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Near the edge of The Heart, its base half-hidden in the tall reeds, was a rather enormous pile of carcasses and random objects. It was a rather impressive death-pyre, with the legs of a large Gembound deer sticking out at odd angles near the base, and corpses of various sizes and in various states of decay stacked on top. There was a depression in the center, as if something rested there.

The fetid stench was easily detectable from some distance away, by now, which was very likely the cause of the multiple shaggy black cave rat corpses strewn around the edges. Some were charred as if they'd been badly burnt by something. Others had a great deal of blood on their jaws, long crooked teeth, and forepaws, as if they'd given almost as good as they'd gotten before finally succumbing.

Other rats, cave rats and smaller, more ordinary creatures, sniffed around from a relatively safe distance.

A bit farther, slowly sliding up one of the water channels toward the Groves, a large, dark shape was visible like a fallen log. Dragon wasn't hunting, or rather not actively, though he'd keep his eyes out for opportunity. Instead he was travelling, looking for something else that Aquarian might find a meaningful offering.

The problem was that he couldn't go very far from his pile, anymore. The rats would shred it apart, so he had to stay within earshot.

That hardly mattered, though; it would be ready soon. Very soon. Provided, that is, that nothing went horribly wrong.

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Along he drifted, slow languid strokes of his thick tail propelling him through the dark water. The twin ridges along his back would be visible to Ghanyarah, as would his golden-green eyes and dark snout, all of which protruded just above the marsh water's surface. Even that swishing tail would sometimes briefly break the water, a glimpse of the longest, heaviest part of the little gator.

He had not yet noticed Ghanyarah--but he had noticed something pink and shining on the edge of one of the twisting roots of the tree ahead, where it stretched down into the black.

Well, that's new. I wonder if Aquarian would value it? It looks like a--... A something. Shiny, pink. Would he want it? Maybe it's a piece of something dead. No--it looks like a rock? Is that a rock? A gem?

The alligator hatchling, not more than a couple feet long yet (and yet heavily scratched and scabbed over his snout and neck) moved quickly closer, peering upwards so that his seemingly toothless snout broke through the water.

What is that?

Even so close, he couldn't yet pick out that there was a lizard, a reptile, a thing-like-him-but-not, perched along the branch. A thing attached to the stone. He saw only the pink shiny, like a minnow approaching an anglerfish, pausing a few feet away at the foot of the tree to squint at it--first one eye, and then the other.

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Pink, shiny and pink, and what's that? That's not a root it's on, it's grayer. Are those scales? Are those--eyes? Is that--COLD! COLD!? COLDCOLDCOLD--

SQUEAK!

Instinctively, the little alligator summoned his inner fire, thrashing and scampering through the water. Steam hissed up around him, dispersing the frost that had started to collect. He sent sprays of water as he ran for the safety of the tree root, claws digging in, the stench of burning skin and smoke roiling up from him eclipsed by the burning sting in his flesh.

"Ow-ow-ow!"

Then, suddenly, he skidded to a stop--gripping the branch and nearly falling off, a water animal on a tree, face-to-face with one far more suited to it. He blinked, smoke still drifting from his skin, staring into the eyes of another reptile for only the second time in his short life.

It looked like his own reflection, when he saw it in the marsh--but not quite. Like another little-Aquarian. As usual, he didn't think, before he spoke--nor did he even slightly associated the other animal with the ice magic that had been cast. It didn't matter if Ghanyarah backed up, or even if he bit at the alligator--the alligator was too surprised to do anything but stare, smolder and speak.

"Are you a dragon, too?" he blurted.

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Dragon blinked, shuddering as the spell entirely left his system, and as the pain of burnt flesh wracked him. Ow, ouch, ow. But--another dragon! And one only his size, too! He eyed it over, taking in the grey skin, the places where it blushed pink, its sunset eyes. And the horns, on its head! Those were horns, right...? Or--a horn, rather?

"You're smaller than Aquarian," Dragon said at last, in an almost suspicious fashion, turning his head to eye Ghanyarah. Everything in the little reptile's little brain revolved around the marsh monster. "Are you his baby?" They were in Aquarian's swamp, after all. But that meant-- "I'm probably his baby," Dragon added at once, matter-of-factly. Then, slipping a bit on the tree branch, he crept closer--and finally answered the other's question.

"He's a dragon, and you're a dragon and I'm a dragon too. That's my name. Dragon!"

Dragon puffed out his chest, intending to release a plume of searing breath into the air overhead just to solidify his position as "dragon," but his magic was still subsiding from the flesh-charring defensive magic. He found himself, instead, coughing and hacking, alligator jaws pointed down and open. Ghanyarah's pondering over whether Dragon was overly dramatic was probably immediately answered. His eyes rolled up to peer at Ghanyarah, undeterred, as he spoke through the choking.

"What's yours?"

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Dragon settled a bit on the branch, lowering himself from standing quite upright to basking in the almost nonexistent, dim light.

"He's big," he began, chirping in thought. "His mouth is--is the size of this tree. You and me, we're his teeth. Size." He eyed the komodo dragon over as he spoke, and decided that Ghanyarah was pretty--pretty skin, a pretty rock-horn-thing, pretty claws that were nice and sharp. "He lives in the water and I bit his eye and he wants food. I'm getting him food. He said he'd help if we give him food. He has frill-fin-things, like this." With that the little alligator lifted his own front legs, claws splaying alongside his head to apparently imitate Aquarian's frills, albeit rather poorly. Then Dragon chirped again, and tilted his crocodilian head.

"What are you doing here?"

He himself had slept on a tree's roots once or twice, but this creature, he noted, looked far more at home it than he had.

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