Kiri— Aerstelle

“You feel the earth shake under your feet and see a green light spread across the sky, coming from the direction of the forest,” Tala says, looking at each person in anticipation. “What do you do?”

“I check for magic,” Fraze says, rolling a die. “A 15.”

“You can tell it’s magic,” Tala says. Fraze gives her a blank stare. “…and it’s light magic,” she adds, rolling her eyes. The little tan dragon on her shoulder appears, rolls its eyes too, and disappears again.

“Justice,” Bergen says, punching his fist into his open hand.

“I fall asleep,” Vidhun says.

“Me too,” Kiri adds.

“Humans,” Fraze says with a scoff. Or at least that’s what his character says.

“Justice,” Bergen repeats.

Tala just looks at them. She takes a deep breath and smiles at them, showing her teeth. Pargu appears again and shows his teeth at them too. He jumps down from her shoulder and onto Fraze’s head. “Now what?” she asks with forced cheerfulness.

Several hours later, their characters sit in an office, surrounded by orc guards, talking to a very rich dwarf. Kiri’s character already successfully sneaked a dagger past the guards and stole the flowers off a plant. Vidhun’s character is on his fourth personality change and Bergen repeats justice over and over again and refuses to kill anyone.

Tala is tearing her hair out.

“So you are saying that we are going to force the refugee gnomes into a segregated area?” Fraze says slowly.

“Goblins,” Tala corrects.

“Like force them into a camp?” Bergen asks.

“A camp where they are…concentrated?” Kiri clarifies, a grin on her face.

“What?” Tala exclaims. “No! Of course not! First of all, we’re not forcing them to do anything, we’re just relocating them.”

“Kinda like purifying the city then,” Fraze asks, an eyebrow cocked. “Just how much force are we allowed to use?”

“No force!” Tala cries. “It’s to give them homes!” Pargu starts eating some of Tala’s snacks, but she doesn’t even notice.

“But what if they attack us?” Fraze asks, the other eyebrow cocked now.

“Justice,” Bergen says, nodding. His blue dragon, Sol, appears and mimics his hand gesture with small claws. It slithers down to his lap, curls up, and disappears again.

Vidhun just sits back and watches the chaos with an occasional chuckle. His girlfriend, Preita, is sleeping next to him with her white dragon hovering just above the ground, shifting in and out of view as it dreams.

Kiri’s dragon, Deea is under her own chair, growling quietly at the sleeping Cai. She hates doesn’t other dragons, ironically. Pargu sneaks up behind her and snaps at her tail, earning him a snort of fire to the face. He spits a spout of water at her in retaliation.

Kiri’s tiny dragon disappears, though they can still hear her growl at all other other dragons around the table.

“Guys, are you going to play?” Tala begs and raises her hands in the air. Snakes of water swirl over each of their heads threateningly.

Kiri reaches up and evaporates the water with a lazy hand. Bergen opens his mouth, twitches his fingers, and watches while the water shoots into his mouth. “I really need to drink more water, thanks,” he says with a big goofy smile on his face. Vidhun and Fraze eye the water warily. Pargu is flying over their heads crowing evily.

“Good,” Tala says, a pink blotch spreading on her chest. “So what do you do?”

It’s with great surprise that all of their characters make it out of the building without getting killed, thrown in jail, or banished from the city.

“It’s all part of being the dungeon master,” Fraze says consolingly to Tala, after they’re done. “Remember that time when you made us adopt the evil vampire?”

She smiles sweetly at him and they all go to eat some pasta together, the four tiny dragons trailing behind them.

Kiri smiles to herself. She’s never been part of a big family before and she loves it- even if Deea loathes being around so many other witches.

She follows the rest into the kitchen, the little orange dragon grumbling from her invisible spot on her shoulder.