[Closed] Do not talk to me of dragon fire...

[smirkwood]

Who| Thranduil & DRAGON!!! Iskierka
What| DRAGON!!! Thranduil finds out that his fellow D1 tribute is a dragon.
Where| D1 common room
When| January 10th
Warnings/Notes| cw: panic attacks and flashbacks, that sort of thing.

Elves do not usually sleep under normal circumstances. While being in this new and strange land was decidedly not normal, Thranduil still had a hard time accepting the fact that his body was telling him he had need to. That would be why he slept so little since his arrival.

It was nearly dawn when the Elvenking found his eyes closing as he sat in his preferred high backed chair in the corner of the common area of the training center. He did not want to sleep - it left one vulnerable - but if he must sleep he would at least rather do it in private.

Therefore with that thought in mind, the king makes use of the elevator, strange as it was, to go to his somewhat more private chamber. It still irked him that he had to share the entirety of the suite, but there was not much he could do about it at the moment.

When the doors open, he steps inside, but there was a strange sight before him. One that he could hardly believe was real, but none the less had him frozen in place.

Comments

[letthemburn]

Most of the time, Iskierka is content enough to return to her room, once night falls. Not for any particular affinity to it, for all that it's hers, but for the fact that it's habit. That it's also where she keeps the closest thing to a representation of the one person from home she misses helps (even if she'd hardly be inclined to actually admit to it.)

Today, however, she's ended up curled up in the common room for the district, not out of any real intention to do so but because she hadn't felt like bothering. She knows well enough to keep mostly out of the way, and most of her district mates have long since gotten used to the fact that there's a dragon around.

By the time Thranduil arrives she's more dozing than actually sleeping; a loose pile of scales and wings - of vibrantly red scales and wings, even if they're marked here and there with greenish spots - somewhere near the middle of the room, but just managing to be off the main paths to get from any one point to another. And just in case all that wasn't already bad enough, one of her eyes slides open at the sound of the elevator. She doesn't make to speak, but it's clear enough that she has noticed him, for good or for ill.

[smirkwood]

A sleeping dragon would have been bad enough, but when the eyes slide open it is enough to shorten his breath. The king makes a concentrated effort to remain calm. It was a small dragon, but a dragon none the less. Small enough that just perhaps...

Thranduil slowly reaches for a sword, but his hand grasps air. For a moment he had forgotten where he was... it was as if he were on the battlefield all over again, armored and armed. However, here he had nothing.

His calm is slowly failing, but he does his best to keep it in check. Perhaps another weapon - or something he could use as one - could be found in the room. Or a shield to protect himself from being washed in flames once more.

Ever so slowly and carefully does he move to the side, attempting step foot behind the wall that separated two sections of the common area.

sorry about taking so long to get back to this!

[letthemburn]

Unless Thranduil wants to make an attempt at the fine art of using chairs as weapons, there isn't really a whole lot that could be of use in the room - possibly intentionally so. On the other hand, Iskierka makes no attempt to actually move from where she is. True enough, her other eye opens not long after the first, and she's following his movement with what is very definitely amused curiosity, but at least she doesn't care to move to interrupt his progress.

It's only when he's very nearly managed to make it behind the wall in question that she speaks up.

"You need not hide, if you wish."

it's okay! <3

[smirkwood]

From his place behind the wall, Thranduil tries to tell himself that he is not hiding so much as protecting himself from the potential oncoming flames. At first he says nothing, just taking a few breaths to calm down enough to suggest his usual regal confidence in his tone.

"If you think that I would trust the word of a dragon, you are mistaken. How do I know you do not intend to attack?"

[letthemburn]

"Why, I have hardly moved," Iskierka counters, as if this is a perfectly respectable answer when one is being accused of harboring intent to attack. "And in any case, you are over there and I am here; that is not an insignificant amount of distance."

Her flames, when she has them, could cover that distance and with no trouble besides, but there's the slight matter that she's fairly certain that her fellow district-mates would prefer the common area unscorched. And the Peacekeepers, but she cares less about what they might want than the people she actually has to interact with on a regular basis.

[smirkwood]

"That distance is nothing to your flames."

Thranduil of course assumes the worst - she had the look of a fire-drake, after all. However, the mere thought of flames has him tensing up further. He probably couldn't move from that spot even if he wanted to. He works hard to keep his tone even while he plans his escape. If he could calm himself enough, to move, that is.

"Do not take me for a fool."

[letthemburn]

He's correct in his assumptions, and were she to be told that she had the look of a fire-drake Iskierka would likely find it incredibly apt. She should, after all. Not all the firebreathers of her world look the way she herself does, but she very much looks like any other of her breed and that is quite enough for her.

"If I had wanted to burn you where you stood, I should have already done so," she answers, and while it's probably not comfortable, it is the truth.

It also implies that she still could if she wanted, as opposed to her current lack of an ability to do so, but Iskierka figures that she doesn't need to immediately give the truth to someone who's less than inclined to trust her.

"And I have not taken you for anything, least of all a fool."

[smirkwood]

Thranduil is quiet, spending a great deal of energy trying to keep the panic from showing. As she talks about burning him where he stands, his heart pounds and memories of dragon fire threaten to overcome him... but he would not allow it.

Still, he was faced with a problem - fighting the dragon was out of the question without a weapon, so finding a way out would be his only option. After a long few moments, he decides that it really was not a good idea to get into an argument with such a beast, even if he knew he was in the right.

"...Let me leave here and I will say nothing further. I will leave you be if you will do the same for me."

He's disgusted at himself for the unsure waver to his tone. It was unlike him to be unable to repress such a display of weakness.

[letthemburn]

The proposal is a reasonable one. Iskierka might certainly still make to fight Thranduil elsewhere, but that's elsewhere and they might have needed to fight anyway in that scenario.

All the same, Iskierka does wait a moment before she answers Thranduil's proposal. She's not doing it out of any direct maliciousness - although it may certainly seem so - but she's noticed the waver to his voice and spends a moment working out what it means. (She's not always great at human expressions of emotion.)

"I suppose that is reasonable enough."

It's not as if she needs to talk to all her districtmates after all, and while she might not exactly go out of her way to not be in the same spaces as he is, she can manage to not bother him overmuch without any real trouble.

[smirkwood]

"Then we are agreed."

He is eager to leave, but he wasn't about to run. Instead he walks and stops in front of the elevator, but keeping it to his left as he presses the down button. With Iskierka to the right of him, he could keep a better eye on her movements.

When the doors slide open he steps inside calmly - at least, that was how it appeared. Once they're closed and he is alone, he takes hold of the railing and allows himself to freely tremble.

He would not be found in the district one suits again.