Wisteria

awakened: icarus, scarlet macaw / don, spotted faun

Have you gotten any gifts lately?

"A gift?" Wisteria asked, tilting her head thoughtfully. She was younger than most of the dragons in the bar, and she was eyeing Aries with the kind of bright-eyed fascination that only comes with youth. "Well, alright."

"It's a bit of a stretch to say lately, but.. my cousin and I were given a gift that saved our lives. I hatched in a horrible place, an overpopulated fodder camp in the middle of nowhere. Miles of nothing but tundra and open sky. There was never enough food, and the wind was so cold I thought it would cut through me, and- well, I don't think I would have lasted very long were it not for my cousin Harbor."

Wisteria sighed, tugging absently at the edge of her ragged cape. She suddenly looked very, very young, but she took a deep breath and kept going. "Then the deities got into one squabble or another, and all of us were told that we were being trained and sent away to fight their wars. A fate worse than death, some of the older dragons told us, the ones too weary to fight back. None of us had asked for that kind of needless violence, but.. we didn't have any other options. There was only so much food, and they'd stop sending resources when we left. My siblings and I were so young, we all were, but I understood that our lives weren't really ours."

"Then, a few days before we were supposed to leave, a dragoness showed up. A Spiral whose orange scales stuck out like a sore claw, with the kindest eyes I'd ever seen. She said- she said she was looking for her daughter's descendants. And the higher-ups went through the recordbooks, and sure enough Harbor and I were related to her. Though we looked nothing alike, of course- I guess five generations will do that to you. And she introduced herself as Fleet, and she asked us if we would like to leave the tundra and the threat of being exalted behind. Harbor and I said yes, obviously, and she took us back to Revenant- a place where we don't have to worry about struggling to find food, or weather gales strong enough to freeze your blood, or dread growing up because it means you'll be taken away from your family forever."

"So.. that was my gift," Wisteria said after a long moment, spreading her talons in a half-shrug. "A new start, a second chance- whatever you'd like to call it. A place to be a kid, to grow up, to not die in a pointless war that'll be forgotten the next week."

The curious shine was once again sparkling in her eyes as she sized up the dragon next to her. "You up for storytime? How about... hm. What's the hardest decision you've ever had to make?"