daisy the dragon saviour

The pet shop smells like birds and dog food, and Daisy's here to buy mice. Dead mice, preferably, as she'd rather not watch one of her snakes killing the poor little thing.

"Good afternoon, good sir", she jokes with Vihaan, the man behind the counter. He knows Daisy well enough to call her a friend, and he's already got her today's purchase prepared in the freezer.

"G'day, milady", Vihaan replies. "Where does your quest lead you today?"

"Nowhere new, I assure you. You have my mice?"

"I have more than mice. I've got an egg."

"An egg?" Daisy asks with disinterest, rummaging through her brown polka-dotted backpack to find a wallet.

"A huge one. The vet couldn't identify it, so I figured I'd let you take a guess."

"Oh?" she raises an eyebrow. "I just might." With almost six years of biology lessons behind her and a Bachelor degree in front of her, Vihaan spoke to the right person about the egg.

"Over here", Vihaan walks into the storage area in the back of the shop and Daisy obediently follows. She stops to pet some random animal, though, and Vihaan just laughs it off. When they make it to the egg, Daisy is very, very cross with herself. Because she has no clue what it might be. All that money that went to college was thrown away.

"I've literally seen nothing like this in my life." The egg is a bit taller and wider than her hand and it's dark green, the colour of a forest, and it's filled with red spots which look like they are perfect circles. Oh, and it has horse ears and two small horns. "Are these a part of the egg?" she asks and touches an ear gently. It twitches and Daisy considers migrating to Antarctica, or at least just running away. "What the freaking crap. What."

"Told you", Vihaan says, as confused as Daisy looks. She glances at him, then back at the egg.

"Man." He glances at her in confusion.

"Lady?"

"I mean, man." She emphasizes the last word. "You're joking with me, right? This is a hidden camera thing and you just made me believe that this egg has ears and horns. Right?"

"Honestly, I'm just as confused as you are." Daisy lets out a whine, pointing at the egg in a way you could only describe as dismissal. "I swear. The owner just came and left it here. Told me to find someone to take care of it, because we have no heaters in the store, and it seems to like heat."

"I have a heater. Wait, that's not important, I'm not taking it in. But then, who is? Not me, that's for sure", she argues with herself and Vihaan watches, just a tiny bit amused. She needs to stop herself, she thinks, before she adopts yet another animal, because that's apparently all she wants to do in life.

"So you're taking it?"

"Of course I'm taking it", Daisy snorts, "but only until it hatches. Then it's all yours and if it turns out to be something illegal, I am not connected with it in any way."

"You're the best", Vihaan tells her as he puts the egg in a paper bag, which has pillows in it, so that the egg doesn't move much.

"I know. How much do I owe you for mice?"

She'd been staring at it for a good half hour when she heard knocking.

"Come in", she shouts out, absentmindedly. Daisy hates not knowing, and right know she'd chop off her left ear and most of her shoulder-lenght hair to figure out what's in the egg. Granted, it's not a huge sacrifice, because she's part deaf on that ear, and hair grows, but she can't commit fully. Wait, she needs that ear to hold her glasses up. She'll wear contacts if she has to.

"Hey, Daise", a dark-skinned man walks in and plops onto the ground next to her. His name is Reggie and he's been her deskmate during classes ever since Daisy promised that her snakes will devour his rabbits. "Is this the egg?"

"Obviously", she says, without any snark to it. She put the egg directly in front of the heater in her small living room. Hey, at least she has a place. Reggie is still doomed to a student home, and he had to smuggle his three rabbits and, occasionally, girls, in.

"The hell is that?" he asks once he gets a clear view of the egg.

"Nobody knows, and neither do I. My summa cum laude is freakin' useless now, I can't even identify an egg."

"Maybe you'll be able to figure out the species when it hatches", Reggie suggests.

"That's what I'm doing now."

"Hatching?" Reggie asks with something resembling a smirk playing on his lips. Daisy either doesn't notice, or doesn't care to show him that she cares. Because, really, she doesn't. She considers herself to be more mature. As if.

"I'm watching the hatching."

"Whoa, Nelly. You might just become a Rap God with that attitude."

Daisy whacks Reggie's head with a slipper she took off her foot.

"I thought to do an all-nighter, perhaps clean the kitchen waiting for it to hatch", Daisy gets up from the floor, yawns and stretches. Her spine makes exactly the noise you'd expect knowing it belongs to a twenty-four-year-old college student who spends all day studying. "Gut tells me it's close."

"Of course it is. The shell's already cracked", Reggie carefully traces the egg, the place where the shell gave in to the ears and the horns. "I'll make you dinner, go lay down or something."

"Bless you", Daisy says, takes off her glasses and flops face first on the sofa. "Don't boil my snakes."

"Yin and Yang are in safe hands."

"I don't flippin' trust you."

"Snake meat tastes great, didn't you know?"

"Rabbit tastes even better."

The egg doesn't hatch that night, and Reggie makes a tasty, comforting salmon soup which they consume around two in the morning. They end up watching a rerun of a lukewarm sitcom and falling asleep on the sofa, stacked as delicately as an intense final round of Jenga blocks. When Reggie wakes up with a little help of an obnoxious military alarm from his phone, Daisy curses him, tells him that he'll burn in hell and that she's feeling betrayed as he left her as a one night stand. Reggie silently walks into her bedroom and finds a blanket, and when he covers Daisy with it, she falls asleep like a parrot.

He unlocks her phone (password: her birthday) and sets an alarm an hour from now. Leaves the flat and prepares for a yelling session from his dormmates.

Daisy wakes up with the alarm and wants to throw her beloved phone through the window. She fights the urge, though, and settles with checking her egg. It's too big, she decides, to be normal, and spends the rest of her morning eating salmon soup and going through the internet to find a mention of something so ridiculously big. And green. And horny. No, not in that way, one search catapults her into a cornucopia of porn sites the internet has to offer, and she closes it before the naked ladies have a chance to utter a moan and cause Daisy to get permanent brain damage. When she finds nothing, she switches to her textbooks, and finds even less there.

"What am I gonna do with you?" she asks the egg. The egg doesn't answer.

She texts Reggie and thanks him for the soup and tucking her in, and then spends the rest of the day working on her reptile anatomy. Not that she has reptile anatomy, she's just learning about it. Huh, it would be fun to be a reptile for a day.

This night she actually manages to fall asleep in her bed—looks like that thing has a use after all—but that doesn't last very long as she hears a crackle and immediately goes to check the egg (falls out of the bed, pushes herself up with a help of the bed frame, scrambles for her glasses, nearly trips over a slipper), worrying about what she will find.

She doesn't find very much. The egg has cracked, but not significantly, and the only change Daisy could see was a small crack on the bottom, and she had no idea how it came to be. Usually the top of the egg cracked first, because the animal would push through with its nose, and since she had a clue about the animal's position in the egg, the only thing that could have caused a crack would be a tail of sorts.

If it has a tail. Maybe it has two heads. Maybe it is just a giant head. Daisy wants to know as much as she doesn't, but she figures she'll find out soon enough.

Since she hasn't eaten anything solid for at least twenty four hours, she gets up to grab a cracker or something. The egg won't hatch in a minute it takes for her to reach the kitchen, right?

Wrong. As soon as she turns her back, there's more crackling and a huff, and Daisy turns on her heel to return to the egg. But it wasn't an egg anymore, it cracked fully and the top fell off, with two horn- and two ear-holes, revealing… what?

If Daisy had to describe it in any way, she'd say that it's a dragon. Only, it's not, because dragons don't exist. But if they did, Daisy would have it. It was either that or a snake with wings.

"Um", she says, and that's the most understated word she could muster up at the moment. It is the same colour like its egg, covered in lizard-like skin, it has a horn-ear situation going on on its head, and its eyes are set on Daisy, black and not moving. When it sneezes, it releases out fire like a cigarette lighter, and Daisy lets out a yelp.

Her phone is dug our from her back pocket and she calls Vihaan.

"G'mornin'. 'M not asleep."

"Help", she whines, "I have—" and then the dragon climbs out of its egg using its claws, waves its wings once and then Daisy has a dragon flying around her flat. "Call you later." She hangs up.

The dragon looks like it's having the time of its life. Well, until it hits a wall and plops onto the ground like roadkill.

"Careful!" Daisy exclaims and rushes to check if it is okay. "You're too young to be flying around like that!" Nevermind that the creature isn't real, its pain is, and Daisy intends to help. It raises its head helplessly and makes a cooing sound before ragdolling onto the floor. "Are you hurt?" The dragon clambers up back onto its feet and keeps on staring at Daisy.

She stretches her hand out, slowly, and the dragon blinks twice before curling up against her palm, and Daisy realises she's become a mom.

"Hey, baby", she whispers and picks it up. Its skin is warm and rugged in her hands, and with its snout upturned, Daisy tries to identify it as a hognose snake of some kind, but there's a slight hole in her plan, and it's that snakes don't usually have wings.

Internet is, again, the first place she thinks to look, and when she sits down in front of her laptop, she puts the dragon onto her thighs.

"You're not real", she reminds the dragon, who lounges in her lap. It makes a happy gurgle and buries its head between Daisy's knees.

First thing she looks for is dragon food, to feed the little thing, which, in the meantime, fell asleep. She finds nothing concrete, but she makes an interesting observation which is—she's not in the slightest terrified of the dragon. And she should be. Because it doesn't exist, and the fact that she's imagining it means that college has officialy fried her brain.

She decides to try and feed the dragon with mice once it wakes up. Maybe try to get it out onto a patch of grass and see if it's a herbivore. Although, people might look at her strangely when she claims that she's walking a dragon (dragging a leash behind her, dragon-less).

After picking up her phone to call Reggie, she decides against it, because it was around midnight at that point, and seeing that she's on an unplanned coffee cleanse, she picks the dragon up and does what she was meaning to do from the start—go to bed and sleep. And she does so, curling up with the creature as if it was a dog.

It doesn't matter, really. Because this was all a dream and the dragon wasn't real.

When she wakes up and there's a burnt hole in her sheets and a knock on the front door, she knows she's in trouble.

First she scrambles around the flat to find the little, wiry thing, and finds it in front of her snake enclosure, staring at her two snakes with big and wide eyes.

"If you eat my snakes I will eat you", she threatens the dragon and it huffs at her. "Behave", she warns it and heads for the door.

In front of her place stood a short, tan woman who had sunken-in cheeks and tiny lips, pressed together in a particularly judgemental way.

"Daisy Argos?" she asks.

"Yes?" Daisy asks. She's not lucid enough; it's too early in the morning to notice that the woman in question is wearing clothes centuries old, or that her eyes are a fetching shade of purple.

"What an unfortunate name", the woman sighs. She pushes her way inside, past Daisy, and if Daisy had not been sure that she could take that woman in a wrestling match, she wouldn't have let her in.

Then she gets a great idea. If the woman sees the dragon baby currently asleep on the sofa, then she is not going completely insane.

"Move", the woman says to the dragon, and when it listens, she sits on his spot.

That's it. Daisy is going to lose her mind.

"Wait. You see it too?" The woman snorts.

"Of course. He sees me too, perhaps that's why he sat right where I wanted." She sits, and Daisy's first instinct is to offer tea. The second thing which crosses her mind, however…

"Who are you, what are you doing here?"

"Doesn't matter, human. What matters is this creature", the woman waves her hand towards the dragon, who clambered on top of the heater and is now heating its stomach and wings on it.

"What about it?"

"How did you get him? Moreso, what are your intentions with him?"

Daisy won't answer her questions, because the lady didn't answer hers. That's not how conversations work. And then she has nothing to say.

"Tea?" she offers.

"No", the woman snarks. "Answer my questions, otherwise we'll have a problem." Daisy is a a heavy-handed pacifist, and she'd rather not fight. Er, perhaps telling the woman that she's planning on keeping the dragon isn't such a good idea.

"I got him as an egg from a pet shop", she says. "I'm a biologist, and they knew it was in good hands."

"Something's wrong", she mutters to herself. "Something's very wrong."

The dragon decides that this is a great moment to catapult itself into Daisy's chest and clamber up onto her shoulder. She can't tell, but it looks like it's glaring at the woman.

"You do know you're not allowed to have a dragon in Great Britain?"

"I did not", Daisy admits, "but I know now. I can't exactly leave it out on the street, now, can I?"

"You have to send it to someone more capable than you! I expect the dragon out of the country in a week, otherwise I'm going to report you!"

Then the woman leaves, just as abruptly as she appeared, and Daisy and the dragon are left clueless. Seems like Daisy became a criminal, as well as a mum. She heads to the door to lock it, and continues on with her day.

Because, honestly, what can that woman do? Call the police and tell them that Daisy has a illegal dragon in her flat? That would sign her trip to a mental hospital and nobody would even bother Daisy. If Daisy knew someone who raised dragons, that's where her little one would end up, but alas.

"You need a name", she tells the dragon, but it doesn't acknowledge her. It just hangs over her shoulder like a dead weasel. "I'm going to name you whether you like it or not. The lady said you were a boy? You need a boy name. Wait. What if you preferred a girl name? Would you safe enough to tell me? Have we reached that point yet?" She keeps twittering to herself and goes to make herself some tea.

The dragon spends the day on Daisy's shoulder, being mostly quiet, and then he begins crying out, and the sound of it vaguely reminds Daisy of a police siren.

"What's wrong?" she asks him as she's taking him off her shoulder. "I can't help you if I don't know what's wrong, and I haven't learned about dragons throughout my schooling." The dragon is still wailing when something crucial passes Daisy's mind. "Heck. I have to feed you!" As if he understood, he immediately perks up. "But what do you eat?"

After a few disasterous attempts which included a frozen mouse, a basil plant Daisy stole from her neighbours' balcony and cow milk, Daisy gives up.

"I can't help you, I'm sorry", she says, disappointed with herself. "There's not a thing in my house you want to eat. And I'm not letting you eat my snakes. It seems caniballistic."

Daisy sighs and drops onto the sofa, the dragon following her.

"I hope you'll still love me even though I can't feed you. I'll try harder tomorrow. And you're not real anyway, so you can't die."

The dragon grumbles—actually grumbles—and settles against Daisy's thigh.

"Hibernate or something", Daisy suggests. "Then you won't have to eat."

Daisy then realises that, hey, sleep is as good of an idea as any. Taking a nap won't hurt.

Except it's the absolute worst idea Daisy's ever had, and that tops that time Daisy thought that two martinis won't hurt her and Reggie had to carry her home, which ended up in him staying the night because she fell asleep on top of him. He had classes in the morning and never truly forgave Daisy.

There's a bang, a sound which reminds Daisy of firework, and then a scream (Daisy's). Because she can deal with scary ladies in her house, she can even process dragons. But people appearing out of thin air in the middle of her living room? That's where Daisy draws a line.

"Aah!" Daisy gets up, scoops the dragon into her arms and hides behind her sofa.

"Told you we'd scare her", says a female voice. Daisy can't see who's talking because she doesn't dare to peek out from her safe space.

"Isn't there a law against teleporting into someone's house without their consent?"

"Probably. Not that she'd know."

"You're so nice."

"Of course I am. We're here to help. Now." The girl coughs. "You don't have to hide", she says, in her best calm voice. "I'm Leilani, and this is Sherman. We didn't mean to scare you."

Daisy doesn't respond, but the dragon climbs out of her grasp and excitedly flies over to Leilani. She tries to catch him, but fails, and then she gets up to meet her guests. Anyone deemed good by that dragon is good enough for Daisy.

"See? I told you she had an illegal dragon. Hey, little dragon", Leilani coos.

"How did you… do that?"

"Magic", Sherman says, with not a hint of sarcasm in his voice, making grabby hands at the dragon in Leilani's hands.

A lively duo, a part of Daisy's brain which is sane says. Leilani looks as Hawaiian as her name, with a flower in her long black hair and green eyeshadow spreading from her monolids to her radiant pink cheeks. Sherman is as pale as a mop, with shaggy white hair resembling a malteser puppy and an upturned nose Daisy would find charming in a different universe, in which he didn't just appear in her apartment.

"Hi", Leilani says after she lets Sherman hold the dragon. "I'm sorry we barged in like this but we have to work fast. You didn't tell us your name…?"

"Daisy?" her voice gets pitchy.

"No, this isn't a daisy, it's a hibiscus flower", Leilani touches her hair.

"No… I'm Daisy. How did you… Why are you… What? What's going on?"

Leilani and Sherman share a look, then Leilani sighs and heads towards Daisy's kitchen. Daisy doesn't move an inch. She doesn't think she can.

"Sit down. This is gonna take a while. Sher. You're British. Brits drink tea?"

"I'm sorry for her", Sherman says and places the dragon onto the sofa. He looks at Daisy apologetically. "She means well. Just relax."

As long as Daisy would like to 'just relax', there have been three strangers in her flat in less than twenty four hours, and she is freaking out.

"Okay, that's enough!" she shouts out. "Leilani!" Leilani stops in her tracks, holding an empty mug and a package of sugar. "Sit on the sofa. You too!" she points at Sherman. They listen and under five seconds they're on Daisy's sofa, with the dragon in between them and a sugar packet on the floor next to Leilani's legs.

Daisy's looking at them, feeling once again like a parent whose children have been acting out.

"This has been a weird day", she starts, placing her hands on her hips. "And I demand an explanation. Right now." Leilani opens her mouth but Sherman stops her, placing his hand on her thigh.

"I'm taking over", he tells her, and she nods and leans back. "We don't have much time, but I'll sum it up for you. This is the first dragon in England since the 1800s, and if anyone notices you have it, you'll end up in prison, or something worse."

"Um… alright."

"You can just travel to Russia or the States, leave the dragon with a breeder or something", Leilani suggests. "We can help you with that."

"Wait, wait", Daisy waves her hands in front of her, trying to make sense of everything. "Who in the world are you? And how did you… bloody teleport into my flat?"

"I'm a witch. Sherman's… he's a nymph. Basically a water wizard."

"Gee, thanks", Sherman runs a hand through his hair and crosses his arms. "Maybe do it subtly next time, yeah? Ease her into it."

"Witch?" Daisy looks at Sherman, then at Leilani, the dragon, and then she sits on the floor and buries her head in her hands. "This isn't happening. This is not happening. Reggie drugged my soup."

"Who's Reg—" Leilani starts, but Sherman covers her mouth with his hand.

"I'm sorry this is so abrupt, but we really have no time."

"But... I have college. And family here. And absolutely no cash for trips outside the country." Daisy says that, as if it will make all this disappear and she'll wake up, dragonless.

"Money's the least of our problems. Leilani is magic with computers."

"Hehe. Literally", Leilani giggles.

"And you don't have to stay out for too long. Just find a breeder and drop off this fellow", Sherman says and pets the dragon, which makes a sneezing noise, "and you're done. You don't go to jail, and we won't have you on our conscience."

"Why would you even help me?"

"Conscience", Sherman repeats, "and I just really wanted to see a dragon in real life. We live next to the lady who marched into your house earlier. She came out of her flat with a smug-arse look on her face, and she only gets like that when law's being broken."

"I… Thanks, I guess?"

"Now… Wait. Have you fed him?" Leilani asks just as the dragon bites her finger.

"No, I haven't. I don't know what dragons eat."

Leilani looks at Sherman—the supposed dragon expert in the house—and shrugs.

"Adults of most species eat goats and cows. No idea what would a baby eat", Leilani offers.

"Well, it's a French tarasque. They eat everything, as far as I know. You tried plants?"

"I tried everything I had in the house." Mum-Daisy mode activate. Everything else stopped matter—she has to take care of her baby. "And he doesn't want anything."

"You named him yet?" Leilani asks as she cuddles with the dragon.

"Erm, not yet. I just need to make sure he doesn't die first."

"I have a garden with all sorts of plants, we can try there", Leilani suggests. Sherman claps in excitement.

"Yes! That's the first smart idea I've heard from you in a decade! Let's go!"

"How do you propose we carry a dragon outside? Teleporting?" Daisy asks, as if that question hadn't crossed their mind. She is pretty sure now that a dragon is a ticking bomb and having him outside probably isn't a good idea.

Leilani puts the dragon on the floor and he heads towards his mum. In the meantime, the witch takes a pretty floral bag off her shoulder and opens it up. First she takes out a phone, a wallet, some snacks, a flower necklace, three bottles of nail polish, a make up bag and a hand-held mirror, then she continues talking.

"No, we can't teleport with him, people might notice. If Mister Dragon behaves, he can get in the bag and if anyone asks, I'm carrying a lizard to the vet."

Daisy's in shock, for the first time since ten minutes ago, because how did all that fit into a small bag? They don't notice her, however, and Sherman puts all Leilani's belongings into his—even smaller—bag.

"Come on, dragon", Leilani reaches out for him and nudges him towards her bag. He climbs in and disappears.

"Wait. Where did he go?" Daisy asks, because there's no way in Hell that he fit into that bag.

"Don't worry", Leilani says, and Daisy doesn't think she wants to trust her. Sherman, however, is more convincing.

"Nothing's happened to him, he's safe. Now, let's get going, so the dragon doesn't starve."

A couple of minutes later, Daisy's walking in an unknown direction, with a nymph on her left and a witch on her right. Somewhere in the purgatory of the witch's bag is Daisy's baby dragon. Which she will have to give up in less than a week. Daisy's head is going to explode, she's sure of it.

They don't go as far as Daisy thought they would. Turns out that Leilani and Sherman's place is just next to a park ten minutes away from Daisy's flat. Once they're in, Sherman looks like he's relieved.

"Okay, now that that's done, let's check out what the little one likes."

Leilani opens her bag and digs through it.

"Where did he go?"

Daisy's brain short-circuits. They lost her firstborn.

Then, inexplicably, Leilani and Sherman start searching through their cramped, one-person flat. Daisy, not for the first time, hasn't got a clue what's going on.

"Aha!" A minute later Leilani exclaims and Daisy sprints to her. She finds her on the balcony, where it looked like Leilani had accumulated at least a hundred different plants. And there was her dragon, chewing on some flowers. "He's eating my rock jasmines", Leilani says in disbelief. The dragon looks up at her, sneezes, and continues eating.

"What?" Daisy asks.

"Androsace chaixii", Leilani recites, then facepalms. "Of course. It's an endemic plant. French", she explains.

"Have you fed him?" Sherman asks from the inside.

"He's eating now, we might as well start working", Leilani pulls Daisy inside. There's loads of clothes, bags, books and flowers everywhere, and Daisy's looking around, taking it all in.

"We don't spend loads of time in here, it's not the tidiest", Sherman apologises and removes some jumpers from the sofa so the girls could sit. He himself sits on a still-cluttered ancient-looking rocking chair. "Now, let's plan."

"Don't you mean scheme? We are breaking the law, after all", Leilani laughs quietly.

"My head will detonate", Daisy squeaks.

"Firstly, documents. Leilani can fix you up with a plane ticket and a passport, we'll work on that tonight. From then on I'll just find a breeder and we're all set."

"Where am I going?" Daisy can't help but ask.

"A country that has no dragon limitations", Leilani says. "Russia, most of Asia and Africa, USA, Brazil and Australia."

"Please don't send me where there's war", Daisy pleads.

"Sure thing", Leilani says offhandedly, and Daisy doesn't trust her. "You can pack tonight."

"As for the dragon… Lani, do you have a backpack you can ruin?" Sherman looks around, as if the answer wasn't obvious.

"No!" Leilani exclaims. "I need all of them."

"I have one at home", Daisy offers.

"Empty it out, we'll set it up tomorrow", Leilani says. "I think that's all, actually. I'll pack up some flowers so baby dragon has enough food, and you go home and pack a suitcase for a week, just in case."

"You promise I'll get back home safely?" Daisy asks, wearyness taken over her. They're going to catapult her god knows where and then she'll have to lie to her friends that she was on a vacation when, in fact, she was actually somewhere in South Africa, with a hungry dragon in her bag, running to find a breeder to drop him off to. Nothing weird at all.

"Of course. You'll be back home before you can say 'passport control'", Sherman says.

"Also, also", one thing remained unexplained in Daisy's mind, "how did he just appear in your apartment?"

"Wait", Leilani gets up and walks to a corner of the room. She waves for Daisy to follow. "Now look at that wall, and don't freak out." Leilani opens her bag and puts her hand in. At the same time, a hand comes out of the wall.

"What." Complete apathy from Daisy. She's had enough surprises for a day.

"Try it!" Leilani shoves the bag into Daisy's arms, and she cautiously takes off her glasses and puts them in. Another hand comes from the wall, holding Daisy's glasses. "That's how you're going to travel with your dragon! I'll set up a portal connecting your house and your bag and the dragon can be in England until you pass border control."

"You can do that?"

"Of course. Easily. Don't worry, everything will be fine. Now go pack, we'll have the dragon here." Leilani hands her bag to Daisy. "Return it to me tomorrow, and when you get home, just stick your head in and we'll give you the dragon."

"Okay… okay."

Daisy is home in half an hour and the first thing she does is pull her dragon out of Leilani's bag, and he's still chewing on some flowers.

"Mum's here", she tells him and he immediately curls up against her. Carrying him, she goes to pack. It only occurs to her mid-pack that she has one more thing to take care of. She dials a number and shoves her phone between her ear and her shoulderblade.

"Hello?"

"Vihaan? It's Daisy. I'd like to apologise for that day I woke you up."

"Water under the bridge, don't even worry about it. How's the egg going?"

"Long story. A really long story. I can't really… It's complicated. Listen, can you take care of Yin and Yang, just for a week?"

"I'd love to, but my girlfriend's afraid of snakes. She barely let me get a lizard. I'm sorry."

"It's okay. I'll see you later, yeah?"

"Sure thing. Bye, Daisy."

"Bye."

Daisy tries once again.

"Reg, mate. I need help."

"Good evening, Daisy. Yes, I'm good, how about you?" She hears Reggie sigh. "Okay, what do you need?"

"Yin and Yang. One week tops. I promise they won't eat your rabbits. Please."

Another sigh, this time much heavier.

"Yeah, alright. I've always wanted snakes. Wait, why? You going somewhere?"

"Mhm. Come pick them up."

"What, now?"

"Yeah. I'm in a rush, I'm sorry."

"I'm on my way. You owe me two."

"I owe you one, and you get free food from my kitchen, now get your arse over here."

"Aye aye."

Daisy hangs up and rushes to grab all the things her snakes will need to give to Reggie. She puts them next to their tank and returns to her clothes. They didn't tell her where they're sending her, so she packs layers and walking shoes. Half an hour later, the doorbell rings. It's Reggie, in pajama bottoms and a zipped hoodie, leaning against the doorframe.

"'Sup, nightowl", he says and marches in. "Give me the snakes so I can go sleep."

Daisy puts a plastic bag with the snake food and other equipment he'll need on Reggie's shoulder and then gives him the tank.

"Bye, Yin. Bye, Yang. I'll miss you."

"Have a nice trip", Reggie says and walks away.

"Goodnight", she shouts after him and closes the door before the dragon flies out. She takes out everything from her brown backpack and finishes packing. Around three in the morning, she's asleep on the floor next to her bed, and her phone rings.

"Huh, what?" she answers.

"Hi, it's Sherman. You're flying to Russia, that was was the only place we could find tickets to. Your flight is at eleven thirty, and your new name is Daisy Smith."

"Why do I need a new name?"

"Leilani had extra time on her hands. It's perhaps better that nobody knows you had any business with dragons after this whole mess."

"Mm, okay. I'm gonna sleep now."

"You have to be at the airport at ten. We'll be in your house around nine."

"Yeah, sure. Good night."

She hangs up, rolls over and continues sleeping.

Her dragon wakes her up around a quarter to nine, chewing on her fingers.

"Morning", she says and stretches. "Seems like we're going to Russia." Turns out, awake Daisy has better idea than the sleepy version. "Oh. Oh!" she exclaims and gives the dragon a little shake. "You're invading Russia. And you're French. That makes you… Napoleon! Yep, that's your name now."

Napoleon doesn't react to the name, but he doesn't reject it either, so as he's climbing onto her shoulder, Daisy decides it stays. She throws some more warm clothes onto her suitcase, because she supposes Russia will be cold, and heads to the kitchen to make herself some travel tea. Nine and spare change, when there's a bang coming from her living room, Daisy doesn't even flinch.

"Where are you?" Leilani calls out.

"Kitchen."

Leilani and Sherman walk into Daisy's kitchen, wearing the same clothes as yesterday. In Sherman's hands is a passport and a plane ticket, and in Leilani's, a plant pot with rock jasmines.

"I told you she's magic", he says.

"Where's the backpack?" Leilani asks.

"Bedroom. Polka dots." Things are just happening to Daisy now, she's a passive observer. She is out of fucks to give.

"Okay, great. Where do you want the portal to be?"

There's portals now. Cool.

"Bedroom's fine, I guess." Leilani nods and heads back through Daisy's flat.

"We can't exactly go to the airport with you, but we can walk you off. We're suspicious-looking", Sherman quickly explains. Daisy doesn't comment, she just pours tea into a large travel mug, and Napoleon instantly crawls into the kettle. Daisy just turns around and takes out milk from the fridge, making herself cornflakes. Absolutely out of fucks.

"Do you want anything?" she asks Sherman.

"No, thanks. I don't eat, and Leilani ate around four."

"Okay", she says, munching on her cornflakes. "How will I feed Napoleon? Those flowers won't last long."

"He's got a name now?" Daisy nods. "Leilani charmed the flowers into fast growing, he'll be fine." She keeps on nodding. "Do you have a ride to the airport?"

"No."

"We'll teleport you there, then."

"No offence, but I'd rather walk to Russia than have you teleport me. I'll get a cab."

"Oh yeah, thanks for reminding me." Sherman goes through his pockets and fishes out a credit card. "This is Daisy Smith's credit card. She's a millionare, apparently."

"Wait." Daisy takes the credit card from Sherman. "You stole from someone named Daisy Smith?"

"No, Leilani made it yesterday. Don't ask me how, she bought a plastic container and shaped it for an hour."

"That's… quite brilliant, actually. Thanks. I mean it."

"No problem. It was fun, doing something new for a change. I haven't had that much fun since the eighties."

Daisy forces herself not to ask. Napoleon emerges from the kettle smelling like Ashwaganda tea, his little claws clinging onto the rim of the kettle, and Daisy pats his head with her pointer finger. Leilani walks back to the kitchen, testing out her work on Daisy's backpack.

"It works. You're all set."

"You said I was going to Russia. That means Moscow, not a random city in the middle of nowhere?"

"Of course, we're capable folk. The address of the breeder is on your phone." Leilani glances at Sherman. "Our work here is done, don't you think?"

"I suppose it is."

"So this is goodbye", Leilani says. "I wish you luck."

"Thanks", Daisy mumbles, crunching on her cereal. "I hope I'm not going to need it."

Leilani salutes her and grabs Sherman's elbow.

"Bye bye, Daisy."

"See you."

Bang, and they disappear from Daisy's flat. Daisy finishes her cereal. When she's done, she picks up the credit card and the passport and puts them in her backpack. She then decides it's time to get to the airport so she goes to her bedroom to pick up her suitcase. A wave of confusion washes over her when she sees that same passport and credit card on the floor next to the door, but it quickly passes. This is her life now, apparently.

Just as a test, she puts the backpack on her desk and crawls to the place she guesses the portal is, just to stick her hand through the wall. When she sees her own hand coming from the backpack like something out of a horror movie, she moves away from the wall, deciding never to do that again.

"Hey, Napoleon?" she calls out for him. Just as expected, he comes flying into the bedroom, this time stopping before he hits a wall. Daisy places her palm over the wall and taps it. "C'mere. That lady from the other day said you understood what I was saying. So fly into the wall."

Napoleon looks at Daisy's hand, which is tapping the wall, and walks towards it. The dragon slowly disappears and Daisy jumps up victoriously before checking her backpack, and sure enough, Napoleon was in it, black eyes staring curiously at Daisy.

"Good boy!" she exclaims. "Now, let's go."She grabs her suitcase, closes her backpack and walks out of the room, careful to lock it. She still doesn't have an idea as to how this would work, but she'll be damned if she let that stop her.

She goes to the nearest ATM for cash, gets herself a cab, gets to the airport on time, but when the time comes to check her luggage in, she's near hyperventilating.

"Your bag", a man points towards Daisy's backpack. "On the tray, please."

"Oh… Okay." She takes the backpack off her shoulder and places it on the tray. She passes through the metal detector without any problems, but then she has a mini panic attack as her backpack disappears and reappears from a scary-looking white box thing, and an x-ray image of her backpack appears on a screen. Empty. The rest of the journey will be a breeze, she thinks.

And it is, mostly, except for one minor incident.

Daisy is in her seat (next to the window, bless Leilani), and a gorgeous Middle-Eastern man is sitting next to her. His mother and sister, Daisy guesses, are sitting behind them, and the three of them are talking. And Daisy decides that it's a good moment to check on her child. She opens her bag and reaches out into it.

"Napoleon?" she whispers, and soon she feels cold scales against her palm. "Is everything okay? We'll be in Moscow soon. Cow. When you're all grown up you'll eat cows. I wonder how I'll manage buying a cow a week."

Gorgeous Middle-Eastern man looks at Daisy just in time to see her smiling at the inside of her bag. He doesn't look at her for the rest of the flight, and she never sees him again.

She doesn't get to enjoy Moscow properly because she gets the first taxi and gives the driver the address.

"You sure this is right address?" he asks Daisy.

"Um", Daisy looks around, then at the rear-view mirror with genuine concern in her eyes. "I hope so." The driver laughs and makes a turn.

"I drive you there, but it's middle of forest. Nothing. No people."

"Great."

"First time in Russia?"

"How'd you guess?" The driver laughs again, and Daisy is grateful for some sort of distraction because the reality of the situation is dawning on her and she's close to a panic attack.

"I'm Alyosha. If you ever need go somewhere", Alyosha finds a business card from the glove compartment and hands it over to Daisy.

"I'm Daisy. Like the flower?"

"Yes, yes. You are from Great Britain?"

"London, yeah."

"I go there once. Very different than Russia, very interesting. I love travelling. Business trip?"

"You could say so. It's a long story, and one day it might even be funny, but not today."

"I wish you luck. Don't get lost in forest."

"Oh, I will try."

Alyosha keeps the pleasant conversation going, and Daisy is grateful. It felt nice to distance herself away from all the witches and dragons and portals and everything else not-human for a while, right before she gets thrown in the dragon den.

They pull over onto a rugged path leading into the forest, just on the side of the road.

"Christ. What is this place?"

"Address you gave me." Alyosha's looking at Daisy like he's indecisive—should he laugh, or should he cry with her?

"If I die, I don't blame you."

Daisy pays for her ride and gets out of the taxi dragging her suitcase behind her.

"Have a good day", Alyosha tells her.

"You too", she says and waves after him as he drives away.

It takes Daisy a couple of minutes to walk into the forest. Not because she doesn't trust Leilani and Sherman—they got her here safely, in the first place— but because she had a dragon in her backpack which she's going to have to give away, and she's not sure she can do that. What is she doing here, anyway, if she isn't going to give up Napoleon? Did she just migrate to Russia?

Deep inhale, and she's marching into the forest, suitcase and all. If she dies, she'll at least die like the courageous woman she is.

She stops marching some five minutes in, because… There's really nothing there. Alyosha was right, and Daisy feels stupid.

"Hello?" she calls out. "Is anyone out here?" She regrets not learning Russian, but it's too late for that now.

The forest is rather quiet, the trees even muffled the sound of the cars from the road, so Daisy can hear every time her foot falls onto leaves. Then she stops, because she thinks she heard something.

It's a growl. It's a growl, and four pairs of footsteps, and Daisy is absolutely terrified.

"Who is there?" Silence. "I have a dragon." More silence, then four pairs turn into three.

"Dragons?" An accented female voice calls out from the dark. "Danil, myesto! You said you had a dragon?"

A head of a woman with blonde highlights in her hair pops up from behind a tree, and Daisy jumps back at least a metre.

"I'm sorry, I don't have any clothes on. Not a problem."

There is a loud, choking sound which sound surprisingly like laughter from behind the woman, making Daisy yelp.

"What is that?"

"A person", the woman says casually. There's some leaves rustling from behind her.

"How rude", says a deep, gruff voice.

"Wait a bit", the woman says to Daisy and returns to the darkness. "I have clothes in the house. Can you just follow us?" As the woman's speaking, there's a howl. An actual wolf howl. Daisy is silent for a couple of seconds, considering her options.

"Erm. Sure." Daisy decides to call Leilani and Sherman the moment she walks out of the forest and yell at them for about an hour, but she follows the woman anyway. It doesn't take them long to stop in front of a large wooden cabin, and Daisy wonders just how bad she messed up. Then, she sees a pair of wolves coming from her side. One brown, and one with lighter fur. The lighter wolf steps closer to Daisy and she yelps.

"Back off!" she says, holding her suitcase in front of her, as if it would help her hide. Something, however, didn't feel right. Both those wolves had white ears, regardless of their fur colour, and Daisy, with her limited wolf knowledge, doesn't remember and species of wolf with such specific markings. As the wolf approached her, she realised it was huge.

The wolf lowers its head, tilts its ears back and slowly walks to Daisy. Submission, she knows that one. Maybe the wolves were the woman's pets. Hey, it's magic. Anything could happen.

So she pets the wolf. Because she might as well, after hauling herself all the way here. She has done so much, and an oversized puppy is not the scariest thing in the world.

The brown wolf barks once, then dissolves into a fit of coughing, which scares Daisy so she distances herself from the lighter wolf. After the brown wolf recovers from his coughs, he nudges the door of the cabin open and walks inside, the lighter wolf following. Daisy walks behind them, and when she finds no one in the cabin, she sits down on one of the sofas.

The cabin on the inside looks old, but comfy. Daisy is in the living room, she supposes, so the other rooms must be down the hallway, where the wolves went. She takes the backpack off her shoulders and places it next to her, on frayed pillows.

She waits for a couple of minutes when she hears laughter, and conversation on Russian. A couple emerges from the hallway, a man and a woman. The woman is the one Daisy saw in the forest, plus some clothes, and the man is hunched back, with his hands in the pockets of his hoodie, and Daisy thinks, 'they come in pairs'.

"I'm sorry we scared you", the woman hurries to Daisy and sticks her hand out in a greeting. Daisy shakes it reluctantly. 'We'? "I'm Anna, this is Danil, and you've got a dragon?"

"Erm, I do." Daisy watches as Danil throws himself violently onto the other sofa and turns on the television, muttering something in Russian. Anna replies with something that sounds like a swear and focuses her attention onto Daisy.

"He doesn't like dragons, even though the pack's been keeping them for hundreds of years. Can I see it?"

Uh huh. Sure.

"Yeah, just a moment." Daisy opens her backpacks and puts her hands in. "Napoleon?" She hears a sneeze, and then her dragon is in her arms and she pulls it out. "This is Napoleon", she introduced him to Anna, the dragon looking around himself in excitement.

"A tarasque, I haven't seen those in a while." Anna comes closer to Daisy and Napoleon and offers her hand to him. The dragon pulls himself out of Daisy's grasp to examine the new person. "He's pretty young, isn't he? Less than a week."

"Yes."

"He's… a bit too small. Did you get him when he was born, or?"

"No", Daisy shakes her head. "I got him as an egg. I didn't have him for long before he hatched, though." Anna stretches out Napoleon's wing and checks its mobility, playing with his claws in the meantime.

"Did you heat the egg?"

"Err, yeah, I have a heater at home."

"He needs more heat than that", Anna shakes her head. "You should've put it in a fireplace or something of the sort. You're lucky you got a tarasque, and not an ejderha. An ejderha would've died in you. But, then again, they're pretty rare." She gives Daisy a strange look. "Is this your first dragon?"

"Honestly, I didn't know dragons existed until I got this one."

Both Anna and Danil are looking at her now. Danil's raised his eyebrow, and Daisy wants to hide behind her suitcase again.

"Who are you?" Anna asks her.

"I… am Daisy Argos, I'm from London—"

"No, no", Danil stops her. "What are you?"

"…Human?"

Danil gets up and stomps his way through the door , yelling over his shoulder at Anna.

"No. No way. I'm not dealing with this. Fuck this. I'm telling the pack. Goodbye."

"Don't mind him", Anna tells Daisy. "He's young and bitter." She shifts closer to Daisy, letting Napoleon back into the backpack. "The fact that you're human only means you've much to learn."

"You're… not?"

"No", Anna laughs. "I'm a werewolf." Daisy must look shocked, because Anna asks, "Have you never met a werewolf?"

"No?"

Anna stops, and considers things for a second.

"Are you afraid of us?"

"No. I would be, if you attacked me. Why would I be scared of you?"

"People usually are." Anna gets up and waves at Daisy to follow her. "C'mon. I want to show you something. You can leave your stuff here, I'm sure I'll find room for you in the house." Daisy nods, leaves her backpack and suitcase next to the sofa, picks up Napoleon and follows Anna through the hallway, out of the cabin. As they walk, Anna keeps talking, and her voice sounds soothing to Daisy. "I don't know how you got this dragon, or how you managed to travel all the way here, but it's good that you have. Here is safe."

"Really?"

"A wizard protected this forest from people who wanted to destroy it, and people who have bad intentions. We'll take good care of you two as long as you stay, regardless of what Danil thinks."

"Thank you."

"Now, since you're human, and this is the first dragon you've seen, I think it would only be right I introduce you to some other, adult dragons. Teach you about them. After all, you'll need that knowledge to take care of this little guy."

"Huh?" Daisy gets confused. "I was supposed to leave him here with you."

"But you don't want to do that, do you?"

Daisy shakes her head before she even knows what she's doing, surprised by her own reaction. Anna smiles at her.

"It's okay. Once you witness a dragon hatching, you two are inseparable." Daisy then considers it, and reaches the conclusion that she's absolutely, completely screwed.

Because she'll do it, right? She'll quit school, leave Britain and stay in Russia just so she could still have Napoleon with her, that little dragon which needed her protection, which she carried out of the country. She risked many things for him, and she's willing to risk more.

Daisy's following Anna through the forest for what seems to be forever when Anna continues talking.

"Currently we have seven dragons. Four Chinese water dragons, they're in the lake at the end. Three Russian gorynychs. I mean, one, but they count as three. You'll see why. Oh, here we are."

They reach a clearing and Daisy is taken aback. The sheer size of the full-grown dragon is… well, magnificent.

There, sleeping in the grass, is a green dragon with three necks and three heads, like something out of a cartoon. It has wings, which are comically small compared to its large body, and Daisy firmly believes that they're just for show. It's the size of a truck, maybe two, and Daisy is mesmerised.

"Is it… on a leash?"

"No, no, they're not", Anna laughs. "If you want, we can go and pet them."

Again, Daisy is surprised by the lack of a fundamental human fear of big and unfamiliar things and follows Anna. When they get closer, one dragon head wakes up and rises from the ground

"It's our only gorynych girl, Valeria", Anna says with fondness as she stretches her arm out. Valeria huffs happily and stretches her head closer to Anna's hand. All three heads are the size of a human, and Daisy wonders if Napoleon will grow to be as big as Valeria and her brothers. "The interesting thing about gorynychs is, that if they have different genders in one body, they can lay eggs and have baby dragons."

"That's so cool", Daisy says, watching as Anna's hand touched the scales on Valeria's head. "Can I…?"

"Go ahead. She likes to be pet on her cheeks", Anna tells Daisy. Daisy's hand is the size of Valeria's eye, which is watching her as she's walking around her huge head to reach her cheek. In the meantime, Anna walks to the other two heads, waking the whole dragon up with soft words. "Uh oh, you might wanna move now. They're awake, and you don't want to get squashed", Anna says and grabs Daisy's wrist, dragging her away.

"She—they're not dangerous, are they?" Daisy asks, running after her.

"Of course not. But they're heavy", Anna laughs. "Let's go to the lake, Chinese water dragons can't step on you. But the lake's far…" she stops and thinks it through. "You know what, I don't usually let people do this, but I'm gonna turn, and you climb on top of me, like a horse."

"What?"

Anna turns around and begins explaining.

"I can turn into a wolf. It's… It looks scary, and painful, but I promise you it's not. Hold on tight, but don't pet me. It's… weird."

Daisy doesn't really process that. How can she turn into a wolf? That doesn't seem probable. But that's exactly what she does. First, she takes off her clothes (and Daisy politely looks away), then the process of turning begins. Even though Anna said it doesn't hurt, Daisy hear bones breaking, and until she sees a wolf in Anna's place, she doesn't stop worrying.

"Is it… really you?" she asks the wolf, because her science brain can't possibly process that. Where did the fur come from? And the tail?

The wolf nods and sits down, and Daisy has nothing to do but to climb onto the wolf—or Anna, Daisy guesses.

"This is very weird, you know that?" Daisy asks Anna. Anna gets up, looks back at Daisy, and nods.

Daisy figures she might as well hold on, because it doesn't get any weirder than this, or at least she hopes so. Anna starts running, and Daisy's grip gets tighter.

She runs for some fifteen minutes when they reach the lake and Daisy gets off of Anna's back.

"I'm guessing you can't turn back because you left your clothes there", Daisy says and carefully walks up to the lake. "Are they like fish? You said Chinese 'water' dragons, so I would suppose that they're in here."

Daisy figures that it's the smartest to sit by the edge of the lake and wait for them to show up. Anna sits next to her, curling her tail to lie on her front feet.

"You have to explain werewolves to me", Daisy tells her. "I used to think you could be wolves only during the full moon, but there's still daylight. Think of me as a child who knows nothing about such things."

Anna nudges Daisy with her paw and points into the distance with her noise.

"What?" Daisy asks. Then, she notices a blue shadow under the water approaching them. "Oh, there it comes."

The dragon which reaches the surface looks smaller than Valeria and her brothers, but it doesn't appear to have legs. Daisy can see a couple of fins on a long snake-like body and big teeth coming out of its mouth.

"That's… amazing. Are Chinese water dragons more related to snakes than tarasques?" Daisy asks, with no desire for an answer, and gets up. The dragon's head is now right in front of her, and she wants to pet it, as well as Valeria. Just as she does so, she looks into its eyes, to check if its alright. Then, she blacks out.

She wakes up half an hour later, in the cabin, soaking wet.

"I'm sorry!" she hears Anna squeaking somewhere in the background, but it's an unknown, dark-skinned face she sees right above her.

"Annushka forgot to mention", he says, in a sultry voice of a jazz singer, "that, if you're not used to Chinese water dragons, they can easily hypnotise you."

"Oh, piss off, James", Anna pushes James away and crowds Daisy. "I had everything under control, I got her back to the house and she's still breathing, right?"

Daisy moves her hair from her face and straightens up.

"What's going on?" Daisy asks.

"Nothing! Everything's fine!" Anna continues squeaking, like a dog toy someone stepped on. Daisy hears Danil in the background, saying something in Russian, and James looks as pissed of as Daisy feels.

"English while I'm around. Please and thank you."

"Wait, you carried me?" Daisy asks. She's not exactly thin, but it never became an issue until someone tried to carry her. "How?"

"Knowing her, by biting your arm and dragging you", Danil says.

"No!" Anna complains. Then, a small group of people walks into the house and Daisy scrambles onto her feet.

"Can I just have a moment? Alone?" she asks, and Anna nods frantically, grabbing Daisy's suitcase and walking down the hallway and climbing the stairs on the left. Daisy takes her backpack and runs, so she won't have to meet any more new people and remember new names, and all this new information was making her rather dizzy. If she's going to pass out again, she will do that privately, or in front of the least amount of people.

"You can take my room, I'll make James let me in his", Anna says as she shows Daisy a small room which has more clothes on the bed than a normal person needs, let alone with the full closet in the corner. Anna leaves Daisy's suitcase next to her and grabs an armful of clothes to drop them next to the closet. "I have a hard time saying goodbye to things", Anna shrugs.

"I see", Daisy says gingerly as she puts her backpack on the bad. "Thanks for giving me a place to stay."

"Of course. You can stay for as long as you need." There's noise from the bottom floor, and Anna rolls her eyes. "We're animals, you have to excuse us", she laughs at an inside joke. "I apologise for what happened again, and I'll tell you more about Chinese water dragons later, but now I have to tell the pack about you and pray that they won't hang me upside down by my tail."

She waves, and then she's gone from the room and Daisy sits down on the bed, trying to make sense of what happened.

She, Daisy Argos, is in Russia, with a tarasque, and she's in a forest, in the house of at least a half a dozen werewolves who keep dragons, and one of those dragons made her faint. Completely normal.

Daisy opens her backpack and lets Napoleon out.

"Run free, my child", she says dramatically and places her suitcase next to the bed. After Napoleon looked around the room, he returned to Daisy, cuddling in her arms and sneezing. "This is all messed up, right? It isn't just me." She sighs and changes her clothes into something less wet.

She hears stairs creaking and prepares for the worst; Danil, kicking her out of the house. She doesn't like him all that much. There's a knock on the door, and Daisy gets up to open it.

"Hello", she says. Standing in the hall is a tall, Chinese woman wearing a long, flowy dress, staring a bit right of Daisy's face.

"Hi", the woman says. She's in her early thirties, a bit older than Daisy, and Daisy is glad that she's calm. She's not sure that she can handle any more people being loud and talking about things she doesn't understand. "May I come in?"

"Of course."

"Are Anna's clothes still all over the floor? I don't want to trip", the woman says with a smile. "I'm Jia Li, and you're Daisy, right?"

"Yes. Um, she moved most of her clothes."

"Wait, I didn't tell you. I'm blind", Jia Li says and makes her way to the bed carefully.

"Oh, yeah, sorry", Daisy nods and makes sure to move all Anna's clothes away later.

"I figured that, if Anna was your guide to this place, you must be confused out of your mind."

"You have no idea", Daisy lets out a sigh, relieved. Napoleon flies over to Jia Li and makes himself comfortable on her lap.

"Oh, is this the dragon everybody's talking about?" Jia Li puts her hand near the dragon, letting it get accustomed to her first. "The reason you flew all the way here."

"You have no idea." Daisy sits crosslegged on the floor. "Now, could you please explain me what the hell is going on with this house? There are too many people…" Jia Li starts laughing.

"I agree whole-heartedly. You might not want to mention Hell here, though."

"Why?"

"Here live eleven werewolves and a forest nymph."

"… Sorry, I don't understand."

Jia Li shakes her head.

"You're human, I forgot. Okay, from the beginning." Daisy settles down, ready for answers. "Werewolves and vampires are believed to have demonic energy, but that's uncomfirmed. And in this forest is the only werewolf pack with wolves from all over Asia, because there aren't any werewolves there. We tend to form packs. It's… a hierarchy thing. If you stay longer someone might explain it to you, but I'm not familiar with it."

"Are there any… werewolves in Europe?"

"Loads. Europe has many werewolves. There might be some more elsewhere, but I didn't hear about them. You've met Anna and James. James is from England, you know. Anna travelled there once, as a vacation, and the two of them fell in love, so James' pack got rid of him. Anna suggested that they go back to Russia and start their own pack. They built this house some three hundred years ago—"

"Three hundred years?" Daisy stops Jia Li.

"…Yes?"

"They were alive three hundred years ago? But… they look like they're my age?"

"Werewolves are immortal. So are nymphs, as well as witches and wizards."

"Give me a second", Daisy says. She doesn't feel so well. She can hear her heartbeat in her ears and she is terrified. "Immortal? How old are you?"

"Anna and James are about four hundred. Most of the wolves are younger, and our nymph, Tamara, she's been around the late 1700s. Sarnai even longer. Ask her to tell you about the Mongol Empire."

"That's… wow." Jia Li smiles fondly.

"I haven't been around humans in a long time, I forget that everything here is new for you.

"How long do dragons live?" Daisy asks.

"Depends on the species. Our dragons usually live up to a hundred and fifty years. Tarasques longer. I think rare dragons such as ejderhas and yongs live around five hundred years."

"Such a long time…" Daisy's shaking her head. Napoleon's going to outlive her twice, and she won't be able to always protect him. This must be how all mothers feel.

"But…" Jia Li says, her fingers touching Napoleon's wings and torso. "There's something wrong with this one."

"Huh?"

"He's very cold. I'll give him to Sarnai, she'll know how to heal him." Jia Li must sense Daisy's sudden fear, because she lets Napoleon fly to her. "Don't worry. There isn't a single illness Sarnai hasn't been able to heal."

"Just my luck", Daisy huffs.

"The pack are eating downstairs, if you want to join them."

Daisy didn't even realise she hasn't eaten since morning, and that her stomach has been reminding her of that for a while now, so she agrees to go downstairs with Jia Li, leaving Napoleon in the room and hoping he won't burn any clothes, otherwise Anna is going to kick them out of the house and Danil will throw a party.

They walk down the staircase to the living room, where a group of people sat, some on the sofa but most on pillows on the floor, watching something which looked like an Italian soap opera. There is a couple of pizzas stacked up in their boxes on the coffee table, but no one seems to be eating. Anna notices Daisy and immediately gets up, her mind set on introducing Daisy to everybody.

"Hey, everybody", she says, loudly, and Daisy hears a couple of groans. It's not hard to believe that Anna has her 'announcments' every now and then and that the rest of them just want her to shut up so they can watch Giuseppe getting killed by his own daughter. "This is Daisy, she's from Britain and she's going to be staying here for a while."

"Hello", Daisy waves, feeling uncomfortable. Anna threw the spotlight onto her and there's no way to escape it.

"You know Danil, James and me. On the sofa we have Alexandr, Tamara and Chao", she points at a girl with her hair up in a mess of a bun and two guys sitting next to her, "pillow on the left is shared by our designated spicy food chefs, Kavya and Eshan", she shows Daisy a couple intertwined on the floor and they wave, "and who could forget Sarnai, sitting too close to the television because she's old."

"Hey!" comes a husky shout from behind Daisy, scaring her. However, the man is nowhere near as terrifying, with a flower in his hair and a couple more in his beard. He throws an arm around Daisy's shoulder and squeezes it in a friendly gesture. "I'm here as well. I'm Naeem."

"Hi", Daisy smiles, looking at the flowers around his face. She finds them charming.

"Ooh, did Raphael make out with Beatrice yet?" he asks, his attention off Daisy as he makes his way through a mess of limbs on the floor. He sits next to Danil, who looks nothing like the grouchy wolf Daisy saw a few hours ago. Instead, he's cuddles closer to Naeem, and Daisy can't help but think that there's a story there.

"Usually I'm against take-out", says Kavya, untangling herself from Eshan. She's got long, flowy clothes, just like everybody else, but while the others seem to be a bit disheveled and messy, with dirt under their fingernails and leaves in their hair, the Indian duo look like they're fresh out of a shower. If they're cooks, Daisy can easily understand why. "But the last time someone tried my curry without a warning—"

"Yeah, that was me", Chao raises his hand, like he's in school.

"—we had to run after him." There's laughter, and Daisy finally feels at ease.

"Listen, I like spicy food, but that was—"

"Overwhelming?"

"Terrifying." Kavya pushes Chao's shoulder playfully, reaching for him from above the arm rest.

"So we decided pizza was the right way to go."

"Thank you. I mean it", Daisy says. So far, the magic community have helped her in many ways, and she hopes she will be able to repay them once this whole mess is over.

"You can sit here", says Sarnai, shuffling to the side so Daisy has some room. Daisy somehow manages not to step on anybody, and when she's settled down, she's being offered pizza and Sarnai is explaining the plot to her in a hushed voice, and by the time second episode is over, Daisy can sort of tell who everybody is (in the soap opera, not the werewolves).

James, Anna and Alexandr get up then, heading out, and Jia Li explains that they're going to check on the dragons. Sarnai offers to examine Napoleon, so the two of them joined by Jia Li walk upstairs to Anna's room.

"Anna told me you had the egg outside the fire." Sarnai is checking Napoleon's teeth, and while he looks like it's uncomfortable, he isn't moving from her grasp.

"Yeah, I didn't know."

"That's understandable", Sarnai nods and looks at Jia Li for guidance. "Jia, do you think…"

"Yes", Jia Li says. "I wasn't sure, but I guess you're right?"

"What?" Daisy asks. It seems to her that they're talking in code, and she doesn't understand a word. The look Sarnai gives her makes Daisy very, very worried.

"Prenatal hypothermia. A month ago, our gorynych laid an egg, but for some reason, they didn't heat the egg properly so the baby dragon hatched small and weak. I… didn't know what to do, so Tamara decided to keep it in a fire, frozen in time, until we found someone who knows how to help them."

"So… you don't know what to do?" Daisy is slowly losing all hope. Like he felt a change in the atmosphere, Napoleon fights out of Sarnai's grasp and attaches himself to Daisy's chest, not showing any intention of letting go.

"I do", Sarnai smiles. "A dragon never died if I had a say in it. I found a dragon keeper online who was able to heal such dragons, and I was going to tell Anna about her after she comes back from her check-up. The problem is, she's in Brazil."

"Online? How do you even find people like that?"

"She knows where to look", Jia Li tells her. "Now we just need to ask the wolves, 'who wants to fly across the world?' And I don't think anyone will volounteer. Especially during the full moon period."

"I'll do it", Daisy says, without even thinking about it. After all, she has a limitless supply of money, a baby dragon of her own to heal and plenty of time to spare.

"Really?" Jia Li asks, but Sarnai doesn't look surprised.

"You and that dragon bonded. I understand."

A few moments pass, in which Napoleon is curling as close as possible to Daisy.

"I'm just going to have to buy a ticket. Do you have internet here?"

"Of course", Jia Li says, like it's the most normal thing in the universe. "The password is 'Beatrice', capital B."

"Okay, I'll do that now."

"We'll leave you to it." Sarnai gets up and takes Jia Li by the elbow. "C'mon, you have to cheer me on as I beat Eshan, Tamara and Naeem in Mario Kart."

"She always loses", Jia Li whispers to Daisy as they're leaving. When the door closes, Daisy just sits for a solid fifteen minutes, just processing. She seems to be doing that a lot these days.

So, Brazil, huh? Daisy doesn't know much about it, and she's never had any particular wish to go, but she's going anyway. If for nothing, then she'll do it for the two baby dragons. England and college seem to be so far, and if Daisy was to be honest, she'd rather spend time caring for Napoleon than go back to college and end up as a biology teacher in a school where kids don't care about her subject.

Future is scary, and Daisy prefers not to think about it, if it's not absolutely necessary.

She takes her laptop out and, before she goes to look up flights for Brazil (if there are any), she decides to call Reggie to check up on him, but only after she hides Napoleon in hee backpack. She sees that he's online and starts a videochat. He answers, and then there's his tired face, covering Daisy's laptop screen.

"Sup, dude", he greets her. "How's it going?"

"Reg, hi!" Daisy exclaims. At least someone's life is still normal. "I didn't wake you up, did I?"

"Nah. This is my resting face. How's your trip, where are you?"

"Um, Russia?"

"Russia?!" Reggie's phone falls out of his hand and for a moment all that Daisy sees is black, at least until Reggie picks up his phone. "How the hell are you in Russia?"

"A plane took me there."

"How did you pay for it?" Then Reggie fake-gasps. "Daisy Argos, do you have a sugar daddy I don't know about?" Daisy plays with the thought of Sherman and Leilani being what Reggie thinks them to be, but she discards it soon enough.

"Not quite. I have a mission." Reggie hums Mission Impossible for a couple of bars before teasing Daisy about her choice of words.

"Who even says mission?"

"It's a mission, Reg. Bugger off."

"Sure, sure. Yin and Yang are fine, thanks for asking. My bunnies are all alive, also, and I'm eating veggies and staying hydrated."

"Good boy", Daisy says, then laughs. What if she said that in front of a bunch of werewolves who were downstairs? Some would laugh and Danil would bang his head against the nearest flat surface.

"What's so funny?" Reggie asks.

"I'm in Russia. And now I'm booking a ticket to Brazil. What even is my life."

"Braz—you know what, I don't even care. Catapult yourself to the moon for all I care. Listen, I have a date to go to, and I kinda need to shower. So I'm going to do that."

"You go. Good luck on your date, I hope she survives it."

"Ha ha. Ha. Bye, Daise."

"Bye, Reg."

Reggie's love life is nothing short of colourful, and Daisy is willing to bet that his date will end catastrophically. After a long relationship with his high-school sweetheart ended, he began dating, but not a lot of people are willing to date a weird dude whose only friends are his rabbits and a girl who is addicted to tea and whose interests include reptile reproduction.

The shortest plane ride from Moscow to Rio de Janeiro is some sixteen hours, and that number makes Daisy want to throw up. Sixteen hours? In such a small space? She'd go insane. So she decides to pick a flight which leaves in the night hours, so she can sleep during the flight, and after grabbing her new passport and credit card from the backpack, she enters her data, and just like that, Daisy will be a passenger in a flight that leaves two days from now. To Brazil. It's a tiny bit terrifying. Just a tiniest bit.

She plays with Napoleon for a little while, watching him fly around the room like nothing's wrong with him, and after, she grabs her clothes and wanders around the house to find a bathroom. She showers, brushes her teeth and goes to sleep.

That doesn't last for too long, as around three in the morning, there's a knock on the door, and Daisy groans as a response.

"Daisy, it's Anna", she hears a not-so-quiet whisper from the other side.

"Mm, come in." It was her room, after all. It's not like Daisy could say anything to her.

Anna opens the door and tiptoes in. She trips over a carpet or something, Daisy can't see, and then she sits on the bed, missing Daisy's legs for about an inch.

"D'ya like some?" she slurrs out, waving a half-empty beer bottle in her hand. "It's wasted on me, werewolves can't get drunk, but it's the thought that counts, right?"

"What's wrong?" Daisy asks. The only other time a person with a bottle in their hands entered Daisy's room, it was Reggie and his longtime girlfriend dumped him. So Daisy figured it was bad.

"It's… nothing, it's… James." Daisy thinks that's hardly nothing.

"What about him?"

"It's… gonna be fifty years we're not together anymore in a couple of months. And you came from Britain, you reminded me of us when we were younger, and… fuck." Anna may not be drunk, but she is definitely not behaving like she used to, and Daisy can't help but think that this is bothering her.

"Can I… help?"

"Ha." Anna laughs, but it's without humour. "Nobody can help me, but myself, and I sure as fuck am not gonna do it." She pauses, and sighs. "Have you ever loved someone so much and so long that they become a part of you and they're in everything you do?"

"I can't say I have."

"Of course. Human. Your lifetime and mine are incomparable." That too, but that's not the main part of Daisy's concerns. "We were going to be together forever. And now I get to spend that forever alone."

"What happened? If you don't mind me asking."

"You wouldn't understand. Hierarchy." That's the second time Daisy's heard that word, and she never knows what it means. Anna downs her drink. "I'm sorry for bothering you, I'll go now."

"You can vent out longer, if you wish."

"Yeah, but that won't bring him back to me, right?"

Daisy doesn't know what to say, so she doesn't say anything and just watches Anna walk out of the room.

Love is scary, and Daisy is just glad she doesn't have to go through such pain and rejection. But then again, there are plenty of ways to get hurt in this world, she'll find a way somehow.

She struggles to fall asleep after.

In the morning, she tells Anna and James about her trip to Brazil and she asks to see their baby dragon, who has Napoleon's condition. Anna volunteers before James can open his mouth and she drags Daisy away.

They exit the house and Anna shows Daisy into the basement.

"I was pretty sure they were going to die", Anna tells her as they walk down a flight of stairs. "Our gorynych laid the egg during a full moon and I'm pretty sure some of the wolves scared them so that they hid the egg and didn't heat it properly."

"How are you keeping it then?"

"Ask Tamara, she's magic." It feels like more and more time Daisy spends in this house, she will have more and more questions. "Here it is."

Anna's pointing towards a small, glass-like container which looks like it's made of cell fragments, and inside of it is a green three-headed dragon, smaller than Napoleon, and it's asleep.

"He's tiny", Daisy whispers. "Are all dragons his species this small when they hatch?"

"No. That's why Sarnai was worried. I don't think it's moved."

"But how can they and Napoleon have the same illness? Napoleon is active and he's eating, he's just a little cold." Anna drags out two chairs from a corner and pulls them forward so the two of them can sit down.

"Tarasques have thicker skin, they're prone to adapting to their surroundings. Plus, he might have been in the cold for less time. Jia Li told me that Sarnai and she were searching for someone to heal this one, but I didn't know they found it."

Daisy considers the dragon for a little while.

"Did you name them yet?"

"No, we didn't think that they'd survive. It's two girls and a boy, I believe. We'll name them later. First, I think we need to wake them up."

"How?" Daisy asks.

"Tamara said we just reach into the container. Would you do the honour?"

"Um, I can try." Daisy gets up from the chair and sits in her knees, centimetres away from the dragon. It feels like she's always sticking her hand into weird magical things, she notices.

The dragon instantly stirrs closer to the heat of her hand.

"Dragons love you", Anna tells her.

"I have warm hands", Daisy explains. She marvels at the baby dragon—it's so much different than Napoleon, and to think that all of its heads are different beings altogether? Daisy thinks that human scientists would have a field day if they found out about dragons.

But they don't know. And neither should Daisy. Whoops.

"Is it cold?"

"Very."

"I think I should talk to Tamara about perhaps transporting it to Brazil in this container", Anna says. "It doesn't seem safe to take it out."

"I agree." Daisy takes her hand out of the container. "Are you okay? I mean, after that yesterday."

"Oh, don't worry", Anna waves her hand, obviously not willing to talk about it. "I have outbursts every now and then. If it wasn't for you, I'd just cry in an empty room. Really. It's fine."

It doesn't seem fine, Daisy wants to say, but it's not up to her to meddle. The dragon raises its heads and crawls closer to Daisy.

"Poor baby", Daisy whispers. "I'm going to help you, I promise."

Anna watches her for a while, considering things.

"You can name one of them, if you wish. So you have a connection with them."

"Thanks. I'll think about it", Daisy says, and Anna eventually leaves her playing with the dragon. Daisy discovers that they can't walk and their wings aren't moving, but their necks seem to be just fine when close to the heat Daisy provided. Another protective feeling appears in Daisy. She's going to save these three, she's going to save Napoleon, and all the dragins will be okay.

After some time spent with the baby dragon, Daisy realises that she hasn't eaten, so she decides to nag someone about lunch. She finds Kavya and Eshan in the kitchen, having a conversation in Hindi. When the conversation pauses, Daisy speaks up.

"Hey, I don't mean to bother…"

"Not at all", Eshan tells her.

"But, um, I'm human, and humans have to eat."

Kavya bursts with a swear and punches Eshan in the shoulder, a bit too hard to be considered normal, but Eshan doesn't show discomfort.

"I knew we forgot something!" she exclaims. "We don't have to eat, I'm sorry, I'll just make something really quickly…" She immediately starts taking out a pot from the cabinets.

"But you ate yesterday", Daisy says, not understanding.

"Just because we don't have to, doesn't mean we don't like food", Eshan explains.

"How high is your spice tolerance?" Kavya asks Daisy.

And less than an hour later, Daisy is sat on the sofa, with Naeem on her right and Alexandr on her left, a curry bowl in her hands, and she is rooting for Beatrice. She hasn't been this invested in the plot since Dora told her to explore. Her curry bowl is, Kavya claims, the mildest she's ever made, and Daisy's tongue is burning. Naeem offered her water, and she refused. She's stronger than a meal, goddamnit.

"Heard you were going to Brazil", Chao says, entering the living room and sitting on the floor, on top of the pillow. He's holding a curry bowl as well.

"Huh?" Daisy asks and swallows her curry. Tears come to her eyes but she continues anyway. "Oh, yeah. I guess I am."

"You're just going wherever the wind blows you, huh?" Naeem asks, looking as if he might give Daisy some water after all.

"Honestly, I no longer feel in control with my life. Things happen, and I tag along."

"Go with the flow", Alexandr says, nodding solemnly with the face of a man who has heard that phrase being used once in an American TV show.

"How did you guys feel when you discovered you were werewolves?" Daisy asks casually, and Chao nearly chokes on his curry. "Crap, is this not something I'm supposed to talk about?"

"No, no", Chao waves his hand, trying to breathe.

"People don't usually ask." Naeem looks like he might get up and help Chao, but he decides not to last second.

"You don't think about anything then", Alexandr answers Daisy's question, completely unfazed. "It's mostly pain when you first turn, though."

"Pain?" Well, it was foolish of Daisy, the biologist, to assume that changing your body from human to wolf would go magically and pain-free. Daisy just imagines bones breaking and muscles stretching and suddenly she feels a wave of sadness for all the werewolves in this house. "Does it hurt every full moon?"

"It stops hurting after two years, but until then every time you turn is a nightmare", Naeem tells her. "Immortality comes with a price."

They keep on watching the show, and while Daisy has many more questions, she also wants to see how the episode ends. And another one. And another one. It isn't long before the other wolves gather in the living room as well, and soon it's crowded again, but while the seating arrangement is completely different to yesterday, every one has enough space, and a clear patterns emerge. Kavya and Eshan are always close, and so are Naeem and Danil, while James and Anna are on opposite sides of the room, and Daisy begins to think that the werewolf soap opera is more interesting than the Italian one.

She's so amazed with this group dynamic. She's never been surrounded by that many people in a situation which wasn't forced (i.e., school and college), a situation that was actually relaxed and relatively happy. If she was majoring in psychology, like some of her high school acquaitances, this would be a gold mine of information.

The time she spent in this house wasn't long, but it felt as warm, if not warmer than her family home. She wonders whether it's characteristic for werewolves or whether all magical beings acted this way toward strangers.

And she's leaving soon, to heal their dragon as well as her own. It's the least she can do. She is Daisy the Dragon Mum, and by Lord, her dragons will be alright.

She falls asleep on top of someone after a marathon of Beatrice's love affairs, and that same someone must have carried her to the bed, because she woke up next to Napoleon, by Anna, who's searching for something in a pile of clothes closest to the door.

"Sorry!" she whispers when she notices that Daisy's waking up. "I just needed a shirt. Go back to sleep, it's fine."

"I'm up now", Daisy rolls over and yawns. "Did I fall asleep yesterday?"

"Yeah, during one of the best episodes. James thought it was the funniest thing ever."

"You watched the show before?"

"Many times."

"Ugh." Daisy gets up and stretches. Something cracks, as if on command. "I'm always the last one that the news reach."

"Humans and vampires alike."

"Vampires are real?!"

"No, you're dreaming. Bye!" And Anna sprints out of the room, leaving Daisy more confused than normal. (And her 'normal' was very, very confused.)

So she changes her clothes and packs, Napoleon following her every move and eventually settling on her shoulder. She still didn't think that there was anything wrong with him, but she will trust Sarnai. She knows better, after all.

Daisy wonders about all the things she didn't get to learn from the werewolves, and decides to ask them all those questions after coming back from Brazil. She has her mind set on doing a full-on examination of the werewolf species as a whole. Maybe interview them all and compare that information. Become the first human biologist who wrote about werewolves? Sounds pretty good to Daisy.

She leaves Napoleon in the bedroom and walks downstairs, only to be nearly run over by a black wolf. Then, more wolves run after it, all with black and brown fur and white ears. If Daisy wasn't scared, she'd notice it as a pack characteristic, but in the moment, she was just careful not to fall back on the stairs.

She just watches after them, without a single idea of what to do.

"They're playing tag", Tamara says, walking out of the kitchen with a goofy smile on her face. "It's a normal day, trust me."

A light and a dark wolf run through the hallway, like an afterthought, and Tamara watches after them. Judging by the fact that Anna was the only one who was (dyed) blonde, it wasn't hard to guess that it was her, but she didn't know who was the wolf running with her.

"The alphas", Tamara explains walking to the living room, so Daisy follows.

"The pack has two leaders?"

"Yeah. Not all werewolf packs do this", Tamara sits down, "but since they both started the pack, it's how it is."

"Anna isn't over them breaking up", Daisy says, hoping to get a little bit more information about the situation. Usually she wouldn't try to pry, but there have been too many questions in her head lately and she just needs some answers, even if they're irrelevant to the situation like this one.

"She'll never be." Tamara sighs. "They created everything together. If she could get some distance from James, maybe she'd get better, but she has to live with her past every day. I mean, it's her own fault, but James is stubborn as well. They're both im the wrong, if you ask me, but no one cares about my little dryad way of thinking. I'm so out of touch with the wolves, it's unreal." There's some laughter, and it makes Daisy feel more at ease. She's not the only black sheep in the house.

"A dryad?"

"A forest nymph", Tamara clears it up. "You know, like in Greek mythology?"

"Not really. I didn't have a lot of history lessons at school."

"It's okay", Tamara waves her hand, "most of them are lies anyway. When Sarnai told us about the history she lived through, we couldn't believe just how much humans changed in their books."

"Wait, how old is she?"

Tamara smiles, as if she knows that she has information that interests Daisy.

"She was born in 1227., in Karakorum."

"Christ!" Daisy exclaims. "…How? I mean, how does that work?"

"Magic", Tamara laughs.

"No, really."

"Yes, really. We don't exactly know. We just know that, unless something badly harms us, we don't die. Or, in my case, if something damages the forest."

"Wow…" Daisy can't physically comprehend that, but she sure will try. That's the only option, otherwise she will pass out again, this time without external forces. "I'm not… this…"

"It's okay", Tamara tells Daisy, watching her as if she envies her. "If someone told most of these people that they were going to be hundreds of years old, they wouldn't believe it either."

Alexandr and Jia Li walk into the room and, while Jia Li is polite and sits on the sofa, Alexandr drops onto one of the pillows on the floor, seemingly exhausted.

"I hate tag", he informs the girls and leans back, pretending to be roadkill.

"It's not so fun when you're the slowest in the pack", Jia Li nods knowingly.

"First of all", he says, then swears on Russian, "and second of all", another swear, this time impressively long, and Daisy just watches between them, feeling excluded. That must be how James feels when they speak Russian in front of him.

"Always a charmer, that one", Tamara says. Then, a pillow flies directly into Alexandr's face.

"THANKS, TAMARA", he yells out obnoxiously, not showing any intention of moving.

"Um", Daisy says, her voice scarily close to a squeak, "did that pillow just fly?" Tamara observes Daisy for a second, before the pillow shoots up into Daisy's hand.

"Of course. I may not be a witch, but I have a few aces up my sleeve."

Daisy tries not to laugh, because Tamara just made a joke she didn't mean to make, and it's probably only funny to Daisy anyway.

Soon the other wolves start dripping into the living room and occupy the seating area. It's touching how they make space around Daisy and mold their own existence around her.

This time they don't watch the soap opera, so Daisy never finds out whether Beatrice jumped off a cliff or if Raphael saved her. Instead, they put on a cheesy American comedy from the early nineties, and it's obvious that they watched it dozen times prior because they can quote almost every line. Near the ending, Naeem and Chao act out the wedding scene and Danil throws a pillow at them, and Daisy doesn't remember the last time she laughed so much.

And then she has to leave. Bummer.

Tamara and Anna walk with Daisy to the basement to help her pack their baby dragon.

"We decided on the names", Anna informs her.

"We're naming the girls, and you can name the boy", Tamara says as she places her hands on the capsule in which they keep the dragon. She lifts it and slowly inserts it into Daisy's backpack.

"On the far left is Galina, Vasilisa is in the middle, and the far right one is yours", Anna recites.

"Alyosha!" Daisy says, remembering the name of her awesome taxi driver, which will be her lift to the airport.

She calls up Alyosha to pick her up, he says he will be there forty five minutes from now and Daisy spends half an hour saying goodbye to everybody. Chao, Naeem, Sarnai and Kavya hug her, while others opt for a more casual goodbye. James is the last one in the line, and he shakes Daisy's hand formally, and the others mock him in the background.

"Shut up", James tells them calmly, smirking at Daisy. "Idiots. Anyway, I'd like to thank you on the behalf of the pack for taking care of the little dragon."

"Oh, it's nothing, really", Daisy says, flustered.

"Here", James hands a folded paper over to Daisy. "Here is my number, as well as Anna's. Call us if you need anything. Oh, and be careful. There are plenty of dragon smugglers in Brazil."

"I will." Daisy puts the paper into her backpack, hoping Napoleon won't eat it or burn it.

And just like that, she's leaving the cabin, with Anna by her side, walking her off out of the forest.

"I hope you learned something from us", Anna says, her fingers in her pockets and her head leaned down. "I'm sorry we couldn't be more of a help."

"No, you taught me loads. Maybe I will finally stop going around the world with my jaw permanently set to wide open", Daisy smiles. "Plus, because of you, I get to see Brazil. I don't think I would've gone otherwise."

"I'm glad you like this job we've burdened you with", Anna laughs along, but it's quieter than Daisy's heard it. "You're becoming a true dragon saviour."

"I'm liking that title, I might keep it."

They walk for a while longer, and Daisy wishes she has some comforting words for Anna and her situation with James. She doesn't, but she still wants to say something.

"Promise me you'll talk it through with James", she says abruptly, causing Anna to flinch. "I mean, not to necessarily make up, but… just so you get some closure. Promise me you'll do that."

Anna looks at Daisy for what feels to be a long time.

"I promise", she says, nearly a whisper. "I'll try, at least. He might not want to hear me."

"You don't know if you don't try."

"Ha, I guess you're right."

They reach the end of the forest and Anna hugs Daisy. (Daisy is beginning to feel dizzy from all this hugging.)

"I wish you luck", Anna tells her as she releases her.

"Thank you. You too."

They share a smile, and Daisy heads to the road only to find a taxi parked there. She hurries toward it.

"Daisy!" says Alyosha happily. "Good day! Do you need help with luggage?"

"No, I'm fine, thank you", Daisy calls out and places her suitcase in the trunk. She gets in the car and smiles at a familiar face.

"You didn't die!" Alyosha exclaims and Daisy laughs.

"I suppose I didn't. There's still time, though", she says.

"Where are you going now?"

"Brazil." When Alyosha goes a tiny bit pale, Daisy realises she's made a mistake.

"I can't drive to Brazil."

"Oh, no, not…" Daisy shakes her head. "I'm flying to Brazil, I need to go to the airport."

"Oh, okay", Alyosha says, visibly relieved. "I don't think I'm allowed to drive to Brazil."

"We could try", Daisy jokes.

"My passport is home."

"Ah, shame."

Alyosha drives away, and Daisy wants to tell him everything that happened, but she knows that she can't. She wants to run arround telling everybody. It's not her story to tell, though. Alyosha is polite enough not to ask about how Daisy spent her time. Or maybe he just didn't care. Or maybe he had weirder passengers than Daisy.

An hour and a half after that, Daisy is getting ready to fall asleep on the plane. She checked on her dragons (Napoleon is fine, the triplets are still asleep), and everything is going okay. Everything is less okay when she lands at seven am, exhausted and nearly out of her mind. How do people do that? How do they stand the time outside changing, but Daisy's time remains the same? If it was up to Daisy, it'd be afternoon already and she'd be having lunch.

She waits for her suitcase and heads out of the airport. Then, she has no idea where to go. While James did give her the numbers, no one actually told her where in Rio de Janeiro she is supposed to go.

Well, she's not going anywhere today, she thinks, and decides to sleep somewhere near the airport, and then make further plans.

She sits down with her backpack at her feet and connects her phone to the airport WiFi. As she's searching for a place to stay on the internet, she hears someone speaking English in a crowd of Portuguese.

"I am the most tired I've ever been. I've literally never been this tired in my entire life."

"… We didn't change the timezone, Kip."

"Yeah, but I haven't slept in like six days and I'm pretty sure I'm close to collapsing at this point. Matheus owes me."

"He owes you what?"

"Something. Hey, do you feel something weird?"

"Except the fact that it's hot?"

"Yeah. There's something highkey magic here. Come on, let's find the magic person."

Daisy hears them walking closer to her, so she doesn't look up.

One of the girl gasps.

"Ooh! Tawny, I think someone has dragons!"

That's it. That's Daisy's queue to get up and get lost. James warned her about people like this.

Not to appear too suspicious, she waits a couple of seconds to get up, put the backpack on her shoulders and casually sprint away from the airport somewhere where aren't that many people. She ends up wandering through the parking lot, completely lost, so she goes to find a taxi somewhere. Anywhere is better than here, because here are people who can literally sniff out the magic in a crowd.

The taxi queue is huge. Daisy doesn't want to for it for hours, so she stands outside, contemplating her life up to this point.

She stands there for about an hour, looking very suspicious, and around the hour and fifteen mark she sees a man sneaking up to her from the side. She notices him, and looks up.

The man has a dragon on his shirt, and Daisy thinks she found the person she needed.

He says something to Daisy in Portuguese, casually. Daisy is slowly getting sick of not knowing languages spoken around her.

"English, perhaps?"

"Sure", the man nods, then continues speaking in a heavy Aussie accent. "Are you here looking to sell or buy?"

"Heal, actually."

He narrows his eyes a bit.

"… Okay. I think I have a guy for that. Let's head to the beach."

Daisy decides not to ask questions, but so far, all magical folk have been nice to her, so she shouldn't have a problem. If all else fails, she will release the Kraken. Or scream. Yeah, probably scream.

She follows the man (who didn't give a name or ask for one) to the parking lot again and enters his car. They drive in silence and Daisy gets a chance to marvel at Rio, probably the only one she will get.

"Where are we going?" Daisy dares to ask, fifteen minutes into the ride.

"The beach", he answers shortly.

"Okay then." Daisy doesn't ask any more questions.

He stops at a parking lot and gets out, and Daisy decides to do the same. It's in the middle of the city, though, and there are tourists everywhere. Daisy can just make out the statue at the top of the hill and the harbour in front of them. The man heads to the harbour. Daisy follows.

They walk for a while until they reach the shore, and the man points at one of the boats near them.

"That's our ride."

They board the boat from the pier, and Daisy stops trusting this man.

"Where are we going?" she asks again, hoping for a clearer answer this time.

"Saquarema", he answers, as vague as before.

"Where's that?"

The man points in a vague direction, which pisses Daisy off.

"Can you answer one question properly?"

"How young must you be to be this naive? I wouldn't give you more than fifty. You never heard of Saquarema Ladrões?"

"No", Daisy says, fear growing inside her. This is not good. She is on a boat getting farther and farther from the shore with a man who called her naive. She wants to leave immediately, so she says so. "Take me back to the shore."

"Ha", the man barks a laugh. "Sure, Dragon Lady. After that I'll go buy candy for the poor and fix Rio's economy."

"What are you doing?!" Daisy is panicking now, and she has no idea what to do. Before the man has the chance to speak, something rocks the boat, and Daisy is fully convinced she's going to die.

"If you don't let her go, I'll feed you to the sirens", a familiar voice comes from the water, and Daisy peeks down over the edge of the boat. It's that blonde woman from the airport, who seemed to feel the dragons' presence. Maybe Daisy was mistaken about her, because she definitely doesn't seem like a smuggler.

"Huh?" the man says, his voice a mix of confusion and determination. "Get off my boat!" The woman doesn't listen. Instead, she climbs into the boat and starts steering it back to the shore. The woman, Daisy notices, isn't wet, or even mildly alarmed.

When the man leaps at her, she takes off her shoe, lightning fast, and hits him with it, accentuating every word with a smack.

"Evil—white—man!" When the man looks properly out of it, she puts her shoe back on and continues steering the boat. She glances at Daisy. "Please don't tell Tawny I did that."

"I—I won't", Daisy stuttered, holding her backpack close to her in case anyone else tries to kidnap her dragons. Maybe Kip and her are more similar than she'd pinned them to be.

"Don't worry", the woman says when she sees Daisy's face. "I'm just gonna take you to the shore and then you can go do whatever you need to do."

The man starts standing up and she steps on him to keep him down.

"I… don't actually know where I'm supposed to go."

"Oh." The blonde's eyebrows connect. "I know someone who knows his way around here, I'm sure you'll get where you need."

"Let me go!" shouts out the man.

"Not likely. If this girl doesn't get to leave when she wants to, neither do you."

"Who are you?" The man is now constantly yelling, and the woman decides that it's getting annoying, so she waves her hand. The man's mouth is still opening, but not a sound's coming out.

"I'm Kip", she introduces herself to Daisy. "And you're human. I think I'm gonna need an explanation of that."

"I—"

"Later, when we get to the shore. There's time."

They reach the shore eventually and Kip grabs the man's wrist, pulling him with her.

"I'll just handcuff you to a streetlight and leave you here. I don't want to deal with dragon smugglers just now. I'm on vacation", she notifies Daisy and takes off the man's shirt, using it as a rope. The man can't make a sound, and he's not moving either.

Kip drags the man to a nearby streetlight and ties the shirt around it, and around the man's wrist.

"You stay here and be good. English Rose, you're with me."

Even though Daisy should've already learnt the lesson not to talk to strangers, Kip is a stranger who just saved her, so she'll trust her unless weird things start happening. Then Daisy is leaving.

"Now we search for a long-haired emo. Tell me if you see someone who matches the description."

Daisy spots the girl soon enough, dressed in all black and looking pissed off on a bench under a tree.

"Kip, I swear…" she's muttering to herself. She shakes her head and turns to Daisy. "Did she scare you? I'm so sorry, Kip doesn't understand normal human behaviour. I'm Tawny, and I promise I'm more normal than Kip."

Daisy's looking between them, back and forth, until she gets dizzy and sits down on the bench next to Tawny.

"I'm sorry, I'm really tired and this is all just too much."

"Kip, damnit", the brunette shakes her head and kneels down so she can see Daisy's face better. "Are you okay? You look like you're going to be sick."

"I think I am. Can you… just... Slow down?"

"Of course." Kip sits on the ground next to the other woman. "I am Kip, and this is Tawny. Who are you?"

"I'm Daisy… and I need to find someone to heal my dragons. I—I—"

"Take it easy", Tawny says, and her voice is significantly more soothing than Kip's. "Let's get you some water… Kip, take her suitcase."

"I love it when you boss me around", Kip jokes and takes Daisy's suitcase. Tawny rolls her eyes.

"We have a friend who lives here, he will know the dragon keeper you need", Tawny tells Daisy and helps her up on her feet. "Let's get away from all these tourists."

"Gatinha, you are a tourist, too."

"Shush, Kip."

They make their way through the parking lot to its enterance.

"Matheus will be here any moment, and he will drive you to the dragon keeper", Tawny says. She offered to take Daisy's backpack during the walk, but she was unwilling to let go of her dragons.

"Speaking of", Kip jumps into the conversation. "I don't know any dragon keepers in Brazil. There weren't any in South America at all the last time I checked."

Oh no, Daisy thinks. How will she save her dragons now? She can't have travelled all this way for nothing.

"Maybe someone moved here", Tawny suggests.

"Maybe. Brazil's dragon laws are loose."

They wait for a few minutes, and, while Kip and Tawny have a conversation, Daisy's mind goes white around the edges and she zones out. Maybe everything up to this point has been a dream and she'll wake up on the morning when she went to buy snake food and Vihaan won't give her a dragon egg and everything would be fine.

She's not that lucky.

Soon enough, a car pulls over right next to them and Kip immediately starts putting their suitcases (because Kip had carried both hers and Daisy's) into the trunk.

"Just tell us if you feel uncomfortable at any point. I know entering a car with strangers must be scary, but trust me. We're the good guys. At least, I am. Kip is just comedic relief", Tawny tells Daisy.

"I heard that", says Kip from the back. "Now let's go."

They enter the car and the first thing Kip does is to hug the driver—Matheus, Daisy guesses.

"Hi!" Kip exclaims. "We have picked up a human on our way here! Matheus, this is Daisy. Daisy, Matheus."

"Hello", Matheus says. His hair is blue at the tips, but everything else about him seems normal. "What's your business in Rio?"

"Dragons?" Daisy manages to squeak out. Oh, great, now he thinks Daisy is smuggling dragons. How eloquent of her. "I mean, I have a couple of dragons. With the same illness. And I'm hoping to heal them."

"Yeah, yeah", Kip nods along. "I don't know anyone who deals with dragon illnesses in Brazil. But, then again, I don't live here."

Tawny, who's sitting next to Daisy on the back seat, facepalms. Hard.

"Kip, please", she complains.

"Lucky for you, I know just the person you're looking for", Matheus drives off. "And I think you two know her, too", he tells Kip and Tawny. Kip just stares at him with narrow eyes until an almost literal lightbulb turns on in her brain.

"Al-Islah!"

"Who?" Tawny looks even more confused than before. Daisy understands her completely. Confusion has been a permanent state of mind of hers for a couple of days now.

"I've helped her back in the 1800s. You know her by a different name", Kip tells Tawny, "but it's the same person. Remember? 'The bravest warrior of the Ottoman Empire', or whatever she said her title was."

"I… hm. I think I know the person", Tawny doesn't look too convinced.

Daisy doesn't know much about history, but this doesn't seem right. A female warrior? In the time before the 1800s? She'll believe it when she sees her.

"You know her, trust me", Matheus tells Tawny. "I went to visit her once, nymph business, and she didn't shut up about you."

"Only the awful, I hope", Kip laughs.

"I'm so sorry. Again", Tawny whispers to Daisy. "That's Kip for you."

Then Kip and Matheus start talking in perfectly fluent Portuguese, and Daisy's not sure whether she prefers it this way or not. She doesn't hear her name, though, so that's good.

They drive out of the city, around the favellas and into the forest. Matheus stops the car in front of the forest, just off the road.

"The rent-a-car owner would kill me if I drove it through the forest", Matheus switches to English, obviously for Daisy (and Tawny? Daisy doesn't know if she spoke Portuguese as well).

"I don't think I'm dressed for the forest", Daisy says, gingerly exiting the car. Soon they're all out, and Matheus locks the car.

"It's not far", Matheus says. "Kip, you'll get the luggage later. First, let's deal with your sick dragons. They must be important when you travelled all the way to Brazil to heal them."

"They are."

They walk through the forest, and all of the branches seem to move from their way. Someone's magic here, Daisy decides, and it's not her. Nobody looks as if they're doing magic, though, so she can't tell.

"The magic community is usually not weird, I promise", Tawny says. She and Daisy are falling behind, while Kip and Matheus are making their way through faster and with considerable ease. "Show-offs", Tawny calls after them.

"Darlin', I'd levitate you if you ask me to", Kip yells over her shoulder. Is she a nymph? "Daisy isn't complaining, and neither should you."

"Well, Daisy's body doesn't actively reject sunlight", Tawny complains.

"You'll live", Kip turns back to Matheus.

"Being a vampire sucks", Matheus jokes, and Daisy is reminded of the conversation with Anna. Is Tawny a vampire?

"Ha, ha. I haven't heard that joke a million times in the past hundred years. Truly hilarious."

Tawny notices Daisy staring at her, eyes big as plates. She opens her mouth to speak, but then stops herself by biting her lip.

"So, have you never met someone who's more than a hundred years old?" she tries weakly, an attempt to make Daisy's life easier.

"I've never met a vampire", Daisy replies.

"You've met me an hour ago", Tawny says. Daisy considers it.

"I guess I have."

They walk for some ten minutes when they reach a clearing. There's a house on its edge, and next to it there's a garden of significant size, filled with fruits, vegetables and flowers in bloom. Some of the flowers are carefully placed around the walls of the house, and they grew around the edge of the room. A bonfire is placed some ten metres away from the garden. There's also a tiny shed, not far from the house. Most of the grass of the clearing, however, looked as if it had been stepped on, and although it was green, it was squashed to the ground.

"That's beautiful", Daisy says breathlessly, in a quiet voice. They all hear her anyway.

"Most of us choose something less flashy. This isn't very practical for the modern, urban lifestyle", Kip comments. "Hey, Tawny, let's build a house in the forest and never communicate with humans again."

"I'm pretty sure that's speciesistic. Is that the word I'm looking for?" Matheus asks.

"English is, like, my fifth language, don't ask me", Kip says looking around. "Where is she?"

"Making an enterance, knowing her", Matheus says.

And make an enterance she did.

First, there was an impressive amount of warmth and wind, all whooshing into the clearing at once. Then, there's a dragon on fire. It's as literal as it gets. Instead of wings and tail, the dragon has fire in the shape of those extremities, leaving embers behind which go out in seconds. On its back there's a saddle three times the size of a normal horse one, and it provides a fire-free seat to the girl riding it.

Kip whistles, which earns her a smack from Tawny, while Daisy is completely mesmerised. Her jaw feels like it might unhinge from her face.

The dragon lands on the grass, its feet frying the grass completely, and a lady hops off its back, uttering encouragements in a calm voice. Somehow she's petting the dragon without burning to bits, and Daisy needs to learn how to do that.

Ruffling her wind-swept hair gracefully, she aproaches the group with overpowering dignity.

"Hello", she says. Her voice is smooth and soothing like honey, with an accent Daisy can't place. "What brings you to my corner of the rainforest?"

"We're just visiting, but Daisy here", Kip pats Daisy's back, "she's got dragon business."

"Dragons?" she asks, raising an eyebrow. "Never heard of them."

Just then, the fire dragon stretches its long neck to the group, its nose close to the woman.

"Sona, kal", she says, patting the dragon's cheek. "This is Sona."

"She's amazing!" Kip exclaims. "I never knew there were ejderhas outside of Turkey."

"There aren't. Shh." The woman covers her mouth with her finger. "You three know me", she gestures at Kip, Tawny and Matheus. "But I feel I should introduce myself anyway. I'm Islah Bint Salih."

"I'm Daisy."

"Nice to meet you, Daisy", Islah says with a slight bow. "And, Tawny, we've met, but I had a different name back then."

Realisation blooms across Tawny's face.

"Oh! Yes, yes, of course! I didn't know…" she shakes her head to reset her thoughts. Then glares at Kip. "You never told me!"

"I forgot. I have a million and four things on my mind at any given moment", Kip makes an excuse for herself and eyes the dragon curiously. "Can I pet her?"

"You can try. She doesn't like most people", Islah tells her and nods towards the house. "As for those who prefer having skin, let's move inside. Are you hungry, Daisy? I made Güllaç, my mum's original recipe, I think you'll like it."

"I've never tried it", Daisy admits. As Islah guides her into the house, Tawny and Matheus stay back, watching Kip with the dragon as if it was the most interesting movie they've ever seen. "Is she going to die?" Daisy asks, full of genuine concern for Kip.

"It would be very ironic, for her to die because of a dragon."

"Why?"

"She spent a century helping water dragons in China", Islah explains as she opens the door for Daisy, letting her walk into the house first.

"This isn't exactly a water dragon", Daisy points out, but walks into the house all the same.

The inside is as beautiful as the outside. There are flowers everywhere, of all different kinds, just like Leilani's flowers, and, while there isn't a lot of furniture, that which does exist in the space looks worn, comfy and homely. Everything looks soft and welcoming, in gentle pastel colours. That is, everything except a huge metal sword hung above a fireplace, engraved with some writing and with dried blood in its creases.

'The bravest warrior of the Ottoman Empire'. Wow.

"Is that yours?" Daisy is completely taken aback. She leaves her backpack behind and navigates through the room to the sword. It is long, curved and thin, unlike a generic sword Daisy imagines, and it looks sharp, even though unused.

"No, I found it in the forest", Islah says, and since she says that in a calm tone, it takes Daisy a couple of seconds to realise she was joking.

"Oh", Daisy laughs, "it's dangerous to leave swords around."

"I thought so too, so I took it with myself so no one would get hurt."

They share a smile, and Islah shows Daisy into the small kitchen. There's three chairs and a table under a window, so they sit for a while and watch Kip run as Sona's chasing her, and Tawny and Matheus trying not to laugh in the background.

"It's… how do you call it in English?… A charade. Kip is playing with Sona, she's not really in danger."

"Is nobody's first language English?" Daisy asks.

"Here? Out of all of us? No." Islah leans against her elbows and nods at the group outside. "Kip is Greek, and Tawny is Portuguese. I'm not sure about Matheus, though."

"You're… Turkish, right?"

"Broadly speaking", Islah shrugs. "You're lucky that English is internationally spoken."

Kip, Tawny and Matheus eventually come inside, just as Daisy is finishing her dessert (which is truly divine). Kip looks slightly breathless, but extremely satisfied with herself.

"She didn't catch me", she announces.

"Because she didn't want to", Islah points out. Kip stares at her, faked disappointment blooming on her face.

"How dare you! I thought that my puny human legs can outrun dragon's. Truly, a dream shaterrer." Kip notices Daisy's empty plate and looks at Islah. "Can I get some, pretty please?"

"Of course."

Daisy watches as Islah serves Kip, but doesn't offer anything to the others.

"Do you guys want some?" she asks them, and Tawny and Matheus just stare at her for a moment, not understanding.

"We don't—"

"I mean—"

"She's human, you guys", Kip says, waving her abnormally long spoon around, and turns to Daisy. "Vampires can't process food and nymphs don't need it to survive."

"Thanks, teacher", Tawny says with some sort of irony that Daisy doesn't understand.

Since there isn't enough chairs for all of them, Kip sits atop Tawny and Islah pulls a tabouret from the living room for Matheus.

"So, let me hear about your dragons."

"Okay." Daisy takes a deep breath, as if she was defending her work during college. "I've got two. Well, four. Depends on how you want to look at it. One is one, and one is three. What?" she stops herself, because it sounds confusing even to her.

"I assume you've got a gorynich, then?" Islah asks with a small smile playing on her lips, careful not to appear mocking.

"Yes. The three-headed… thing. They're not mine, though, they belong to a pack in Russia. I've also got a… I don't think I'm pronouncing this right, a tarasque?"

Islah's eyebrows shoot up, and she nods quickly.

"Yes, you are… I haven't seen a tarasque in years." She shakes her head and returns to her normal self. "What seems to be the problem with them?"

"They're cold", Daisy says. "Sarnai—the medical expert or whatever—she said something about hypothermia? Their eggs weren't heated enough before they hatched."

It's important to notice that Daisy's inner clock due to international travel became completely messed up, and she might not be at her most eloquent. If they noticed, they didn't point it out.

Islah is nodding along to her talking and, when Daisy finishes, she brightens Daisy's day.

"Of course. I can heal all of them, but…" Maybe not, then. "You said the gorynich belongs to a pack in Russia? I'm afraid you'll have to tell them that they're not getting their dragon back."

"What?"

"If it's been out of the fire for any amount of time, it's unfortunately not strong enough for independent living. Gorynichs are weak to temperature changes."

"Oh." Daisy weighs her options. "But they will live?"

"If they stay with me. I know the magic needed for them to keep their… there was a word for this… homeostasis?"

"That's Greek", Kip points out.

"So it is correct", Islah says with a smile. "As for the tarasque, I can heal it and it will be good to go. They're more resilient."

"Oh, okay. That's alright, I guess. The tarasque is mine anyway."

"About that", Tawny says cautiously, as if on shaky grounds.

"How did you get it?" Kip asks, with no interest in pleasantries. Tawny glares at her, but she either doesn't notice or doesn't care. "You're not supposed to come in direct contact with any dragon. You're from England? Somebody's leaving illegal dragons behind and that needs to be investigated."

"And that someone is not going to be you", Tawny tells her.

"Aw, dude, come on. England is colder than Brazil. And you don't have to learn the language."

"Let's settle down somewhere where there isn't any illegal dragon business, or humans who are beginning to learn about the magical community, or slaves to be freed. This was supposed to be a vacation, Kip."

"I'm sorry", Daisy says. It felt like that was directed at her.

"No, it's not your fault. If it wasn't for your dragons, she would've found someone else in trouble and make it her mission to save them", Tawny shakes her head, giving up.

"If I don't drag you out with me, you'd just stay in the house for years and do nothing", Kip argues.

"What's so bad about that?" Tawny says, even though she realises that Kip has a point.

"Old equals wise, right?" Matheus asks with a smile. There's something fond about it, and Daisy is lead to believe that these three have a whole lot of history that she doesn't know anything about. She hopes to find out, though.

"… Anyway, dragons?" Islah tries to steer the conversation back to its initial topic. "Can I see the dragons? I have to see them to help them."

"Oh, sure, give me a second." Daisy hops up and rushes to the living room. She opens the backpack, and Napoleon immediately flies out, clinging onto the ceiling.

"Hello!" Kip's the first one to react, seemingly unalarmed by the dragon hanging upside down like a bat.

"Napoleon, get down!" Daisy commands. Her dragon looks at her for a second or two before releasing the ceiling and dropping onto the table.

"Very active", Islah points out, watching Napoleon carefully. "That's a good sign. Can I touch you? Or are you going to burn me?" She's talking to the dragon like it's a real person, and Daisy likes that. In the end, Islah manages to pet Napoleon's wings before he flies up and into a window, staring at something with utmost concentration.

"That's absolutely terrifying", Tawny says.

"Vicious beast", Kip agrees. Matheus decides that it's probably for the best to remove the plates from the table, in case Daisy's other dragon decides to pull a similar stunt.

Unfortunately, it's not the case. Galina, Vasilisa and Alyosha aren't asleep, but they aren't far from it. When Daisy pulls them out, the nymp capsule around them disappears, and the dragon opens its eyes, but doesn't move.

"As I thought", Islah nods. "They're in much worse condition."

"But you can help them?" Daisy asks.

"Of course."

There's a scratching noise from the window, and when they look at it, they find it's Napoleon from one side, scratching the glass, and Sona, from the other side, pressing her head against the window. Islah throws her head back with a sigh before she gets up and hurries to get her ejderha away from the window. Daisy walks up to her dragon as well, because he started breathing fire and melting the glass.

Kip and Tawny don't move, and Matheus just returns to the tabouret. Daisy wonders how old must you be to not be alarmed by your surroundings.

When Islah marches back in, Napoleon is in Daisy's arms and the gorynych is asleep on the desk.

"I'm sorry for that. Sona is very protective of baby dragons, especially those who appear ill."

"Napoleon's never seen a dragon, that must have been an experience", Daisy offers.

"Indeed. Now, are you all planning on staying here? Because, if so, I must inform you I only have two beds and a sofa."

"Ha!" Kip exclaims and points at Matheus. "You're gonna sleep with me! Like the good old times in Spain!"

"What?" Matheus frowns. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, obviously Islah is on the sofa because she's the host and she will insist on it, and Tawny has been the least scary person out of us three, so Daisy should sleep with her, and I'm gonna have a fun time with you!"

Daisy wants to complain, but, after she does the maths, she'd rather sleep in the same bed as Tawny than as anybody else. Even if she is a vampire.

Tawny looks like she's genuinely ready to bang her head against the desk.

"Alkippe Georgios, I will feed you to the hellhounds", she says in a calm tone, which seems anything but calm to Daisy.

"What?" Kip asks innocently.

"I don't sleep! And Matheus doesn't have to!"

"Oh. I forgot."

"Spain, huh?" Matheus asks, slightly shaken. "Whatever in the world made you bring up Spain again?"

"He kissed me once", Kip turns to Daisy, "and I'm never letting him forget it."

"That's not what I'm talking about and you know it", Matheus says, "but alright. I'd also want to note that I was very high on fairy dust."

"Excuses, excuses."

Matheus says something—Daisy isn't sure if it's Spanish or Portuguese—and Kip flips him off.

"I'll take these dragons to my shed and begin healing them while you argue, okay?" Islah suggests and picks up the gorynych. She heads through the back door, and Daisy follows, holding Napoleon tightly so he wouldn't fly off.

"How does Tawny stand them?" Daisy asks with a smile as they cross the clearing into a small shed on the other side.

"To keep up with Kip you need a lot of patience and knowledge", Islah tells her. "Especially in arguements. She's two steps ahead all the time, and if it seems she made a mistake, she did it on purpose."

"That was just to annoy Matheus, then?"

"And to show off in front of you. You're new to the magical world and she's feeding you information."

"She could just sit me down and tell it to me like a normal human being."

"You might want to word it differently", Islah lets out a soft laugh. She shifts the gorynych in her hands to reach into the pocket of her skirt, where she finds keys. She unlocks the shed.

Daisy wonders how both of them are going to fit in a shed the size of a coffee table. She peeks in.

There's a staircase leading down. Of course.

Downstairs, in the basement, it smells like herbs and leather. Daisy guesses it's because of all the small jars, scattered across an abundance of shelves. The basement is probably as big as Islah's house, and it's packed full with ingredients and books, most of which look centuries old.

In the middle of the room, there's a desk, and Islah places the dragon there.

"Don't let Napoleon fly off, he might eat something and become ill. There are many substances here which can be lethal if consumed raw."

"I won't", Daisy promises as she walks around the room. Most of the names written on the jars are in Latin, which Daisy theoretically knows, but the words on most of the jars aren't familiar to her. "How do you heal the dragons?"

"It's a process", Islah says and bends down to search for a specific ingredient. "You have to have access to a variety of rare plants, and I've spent decades trying to get them to grow here. Dragon-scale roses", she announces as she delicately takes out a jar from its place and puts it on the desk. "Try searching for one that says saffron root, it should be somewhere on the top shelf behind you."

They spend a short amount of time gathering jars of different shapes and sizes, until they have a diverse collection of seventeen different ingredients on the desk.

"Basically, all of these ingredients are somehow related to fire", Islah says. "There's pyro-lavander, which grows near volcanoes, but retreats to the ground whenever humans are near. This one type of calla lilies, found only in Southern Africa, which burns as bright and as long as coal. And this one", she taps the smallest jar proudly, "that's petals from magma flower. It only grows inside volcanoes, ten minutes to eruption."

"How did you get that?" Daisy asks, examining the ingredients, most of which she's never heard of. "Who goes around active volcanoes?"

"I do", Islah smiles. "I can't not have it in my collection."

Daisy pulls herself a chair and watches as Islah takes out a beaker. Then, all jar lids pop off at once and powders, leaves and petals begin flying out of them and into the beaker. It looks like Islah's controlling it, like pulling invisible strings attached to her fingers. Witch, Daisy classifies her.

There's no measuring involved. It seems like Islah knows exactly how much of each ingredient she needs, and pulls out exactly the right amount. Soon, a red liquid collects at the bottom of the beaker, and there's smoke coming out of it.

"It's done", Islah says. "Hold onto Napoleon a while longer, I'll deal with these three first." She gets her hands covered in the red liquid and handles the dragon, making sure to cover all of its body. As soon as the liquid touches them, all three dragon head perk up and start looking around.

"Hi, everybody", Daisy says, moving closer to observe the dragon.

"I will have to do the treatment at least once every three months, if not more", Islah explains. "As for Napoleon, he will be fine after four or five months, two treatments at most."

"You hear that, buddy? You're going to be just fine", Daisy rocks Napoleon, and he coughs before stretching his neck out to rest on Daisy's shoulder.

"He's very fond of you."

Daisy smiles. In the few days she noticed that he's already growing, and when he flies around, he always returns to Daisy. Maybe she's involuntarily doing something right.

"I'm a Dragon Mum", she announces happily. A laugh escapes Islah—the most undignified noise Daisy's heard from her.

"Me too. That's very accurate."

"How many dragons are there here?"

"Um", Islah frowns, "no idea." Daisy raises an eyebrows. How does she not know? "I mean, I've got Sona, and a cluster of water dragons in a lake a couple of kilometres south. Then there is an absolute ton of Amazonian piasas here, and most often I just feed them. You might run into one of them."

"Piasas?"

"A piasa is a bird dragon", Islah explains. "They're a bit smaller than horses. Yellow feathers. They usually flee from humans and magical beings but I have a feeling they'll like you."

"Thanks."

"Okay, these three are fine for now", Islah announces as she returns the gorynych to the desk. It's standing up now, for what seems to be the first time, and they're testing out their short legs by stomping around. "Hand over Mr Bonaparte."

After she covers Napoleon in the red liquid, Islah washes her hands in a tiny sink in the corner and starts returning the bottles.

"You can let them out now, so they can fly around. They can't get out of the clearing." Daisy listens, and the dragons run out of the door to the best of their ability.

"Why don't you just levitate them into their original places?"

"Erm, it's a very delicate construction. Also, I hexed the shelves to repel magic, so no one can just come in, say two words, and steal the ingredients."

"You get many visitors here?"

"No."

"Fair enough."

When all the jars are in their respective place, Islah offers to go further into the forest to check on the piasas with her.

"If you want to, of course."

Even though it meant leaving Napoleon alone, flying around, at high risk of hurting himself, Daisy doesn't want to miss out on any extra dragon knowledge. They tell the group they're leaving for the forest (Matheus is on the sofa watching the news, Kip and Tawny are having a soft conversation in Portuguese) and they're off.

Like Kip or Matheus did when they were first walking into the forest, Islah moves the branches with her magic, and half of the walk Daisy just watches the trees around her move.

"You haven't been around a lot of magic, have you?" Islah asks her.

"Not at all. This is all very new to me."

"You're in great hands. Kip and Tawny, even Matheus—they're legendary. I'm not sure how many of the stories about them I've heard are myths, and how many are truth."

"Really?" Daisy'd never pin them for legends, but who's she to know.

"If you ever get the chance, ask them to tell you something about themselves."

"Like what?"

"Anything", Islah says, moving a branch so it doesnt get caught into her skirt. "If I remember correctly, Tawny is somewhere my age. That means centuries of experience travelling."

"You travelled a lot?"

"Oh, not me. I spend my human years in the Ottoman Empire, then I learned about dragons in Tibet. Lost a couple of decades in France, but then my illness started bothering me more than usual and I had to find someone to help me. I stayed with Kip and Tawny in North America for a little less than a year two centuries ago, and since then I'm here."

If Daisy was to come out with an opinion, it would be that, for a person who 'hasn't travelled a lot', Islah sure seems to have travelled a lot.

She picks out Islah's illness from the monolog, but she decides not to ask. At least, not yet. Everything she needs to know is in her reach, and she will slowly uncover it all.

Or, you know, like with the pack in Russia, she will leave Brazil more confused than ever.

"Stay still", Islah suddenly stops and the branches behind them snap into place. Daisy listens stops just behind her.

"Are they dangerous?"

"Piasas? No. But they're very cautious and they won't approach us if we make a lot of noise." Islah whistles a line of two notes, the first one higher than the second. After a couple of seconds, the melody is repeated multiple times, all around Daisy and Islah. "Bunch of birds, really", Islah smiles.

When the trees in front of them move, a yellow, feathery head with two jewel-like eyes pops out, tilded to the side.

"I know this one", Islah says as she's stretching her arm palm down to let the dragon come to her. "He's always getting himself in trouble, I have to heal his wounds at least once a year. Hey, dummy", she sweet talks, and the dragon hops out from behind the tree and pushes Islah's hand with his head, as if to make her pet his head.

"He's lovely", Daisy says, slowly walking around the dragon to get a full view of his body.

"See here, and here?" Islah pets the dragon's body as a disguise to show Daisy the places where he's been hurt.

"Do you name them?"

"No, not these. It's their forest, I'm just a visitor."

Daisy thought that witches were immortal. Perhaps it has something to do with the illness she mentioned before.

"Can I touch him?"

"You can try. Slowly."

As soon as Daisy stretches her hand out, she's tackled to the floor, with feathers in her face and surrounding her, and for a second she doesn't know what's going on. She hears Islah whistle out two notes, quicker and different order this time, and immediately the dragons are off her.

"I'm so sorry, I don't know what happened…" Islah utters a litany of apologies as she's helping Daisy get back on her feet. "They seem to adore you, otherwise they'd flee in a different direction—away from you."

"I'm f-fine, I guess", Daisy stutters as she uses Islah's steady hand as leverage. "What happened?"

"I think dragons really like you."

When Daisy gets up, she looks around. The (multiple) piasas create a circle around her, each a metre away, and they're all staring at Daisy. There's something in the way they're looking at her which makes Daisy think of an old family dog she used to have, times ten.

"You've got a cut here", Islah traces a line over her cheek. "Give me a second, stay still." Daisy does as she was told, and feels wind on her face. When Islah nods, she places her hand over the supposed cut. Gone.

"That's… cool." That's the most eloquent response Daisy can think of.

"Living around dragons means that you have to stich yourself up every week. I've got a lot of practice." Islah's gaze covers the dragons. "Off you go."

The dragons slowly back away until they reach the trees, and then they begin running away.

"I'd say that was odd, but… I've seen many odd things, and this doesn't even reach the Top Hundred list, so let's just ignore it for now and get back to the house", Islah suggests, and Daisy figures that it's the smartest to trust her.

When they reach the clearing, they find Kip and Tawny sitting near the bonfire. Tawny's arms are crossed on her chest and she's clearly mad about something.

"Matheus had to go check on something", Kip says cheerfully, seemingly oblivious to Tawny.

"Daisy", Tawny calls out, "your first language is English."

"Yes?"

"Please explain to Kip the definition of a vacation."

"Um… a vacation is a period of time in which you travel somewhere and relax?"

"Relax, Kip!" Tawny exclaims. "Do nothing! I can't believe you dragged Matheus into this. I should've known."

"It's a problem that's got to be solved now or later", Kip shrugs. She seems to not feel guilty at all. "And I figured now, better than later. Also, we can still 'relax'", air quotes, "all you want, because it's Matheus who's doing most of the work. I'll just translate." She turns to Islah and Daisy. "Tawny's got some unresolved issues with Mister Ocean and we're conspiring with sirens to fix that."

"Sirens? Do they really exist?" Daisy asks, partially because she wants to know, and partially she doesn't want to see Kip and Tawny fighting.

"They have existed at least for two millenias, if not more", Kip shrugs.

Islah opens her mouth to speak, but she bites on her lip to stop herself. Daisy notices, but doesn't point it out. Meanwhile, Tawny gets up and marches back into the house.

"Anyway, how did your walk go?" Kip asks, rubbing her hands to get some warmth from the fire, as if they weren't in the southern hemisphere during day.

"We survived", Islah nods slightly and sits on the grass (what's left of it, anyway). Daisy decides to sit down as well, because why not.

"A dozen dragons attacked me."

"I don't sense any irony in your voice. What up with that?" Kip looks Islah, then Daisy. "You're a special brand of human, aren't you?"

"I hope not."

"Okay, story time." Kip uncrosses her legs only to fold them again, in a different way. Something cracks. "Old bones. Anyway, Miss Daisy. How in the world did you obtain two dragons, and how did you haul your English ass all the way to Brazil?"

Before Daisy can answer, Tawny is back with three mugs in her hands. She distributes them.

"I made tea, I hope you don't mind", she says as she hands Islah and Daisy the mugs. For a second, Daisy wonders how she made tea in a minute and a half, but then she remembers. Magic. Tawny looks at Kip and glares. "I'm not as angry as I used to be, so I didn't poison your tea. I just spat in it."

"That's hilarious", Kip takes the mug and sips. "You say that as if we didn't mix other body fluids in the past."

"I swear to all that's good, you'll be the death of me."

"As I should. Now, Daisy, if you will?"

Daisy then tells them about her journey from the petshop, Leilani and Sherman, to Anna and James in Russia. The immortals listen in silence, sometimes nodding along, and when Daisy finishes, Islah speaks up.

"Leilani is very skilled at botany. Some of the flowers here are hers", Islah nods at her garden.

"I'm more interested in her tech savviness. She shouldn't really be hacking the human system like that… but, she's not using it maliciously, so I'll let it slide." Kip shakes her head. "I believe we've met her once, while she was crossing the States."

"Do you know everybody?" Daisy asks.

"Unfortunately. I didn't know about the collaborative pack in Moscow, though. How are they doing?"

"Fine, I guess. The alphas broke up, though, so now they're working things out."

"No", Tawny says.

"What?" Kip frowns at her.

"I said, no, we're not going to Russia to do couple counseling."

"Aww, why not?"

There's rustling from the forest and Matheus walks out. He's dragging three suitcases behind him which he leaves in front of the house before he approaches the bonfire crew.

"Brought your suitcases", he says, then says Kip's name and proceeds to speak in a different language, which Daisy guesses to be Spanish.

"Well, that's my queue", Kip says and gets up, brushing herself off. "Be back soon."

"I hope you get eaten by a shark", Tawny muses, her voice blank.

"Yo estoy offended. Now goodbye yourselves", Kip waves and pulls Matheus by his wrist back into the forest.

"What a rollercoaster", Islah notices.

"What an idiot", Tawny agrees, watching as Kip and Matheus leave.

"Why do you hate her?" Daisy asks, and Islah and Tawny just stare at her for a couple of seconds.

"Hate her? I'm married to her."

Daisy feels her jaw dropping.

"… Okay?"

"I don't hate her", Tawny shakes her head, "but she constantly drags us around to help my… situation. I've told her many times to just leave me alone, but apparently she'd rather help me than do something else that is more important."

There's something resembling marching coming from the forest again, and it's Kip, stomping her way into the clearing. She looks at Tawny for a couple of seconds before saying a line in Portuguese and running back after Matheus.

Tawny covers her face with her hands and groans.

"What was that?" Islah asks.

"She said… 'As if you don't know you're the most important thing to me'." Daisy swears that Tawny looks as if she might be blushing, if only she wasn't ghostly pale.

"That's cute", Daisy says.

"She can be, when she tries. Rarely", Tawny adds. "Kip is a very particular person. Luckily, I learned how to deal with her."

"I'm going to start making lunch", Islah nods after a couple of beats of silence and walks to the house.

"And then there were two", Tawny notices.

Daisy watches the bonfire for a few seconds when Napoleon flies directly to her lap, soon followed by the gorynych, which lies down leaning their heads on Daisy's thigh.

"Am I magnetic or something? These dragons can't seem to stay away from me", Daisy asks as she pats Napoleon's head with her finger.

"It's not a common thing, but I've heard that dragons are very attracted to some humans. Um, not in that way", Tawny corrects herself.

"Really?" Well, Daisy is less weird than she thought she was.

"Yeah. The last case I know of… well, has to be 1800s, France." Tawny takes a deep breath. "Oh, no, now I'm going to have to tell you all about it, right?"

"Err, yeah?" Daisy says. "If there's anybody like me, I want to know."

"You sound like me when I was turned. Okay", she nods, "I don't know the story fully, I've heard it centuries ago, and if you want to know the details, you might want to ask Kip, but here it goes.

"A wizard who spent his life examining dragons travels from Asia to Europe, intending to sail to America and be one of the first people to fully research the many endemic dragon species of the New World. However, when he reaches France and searches through the forests, he finds them lacking. The native French breed, the tarasques, are dying out. America can wait, he decides, and makes it his current task to bring the tarasque breed back to life.

"Of course, it's not an easy task, especially in an then-urban area such as northern France. The process involves finding a young tarasque pair of opposite genders and somehow flying one of then over cities to meet the other one. Once the female lays eggs, you move onto another pair. And another. He was lucky, because wizards are immortal, and he could keep doing it until he's fully satisfied with the situation in the French forests.

"One day, when he's checking his growing tarasque family in the woods fairly close to humans, he notices one of them missing. Of course, he panics and goes to find it before the humans can, because he learnt not to mess around with humans and magic after the inquisition.

"It's early in the morning, the time when tarasques are usually asleep, and the wizard looked through his forest and the forest next to it, but he couldn't find his dragon, sleeping or not. However, he finds a small hut near the houses of the noblemen, and decides to rest there. The hut didn't look like it was used either way, and he won't bother anyone if he sleeps until noon.

He doesn't even get to fall asleep, because a woman opens the door with a short-lived scream and steals the first dream from the wizard.

"'First a lizard with wings, then a strange man', the woman says, backing away to the door. She's carrying a soft, richly woven quilt and the wizard can hear satisfied coos from it. He quickly decides to take the dragon from the woman, run just out of her sight and then teleport back to his forest, but the woman is still standing in the doorframe, and he can't exactly teleport in front of a human."

Daisy laughs, so Tawny stops.

"No, sorry, continue", Daisy says. Tawny observes her with a slightly confused smile and continues.

"So they're silent for a couple of seconds—the woman staring at the wizard with wide eyes and the wizard trying to find a way to flee in the least confusing way for the both of them. Then the woman shifts the quilt-covered dragon onto her left hand and offers the right one to the wizard. 'I'm Henrietta. Does the lizard have a name?' she asks, and the wizard, in all his confusion, shakes her hand and says his name, as well as the dragon's.

"'Where are you from?' Henrietta asks. 'I don't think I've seen you on any of this year's balls.' 'That's because I haven't been on any', the wizard says absent-mindedly, walking closer to check on his dragon. 'You're a scientist, right? You created this', Henrietta uncovers the dragon, the now-blackened quilt dropping to the floor. The dragon looks relieved to be free so he flies into the wizard's arms. 'I didn't create anything', the wizard shakes his head. 'I'm sorry, but I have to go now. I'd appreciate if you don't tell anybody about my creations.' Henrietta is still in the doorframe, showing no intention of moving.

"'There are more?' she says, and the wizard realises he's made a big mistake. 'Please let me see them! I promise I won't tell anyone! Nobody will know, just let me see them!', she begs.

"Now, when Kip told the story to me, she said… You wouldn't understand", Tawny's frowning a bit.

"Say it anyway."

"She said, 'the wizard looked at Henrietta like I looked at you on the cliffs. He looked at her as if his body knew she was going to be important to him, but his brain didn't catch up yet'."

Daisy doesn't know what the cliffs mean, but she guesses it's important to the two of them.

"The wizard, at that point, is equal parts tired and relieved, and the woman is the first contact he's had with a person, let alone a human, in years. So he lets her go with him. They're walking through the forest, the dragon flying beside them, and Henrietta is a constant supply of questions. 'How old is he?', 'Are there more species?, 'What do they eat?' and so on. Questions you've certainly asked yourself, as well."

Daisy is reminded to earlier this week. Luckily, she's much more knowledgeable than then, right?

"The wizard answers all her questions patiently. He's doing it with ease, educating Henrietta about the dragons without thinking about the consequences. The thought that he really shouldn't be telling her all that appeared much later in his head, and by that point, Henrietta became a member of his party and he couldn't shake her off even if he tried.

Henrietta's brother's godmother was somehow related to the royal family, so Henrietta was technically a noblewoman, but everybody thought she was slow and didn't pay attention to her. That's why they built her a house far away from the rich part of the town, and generally left her alone. The only duty she had was to appear at the annual ball and stay as far from the other noblemen as possible.

"All in all, she had a comfortable, but boring life. So when the wizard appeared, she decided to cling onto him for as long as she can.

"Of course, the dragons took her in like she was one of their own. Something similar to you and Napoleon—they followed her everywhere, and it made the wizard's job much easier.

"It started fairly innocent; Henrietta visited three times a week and spent hours with the wizard and his dragons. Only when the wizard started explaining his powers and immortality to her, he realised something. He was in love with a human, and things wouldn't end happily.

"He confessed four years after they met, when Henrietta came back from the annual ball in tears, because nobody spoke to her all night. He told her that he lived through peace and war, feasts and hunger, but he never knew someone as beautiful as her and, if he went to the ball as well, he would've danced with her all night."

Daisy feels her mouth stretch into a smile before her brain even processes the words.

"That's so sweet."

"Some people are cute like that. And I got Kip", Tawny adds with a chuckle. "So there's that story, of how a wizard and a human who was particularly interesting to dragons saved the tarque breed."

"See, Napoleon? That's where you're from", Daisy pokes her dragon and he makes a slight humph noise before cuddling into her hand. "I have to ask Islah if she has rock jasmines, because this lil buddy only eats those."

"She probably does", Tawny glances at Islah's garden. "I wish Kip would just let me stay in one place for at least a decade. She's like a spinning top", she explains shaking her head. "Oh, well. I signed up for this myself."

"Yeah, you could've said no." It's Kip's voice coming from the forest. She and Matheus walk up to the bonfire, and the first thing Kip does is lie down with hear head on Tawny's knees and fall asleep.

"Don't sleep yet, Islah is making something to eat." Tawny nudges Kip's head gently.

If Daisy hadn't listened to the story, she might have gotten up and helped Islah, but it was too late now, because Islah calls them inside for late lunch.

Once they've eaten, however, Kip wilts like a high-speed video of a flower in winter, and the group moves to the living room, since there's more space there. With Kip sleeping, her head using Tawny's lap lap like a pillow and Tawny brushing through her hair absentmindedly, Islah guesses that's as good as any other time.

"I was waiting for Kip to be… not present, I guess, to ask you something", Islah says when she returns from upstairs with a blanket in her hands. She covers Kip with it and sits on the tabouret.

"How secretive", Matheus points out.

"Not really", Islah smiles, "it's just something that would require work and, Tawny, if you're not feeling up to it, we can not mention it to Kip at all."

"She'll find something to do anyway." Tawny looks down at Kip with a mix of anger and fondness.

"Okay. A couple of months ago, I heard about a couple of sick sirens around Saquarema, and I was in the area, so I transported them to the lake in the forest. I was wondering if you know any chemists, because they appear to have chemical burns all over their body and they haven't healed yet."

"I don't think so", Matheus shakes his head. "I'm sorry, but ever since the inquisition we tend to avoid scientists of any sort as much as possible."

"I know, I do that as well", Islah says, "but their injuries can't be healed with witch magic. At least not mine."

Daisy figures it's as good of a time than any to mention it.

"Um, guys? I'm a scientist, well, sort of, and I have a friend who's a chemist. Sort of."

"You're cool, don't worry, you don't want to eradicate the whole magic community", Kip mumbles, surprising everyone by waking up. When Tawny moves her hand from her hair, she sits up and stretches. "Apparently, there's no rest for the wicked. Al-Islah, you got some of that hardcore Turkish coffee? Cuz I'm gonna need all the help I can get."

"Here we go again", Tawny shakes her head. "You know what? It's fine by me. Go and get killed by sleep deprivation. I've stopped caring years ago."

Kip, however, looks more awake than ever as she rushes back to the kitchen and continues twittering to Daisy.

"So, scientist lady, your chemist friend is human, I suppose? Which is going to be very, and I mean very intersting, but we're working on integration anyway. Do you know where he lives?"

"London?"

"Shit, it's late there. Oh well, it's not that bad, he'll live. Just let me get coffee into my body and I'm going to get us there. Think of a way to explain sirens to him while you wait."

"What??"

"Well, he's gonna be healing sirens, and we can't exactly tell him that it's people dressed up as half-fish", Kip explains as if it's obvious.

Daisy makes a grand gesture of taking her glasses off and facepalming.

"Me too, Daisy", Tawny nods approving of Daisy's actions. "Islah", she then proceeds quietly, "get her back into the living room. Matheus?"

Islah, with no further questions, heads to the kitchen and guides Kip out of it, with excuses that she keeps coffee in the pantry. Matheus doesn't move an inch. The moment Kip steps back into the living room, her eyes close and she comes plummeting to the ground, and she would've hit it at full speed hadn't it been for Islah, catching her.

"Thanks", Tawny nods to the two immortals. "I don't usually like to do this, but…" She shrugs, making an excuse, if only for Daisy. "The last time she stayed up this long she had a stroke and I had to call an actual doctor to keep her alive until she was well enough to heal herself."

"Why did you even let her get to this point?" Matheus asks, with a particular sort of bitterness Daisy can't decipher, while Islah's placing Kip back onto the sofa.

"Well, um… first there was a full moon, and then someone left a litter of puppies on our doorstep, so we had to find people who wanted a puppy. I told her I could handle it, but she insisted. It's irrelevant, really. It's just Kip being Kip. How long will she be out?"

"I've got her down for six hours", Matheus shrugs, "but it could be longer. Depends on how tired she was."

"She didn't look tired to me", Daisy notices.

"Mm, that's because you don't know her. Usually she has something loosely resembling boundaries", Tawny muses, and they stay in silence for a short while before Matheus claps his hands against his knees and gets up.

"Well, I'm in a mood to get wasted. Do you have anything alcoholic in the house, Islah?"

"Of course I do. You forget I have a wine cellar. I didn't teleport all that wine from Europe to rot."

Oh no, Daisy thinks as the duo leave to grab the wine. Oh no.

"Prepare for stories", Tawny says with a slight smirk on her face. "That wine is hundreds of years old, and witches are talkative when drunk. And Matheus… huh, we'll see."