Tiamat, the Queen of all Chromatic Dragons, let the scrying spell die. For a long moment, she was silent, and one could almost feel the tension in the air. Then she laughed. It was not a laugh that any human would have been pleased to hear, a deep roaring sound that would have made even the mightiest of warriors tremble in fear.
However, despite his human-seeming form, the being that stood before her was hardly human. And he was quite happy to hear the dragon queen laugh. "You are pleased, then?" he asked.
Tiamat brought one of her heads down to his level. "Indeed," she said. Had the 'man' been human, the sheer physical force of her voice would have blown him off his feet. "You have repaid my favor to you most satisfactorily, Loki."
The trickster god bowed shallowly. "I am glad that you think so, Great Tiamat. It was not easy to trap Bahamut in that ring. Particularly since it could not hold a male."
The dragon queen's latest consort, an ancient red dragon, stirred from his place beside his goddess. "How could you accomplish such a thing? To make the Platinum Dragon think himself a female?"
Loki raised a finger chidingly as he gazed without fear at the massive dragon. "That... is a secret."
"How long will the ring bind... her?" Tiamat asked.
"At least until the boy dies, more if he must stay longer to fulfill his wish. And before, you ask, there's no chance of him finding a way out. The vast majority of Bahamut's powers and knowledge cannot be held by such a form. He will remember what he was - mostly - but within a few months, a year at much, he will think as, feel like, and be exactly what he seems to be - a human girl." Loki smiled. "The mind may control the body, but ultimately the body shapes the mind."
"Then you have done well indeed," Tiamat said. "I will grant you a small token of my appreciation then, if you would have it."
Loki bowed again. "I would be delighted."
"I recall you are engaged heavily on that world, the one where they call you by that strange name -"
"Bozdogan." Loki said smoothly.
"I will grant you twelve of my most powerful dragons, to aid your forces there for the next year."
"Your kindness is too great," Loki muttered, but in his eyes it was clear he was already going over plans in his mind.
"For the opportunity Bahamut's long absence will give me, it is a small gift."
"By your leave?" Loki asked, and when Tiamat nodded, he vanished.
Tiamat's consort snorted. She actually had to think a few moments to remember his name was Pyre. A particularly unimaginative name for a red dragon, she had thought. She actually couldn't remember why she had bothered to take him as a consort. Slowly, she swiveled one her heads to face him. "What?" she asked.
"I was just thinking," the red dragon said. "I wonder how long it will be before the boy gets Bahamut pregnant."
"They're too young to be fertile," one of Tiamat's other attendants pointed out.
Pyre grinned. "I wouldn't mind waiting a few years for a chance, though."
All of Tiamat's head turned to face the red dragon, and an expectant hush fell over her throne room. "Is that so, Pyre?" she asked in a dangerous voice.
The red dragon quickly realized his mistake. "...No Great Tiamat! I would never be unfaithful to -" He stopped realizing that his voice had changed in mid-sentence, sounding strange to his own ears. It would be a rare human that would realize what the change met, but the dragons who attended Tiamat recognized it all too quickly, and the loud sound of draconic laughter filled the air.
"You see, Pyra," Tiamat said, her own amusement with the punishment she had chosen evident, "the changing of gender is not so difficult a matter after all. Now, be gone from my sight, and do not return for at least a century. Maybe then I will undo what I have done."
Even as the red dragon vanished, the dragon queen had placed the matter out of her mind. Far more pressing was the issue of what to do now that Bahamut was out of the picture.
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(Posted Mon, 29 Mar 2004 07:20)
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