...they'll probably be really terrified of you."

"But - but I'm an innocent bystander! You liking me doesn't mean I'm like you, it means that I'm likable -" She huffs and leans into him. "Sorry, that. That wasn't at you, I'm just. Everything dragon associated is worthy of terror?"

"Mm, it's not that they'll think you're going to personally burn down the city, it's that they'll think you might go back and tell me they were rude and I'll come and burn down the city."

Wince. "Ah. It'd be tricky to mitigate that."

"Yeah."

Snuggle. "I want to figure out a way, though," she murmurs. "I don't want to just - just leave things as they are, you're so clearly unhappy."

Sigh. Snuggle.

Hair kiss. Snuggle.

"... Honestly, I'm glad you picked me up, now."

"...really?"

"Yeah. It's, um, blatantly obvious that you need someone? And I don't mind being it, I'm the youngest of a pretty big family, my country is not going to crash and burn in my absence. Maybe relations will be slightly trickier without a spare princess to marry off, but. Not the end of the world."

He hugs her.

"I'm—I—thank you."

Hug! Hair kiss. His hair is getting many kisses.

"You're welcome."

Snuggle-nuzzle.

Snuggle.

"So what does your perfect future look like? If you could have everything you wanted, no matter how contradictory the things involved are, what would it be?"

"—I don't know."

"All right." Comforting hair pet. "Well, I assume you want to keep me around and stay living here on this lovely mountain of yours, right?"

"Yes."

Hair kiss.

"I also assume you don't want to lie to people about who you are, or deal with people rioting at you."

"Correct on both counts."

"I'm so clever!" She snuggles him and hums thoughtfully.

"... Okay, well. Here's another question. You mentioned that you, um. Get something out of kidnapping girls. Is having me here scratching that itch in some way, or no?"

"...I'm not quite sure."

"Well, all right. Do you want to try talk about it?"

"...I don't really know how..."

"Well, that's okay." Snuggle. "Do you think answering questions about it would work better?"

"Suppose we could try it. Not like I have a better idea."

Nod. "Okay, so. Um. What exactly do you, um. Do. With the girls you kidnap? Is it just the, the obvious, or...?"

"...that may depend on what you think is obvious..."

"Um." She clears her throat. "I was assuming, ah. Rape."

"Yes, there's that."

"Well, is it, um. Just that? One and done, or...?"

"...not just once, no, I keep them for a while."

"Ah. I. Suppose that follows, what with. Not wanting to fly around too much." She shivers a little, and snuggles closer. "Um. Is it - just the, um, immediate pleasure? That's the - appeal?"

...he hugs her.

"I like to hurt people. I like - making people feel things. Pain and fear are old favourites. And - I'd definitely be losing something if I stopped - but I'm not sure I mind much, because what I have with you is so much better."

"Oh. Okay," she says, relaxing a little. "Different but better. That makes sense. If you're not getting something you need from just me, let me know?"

"...I... what?"

"I - I don't mean, um, you necessarily getting, the - whatever it is from me in particular, just, um. ... I'm making a mess of this."

Slightly baffled snuggles.

"Sorry. Let me try again, um." Snuggle, deep breath. "Okay, so since I'm in a different category than your previous, uh, guests, I'm worried that, hm. Just cutting everything in that category out of your life would be bad for you? Mentally? Like you'd feel like you were being forced to just eat one type of food and would eventually get frustrated. I, um, I'm definitely not okay with you kidnapping and torturing new girls, but. Maybe we can figure out a way to get you a happy substitute? Or maybe you don't need it at all and just want to snuggle me, maybe I'm just overthinking things because I want to help you properly."

"...I don't know," he says, snuggling her. "I don't know... what it would mean, what it would be like, to have everything I need."

"Oh," she says, softly. She kisses his hair again. So much snuggle. Many snuggle. "Okay. Then just - let me know if you're unhappy?" Pet pet pet.

Nod. Snuggle.

Snuggle. She made kind of a mess of the talking, so she's just going to stick to this for now. Snuggle, snuggle.

Snuggles are good and cozy and important.

They are! So very, very important. Snuggle, snuggle.

She's willing to stay like that for a while. This time she doesn't fall asleep, just begins absently humming another tune while petting him.

Good! Cozy!!

...he might doze off a little.

That's fine! He's allowed to doze off. She'll have some time to think, while he naps.

Clearly she's going to need to pick up some hobbies while living with a dragon. She reviews the ones she already has for whether they'd be much good while she's living with a dragon. At the very least, she should probably ask him to make her a harp so she can polish her slightly languished musical skills. Embroidery had been a bit too sedentary and time-consuming for her tastes, even if she'd liked the finesse and detail, she'd had too many other things to do. Maybe it's more viable if she combines it with snuggling. Since she's already staying still so she can cuddle a dragon.

Most social hobbies are out, but not all of them. There are probably a few card games she could teach him, so they can play cards together. There are definitely some two person board games, though maybe they have different tastes there. Hmm, what other social things does she have available? She supposes she could be ridiculous and suggest braiding each other's hair...

...

Actually now that she thought of that, she kind of wants to. She spends a minute considering the wisdom of braiding a dragon's hair while he sleeps. Soon enough, she decides that she's his favorite person partially because she's kind of silly sometimes. It's not like she's going to go as far as to make him look absolutely ridiculous by putting bows in it. Mostly because she doesn't have any ribbon, but still. Braids can be perfectly serious. Plus, while cuddles are extremely comfy, they're not very mentally stimulating. Neither is braiding someone's hair, really, but that's at least stimulating in a more tactile way.

Gently, she combs her fingers through his hair and starts carefully making little tidy braids. There's nothing to tie them with, so they'll fray apart, but she doesn't really mind.

Partway through this endeavour, he yawns and stirs, giving her a sleepy hug.

"Hi there," she says, dropping the braid she's on in favor of kissing his forehead and hugging him back.

...he shakes his head slightly, noticing something strange about it. He unhugs one arm so he can reach up and touch the strangely-behaved hair.

"...Saveth, did you braid my hair?"

"Who, me?" She blinks, innocently. "Yes."

...he giggles. "Why?"

"I was thinking of potential hobbies I could have, and facetiously thought 'we could braid each other's hair!' Then of course when I thought of it, I really wanted to. So here we are, and now you're pretty!"

Further giggling.

She giggles, too.

"I hope you don't mind?"

"I wouldn't have thought I even had enough hair to braid!"

"You do if they're little ones! I'm glad I could enlighten you." Snuggle.

He shakes his head a couple more times, until the braids all fall out, then wraps his arms around her waist and nuzzles her shoulder.