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Book 3: Chapter 9: Dragon's Afternoon

Besides, if anybody in this so-called “Free Hive” dared to touch Arthur after they had guaranteed his safety, Brixaby would simply make an example of them. Unlike his rider, he had no moral qualms about destroying cards for his own gain.

Irritatingly enough, while he trusted his Arthur to be able to take care of himself, like a proper partner, Cressida was waffling back and forth about her own dragon's safety. The girl was insisting on accompanying Arthur with his conversation with Laird. And yet she clearly did not like the idea of Joy going off without her.

"Are you sure you'll be all right?" she asked in a low undertone to Joy. "Wouldn't you rather come with us?"

Then again, Joy did not have any combat cards so it would be hard for her to defend herself.

(The hypocrisy of this statement didn't bother Brixaby in the least. After all, Arthur had proved himself more capable without a combat card to his name.)

Also, it was vexing that Cressida thought Brixaby would allow Joy to get hurt.

"She will be with me, and I am more than enough protection for anybody," Brixaby told her imperiously. "She is part of my retinue. Therefore, you may also go and protect my Arthur."

Though he was certain that his rider could take care of himself, he supposed there was a certain advantage in bringing somebody along who could summon elemental flame bears.

Cressida did not look entirely happy at the duty Brixaby had magnanimously given her.

"Come on, Brix," Joy called happily, forcing the issue by lifting into the air without her rider. The air currents became briefly turbulent thanks to her larger wings. Brixaby had to work to compensate for his smaller—though still vastly superior—form.

The two dragons started to fly off, but then Joy suddenly wheeled back around. “Oh, Len, of course you're invited to come, too.”

Who? Brixaby almost asked, and then remembered at the last moment that Len was a blue dragon who never spoke and was as interesting as a bowl of bland porridge. He glared at Joy for extending the invitation.

Thankfully, Len shook his head and backed away, hunching his neck as if to make himself smaller. Ridiculous. He was almost twice the size of Joy. “No... no, ma'am. I would like to stay here with Tamya, if you please. If that’s okay with you, I mean.”

“Aw,” Joy sagged a little, then shrugged. Finally, finally

, the two of them lifted into the air toward the crafting cave.

Once they were high enough not to be easily overheard – discounting card powers, of course – Brixaby spoke to Joy.

“I know why I'm going to the cave—” For all the sweet, sweet skills that would surely be on display, “but why are you going there?”

“For my quest, silly,” Joy said. “I'm here to make friends.”

Brixaby heaved a sigh. He suspected that Joy's quests were not as random as the little dragon pretended that they were. Whenever he picked up a quest from her, it was goal-based – do this, do that, and usually required gaining a skill or a specific goal. Joy's, on the other hand...

“I have to make five new friends,” she said happily.

Brixaby scoffed.

Joy glanced over at him, and her expression changed slightly to one that better suited a predator. “And if I do, I will acquire a temporary point of luck to use whenever I want.”

“You...” Brixaby eyed the other dragon. That was a really good reward. “Do you suppose I could also gain that reward?”

“Don't know. It's random. Now let's go, there are lots of people in there, and I'm great at making friends.” She nudged him with the tip of a wing, which almost sent Brixaby tumbling in the air. Because he was a natural great flyer, it didn't happen, but it was a close thing.

He grumbled to himself as he buzzed, and Joy flapped towards the crafting cave.

***

Back in Wolf Moon Hive, crafters were kept behind guilds with high, protective walls, with many card-based restrictions carved on them. Naturally, this was to avoid any theft or craft secrets leaking out. Brixaby was not vain enough to assume he was the only one who could copy skills or techniques.

Here, however, crafters worked out in the open. That meant if Brixaby could get close enough-- within their aura -- he could pick up those skills. And unlike magic or combat-oriented skills, crafting skills would become his, thanks to Arthur's Master of Skills card.

As they flew closer, Brixaby caught another interesting difference between Free Hive and Wolf Moon Hive: Dragons worked as crafters too.

In fact, some of the dragon crafters had stalls set up for themselves, and the large, open-air cave gave plenty of room for dragons to fly in and out while humans walked upon the ground.

The stalls themselves were not made of fabric, which could be easily blown away by dragon wings, but rough stone, likely shaped by some form of earth or rock manipulation. Interesting. He noted all these details carefully, for when--if--they returned to Wolf Moon Hive. Perhaps there would be some interest in dragon crafters there.

“Ooh, look down there! Look at the pretty glass they’re making!” Joy descended to land near one of the first stalls located next to the entrance.

A silver dragon with odd blue patterning under his belly, like a spider web, was working alongside a human by a glowing forge. The human was blowing into a thin nozzle attached to a pipe. The other end of that pipe was in a glowing hot expanding blob of molten glass.

The silver dragon carefully held the glass in blunted claws and turned it so that when the human blew air in, the molten glass expanded evenly. Tiny wisps of smoke came up from the dragon's claws as they smoldered, but neither the dragon nor the human seemed to care.

But caught Brixaby’s attention was that he did not immediately pick up any of the skills they were using. Which meant that either there was something wrong with his own cards--highly unlikely even if his rider was currently card-locked--or these two were just going by normal, hard-earned experience instead of card-based skills. How irritating.

“Doesn't that heat hurt your claws?” Joy asked, staring with wide eyes.

“No, my scales on my fingers have become well calloused over the years,” the silver dragon replied. “Back up behind that line.” He pointed with the tip of his tail to a red line painted on the floor. “You don't want to get splattered with molten glass. That will hurt.”

The human raised his lips from blowing the glass long enough to add, “We'll be with you to show the wares in a few moments. This is delicate.” Then he went back to huffing air into the pipe.

“And mind your tails and wings. If you knock any finished glass over, you will be working in here to pay for it,” the silver snapped, seeing Joy turn toward their table of wares.

Joy obediently tucked her tail under her body and held her wings close.

Brixaby, who had a perfect form and did not need to worry about such mundane things, buzzed to inspect the glassware more closely. To his delight, he realized that they were not all simple vases, but drinking bowls. Dragon-sized drinking bowls, some large enough to hold a good deal of soup.

This had been a concern in the back of his mind as he grew larger. Yes, his form was small and still perfect, but as he consumed more card shards and grew, he would find it more difficult to eat from proper vessels.

He had rather grown to enjoy human food and did not want to eat from a trough like a lower animal.

As he looked over the glassware, he found he rather liked one simple white bowl with walls as thin as a chicken egg, but strong when Brixaby lifted it.

Meanwhile the crafting pair finished the work. The silver replaced the larger molten vessel back into a forge to heat again.

Finally, Brixaby got a skill:

New Counterfeit Spell obtained: Feeding The Forge

Remaining Time: 71 hours 59 Minutes 59 Seconds

A magical skill, and this was only a Common dragon.

He was a little annoyed that he was admiring the wares of a mere Common... but, well, the glassware was quite good.

Wiping off his hands, the human came up to them. His face was soaked with sweat, and he was red around the cheeks, but he didn't seem out of breath.

"Can I help you two kids?"

"Kids?" Brixaby swelled. He was nearly five months old! Within a month, he would be graduating from Moon hive class, if this absence didn't set them back. In any case, he was no child.

Of course, the ever-talkative Joy jumped in before he could formulate a reply.

"These are so pretty. How long did it take you to learn how to do this? Oh no, wait! I have a better question: is this what dragons do when they don't fight scourgelings? You make pretty things? How did you and your rider learn to do this?” she asked the Silver.

The dragon turned from the forge to answer her, and the human took his place to manage the heat.

"He is not my rider. He's my business partner,” the Silver said.

Joy visibly stopped herself before she asked, "Where is your rider?" That was something that they both learned early on not to do. There were too many dragons in the hive who had lost their linked riders in one way or another. Brixaby shuddered.

"My rider works as a sheep herdsman," the silver added.

"That is so interesting," Joy said, and the weird thing was, it sounded like she meant it. Usually when Brixaby said that something was interesting, he meant the opposite.

"So,” Joy continued, “does your and your rider’s linked cards help more with glass blowing or with the sheep?"

That was an incredibly rude question, so Brixaby was shocked when the silver answered.

"Neither. We have a card used spell to duplicate scrolls, but I found there weren't many academic pursuits here at the Free hive. And glassblowing marries both the logical and the creative. As for my rider, he was a herdsman before he came to the hive..." The silver continued, happy to explain his life story.

Brixaby had found that happened a lot around Joy.

He didn't know if she had a secret conversational skill or if people picked up on her friendliness and opened up in kind. The pink dragon was sitting up in interest, tail wrapped around her feet, every line of her body showing intense interest in something that was frankly not interesting to Brixaby.

He continued to browse the wares, but he found himself repeatedly drawn to the white bowl labeled "porcelain." He briefly considered stealing it and hiding it in his personal space, which he had access to thanks to his linked card with Arthur.

However, it was improper to hide his valuables and much more important to display them out in the open… which he couldn’t do if it was stolen. That was a problem.

Then he saw the price tag and realized that the bowl cost one Rare shard.

He didn't have any Rare shards as he always ate them as soon as he could lay his claws on them.

After some consideration, Brixaby decided not to steal the bowl. Instead, he would ask Arthur to buy it for him. His rider was intelligent and Brixaby was confident he’d be able to talk down the price.

Joy finally wrapped up her tedious conversation, and she and Brixaby moved on. As they left, Brixaby caught a sly look on Joy's face.

"Only four more friends to go," Joy said.

"Oh, it suddenly makes sense," Brixaby said. "That's why you were so interested in that boring dragon’s story."

"Hey, Tomlin isn’t boring. He's interesting. Don't talk about my new friend like that," Joy bumped him in a teasing way, and they continued on.

“Yes, yes,” Brixaby grumbled. “As long as I continue to be your top ranked friend, I do not mind if you befriend all the Commons in every hive… if this can even be considered a hive—” He stopped in midair so fast that Joy crashed into him. She had been going at walking pace, so this was no big problem.

Besides, Brixaby hardly noticed. All his attention was on the gleaming, beautiful craftsmanship… no, work of art, in the next stall over.

“Joy,” he whispered, awed. “Forget the tacky, red glowing runes. Look at that.”

Joy followed his gaze, wrinkled her snout, then looked back at Brixaby as if to make sure they were looking at the same thing. Seeing that she was, she tilted her head.

“The… chainmail?”

“Yes!” Brixaby buzzed up to it, and after a moment’s appreciation for the fine work, ran his claws down the hanging chain mail shirt. It was as buttery smooth as he hoped, every rivet gleaming in the sun. He turned and looked at the craftsman who was nearby, working on another. “I must have this. It is exquisite! What would you charge for this, but made for a dragon? No wait!" he realized, "I will require many sizes, as I will grow." He peered at the man. "I demand you show me how to craft this!"