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In turn Izagor began telling him about her own life and history—with her words she painted a picture of the towering mountain cliffs were she had hatched, where her clan, her family, and her friends were waiting for her when she finally got tired of roaming the world. She told him how they would fly over the highest mountains to ride the winds, or how they would soar to the coast and dive into the ocean to fish. She spoke about their stories and their legends—the tale of The Mountain That Could Fly, or the myth of The Dragon Who Flew Over The Sun—simple fables which she had heard as a tiny little hatchling.
Time flew by as they shared conversation and enjoyed each other's presence. The forested wilderness far below eventually gave way to buildings and paved roads as they entered the more urbanized areas of the Marlander Empire.
Prompted by a question from Izagor, Mason talked about the massive clockwork trains which rolled from city to city and town to town wherever there was track—he told her about how they had revolutionized the empire by allowing people and goods to move freely from one place to another, powered by tremendous metal springs wound up with so much energy that they could explode if mishandled. Industry and economy boomed thanks to these marvels of clockwork engineering, and people from all parts of the empire could travel far and fast.
Izagor was intrigued. Freedom was something she took for granted, and it had never occurred to her that humans could not simply fly wherever they wished. Instead they were bound down to towns and homes and jobs, whereas dragons flew wherever they wanted and roamed as far as they dared. At her prompting, Mason flew slightly lower and diverted off course to go follow one of the many trains which ran across the empire. He slowed down and matched its speed, and Izagor watched with awe as the train powered its way across the countryside like a huge mechanical worm. Perhaps some of the train passengers might have spotted the dragon flying overhead, but Mason didn't care. It was worth it to see the expression of wonder and awe on Izagor's face.
--
Their flight, pleasant as it was, eventually had to end. The sun was setting and Mason was not confident that he could continue flying while it was dark. They were no more than an hour and a half from his home town, Klosk Harbour, but his wings were getting increasingly tired from all this activity.
"I don't think we're going to make it home by today," Mason admitted. "If I'm not wrong that's the township of Cinderfell over there. I could try to follow the train tracks all the way to Klosk Harbour, but it's getting a bit too dark. If I accidentally make a bad turn and follow the wrong track, we could end up lost in the darkness."
Izagor patted the side of his neck. "Alright. We don't need to risk it. Land and let's try to find somewhere to rest for the night. We continue our journey tomorrow."
Mason changed heading so he was flying directly towards Cinderfell. "I'll land just outside the town. You can go inside and try to find accommodation—I'll give you some coin to rent a room from an inn or something."
"And what about you?"
"I'll sleep out here in the hills, where people won't see me."
Izagor laughed, and Mason realized that he was increasingly enjoying the melodious sound of her voice. "Alone? Out in the hills? There's no shelter or anything—no caves to sleep in, and not even a tree to take cover under. Why don't we both go find a room in one of these inns?"
Mason halted his descent and flew in a large circle instead of approaching the town. "But I'm...I'm a dragon. I can't just walk in through the front door and ask for a room! Dragons aren't a common sight in the empire."
Izagor scratched at her clothing, which was beginning to itch against her skin. "Then don't. I'll walk in through the front door and ask for a room, and then I'll go to the room and open a window to sneak you in. They won't even know you're there—what's there for them to complain about?"
"Are you sure you're up to it? What if they realize that you're actually a dragon in a human body?"
Izagor waved away his doubts. "It'll be fine! Maybe I don't know everything about your society and culture, but how hard can it be to pass off as human? Let's do it." She looked over the town of Cinderfell and squinted at the many buildings. It was increasingly becoming dark, and it was getting harder to see. "Do you know which of these buildings is an inn? Let's land on the roof."
"The roof? I thought we were landing outside town?" Mason asked.
"Why? Do you want to walk further?"
"No, but I should avoid being seen..."
"The sun's already set, so I don't think people will be watching. But if you want to stay out of sight, just land somewhere dark where there aren't so many of those magical lanterns—how about over there?"
In the fading light, Mason could only just barely see where Izagor was pointing. She was gesturing towards a darkened alleyway between two office buildings which had closed for the night. This part of town seemed deserted, so he flew towards it.
Landing was a rougher affair than either of them expected. Mason was used to touching down with only his own weight, and Izagor's added mass made him land heavily. He stumbled once and let out a grunt, but his main concern was not himself. "Oof! Are you alright?"
Izagor patted his neck. "I'm fine." She tried to slide off Mason's back, but her legs collapsed and she dropped to the ground. "Oh! It's harder to walk than I remembered. My legs feel so tired—I think riding you was more tiring that it would have been to fly on my own strength." Izagor pushed herself to a squat, then a standing position, and she brushed of some dirt which had gotten onto her clothes. "Alright, now let's go find somewhere to spend the night..."
--
Izagor stared up at a large sign which read, "Imperial Hotel Cinderfell", and she smiled. "This looks like a good place. What do you think?"
Mason poked his head out from one of the bushes that was lining the side of the road. "Oh yes. I've stayed at the Imperial Hotel in Klosk Harbour and their service was quite good. A bit on the expensive side, but that's fine." He reached down for the pouch still strapped to his chest and took out a smaller pouch filled with gold coins minted with the Marlander seal on one side and the emperor's face on the other side. "I don't think they'll ask for full payment up front, but here's some money in case they require a deposit."
Izagor took the coin pouch and stared at the lumps of metal within. "Ok. So I just...give this to the person at the desk?"
Mason nodded. "Just walk in and go to the front desk. Talk to the receptionist there and ask to rent a room for a single night. If he requests a deposit, pay him with those coins. Otherwise he'll give you a key and show you up to the room. Once you're there, wait till he leaves and then come to the window and wave me in. I'll...I'll climb up somehow."
Izagor looked at the hotel thoughtfully. The building was well lit and was five storeys tall, and a restaurant was visible at the side—she had admittedly been most attracted to the smell of the food. But the building's exterior was smooth and free of pipes or ledges, aside from a series of balconies, which might make for a difficult climb for Mason. "I'm not sure there are many good pathways to climb up," Izagor said.
"Yes, I'll figure that part out. Just go rent a room and signal to me from the window, and then I'll get up there. Somehow." Mason ducked back into the bush as a horse carriage came trotting down the street, but it didn't stop at the hotel and kept going past them. "Good luck!"
Izagor passed the coin pouch between her left and right hand repeatedly. "Right. Ok." She walked down the street and turned towards the hotel's entrance. "I've fought a sea serpent, I've flown over the world's highest mountain...I can do this," she murmured to herself.
As she approached the glass front door, a man wearing neat black and white clothing frowned at her with a disbelieving look. He seemed to have hair coming from his chin for some reason, which Izagor found amusing. When she kept walking towards him, the doorman pulled the door open for her and beckoned her in with a bow, gesturing with hands covered in white gloves.
Izagor walked through the entrance...and froze. The inside of the hotel was all bright and clean—filled with warm lighting, tasteful artwork on the walls, and a soft carpet underfoot. Izagor wanted to take off her boots so she could feel the carpet with her feet, but instead she settled for kneeling down and rubbing a hand against the carpet. "So soft..." She bent even lower and rubbed her cheek against the velvety carpet.
The man who had opened the door for her was watching through the glass, and now he looked like he was wondering if he should have denied her entry. Izagor jumped to her feet and walked away before he could change his mind. She strolled up towards the large desk (the front desk, presumably) where there was another man wearing the exact same attire as the doorman.
As the receptionist looked up, his eyes went wide in a shocked expression that was becoming increasingly familiar. Izagor could see that he was looking over her with an incredulous face; Mason had said there was nothing wrong with her body and she looked like a normal human, so there must have been something wrong with her attire. Were all humans so obsessed about clothing that people would stare at you for wearing the wrong type? The clothes she was wearing (Mason's clothes) were only a little bit dirty from the few hours spent flying.
"Salutations," Izagor began by saying. She raised her arms and was about to rock them left and right in a wing salute, but then she realized that humans might not understand this gesture. She dropped her arms and just smiled instead.
"Good...evening! How...might I be of service to you?" asked receptionist, speaking slowly and frowning in a confused manner.
"Thank you for the offer, but I do not need you to service me. What I need is a room. To stay in. For tonight. Thank you!" Izagor tried smiling again.
The receptionist nodded and took out a piece of paper from a tray. "Certainly, ma'am. Now if you would be so kind as to give me your name?"
"My name is Izagor."
The receptionist wrote this down. "Full name, please?" he prompted further, looking up from his paper.
"What?"
"I need your full name for our recordkeeping purposes. May I know your family name?"
Izagor paused and pondered what she would do. Her full name was Izagor the Brown (or Izagor the Reddish-Brown if you wanted to be very formal), but this sounded a bit too much like a dragon name and not a human name. Also the man had asked for a family name—perhaps he was asking for her clan's name? Or the name of her parents? But those wouldn't sound like human names either. After a few seconds of quick thinking, Izagor decided that the safest bet was to just use the one human family name she already knew—Mason's. "Uh...Tolovius. My name is Izagor...Tolovius. Yes..."
"Of course. Excellent. Now, Ms Tolovius, we have several rooms currently vacant, including single, double, twin, triple, and suite. Which of these would you be interested in?" The receptionist picked up a flyer and showed it to her.
Izagor knew how to read and write draconic runes, but she had no experience with human written text—she couldn't understand any of the words written on the flyer. She just pointed a finger at one of the pictures which showed a room with a pair of beds, but then she realized that this might look suspicious if she was supposed to be alone, so she switched to the picture which showed one large bed. "Yes. This...this one."
"The double bedroom—excellent choice. Breakfast tomorrow is complimentary. Given the time of year, these are our standard rates here on a per night basis." The receptionist took out a separate piece of paper with more writing, but Izagor couldn't read it anyway, so she just stared blankly and nodded.
"Yes... Wait! Which way is the room? I need a room with windows facing...um..." Izagor suddenly realized that in becoming a human, she had lost one of her most basic instincts—dragons had internal compasses which helped them fly, but now her natural sense of cardinal direction was gone. Mason would be looking out for her to signal from one of the rooms on the hotel's front face, but she didn't actually know what direction this was. Instead she just pointed a finger over her shoulder. "That way. The windows need to be that way."
The receptionist took this request in stride. "I believe that can be arranged...yes, we have a room available facing the front street on level three. However, for new guests who have not stayed with us before, our establishment requires a deposit of two gold faces which will be refunded on checkout, minus fees."
"I have this..." Izagor opened the coin pouch and poured out all its contents onto the desk, forming a small pile of gold.
The receptionist raised an eyebrow. From the dozen or so coins, he slid two into a metal strongbox on the desk. "Very good, ma'am. Now if you could just sign here on this form, please."
Izagor took the offered pen, held it in her clenched fist, and scrawled randomly at the spot indicated. She normally used the tip of her tail as an ink brush if she needed to write, but her tail currently didn't exist so this would have to do. After some consideration, she put down the pen and began pushing her scattered coins back into the coin pouch.
The receptionist kept his face neutral. "All settled then. Your room is already made up and prepared. Do you also require dinner? Our restaurant will remain open for two more hours."
"Yes! Although first I wish to see the room, so I may inspect the windows and the balcony, and stare out of them at the sky. Please. Thank you." Izagor smiled again as the receptionist got to his feet and led her away. In her opinion, she had handled things very well.
The receptionist adjusted his collar and mentally added this encounter to the long list of strange and unusual guests he had handled. "Foreigners..." he muttered under his breath. "Ahem! This way please."
--
About half an hour later, Mason finally landed on the balcony where he had seen Izagor standing and waving to him. It had taken him longer than expected to find somewhere dark to take off so he could fly to the hotel room without getting spotted, but now he was here...and the room was empty. Had he gotten the wrong room? But the lights were all on, and the place appeared to have been recently cleaned. "Hello?" he called.
"Mason? In here!" came the muffled reply from the bathroom.
Mason poked his head into the bathroom and found that Izagor was staring at herself in the mirror. "Izagor...what are you doing?"
"Call me Izzy." Izagor was tilting her head to peer at her face from various angles, and she ran a hand over the freckles which covered her cheeks. "Look at this! That human in the mirror is...me. I'm so weird. As a dragon I did had a few spots, but they were on my side, not my snout. And now there's all this...hair. It keeps getting in the way of my face."
Mason found himself likewise captivated by his own appearance—he had never actually gotten a chance to see his own reflection, and now it was fascinating to see how much he had changed. His mouth and nose had stretched into a pointed muzzle, but his face was surprisingly still capable of rudimentary expression. He could still smile or frown, conveying some level of emotion. Two short white horns sprouted from the rear of his skull pointing backwards, and there was some sort of finned crest that ran from the top of his head down his neck. As he watched, his crest rose slightly; Mason found this amusing, which only made his crest rise up even further. He reached up to try and pat it down, but it kept springing up. The feeling was oddly pleasant. "This is very weird."
Izagor bared her lips and stared at her teeth. "So weird. Being human isn't as horrible as I first imagined, but I can't wait to change back to normal. Good thing we'll make it to your home town tomorrow, or we would have to teach each other how to use our bodies." Noticing Mason's current focus, her lips pulled back into a toothy grin "I see you've discovered your crest—don't play with it too much or it'll fall off."
Mason snatched his paw away, and he felt his crest drooping from that thought. "Really?"
"No. That's just a myth told to fledglings because they like to play with their crest when it first grows in." Izagor reached out her hand and gently stroked Mason's crest, which made it perk back up involuntarily. "Can you tell why?" Tiptoeing and leaning towards him, she licked the sensitive membrane.
Mason moaned softly as a tingle ran down his back, and the sensation seemed to echo into a warm pleasure in his underbelly. "Oh...! Uh, wait..."
Suddenly he felt very embarrassed, but Izagor seemed amused by his vocal reaction. "You like that, don't you? Haha, too easy. That's not the only place fledglings discover they like to play with..."
"Shall—shall we get dinner?" Mason suggested, trying to change the topic. "I'm rather hungry."
"Yes! Good idea. I am hungry too." Izagor agreed; her face lighting up at the thought of sating her appetite. "How do we get food? Are there nearby hunting grounds, or does the food come prepared by the hotel?"
"You can go to the restaurant downstairs and order some food from there. Bring some back for me too—since I can't be seen, I'll just wait here and maybe take a shower."
"Ok! I'll be back soon." Izagor left the room to go get dinner, leaving Mason alone.
--
Mason tried to take a shower.
The soapy suds and warm water still felt just as pleasant against his scales as they might have against his skin, but he soon discovered that even the hotel room's larger than average bathroom wasn't quite enough space for a dragon to take a proper bath. He could curl his tail around his legs, but washing his wings proved to be quite troublesome—there was only enough space for him to unfurl one wing at a time, so he had to stand outside the shower stall and stick his wing inside. This led to water bouncing off the flight surface and splashing everywhere.
Other than his wings, he could wash the rest of his body just fine, and Mason took this time alone to make a proper examination of his anatomy. His tail was unexpectedly dextrous, and he could actually use it to grab and pick up objects if he concentrated. He also discovered that his claws could retract into his forepaws, like a cat. One particular part of his body was even more unusual—under his tail and between his legs, his groin was strangely featureless other than a narrow slit which looked almost feminine. Mason didn't know if this was a normal trait for a male dragon or if the transformation had somehow altered him into a female, but he had no plans to clarify this with Izagor.
Turning off the water, he stepped out of the shower and started using towels to dry himself. His bath must have taken longer than he realized, for suddenly there was a loud crashing sound from the door which made him jump. It sounded like there had been an attempt to kick the door open, but who would kick a door before simply trying the doorknob?
The room door began to click and shudder as someone tried to open it—someone who clearly had very little experience using doorknobs. The door swung open seconds later, revealing a brown-haired woman carrying a large plate with food piled on top. Izagor was grinning widely, and her mouth and hands were stained with various sauces. "Did you know they just let you eat as much food as you want? It's called a buffet, apparently, and it doesn't make any sense. How do they pay for it all? Anyway I brought some for you."
