away,

Kyouya returns via teleport with a full grown dragon and the Alpha mage's room abruptly expands to accommodate such a huge creature. The golden scales are slightly dented in a few places and the large shifter is completely still.

"Is this enough blood?" Kyouya asks, leaning against the massive jaw casually.

"That… that is more than I needed," Kawahira admits. "The seal would only take like three drops, perhaps."

Kyouya shrugs.

"I honestly don't know what I was expecting when I sent you out," Kawahira says in complete truth. "I mean I know that you're both friends but I never really asked how you met."

"Friends?" Kyouya echoes in confusion.

Kawahira chuckles and moves away from his benches, striding closer to the dragon. The tiles of the floor rise up and lever open the supernatural's jaw. The mage quickly ducks in and takes the three drops from the Alpha dragon's tongue because there are no scales there to make it indestructible.

Kyouya frowns after the Alpha as the man walks away again, murmuring in a different language, since the teenager still doesn't have an answer.

The scaled hide beside him shifts and the large eye, right beside Kyouya, snaps open to reveal liquid gold with a black slit for a pupil.

Tonfas slot into Kyouya's hands, ready for a fight, but the dragon… kind of flops a bit like a fish out of water. A high pitched whine escapes the Alpha, more like a child throwing a tantrum than a creature in pain.

The thrashing and rolling forces the room to expand and contract as the huge dragon moves about, whipping the long tail and flapping its golden wings which cause a gust of wind to nearly pick Kyouya up from the floor. Kawahira snaps up a translucent barrier before any of his materials get blown away.

"Why would you do that?" the Alpha dragon complains in a deep voice, hiding its muzzle under its paws and razor sharp black talons. "Every time I meet someone they're always so mean to me."

Kyouya is kind of lost.

The dragon huffs out a warm breath that carries a cloud of smoke with it, and shifts into human form. Wings slam into the tiled floor and cover the Alpha's body completely as the dragon curls inward.

The wings shudder and fold in pleats to get smaller in size before the Alpha finally reaches human height. The jewels and gold coins clatter to the ground as they get dislodged from scales, forming a small pile of riches where the Alpha stands.

Then the far smaller wings snap backwards and press into the Alpha's spine, melding with the body and left over tail to leave a whipcord thin string of gold. The almost delicate looking tail sways like a metronome along the pile of riches, making the metal clink and clatter as the tail slices straight through even the diamonds in neat cuts.

The now human frowns down at Kyouya, warm and tan skin contrasting with the spiral tattoo arcing up one arm and seeping over the shoulder. The Alpha still has scales, fading in and out of visibility along the man's legs and hips, climbing up the bare chest to wind down muscular arms. Pale blond hair is only just swept out of the man's eyes, messy and wild.

"And who are you, little human?" the Alpha dragon rumbles in annoyance, voice low and husky as slit pupils lock onto the teenager.

Kyouya flings a tonfa at the man because the Alpha is completely naked.

It's a direct head-shot and the man topples like a tree.

...

Only after Kawahira stops laughing, wakes up the unconscious Alpha dragon and dresses the man, does Kyouya emerge from the bed.

"Sorry," the Alpha says cheerfully, tail whipping about the air behind him. "I keep forgetting that I end up naked when I shift."

Kyouya scowls harder.

"Anyway, my name is Dino, Alpha dragon," the man introduces. "Chiavarone Dino, I suppose, since you're Japanese. It's nice to meet you."

"Hibari Kyouya," the teen murmurs back. "You may leave now, as you are no longer needed."

Dino winces exaggeratedly, hunching his shoulders so the fur on his new jacket bunches up. "You don't have to be so mean. I just want to hang out."

"Perfect timing then," Kawahira says as he turns from his benches, holding a red armband in one hand. "Kyouya here is interested in sightseeing the supernatural world, anything and everything that would be of interest. I'm sure he would be thankful for a guide."

"No," Kyouya deadpans.

Kawahira smiles and tosses the armband through the air. As soon as Kyouya snatches it up, both the human and the dragon are yanked from the room and thrown via mage travel.

...

Dino and Kyouya appear in a dense forest, right in front of a very angry looking unseelie fey.

"Get out," the fey snarls.

The vines and flowers threaded in her dark hair writhe in anger. Her dragonfly-like wings flutter quickly, trapping rainbows of colour, and the surrounding flora grows exponentially, leaves shivering and trees bending to loom overhead ominously.

Kyouya whips out his tonfas with an eager look but Dino's thin tail whips out and tightens around the teenager, pulling him back behind the shifter.

"Hana," Dino greets, calmly but with an undercurrent of danger. "This child belong to Kawahira. Hurting the human or I will be tantamount to declaring war, you know that."

Hana snarls but the forest stops writhing.

"Is there anything I can do to help you?" Dino asks, softly now. His tail is pulled and pushed at but he dismisses the feeling. "You're very clear headed, Hana, something must have happened."

Hana looks away but her shoulders slump. "It's Kyoko."

"The sibling to the Vongola Guardian?" Dino muses, ignoring the modified saw blade hacking away at his tail. "Are you two fighting?"

"Someone took her," Hana grits out.

Dino immediately tenses, mostly at the words but a little bit at the teeth gnawing at him. "No one is that stupid."

"That's exactly what I thought," she huffs out an unamused laugh. "I ignored the threat, because why would it be sent to me instead of the muscled headed monkeys calling themselves her brothers?"

"Do they know?" Dino asks, using his tail to move the teenager further away when he feels the brush of tonfa at the back of his jacket.

"I tried to get through to them, but you know angels," Hana spits out with scorn.

"They laughed in your face and called you unimportant," Dino sighs. He tilts his head to the side and a tonfa flies past.

He doesn't need a confirmation to know that's exactly what happened with the arrogant pigeons. They'll easily dismiss even Alphas, and focus their entire attention on killing off demons at the slightest provocation.

They might be a warrior race but so is Dino and he doesn't throw himself at any opportunity to shed blood.

"The worst part," Hana begins hesitantly. "Is that I think it was dwarves."

"Dwarves?" Dino blurts out in horror, tail tightening around Kyouya protectively even as another tonfa skims his ear. "Seriously, is there anything at all I can do?"

Dwarves are the best smiths, hands down. Unfortunately, as a race that only gives birth to males, they tend to demand females as payment – and if that doesn't work, they'll simply steal the women.

Hana grits her teeth and stares Dino down, searching for honesty in the offer. It actually seems like the Alpha dragon is completely willing to take on Hana's requests. A third tonfa whistles past but both Alphas ignore it.

Accepting the help is the only option Hana has of bringing Kyoko back with angel feathers intact. Hana had been debating, ever since learning that Kyoko was taken, if she would leave the forest. It would mean the loss of all of her powers as a fey and she would be nothing more than a human who could see past glamours.

Hana is purebred fey, not a subset like a nymph. Fey can move between the fey courts and Earth but on Earth they are restricted to places with high levels of fairy dust like mushroom rings. If Hana did break the connection between her and the forest, she would be able to go after Kyoko but she would most likely end up dead or as another prisoner.

"Whatever you want in exchange, it's yours," Hana says confidently. She rises to her full height, the living dress of vines and twigs reflecting off her wings.

"No need," Kyouya cuts in then. "I've always wanted to fight a dwarf."

Hana smirks, approving and clearly blood thirsty. Vines drop down around Kyouya's head and the teen accepts the tonfas back.

"Might want to step back a bit," Dino recommends lightly, his tail guiding Kyouya into the circle of his arms. "Dragon travel is rather… destructive."

Hana fades into non-existence but both males know the trees are her eyes.

Dino wraps his arms tighter around Kyouya and the world turns to fire. It swarms the two and grows as it feasts on Dino's will, spitting out embers as it forms a fire tornado and reaches up past the tall trees to claw at the sky.

The next second it splutters and dies, flickering out to reveal a large diameter of damage where the trees are ash and the ground is charred black.

The trees at the edges of the destruction zone shift and the burnt edges flake off to reveal new bark underneath. The dry and ashy dirt shudders before new plants sprout up, bright green and healthy.

...

Kyoko wakes as the Earth trembles, vaguely remembering short people. She opens her eyes and sits up to find herself somewhere underground, with one torch hanging on a jagged rock wall, and a dirt path leading out of the small cave.

There's a crumpled ball of silver metal beside the exit as well, something like criss-crossing bars. With every quake, bits of dirt and stone fall from the walls and ceiling. She sits up and blinks when a black jacket falls to her lap, having been covering her like a blanket before.

She peers down and lifts a sleeve in curiosity. There's a red, cylindrical strip of material with a bird in flight sewn on in gold string. She slips her arms through the jacket and stands, brushing off a light amount of dirt from sleeping on the ground before heading out.

She takes the twists and turns without a care, searching for someone to ask directions. She's probably late to Hana's place already, and she hopes the unseelie fey isn't worried about her.

Kyoko glides around the next corner and a smile lights her face when she finds intricately carved double doors made of thick stone. She steps up and pushes on one door, feeding some angelic grace into her muscles so the heavy door swings easily.

As soon as it starts moving the sound of thumping reaches her, in time with the shuddering of the cave system. The screaming is there too, as well as the heat of flame.

She peeks in hesitantly and finds a large dragon trotting (or perhaps prancing) around and squishing dwarves under large, taloned feet without any care or effort. A tiny blur flips around the scaled creature's head and hits the ground so hard it craters, throwing up a mass of dwarves from the shockwave.

Kyoko sighs in exasperation and backs out of the room, closing it politely behind her. It would be rude to interrupt. Some people just like fighting too much for her tastes, but she would encourage whatever makes them happy nonetheless, especially in her brothers.

She turns and hums as she wanders through the cave's halls. She'll find her way out eventually.