To a dragon, words mean very little. They could hear fine and even understand basic concepts: names, locations, orders. But, to Irida at least, the things she could hear mattered far less than the things she could feel. Humans had outstanding control over their words, but hardly any over their emotions. Even the small wizard she lived with only seemed to bother regulating himself during spell casting, being an open book to her otherwise.

Irida was happy it worked out that way. Her flimsy grasp on words didn’t leave her much room to trust what was said to her, but the emotions that radiated from her two human parents allowed her to feel safe with them. It was for that reason she knew that the heavy one was afraid of the windows, and that she should stay away from them.

Of course, she still thought words were fun. The last few weeks she had started to catch on to the names of herself and her parents. Her tiny parent was Laz, and his name left a pleasant buzz in the air whenever it was said. The big one was Calder, and while his name wasn’t quite as fun to hear, she loved how his deeper voice resonated through her. She wondered if she only liked hearing Laz’s name more because it was always Calder saying it.

Her own name was always a treat to hear. The complexity of the word made her feel special. She wasn’t sure if dragons were supposed to have names, or live with humans at all, but it made her happy all the same.

What didn’t make her happy was sitting alone, in the dark, with neither of her parents around. Their emotions in the days prior told her enough, that a farewell was approaching, that they were worried for her, that they were worried for themselves. There was excitement amongst them as well, though. Perhaps they were out to get a present for her, or even bring back another dragon sibling for her to play with! Laz was always too worried to play with her, and Calder wasn’t around as often as she’d like.

Whatever the case, she knew her parents would return eventually. They left her food and took very little with them. They would have to return to eat, or bathe, or read that big book that Laz was always looking through.

Irida strutted over to the pile of gems that she and Laz had made together. It was a gorgeously diverse selection. Large ones that looked like the sky, tiny red ones that tickled her mouth as she ate them, even her favorite dark blue ones that always gave her a burst of energy. Unable to resist, she knelt down to nab one of the dark blues. It went down smoothly in a single gulp.

She purred and thought of Laz, and that day he fed her his bracelet. It had pained him to give it up, and she felt bad about always trying to snag it from him. Thankfully they had figured out how to cast spells together. She liked it when he sent magic through her. It made her nostalgic for a time she couldn’t remember. A time when she was unable to think, only feel.

Her thoughts quickly returned to food, as one dark blue wasn’t enough to sate her. She scooped up a mouthful of the tiny reds next and chirped at the tingly feeling they left on her tongue. There were also a few dull yellow gems in the pile, which weren’t her favorites. They beat the iron she used to live off of by tenfold but now that food was less of an issue, she found her pickiness growing.

To make the drab meal more interesting, she used her nose to roll a dull yellow away from the others and into the middle of the room. From there she swatted at it. Her new claws were heavier than she was used to, however, and sent the gem flying across the floor. The eyeball-sized crystal shot under Laz’s desk, striking one of the legs and ricocheting toward the back door where it hit with a nice thunk and continued to roll along the uneven floorboards.

All throughout the gem’s path, Irida’s eyes were glued to it. Through sheer instinct she was able to predict where it would go next, how it would bounce, how its speed would change. And all the while, her mind was screaming at her to jump at it. To chase it down, devour it. Her powerful hind legs twitched at the idea of getting to spring her into action. As the dull yellow rolled near her, she could no longer resist.

In an instant, her legs propelled her up in the air, almost as high as Laz was tall. Irida felt relaxed while airborne. It was euphoria in its purest sense. Time slowed, her sense heightened, the air itself seemed to welcome her to its domain. And falling was the best part. The ground rushed toward her, as did everything it carried. The dull yellow was approaching her landing target, testing how well she had aimed her jump. When her front legs touched down, she held her weight up while sticking out her neck to clamp her jaws on her prey. Before all four of her feet were on the floor she had swallowed the gem. She ate it happily, the thrill of the hunt making up for its lack of taste.

While she debated on which gems to eat next, a noise came from outside. Someone was strolling up the walkway. Light-footed, slow, but determined steps.

Irida’s first instinct was to go to her and Laz’s room. It was where she was ushered toward every time someone came to the house, other than Calder. She then wondered if it was Laz coming home earlier than she anticipated. They didn’t sound like his steps, but she had been surprised before.

Her questions were answered when a voice called out through the door.

“Hello! Wizard, sir, I have a basket for you!” The voice was high and nervous. “It’s thanks for helping me the other day! Hello?”

The door shook. Irida panicked.

She could tell the voice wasn’t a threat, but none of the voices she had ever heard sounded too threatening. They were always nice, and she had begun to imagine what each of the voices looked like while she hid behind the curtain in the bedroom. This particular voice was one she was especially curious about. It had more earnestness than any other she had heard. Nothing to hide, nothing to convince. The boy’s words carried his emotion plain to see. She wished more humans would talk like him.

Irida thought about how she might be able to pull one of the curtains to get a good look at him when the door handle rattled.

That’s right, she couldn’t be seen. Her parents had never felt more strongly about anything. Despite how desperately she wanted to look at the fascinating stranger, she slowly backed away toward the bedroom until she was behind the room’s curtain, where she crouched low and hoped the voice would leave.

“Are you home? Hey, hello?” The boy was persistent. “Did you leave with those carriages this mornin’? Or…” He trailed off, as if realizing that if his hypothesis was true, nobody would be able to answer him.

Irida stayed in place, fighting off her curiosity to run over and look out the window. Several minutes had passed since the boy had arrived, and she hoped he would leave soon. He didn’t seem the type to try and break in, but she knew there was still much to learn about humans.

Again, the crooked handle shook and Irida clenched down low to the floorboards. She looked to Laz’s closet, the last place she could hide the front door really did swing open.

“Alright, well,” the voice eventually said, “guess you’re out.” There was a pause, then some creaking of the window by the door. “Bye!”

The sound of fast feet running down the stone and away from the house was the last Irida had to worry about it. To play it safe, though, she waited another few minutes before she returned to her glistening mountain of food. She spotted a tasty pile of tiny reds and felt her stomach grumble.

***

Boredom. Irida was experiencing pure boredom for perhaps the first time. She had gotten a little bored before, when Laz would read his books and Calder wasn’t around, but at least his presence was enough to not feel so alone.

So it wasn’t just boredom, but loneliness. Since the day she hatched, she had never gone more than an hour or two without one of her parents being in the house, and even those times were rare. But now, as the few sunbeams that snuck through the tops of the curtains faded and the temperature dropped, Irida missed having the two humans around.

Only a third of her gems had been eaten, which to her felt like a commendable achievement of willpower. Eating was all she could think to do while she waited. Two long naps and some jumping around the lab were great, but she couldn’t sleep and jump around for hours on end. And now thanks to the naps she was wide awake when she should be settling in for the night.

She hopped down from Laz’s bed and wandered into the lab. Inspecting the notes and vials had lost its charm after an hour of attempting that, and her feet kept walking across to the other bedroom in the house. A spare room that had a bed covered in clothes, and a closet packed with parchment. Irida had been in there a few times, mostly when following Laz around the house, but never found it all that interesting. It was cold and dark and Irida couldn’t read, so what use was it to her?

Hours of boredom had to be endured for her to walk in, hoping that the change of scenery would improve her mood. She had hoped Calder would leave the back door unlocked so she could go outside, at least. No, only the cramped indoors for her while her parents were away.

She stared at the pile of clothes that covered the entire surface of the bed. There were one or two times she had tried to jump up and sleep on it, to test which was comfiest. Unfortunately, Laz would always pick her up and toss her back to the floor. Though now that she was growing steadily, she wondered if Laz even could lift her anymore.

Either way, she leapt onto the mess of cloth. In an instant, it began to swallow her. Soft fabrics shifted and slid around, leaving her nowhere to plant her feet. She decided to give in and roll over, letting the clothes embrace her. They were very comfortable, and she understood why Laz was always covering himself in them. That was her main complaint with Calder, he sometimes wore tough, metal clothes that were a pain to lean against.

The cradle she had made for herself was almost enough to entice her into taking a third nap of the day. She nestled down until she was almost completely enveloped, when a harsh scratching sound startled her.

For a second, she was unsure where it came from. Had she accidentally torn one of the garments? Her new claws were taking some time to get used to. Thankfully, or perhaps frighteningly, the same sound echoed through the house. It was certainly the sound of a claw, but not hers. Now that she was listening for it, she could tell it was from out in the lab.

Carefully, she crept out of the messy bed and landed on the floor with only a soft thump. The scratching was happening more and more. The sound subtly shifted around, from the scratching of wood, to glass, to a third thing she couldn’t place. Whenever it hit the glass she shivered, as the vibrations rang through her in the most intolerable feeling she had yet to have.

Once she reached the lab, still slowly crawling to hopefully avoid being seen by whatever the source was, she located the source. The window by the door. On the other side, less than a dozen feet from Irida, the scratching was only getting faster. And what’s more, now that she was closer, she could hear low, guttural chewing. A wild animal was attacking the window.

She froze again. Was being seen by an animal okay? They were unable to speak, as far as she knew. And if nothing was done, the window could break! Would Laz come home and think she was the one who broke it? Would humans come and see what the commotion was and end up seeing her?

It became clear that she needed to stop whatever it was, now she needed to determine what to actually do. She had never fought anything other than Calder’s hand when she was smaller, and he wouldn’t even let her do that anymore. There was no way for her to use magic without Laz there, either.

All she could do was hope that the sight of a dragon was enough. She readied herself, staring at the drawn curtain and imagining what beast might be on the other side of the window. Whatever it was, it wasn’t strong enough to break the window in a single swipe, or even the dozens of swipes it had taken. That meant she had a chance.

She shot her tongue out at the heavy brown curtain and it thwapped against the window on the other side. There was a brief pause in the rustling, but it returned in only a few moments. Again. Her tongue, now aimed a bit lower, knocked against the window despite the curtain absorbing some of the blow. And again, the noises ceased for a handful of seconds but came back at full force soon enough.

It was no good. Irida realized she would have to risk being seen if she wanted to put a stop to it. She thought about running to the bedroom and hiding and hoping her parents would return soon, but knew this was a chance to prove herself. To defend their home against an invader. It had to be done.

In one motion, she jumped forward, sneaking under the curtain and springing up to see what was on the other side of the window. Her mouth was opened wide to be more intimidating, and her claws struck the glass to startle it as much as possible, even if she hated the noise.

Outside, a furry animal as big as Calder was standing on its back legs by the windowsill. It had a slate pelt, with black patches around its eyes, and big, round ears. Its teeth were long and, at the moment, buried into a red fruit sitting on the windowsill.

But, her plan had worked. The creature’s eyes widened and it let out a wimpy, pathetic wail. It even lost its balance and had to land on all fours before running out of sight. In its wake, a few half-eaten fruits and vegetables were on the ground, as well as a wicker basket that had some undamaged produce inside. Irida figured that was left by the boy from earlier, and must have been what all of his talking was about.

She didn’t see any humans outside, and the beast had turned and sprinted toward the trees instead of the town. Happy with her job well down, Irida stepped away from the window and allowed herself another dark blue as a treat.

Her parents might never know what she had done, but she was elated in knowing she had helped them. That she was able to hold her own against ferocious wildlife that was harming their home. If she could do all of that already, she couldn’t wait to see what she would be capable of when she finished growing.

With the gem held in her mouth, she walked back to the spare room and let herself get lost in Laz’s clothes again for a well-deserved nap.