The lizard seemed displeased with his new nestmates.

I couldn't have cared less.

Half a dozen cave spiders wove their glittering webs over the entrance of the cave, only the soothing press of my mana keeping them from staking territorial claims with their particular brand of cannibalism. I had shaped these with as much mana as I could shove into them before they began to reject it, enriching their venom until they could take down prey far larger than themselves, a last defense if their webs failed. As a final touch, I took the ruddy hue of their banded legs and blended it over their entire bodies, brightened to a gleaming red like little scuttling jewels in the dark.

I wouldn't ever find them beautiful, lacking the scales and wings where I found true perfection, but they were far less horrific to look at. It would do for now.

Precious few creatures had come to investigate my trap, only more buzzing insects I had no interest in beyond the spark of mana I got from their deaths as my spiders feasted. The lizard had tucked himself against the base of my column, watching the new additions with his lanturn-like eyes.

I wanted more.

Dragons never settled and I was no different—to kill the bastard outside, I would need far more than mere cave spiders and mushrooms, no matter how much venom I could fill them with. My memories clashed with the guiding hand of my instincts, wanting to force the lizard to carry me out into the wider cave to scrape and tear any creatures in my path. The overwhelming fear I was shaped from stayed my hand.

My pool of mana was almost half full, the runes over my core gleaming once again, before something new arrived.

One of my spiders, newly formed and yet unthreatened by life, had spun its web by the base of the algae to scoop up as many scurrying bugs as it could manage. An efficient strategy, as shown by the many flecks of mana I'd absorbed from its escapades, but its position put it at risk.

The pros outweighed the cons right up until an arrow-shaped head shot from the darkness and plucked it clean from its web.

All my many points of awareness zeroed in.

The snake snapped down the spider, thin fangs compressing its carapace to disappear smoothly down its throat. It was a gorgeous thing, dark grey with black diamonds crawling over its spine, eyes pale and flashing. Raising its head, I saw its underbelly was pure white, free of dust and grime.

I could have purred.

Hello beauty, I crooned, filling my ambient mana with soothing thoughts of protection and food. With any luck, I could trick it inside to be fully separated from the outside world, able to drop rocks a plenty over its pretty head without the rest of the cave system noticing. It slithered closer.

The lizard raised his head at the change in mana, tongue flashing; I saw the moment he noticed the snake. His tail lashed as he rose to all fours.

The snake's grey tongue met the air. It hissed but didn't retreat, coiling opposite of the fungal garden, at least five feet long—beating the lizard in size, but where it was slender, he was strong. In a fight between the two, there would be no clean victories.

And, most infuriating of all, I couldn't control either one.

I covered the lizard in pressing strands of mana, urging him to slow down, to plan out a manner of attack. He ignored me with the same ease he'd ignored all of my previous orders. Some predator had entered his nest, no matter the new roommates, and he wouldn't allow it to stand.

The godsdamned idiot was going to get himself killed and leave me without any power beyond a few crawling spiders. I threw more of my ambient mana over his back, enough his tail lashed, but he stayed focused on the snake.

My one consolation was the bare knowledge I had of other reptiles—the snake was a constrictor, not venomous. The brief glance at its fangs had been enough to confirm that. But my lizard wasn't either; his strength came from his claws and fangs.

Two things that scales were built to protect against.

The lizard stalked forward until his nose brushed against my row of mushrooms, eyes narrowed. From my bare sense of my creatures' minds, I could feel the moment that every spider near the algae abruptly decided they had places to be and scattered back up to their webs. The snake hissed, tail lashing, and reared–

What I'd taken for a white underbelly exploded in light; fucking bioluminescence. As if it needed any other advantage. The lizard reeled back, cave-adjusted eyes blinded and smarting; an easy target.

Like an arrow, the snake shot through the fungus. It sank its fangs into the meat of the lizard's shoulder—or tried to, at least. I had a smug little moment as it bounced off his defensive scales but that was only its attempt to secure its position, not a proper attack; in seconds, it wound its way around the lizard's midsection, threading between his sprawling limbs.

I watched its grip constrict with the kind of fear I hadn't felt in a very long time.

My mana surged to life. Thrashing, the lizard bit and tore at what length of the snake he could reach, but while he ripped scales loose and drew streaks of blood it only squeezed tighter. I shoved power heedlessly between the two, enough the mushrooms between them shuddered and grew, but I couldn't do anything. Gods, he was going to die and I couldn't–

With a hiss, the lizard gave one last full-body tremble and went limp.

I bellowed, and not a thing heard me.

The snake cautiously untucked its head from its protected position, still coiled tightly. Another moment passed and it seemed to accept it had won the battle, tongue flicking out. It either ignored or didn't feel the weight of my furious glare, jaw extending as it slithered forward.

The lizard abruptly twisted and slammed his fangs over the back of its arrow-shaped head.

It shrieked, spasming—he bit harder and flung them both into a death roll, crashing through the mushrooms as they spun deeper into the nest. The snake exploded in another burst of light, sending my spiders shrinking into their webs, but the lizard ignored sight and dug his teeth past its scales.

Much like he had only moments before, the snake's struggles slowed. Its tail whipped heedlessly at the ground, fangs tearing at the air but unable to attack him with the grip he had behind its head, blood spilling from under its scales. The lizard managed a hiss through his very full mouth.

I fretted overhead, mana reaching and grasping, as seconds stretched to minutes. The snake barely twitched but the lizard wouldn't risk his own trick rebounding on him, fangs grinding deeper.

Until finally, it slumped over dead.

A burst of mana exploded out of it, the majority trickling back to my core alongside the slippery, flitting mess of a soul; but a not insubstantial amount entered the lizard's jaws, flowing alongside his channels like quicksilver. He blinked and finally let it slip out of his mouth, scarlet streaking over his blue-grey scales.

I didn't have to ask him not to eat it. He spared a second to glare at the corpse, shaking off the worst of the blood, and glanced back at me with what would almost be called smug intelligence; I didn't know what else to label his primitive trap as. He'd tricked the snake. Certainly he hadn't been that smart—as low as my threshold was when my only other companions were spiders—when I first encountered him. My mana seemed to be increasing his intelligence.

Gods knew it couldn't have been anything else.

He retreated to his corner as I poured soothing mana over him, worming what healing influences I could muster into the odd wheeze of his breath and cracked teeth. He ignored me but did curl up, tail over his nose.

Then I sat back and really considered the snake in the middle of my room.

Beautiful, yes. Dangerous, yes.

At my heart, I was a deeply petty being, but even with its irritable actions I wanted it.

I shifted my points of awareness forward, tracing over its scales—fully a constrictor, deeply camouflaged for dark stone, lacking the hooded eyes of a creature that occasionally went into sunlight. Prodding at the memories from its soul I could see endless waiting, keen little eyes poised to see the faintest movement deep under the mountain; that alongside the bioluminescence cinched it for me. It was an ambush predator, relying on blinding its opponent from the shadows and constricting them before they could react—in a normal situation, it never would have gone after my lizard, at least not while he was awake.

But it hadn't been a normal situation. All living things craved mana, no matter their level of sapiance, and I was an endless fountain. It had wanted to feast.

With the best equivalent of a sigh as I could muster, I dissolved its corpse into motes of pale light and examined its core.

Luminous Constrictor (Common)

Living in the shadows, they hide and wait for their chosen prey to draw closer. By releasing a flash of bioluminescence from the scales beneath their throat, they stun the creature and can freely constrict it. Though they lack a venomous bite, they are powerfully built and extraordinarily quick, allowing them to bring down prey many times their size.

What I'd guessed, then. My gathered schemas seemed to be building on a theme—the only truly strong creature I had was the lizard, with all others built around traps and deception. My dungeon instincts purred happily at the thought.

My dragon half was less pleased.

I wouldn't create one of the constrictors, not yet. Already my mind spun with plans of adding the cave spider's venom, of taking its bioluminescence and creating glowing rows of mushrooms to attract all manners of prey, but for now I needed to help the lizard. He wouldn't be in pain for a second longer than necessary if I had anything to say about it.

And, with my mana pushed over half full with the snake's death, I did.

-

Nicau watched the Dread Pirate's progression through Calarata and felt his stomach drop.

The cart rumbled through cobbled streets more mud than stone, enormous wheels trembling and quaking even with their mana enforcements. Pebbles flew out of its path and clattered against its rickety surroundings, drawing more faces to windows and more silent watchers. That had to be his goal.

It was working, because those who came for the sound stayed for the dragon.

Even tightly bound by ropes, wings compressed to sides and head curled back, it sprawled over the entire main road and dragged its tail well behind the cart. Dozens of feet long, scales wider than his hand, horns long enough to replace his spine.

And, perched on top with beasts made from shadow pulling the cart, the Dread Pirate watched them all back.

Nicau took the sliver of comfort that as one of Calarata's many stowaway orphans, the man wasn't looking at him directly, though it didn't exactly help much. Useless as he was to Varcís Bilaro, he still lived in the illegal pirate cove of Calarata, and thus survived under his protection.

It was easy to forget all the taxes they had to pay when he shot a dragon from the sky with a single lance.

At his side Romei wrung her hands, both of them peering out from one of many alleys dotting the city, dark eyes sharp. Pigeoncatchers, the both of them, selling the gamey birds on the docks to returning pirates or adventurers hungry for a meal—but it was him that hid in the shadows, fled away from those stronger. She had never been content with that. Had always wanted to sail on a ship of her own.

He didn't like the look in her eyes as she watched the dragon.

"Killed it on the mountain, didn't he?" She murmured, lips barely moving. The cart rolled past with a rumble like thunder. "Across from the city?"

Nicau shook his head just as minutely as her. "Closer. It landed in the cove, right off the docks."

Her eyes, if it were possible, grew brighter.

"How much do dragon scales sell for?"

He blinked and fully turned to face her, the enormous tail dragging a crevasse in the dirt of the road before them. "What?"

"The scales, Nicau—the Dread Pirate took the corpse but I doubt he took enough time to fully inspect the area if he killed it yesterday and brought it back today. There has to be some scales that fell off. We could sell them." She glanced both ways but no one was in their alley, window shutters of the surrounding buildings closed. "You can track them, can't you?"

Ah.

Nicau winced—he knew she wouldn't invite him if she could get away with it. But where she had been born and raised on Calarata's streets, he had been a stowaway first, learning the famed petty theft secret of following mana trails.

Useless in most situations, with the moderate exception of tracking enormous deposits of power.

Such as scales.

"...I could."

Romei grabbed his hand to pull him deeper into the alley, excitement thrumming between them. "Even one would get us a ride on the Diving Darling—and just a handful more and we could barter our way into being cabintakers." Her nose wrinkled at the name of the grungiest ship of the city—especially for Calarata, with expectations particularly low to begin with—but her eyes brightened soon after. "Or, gods. Imagine if you find enough we could join the Dread Crew."

Nicau peeked around the corner. Varcís was well and truly out of sight but no one knew the full extent of his powers, whether he could hear anything said in the city like the rumors whispered around, whether he could read minds and knew this conversation was happening.

But to join the Dread Crew…

It meant not struggling for the rest of your life. It meant receiving the Dread Pirate's taxes instead of having to pay them, meant comfort and riches beyond every stowaway's wildest dreams, meant power and respect enough to make the Leóro Kingdom willingly ignore you instead of having to stay hidden. It meant everything.

All for a few scales.

Nicau was a coward at heart, he knew that. He had only survived so long as he had because he was.

But Romei had survived equally long and gods, he wanted this.

"There might be enough for me to trace it," he said. She took that as approval and already started patting her pockets, tugging out a waterskin and enough scraps of food to last the night. "But I'll run out of mana soon and we won't be the only ones to think of this; are–" he paused, shivers crawling up his spine. "Are you sure?"

She brushed a hand over the old, ratted clothing both of them had scrounged from back streets, the hollows under both their eyes and the wrists she could wrap her fingers around. The Dread Crew had none of that.

"Let's go."