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Book 2: Chapter 63: Draconic Attributes

So with only a quick stop to find Carley and explain Cressida was authorized to come and go as part of his retinue, he took Brixaby to the kitchens.

The hive had giant kitchens on the lowest level where the bulk of the population lived and worked, some restaurant-sized ones on the mid-levels which housed most of the dragon riders, and some exclusive ones on the higher levels for the elite of the hive.

Arthur knew which one expected to visit — or where to send a servant to fetch for him — but he was feeling homesick.

Three weeks ago, he\'d been a nobody with a couple of jobs to pay for an apartment in a middling part of the city. Now he was someone of importance. He would be expected to lead people.

Right now, he just wanted to sleep in a familiar bed. He\'d rather it be back in his old apartment in the city, but smuggling Brixaby out of the hive would be too problematic.

So Arthur settled for his quarters inside the hive. The one Kenzie had gotten for him.

It was near enough to the sprawling lower-level kitchens that he was able to stop in with little trouble. Brixaby kept silent for once, a small dark spot on his shoulder, and the servants were busy enough not to give him much of a look. Arthur collected two bowls of beef stew.

On his way out, he passed by a man who was using the ample workspace to carve a melon into a flower. Likely, that melon wouldn\'t be displayed in the lower levels but some upper tier rider\'s room.

Huh. Maybe he should host a fancy party and have one of those—

New Counterfeit Skill obtained: Decorative Vegetable Carving

Remaining Time: 71 Hours 59 Minutes 59 Seconds

New skill gained: Decorative Vegetable Carving (Cooking Class)

Due to your card’s bonus traits and your existing Cooking Class, you automatically start this skill at level 5.

Arthur stopped so fast he slopped stew over his hands.

The man working on the melon looked up, saw Brix, and paled slightly. "Can I help you, sir?"

Arthur didn\'t have to force a smile. "No, thank you."

He moved on.

"As my steed, you should make your movements more fluid and less jerky," Brixaby complained.

"I worked in the kitchen for years," Arthur said in wonder, hardly listening to him, "and I never picked up that skill. Then again, I didn\'t try for it, but now — now I have Decorative Vegetable Carving. Just like that."

"Decorative vegetable carving?" Brixaby repeated. "What use is that?"

"You\'d be surprised. I saved myself quite a few times using basic skills. Speaking of which..." He glanced at Brixaby. "You\'ve been riding on my shoulder off and on all day and you haven\'t gotten a, uh, human riding skill?"

"No? Should I?"

"I received a dragon riding skill, my first time on Tess."

Brixaby bristled. "Who is this Tess? How dare they! I am your dragon. Not—"

He went on like that but Arthur wasn\'t listening.

He was still deep in thought by the time he and Brixaby made it back to his old room on the lower levels.

Though he hadn\'t lived there nearly as long as he had with the apartment he shared with Horatio, stepping inside felt like home.

Brixaby wasn\'t as impressed. "This is quite small and dark, and there are no rafters for me to roost from."

"It\'s palatial compared to some places I\'ve lived." Arthur set down the bowls on the small table. "Here, try some of this. You might like the broth and the chunks of meat."

He had never seen a dragon eat human food, but heard that some of them liked fruit as an occasional snack. This probably couldn\'t hurt.

It might even help Brixaby to grow.

Jumping to the table, Brixaby sniffed his bowl of stew and then cautiously dipped the tip of his muzzle in. A moment later he\'d ducked his entire head under and was slurping greedily.

Arthur grabbed up a spoon and dug in his own bowl. It had been a long day.

The simple stew also had an indefinable sense of \'home\'. Buck Moon hive treated him well and the food had been several orders above what he usually ate. But the mix of spices was slightly off. It was as if the cooks were used to adding a few pinches more spice and sugar to everything. Not bad, just markedly different.

It was good to be home.

Brixaby finally came up for air, long tongue licking at his chops.

"I just received a new skill."

"What is it?" Arthur asked eagerly. It was his first skill he\'d gotten on his own, without copying from someone\'s aura first.

"Culinary appreciation."

Arthur grinned. "You really are my dragon."

"Yes, was that in any doubt?" Brixaby speared a floating chunk of stew meat and started tearing it apart with his needle-like claws.

Eating good food hadn’t helped Brixaby’s quest to grow larger. It timed out within the hour.

Arthur wasn\'t too surprised. Nor was he worried: They were going to spend a lot of time with Cressida and Joy. Either Brixaby would get another crack at that quest, or perhaps another one that would be easier to complete.

"Why are you smiling?" Brixaby asked.

Arthur shook himself. "Nothing, I was thinking." He didn’t want to tell the dragon that he was thinking about his size. Brixaby could be sensitive about it.

The dragon narrowed his red eyes at him.

Not wanting to explain, Arthur said, "Let\'s talk about your skills."

"Yes!" Brixaby perked up at once. "Is there a rending skill? A skill to see which cards are best to steal? Perhaps a dark of the night skill..."

"There\'s a stealth skill," Arthur said. "That one has helped me out quite a few times."

The little dragon\'s tail flicked in satisfaction. "Yes, that will do nicely. How do I achieve this skill?"

Arthur almost said, \'By being sneaky\' but... that wasn\'t quite it, was it?

"You have to be deliberate," he said. "Back when I was first learning about my Master of Skills card, my father advised me to think about what I was doing. To... to practice with intention. A person does hundreds of actions each day, but only when you slow down and think about it do you start to master the process..." He trailed off and shrugged. This was a concept he knew, but until now he hadn\'t truly put it into words.

Brixaby, however, had listened raptly. "I see. So that is why I hadn\'t received a human-riding skill. Or a flying skill at the expert level," he added. "This room is much too small for me to adequately practice."

With that, he made a light leap to Arthur\'s shoulder. "But you may pace around the room."

Arthur stood from the table. "Focus on moving with me. Your center of balance isn\'t important now, but it will be when you start to grow."

Brixaby adjusted himself so that his long dark tail lay across Arthur\'s neck. "Like this?"

"Yes, and it may take some repetition. Three times is the magic number for me."

With Brixaby hanging on and concentrating, Arthur crossed from the table to the other end of the room, turned on his heel, and crossed again.

Because he was focusing on Brixaby so intently, he once again felt something within him change. No, that wasn\'t quite right. It felt as if something tiny deep inside had just grown.

The seed of a new skill?

"Aha!" Brixaby cried. "I received my human riding skill at level four."

"Perfect." Arthur looked around the room, searching for inspiration. His gaze landed on a nearby bookshelf. It was empty, but he\'d taken a few dry books of hive history from his room at Buck Moon hive.

"Next," he said, "reading."

He spent the next half hour or so going over the ABCs with Brixaby. The dragon had a keen sense of memory and picked it up faster than Arthur had when he was a young boy.

Once Brixaby received basic \'Reading\' at level 3, Arthur taught him to count.

"Oh," Brixaby said once he got the basics down. "Is that what those attribute numbers mean in my core?"

Arthur slapped his palm to his forehead. "Right, why didn\'t I think of it? You\'re linked to my Master of Body Enhancement, too. Of course you can see your own attributes."

He didn\'t ask why Brixaby knew the word \'attributes\' even though he had just learned the fundamentals of reading. When a card entered the heart deck, the details were imprinted on the soul. He assumed dragon cores were the same thing.

"Can you show me?" Arthur asked.

"They are very good numbers. Some of the first people count, which means they\'re the best," Brixaby said proudly and showed the list.

(20 = Average)

Strength: 5

Stamina: 7

Dexterity: 4

Perception: 21

Charisma: 20

Intelligence: 29

Wisdom: 15

Luck: 20

Some of those were… not great. The strength and stamina explained why Brixaby was so small, though.

Brixaby\'s expression was of expectation, and Arthur didn\'t want to hurt his feelings.

"Your intelligence is higher than my own," he said grudgingly. "Very good perception, too."

Brixaby preened.

The night was growing late, and they had a big day in the morning. Brixaby had eaten his fill of the stew, as well as the dregs on the bottom of Arthur\'s bowl, and was looking round and sleepy.

Arthur checked the time on the portal spell.

A little over two hours remaining.

"I\'d like to try the portal again," he told Brixaby. "Oh, wait—" Then he went to his writing desk, pulled out a piece of paper and started writing.

He kept his note brief and impersonal — aware that Baron Kane\'s men could search his father\'s cottage at any time for contraband. He also his reference to the children he had helped escape the village as discreet as possible.

Calvan,

I am well and everyone is settling into their new lives. There\'s no easy way to ask this: I\'ve come across information about your wife, Lottie. I need to know: What was her card?

I don\'t know when I can see you again. If we cannot talk, please write me a letter and leave it on the table. I\'ll receive it.

Arthur bit his lower lip and decided against signing it. There was far too much incriminating information on the page for his liking already.

Hopefully he wouldn\'t need the letter and could simply talk to his father face-to-face.

Brixaby was dozing on the bed and grumbled when Arthur poked him awake. He eventually woke up enough to help lend his strength to tearing open the fabric of the world again.

The cottage on the other side was dark with not even a glow of embers from the wood-stove.

Arthur called out his father\'s name without an answer.

With Brixaby visibly wilting, Arthur shoved the letter through where it fell down to the wooden table.

Then he let the portal snap shut.

"Can I go to sleep now?" Brixaby asked, grumpily.

"Yes, Brix. You did good." Arthur set aside his worry for his father long enough to guide the dragon to curl up on Arthur\'s own pillow.

Brixaby took this as his due, yawned big enough to show every one of his tiny razer teeth, and settled down to sleep with the tip of his tail curled over his nose.

Arthur stroked one fingertip down the length of his dragon\'s purple-black spine.

Why hadn\'t his father returned to the cottage?

Everything was in good order — nothing broken as if there had been a fight or a search from the Baron\'s men. And the cottage was too well built to go empty for long. If the worst had happened, there would be another family living in there within days, perhaps hours.

Perhaps Calvan was busy. There wouldn\'t be much of a reason to stop by the cottage other than to eat and sleep.

Arthur hoped Calvan had found someone special who he was spending time with. It had been years since Lottie died.

There was no point worrying about it for now. He had to find a way to survive his upcoming visit with the king.

But before that, he and Brixaby had dragon care class.