Neither Claret or Syrah ever expected to stay.

They never even intended to stop at the Reach in the first place; in the end, exhausted, hopeless, with Claret nursing untreated burns and Syrah catatonic with grief, they simply never had a choice. When they found a small, relatively isolated clan, they decided it was the safest place they were likely to find. Neither would speak to their hosts outside of what was required for politeness. Claret, though reserved and soft-spoken, did most of their talking. Syrah just stayed tucked close to her mate, with her eyes lowered, and never said a word except to thank or apologize to someone.

It would be months and one unannounced disappearance later before they were willing to mingle with the rest of the Reach. It would be the better part of a year before Claret, tucked away on the plains with Radec and Adecia, would finally explain why they had ended up where they did.

The gentle, sweet-natured pair that the Reach had collectively taken under its concerned wing were fleeing accusations of murder.

All Claret could say, trembling and staring between his paws, was It wasn't Syrah's fault.

She had a medical condition, he said, almost pleading. A rare neurological condition called Anathemia that meant her body rejected its own magic. It was no one's fault. The leading theory was that anathemia was caused by entirely random fluctuations of mana while the egg was incubating; congenital, impossible to predict, impossible to prevent. When found in a dragon with little or no natural magical power, it was very rarely harmful. It would cause occasional spasms, periodic weakness or dizzy spells, but nothing serious.

In a dragon with naturally higher levels of raw internal magic, it was almost always fatal. Syrah was one of the most powerful mages Claret had ever seen.

In her, the anathemia manifested violently and frequently as her body attempted to dispel massive levels of magic through channels of power that it simply didn't have access to. Her symptoms included migraines, seizures, and the risk of fainting when she tried to use her powers; but if she didn't use them, the consequences of the resulting magical backlog could be even more dire. Raw elemental magic would tear its way free one way or the other, heightened as with any mage by her emotions; but in such large quantities, it would be entirely outside Syrah's control.

There were ways to help her--experimental meditation techniques to redirect the flow of magic and help her bleed it off more safely, herbs that would help to suppress the amount of magic her body produced in the first place. Years later, a Serthis potionmaster of the Reach, a sister of Shirala's named Athis, would begin to develop a chemical treatment that would be even more effective. But they weren't perfect. Accidents could happen. Claret didn't give many details, aside from the fact that Syrah had been startled. Syrah had been startled--and a hatchling had died.

"I couldn't just watch them kill her," he said. "I couldn't just let her die."

Syrah had tried to explain right up until the end. Tears in her eyes, horrified and sickened beyond measure, she had tried to explain that it had been an accident. The hatchling's bereaved parents wouldn't hear it--but Syrah was a Wildclaw at heart, and refused to back down. Doing so would be tantamount to saying she had killed the child. She hadn't. It had been an accident. She would let them kill her, if that was what it took for them to have peace. But when Claret had leaped in, covered her with a wing just barely in time to block the burst of flame from a clan stirred suddenly into a lynch mob, she couldn't let him die for her.

Claret pleaded with her to run, to live--and she pleaded with him to leave her. And she realized he never would. They would tear the only dragon who had always been there throughout her struggles to pieces for defending her, and she couldn't let it happen. She let him grab her and escape, and Claret knew as he did it that in backing down from her accusers Syrah was internalizing a confession to infanticide.

But he couldn't just let her die.