A Summoning, Part XXXVIII

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Part XXXVIII
~High Priestess~

Would you like to go flying this afternoon?

Thomas woke up half-buried in gold to the sound of a text message on her phone. It wasn't hard to get up or anything, but she still wasn't used to the feeling of cold metal sliding down off of her while she stood up from being asleep. The physical sensation was surreal enough on its own, but the fact that a part of her enjoyed it was even stranger. After that it was hurrying to get her phone and read the two messages on it, the second of which was:

My apologies for not reaching out for a little while. I do need to do quite a bit of studying to be properly prepared for all those exams!

So...would she like to go flying? This afternoon, or any other time whatsoever? Yes, definitely, always. With Stella...? The immediate answer was also yes, but that was bitten back by some hesitation and worry. Curling her tail around to get a few stray fragments of gold to fall off it and back into the pile, she replied in reverse order:

thats ok

sure, what time

---

Dai sat with a goddess and a dragon for lunch on Friday. Well—they were two of his friends, after all. Unfortunately, both of them were too distracted to be much fun to hang out with. Now, with Thomas he knew what she was dealing with, and her flustered fidgeting was honestly kind of cute. But seeing Zotha close her eyes and rub her forehead just below the base of her horns like that was kind of worrying. Did it mean the whole world was in danger and she'd been drafted to help deal with or something?

"Yooo." He reached out and snapped his finger a couple of times. "Earth to Zeke? Or whatever? You awake in there?"

"Ah, sorry." She shook her head. "What were you saying?"
"Next week's game, dude! Am I the only one thinkin' about it?"
"Oh, is..it's that time already, huh? Yeah, looking forward to it," she said, putting on a smile and nodding.

"Seriously, what's up with you, huh?"
"You know..deity business...stuff." Seeing that that didn't satisfy him (or Thomas, who was now distracting herself from her own worries by paying more attention to this), she elaborated: "Any time someone 'asks' to use my power for something, I have to approve or deny it. Nngh...some twenty requests came through at the same time a minute ago. And I was up pretty late last night, too..for a, meeting."

"You still need sleep?" the dragon-girl asked. "Can't you just will yourself well or something?"
"I don't know about need, but I think I'm still human enough for it to make me feel better anyway," she said. "I guess I don't actually feel all that tired from just that; it's more the increasingly frequent requests..because of an agreement I made."

"Hmn..why don't you just 'configure' certain things to be auto-approved, if you're getting so many requests?" she suggested further.

"You gonna run low on steam, sendin' out that much power?" Dai pitched in.

"Nope. Aah, if anything I'm getting an excessive inflow. It's...hard to describe, but that's mentally overwhelming in its own way too. And—that's not a bad suggestion, but I've never tried to 'configure' my own power to do something automatic like that before..."

"Well, no better time than when you need it, right? Just, I dunno, set up a rule that 'this and this is okay as long as whatever', 'if it's like this then ask me for approval'...stuff like that?" Thomas said vaguely, waving a hand in a circle through the air. "Maybe have it 'record a log' you can refer back to to make sure it's working right?"
"Leave it to you to think about magic like a programmer, hmn? Well, I'll give it a shot, I guess—thanks."

"Sure."

Dai decided the next course of action was to poke the bear. Well—the dragon, actually, which most would consider an even worse idea. "Sooo, you gone out with Stella again yet?"

"..No."

"You gonna? Ask her out or somethin'?"
"I...she asked if I wanted to go flying this afternoon."

He tilted his head. "Is that a euphem—"
"No!" This word was emphasized further by her slamming the table with a hand hard enough to make a loud banging sound and rattle all the dishes sitting on it.

Dai couldn't help but laugh at this reaction. "Pffhaha! I was just joking, dude! I know you like literally flying, 'kay?"
"..Right." She looked away, blushing and crossing her arms. "Sorry."

"Yeah, and don't hit the table like that when I'm not around," Zotha said. "That was enough force to rip it off the leg and send it flipping up through the ceiling. Those 'veil keeper' people would have a fit."

"Sorry again."

"Hey, I don't mind—and you shouldn't be the one apologizing anyway. Daaaii?"

"Yeah, sorry. I know it's a touchy subject, I'm just tryin'a help you loosen up about it."

"I know. Just...give me some time."

"All the time you want. Buut, sounds like you've got 'till this afternoon. Unless you said no?"
"I..said yes," she admitted. "Now I don't know what to say when I see her..."

"You don't have to say anything, you know," Zotha said. "If you're happy with the way things are for now, and she seems happy too—then there's no need to push it. Or you can at least procrastinate on talking about how you feel until after you've had some fun together, right?"
"Mmnh. Maybe. I'm not sure that's a great idea..."
"Worst case, she isn't interested, right?"
"I don't know. Maybe it's worse if she is." Thomas shook her head. "I don't..like...how possessive my instincts make me feel. About something that isn't even...well, that isn't, yet. You know?"

"I can't say I quite know what that's like," she said. "I wonder...if there's any 'adult' dragons around who could..help you out? Maybe give you pointers on dealing with 'being a dragon'? I could look into it if you want?"
"...Sure. Thanks."

---

While Prama was busy making some low-difficulty, medium-high-demand potions on her own (with Boreas occasionally looking in to make sure things were going smoothly, which of course they were), she was periodically distracted by some distant yelling. Her analysis after some sampling was: happy in tone, two distinct voices (both female), usually too far off to make out words but with the occasional clear cheering coming through, like a distant "Whooooo!" The strangest thing was that they seemed to be coming from above, and none of her continued careful directional listening seemed to quite dispute this theory.

After the twelfth time, she waited for Boreas to check in on her again. Some more excited yelling came about the time the werewolf alchemist showed up, conveniently enough, but she didn't seem to react to it at all. After listening to her teacher's comments, she said, "You do hear that, right? That yelling?"
"Mmh," Boreas nodded.

"It's not bugging you? Some kids running around your property or something?"
"Flying, more like," the werewolf said. "The area 'round here is protected, so no one under the veil can get to it. Including planes and drones and such, so—convenient place for folks who need to practice flying, or..who just want ta play around in the air."

"Ah. So—you're not about to yell at them to get out of your sky?"

Boreas shook her head. "Nobody owns the sky. Let 'em have their fun, anyhow."

---

Stella came in for a landing, gliding gracefully toward the ground and hitting it with her feet, flapping her wings to lift briefly in a hop and bleed off some forward momentum, then repeated this process a couple of times before finally sticking her landing. After this, Thomas came down a few yards in front of her, landing in a rough, awkward dive that left her briefly rolling forward along the ground before finally coming to a stop. She slowly sat up afterward, and found Stella walking up to extend an arm her way.

"May I...hfffh...help you up?" The celestial was panting slightly from the workout of flying at increasingly high speeds; the dragon didn't feel tired at all.

"Uh, n-no, that's..I'll get myself up, thanks," Thomas said awkwardly, hopping up to her feet and dusting herself off/using magic to cast the dirt out of her clothes and hair. "Guess I don't come anywhere near winning when it comes to landing, huh?"
"Heheh..it is a difficult skill to master, I believe. Hfffh...Nonetheless, you must be quite talented to fly so well with only a few days' experience."

"You seem winded...want to call it a day for now? Um...go somewhere to eat?"
"Certainly!" she smiled cutely, and Thomas had to look slightly away and try to make her cheeks stop heating up.

They started back toward the car, Stella watching her a few times with a slight, uncharacteristic hesitancy to her expression. "Something wrong?" Thomas finally asked.
"I was just wondering...do I make you, uncomfortable in some way?"
"Uh..."
"I only ask because...even though it seems as if you enjoy my company most of the time, you occasionally seem at least, unhappy, or frustrated perhaps? If I have a habit of saying or doing something you find unpleasant, I would like to know."
"It's.." Thomas sighed, stopping her walk and turning to face the short, white-winged girl. "Look, it's not—you. Not really. I just...feel like I haven't been entirely honest, I guess."

"Honest?" Stella tilted her head slightly. "About what?"

"Well. You know how I haven't been a dragon for very long. This...happened because of Zotha. Yeah?"
"Yes?"
"I also..was a guy before this happened. Look, my name's Thomas, I just—did a really bad job introducing myself before, a-and haven't corrected you."

"I see..." Stella nodded, looking down to think for a moment, then turned her head up again to look the dragon-girl in the face. "I don't want to trivialize your concern, but is that all it is? I don't particularly mind if you were male before—after all, I'm in a similar situation. If anything, it's something else we have in common."
"It's..yeah, there's more to it than that," Thomas said. "I, just—I've always been really awkward around girls, and that hasn't really gotten better. Especially if it's someone I...like? And it's worse because I have weird new instincts—being a dragon and all—screwing with my emotions even more. I dunno how to deal with it all."

Stella put a finger just beneath her lips, tapping her upper chin in an adorable sort of 'thinking' expression. "Yet you seem amicable enough most of the time. You need not put up a front for me if I make you feel awkward, you know? Oh, wait—" her eyes widened slightly. "D-do you mean to say that you like me?"

"Uh..y-yeah." Thomas looked away, feeling a mixture of fear and anticipation. "Kinda. You're just..really cute, you know..?"
She wasn't expecting Stella's response to this: a bright blush spreading across her cheeks followed by a slight, soft giggle. "Heheh...! My goodness..."

"Um...?" There were some good signs, but Thomas still wasn't sure about the meaning of that reaction.

"Sorry, sorry! It's just that I found myself at a loss for words, for a moment there." Stella held her hands together behind her back, picking up one foot to lightly kick the ground a couple of times. "To be..perfectly honest, I was beginning to feel some concern that I was taking advantage of you. That is—as new to the world as I am, I want to have all sorts of experiences for myself, but much of what I want to do..can't be done alone, or is at least much better with company. I told myself I was showing my gratitude to you, as you did save my life, but I was also worried about monopolizing your time. I am trying to make other friends, of course, but still found myself wanting specifically to do something with you. There really aren't very many people who can fly, statistically speaking, so making that what we did together made sense—although I think it was only an excuse..." While she spoke, Stella's words seemed to alternate between coming out slowly word by word and flowing out practically an entire sentence at once.

"Y-yeah?" The dragon-girl was even less sure of what to make of this barrage of words, but it seemed like this kind of overexplanation was just how Stella responded to feeling nervous. She was still blushing this entire time, after all.

"Erm. My apologies if all of that didn't make much sense. All I mean is, when you called me cute, I realized that perhaps...I might just like you, too? Because it made me feel...awfully happy, all of a sudden, to hear that from you."

"...Oh."

"...Pffheheheh~!" After a pause, Stella burst into a brief but uncontrollable giggle again. "You know as little what to do with yourself as I do, don't you?"
"Uh—I think so? If I followed that right..."

"Here," she said, holding up her arms, "Perhaps we can just see how a hug feels, and work out the rest later."
"S-sure."

Thomas picked the small girl up in her arms, and found a pair of slim arms pulling tightly around her upper body, Stella leaning her head over her shoulder so their cheeks touched. The celestial's body was unbelievably light—even factoring in dragon strength—and it was soft and warm. She could feel Stella's heart racing in her chest, which was slightly comforting in a weird way, and after a moment the small girl lifted a hand to lightly brush through her hair.

"This is..not so bad, is it?"
"Uh, yeah, no—it's great," Thomas stumbled awkwardly.
"Heheh..all right." Stella let go, so the dragon-girl did the same, watching her hop down gracefully to the ground a foot or so away. Her face wore a joyful grin with an even brighter blush than before...and Thomas was smiling too, she noticed, and her tail was waving back and forth a little bit.

"Shall we...go on to dinner, then?" Stella said. "N-now that we've cleared the air a bit, I'd love to talk with you some more."
"Uh, y-yeah, sure."