After Tyvni received her fair share of tickles, hugs, and kisses, she finally lowered herself enough for Faine to climb onto her wing, then her arm, then her back. Faine took a deep breath and grabbed onto the thorn spikes at the back of the dragon's head, and with her other hand, traced Tyvni's scales.

No amount of light would do Tyvni's scales justice. Their deep green glittered in the evening, and dulled in the morning, thrived in the afternoon and shimmered like diamonds when she slithered below the water's surface. Scars from battles with other dragons marred her skin, and an arrow wound from an accidental shot to the shoulder broke between two of her largest scales.

Faine applied pressure to the small ridge of scar tissue and followed that up with a tickle behind a thick horn, a spot the dragon was notorious for missing. And every time she did, she shook more scales off her body.

Ilian hadn't moved. In fact, he was staring at them in awe and wondering how the hell Faine was so insane as to climb on a dragon's back without a saddle, a bridle, a bit, or reins. His scent clouded that uncertainty, and it wasn't just about climbing on the dragon, to begin with. It was the lack of reinforcements.

"I didn't teach Tyvni how to fly by suffocating her with a saddle," Faine said. The dragon lifted her head in recognition of Faine's voice and chimed from deep within her throat. She was hungry and becoming impatient with every second they weren't in the air. "Tyvni wouldn't have trusted me if I did. I taught her how to fly over the ocean so that when I fell off her slick back, I didn't splatter on the ground."

Ilian flattened his stare. Never once did he look away from the beast in front of him. No matter how scary or large these beasts became, Faine didn't look at them like that. Beasts. Tyvni was her child as anything would've been if she raised it from an egg and watched it grow to be thousands of pounds. They had many encounters together with immortals and mortals alike that didn't know how to handle being around a dragon.

The majority pulled out weapons to defend themselves and pissed Tyvni off to the point she flew away and didn't give them a chance. The fact that she was giving Ilian a cold shoulder now was due to what she discovered when arriving. Ilian attempting to carry Faine away. Anyone out of the know would take that as a threat, especially a dragon that viewed the victim as their mother.

"Come," Faine said, extending her hand towards him. The wind caught in her hair, blowing the silver strands off her shoulders, and Tyvni rustled with desire underneath her. The desire to take to the skies and soar against that wind. "I'll take you to Tyvni's favorite place."

"If I splatter against the ground—"

"I won't let you." Her voice was confident, truthful, and Ilian didn't bother asking any more questions.

He stepped towards the large beast that was once small enough to fit in the palms of her hands and carefully hovered his boot over her wing. Tyvni whirled and growled at him, but received a pinch over her scar tissue as warning. When she complied, she lowered her head against the ground but blew smoke through her nostrils. A silent way of saying Faine would pay for that later.

Though she extended out her hand towards him, Faine didn't receive the chance to grip his skin tight against hers. Ilian batted her help away and climbed on shaking knees and gripped the horns as tight as he could until sliding down into a sitting position behind Faine. She didn't bother telling him he was sitting on the slickest part of Tyvni's back.

Faine turned. "Are you ready?"

He met her question with wide eyes and a frown. "Is anyone ever ready to ride a dragon?"

"I'd say no, but I suggest you hold on. Otherwise, you'll fall right off."

Ilian looked over his shoulder, discovered he was indeed on the smoothest part of Tyvni's back, and scooted himself forward to the point of pressing against her. His arms wrapped around her waist, nearly tight enough to take the air from her lungs, but Faine didn't care. Hadn't cared in a long time.

She straightened herself, grabbed onto the longest horns sticking out from the back of Tyvni's large neck, and said, "Fly, Tyvni."

Those were the words she was waiting for. Tyvni cried out, a squeal, and took off into a sprint. Faine heard Ilian grunt, and he tightened his arms further around her as the dragon raced for the ocean. But she wouldn't make it there. She crested a large, grass-stained hill, and beat her wings once, then twice.

Faine craned her neck and watched as her large paws left the ground and they were soaring high into the sky, farther away from land with every beat of her dark wings. The wind caught in Faine's hair and her stomach lurched into her throat as the dragon soared higher and higher, her tail snaking out behind her long, agile body.

She never tired of the ocean view spreading out before her, utterly endless. Somewhere out there was another world entirely, land Faine had yet to step on, but with Tyvni, she would reach it someday. It was close-minded to think they were alone, that other lands didn't exist, but trade proved otherwise. She'd often thought about stowing herself away on a merchant ship to experience those lands for herself, but like everything else in her life, it went on the list of what needed to wait until after one-hundred years.

Tyvni cleared land and the scent of fresh grass caught on the ends of her claws was replaced by the salted water. She flew as low as she could, low enough to scrape the ends of those claws against the surface of the water, as well as her wings. Ilian's arms loosened from around Faine's waist and she felt the deep breath he took reverberate through the both of them.

"This is beautiful," he breathed into the wind.

"Shall we have some fun?" Faine asked over her shoulder.

On instinct, he gripped tight. "As long as the fun means we remain on the back of this dragon..."

"I knew you'd come around." Faine reached back and patted his cheek. "It's up to you to hold on."

She didn't give him the time to retort as she gripped hard onto Tyvni's horns and pulled up. In response, in the same way she'd react to reins, Tyvni soared higher. The climb became steep and Faine leaned into it, forcing Ilian to do the same. They climbed high into the sky and left the world behind, so far that even Faine wouldn't look down to it without feeling nauseous.

They soared higher than the clouds, and when they finally straightened out once more, Ilian released the breath he'd been holding in. "That's enough fun for me," he panted.

Faine laughed. A real laugh. "I was only getting started."

The edge of Tyvni's wing reached for the white clouds around them, purposely grazing to touch the substance that held nothing. This was her favorite height, as well as her favorite to play with the other dragons. Their hiding game didn't become advanced until they were weaving through clouds to find each other.

"What could you possibly have planned? Weaving through sharp rocks or terrorizing entire cities?" Ilian rested his chin against her shoulder in the same way he had when he helped with her cycles. At least this time, she had the chance to appreciate it without crumbling from abdominal pain. Though, if his binding grip around her waist tightened any further, she worried her ribs might snap.

"We have to get back down somehow. The quickest way is to dive," Faine said.

He was getting used to the unsaid truths. As if he already expected this was to happen, Ilian scooted to the point she was nearly in his lap and flattened his palms against her ribs. Tyvni screeched to prepare for her order and the thirst to do anything other than glide. They always went the same way to get down from the clouds. One subtle motion. To the ground.

Faine braced her boots against two horns on the sides of the dragon's head and adjusted her grip to wrap around the long horns she had already been holding onto. She caught sight of the moon illuminating in the resting eve and gave a firm tug down. Tyvni didn't hesitate.

Immediately, she dove head-first, tucked her wings in against her body, and aimed for the ocean water. Faine dug her boots into the horns to keep herself from slipping forward, but there was no way she was moving, not while Ilian was pulling her back from falling off the front of Tyvni's diving body.

Ilian tucked his face in against her neck and a twinkling laugh released from within Faine as she discovered one very simple truth. Nothing would match this feeling. The reckless sense of falling and the way the mind reacted with dread, a sense that Faine learned to block long ago. Instead, she was falling and hope blossomed within her chest. The knowing that Tyvni would pull up at the right moment and they'd fly at a racing speed over the ocean's water, close enough to graze their fingertips against the liquid glass surface.

The wind swallowed them whole from within their descent and stole the already weakened supply of air in Faine's lungs. Before she knew it, all she could see was ocean before her, the rest of the sky and the world had disappeared and all that remained was that dark water and the straight snout of Tyvni's shot, like an arrow leaving the bowstring and aiming for one very specific target.

Their doom.

Faine held on tight, and though she didn't have to, she told Ilian to do the same. What sounded like the crack of a whip broke through the air, but it was only Tyvni's wings spreading out wide. She arched her head back inches above the water and turned her flight into a forward aim for Pinedon.

The rush lingered and Faine's heart remained rapid in her chest. Pressed against her, Ilian's was the same. A gentle wind pushed against them and the straight beat of Tyvni's wings was the only thing that got him to remove himself from where he buried his face within her neck. "I officially think you're insane," he said shakily.

"Ruins horses, doesn't it?" Faine asked. She met Ilian's stare over her shoulder.

His eyes were brighter than they had been before the descent, it was common practice that once on the back of a dragon, freedom was an inevitable sense. Faine understood that glitter. Had seen it in the eyes of those that rode and owned dragons. Hearts became fuller and dreams blossomed around a creature that many claimed to be beasts.

"I think I'd very much rather be on land." Ilian looked below them, to the world they were now soaring over, and he puffed out his cheeks. Isflean stretched below; the Palace District and the markets cluttered with ant-sized people.

Faine leaned forward and placed her hand against the side of Tyvni's neck. The dragon's pulse was racing as hard as her own. "Let's go, Tyvni," Faine ordered in a soothing tone. "Let's go have some fun."

As they soared over the stone wall that kept intruders out of Isflean's streets, Tyvni released a cry that was loud enough to alert other dragons nearby of her arrival and departure. The high elf family's training grounds were close and any dragons within would've been lucky to be as free as the dragon soaring above and away.