Yvaine

When I was small, my mother asked me and my clutchsiblings what names we wanted. I picked "Princess Starfall". My brother wanted "Stormy Night" and my sister "Princess Purple".

My mother talked to my father after that, and then they came back to say that these were all fine names and we could use them in the lair, but they'd be waiting until we were older to register them.

We're older now, but we still haven't registered names. I know Storm is kind of sick of his child's-name -- there's Stormson and Nightsea already in the lair, for starters, and my clutch-sister hates hers so much she gets mad if you use it. We call her "Purr", which she doesn't like but doesn't hate. And mine is silly too. But we can't decide on final adult names. Names are HARD.

We've been looking for another lair that has an opening for us. My dad set a high bride-price for us with the matchmaker's. He says we're beautiful and our looks make us rare and special and someone will want us enough to pay it. "It's just a matter of time."

I'll give him "beautiful" -- practically all the dragons I know are beautiful -- but I always break into giggles at "rare and special". We're not rare! I have four older sisters who look like me and my sister is almost my twin and my brother's not much different, and one of my nieces is pretty similar too. And if I know seven dragons like me, young as I am and with almost all my life spent at this one lair, how many must older dragons know? I'm common, common like my breed, and just as beautiful as all the dragons who've come through my lair recently, eager to be trained for Windsinger's Call.

It doesn't worry me, you know, that my appearance is quite ordinary. Cloudkeeper understands: it's not the shine or the tint of your scales that makes a dragon. It's the spark behind your eyes, the will, imagination, and determination. I'm not valuable because my hide shimmers, because my body matches my wings or because of the pristine white of my underside. I'm not valuable because some lair might pay a fortune in bride-price for me.

I am valuable because I am a dragon and we are all valuable, all sacred to the gods. Any one of the gods would be glad to pay my lair and honor me with exaltation. (Though I wouldn't go to any but Windsinger, of course.)

But more than that, more than any treasure that my lair might gain because of me, I am priceless. Because I'm me, because I am the only me there will ever be. My sisters may look like me but they'll never be me. There will be other dragons who look exactly like me, but they won't think the same thoughts, breathe the same breaths, do the same actions -- similar, maybe. But not the same. I'm unique. We all are. Whether I go to live with another lair or go to Windsinger, whether I fetch my father's price or a lower one or none at all -- it doesn't much matter. My true worth isn't measured in gems or treasure. My father taught me that.

I'd like to find a mate in this world -- maybe not one that looks just like me -- and know love, and travel. I want to bring honor to my lord Windsinger when and if he honors me with exaltation. And the best way I know to do that is to make the most of this world he shaped for us.