Since I grew up in the Misty Mountains—between the Forests of Baron, and the Kaipo Desert—I'm not versed on the differences in bodies of water; and on the way to Bahamut's Lagoon, I make the mistake of telling this to Rob.

"Alagoonneedssand," Rob says.

"You're slurring your 's's together again," I tell him.

He ignores me, plowing on, "Itsshallow, unlikeabay, whichcanberatherdeep."

"Uh-huh," I mutter.

"Alagunaisbetweenalagoonandabayindepth."

"Okay."

"Thenalaguneisevenshallowerthanalagoon, likealmostapond."

"Yep."

"Apondisthemostshallow."

"All right."

"Ifit'sfreshwater, it'salake."

"For sure."

"Riversareneededforsaltwaterandfreshwaterto—"

"She isn't listening to you," Shiva shouts over her shoulder. Her and Ifrit walk ahead of me and Rob, picking and choosing which redrock slopes we climb, and which we pass, exchanging quiet conversation that I wish I could overhear, except I have Rob in my ear.

When he tugs at my sleeve, I smile at him, confessing, "I didn't really take that all in."

He shakes his tiny bomb-arms at me. "Thenwhy'dyouask?"

"I didn't." I shrug. "I just told you, I didn't know a whole lot about why a lagoon is a lagoon."

He zips in front of me, then stops stone cold, opening his arms as if to block me, but fingertip to fingertip, he's still only about a foot wide. I expected him to grow faster than he has so far—since I threw him at the cockatrice, and he returned in phoenix-down-flames—but he remains as pint-sized as a floating kitten with fire brimming from its head.

He enunciates each word, painfully careful with his hyperactive tongue. "So-let-me-get-this-straight," he quickly drawls. "You-confess-to-not-knowing-something, and-you-also-confess-you-don't-want-the-answer?"

I stand akimbo, quirking an eyebrow at him. "I don't need to learn everything, Rob."

"Th-the-h-hell-you-don't," he stammers, flabbergasted. "You're-the-last-summoner-of-Mist. You-need-to-learn-every-spell, every-formula, every—"

"No she doesn't," Shiva pipes over her shoulder. "She could skip white magic."

"Ifrit," Rob pleads. "Helpme."

Ifrit turns around, and Shiva pauses next to him. Where she is thin, wispy, and tantalizingly cold, he is burly, gnarly, and uncomfortably hot. And he looks ridiculous when his fiery eyebrows scrunch into his narrowing eyes.

"Rydia!" he booms.

Why is it that, even though I know he's that loud, I always duck under my arms?

"You must learn everything!" he bellows. "Except white magic!"

"Ohcomeon," Rob and Shiva jeer in unison, then she adds, "Grow a spine and take a side, you big minotaur."

Cautiously lowering my arms, I ask, "Do I need to know about lagoons?"

Ifrit tilts his head up. At first, I think he's contemplating an answer. But when the airship-sized shadow cascades over us, I realize he isn't thinking; he's redirecting his attention to the bigger problem.

It's a huge problem, really.

Bahamut, the largest dragon in the Light and Dark World, flies over us, nearly as wide as the dome of the cave, and at least as thick-bodied as Leviathan was snakelike, long. Bahamut's wings haven't flapped for some time, but merely soared; and I know this because, when he does flap his wings, it knocks all us on our asses.

Shiva squeals as the wind tries to carry her across the redrock, but Ifrit catches her arm. Great gusts of steam billow up between her icy skin and his fiery hand, surrounding us in mist. And as much as my heart is thudding up from my chest, and into my nose, a part of me relaxes at the rising fog, the same curtains of steam that once filled my village, long ago.

"Shiva, Ifrit," Bahamut says, in a majestic and smooth voice I didn't expect from his muscle-ripped body. "What are you doing out here, so far from the Land of Summoned Monsters?" 

Bahamut's scales are the dark purple of a lightning-lit night sky. Between each of his man-sized, hematite talons, a bright energy crackles and pops, not unlike starlight.

"The real question is," Ifrit booms over the wind, through the steam that still roils between him and Shiva, "what are you doing so far from the Moon?"

"Rest and relaxation," Bahamut laughs.

I look everywhere for Rob, then sigh in relief when I see the glow of a Bomb in a trench a few yards away. He must've blown into it and decided, in the dragon's magnanimous presence, to stay tucked away there. I need to harass him later about teaching me about a lava lagoon I won't even see; no reason to look for Bahamut, when Bahamut found us.

"Can you turn into your human form, King of Kings?" Shiva cries through the mist and wind.

Then a bright light envelopes all around us.

I see nothing but white and gold.

It's soothing, like the first day of summer.

When the light passes, a six-foot-three man stands before us in silver-scaled armor and a thick violet, velveteen cloak. A collar of white fur tickles around his dark neck and up along the edges of his pointed ears. His purple irises pierce not just me, but the whole world that lays before him, out to the horizon. Two wings stretch five feet high above and around him, each made with seven feather-shaped swords. 

If his staggering beauty wasn't enough to startle me, then the two children at his side are a strange surprise. A boy and a girl, they each wear violet robes similar to his cloak; and their gold-blonde hair is pulled back into two many-braided knots on the sides of their heads. They hold scepters of silver and gold, topped with fist-sized amethysts that sparkle with the delicate, magenta halo glowing from their pink-and-lavender eyes.

Bahamut walks past the children and up to me, lifting my hand in his before I realize he's in my space. "You're a summoner," he murmurs, smiling enchantingly at me. "Are Ifrit and Shiva escorting you?"

"No," Shiva says, as Ifrit shouts, "Yes," and she thwacks him. He lets go of her arm, so the mists can dissipate, but in the several moments until the fog bank parts ways, I feel trapped in a cocoon of tiny, watery crystals, looking upon the glorious King of Kings, who's holding my hand as if we were best friends.

♥♥♥

Author's Note

My husband is working on a new cover for this story, and I'm excited about it!—so excited, actually, that I wanted to share an in-progress photo:

Hopefully, the new cover will go up next week with the new chapter.

Do you think Bahamut will take Rydia, Shiva, and Ifrit to the Dwarf Castle?

First draft: September 18

Word count: 1050 

Thank you for reading this far!

Please star (⭐) if you enjoyed this chapter.