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Fenna swallowed. "Then we don’t let anyone find out. Not guilds, not traders, not even healers, I got power to heal. We will never take Star to any healing centre. If we take him... the healer will find out. Hollowback Hatchkin stays on his cover."
Zephyr exhaled. "We’ll need to be smarter. Careful. No full power public battles unless absolutely necessary. No letting him breathe full flame."
Fenna reached out and ran fingers gently across Star’s warm flank. "We’ll protect him. Both of us. He’s ours."
Zephyr looked at her, eyes fierce with loyalty. "No one takes him. No matter what."
Muse lumbered closer, sniffed Star, then looked at Zephyr with an expression startlingly maternal—Your baby grew fast.
Zephyr chuckled despite tension. "Fine. Point made."
Light spilled fast now, turning basalt walls full golden. Fenna rummaged in her herb pouch for quick-boil root and set a kettle on the re-stoked coals. The smell of minty bark and leftover tiny piece of charfruit peel wafted, calming overtaxed nerves.
"Eat," she ordered. They split the last moss biscuits—food Muse hadn’t yet claimed—and chewed in thoughtful silence.
Aurora fluttered down to Star’s snout, poking him with her talon. When he didn’t stir, she chirped softer, pushed her little forehead against his scale. Warm glow haloed her down. She wasn’t worried; she sensed life pulsing strongly.
Fenna watched. "She wants to guard him until he wakes. How thoughtful."
Zephyr nodded, finishing dry biscuit crumbs. "Then we use the lull. We need a plan."
They sat around the firepit, the light now mellow gold as the sun peeked over the Emberwood basin’s char-streaked edge.
Zephyr stirred the coal ashes with a stick, sighing as the last heat died. "We were supposed to train here. Stock up, stabilize, get stronger. Not lose our entire food supply to our own drake."
Muse snorted. Not in anger—just offended that she didn’t have anything to eat.
Aurora, barely the size of a melon, hopped into Fenna’s lap and gave a short chirp of concern. The phoenix chick didn’t understand, but she sensed the tension.
Star curled nearby, oblivious. A gentle whuff of smoke rolled from his nostrils as his tail thumped once, dream-dazed.
Zephyr exhaled, fingers tracing the char-scroll they’d spread out.
It outlined the Emberwood Basin. River routes, sulfur pits, cave nests. Danger zones marked by clawed Xs. They’d built it over the past week with real work and risk and some information from before they came here.
And now?
"We need food, again." Zephyr said simply.
Fenna nodded. "Not just for us. He’s evolving faster than any beast I’ve seen. If that hunger returns—"
"He might try biting a tree," Zephyr muttered, then added darkly, "or Muse."
The cow, now chewing tree bark behind them, looked up as if her ears twitched with suspicion. You want to take my bark... no. Find your own bark.
Zephyr’s gaze drifted to the empty satchel again. "Do you think," Zephyr asked softly, "he will evolve faster if we feed him more beast cores?"
Fenna blinked, eyes wide. "What? Are you serious? Zephyr... many Beast Tamers kill their companions doing that. Feeding them more cores than they can handle... it’s not just risky. It’s a death sentence if the beast can’t regulate the energy surge."
Zephyr didn’t answer immediately. He kept his gaze low, staring at the soot-smudged satchel beside his feet.
"I know," he murmured. "But... He’s not like the others," he said, voice quiet but firm.
Fenna glanced over, her brows raised.
"Star isn’t just some mutated Hollowback or rare affinity wyrmling," Zephyr went on. "He’s a real dragon. A legendary species. That kind of hunger, that kind of growth—it’s because he can handle it. His bloodline demands it."
Fenna folded her arms, letting the weight of his words settle.
"But that also means his appetite’s going to grow with every rank," she said. "We’re already out of supplies. What happens when he hits rank C? Or B? You’ll need three or four rank-C beast cores each day just to nudge his teeth."
Zephyr didn’t flinch. "We don’t rush. If we find the right cores, we feed him. If not, we wait. Simple as that."
She stared at him. "Simple? You’re acting like D-rank cores fall out of the sky. Where exactly are we finding those without fighting?"
"We’re in Emberwood," Zephyr replied, tapping the burned crater with his heel. "If there’s any place with rare, unstable, fire-touched beasts—it’s here."
Fenna gave a small sigh, half-annoyed, half-convinced. "It’s reckless, Zephyr."
"It’s a calculated risk," he said. Then smiled faintly. "Very calculated. Maybe." Then he kissed Fenna’s cheeks. She melted there.
From beside the nest, a chirping voice suddenly chimed in. The Emberling went back to Star while they were talking.
"Aurora!" the phoenix chick announced proudly, hopping up on her tiny claws. She flapped both wings at once—almost enough lift to knock over the cup beside Fenna’s foot.
Zephyr turned, startled. "Did she just—join the conversation?"
"She does that now," Fenna said dryly. "Star growth sparks a fire inside her."
Aurora chirped again, more insistent this time, flaring her small wings with determination. Then she turned her gaze toward Star, now fully visible (from mist) and still snoring faintly, his scaled chest rising and falling in coils of steaming breath.
"She wants to grow big too," Zephyr said, smiling in disbelief.
Fenna crouched and scratched beneath Aurora’s beak, gentle. "Don’t worry, little flame. We’ll feed you too. But no chewing on random monster cores. Got it?"
Aurora puffed up her chest, then chirped a proud, short note—as if to say, "Understood! But also, I want snacks."
Zephyr shook his head. "Great. Now we’ve got two mouths to evolve and no food."
"Three," Fenna corrected, with a meaningful glance at Muse.
The cow, halfway through chewing on her fourth mouthful of bark, glanced up innocently, eyes wide. "Iam eating bark for breakfast, when will you give me food? Zephyr."
"Alright," Zephyr sighed. "Today’s priorities: hunt something big, with fat meat, and a core. Anything less, and we’re eating moss stew tonight."