Dark red tattoos are painting her body in weird patterns.
"It's blood," she says calmly when asked. She carved the tattoos herself, and they are imbued with power of her pain, loss and sacrifice, enabling her to reach Beyond, to the dead ones.

She doesn't have children.
"Children are Life," she explains. "Those who bring Life cannot touch Death like I can. That's the price. Death takes."

Shade listens to her, enthralled and fascinated.

"But isn't it... bad?"

Ruedha throws her head back and laughs so loudly she nearly scares him.

"Silly boy. Death is not bad, nor it is good. Death is. It's Beyond everything. Silly dragon categories included."

She smiles softly and pats his head.

"When you understand this, come to me. I'll teach you then. Until that, leave."

He leaves.

When he returns, she doesn't smile at him anymore, though.

He doesn't have any tattoos. Instead, all his wings are bloody red, membranes scratched off so thin they can't hold him in the air anymore.

"Teach me," he says.

And she does.