~Blu’s P.O.V.~

The days passed both quickly and slowly during our journey. Everyday was much the same. Walking, walking, and more walking. We stopped around midday for about an hour: everyone managed to fit in a small lunch before we continued moving again. Then we stopped again at night. It was a constant pattern, and the only thing that showed the passage of time was that my wing slowly healed. Aaron helped speed the process but he could only do so much with his weakness.

I longed to be in the air though. Every time I saw Tyron fly up into the sky every bone in my body screamed to join him, but I knew I couldn’t, and it hurt me far more than I wanted to admit. Ever since I had become a dragon, flying had been one of the few things I had absolutely loved about the change. Without it… I felt as though half of myself was missing.

“Hey Blu, someone wants to see you.” I heard Tabitha say.

I glanced towards her and smiled. Harry was bouncing along by her side with a beaming smile on his face that was almost a little too wide. His eyes sparkled with a mischievous joy that only a child could understand, and while he seemed a little worn out, the constant travelling had done little to douse his rambunctious spirit.

“Hi mommy!” he waved at me happily.

“Hello dear,” I replied, his smile infectious.

He stopped as he came up in front of me, “You look sad.”

I leaned forward and gently nuzzled him, “It’s nothing you need to worry about little one.”

He seemed to consider it for a moment, before nodding with childish acceptance, “Then can I sit on your back momma?”

I laughed, “Of course.”

Gently I lowered myself to the ground, allowing for him to scramble onto my back with ease. I gently moved to get up and continued walking. For the next couple of hours we simply chattered together, mostly between myself and Tabitha. Harry seemed to be having the time of his life on my back, constantly pointing out new and exciting things as we passed by. Tyron came to join us for an hour or two, just to rest his wings for a while, before taking to the air again.

The sun began to set in the horizon and we began to set up camp once again. Tyron found this small hill overlooking the camp and had already claimed it for us tonight. The mountains were still surrounding us in every direction and the red dragon had said that he hadn’t seen any end to them soon. I half wondered if the forbidden kingdom was somewhere in these mountain ranges.

There was also something else that I had noticed during our travels. I had begun to grow an enormous appetite. I ate twice as much as Tyron ever did, which was strange considering he was the bigger dragon, and I often felt a little sick during the morning. Tyron had put it down to the wears of constantly walking, but I wasn’t so sure.

“Hey mum, can I sleep with you and dad again tonight?” Harry asked with a yawn as I made my way up to the hill where we were staying the night.

“Of course,” I smiled, “You’re always welcome with us, you know that.”

We curled up on the hill, me and Tyron lying parallel to one another with our heads together. We couldn’t exactly snuggle up with my broken wing, and Harry in between us, sheltered by our wings. After saying a quick goodnight, we fell to sleep.

***
I woke up suddenly. Everything seemed well. Tyron was snoring with the occasional bout of flame flickering from his left nostril. Harry was comfortably lying by his side, not at all bothered by the small blasts of light. The camp was calmly silent except for the occasional jingle of armour as one of the night watch guards went through their rotations. The smoulders of left over fires burned through the camp like stars amongst the darkness. Everything seemed peaceful. So why had I woken up?

Annoyed at myself I attempted to close my eyes and fall back to sleep, but no matter how hard I tried, now that I was awake, I just wouldn’t go back to sleep. Sighing I decided I was a little thirsty and slowly got up, making sure not to disturb Tyron or Harry. My stomach felt a little upset, and though I couldn’t fall back to sleep, I was dreadfully tired. I glanced at the moon to find that it was still high in the sky. Dawn would be at least another two or three hours away.

Grumbling I made my way through the camp, trying to avoid making too much noise. I gave a small polite greeting to the guards, before plodding over a small ridge which hid a mountain pool. No one could see more from the camp, but I knew if I wanted to I could make enough noise to wake the entire camp ground if anything went amiss.

I pushed my way through the trees, grunting slightly when I brushed my injured wing up against a tree. One thing that sucked about being a dragon was that you were so big it was hard to fit into anywhere. I don’t think I had been in a house since my transformation. It was something I missed greatly.

After struggling a little more I managed to make it into the clearing. The night sky was clouded and dark, with barely a sliver of the crescent moon shining through. Nocturnal wildlife scurried and squeaked through the undergrowth. Dark ripples wavered across the still waters of the pool, evidence of the unknown creatures that lived within.

It was all a little unnerving really. I flicked my tail and decided that I would grab a quick drink before heading back. I didn’t want to be out here any longer than necessary. I dipped my head down and took a long draught, quenching my thirst and letting out a slight rumble of satisfaction. I pulled my head up and was about to turn to her back into the camp, when I spotted a pair of draconic eyes watching me from across the water.

I let out a startled yelp, jumping back, keeping my injured wing on the furthest side of my body from whoever was standing there. It didn’t take me too long to recognise the other dragon. He had the same black scales and smug evilness as the other couple of times we had crossed paths. I growled lowly in my throat, debating whether or not to roar. He didn’t seem to be acting hostile, but I wasn’t willing to take my chances.

“Now now, I'm just here to talk,” he said lowly before I could make any loud noise.

“Why should I believe you?” I growled, backing up toward the trees behind me.

“Because it would have been easy enough to sneak up on you in the dark and get you that way rather than making myself known,” he snorted in response, as if offended by my question.

I narrowed my eyes, still not relaxing my stance, “What do you want?”

“Why, I came to offer my congratulations of course.”

I blinked in confusion.

“Oh, don’t look so startled my dear Blu, surely you have realised by now,” he continued almost smugly.

“I don’t know what you are talking about.”

“Surely you have noticed the signs. Increased appetite, sickness, maybe feeling a little heavier than usual. Moving is starting to get a little more difficult, and the constant travelling really doesn’t help, does it? Every day you wake up a little more tired and need a little more to eat and need to rest just that minute or so more.”

I growled, “So? Because of what you did to my wing I’m not surprised I’m feeling a little unwell.”

He looked genuinely shocked, “You really haven’t realised yet have you?”

“Realised what!?”

“My dear Blu, you are pregnant.”

I took a couple of moments to respond, the information not quite being processed fast enough, “Wait… WHAT! How?”

He laughed, “Your mate impregnated you. You two are having a baby. Congratulations!”

So many thoughts raced through my head in an instant I found myself slightly overwhelmed. I hadn’t expected it to happen. I didn’t even know I could. Usually those with the same… transgender qualities were infertile. It hadn’t even crossed my mind. Part of the reason I had insisted on adopting Harry was that I didn’t think I could ever have children of my own.

All that and more passed through in an instant. Then my mind cleared and I growled again, not quite ready to believe what he was saying

“How do you know this?”

“Garagain and I have known about it for a while now. Well, he guessed it before I did, of course. You see, Hannah, the dragon’s body you now inhabit, was quite a… luscious young female. Now that you and her have combined into one, you have adopted many of her traits, including that specific part of her. Besides, how could I not know, it’s rather hard to miss the rising presence of the first dragon hatchlings in two millennia.”

Part of me still didn’t believe him, but so much of what he had said made sense. The illness, the increased appetite, and I was starting to get a little agitated more easily. It didn’t help that part of me wanted so desperately for it to be true. But there was still something I didn’t get, something that bugged me ever so slightly.

“Suppose what you are saying is true,” I began, trying to get a reign on my boiling emotions, “Why do you care? Why come and give me this information?”

“Am I not allowed to come and congratulate the only dragon couple that has been able to produce offspring in the past two thousand years?”

“Considering what you’ve done to ‘said couple’ in the past couple of months, I would think not,” I growled, nodding to my still casted wing.

He narrowed his eyes, and suddenly seemed very serious, “Despite what you may think of me, Blu, I am one of the only three known dragons alive. I do not want our species to go extinct. We do not want to see you overwork yourself so much that they die.”

I rumbled nervously, “Well maybe you and your goons should back off than, and not make me have to.”

“I’m merely saying that you should be wary of where you walk Blu, because if you continue as you are, there will be much more horrible things to come,” he said, before turning around, “Anyway, I must be off now. We will meet each other again I’m sure. Oh, and by the way, I’m called Gabriel.”

Before I could reply he beat his wings and launched into the sky, leaving me much more confused than when I had come to the pond for a simple drink.

~Tyron’s P.O.V~

I woke up slowly. It was still night. The moon was beginning to sink toward the horizon and I could barely see the light of the sun starting to reach at the horizon. It took my tired brain a couple of moments to realise what was wrong. Blu wasn't there. I panicked for a moment, my head shooting into the air and looking around. I took a deep breath to calm down. He had probably just gone to get a drink or something.

I glanced at Harry, who was still sleeping by my side. I didn’t really want to wake him up, so I lay my head back down and waited. A couple of minutes passed and he still didn’t return, he wasn’t even visible in the camp. My worry grew until I couldn’t bare it any longer.

“Hey,” I whispered to one of the nearby guards making their rounds, “Did you see where Blu went?”

The guard shrugged, “he got up about twenty minutes ago and went to grab a drink.”

“Twenty minutes?” I hissed surprised, “Which way?”

He pointed toward a small hill where the forest started. The one that hid the fresh water spring we had seen earlier. After giving careful instructions to the guard to look after Harry, I got up and began to pad through the camp. It would still be an hour or so until people started waking up, so I tried to make the least amount of noise possible,

Once I neared the trees I heard two familiar voices. One I love, and another that made my blood boil in anger. My surprise was outweighed by my suspicion. I narrowed my eyes I crept through the undergrowth toward the noise. The surrounding bushes and trees hid me surprisingly well, though they also worked to block out most of what the two were saying.

I poked my head between two bushes and finally found the two of them. Blu, seeming rather nervous, surprised and… something else. Like he was happy? I gulped softly as Gabriel seemed to speak rather concerningly to my mate, before turning around and flapping his wings once, taking off into the air. Blu watched him go.

It was impossible to see what his emotions were from his body-language. It was like he was anxious, but not about something bad, but something that would give him great joy. Suddenly he let out a small trumpet of happiness as he turned around to quickly hurry back toward the camp. I pulled myself further into the bush as he rushed through a small track that I had avoided, keeping his broken wing tucked to his scales as he did.

I watched him leave, not knowing what to think, and for a moment I sat there, a million possible explanations for what had just happened cascading through my head. But one of them struck out amongst them all, and it was one my mind continued to return to. Was the story Gabriel told during our battle true? The thought made a uncontrollable fury nearly burn its way to the surface, but I took a deep breath, managing to control myself.

After I was sure I wasn’t going to burn everything around me to the ground, I quickly turned and padded back to the camp. I took the long way around to make sure that Blu wouldn’t get suspicious of where I had been. When I got to the campsite I saw him pacing back and forth. When he saw me his face lit up in a smile.

“Tyron, where did you go?” he asked.

“I… aah… needed to go…” I lied, hoping it worked, “What took you so long?”

“Oh! I have some amazing news!” he exclaimed happily, not even wondering about my excuse.