she has a secret admirer. an admirer who did a last-minute crafts project on a word document with some terribly clipped art. she sits at her desk, rifling through the papers, following a cerebral, loose narrative of a shapeshifting dragon-type speaking draconic. 

her brows have furrowed and the beginnings of a headache are coming on by the time she realizes the flash drive on her desk is also part of the...whatever this is. it takes her a second to place the voice, given he starts in the snappish, snarling language from the page. 

intrigue sparks - not at the fact that he's apparently lost his mind, but that he can speak the language. her dragonology book goes over the written word and their letters, matching the scribbles on the pages she'd received, but his oration is practiced. rough around the edges, but it's more draconic she's heard in a very long time.

so she tucks the papers back into the folder and pushes back her chair, grabs a cup of coffee on her way down to his office, knocks twice, opens the door, and says, when she sees him - 

"wux renthisj vs'shtak?"

kyle lopez

☉

oh. her disappointment doesn't cross her face, but that combined with her lingering confusion keeps her silent. she observes him as he stammers and shifts her weight from one foot to the other, suddenly feeling rather silly for coming in as confidently as she did. 

"the morningstars taught it to me. they kept what old traditions still remain. they're not draconids themselves, but they were keepers to...a family of them." dreams and memories and the sudden knowledge of who and what she is still wrestles in her heart.

she arcs a brow. "how do you know it?"

kyle lopez

☉

the name rings a bell, though she can't recall if she'd ever had the pleasure of meeting the man. even three years ago, when she'd first been on the council and would have run into him, seems like a lifetime ago (because it is, and you know this, and a watercolor dream stands in your way). 

she brightens, though, and moves further into his office when he holds out the dictionary. she palms the cover and smiles down at the familiar title.

"we had one like this." a pause. "have, i think, if Remiel Calcifet managed to save it from the estate." he'd mentioned a while ago that he'd preserved her books following the sootopolis takeover. 

she tries to hand it back to him, not realizing it's a gift. 

"i've only ever really had my dragons to talk to with it. if...you want to relearn, we could converse together?"

kyle lopez

☉

"everyone has to start somewhere," she says with a wave of her hand. she'd struggled with it for so long herself. it's not like she'd grown up with the language. hell, she hadn't beheld a dragon - a real dragon - until she was just shy of sixteen. 

it's a marvelous thing. the dragons themselves don't speak it. the language is a living transcription, alive so long as a dragon has a heartbeat. hums and clicks and shivers and scrapes, translated in real time with the nuance surrounding connection. 

the brushing of spirits. 

she looks away. "no. not - not like i do. not anymore. but i'm teaching Caleb Harcourt and it's been nice. i didn't realize how much i missed it, sharing that with someone else. y'know, aside from the dragons."

kyle lopez

☉

"yeah," she says with a wan smile. "honestly, i - well, i don't visit as much as i used to. they were friends of my parents." and as she says this, her words linger, hesitant. had they known all that time? had they known about the truth? had they known her birth mother?

"i have a nasty habit of pushing people away," she says, embarrassed, "but it was hard after sootopolis fell. after they died."

she messes with the salamencite braided in her hair and shakes the thoughts away. they're all accustomed to loss. "there's a tea shop in pacifidlog with some connections too. the old owner passed some time ago, but the late owner is his grandson. he knows a bit. we could go sometime.

"if you like tea."

kyle lopez

☉

"somewhat," she says. his grandfather had been the one to send her out to her excursion in search of the eon duo. yet another failed endeavor, of which has had her stray from the nostalgic place. 

"but it really is lovely and it's been too long since i've been back." the last time, it's where ALEXANDER STONE had found her. it's where she saw him since his death, somehow living and breathing. 

"let's do it. i'll have my assistant put something on your calendar?"

kyle lopez

☉

it's still unfamiliar ground, not that she'd ever admit it. how does one admit they're not used to having friends and making plans without sounding like a stick in the mud? she's thankful, at the very least, that he seems just as awkward as she is. 

her nose scrunches. while she appreciates hearing her title, restored after all these years, now that she's finally earned it, it feels wrong following the context of this discussion. 

so she waves a hand and with a quirking smile says, "freya's fine," and as she takes her leave, she adds, "top champion lopez."

kyle lopez

☉