The dragon hadn't exactly considered how he was going to get all of this stuff back to Monoceros.

He'd spent the last few days rooting around Polaris, gathering gemstones here and there--a couple might have been "eggs" of a sort, another was the chrysalis of a smaller being. He only had two feet, though, and a (admittedly large-jawed) mouth. Dread had, at least, stashed a large number of the crystals and scraps up on a high ledge, reachable only by the air--but now he was nosing and clawing at the very edge of the Dam's crumbled ruins. He could see the Golems in the distance, shuffling here and there, and he'd warily kept his own: he wasn't sure if they were hostile, and all else aside, he didn't particularly feel like picking a fight with rocks.

He hadn't found much, though; and even now, flipping a few small slabs and shards of stone away, he saw nothing that sparked his interest. There was no shine of color, no glint of translucent light, and so the dragon--his scales dully shining, here and there, in the Spire's distant light--kept shoving through the piles. He wing-walked to and fro, his tail slowly swaying out behind him, wholly absorbed in his task.

Dread spun sharply at the strange hooting call, head coming up and snapping this way and that as his ember eyes searched the darker shadows.

When the piece of gold, or near-gold, clattered to a halt at his feet he inspected it at once, again this way and that. A long-taloned hind foot then stepped greedily forth to claim it, claws carefully closing over it and withdrawing it beneath his weight.

Dread looked up. There was a creature, speaking--and he thought he recognized it, though it took a moment for it to click. His eyes widened with memory, and rage: this was the creature that had stolen from him! The one he'd thought he'd killed! Disappointment and frustration flickered through him; his satisfaction at incinerating the creature had suddenly, all these cycles later, been torn away.

But... it had tossed him a shiny, and what's more, it was speaking. He puzzled, for a moment, over its thick and chewy words. Whatever Howl's bizarre accent was, though, it left the dragon shaking his head in irritated confusion, like a dog with fleas in its ears, as if to shake the sheer weirdness out.

"WHAT?" he demanded. "WHAT ARE YOU SAYING?! I REMEMBER YOU. BUT I DO NOT KNOW YOUR WORDS! -DID I NOT KILL YOU!?" He huffed, staring at the distant primate, smoke twining up now from his nostrils.

Dread shook himself, dog-like, in irritation. It was the monkey's voice: it grated on him, its foolish accent seeming to ring and screech in his ears. He hated it.

His spines rattled as he did so, and when he stopped they continued to clatter quietly for a moment more. He then narrowed his eyes in a sort of grimace, facing Howl. ...He still sort of wished the monkey was dead; he wasn't quite sure how one recovered from death. None of the things I eat ever come back. If I kill this again, I will eat it! he decided.

But, aloud--if reluctantly--he simply spoke to the thing, rather than any tearing or fire or eating.

"TELL ME, THEN," he boomed, and waited--ember eyes lingering on Howl with unconcealed suspicion.

He was puzzled at most of what Howl was saying--because he didn't understand the vast majority. The slurring drawl was unlike anything he'd heard, and his suspicion only rose--to dangerous levels--as the primate sauntered toward him.

He inhaled, intending to blast out a burst of warning flame, but he was rushed--his eyes and his attention fixed on the ever-closer monkey--and instead he inhaled a cloud of his own internally-burning embers.

What resulted was likely confusing to view, to say the least: the black dragon suddenly reared back with a pained roar, and began thrashing and lashing, whirling back on himself. His tail whipped through the air, dangerously close overhead to where Howl had been slipping closer, and slammed with a shattering crack into a boulder; his claws raked at the stone as he twisted rapidly, snakelike, this way and that. Another roar escaped him, coughing this time, and smoke billowed from hanging-open jaws. He was facing away, then forward, then up, his wings half-spread and mantling, his neck arched down and fangs glinting in the Spire's light.

When at last the agony subsided, he turned, anger and pain burning in him (with an unfortunate level of literal-ness) and glared at Howl--or at least, where he'd been, assuming he hadn't bolted at the display. It certainly could have seemed, without the context of having inhaled his own flames, that the dragon had simply thrown a sudden, violent tantrum.

There was strain in his voice as he spoke.

"SPEAK PLAINLY! I DO NOT UNDERSTAND YOU. AND MY NAME IS DREAD." He hissed and shook himself, his eyes squeezing briefly shut.

Damn that had hurt.

Dread shook himself, blinking away the pain, and turned to face Howl. Or-... where Howl had run off to.

He blinked, peering around,

"I will not EAT you if you do not STEAL from me. FIND ME SHINIES," he agreed, with a growl to his voice--mostly born of resentment of his own backfired flame. "BUT DO NOT STEAL." He was thinking, here, specifically of Asimona. The last thing he wanted was for the stupid monkey to steal shinies from a friend-dragon, and upset her, and cause problems! ...Anyway, he'd given her some of her shinies. "IF YOU STEAL FROM MY FRIENDS, I WILL KILL YOU, AND BURN YOU, AND EAT YOU." It was not entirely clear in which order he would do this, and he did not think to list his "friends."

Oh, well.

"I WILL HEAR YOU FROM MY DEN IN MONOCEROS," he added, in a growl.

And then he leaned forward, smoke pluming up from his nostrils as he craned his neck toward Howl. "What is your name?" he demanded. He couldn't remember if the creature had given it, or not, but now he was interested, and so now, he asked.