Claw and Ophira 3: Light Hummerby Dungeon

After the Monsters were dead, Ophira wiggled out of Claw's arms. She wasn't going to let the forest catch on fire, even if he was more concerned about killing the monsters. She took off one of her boots. it was already wet so she used it to collect water. She was going to try and stop the fire at least.

Claw started stomping out flames. "I didn't mean to do this... I liked the forest." he was flame proof and so he was just slapping the base of the fire.

She emptied the boot full of water onto the fire they had previously started. "I am more worried that the forest has a keeper of some sort... One that would be displeased that their forest was on fire." In stories, it was common for there to be a forest spirit or such entity, and as royalty it had been important for her to know how to NOT piss them off. Ophira pulled her boot back on. "We need to move as far from here as we can." Even if there wasn't an entity coming, the smoke had obviously attracted monsters and would likely attract more.

Claw frowned. "OOOh. Yeah... those tend to not appreciate accidents." He smacked the flames until they died down. " I like the running away plan. That's a good plan." He transformed into his full dragon form. "Do you want a lift? I think it would be faster."

Ophira paused in hesitation for a moment before giving a slow nod. "Alright." She knew she could touch him.. but there was always the lingering fear that her touch would hurt him. "Where.. would be the best place to sit?" With the wings and bendiness, she wouldn't want to be in the way or thrown off.

"uh." Claw fluttered his wings for a second. "On my shoulders,above my wings." He gestured to the spot with his tail. "That bit isn't too wiggly."

There was another slow nod as she accepted the information. Carefully, Ophira climbed up onto the large dragon. Once her initial fear of the touch was conquered, she wrapped her arms around him as best she could and leaned against his scales. It was.. interesting. "I am ready.. I think." She hadn't ever ridden a dragon (or anything) bareback. Even riding horses as a child she'd been given a saddle. She only hoped she wasn't too foolish in her position.

"If you feel like you're going to fall, tell me... oh, and you can hang onto my hair too." Normally he wouldn't want anyone really messing with it... but Ophira was Ophira, and she was an exception to the rule. her safety was more important than his do. he slowly rose in the air, both pairs of wings fluttering softly. He wanted to adjust her to the flying before he actually got going.

Oh right his hair. Ophira repositioned herself slightly and snuggled into his long curly hair. It smelt nice... that would be odd to say though.. "Okay.. I believe I am secured."

"Okay, good, I'm going to actually like start flying now." The dragon took to the air, rising just above the trees. "Okay, so where are we going??" he asked as he flew along. It was weird to have someone on his back, but not horrible.

"We... were looking for a river.. right?" She was still damp from falling in the water and sort of hid in his hair as they moved. Ophira regretting that warming up by a fire had kind of failed.

"yeah." Claw squinted a the ground covered in trees. "Humans like water."

"Yeah..." Ophira sighed softly. "This is nice.. Your hair is really soft... It was an interesting contrast to his scales... She kind of wanted to touch his wings.. but that would be rude while they were in use....

Claw was glad smushing lemons into his hair every other night had paid off. All those hours, and all those times he'd gotten lemon juice in his eyes.... "Thank you~. I try and take care of it." He proudly continued his flight.

To be fair lemons probably didn't help his hair to be any softer, but if it made him happy then it didn't matter. Ophira was just happy and snuggled into the hair some more.

The area started to change, it became less and less forested.. and they approached a great pool of water, with rivers extending like arms. "Ohh, Ophira, you wanna go down there??"

Golden eyes struggled to see past the hair flying next to her face. "Ah! You found a river! Yeah, we should stop."

"Okay, hold on!" the dragon dove down into the lagoon area, landing on the soft ground.

Ophira's grip on his hair tightened slightly and she buried her face in his hair again as they went down. After they had landed, it took her a few moments for her to move from her position. Then she paused looking at his wings for a moment. They really were pretty, but she couldn't bring herself to ask to touch them. It was just too awkward. She slid off of his back and looked up at him with an awkward smile. "Thank you... That was really nice."

Claw grinned and poofed back to 'human'. He waved his hands in a jazz hand motion, then bowed. "Thank you~. I am glad you liked it." He smiled then glanced around. "ooh... This is pretty..."

"The ground looks like cotton candy.." Her brows moved together. What a strange place. ".. It is fairly pretty though." She was still mildly damp, but the hot August air had dried her off quite a bit while they flew. "So follow the river?" Ophira smiled up at Claw.

Claw thought for a moment, wiggling his toes around in the ground. "I like it... The river is one of our best bets to finding people~."

Ophira gave a nod and looked at the large lily pads along the river. She wondered... Perhaps. Carefully she jumped onto the nearby lily pad, breathing a sigh of relief as it not only held her weight, but remained lively and green. She then hopped to the next one.

Claw watched the queen and fluttered along after her. He followed and smiled. " having fun??"

"I believe so... You should tr-" As the golden girl jumped from one pad to the next, she found that the lily pad was less stable than the previous ones had been and landed in the water with a splash.

Claw blinked and dived in after her, grabbing her by the elbows to get a good grip. " are you okay??"

TOUCHING. Ophira went stiff, her uncontrollable first thought being that she was going to gold her best friend and loose him forever. It took her a moment to breathe and look over. He was fine. She tried to remember to breathe than coughed up water. when did that get in her lungs? "I-I'm fine." Her golden head bobbed in an attempted nod to reassure her friend between coughing.

Claw brought her back to land. "Okay... Why don't you cough up some water...and not drown...."

"Y-yeah.." She coughed up some more water and pushed her hair out of her eyes. "I.. should not be so reckless."

" its... Its okay.... Sometimes its good to relax some.." he watched. " juuust maybe not here."

She coughed a bit as she laughed. "I suppose n-not." Even so she was smiling as she wobbled into a standing position. "I find it very easy to relax with you though."

"Ehe... " he watched her to make sure she didn't fall on her butt. Claw folded his wings. "I am glad~. I feel pretty comfortable with you too. You're good." He hummed, thinking. "Maybe if I swim next to you on the lily pad.?"

Ophira gave a look to the steep canyon along the side of the river. It would open up eventually, but to follow they would have to take the river itself. She gave him a slight nod. "If you are comfortable swimming, I suppose that would work." A small smile formed and she added. "You are good too."

Claw grinned and slid into the water. " I am fine with swimming." It wouldn't help his hair any but eh. He waited for Ophira to make a move.

A deep breath first than Ophira took a couple steps back before doing a small run and jump at the nearest lily pad. Please don't turn to gold. After a successful landing, she continued onto the next one. "Is it exhausting to keep up forms other than your main one?"

Claw grinned. " it used to be. But I practiced. Now its like... scratching an itch... oor yawning on command." He swam along side her.

Ophira pondered if it was like yawning or being itchy the whole time he was anything other than a dragon. "Sounds complicated."

" it's magic. Magic can be funky." Claw fluttered his wings .

"What are wings like?" She hopped to the next lily pad, it wobbled a bit but stabilized as she went on to the next. "They look very soft."

Claw looked over his shoulder at his wings. "They are like extra arms. They help me get around." He nodded. "Yeah. Thanks I try and take care of them." Claw paused to make sure her recovery was true.

"Are feathers harder to care for?" Ophira appeared to be hopping alright now. Though the talking did break her focus, she was curious about dragon things. Claw didn't talk too much about his home or family before they left... Always just scattered bits of information. She wanted to hear from him.

"They have oils you gotta be careful of." Claw smiled. "Its not too hard."

"Oils...? Similar to the ones in hair?" Landing on a lily pad she stopped to look over a flower growing from the pad.

"Yep." He swam along, his big dumb head looking over her shoulder at the flower.

"Interesting..." Her brows moved together slightly as her words pushed through the modest wall was her censor. "Do you think it would be odd if I wanted to... Touch them?" In her mind she was insistently listing off how she hadn't been able to touch soft things for so long that to ask wasn't so odd.. But she couldn't will anymore words out, nor could she seem to pull her gaze from the flower even though she was done with it.

Claw blinked. "Touch...? Uhm... I dunno. If you wanna I will let you..." he leaned closer to her ear and half whispered. He wasn't sure why. " just be kinda.. careful not to pull a feather..."

Welp, that was enough to get her blushing again. "Tlaeuv...." She turned her head slightly to face him and spoke in barely a whisper so that only he would be able to hear her. "I will always be careful with you... You are too special to me... If.. You don't want me to though... I will not press the issue again.. But I will never willingly bring harm to you...."

Claw turned a more vibrant red. " You're... veryspecialltometoo..uhm... " He paused " Uhm Yeah. Okay. It's okay if you touch them." He curved his body slightly and moved closer. AAAAAAAAAND was still making sure the queen didn't fall and drown. that was important.

Her hands moved to her chest and the golden girl had to remind herself to breathe. Ophira knew that her warm cheeks meant that she was stupidly embarrassed about something so simple... but then.. Claw had been so uncharacteristicly uncomfortable with the idea that she wondered if it was a dragon thing? Slowly her golden fingers reached for the wing closest to her, pausing slightly just before contact as she had to remind herself that it was okay. There was nearly no pressure at all from her fingers as she carefully ran them over the wing in her overly cautious caress, "They're.. lovely,"

Claw watched, staying very still. that felt nice. "t-thanks." the dragon started to purr. it was a low rumbling sound, similar to that of a big cat purring. He looked at her in surprise. THAT WAS NEW-

The look of surprise instantly had her hands off of the wing. "Did I do something wrong?" She didn't hurt him.. right? Ophira was trying really hard to stay composed and not start panicking. She didn't want to hurt him.

"no... Uhm. That..." He looked away slightly, turning almost red. "that was purring. I think. Yeah."

Ophira was quiet. "Is purring bad?" She wasn't very familiar with pets or dragons so she'd never encountered such a reaction before... and a rumbling noise and surprised look from a dragon still didn't sit well with her... and her hands retracted back up to her chest.

"No, it's a happy noise." if dragons could look sheepish claw did so.

"Oh." Cue the color back into her cheeks. Ophira was sure she sounded like a fool. Looking down at her hands, she asked quietly. "Should... I do it more?"

"Uhm." Claw looked back. "Maybe... maybe when we're done crossing this water..." He didn't want to be sitting there purring one moment like a dumb cat and the next have his ... friend drown.

Ophira was quiet for a moment, the tucked her hair back behind her ear. "Yeah... Thank you for humoring my whim Tlaeuv." After a slight hesitation within herself, she gave the wing a quick kiss and bolted off to jump at the next couple lily pads. If she was fast enough he wouldn't see how red she was.

Claw followed after her in the water, still rather red. Oh well. "W-well~ anything for a queen, right?" He teased her slightly as he caught up.

"I'm not a queen anymore Tlaeuv." Ophira smiled and added. "I only want to do things that make you happy." She may have said more, but she bounced to a stop on her lily pad as three strange monsters approached One looked like the dragon butterflies from the woods.. but it was colored differently.. the others.. just looked like little puffs with wings.

"Oooohh they're kinda cute...." Claw lunged at the nearest puff, jaws opened wide. "I wonder if these taste good!"

The puff took damage, but managed to wiggle free of his jaws. Ophira rolled her eyes and attempted to hit the other puff with her gold.. but she failed to hit it. These guys were surprisingly resilient to magic...

Claw frowned and continued to snap at the little bug thing. He would have to taste all the new creatures here. It was a whole new world to taste. Yum. he kept his tail behind Ophira so she didn't fall into the water.

The golden girl was also frowning, but only because this was far more difficult than the woods had been. It had never actually been hard for her to gold living things before. She tried to take a step back and bumped into Claw's tail. slowly a layer of gold protection creeped onto the dragon.

Claw blinked at Ophira, halting his chase for a moment and nodding at her before returing to it. This puffy thing would be lunch.

And lunch it was! It had a lot of fur though and not much meat.

Claw spat out a furball. "ew. Too much fur. Don't eat these, Ophira." He went after the butterfly dragon next, ready for a snack he would actually enjoy.

Ophira tried to focus on forming a layer of gold around herself, she did nod to show she'd heard him... though she wouldn't have eatten it honestly. The monsters however revolted and returned attack, the puff shot.. silk at them and the hummerby used magic. luckily they were able to dodge both attacks.

Claw growled and bit the butterdragon. It wasn't really even worthy to be called a dragon. Such a little stupid thing.

One snack and a golden puff later, Ophira was catching her breath when two more puffs arrived, though both of them landed on Claw's head. Totally chilling in his hair and messing it up.

Claw blinked. "These ones are not attacking." He shook his head and muttered something. "well, they're getting my hair pretty good but other than that."

They bobbed a bit but remained on his head. Ophira laughed lightly and was about to start moving again when from out of nowhere a cat sized dragon dove at Claw. It missed but still it was enough to freak out the golden girl and make her jump.

Claw's delight at seeing the other dragon that, well, actually looked something like a dragon was short lived and died when he realized it was aiming for him. He hissed and swated at the thing with his tail.

Ophira cast her gold on the creature after Claw threw it off balance and it sunk into the water below the lily pads. "Maybe if we keep moving we can avoid being attacked as much.."

Claw nodded in agreement. "that sounds reasonable. Letsss keep going.... IF you want I can even ferry you."

"Are you sure?" Ophira eyed another one of the dragons running towards them and tried to gold it before it could attack.

Claw bit at the small dragon. "Sure, it might be faster." And maybe these things couldn't swim... These things are like dragons more."

As the lil thing died in the dragon's jaws. Ophira nodded and carefully climbed onto her friend. "Do.. dragons often have problems with swimming?"

"It's got tiny little front arms, I dunno." He didn't know. Maybe they wouldn't want their wings wet.

"Perhaps?" In all honesty though, she was really just enjoying having contact with another living being.. he could have said nearly anything and she would have likely agreed. She didn't notice that another tiny dragon was giving chase.

Claw noticed though. He had sharp ears. He swung his tail at the dragon, growling.

The growl alerted her to the oncoming danger and Ophira flung sharp bits of gold at it, sending it sinking into the water as well.