It was a typical dark, blustery evening on the northern plains near Zekira (the city, not the planet). The sun had nearly set, but there was still an orange glow on the horizon underlighting the heavy clouds. A storm, early for the season, was coming in from the sea, broken in the sky with miles of lighter clouds that allowed the stars to shine through occasionally.

"What do you want to do today, Rauha?" asked the brightly marked dragoness as she roused from a long afternoon slumber. The hawkdragon circled her head, then settled on her shoulder and gave a hawk-like call in reply. Rauha wasn't much for words. "We could do that," replied Nolaizama, "But I think that we should leave Neres Storm alone right now. She is brooding, because of her friends having eggs and she has none yet."

Rauha called again, more quietly, and looked to the north.

Seeming to understand where there were no words, Nolaizama nodded and took wing. The plains looked almost empty - but that was an illusion. The whole mountain to the west was crowded with Zekirans and Kin and dragons. The seas too, along with the forest near. But Nolaizama sought something other than the presence of animals or people just now. She teleported, almost blindly into the windy night.

The fall-colored dragoness arrived at a place which was warm, still night, but without the bitter chill that she'd left in the wilderness. It was more welcoming, this warmth - like a fire, a hearth that drew her near. The Nexus was a chilly place too, if you stayed in it for very long. Rauha preened while Nolaizama found a place to land.

That is a nice place to visit, look, it is very festive. Humans must live here. There is a dragon nearby.

That she assumed people and dragons would go hand in hand was perhaps a stretch in some worlds, but this was Dasmalenra Weir. There certainly was a bit of a precident that people and dragons coexisted. Oddly though, a bunch of young humans were scurrying around from nook to nook, making loud noises each time they reached an inhabited one. Cheering and happy, they moved to the next. Sometimes they shrieked in mock-terror, sometimes a tiny member of the group would burst into real tears over some imagined danger. But there was no true danger this night, was there? Nolaizama did not get that feeling, anyway.

The feeling she did get was one of mischief, fun, adventure. It made her heart flutter - and a batch of leaves got kicked up from her magic because of it. "Let us find out what they are doing, Rauha!" she said, and dove lightly onto the road. Houses of more modest types were all dolled up and given spooky appearances, bones and hats and lanterns danced in the light breeze - a breeze made a bit more strong because of Nolaizama's powers...

"Oh what a wonderful costume!" Exclaimed one woman at her door. The next thing Nolaizama knew, she was being handed some fancy-smelling sugar treat! "Oh you don't have a bag yet? Here, let me get you something, you can hardly trick-or-treat without one!"

So it was, that in the course of an evening out on the 'town' at Dasmalenra, this small sized fall dragoness collected quite a bit of loot! Booty! Bounty! STUFF! A couple people offered tricks, of course - the door buzzer gave off a mild shock, approaching the house activated a spell of noise, that kind of harmless stuff. But in the process, she had to wonder, what was this little round thing?

It was bigger than some of the candies, but smaller than an apple (which she also got, candy coated!). So when they finally got home - and it was morning on their part of Planet Twenty - she was too exhausted to worry about it.

And then... it started to hatch...

food!

Nolaizama looked around, but Rauha was asleep already. Though the excitement of a hatching was upon the bigger dragon, she couldn't rouse her companion to see it.

She's hungry all right, the little rainbow-colored flitter all but lept out of her egg and onto the basket of goodies that Nolaizama had gathered. "If you want you can have those too," Nolaizama commented of the weird little metallic things. Some cheap old guy had wrapped up spare pennies. She didn't know they were money, and what would she spend them on here anyway? The flitter cheeped, added another belch to her thoughts, good loot!

"That's your new name, then! Loot!" Nolaizama gave a draconic chuckle that finally woke her winged friend. "Look, Loot!" But the hawkdragon was already back asleep after their long, long night.

Name: Nolaizama (leaf)
Age: Adult
Type: Fall, Red Maple Leaf-marked Beige
Gender: Female
Abilities: Summon Leaves, Wind Gusts, Flame Breath, Telepathy, Teleportation
Hatched From: Starburst Weyr, Giveaway October 2005

Name: Rauha (peace)
Age: Adult
Type: Sand bodied, Cool Grey winged hawkdragon
Gender: Female
Abilities: unknown
Hatched From: Starburst Weyr, Giveaway October 2005

There was a rippling of wind, warm mixed with chill, that made Nolaizama look around. It was almost like people had described, a shiver up her spine as though someone were talking about her.

Her two smaller companions were still asleep, they'd been romping through the falling leaves and causing a ruckus down near the Kin collective. So Nolaizama carefully stood, stretched out a little and took wing. The night was clear, not warm but not too cold.

Suddenly it got much warmer. She almost crashed into him, but backwinged rapidly and swung around when she saw the dragon. He was the color of leaves ready to fall, with hardy wings and thick rounded horns.

His name was Ayeli, where he'd come from was a mystery but it didn't matter now. Nolaizama realized that she'd found sudden perfection with him. He was quiet, Ayeli prefered to sit beside a fire (that either he or she could create), watch the sunset, or cuddle in a warm den as snow fell outside. But he wasn't meek, at the first sign of any distress on her part, Ayeli would shoot into the sky like a rocket, literally blazing with an aura of flames around his wings. That was enough to frighten off any big predator, or Human, that came along.

Ayeli was not the jealous type, but he also wasn't so fond of the chattering little Loot. Nolaizama was pretty sure it was because he didn't have a little friend of his own. Perhaps she'd have to rectify that...

She did so by locating and somehow procuring a unique flying feline. It was frosty-white in color, fast in the air, and simply adored all the same things that Ayeli did - particularly the curling up by the fire or snuggling in a warm den!

Ayeli didn't want to name the creature, but he knew better than to let Nolaizama name him. "His name is Lumpy," Ayeli said, and Nolaizama almost choked.

"Why would you name something Lumpy!?" She asked, and then took a good look at the flying cat. He did sort of look lumpy when he was curled up and not in motion in the air.

Name: Ayeli (Autumn)
Age: Adult
Type: Autumn dragon,
Gender: Male
Abilities: Flame aura, create fire, douse flames, teleportation/nexus travel, telepathy
Hatched From: Zaireac giveaway 2008

Flying cat from Dray's giveaway 2008