Many souls have imagined themselves riding a dragon. This is a very mundane hubris, too simple and mild to even mock. It's a fantasy that's driven away by the flash of rippling muscle and glittering scales and constant [i]motion[/i] - and it's the motion that breaks fantasy into a breathless reality. If an illustration of a tiger is cute, the tiger in motion is heart-stopping - and a dragon in motion is beyond parallel. Primal instincts are overwhelmed by complex body language, the flick and flow of wings, the paradoxical gentleness with which stone-shattering talons brush the earth in landing, the vocalization of tail and neck and scales of winter skies fading to scales of summer skies. Every motion is hypnotic, every mannerism is deadly.

It takes a rare soul indeed to stand in the presence of a true dragon and decide [i]nevertheless[/i] that they will ride it.

Tall leather riding boots touch the ground, gripping black stockings beneath a dress of midnight rose patterns, wrapped in a long buttoned overcoat. Hair imperiously straight is tied back into a long ponytail by black leather gloves. Her eyes know exactly what she is capable of, and the bruises on her slender neck tell of how she pushed those limits. Her approach is predatory and pulls the dragon in her wake, looming over her shoulder like a wartime mafioso's favoured muscle. To wear a dragon princess as such an accessory is a mighty fashion statement indeed.

This is Countess Keron of the Sky Castle. Her eyes flick from girl to girl, coldly and appraisingly. Finally they settle on Cyanis who is visibly sweating and trembling, a street pickpocket in the presence of a crime lord. She hurriedly bows and tucks her sunglasses behind her back. "Countess Keron," she half-squeaked. "Princess Jessic. Uhm."

"You," said the Countess, snapping her fingers and raising her hand. "Have our attention." Smoothly, Princess Jessic places a bottle in her outstretched fingers and she takes a brief sip.

"Oh! Well, um, I have captured a Princess, plus friends," said Cyanis. "And I was hoping to...?" 

The Countess had taken Chen's chin with her hand and was turning her face from side to side. "Princess Chen," she said. "Pathetic. Trying to trick us like this?" With one harsh movement she grips and pulls a rope expecting it to come loose - but instead it tightens and pulls your whole body taught. A razor eyebrow arches. "Oh? Could it be that you're actually caught?"

"She is!" squeaked Cyanis. "And she's for sale. I caught them all!"

"Hm," said Countess Keron, sweeping over to Rose and looking down at her. "And this is that troublesome monk, isn't it? And you expect me to believe those ropes actually hold her?"

"I've stolen her mind!" said Cyanis. "She's perfectly obedient, I promise -"

Keron hooked her leg around Princess Jessic's right foreleg and pulled it forwards, raising the talon almost to Rose's neck. "Prove it," she said to the fox.

"R-Rose, I order you to clean the Princess' foot," said Cyanis, wilting.

And finally that harsh gaze turns towards Yue. Countess Keron kneels down before the knightly maiden, eyes sharp as knives and staring right through to the heart. 

"You I don't know," she said, her voice dropping a fraction too low for Cyanis to hear. "And I [i]do[/i] know foxes. If she tricked you into this just nod. Nod, and she will take your place - carried back to a dungeon in the castle in the sky, while you will be free to go."

So what of it, Yue? Are you a knight, or are you simply dressed as one?