Theirs is a difficult world. Xanthien knows this, for he grew to adulthood in his birth clan, and came to know the duties and responsibilities of a dragon born beneath a sky filled with sparring gods. Their strife is reflected in the world: in plague and monster attacks, in land sundered by earthquakes and storms.

Xanthien does not know why he prefers the company of drakes, only that it is for every dragon to make nests. This he does because he believes, wholeheartedly, in the war to come, the one that the shattering of the pillar has made inevitable.

But it does not bring him joy.

In some clans, he knows, his sort are unwelcome for their chilling effect on the eagerness of both sexes to breed together. He has avoided such clans as much as possible. The tail he had broken by the one clan he fled he hides, with as good a face as possible, with an elaborate series of cuffs that serve both as ornament... and armor.

He has come at last to the Lair by the Sea, where it seems no one cares who lies under whose wing, so long as the children come. But, Xanthien thinks with some pain, it doesn't matter what the Clan Leader's attitude is, if the one you've fallen for believes what you are is abomination.

Maybe one day, Xanthien thinks, Endymion will change his mind. Until then, better to pine somewhere he is welcome, than to live in fear of another broken bone somewhere else. And the longer he stays, the more he relaxes. He does not realize, thus, what an example he is to others: that he is beautiful and strong, thoughtful and responsible. The hardship and cruelty he's endured has only made him gentler with others.

He is a very hard drake to resist.

***

Volari's arrival has been the distraction Xanthien needed from his crush on Endymion. She needed someone to look out for her--Xanthien was willing, and (importantly for her) uninterested in her as a potential mate. They have become friends, and beneath that kind regard, Volari has tentatively flourished.

But she had never had a season before, and didn't realize how potent a motivating force it is. Nekure didn't force her, but her body did something she didn't want, and it drove her mad with grief--and Xanthien insane with wrath. Nekure is a ferocious dragon, though, so instead of attacking him directly Xanthien presented himself to Reina and Argos. 'Take me to the Mire.'

They looked at one another and said, 'You will get hurt.'

'Take me to the Mire.'

So they took him, and he learned to scratch and bite and survive. On his own he researched spells and learned one to ward another dragon, so if ever Volari needed him again, he could do something for her.

...and then he challenged Nekure, and wiped the ground with him.

...only to discover Nekure was already full of remorse for his actions. He hadn't known about Volari. He was so sorry for it.

What to do? Xanthien still trains for the fight, and at night spreads a wing over Volari's shivering body and noses her, reassuring her. He has become a fighter to defend his friend. Now he's beginning to think what he needed to learn was how to heal. Even after Volari left him for the company of a dragoness who loved her as she needed to be loved, he often thought it... that the world needed more healing than it did hurting, and yet how the world convulsed in its violences!

***

It was on this subject that he consulted Endymion, after the latter had begun inviting him to walk of an evening. They had done nothing but walk, and talk of mild subjects, inoffensive topics, a hesitant furthering of an acquaintanceship. But Xanthien was so troubled about Nekure and Volari that he found himself pouring the story out to the drake for whom he'd lost his own heart long ago, and for once it didn't matter that he wanted Endymion as a lover. He needed him now as a friend and a confessor, and because Endymion was a peerless listener. Listen he did, all the way to the end of the story.

They walked on in silence, in the warmth of a purple spring evening, the breeze off the sea rustling the grasses around their flanks. At last, Endymion stopped.

'What is it in the end that disturbs you?'

'The waste of it,' Xanthien said. "Gods, Endymion, but the waste of it all! For want of love, of understanding. Neither of them meant to hurt one another. And there I was, helpless witness. I feel...' He lashed his broken tail, the plates clinking. 'I feel helpless. Before all the injustices of the world, petty and great.'

'But without you she would never have been happy!' Endymion said. At Xanthien's frown, he said, 'You don't see it, do you. Volari would never have accepted that she deserved the love of a dragoness had you not first demonstrated that she deserved the love of any dragon at all. She'd been told for so long that she was unnatural that she believed it. Until she met you.'

'You... you really think that?' Xanthien's crest sagged.

'I know it.' The other drake looked down, scratched at the ground. 'She was not the only one you convinced.'

Xanthien held his breath as the other drake met his eyes.

'I... you...' Endymion trailed off, crest feathers slick to his neck now. 'I... have always admired you.'

'And if I said I wanted something different from admiration?' Xanthien chanced, his heart hammering between his legs.

In answer, Endymion leaned toward him and brushed his cheek oh so lightly against the other drake's. Xanthien shuddered.

'I made you wait so long!' Endymion whispered. 'I am sorry!'

Xanthien exhaled, rested the tip of his nose against the crest frill, smelled the scent of the other drake and shivered. 'It's all right,' he answered, softly. 'You were worth the wait.'

***

That after all the years of seeking, he might have a home at last... and that the drake of his choosing finally welcomes him--it's more than Xanthien ever anticipated having, and he is grateful, daily, for these gifts. He still nests when he is asked, but that is rarer now; there are a sufficiency of dragons in the clan that the nests are often bespoken in advance for couples who want to breed.

Most days, Xanthien flies patrol, as this is the duty he knows best. He knows how to fight; he knows alertness and vigilance. In his breast burns a heart that longs only to protect the clan that gave him succor. When he is done, he goes home to a wallow in the warm grasses and finds his beloved there. Sometimes Endymion's granddaughter joins them, and they sleep in one pile; sometimes she wanders, and leaves her grandfather and his lover to their private joys. But she regards Xanthien as another grandparent, and this is treasure beyond anything he could have expected. In this world, where the progeny of dragons do not often love one another, the steadfast love and presence of a child is a gift beyond price.

To be content! What a strange thing! And yet he is!

'You grow more handsome with each day that passes,' Endymion says as he ties on Xanthien's armor with his long, clever fingers.

'You say that every day,' Xanthien says.

'Because every day it continues to be true,' Endymion answers, eyes twinkling. 'You shouldn't argue logic with a scholar, my dear.'

***

He went to succor the Dream--of course he did. All of the Lair by the Sea marshaled to the defense of its sister-clan, and of his family, Xanthien was the most skilled in battle. While Endymion and Liriope sped for the wreckage in the hopes of rescuing the trapped and wounded, he rose to join the flights attacking the demon lord, and he did so with his beloved's fervent well wishes beneath his wings.

And he fought well. Of the dragons who came from the Lair, he was one of the few who lasted the entirety of the battle, who helped wrench the demon down at last.

But it was not without cost.

He limped back, wings crumpled and blackened, his body torn, feathers and flank shredded and burnt. He made it on all four legs, but only enough to pass out at Endymion's feet. And there he remembered no more until he woke to the sight of Calla. And the look in her eyes... he began to struggle upright.

'Stay,' she said, with such authority that he immediately ceased. She held up one of her delicate black hands. 'Thank you. You'll fly again. With aid.'

'With... aid?' He craned his head over his shoulder... and almost fainted. Blood and death had not harrowed his soul, but the sight of his wings with half their vanes amputated--

'We're making you replacements,' Calla said. 'You're lucky... if the bolt that ripped them had gone any lower, you wouldn't be here to talk about it.'