"Brother Leigh, who was that?"
Torra asked it for what felt like the hundredth time. His curiosity had been at its peak since the moment he caught a glimpse of Frostina, and I had not answered him once.
I ignored him entirely and wrapped him in his blanket like a burrito.
Not to keep him warm. But because he kept trying to jump on me.
"Brother Leigh, you didn't answer me." He squirmed, working to free himself from the wrap.
He moved too much and rolled right off the edge of the bed, face first into the floor. His nose bled.
I stood frozen where I was.
It was Torra starting to cry that finally snapped me out of it. I picked him up immediately and healed him. He sniffled while I wiped the blood away, and then he stopped. I put him back on the bed without unwrapping him.
"You move too much. Look what happened."
Torra went still and said nothing.
And then, a few moments later.
"Brother Leigh. Who was that?"
Then.
"Brother Leigh, who is she?"
"Brother Leigh..."
"Brother Leigh."
He had stopped moving. But his mouth was a different matter entirely.
"Brother Lei-"
"A dragon." I said flatly.
Torra immediately rolled over at the word.
"She's a dragon? Why does she look human? Why does she look human?"
"Torra."
I glared at him and exhaled.
He was not going to stop until I gave him something. That much was clear.
I picked him up, still wrapped in his burrito blanket, and carried him outside. I used magic to keep him warm against the cold as we stepped out.
Frostina was still buried under the snow exactly where I had left her. She hadn't moved.
I took a spare shirt from my item box and threw it toward the spot.
"Wear it." I kept my free hand over Torra's eyes.
Frostina slowly emerged, took the shirt, and put it on. She stood there waiting.
"Torra. Her name is Frostina. She's a dragon."
I lowered my hand from his eyes.
Torra studied her. Then his face fell.
"She's just a human with a horn." He said, deeply disappointed.
I looked at Frostina. The meaning was clear enough.
She shifted immediately, no instruction needed, expanding back into her full dragon form. Wings spread, scales catching the winter light.
Torra's eyes went wide and bright.
"I am the Ancient Dragon Frostina." She announced, flapping her wings. Snow scattered off the ground in every direction.
Which gave me an idea.
"Clear all the snow."
"What?"
"Do I need to say it again?"
"N-No. I'm clearing it."
She began working through the settlement, flapping carefully, controlled. I could see her concentrating, measuring the force of each beat to avoid disturbing anything beyond the snow itself.
When enough ground was clear, I set Torra down and unwrapped him from the blanket.
"Wow! A real dragon!" He ran after her immediately, following along as she worked her way through the residential zone.
I crossed my arms and crouched to watch.
One by one, the residents emerged from their houses as the snow disappeared from the rooftops and pathways. The children spotted Torra first, then saw what was flying just above him, and stopped in their tracks.
"Torra, that's a dragon!" Maya pressed herself behind Nico.
"Get away from it!" Jenna joined her.
"Torra, it's huge!" Rafa pointed with wide eyes.
"She's Frostina. Brother Leigh's pet!" Torra announced happily.
Frostina flinched. Then fixed a glare down at him.
"Who called me someone's pet?" She roared.
The shockwave hit the farm and uprooted several patches of crops.
I let my killing intent seep out toward her. Just enough.
She felt it immediately and went rigid, turning to find me crouched by the Sequoia tree, watching.
"I mean... I'm his familiar. Not a pet. Familiar, correct?" She said, her voice considerably smaller.
"Isn't it the same thing?" I said.
"Y-Yes. Yes it is. I am a pet. An ancient pet." She went back to clearing snow.
Torra laughed. The other children, reassured by his total lack of concern, began following Frostina around.
The other residents drifted over and crouched near me, their eyes tracking the children.
"Leigh, why is the dragon clearing the snow?" Gringo sat beside me.
"I told her to."
"Didn't she just fight you?" Favio asked.
"It wasn't a fight."
"Will she hurt anyone?" Benneth's gaze hadn't moved from Frostina.
"No."
I noticed it as I said it. In my early days here, I hadn't answered anyone. Single-word responses had felt like too much. Now the answers just came out, short as they were, without me thinking about it.
When the settlement was fully cleared, Benneth noticed the damage to the farm. Several patches stripped bare from Frostina's roar.
I stood and walked over to where she had settled on the ground, children scattered around her feet, peering up.
"You destroyed the farm."
Frostina looked at the farmland and her expression immediately changed. She shifted back to her human form, panicking.
She knows how I hated for her to destroy the settlement.
Benneth had followed me over, and the moment her eyes met his, something happened to his face.
He stiffened. Swallowed hard.
I recognized that look. In my past life, people had looked at me that way before they realized how cold I was. That particular expression of someone seeing something for the first time and not being ready for it.
"Fix the farm." I told her.
Frostina flinched and moved to the fields without argument, using magic to restore each patch, pressing the uprooted crops back into the soil until everything was as it had been.
"I fixed it." She pointed at the results.
I nodded and turned back toward the Sequoia tree.
The others were already gathered there, warming their hands around freshly brewed cups. Benneth was the only one who stayed behind. I had no interest in listening to whatever conversation was about to happen between them.
Kalan handed me a cup when I sat down. Herbal tea, brewed from the Chilper herb I had planted from the Abyssal Forest.
Rare herb.
Brewed, it gave the drinker cold resistance and quietly flushed toxins from the body. The warmth they felt was from that.
They thought it was just good tea.
It was too tedious to correct them.
"This tea really is the best." Elder Elka smiled over her cup.
"It does keep the cold away." Mathilda took another sip.
Benneth returned a little while later with Frostina walking beside him. He picked up a fresh cup with the easy generosity he showed everyone and held it out to her.
"Here. This will keep you warm."
Frostina turned on him immediately.
"I don't drink that!" She glared at him with open hostility.
Benneth pulled the cup back, confused and clearly turning over what he might have done wrong. He apologized, uncertain of what he was apologizing for.
I matched her with my own coldness, not enough for the others to feel, just enough for her.
Frostina's shoulders dropped. She turned and walked away from the table.
Benneth sat beside me looking like someone had taken something from him.
"It's not your fault." I said.
Not to comfort him. Not to reassure him. Just to make sure he didn't spend the evening blaming himself for something that had nothing to do with him.
"She's angry with me." His voice was barely there.
"She's not. The tea is the problem. She can't drink it."
Benneth looked at me.
"What do you mean she can't drink it?"
"It's poisonous to her."
"What? I nearly poisoned her?" He went pale.
"You didn't. She would have to actually drink it to be poisoned. She's not that foolish." I said flatly. "The Chilper herb is toxic to dragons. She knew immediately."
Benneth pushed up from the bench and went after her. Whether to apologize or explain or something else, I didn't particularly need to know.
Oliver settled into the space Benneth had left, Olivia taking the seat on my other side.
"Leigh." Oliver leaned forward, already lit up with whatever idea was forming. "Will we be making clothes for the dragon?"
"We saw the shirt she's wearing." Olivia's expression shifted into something close to indignant. "That's yours, isn't it? We really can't have her walking around in your shirt."
"That shirt was made for you." Oliver agreed firmly. "Not for her."
"Do whatever you want."
The twins' eyes both went bright at the same time.
Around the table, the residents sat with their tea, the cold of winter present but no longer pressing in the way it always had before. No fur coats. Just the clothes Oliver and Olivia had made from Tarant fabric, and cups of tea brewed from herbs growing in their own fields.
A year ago, winter in this settlement had meant fear and rationing and waiting to see who wouldn't make it through.
That's what they were afraid of. Counting their already declining numbers on who survived the winter.
But not this time.
Not this year.