2024-07-08 - I hope none of you are Gold.

Rioth was certain of many, many things, but one of those things could not leave her feeling bossy or smug.

And she knew it for a while, now, though she avoided thinking it in case that would somehow will it into being, faster: She was not a gold.

She knew she was large. She knew there was something gold about her egg; that much she was able to pick up in the tones of each human mind and voice that passed through their nursery, and in the shouts about cracks and orders to move her and her siblings.

It didn't hurt as much as she thought it would hurt, that slow, dawning confirmation that she could not be completely like Gwillanth. It was just a creeping, gnawing descent into feeling more lost and puzzled by the moment. If there was one thing everyone outside would agree on, it was that there were many colors of the -THs, of the 'dragons,' and they all did things those colors do - because those colors have always done it.

Most of those times, it was the humans thinking it. They would agree, they would be angry, they would question it, but they would still be thinking it.

Rioth had found herself straining to listen more to these types of talks and thoughts. She wouldn't compromise, she couldn't pretend to start all over again of COURSE, could an egg even do that? - but perhaps there would be an opening, some human would slip and say something that made her own gold-tinted thoughts all right again and she'd have to shout less about it in the end.

She'd chirrup in relieved cheer once Issrodeth arrived - they had been worried for some reason, right? The big mind was fuzzy and pain was distant.

Perhaps she'd feel if Rioth mentally snuggled closer and hum her a comforting song. It would help, surely.

And in this state, Rioth soon got her wish for more of those sorts of talks.

The glimpses of their biological father had been fleeting, mentions of a 'Dei'r' had been passing. While they carried a note of respect, it had been nothing compared to how people approached Gwillanth, and so Rioth had figured they were just more in the background, that the golds were in charge, that the big bronzes were nice to put eggs there, and Being Big was good, surely.

There was a spark of those salacious mind bubbles when Igith spoke of a Eucath, with the soft implication of more - THIS was the good stuff, those bubbles were nice. Chase and be chased - those were nice ideas, it sounded like a marvelous game, they brought the bubbles and sparks...

...and Issrodeth might as well have snatched that idea from the sky and ripped it to shreds as it crashed to the earth. The feeling of her shutting the younger gold down was a shock that twisted in the little dragonet's throat, even if Rioth could not articulate why.

Those bubbles...those were love. That's what the other golds were saying. Not Gwillanth's love for Rioth and her siblings; distant, different, giddy. It was flying, it was catching and fleeing and the joy of the open sky and every flying dream you've ever had, shared with your favorite others. It was comfort, it was thrill, it was closeness.

It was Pertemarth.

And, Rioth realized, feeling rather ill, Golds weren't allowed to have it.

Her silence was palpable. This didn't feel like something she could shout or sing away.

"I hope none of you are gold," she growled, unexpectedly bitter to any nearby sibling that would listen. "It sounds terrible."

Maybe it was best that she wasn't one, after all.