Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Sasha didn’t think of herself as a savior. She was Lord Grime’s personal knight, and top strategist of Sapiea only rivaled by Grand Cross Yunnan. Sasha definitely thought of herself as one of the most qualified people in the kingdom, maybe in the entire land, but not as some sort of supernatural white knight in shining armor.

The kingdom vehemently disagreed with her.

“Sasha, good news!”

Percy’s excited voice woke Sasha like a bucket of water to the head. She groaned and sat up in bed, rubbing the sleep from her eyes. She had been awake for most of the night, staring up at her ceiling and listening to the sound of the breeze against her windows. Sasha really needed to get some of that sleeping tea Grime had recommended to her; this insomnia was becoming a problem.

“What, Percy?” Sasha grumbled, hauling herself out from under the sheets. “I had a rough night last night, couldn’t this wait?”

“It’s a direct summoning from Lord Grime! He wants you to get up as fast as possible and go to him. You’ve earned some kind of reward!” Percy’s obnoxious enthusiasm was starting to grate on Sasha’s frayed nerves. He skipped out of her room; she had never seen anyone from Tower skip before, or even bounce.

Sasha replaced her nightgown with her clothes and armor, pulled her hair into a ponytail, and slung her swords across her back before leaving her room. The halls were filled with her fellow knights and guards; most patted her on the back or congratulated her as she passed, but she noticed that some of it was strained. The ones not getting into Sasha’s face had an air of hopeful melancholy around them. Probably something from the king, then. Or the missing townsfolk had been found. Most likely dead in a bandit hideout, which would explain the sorrow.

She pushed open the doors to Grime’s hall, striding in like she owned the place. He turned around and grinned halfheartedly at her, a tinge of… something she didn’t like in his eye. Lord Grime was her adoptive father, and closest person in her life. He was a grizzled, scarred man, with a recently shaven beard and a milky eye from a botched dagger strike. He was one of the strongest people she knew, and Sasha had come to rely on him as a pillar of stability for her tempest of a life. Seeing a flash of pity in his gaze tempted Sasha to turn on her heel and march back to her bed.

“Sasha,” Grime started, “I have received a message from the king.” His tone was grim. “They have located the cause of the missing villagers, and they want you to go and eliminate it.”

Sasha arched an eyebrow. That was it?

“Okay, where is the creep?”

Grime looked even more grave.

“I’m so sorry, Sasha. I tried to convince the king that you weren’t ready, but you were the best option aside from Yunnan, and she's preventing Homoa from invading us. The creature is a dragon.”

That woke Sasha up fully. Her muscles instinctively tensed, and her mind rapidly flicked through locations that she could possibly flee to where King Andrias couldn’t find her. This news explained a lot. The strange behavior from everyone, the fear from Grime. The king wanted her to slay a dragon . Her.

Grime used to have a sister, Aunt Beatrix. She was his knight while Sasha was still a teenager, and had been sent by the king to defeat a wyrm plaguing the nearby Wartwood. She killed the beast, but she never came back. Died from its venom minutes after slashing its throat.

Dragons were a death sentence. The successful slaying of one was rare, the slayer coming back? Impossible. Almost all legendary figures Sasha knew of had lost their lives to those monsters. Barrel the Brave? Dead to a wyrm like Beatrix’s. Leif the Miracle Worker? Ambushed by a moss serpent while hunting for ingredients. Aldrich, the previous king? Knucker came out of a well and tore him in half.

“W-where is it? What kind?” Sasha tried to keep her voice from shaking. She was Sasha Waybright, daughter and knight of Lord Grime. She could do this. If she was smart, she wouldn’t perish in the attempt like so many before her, right?

She was lying to herself, and Sasha knew it.

“It lives in the Topian Grottos. Nobody has gotten a good look at it, but we believe it’s either a knucker or a storm salamander.”

“Great.” Sasha was going numb. She thought that things couldn’t be worse. But the dragon she had to face was either something that could shred through the King’s Guard like they were paper, or a beast capable of starting hurricanes and responsible for floods. Her chances of killing the thing, let alone making it back, were looking to be smaller and smaller by the second.

She rigidly turned around and marched out to pack, not saying a word more to anyone. She needed to think.

Sasha dismounted from Joe, a dappled bay she had been lent by the king. Sasha had spent the past three weeks receiving orders, strategizing, and traveling. She had gotten her swords and armor enchanted and some potions brewed by the royal alchemist. She had also learned everything there was to know about knuckers and storm salamanders. She had calculated her chances of survival, and deemed them to be zero. She chose to do this on her own, and had shrugged off suggestions of taking others with her. Sasha knew that she was going to die, probably without making a dent in the beast. Anyone who came with her would share her fate, and she was not going to be known as the warrior who dragged others down with her.

The entrance to the Grottos yawned open in front of her. Cold water lapped at her feet, the mouth of the cavern lunging out of the landscape like a breaching whale. Sasha activated her glowshroom torch, and walked inside.

She almost immediately slipped and fell the moment the cavern tilted downwards. Her torch went skittering into the water, extinguished. Sasha felt around for it for a moment, but only noticed the current and the water deepening. As if things weren’t bad enough, she had lost her light source.

Thankfully, she had prepared for this. Sasha uncorked the darkvision potion she had requested, and choked it down. Almost instantly, the darkness bled away, and the only difference from daylight was the stark lack of color.

She moved on. The caverns stretched downwards, and Sasha realized that deep slashes she had thought to be cracks in the walls were claw marks. They increased in frequency as she went deeper, serving as a sinister guide through the maze of caverns. The air grew stuffy and cold, and Sasha felt like the grottos were closing in on her, threatening to strangle her like a wall of choking vines.

After a couple plunges through underwater portions of the caves and a climb down a waterfall, Sasha emerged into the dragon’s lair. The cavern was nearly six times the size of Grime’s hall. Thin rivulets of water from a spring at the far end wound their way through mounds of silver and carved stone tablets, potions and weapons sprinkled throughout the hoard. There was no sign of the beast.

“Hello?” A voice said almost right next to her, and Sasha almost died from a heart attack. In her scan for the dragon, she had completely missed the girl standing behind her, offering a hand to pull Sasha from the pit she entered with.

Sasha took the help, pulling herself out of the hole and to her feet, coins clinking beneath her boots. The girl had scaled arms and feet, and a tangled mass of feathers for hair. Small wings were pulled tight to her body, curling around the girl like a blanket. The avia stared at Sasha, tears pooling in her eyes.

“You need to go and hide, now. I don’t know when she’ll be back,” she said fearfully, wrapping her arms around her body. Sasha was curious at the mention of a “she.”

“Who’s ‘she?’ And who are you?” Sasha asked, a hand going to her sword.

“I’m Anne. I got kidnapped to pay off a debt my family owes to Marcialdoth. Now, please, hide! She’ll be back any second!” Anne’s wings whipped out from behind her, flapping in panic.

Sasha was suddenly keenly aware of the sound of water parting, and something rearing up behind her. Water droplets sprayed on her already-drenched back, and spattered across the cavern floor like blood. She turned to face the creature that had emerged, and at that moment, Sasha’s darkvision blinked off.

Chapter Text

Sasha cursed. Loudly.
There was another spray of water across her face, and an odd heaving noise from before her.
“Quite the filthy mouth you have, wopsit.” The voice was higher than she expected, with a playful tinge. Sasha heard it pull itself out of the pit, scattering coins and water all over. It wound behind her, the constant sound of clinking coins and a dragging tail allowing her to pinpoint its general location. “What is your purpose, here, in my skatuch? You smell like a wistu, an enemy, but you are aware of the stupidity of coming here armed so lightly, no?”
Sasha drew her swords and pointed them in the voice’s direction.
“You’ve been terrorizing the locals! Raiding, plundering, murdering. I’m here to put a stop to that, and if I die taking you down, so be it!”
Metal and water washed against Sasha’s boots as the creature drew close, exhaling a breath that smelled of fish and ozone into her face. There was a sudden sparking noise, and tendrils of electricity suddenly lit up the silhouette before her for a second. The lightning had danced between the thing’s teeth, and Sasha caught the gleam of multiple eyes and a wide head before the cavern plunged back into complete darkness.
“On the contrary, wopsit,” the dragon growled, “I keep to myself and my debtors. I do not destroy for lack of reason, and to imply otherwise is cotose of you.” The thing moved around Sahsa again, close enough that the clicking of claws against stone was audible. “Do you truly wish to perish for a futile, false cause?”
Sasha’s hands were shaking. She forced herself to still, and breathe. Maybe multiple dragons were home to the grottos. Were storm salamanders or knuckers gregarious? Or the creature was flat-out lying to her. If so, that meant it was afraid. The fact that it hadn’t attacked yet said as much. It could probably sense the drakonbane enchantment on her blades, then.
“Well, survivors of the attacks report seeing an aquatic dragon, and you’re the only one known to be close enough to all of these raids,” Sasha challenged. “So, how about you stop cowering in the dark and just fight me already, you mutated fish?”
There was a sharp hiss from the dragon. Sasha heard its tail lash, and thrust forward with one of her swords. The edge met resistance, but kept going. Something warm splashed across Sasha’s hand, and the smell of iron rose into the air.
“You are a repaiup yagpa, and an aegra rotinivokar!” The dragon roared. A whistling sound approached Sasha, and she let go of her sword and ducked. Something heavy soared overhead, and she took the opportunity to raise her other blade into it. She was rewarded with another yelp of pain and more liquid raining down on her. Sasha felt something close around her leg, and she was suddenly pulled high into the air upside-down. There was a crackling sound, and a blue light illuminated the cavern. The dragon had grabbed her by the leg and hung her in front of its jaws, which were now wide open. The light had originated in its throat, and loose sparks showered from yellowed fangs. Sasha swung her sword at it, but it had held her out of reach.
There was a wet, tearing noise, and Sasha was dropped to the ground. The wind was knocked out of her, and she registered that the creature’s talons were still curled around her leg. A bolt of lightning arced across the room, hitting the far wall, and the dragon shrieked.
“Come on!” Sasha was pulled to her feet by scaled hands. “That distracted her well enough. Let’s go!” Sasha followed the girl through the darkness, slipping and sliding on damp coins while the sounds of the dragon thrashing echoed across the walls, making it sound like it was everywhere at once. Anne grabbed Sasha around the middle, and they were suddenly free-falling through the damp air. They alighted on the ground, the sounds of furious pursuit coming down the pit. Anne shoved Sasha forward, hitting her head on a rock. “Sorry! Duck more, there’s a hole!” They both crawled into the cramped area, Anne’s wings over Sasha’s face and her elbow digging into Sasha’s side. They held their breath as the creature slithered past their hiding spot. They sat there for who knows how long, counting the seconds and relaxing as the growls and various draconic curses faded into the tunnels.
“So,” Sasha offered, breaking the silence. “Sorry about making your situation worse.” Anne’s reply was quick and hushed.
“It’s fine. I’ve only been here about two days anyway. Hasn’t been bad so far, but I’m glad it never got the chance to be.”
Sasha wiped her hand on her already-soaked tunic, only succeeding in spreading the smell of iron further around her.
“Thanks for the save, too. I… I wasn’t ready to die.”
Anne chuckled slightly at that.
“You came into a dragon’s cave with nothing but two swords and confidence. I thought you were a sacrifice to her at first.”
“So, what was that distraction?”
“I dropped an axe onto her arm. Grabbed a random shimmery one, and, well… it worked a lot better than I thought it would, that’s for sure.”
Their awkward conversation was broken off when the sounds of the dragon approached. Its stride was less sure of itself now, less predatory. It stopped and sniffed the air, and Sasha held her breath.
The air grew warm again, and sparks once more lit up the tunnel. Lightning curled around its teeth, bathing the caverns in a cool blue light. Sasha got a better look at it this close.
It was a slender, serpentine creature, with wide, shark-like jaws, two sets of feathered gills flared out behind its head, and branched antlers framing its face like some odd crown. Ten golden eyes glared at their hiding spot, teeth bared in a pained grimace,
Its voice had lost all tinges of playfulness.
“That wasn’t very nice of you,” Marcialdoth growled, a light building in her jaws.

Chapter Text

“Get out, now, or I will release my trekis esaj,” the dragon hissed.
Anne climbed over Sasha and out of the hollow. Sasha felt her trembling, Sasha’s body seemed to have forgotten how to function, and she had to focus on each breath and blink. She followed Anne out, putting her hands up like the avia had.
Marcialdoth jerked her head towards the shaft leading up to the lair. She was a storm salamander, six pairs of legs holding up a snake-like, frilled body and long, folded wings. Her front left leg ended in a clean stump, a sizeable notch in her tail leaking blood, and Sasha’s sword deep in her shoulder. The area around the wounds were inflamed and hissing softly, like smoldering coals.
Anne and Sasha climbed silently back through the passage, Marcialdoth never more than five feet behind. Why hadn’t she killed them then and there? Maybe this was to instill more fear. Play with her prey, like an overgrown cat. Sasha had heard stories of how angry dragons would kill incredibly slowly, making their victim suffer for hours or days on end.
Sasha clambered back into the lair, coins skittering before her. Anne pulled herself up just behind her.
Marcialdoth slid into the cavern, her blue light reflecting off of the silver and steel and bathing the lair in a ghostly glow.
“Further in.”
A bolt of lightning struck overhead as Sasha walked, making her almost trip from flinching. A vial was suddenly pushed into her hands, the glass cool and slippery from the moisture.
“Drink,” the dragon rumbled.
The world brightened into black and white as Sasha downed the vial. A darkvision potion. Anne was just next to Sasha, shaking like a leaf.
“Sit,” Marcialdoth growled. Sasha and Anne sat. “I should kill you both here and now. Toss your burnt corpses back to your families and torch their homes as well.”
Sasha watched Anne’s face drain of blood.
“But, I will not,” Marcialdoth finished. “I do not wish to be in history as a soti. In exchange, however, Anne, your time increases by two weeks.”
“I… time?” Anne’s mouth was opening and closing like a fish. “What do you mean by time?”
“Wartwood didn’t give me a shred of what I was owed last visit. Your mayor agreed to let me have you for three weeks as a companion, in compensation. Did I not inform you of that?”
“...crud.” Anne said faintly.
“That was my baclax, then,” the dragon sounded genuinely remorseful. “As for you, wopsit,” her tone changed back to a growl. “What kind of fevek insults and stabs their host in less than a minute after meeting?!”
“So… you didn’t perform those attacks?”
Sasha questioned. An odd feeling of guilt blossomed in her chest.
“Thric. Of course not. I informed you as such, wopsit,” Marcialdoth hissed. “In exchange for your awful stunt, you will get this blade out of me and remain here for three weeks. Those are my terms.”
Three weeks. There was no way Marcialdoth had enough darkvision potions to last that long. Three weeks in the darkness while an angry dragon pushed Sasha and Anne around. Grime would believe that Sasha had died.
“No,” Sasha said, standing.
“No?” The dragon echoed menacingly.
“No. I will not remain here and be your slave, and neither will Anne. I don’t care what you do, I’m not giving you any satisfaction.”
Marcialdoth put her talons over her snout and closed her eyes, seemingly exasperated.
“...Kii ui nomeno ir zyak sharten? I am giving you a way out, wopsit. You,” she pointed at Anne, “chopped off my talon. Nothing I can’t fix, but it’s quite painful, and you,” she pointed at Sasha this time, “stuck a drakonbane sword into my shoulder, and the burn is making it quite difficult to think straight, and you are vrinpict that I am not any other dragon!”
Sasha scowled and crossed her arms. This dragon had taken so many insults from her and gotten two grievous wounds. The fact that she hadn struck either of them down yet indicated a lack of ability or that Marcialdoth was just a wimp. Feeling her confidence rise again, the dragonfear leaving her body, Sasha replied.
“Did you hear me? I don’t care what you do. I’m not letting an innocent stay imprisoned, and I’m not becoming a prisoner, either.”
Marcialdoth stared at Sasha. She glared right back.
After a minute, Marcialdoth heaved a sigh and turned to the exit.
“Ilfis oli si jaseveic,” she intoned, waving a talon over it, before turning back to Sasha. “You will remove this blade from me, wopsit. You will then help Anne clean up the absolute jekip you have both made. You will stay the night, and then you both are free to go.”
Sasha heard Anne let out a breath.
“All right, fine.” Sasha trudged up to Marcialdoth, who had laid down. Her sword was in about halfway, the wound pulsing around it. Sasha grabbed the hilt with both hands, braced a foot against Marcialdoth’s underbelly, and tugged as hard as she could.
There was a rumbling hiss of pain from the dragon, and Sasha’s hands slipped from the hilt. It hadn’t moved at all.
“Come on,” Sasha growled to herself. “This is the one thing I have to do. It’s not hard.” She seized the hilt again, braced herself, and pulled. Anne’s arms came around Sasha again, pulling as well. They both yanked it as hard as they could, and Sasha felt it start to give. The blade finally slipped out in a shower of blood, accompanied by Marcialdoth’s pained roar. Sasha and Anne went down, the sword in hand.
Sasha came to her feet, hauling herself off of Anne, and sheathed her sword. Anne got up behind her, and Marcialdoth had started grooming the wound, hissing occasionally in pain.
“You are not yet done, wopsit. You have much blood to clean.”
Right. Anne took Sasha’s bloody hand and led her over to the spring in the corner of the grotto.
“Just take a cloth from over here and dip it in. It’ll completely clean it, so you don’t have to worry about dirtying the rest of the cave,” Anne provided.
Sasha sighed. This was the worst dragonslaying in the history books. Sasha washed off as much blood as she could in the spring. It had gotten everywhere: her hair, her arms, her legs, her face. At least it hadn’t dried in the humidity of the cavern.
Sasha took a cloth and went to join Anne, stopping momentarily to squint at Marcialdoth.
“What is she doing?”
Anne looked up.
“Eating her amputated talon.” Anne went back to work like it was nothing.
“Why?”
“Regeneration thing, I think.”
Sasha grimaced and went to scrub the blood off of the treasure. It was difficult; the cloth kept pushing it around instead of actually absorbing it, and she had to go back to the spring multiple times, rinse out the cloth, and wring it out before collecting another handful of blood from the water. Rinse and repeat.
“What did she have you do in the time you were here?” Sasha asked, hoping to break the awkward silence. “Chores like this?”
Anne shrugged.
“Sometimes. There weren’t many to do, though. She mostly just talked to me. She wanted to hear the things I’ve done, stories, my opinions on things. I think I was entertainment.”
They fell silent again. After a couple minutes, Anne spoke.
“Why did the king send you out here, anyway? Marcialdoth is pretty new here for a dragon. There’s a bunch of less… understanding dragons nearby.”
“Apparently the perpetrator was seen by survivors to be an aquatic dragon. Marcialdoth is the only one to match the descriptions.”
Anne looked up at Sasha questioningly.
“...No? There’s, like, five other dragons in the surrounding area. Two knuckers, a skolex, a waterwalker, and a freshwater lindworm. They’re all a lot more rowdy and violent than Marcialdoth is.”
“Really?” Anne was scrutinizing Sasha.
“Of course. Everyone in the nearby area knows them all. We have to in order to keep them away.”
“...You can keep them away?”
“Of course. Most of us just pay tribute to the closest one, but Bogbottom does favors and stories for their dragon. Do other places… not do that?” Anne asked, like it was common sense.
Sasha felt like a fool. Of course smaller towns without a Guard could still thrive. They were used to deferring to the rest of the kingdom, and probably saw their draconic neighbors as less of a terror and more like tax collectors. No wonder Sasha’s own homeland had such issues with dragons. They never thought to think like one!
“No. We do not. I’ve never actually thought of it! Working with them instead of against them…” Sasha trailed off, still deep in thought.
They didn’t talk for the rest of the cleaning, except for Anne asking Sasha’s name. Meanwhile, Marcialdoth had been watching their progress while simultaneously entertaining herself with stone… cards? Sasha wasn’t exactly sure what they were, but it seemed to be some kind of game.
Sasha rinsed out her cloth one final time and went up to Marcialdoth. Her missing talon had started to regrow; the end of the stump had split into four parts, a filmy sheen covering them. The stab wound had stopped smoking, but was still clearly inflamed.
“There. Your cave is clean.” Sasha stated, and went past her to the exit. She noticed Marcialdoth watching her with an expression of anticipation. She was probably excited to see Sasha finally leave. Good. Sasha didn’t want to be here any longer either.
She turned around and went to descend the pit. Her foot, while looking for a hold, hit something flat and solid, and a jolt of electricity buzzed through her body. There was a sound like a bird hitting a window, and Sasha was launched out of the pit and back into the cavern.
She laid there for a second, wheezing. The landing had knocked the air out of her, and she could hear a faint sizzling. Sasha drew air back into her lungs, aware of a strange heaving noise coming from Marcialdoth. The dragon was laughing.
“What in the Underworld was that?!” Sasha sputtered, anger flaring up in her chest.
“Payback,” Marcialdoth choked out between gasps. “We’re even now, wopsit.”
Wonderful. This dragon was a prankster.
There was a hand on Sasha’s shoulder, and she turned her grimace onto Anne.
“Did you know about that?”
Anne smiled faintly.
“She did make quite an obvious spell over the exit earlier.”
“Then why didn’t you tell me?!”
“I thought you knew! I assumed you had another fancy enchantment on you or something!”
Sasha sighed, and, using Anne as support, stood up.
“...looks like we’re staying the night, then. Unless Miss I-Find-It-Funny-To-Electrocute-People removes the spell?” Sasha let go of Anne and took a step forward, putting on her most charming smile.
Marcialdoth had stopped chuckling, and had her mouth open in a grin that reminded Sasha of Tower’s tracking hounds.
“No, I won’t. You did promise to stay the night, remember?”
Sasha had. She had just hoped that Marcialdoth forgot about that part.
Marcialdoth draped herself over a particularly large pile of silver, the grin still plastered on her face.
“I would like to know more about you, wopsit. Anne would probably appreciate it as well.”
“Such as?” Sasha replied suspiciously.
“Name? What do you do for a living? Your swords are forged from rose iron, which comes from the Boiling Isles, so are you from there, or are they just imported? What are your opinions on Homoan architecture and the underappreciated nature of agriculture?” Marcialdoth fired off. Her gills had perked up.
Sasha stared for a second, then turned to Anne for help.
“Yeah, she’s like that. Grilled me for a solid hour about killapillars yesterday.” Anne shrugged.
The three of them sat there for what felt like and may have been hours, exchanging stories. Marcialdoth went off on tangents several times, and absolutely destroyed Sasha in a chess match. Eventually, the constant talking and feeling of her brain getting picked through sent Sasha into exhaustion.
“Okay, I’m done,” Sasha stood up. “Is there a bed or anything around here?”
Marcialdoth blew out a breath.
“Coins.”
“Of course,” Sasha grumbled to herself, making to go and lay down on a pile of silver. Anne took her hand before she could.
“I’ve actually got a setup in the corner,” she offered. “It’s not great, but it’s better than nothing, right?”
Sasha followed her to the “setup.” There were two threadbare blankets on the floor, just out of reach of the various water streams in the cavern. Sasha groaned, taking a blanket and lying down.
Anne still stood, her head cocked in a very chicken-like manner.
“You didn’t take off your armor,” Anne said, like it was a problem.
“And?”
“Isn’t that… uncomfortable?”
Sasha scoffed. She had bunched the blanket under her head like a pillow, and rearranged her belt so that the equipment-less portion was on her back.
“Yeah, but I don’t think I’ll be able to fall asleep tonight anyway. Not while I’m in the same place as-” Sasha raised an arm and pointed it in Marcialdoth’s direction. “You head to bed, I’ll keep watch.”
Anne relaxed.
“Oh, like an elf’s trance. Just… let me know if you need anything, okay? Don’t give yourself back pain for the sake of it.” She took her own blanket, molded it into a vague nest shape, and curled up, tucking her head under one of her wings.
Sasha laid there for a while, staring up at the ceiling of the cavern and counting the stalactites she could see. She was wondering whether a sharp bump in the ceiling would count as a stalactite when the darkvision potion ran out, and she was plunged into darkness.
More time passed. Anne had started snoring, and Sasha was still thinking. She could trust Anne, that was obvious. The avia was a victim of circumstance and bad luck. Not to mention, she had risked her life for a person she didn’t even know the name of. There was clearly not a single malevolent feather on her.
Marcialdoth, however? Sure, the dragon calmed down and became aggressively friendly after that magic barrier trick. But she had still taken an innocent girl from her home and showed no regret about it. She had expressed disdain that Sasha had almost died, but not because she cared about whether Anne and Sasha died, but because it would have broken her reputation. Marcialdoth had still fully intended to keep Anne and Sasha there for several more weeks, and thought that electrocuting someone was an amusing joke. No, she was too unpredictable. She didn’t have any good traits that came without strings. Sasha couldn’t trust her, or Sasha and Anne would end up lightning-fried at the bottom of a lake.
There was the scuttling of feet and the slithering of Marcialdoth, coins parting around her bulk like a ship cutting through the water. She stopped somewhere to Sasha’s left; Sasha could hear the dragon’s head crane over to her prone body.
“You are still awake, wopsit.”
“My name is Sasha. You know that.”
“Yes.” The dragon’s excitable energy had been once more exchanged for that cool, cold demeanor and superior attitude. Sasha gritted her teeth, aching to draw her swords and threaten Marcialdoth away from them.
“Then quit calling me that. I don’t even know what it means.”
“It means new to the world. Young. Green. Inexperienced.” Marcialdoth intoned. Sasha’s fists clenched.
“Really? We chopped off your hand and gave you neck trauma. I’m the personal knight of a lord. Sapiea’s top strategist who’s only rivaled by the Grass Cross herself. I found you, and I survived you. I’m anything but inexperienced!” Sasha growled, her voice rising to an almost-shout by the end of her small rant. There was a crackling exhale from Marcialdoth.
“I could argue about two of those points, but I won’t right now. By wopsit, I don’t mean physically or mentally. You don’t understand the grander world around you. You followed the words of a crazed tyrant without question. You attacked me for next to no reason, just because you had been ordered to. You have no true identity, and that makes you, well, a wopsit.”
Sasha was about to retaliate when she heard the dragon get up.
“You should get some rest, Sasha. There are only a couple hours to dawn, and you require sleep. You are only human, after all. No matter how hard you try, you have limits, and you cannot protect everyone you love at all times without consequence.”
Marcialdoth plodded away, and Sasha thought.

Chapter Text

Hi. Been a while, huh? I doubt anyone cares, but I can't complete this work due to several college classes, a job, an internship, and DMing for two campaigns. I've also just lost a ton of motivation for it.
This work is getting orphaned if anyone is interested in completing it. I had a rough plot mapped out, which I'll show below. You don't have to follow this if you want, of course.

Marcy, Sasha, and Anne go to Wartwood, where they explain more about the whole paid protection Marcy does for them and the misunderstanding that led to Anne getting kidnapped to serve as company. Maddie is here as a friend who likes to talk with Marcy about magic, and Marcy provides her with scales whenever needed. The Plantars are Anne's adoptive family (of course). Ivy is there brandishing a sharpened stick along with Sprig when they land, ready to threaten Marcy into returning Anne (even though she's doing it then and there). Wally was a possible option for the chapter, but he doesn't need to be there if it doesn't end up fitting properly. The whole time, Sasha is following Anne around being contemplative and having an identity crisis. At the end of the chapter, Andrias (who's a Verechelen, aka Chuvash dragon, aka shapeshifter) shows up with his army to wreck the rebellion that was going on in the background (hints would have been sprinkled in).

Final chapter starts off trying to fight Andrias. The protagonists lose, and head underground to an abandoned knucker hole where Mother Olm lives as a (much smaller, and her name isn't Mother Olm anymore) olm selkie oracle. She doesn't give any prophecies this time, but helps the group come up with a strategy to take down Andrias.
They enact that plan by first having Marcy fly Sasha back to the "toads" to gather a proper force. They discover that the hall is under siege, and has been for several weeks. Marcy takes a ballista bolt to the wing and crashes into a tower, and is subsequently littered with arrows (they aren't fatal, just irritating, like landing in a cactus). Sasha and Grime have a long and heartfelt talk about where Sasha wants to go and do with the rest of her life, and she's simultaneously trying to convince him to make an escape attempt from the hall. They remain there for several days, and Andrias ends up showing up and smashing through the barricades himself. He and Marcy fight, Marcy loses pretty badly. Sasha escapes with Grime and half of the force, and take a week to return to Wartwood, pursued by a good chunk of the Newtopian army the rest of the way (are made up of golems as well as soldiers). At Wartwood, they escape through the tunnels Mother Olm had carved out a long time ago, and emerge with everybody excluding Marcy (who got captured in the hall siege) two miles away from the confused Newtopians. They start the trek to the castle (3 weeks), where the Newtopian numbers are thin due to the vast majority out raiding and pillaging. They get in pretty easily, and the majority of the group (excluding Anne and Sasha) gets stuck fighting a large golem barricade. Anne and Sasha slip into the throne room, looking to power down the Box (in this universe, it's effectively an artifact that allows for the creation and reanimation of the golems) to give themselves an advantage. Marcy shows back up, possessed by the CORE (effectively the same as canon, except the CORE members are all draconics, as the royal family are all verechelens, and disguised dragons were more highly ranked in Newtopian society thanks to the royal influence. The royal family lied about all of the dragon stuff in order to keep public opinion in their favor and to drive away dragons who didn't follow them), along with Andrias. It goes similarly to canon All In, with Sasha using the skills she learned throughout the story to fight Marcy and crack the amulet that contained the CORE, and Anne using her agility to outwit and defeat Andrias. Andrias gets backed into a corner, wounded, tries a last ditch attempt to manipulate Sasha back onto his side, and he's stabbed through the chest by her dragonbane in return. I was planning to effectively cut the story there, with Marcy waking up and Andrias dead. More can be added for an epilogue if desired, however.

Things to keep in mind would be, first, everyone's personalities. Marcy is a lot more standoffish, aggressive, and violent, but acts like her canon self around people she knows and trusts. The CORE dials up her traits to 11, and is, just like canon, psychopathic and calculating. Sasha isn't as assertive in this as she is in the show, but develops her personality over the course of the story as she discovers herself. Anne is... pretty much unchanged. Andrias is much less sympathetic than the show, and is up there with the CORE in being a sociopathic manipulator.

I may eventually come back to this story and world sometime far in the future, but who knows? Good luck on your travels and always double check your research!