“We’ve talked about this before Franz. It was a stupid idea then and it’s still one now.”

Jean didn’t bother looking at the young man sitting next to him, instead glancing over the sparse decorations in the main room of the Royal Mage Hall. On top of being barren of any decorative flourishes, the dusty interior of Olivar’s branch of mages in Draughton was light in guests as well. Other than Jean and Franz sitting by one wall, the only other soul in the room was the old scribe, who was squinting at parchment held in the fickle sunlight trickling through the windows, occasionally muttering something to himself.

“It’s fine, Jean, don’t worry about it. That girl just didn’t have good taste! Hells, I can’t even remember her name, so not much of a loss.”

“That’s… not something to boast about. I do remember her laughing in your face when you read it out to her. Want me to put some money down for it happening again?”

“Such a downer, Jean, you’ve been around the Second Lieutenant too much. Come on, help me out here. I’m having trouble finding something to rhyme with ‘remember’.”

Sighing, Jean turned and grabbed the parchment Franz had been scribbling on. Giving the man’s ‘poetry’ a cursory glance, he hummed as if he was deep in thought before dropping it back into Franz’s lap.

“You might not want to call a dragon ‘delicate’. Other than that, it’s wonderful, I’m moved.”

Franz gave a light shove with his shoulder in response to Jean’s deadpanning, before scratching out some words on the parchment. “Whatever, whatever, I shouldn’t have asked. Well, maybe I shouldn’t use delicate… Strong and wise as the mighty oak? Hmm… maybe…”

Thankfully, Jean thought, the guardsman didn’t get any further in his ramblings as the scribe seated at the desk gestured the two men over with a gnarled hand, pointing them to the door that led to the private rooms of the Mage Hall. Pulling Franz along with him, Jean led him to the room they’d been to almost a week before, knocking on the door labeled MAGISTER.

It only took a moment before a woman’s voice called for them to enter. They obeyed, going into the small room. Well, Jean thought it likely a well-sized room, but wall to wall bookshelves overflowing with tomes, a massive desk in the center of the room, scattered pages and no doubt priceless magical baubles littering the floor tended to make any room feel a bit cramped. Well, at least he thought so.

“Alright, blonde one, hurry and take a seat. You, you can stay or leave, but there’s only one extra seat.”

“I’ll stand, don’t mind me.”

Replying to the Magister’s Assistant, Jean took his spot behind the stool Franz was making his way to. Jean couldn’t decide if he liked Magister Wixon or his assistant, Lunia, more. Each were a bother in their own way, but he supposed Lunia was easier to deal with. Where Wixon would get sidetracked from a single thought about some field of magic every other sentence, Lunia never dawdled. And Jean could handle her not knowing his name, despite being introduced to him multiple times over the last few years.

Franz didn’t seem to agree with his sentiments, though, as he was already fidgeting in his stool as Lunia sorted through a drawer in the massive bureau she sat at. The purple-haired woman found what she was searching for, and pulled out a reddish brown bound tome and placed it on the top of a pile of important looking letters. Adjusting her glasses, she opened it and began flipping through the heavy volume, the action scattering the topmost parchments from the precarious mountains on her desk.

Well, Jean reflected, as much as the Magister and his assistant differed in personality, they were still mages. And while he hadn’t met more than a dozen mages in his life on Ethera, most of them had seemed terribly unorganized. Well, that was probably an understatement. It’s not like they couldn’t be in control of their personal belongings if they wanted to, Jean thought. Rather, they probably didn’t notice. The magic messed with their minds a bit. Jean was probably safe; he had learned only a few basic utilitarian spells from Trakov and a few of the older guards… nothing intricate enough to make him like… like a mage.

Eh… I’m sounding like Trakov now, the tradeoff a mage makes is probably worth the cost. Probably.

“Um, Miss Lunia, how are you today?”

For the first time since Jean and Franz had entered the room, the mindmage raised her head and inspected Franz through her spectacles. Blinking once, she responded, expression remaining neutral.

“Adequate, I suppose.”

Mon pauvre… well, it’s a wonder that Franz isn’t already trying to sweet talk her. The list of the women he doesn’t go after is countable on a hand or two… Jean glanced at the back of his friends head, his shoulder length golden hair hiding his expression from where Jean was standing. Let’s see, the Captain, Flora, now Lunia, that madwoman that always hangs around the Cove drinking, hmm… Jean knew it wasn’t limited to single girls, widows or married women. Franz had never cared about that at all, although Trakov and Jean had tried their damndest to curve that last inclination as much as they could, especially after a certain incident involving a 16 year old Franz and a baker’s wife. Clearing his mind of those idle thoughts, Jean also addressed Lunia.

“Miss Lunia, may I ask after the Magister?”

Swivelling her gaze to him, she pushed her glasses up again. Like a child inspecting an ant. Jean pushed the instinctive thought from his mind, and kept his polite smile steady.

“The Master is away from Draughton currently.”

Jean nodded and asked, “Official Magister business, then? Must be busy as his assistant.”

The woman hummed for a moment before looking down at the page she’d stopped on in the leather bound tome.

“Master Wixon told me he was visiting a few old friends in Baralis. An Archmage Enae, something about reviewing a dissertation.”

Both Jean and Franz jolted in their spots slightly at that. Jean didn’t have a full life in the Olivar Kingdom, and he had never traveled to Baralis, the Kingdom’s capital to their southwest, but even he had heard of Archmage Enae. You couldn’t live in the Kingdom and be ignorant of the half-elf Archmage. Jean knew she held a position in the King’s personal retinue, as well as being an esteemed professor in the Royal Mage Academy. Well, those didn’t have much impact compared to the title of Archmage, the highest honor any mage could obtain, at least on this continent. Franz seemed more shocked than Jean, but he was still the first to address Lunia.

“THE Archmage Enae? You know, the, the-”

“I would believe so. Master Wixon and the other Archmages are gathering in the capital to review a study written by some younger professor. From what I understood, it was about the inherent magical properties of the lizardkin from the marshlands, and how they manifest. The Master seemed to think the mage writing it just had an unnatural fondness for lizards.”

“That- the- other Archmages?”

“Indeed. Although I suspect Master Wixon doesn’t care much for any of the others. Archmage Enae is the only one he speaks of to me.”

Franz moved his mouth, nothing coming out, unsure what to address first. Chuckling slightly, Jean briefly thanked any and all gods that he hadn’t lived in this world an entire lifetime, and so didn’t much feel the gravity of what Lunia had told them.

“Magister Wixon is an Archmage? Amazing, really! Although perhaps you shouldn’t be telling us about his trip’s agenda…”

Jean gave the assistant mage his usual polite smile as Franz quieted down a bit, also awaiting her response.

“It matters little. Master Wixon does not speak much of his title, but the likes of you two knowing will not change anything. He might be approaching senility, but Master is still the nation’s foremost fire evoker. Not many could do much to disturb his plans.”

Lunia adjusted her round spectacles resting near the tip of her nose, and gave Jean a neutral stare.

“Besides, given his and the other Archmage’s tendencies, I believe they will spend most of the time gossiping as old hens are prone to do. At the very least, I suspect he will return with orders relevant to our situation.”

“I… see.”

Both Franz and Jean digested her words, more than she had said to them in their previous meeting and more than Jean had ever heard from her mouth in any single sitting previously. Both men could easily see Magister Wixon gossiping like a seasoned housemaid, but neither were sure what to make of the famed half-elf Archmage doing the same. Lunia filled the silence after a few moments, flipping one page forward in the tome that still rested in front of her on the bureau.

“Well, I suppose we have spoken of Magister Wixon’s vacation enough. We should begin with your lesson. Any pressing questions relating to dragons before I begin?”

Franz began asking a question, though Jean thought he heard the slightest bit of emotion creep into Lunia’s tone as she said the word ‘vacation’. It was much too slight to know for sure, but Jean smiled to himself at the thought.

“Er, Lunia, is it true that there’s a dragon living in the forest… with a Moniker?”

“Hmm. It seems you have already been informed of some things by… the brown-haired one here.”

“Jean,” Jean supplied helpfully.

“I suppose we can start there, I will be thorough to make sure… Jean has not given you any misinformation. After that I will tell you of what records we have on dragonkind, starting with the basics of their magic and typical personality traits common to the species. That should be enough for today.”

Franz nodded meekly, remaining close lipped. Both men watched the mage flip forward in the book, settling on a yellowish page near the end.

“What you have heard is true, the dragon residing in the forest near us does indeed have a Moniker. There are two dragons with Monikers that we know for sure: the Drifting Death and the one that is nested in the forest, the Divine’s Pyre, both a result of the Great War 506 years ago between humans and dragons. Scholars of the war seem to believe there is a third Moniker among dragons, but we only know of the two for sure.”

As Lunia spoke the two Monikers, some of her mana was released into the cramped office, invisible to Jean but felt nonetheless. Monikers were one of the few things in this world, he knew, that would use one’s mana without fail regardless of race. Even humans, the race with the least magic potential where many individuals did not even contain sufficient reserves or control to cast a single Magelight spell, would always have mana extracted when uttering a Moniker.

Jean was sure that it was a question to keep one up at night in this world. Well, it didn’t keep him up any, but he was sure all those magical theorists in the capital and in the Elven academies across the sea were tossing and turning all the way to dawn.

“As you might know, a Moniker is gained only through wide reaching and impactful actions against a species or culture. It is, essentially, a representation of a mix of fear, respect, and pure terror from a large group of individuals. Also, since gaining a Moniker is reliant on the weight of the collective magical properties of the group afflicted by the individual, it is usually communities of highly magical species who inadvertently create them.”

Lunia paused a moment and glanced up through her purple bangs to see if Franz had anything to ask, but continued once he stayed silent.

“Then you likely understand the… unique precedence these two Monikers have. Since humans have so little magical potential across any country or culture, those two are the only Monikers recorded to have risen from human societies. And both occurred in the same decade, on the same continent. Tell me, do you two know of other individuals with Monikers?”

Jean couldn’t honestly say he did, only learning about the two dragons a few years before after becoming an officer. His lack of historical understanding had been a sore point between he and Trakov, but that sort of education took time and had to be started from the ground up for a Traveler sent to this world as an adult. As he said nothing, however, Franz gave an answer.

“Well, there was the Scorcher of Fates, around the same time as the Great War… and I think one of my father’s partners from north of the Spine mentioned another - Spiral something or other, from the Spiral Isles?”

“The Spiral Scourge, is likely what you are speaking of.” Without seeing Franz’s nod of affirmation, Lunia continued. “Both of those Moniker bearers were actually humans, and both were created as the result of the peril of a different race they clashed with. The Conclave of Elvish Seers for the first Moniker, and the Drowned Men of the Spiral Sea for the second.”

Both Jean and Franz nodded along, understanding the implications the mage was trying to stress. Monikers emerged as a result of monumental acts of destruction, often turning points in grand conflicts, and were derived from the collective mana of many individuals. To obtain Monikers from humans required either an enormous amount of people or many individuals skilled in magic; likely both. War was obviously where the majority of Monikers were born, and once born they could not be unborn; the individual would forever move with a certain force behind them.

“The answer is, of course, yes. The dragon nested near Draughton for the last half-millenia is the Divine’s Pyre, and for the other Monikered dragon its whereabouts have remained unknown. I expect you both understand the necessity of handling its child with extreme care, as despite 500 years of peaceful coexistence, most dragons have been known to be quite fickle, easily annoyed, and not too fond of humans. That is why, of course, we shall be going through all direct interactions with dragons we have recorded, so you can have a greater grasp of its potential temperament…..”

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GOD. HER TEMPERAMENT, SOMETIMES---no; breathe in, hold, hold, breathe out. Total zen, Mia, you are one with the universe. Fwaaa~

I unclenched my jaw, slowly opening my eyes to look at my mother. Rehm was staring at me, red and gold eyes unblinking and unreadable.

“Is that all? Already lesser than a hatchling just a week into the world?”

I turned my grumpy glare on my little brother who was sitting upright on his hind legs by the pond, his lizard-like expression a mix of pride and embarrassment. Crossing my arms I kept myself from meeting Rehm’s steadfast gaze.

“It’s only because he’s a full dragon, I bet. If we were the same I wouldn’t have a problem.”

“Hmm? That sounds like an excuse, child. Excuses will do nothing but invite the pity of others, fufufu.”

I gently uncrossed my arms, rubbing my bruised shoulder as I did the same for my bruised ego. My brother was already stronger than me, physically, magically, almost every way that mattered. And Rehm seemed delighted by that fact.

“If we were racing, I’d win every time, you know. I make him look like a crumbling gargoyle in the air…”

There was at least that one thing I could hold onto. And by god I’d hold onto it for dear life. I wasn’t about to let my new sibling beat me in every part of dragon-ing.

“It’s true Mother, big sis is much better in the air than I…”

I internally praised my faithful brother, silently promising him a treat later.

“I suppose that is true… I suppose your sister can always flee from other dragons.”

My mouth curling into a grimace, I gave the massive scarlet dragon in front of me a kick with a clawed foot. I Immediately regretted the decision, as Rehm’s scales were like a wall of solid rock; likely harder than that, even. She gave me a single playful, lazy wink and shifted herself to lay on the edge of the pond that dominated one third of the enclosure.

“Fufufu… my children, it was decided when I last returned here. We are departing in 10 days for the gathering. I hope each of you is ready? Or maybe one of you has decided on a name?”

I joined my brother and Rehm by the pond, sitting on the soft grass with my feet slightly submerged in the chilly water of early autumn. My brother answered, voice slightly abashed.

“I do not have one yet Mother, I apologize. Even with what you have taught me so far, I am still unsure…”

“Do not fret, child. There is still time.”

Hah, he’s still so scared of Mother. C’mon, it’s been like a week already!! I eyed the dragon hatchling on my left, still shorter than me with his oversized head. Jabbing his soft belly playfully but with quite a lot of force, I answered as he shot me a nervous look.

“I have decided on a name, Mother, one I like from the language you have been teaching us.”

In the week since Rehm had returned from speaking with Elder Jyun about the gathering, she had been teaching us a language specifically geared towards magic. It was, apparently, aptly named Magetongue. I didn’t know much at this point, but it seemed it was a mess of hundreds of other languages, living and dead, pried open and ripped apart like carrion for any words with significance in incantations. There were words from Teran, the human language, as well as some from several lizard dialects and a few very difficult to pronounce guttural beastkin words, but the majority of the language consisted of a mix of Elven, Draconic, and Dwarvish dialects.

From what I gleaned during her explanation the first night Rehm had taught us, using Magetongue when incanting and casting magic gave a spell extra power. For the higher races at least. Races like humans didn’t use it much, as for them it seemed to trade speed and ease of control for scale and power, but to me and the two dragons next to me, it seemed the drawbacks were nonexistent.

“You have decided on a name? Wonderful, child, what are you considering?”

Giving the massive dragon lounging next to me a petulant glance, I winked at her before retorting.

“Well, I suppose you’ll just have to wait and find out in 10 days!”

Pausing before letting a chuckle rise from deep in her chest, Rehm didn’t care to press the subject.

“Just be prepared, my children. A gathering is a time for judgement, for evaluation; especially for those yet named. It will only be the two of you choosing names, so take care when I am preoccupied with my duties.”

“Okay.”

“Yes, Mother.”

Rehm gave her usual sign of wanting to discontinue a conversation, shifting her forearms and propping her head away from us. I heard my brother, still unsure of his name, muttering words and phrases quietly through our telepathic connection, and I turned to face him, leaning on our mother’s tail and giving him my lighthearted opinions on any words he brought up. Even later in the evening, as he started repeating names he’d already tried, he couldn’t find one that fit, so he went to sleep slightly troubled. When I shut my eyes some time after, wedged between two mana-warm dragons, I wondered briefly if choosing a name would change anything; and if this relaxing life would simply carry on, unaltered by a trifle like a gathering of dragons.