The hag’s cackling still echoes somewhere down the mountain trail, like a goat with asthma laughing at my funeral.

  Yeah. Charming. May she step on every sharp root on her way down.

  I wait until the last clink of her jars fades into silence before I let myself collapse. My legs give out with a graceless thunk and I slump beside the dragon, still reeking of herbs, blood, and defeated pride.

  He’s not saying anything. Just staring at the fire with that look he gets when things go sideways in a particularly theatrical way.

  I nudge him with my foot. “Okay. Talk.”

  He doesn’t move.

  “I , talk, golden diva. What’s with the dramatics? Why are you acting like we’ve just been sentenced to death by interpretive dance?”

  A slow sigh. The sound of a very old soul trying to crawl back into the womb.

  “It’s my aunt,” he says, in a voice that belongs on a velvet fainting couch. “You heard the hag. She wants a from ”

  “Yes, yes. Aunt Threxaval the Bone-Biter.”

  “” he corrects. “Show some respect.”

  I blink. “Okay, fine. So she’s your scary aunt. Big deal. I had an uncle who ran a cult in a bathhouse. They found six toes in his stew pot.”

  The dragon lifts his head and gives me a withering look.

  “Saya, you cannot to grasp what we’re walking into. This isn’t family. This is a ”

  I wave him off. “She’s your aunt. Invite her for tea. Talk it out. Maybe she’s mellowed. Spent a few centuries journaling, tending a bonsai, collecting sins in jars.”

  He stares at me like I’ve farted in a sacred temple.

  “She doesn’t tea. She does She once ended a war by staring at a king until he ”

  I pause.

  “…Right. That’s new.”

  “She’s judgmental on a scale, Saya. I once brought a bronze offering bowl to a blood rite and she For ”

  I try not to laugh. Fail.

  “She excommunicated ?”

  “For sneezing.”

  Oh gods. “I need to meet this woman.”

  “No. You You need to avoid eye contact and hope she forgets you existed.”

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  I lean back against a rock. “Come on. She can’t be bad.”

  He huffs.

  “She hosts funerals killing people. She corrects grammar mid-scream. She’s got a made entirely of other dragons’ , and she ”

  The image hits me and I nearly lose it.

  “Why sideways?”

  “”

  Of course it is.

  I rub my temples. “Okay. Okay. So she’s scary. Elegant. Old. Bit of a bitch. But how hard can it be? We ask nicely. Maybe bribe her. Maybe grovel a little.”

  The dragon goes quiet.

  Then he exhales. Long. Dramatic. Tragic.

  “You want to know? know?”

  I nod.

  He shifts, slowly, like a dying noble mustering strength to deliver his final aria.

  “Then sit, Saya. Sit and listen. For what I am about to tell you will melt the edges of your sanity and curdle your remaining hope.”

  I blink. “Okay, calm down.”

  “ There is Not with Aunt Threxaval.”

  I lean back against a rock, arms crossed, one eyebrow raised in theatrical boredom.

  “Alright, tragic lizard. Enlighten me.”

  He adjusts his position like a dying empress summoning her heirs to witness the final decree. His voice drops half an octave.

  “Aunt Threxaval… is not a , Saya. She is a . A catastrophic . A ”

  “Oh for fuck’s sake.”

  “She , Saya. Alphabetically. Some of them in languages that haven’t been spoken since the ”

  “That’s—okay, that’s objectively impressive.”

  “She doesn’t speak you. She you. You listen. Or you combust from the sheer pressure of grammatical perfection.”

  I squint. “Are you sure this isn’t just you with a wig?”

  He ignores me.

  “She once sent a letter so cruel, so worded, that it dissolved the of a marriage. The couple stayed together, but for they were legally divorced Even the gods were confused.”

  I cover my mouth.

  “When she visited the Three Crone-Goddesses of Fate, they hid their scissors. Saya. The ones who cut the threads of She walked in, sniffed, said and left. They wept.”

  I can’t breathe.

  He’s picking up steam now. There’s a manic light in his eye.

  “The Goddess of Justice once came to her lair. Full regalia. Scales, flaming sword, blindfold. She stood tall, radiant, divine.”

  “Aunt Threxaval looked her over and said one word: ”

  I slap my thigh. “NO.”

  “The goddess corrected her posture. Bowed. Then left. ”

  “Oh gods—”

  “Death himself—, Saya—brings her Seasonally. ”

  I’m curled over now. My sides hurt.

  He lowers his voice, almost reverent.

  “Her chronicle—her —is hand-illuminated on . It when opened.”

  “What?!”

  “She had an entire named after her once. She sniffed the bottle, said it smelled like cowardice and roses, and ”

  “She’s a menace.”

  “”

  I gasp for breath, laughing. “Oh gods. So she’s a bitch with a kill count and a flair for drama. Is that it?”

  He leans closer. His voice lowers.

  “She only destroys ”

  I blink. “What?”

  “You her. On parchment soaked in tears and embossed with your lineage. If you are below the rank of , she returns your plea with a and a letter that starts with ‘No.’”

  I gape.

  “She requests , Saya. ”

  “Like a job application?!”

  “She wants Proper downfall. Moral failure. She burned a city once because the governor tried to bribe her with silver. She silver.”

  I’m breathless.

  And then he delivers the final blow.

  “And when she your plea for destruction, Saya…

  She ”

  I can only stare.

  “Five acts. Live orchestra. Corpse-violinist. Choir of the Damned.

  timed to the final aria.

  The soprano sings her name as the flames consume the palace.”

  Silence.

  I cover my face with both hands.

  “Oh my gods. We’re going to die ”

  He nods solemnly.

  “At least we’ll have ”