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The dragon shrine is kept at a warm temperature, with a banked firepit in the middle of the room, holding precious treasure in its coals. Roy likes it because no one goes in there, except to check on that precious treasure and replenish the incense burning on the altars in the room, and as long as he stays away from the firepit while he plays, he won’t get burned. And as long as he stays quiet, no one will know he’s in a room he’s not supposed to be in. Even at five, he knows that even the clan head’s son is not allowed to be in the dragon shrine.
He doesn’t get it, doesn’t get why the two large eggs in the middle of the banked firepit are treated like they’re more precious than his mother’s jewelry. They look like much larger versions of the eggs Cook collects from the chickens for the clan house’s breakfast, but mottled with browns and golds and reds and only slightly smaller than his own size. They’ve been around for as long as Roy can remember, unmoving in their warm bed of coals. He doesn’t know why they don’t just make a really big pot of fried rice with them.
He's just short of his fifth birthday when the larger egg – the one with more reds and golds than the other - rocks in its nest. He doesn’t catch it at first, focused on rolling his ball along one of the altars and making up stories about all the dragons lining the walls. And then the egg rocks again, with the faintest peeping sound.
It’s never done that before.
He knows he should get an adult, get his aunt or one of his parents, but that would give away that he’s been playing in the shrine. And the egg isn’t really doing much besides rocking and peeping.
He crouches down by the firepit, as close to the rocking egg as he can get, and reaches a hand out to the shell. It’s harder than he was expecting it to be, and softer. It’s also a lot warmer than he was expecting, even with it sitting in a banked firepit. He can feel something moving under the shell’s surface, feel a curious intelligence brushing against the back of his mind. He pulls his hand back with a start and the intelligence fades from his mind, leaving him alone in his own head once more.
He's about to reach his hand back out to the shell to see if it had been a fluke when he realizes there’s a fine crack across the egg’s surface. Now he has to get an adult; what if by touching the egg, he broke it and whatever’s inside? He’ll be in trouble!
He scrambles to his feet, running to the shrine’s door.
Twenty minutes later, Roy’s back in the dragon shrine, surrounded by nearly all of his aunties and uncles and watching as the egg rocks back and forth. The other egg isn’t rocking or making any noise, but no one seems to notice as they focus on the larger egg. He doesn’t know how long they have to wait before the crack he’d seen earlier widens into more and more cracks and a small wedge-shaped head emerges through the shell. He doesn’t know what color the head’s supposed to be because it’s covered in slime, or even what it’s supposed to be but the sight of the small head sends up a cheer through his relatives.
The egg falls forward, the strange creature inside the egg giving a little squeak as it topples over. Roy can’t help it; he moves forward, only briefly feeling his mother grabbing at his shirt as he leaves her side, reaching forward for the strange creature’s head. The wedge-shaped head is almost as big as his forearms, and that curious intelligence is brushing against the back of his mind again as overly large golden eyes lock onto his face.
It's not words, exactly, what’s brushing against his mind. It’s feelings and emotions and colors whirling in patterns he isn’t sure are his anymore, or this slimy creature looking up at him as it pushes an ungainly leg out of its shell. He keeps staring into the creature’s golden eyes as more of its body emerges from the egg, holding its head in his arms, even though his arms are starting to get tired holding up the weight.
Finally, the creature’s whole body has emerged from the egg, and while he can feel his mother tugging on his shirt to pull him away from it, Roy stays put despite the fact that his shirt is now covered in the slime from holding onto the creature. The feelings swirling through his mind settle into love and trust as the animal takes an unsteady step forward before it topples forward off the coals and onto Roy properly. Between the fall and the creature landing on him, the air is knocked from Roy’s lungs in a whoosh.
There’s some exclamation at that and Roy can see hands coming into his peripheral vision to reach for the now squeaking creature, but the hands pause as the air around the creature ripples like water and the image above him solidifies once more into a blond child a couple years younger than him, the same large golden eyes staring into his, before the child reaches one slimy hand to touch his cheek.
The child makes that same squeaking sound it had made in its other form and Roy’s aware of several things happening at once: one of his aunties finally picks up the strange child and Roy’s mother picks him up off the floor while there’s a small commotion around them. A quick glance around at his clan shows him the other egg has started rocking as well, had maybe started during the strange child’s hatching, but his gaze is once more drawn to the blond child his aunt is carrying out of the room.
Golden eyes stare back at him until the door to the shrine closes behind the pair.