The dog-stag was having fun, as she so often did. Usually there weren't that many others around Orion to have fun with, so at the moment she was (again, as she so often did) making her own fun.

Part of that was training, honing her magic skills. She wanted to expand her repertoire, a little, but Pride wasn't here just now, and after a little incident with nearly killing herself with backfiring spells and spending two weeks in a chrysalis, she generally stuck to him for training these days.

This was why anyone approaching the Throne and its nearby garden might see a near-black, antlered deer-dog cascading through the air, soaring gently with a pleased, excited "WHHEEEeeeeeeee-!"

Hooves touched down with a click and she pushed off again, sailing off across the dusty, 'star'-studded rock. "I'm FLYINGGGGggggg..."

She wasn't, of course, but... this never got old.

Acheron paused, coming to a neat halt on the ground with her head now up, ears forward and silver eyes alert. It wasn't alarm so much as realization that she wasn't alone, and she blinked, taking a step toward the stranger.

Her head tilted as she briefly examined them. "Hey!" she greeted, and tipped her head down--for a brief moment perhaps looking like she might be threatening with her antlers, though her voice was friendly. "We have the same antlers!" That was, in part, her answer; when she lifted her head again she was grinning in a dog-like fashion, the corners of black lips peeled into a smile, tongue lolling, eyes squinted cheerfully. "You must be Cadenza? Pride's mentioned you!" Their existence, anyway, so that none of the close family of Orion would be surprised if a white dragon-deer flapped down in front of them. Not that it'd helped, much--count Acheron surprised, regardless. "I'm Acheron." The hesitation didn't escape her, and she tilted her head a bit to one side again.

"You okay?" she asked, bluntly direct, but with a friendly lilt to her tone. She'd never really had a reason to be nervous around others, and had greeted pretty much every stranger she'd ever met with open abandon. To her mind, Cadenza must be worried about something--or afraid. There some kinda danger about? she wondered.

Acheron visibly winced, in a sympathetic sort of way. She even did that intake of breath--a sharp hiss between her teeth. "Oof, dude, that's not--damn. Spur-of-the-moment, huh?" But she shrugged, a little, and grinned. "One thing the old bastards won't tell you, though, because they're old and forget shit, is that they didn't know shit about being parents, either. 'Scuse my language," she added, turning idly away to sniff along the ground.

She trotted a few steps away, hooves clicking, before finding what seemed to be a suitable spot--about where her last bounce had rebounded. There she flopped to her haunches, lifting one hind leg to scratch behind an ear with a hoof. "They all woke up outta the rock--either Dad tell you that?" (And maybe here was why she'd called him Pride--she, too, had two fathers, in a sense.) "But they all had to make it up as they went along. You'll be fine," and here she tilted her head. "You don't even need to start from scratch, like they did. They'll help you--your Dads, I mean. -Oh! That why you're here? Pride was out in uhhh. Eridanus, but he should be back soon."

Acheron squinted. "Hey, when... you say your other dad--Dread, right? When you say he said you don't know enough to be a parent, he wasn't, like, an asshole about it, was he?" She sure hoped not. But Cadenza did seem pretty upset. But if he had been mean, that sounded like something that somebody should address. Acheron didn't know who. Pride, maybe. But it didn't seem... right.

Acheron listened, head still a little canted to one side.

She wasn't the sort to... worry. Or even think, much; her father tended to plan and micromanage his plots and schemes, when needed. But Acheron had never had the need. Even when shit went wrong, well--it worked out; was there maybe a way she could get this idea across to Cadenza-?

Well--first things first. "At least he wasn't mean about it," she said, but it seemed to be more to herself than to Cadenza. Arranging a very stern talking to to a dragon didn't seem like it'd have worked out--and anyway, better to know that Cadenza wasn't being beaten down, even verbally, by a parent.

"Listen, if you don't mind the uhhhh. ...Story or--anecdote? I think that's the word," and she scrunched her nose up just a little, thinking. "Dad--Pride--used to warn me all the time not to use magic alone, especially the dangerous stuff, while training. I did it anyway and damn near blew my own legs off. Basically, I crushed myself!" she explained, with bright cheerfulness. She seemed almost enthusiastic about it, like it was a hilarious story, in retrospect. "At the time, I thought it was all over, y'know? Like, I screwed up, I did wrong, ruined everything, life over. But I went back into my stone, and I woke up. And Dad taught me a little more how to train. And now, here I am! I'm fine. It worked out."

She eyed Cadenza for a moment. "Not everyone's lucky enough to have family to support them, yeah? You'll be fine--and your kids will be, too. Family's important." She hesitated. Was she being... supportive enough? Reassuring, and not just... too wordy? "I mean--it'll all work out okay in the end, so try not to ruin the here-and-now for yourself?"

Acheron shrugged. "Anyway-... There's a garden, if you want, while you wait. There's nothing in there a dragon could eat, I think, but it's a nice place to rest? Or we can go and look for Dad in Eridanus, if you like?" She had no idea that Cadenza could eat plants--Pride hadn't mentioned that part--or that they'd seen the garden already. It just seemed like the best place to invite a guest, especially one who was family.

"Or we can find something to do, if you like? What sorts of things do you like to do?"

The 'I do not know how to worry' struck Acheron as an immensely sad concept. They really are a kid, still, huh..? Pride had mentioned it--had mentioned that Cadenza was a fresh hatch, even though they didn't look it. But somehow, it was one thing to see an immense, shining white antlered dragon with that assumption--and another entirely to hear them talk, to hear their uncertainty. "It comes with experience," Acheron answered, bullshitting with utter confidence. Maybe if she sounded convincing enough, Cadenza would believe it. And if they believed it, well, it was about perception, right? Maybe it'd come true.

She laughed, then, at the mention of swimming. "Well, I'd take you for a swim but unfortunately Orion's one of the worst places for it. There's not a lotta water here." She wished she could think of an alternative, but... oh well. "So you're gonna have water kids, huh? Neat! I have a friend who lives in water. Her name's Lorelei! She gets kinda lonely, I think, because there's not all that many Gembounds who live in water, so maybe we can introduce 'em once they're hatched! It'd be nice for her to have more friends to hang out with."

She stood back up, stretching in a dog-like fashion before shaking herself thoroughly. A tongue lashed out to lap her jaws, and she yawned widely. "...As for what I like to do, well--anything, really! Exploring, adventure, magic! And on the magic topic--a lot of magic can be kinda dangerous. You saw me kind've... bouncing around, before? If that failed while I was jumping off a cliff, or something, I'd just fall and probably break a buncha bones. But I usually use it before a little jump, so it's not bad. But it sounds like you have our magic," she went on, eyeing Cadenza more solemnly. "And, uh... It's powerful. Dad--Pride, he says it's one of the most powerful magics in the caves."

Acheron turned, looking around herself. She picked out a rock a good distance away, nodding toward it. "See that rock over there? -Don't go near it," she added, and then squinted, focusing her magic.

It flickered--went dark, a faint hole forming above the stone--then popped and faded, failing. "Shit," Acheron breathed. "Well, that just didn't work. But... when it works? Anything near it gets destroyed. And I don't mean a little damaged, like the rock would chip or something. I mean destroyed," she added, firing the dragon-deer a somber look. "Yanked into a hole and crushed to dust. Dad can turn stone to molten fire with a look, or throw things across the cave without making a movement. It's scary stuff, and it takes a lot of practice to get the hang of--and even then, it can go wrong."

Shit, they don't know this--and they made kids with the same magic? She tried to spin it to a positive bent, swallowing down the grimace that threatened to cross her face. "Hey, maybe once your kids are hatched, we could all train here together for awhile? Dad's a good teacher, and if you want to learn more, and maybe your fish-kids can too!"