Caerus didn't look at her like a man looks at a beauty. It was the look of a collector eyeing a rare, shiny trinket for a vault.

Yulia went limp in his grip. If the end was coming, she wasn't going to waste energy fighting it.

"She... she can't..." Giotto's face burned a deep crimson against the lace of his dress. His words tripped over each other as he gestured wildly. "She's not... she won't... work for that..."

The dragon let out a low, vibrating huff. It translated perfectly: Are you trying to teach me my business?

Obsidian wings snapped open, kicking up a gale that nearly knocked the girls off the altar. Caerus surged into the air, leaving the cramped platform behind.

"Princess Yulia!" Giotto's scream faded into a tiny pinprick of sound.

The ground fell away, turning the massive stone Temple of Abyss into a scale model. Yulia hung from his talons, staring down at the sprawling spires and molten rivers.

This view would cost a thousand dollars for a front-row seat back home.

They touched down on a high terrace overlooking the volcanic vents. Caerus leaned in, his golden eyes narrowing until they were mere slits of molten light.

"If you'd vomited, I would have dropped you."

He didn't wait for a reply, turning his massive bulk toward the dark, jagged entrance of a cave.

Yulia scrambled to follow, her boots clicking against uneven stone. Deep chasms of bubbling magma lined the path, sending waves of suffocating heat upward. It felt like walking into the center of a blast furnace.

"What are you waiting for?" Caerus reached a central island of rock and looked back, wings half-furled.

Yulia stopped at the edge of a three-foot gap. She looked at the drop, then back at him. "No wings. I don't fly."

The dragon's snout wrinkled in a clear expression of annoyance. "You can't even use Levitation?"

"Nope."

He let out a sharp, impatient hiss.

Yulia offered a small, hopeful smile. "You know, if I'm too much trouble... you could just kill me."

Caerus stared at her for a long, silent beat. "Who... exactly... are you?"

"I guess... your wife?".

The dragon snatched her up and tossed her onto the cold stone slab in the center of the island.

"Shut up. Sleep."

Yulia braced for a strike, but the massive wing descended like a heavy, velvet curtain. Darkness swallowed the room.

She was a small bird tucked under a mountain of obsidian scales.

Seconds passed. Then minutes. A slow, rhythmic thrumming vibrated through the stone bed.

He was breathing. Long, deep, and steady.

He's actually sleeping. He dragged me here just to be a pillow?

Yulia reached out, her fingers brushing the scales. They were hot, radiating a deep, internal fire. The steady heartbeat acted like a lullaby, and her own eyelids grew heavy.

She woke to darkness and the same steady rhythm. The dragon hadn't moved.

"Lord Caerus?" she whispered.

No answer.

She tried to push against the wing, but it was like trying to move a brick wall. Her stomach let out a sharp, hollow growl.

The blood drained from her face. If he slept for a decade, she'd be a skeleton before he even blinked.

"Wake up! Seriously, wake up!" she yelled, her voice echoing in the small, feathery space.

"Kill me if you want, just don't let me starve to death!".

A sharp chirp-chirp cut through her panic.

Flame-colored feathers rustled just outside the wing.

Through a narrow gap in the obsidian wings, Yulia locked eyes with a pair of emerald beads.

"Are you the noise-canceling girl Lord Caerus brought back?" the voice chirped.

...Noise-canceling?

Yulia didn't overthink the term. She didn't even blink at the fact that a red-feathered bird was talking to her.

"Are you the dragon's pet?" Yulia whispered. "Do me a favor and wake your master up."

The bird's chirps turned into an indignant screech.

"I'm not a pet! You're the pet!" The creature flapped its wings, its temper flaring. "I am a divine servant—the Great Ollie! The world's only phoenix!"

Ollie puffed out his crimson chest. "Disrespecting the phoenix of Lord Caerus? I won't help you! Just wait for him to crush you like a grape!"

That would actually be a relief, Yulia thought.

The bird turned to fly away. Yulia's hand moved on instinct, her fingers tracing a sigil in the air.

"Binding Spell."

Golden chains manifested from thin air, wrapping around the bird. The phoenix froze in mid-flight, a feathered statue suspended in the dark.

Yulia stared at her glowing fingertips.

Wow.

Still waiting on my Hogwarts letter, but this works.

"Aaaaaah!" Ollie couldn't move, but he could still scream.

"You—you—you dare use magic on me? This is blasphemy! Do you even know who Lord Caerus is? He's—"

Ollie caught himself and pivoted back into a tantrum. "You're dead, human! Lord Caerus will pluck your soul when he wakes up!"

Yulia's memories clicked into place. According to the game's lore, her talent was second only to Daisy's, making her the strongest mage currently active on the continent.

She focused, casting a Strength Augmentation on her right arm.

She shoved the heavy, obsidian wing aside. Yulia squeezed through and sucked in a breath of fresh, volcanic air.

Ollie went quiet, his eyes tracking her with a new, sharp fear.

"Don't be scared," Yulia said, crouching down with a smile. "I just have a few questions... what was your name again?"

"Insolent human! You forgot the name of the Great Aureon?"

Western names were a nightmare for her memory. Yulia shrugged.

"Sure thing, Lord Oreo."

Ollie's beak dropped open. "Oreo?"

"Now, Lord Oreo, why did you call me the 'noise-canceling girl'?"

The bird puffed out his chest, arrogance winning over his confusion. "You really don't know, you stupid girl?"

"Clueless," Yulia said, keeping her smile bright. "Enlighten me, Great Lord Oreo."

"It's Ollie!"

He hated the name, but he hadn't been complimented in centuries.

"Lord Caerus hears every prayer on the continent," Ollie whispered. "It's a constant roar in his head. But the moment he touches you... the voices stop."

Yulia tilted her head. She was a living pair of noise-canceling headphones.

Ollie opened his beak to continue, but no sound came out.

His body stiffened. His feathers stood on end like needles.

Lord Caerus had muted him.

"I see." Yulia patted the bird's head.

"Thanks, little Oreo. Hope your master doesn't pluck you bald for leaking his secrets."

Ollie's eyes welled with tears.

Yulia didn't break the binding. She recalled the mental notes for a Levitation spell and floated across the lava chasm, her silk skirts fluttering.

Once she was gone, the golden eyes on the stone bed slowly opened.

"Lord... Caerus..." Ollie whimpered as the dragon sat up.

A single flick of an obsidian wing shattered the golden chains.

"Idiot," Caerus rumbled.

Ollie clutched his tail feathers. "Why didn't you stop me sooner? I haven't talked to a human in years! I didn't know!"

Caerus didn't answer. He wouldn't admit that he'd been in the deepest sleep he'd had in three hundred years.

Until the bird started squawking.

"Ollie. Find her."

The phoenix flapped his wings. "And then?"

"Bring her back." Caerus let out a slow, heavy yawn.

He'd give her a thousand steps of grace. If she ran past a thousand, he'd crush her head.

If she stayed within the limit... he'd drain her dry and turn her into a specimen for his vault.