Riley

Water Runestone

Dragonmade

An ancient stone bearing the ancestral rune of the Tidelord. Such a find should be kept as a prized possession.

110

Gabriel flared his wings wide, lowering his head as a sly smile spread across his face. "Come on, show me what you've got." Lunging forward, Riley took a feint at his shoulder before swiping at his other front leg with her other paw. He leaned into the strike, rocking with the blow, before rearing up to body slam her. She hit the ground hard, a pained grunt forcing its way out of her lungs. She writhed on the ground, trying to protect her belly from Gabe's restrained blows. She kicked at his paws, feeling her unsuccessful defense let his feet thud against her chest plate. Grabbing her by the chest plate, Gabriel lifted her upper body off the ground before slamming her down. The blow knocked the air out of her and, stunned, she stopped clawing at him. He planted his front legs on either side of her chest. A mirthful gleam shone in his eyes. "You out already?" She nodded breathlessly. He stepped back a couple steps, far away enough so Riley could roll onto her side.

After a moment of peaceful silence, Gabriel's lazily turning to keep an eye out for monsters and the like, Riley rolled onto her feet and pushed her chest up to sit. "So, am I doing better?" Gabe shrugged nonchalantly, eyes focused on the scrubby forest's edge.

"Ask Evewern. I can't really tell." His eyes roamed back to meet hers, the unsettling red settling on hers. "It's hard to tell when you're not fighting dragons or monsters within your own capabilities, too." His tail twitched as he turned to look at something else that caught his eye. "Sparring with someone else would probably be a better indicator." She sighed, annoyance staining her otherwise stable mood, and she stood up. Arching her back to stretch out some of the day's tension, she folded her wings and spoke.

"Aren't you supposed to be able to determine these things? As one of the strongest in the fighters and all?" She flicked her tail, watching him roll to his feet.

"Nope. That's Evewern's job, not mine, so I couldn't tell you the difference between fighting skills worth anything." Flicking his chin up and closing his eyes, he continued. "And not 'one of the strongest', I am the strongest." Riley snickered, her eyebrows rising to float high on her brow. Gabe looked at her strangely. "What?"

"Gee, arrogant much?"

He walked past her, head held high. "It's not arrogance, it's factual; ask Evewern, if you really don't believe me." Riley couldn't keep the disbelieving smirk off her face.

"I'm sure if I ask Silver or Candal they'll be telling me something different." Gabe's tail swished in indignation. Riley followed him with her eyes as he paced circles around her.

"Silver's head is full of feathers and rocks, and Candal doesn't know any better than to agree with him. They should stick to being con artists and muscling precious ores and money out of poor, unprepared dragons." If Riley's eyebrows could go any higher on her face, they would've.

"That's quite a statement you're putting out there, Gabe. It almost sounds like you resent your fellow teammates for not being stronger than them." Gabe halted swiftly in his tracks, and Riley felt a twinge of regret for what she said. It disappeared pretty quick, but it was there. "Whoa dude, cool it, I'm just poking fun at you." Gabe crossly stared at her for a moment, before shifting his eyes down to the ground and muttering something under his breath. Riley could have sworn she heard 'not fun' and 'me' and thought about saying something to him, but quickly thought better of it. As he exhaled a slow sigh, Riley could see the tension melt out of his shoulders.

"Alright, are we done for today?" Riley nodded.

"I'm meeting up with a friend to spar with him. I was going to ask if you could watch and tell me how I'm doing, but I guess I should ask Evewern to watch us." Gabe perked up at this.

"I can still watch if you want me to. I can't really tell you whether you've gotten better or not, but I can tell if you're fighting well." Riley looked at him for any signs of sarcasm on his brow. Surprisingly, she saw none. He wasn't hard to read either, so Riley figured he was being sincere.

"Sure, could you?" She snorted. "I'd like to find out if all these bruises from sparring with you are worth it." He rolled his eyes at that.

"You're wearing armor, you're fine. You don't hear me complaining about these open wounds you left on my legs." Riley grinned at him, mischief sparkling in her eyes.

"Not you, but your boyfriend likes to complain about you-" Gabe quickly cut her off, and her smile turned smug.

"Tamaran likes to sleep on the wrong side of me, it's not my fault that he gets poked during the night when I shift."

"That's not wha-"

"This conversation is over. Where are you meeting your friend? We're running out of daylight, and it's starting to get rather cold at night." Riley was silent for a moment, wrestling with whether to keep pushing this conversation and take a jab at Gabe or to drop it and get going. She wanted to spar, but poking Gabe in conversation was almost as fun. Almost. Sparring it was.

"I can't actually name it because it's flat out in the middle of nowhere, but I can lead you there." Gabriel spread his wings wide, his shining scales glinting in the sharp sunlight.

"Let's head out, then."

---

For a dragon his size, Gabriel was surprisingly agile in the air; when Riley tried to take a playful swipe at his head, he easily swooped out of reach, twisting through the air to cuff her with the end of his tail. He corkscrewed back to an upright position, slowing up so she could pass again and keep leading. She felt vaguely envious, as she felt fairly clumsy in the air. She couldn't manage tight turns very well, and it stung a little bit to see Gabriel manage the air with ease. She supposed it probably had to do with his training with Evewern in the coliseum, but it didn't really make sense to be that good unless most of the fighting was taking place in the air, which by hearing about his experiences didn't check out. Then, how....

"Gabe?" Gabe flew forward so he was even with her, cocking his head as if he had missed what she'd said.

"What?"

"How'd you get to be so good at flying too?" He tilted his head further, confusion all over his face. Speaking louder, she said, "Flying. You're good. Why." Recognition replaced the confusion.

"Oh, Evewern pushes all of us to work harder at the skills we're not particularly good at. In my case, that was agility in the air and on the ground." A soft smile spread across his lips. "I'm glad all my struggling made a difference." Riley nodded, suddenly hit with a powerful wave of envy. By Icewarden's leg hair, she wished she could do that. What a powerful feeling that would be, to shape the air under one's wings with ease and the balance of a Skydancer.

Trying to swallow down the sudden emotions, Riley tried to focus on navigating. Thankfully, Blue's horribly obvious form stuck out against the snow-dusted plain, and Riley pulled ahead of Gabriel again, drifting down to decrease altitude. He followed a tail length or so behind her.

She landed with a harsh thud, noting in annoyance that Gabe had a much gentler-sounding landing. One day, she would be able to do that too. Blue looked up at Riley hopefully, his cheery expression souring as his eyes flickered over to Gabe.

"Ugh, Riley what did you do? Why would you bring any squares, much less that one?" Riley didn't have to look back at Gabe to know sparks were flying between the two dragons' gazes.

"Sorry that having a brain makes me a 'square.;' I'd thought maybe you have one, but I suppose I'm wrong." A short pause, with which Riley turned her head to look at him fast enough to catch him narrowing his eyes. "And what exactly do you mean when you say 'that one?'" Blue took an aggressive step forward, a move that Riley raised an eyebrow at due to him being too far away for it to even come off as threatening. Personally, she thought it made him look like a hatchling trying to beef it up with an exasperated adult.

"I mean square as in coliseum trash. Why do you and your little cult get to decide who gets to learn self-defense and who doesn't?" Blue's eyes flashed. "I think you know exactly what I mean when I said that. The only reason your leader picked you to learn to battle was because no one would take you seriously otherwise." He paused, tilting his head mockingly. "Where's your doting boyfriend, anyway? Shouldn't he be here to reign you in? To protect you from the real world?"

Riley barked, "Blue, what the hell is wrong with you?? I brought him here to tell me how well I'm fighting!" Her heart pounded harshly in her chest in fury, her head unable to comprehend what Blue was doing.

Gabriel stalked stiff leggedly towards Blue, lips curled to reveal sharp fangs. Riley watched the powerful muscles under his scales ripple with each tense step, and her anger at her friend fled partially for concern for his safety. "You think I need anyone to protect me from anything? I am my own dragon, I defend myself and my honor with my own teeth, claws, and spines." A high hiss escaped Gabe's throat. "The real world doesn't care about my existence or your petty little biases. What the real world does care about is the power and respect one can command, and looking at you, I'd say you're the one who needs protecting from the real world."

"The real world doesn't care, huh? So are your parents suddenly not part of the real world?" Riley's heart spiked with adrenaline, and she saw Blue's throat on the ground in the instant the muscles in Gabe's front leg twitched. Gasping, she could only stand there and try to exhale the terror as she watched Gabe wrestle down the fury that had nearly overridden his actions, his ragged breathing aligned with the shake in the leg she'd seen twitch. Blue stood there, his eyes goading Gabe on. Go on, fight me, they seemed to say.

If Blue had pulled a low blow, however, Gabriel went straight for the metaphorical ankles. "I'm sorry, but until you're as big as I am I really can't take you seriously. The real reason Evewern didn't even bother trying to train you is because you have no potential as a fighter and aren't worth taking the time to train fully."

Riley watched, feeling suddenly exhausted by association and exasperation with these two. Blue jumped at Gabriel, a predictable move on his part, and was immediately slammed into the ground by the infuriated Ridgeback. Blue was wearing armor like Riley was, but that didn't protect him from the impact of Gabe's feet slamming repeatedly into the side of his chestplate. Sandwiched between the ground and Gabe's claws, Blue had nowhere to retreat back to and was at the mercy of his defense versus Gabriel's offense. Just like Riley had struggled with blocking his blows earlier, Blue did too and more, unable to even partially block the torrent of strikes. Unfortunately for him, though, Gabe was not holding back, and Riley would have winced at the bruises she knew would form under his armor if she didn't think he totally deserved to be knocked around by Gabe. Any concern and respect she'd had for Blue disappeared with his nasty comments towards Gabriel and the fact that Gabe wasn't fighting him to draw blood.

Gabe paused, claws held up in preparation for another hit, his eyes observing Blue with detached disinterest . Blue wheezed, the guardian reduced to a heap of armor and trembling limbs before Riley's eyes. She wanted to feel bad for him, but she knew just how low of a blow that was. Sure, Gabe had never talked about his past and parents with her or the public, but it had been common gossip due to how he'd arrived at the clan as a hatchling; she knew that he'd left his parents and home in plauge because his parents refused to acknowledge him as a boy, at the very least. He'd




-was excited hearing about the coliseum from gabe when she was a hatchling. highly anticipated one day being able to join in too but that excitement tapered off due to being waitlisted. eventually, she became frustrated and ended up in the paws of the armor guild, since they promised to teach her how to defend herself without habing to wait for a coliseum audition
-the wane in interest went almost unnoticed by gabe, but it struck him suddenly one day that her interest was gone. perplexed, he confronted her about it, and got a vague answers along the lines of 'i found another path to what i want' from her
-isn't necessarily proud of the armor guild, but won't back down and deny being in it if asked. this is part of what starts to unravel the guild, as she ends up disclosing this info Gabe accidentally and he brings this news right ot Evewern, who already had Saff on the tail of this group
-is a no-nonsense dragon, and makes for a good fighter and would be a good leader if she wasn't constantly discredited due to being younger than a lot of dragons inthe lair.
-when later asked if she wants to be a part of the coliseum team, does join, though haltingly due to aforementioned waning interest
-when Gabe was strong enought o be booted out of trainee camp, he started sparring with Riley, and that sparked Riley's interest again, though not to the same level as before. expecting to not be able to be taught, she was surprised when Gabe said he didn't need Evewern to be there to train her, as he and eithe rJess or Saffron together were strong enough to help train Riley without Evewern. this helps facilitate her learning, and she eventually discloses who/wehre the armor guild is when asked where she'd learned how to defend herself better than aerage. this is when Gabe and Jess/Saff discluse how the armor guild has been doing some suspect af things that they shouldn't be doing, like stockpiling money and resources outside of the hoard and attacking dragons for no reason other than connection to coliseum or supposed connection ot coliseum