“I would like to absorb modified core ESK1,” Sara stated.

  Hammy stretched up on his hind legs like a prairie dog trying to get a closer look. Sara could see his little nostrils moving as he sniffed the air. “Your eyes are glowing,” he said.

  “It’s OK, buddy,” she said. “I’m absorbing a core, whatever that means, and I think we’ll be able to go home if it works.”

  “When we get there, I want a whole can of food. I prefer it freshly opened, not cold from the box of cold. And make a nest with the furry blanket. I’m going to sleep for a long time.”

  Sara smiled, “You got it buddy.”

  “How long is it going to take.” Hammy said, “I’m ready to go now.”

  “I don’t…”

  Pain lanced through Sara’s chest.

  “I…” She felt electricity shooting out from her solar plexus and head through her entire body. It jumped to her pelvis and armpits, and then to her hands and feet.

  Next the energy went burrowing through her body and limbs making tunnels or channels. It felt like little vibrating worms.

  Then it all moved to her eyes. Everything went dark. She fell off the stepstool and when she could see again to, Hammy was right there, eyes wide like saucers, an inch from her face. His fur was poofed out.

  “That scared me,” he stated flatly. “Don’t do it again.”

  Sara petted his fur back into place. “Sorry, little guy.” The static in her vision resolved into a HUD. “I admit, that was terrible, but now that it’s done I feel really good. Something’s happening. Like messages I can see in my head. I’ll know more in a minute.”

  Core reset to level 1.

  Impurities recycled during core integration. Hunger status removed.

  Moderate dehydration detected.

  Moderate bruising and abrasions detected primarily on hands and feet. Cycle mana while inactive to repair.

  Optimal user interface determined via memory scan. Please make any desired adjustments.

  Your field of vision has been expanded to accommodate a mini map and a large number of shortcuts without obscuring your sight. By default, the map will display to the right and your body condition will display to the left.

  Wyrmcraft ESK1A operations can be accessed by query and commands will be carried out via AI as you lack the requisite piloting skills. Tutorials are available.

  Two natural affinities detected.

  Would you like to unlock your Space Affinity?

  Would you like to unlock your Stealth Affinity?

  “Well, can we go home now?”, Hammy said.

  Sara laughed, “It might take me a minute to figure out how to transport us to another galaxy.”

  Hammy let out a frustrated growl. “I could die of hunger by then.”

  “I think you’d probably die of thirst first,” Sara said.

  Hammy let out a pitiful sounding mewl.

  “Oh, Hamster, I didn’t mean it was going to happen. We’ll get out of here way before then. That takes like days and days.”

  “Hurry,” Hammy said.

  Sara sat up and pulled her feet into the lotus position. Not only was it a comfortable pose for thinking, it was Hammy’s favorite lap shape. She patted her leg and he climbed aboard, spinning in a circle several times before settling in.

  Sara closed her eyes and thought, activate my space affinity.

  Scanning for affinity value. Error. Value exceeds previously estimated maximum value. Previous category definitions do not apply.

  ESK0 is analyzing the data. Value is six standard deviations from the mean. Category undefined. Estimated range of ability unknown.

  Level one Space Ability – KNOW where you are. You always KNOW exactly where you are, where you’ve been, and where any entities that you share a soul with are relative to anything you can conceive of.

  Level one Space Ability – sense wyrmholes. You can sense the presence of wyrmholes, can sense recent wyrmholes, and you KNOW where both the origin and terminus of any wyrmhole you have sensed is.

  Level One Space Ability – create wyrmholes. Max wyrmhole distance exceeds previously known parameters. Proceed with caution. Wyrmhole creation can be shared with any creature that shares your soul. Warning. Any creature creating a wyrmhole without the Space Affinity must be intimately familiar with their destination or they run the risk of catastrophic failure.

  This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  She waited for a moment and when no other information appeared, she said, “Activate my stealth affinity.”

  Scanning for Affinity Value. Stealth Affinity is two standard deviations above the mean.

  Level One Stealth Ability - hard to see. You are not detectible via any magical tracking of Rank 2 or below. You are less likely to attract notice. You can become invisible to non-magical beings at will. When active, non-magical beings cannot see, hear, or smell you.

  Level One Stealth Ability – active hide. You may become invisible to magical beings at will, but you must maintain concentration and remain still. If a magical being is looking at you when this ability is triggered, they will still be able to see you. Once they look away, you will become invisible to them.

  Level One Synergy Ability – Space + Stealth – when traveling short distances, you may instantly appear at your destination without creating a visible wyrmhole or making a detectable sound. Distance varies based on the amount of magic in the environment and a number of other factors such as active countermeasures and combat status. Current available distance, 0.253854 miles.

  Warning, it is advisable that you learn shielding magic before teleporting to environments where the atmospheric conditions are hostile.

  Sara opened her eyes and stroked Hammy, who was lying in her lap looking up at her. “Well, Buddy, I know how to take us home.”

  Hammy stood up and stretched, “Let’s go!”

  Sara concentrated on her Wyrmhole creation ability. She knew where her apartment was in a way that brooked no doubt. She KNEW, and she understood why the word KNOW had been capitalized in the description. She also sensed another wyrmhole that was opened recently, and she KNEW where that wyrmhole went. She was about to open a wyrmhole to her apartment when her core spoke.

  Sub-core ESK1B detected in range.

  Would you like Hammy Davis Junior, Felis domesticus, Bondmate to absorb modified core ESK1B, currently located in the corpse of Laugust?

  Is there any reason why I can’t take it with me and make that decision when we’ve both had food and rest? Sara thought.

  This course of action is optimal. ESK0 would like me to advise retrieval of the daggers from the corpses. Reasoning. Dragons are very difficult to kill. An ordinary dagger would be insufficient. Additional reasoning. You may acquire draconic features including resistance to ordinary damage. The daggers represent a threat to you and should be controlled.

  “Just gotta grab a couple of things first,” Sara said.

  Opening the wyrmhole was one of the easiest things she’d ever done. She stepped through it with a cat, two daggers, and a big glowing gemstone covered in circuitry and it was as if she had walked through an ordinary door into her bedroom. She closed the wyrmhole with a thought. She could still barely sense the first wyrmhole that had been opened into her apartment. She focused and then KNEW where it had originated. That was probably the Imperial palace. Yeah, gonna avoid that for sure, she thought.

  This course of action is optimal.

  It was night, but her blinds and curtains were still open. The first thing she did was plug in her phone, then she gave Hammy a whole can of cat food and freshened his water bowl. It was just after 9PM the day after she’d left. They’d about 28 hours with no food or water. She closed all the blinds, put on her PJs, and pulled out her phone. She’d missed a shift at the hardware store, and she’d missed her literature exam. She had so many text messages it made her tired just thinking about it. Her sister Shayla was worried about her. She fired off a text to Shayla saying she was fine and she’d call tomorrow, then turned off her ringer because Shayla was going to call back immediately anyway. That’s just how Shayla operated. She hid the daggers and the core in her sock drawer, then drank water until the dehydration notification in her HUD went away. Hammy was already asleep on the bed. She’d been planning to shower, but she was so tired. She wriggled under the covers so that Hammy was in his usual spot curled up behind her knees. She felt him snuggle in and within seconds, she was asleep.

  *

  Etta was having a good day. For the first time in her life, her thoughts weren’t important to anyone around her. There were no tutors watching her every movement, no etiquette coach telling her she was being undignified or that she was going to embarrass her mother. There were no servants trying to anticipate her needs. People were just talking to each other like she wasn’t even there. She’d never witnessed anything like it. The Andonthans were an interesting species. They had a set of several crystalline vocal cords that hummed while their mouths shaped their words. When they weren’t making words, they all seemed to be improvising some sort of communal tone. She could feel the tones vibrating in her chest, and she could sense a deeper vibration coming from the ground itself.

  But their beauty changed nothing. Dragons couldn’t exist without magical energy. It extended their lives, it sustained their bodies, and in queens, it allowed the formation of eggs. There was a time when The Homeworld existed in balance with magic. No eggs could be produced unless the magic density reached a threshold, and the more dragons there were consuming magical energies, the fewer eggs could be produced.

  From the first day a wyrmhole dragon had looked into the sky and wondered what she’d find up there, the Galaxy’s fate had been sealed. Dragons were able to harvest magic from other living worlds and use it to sustain their magic and lay more and more clutches.

  In draconic culture, the weak were culled by their betters. Only the strongest Queens were permitted make eggs. Only the strongest males would be permitted to sire those eggs. Only the strong deserved life. The Andonthans would die because they lacked the strength to prevent it. Etta was doing them a service by learning about them. She would carry her memory of them long after their world had been stripped of life-giving magical energy. Long after all that remained of them was the refugees sent to serve on The Homeworld.

  And so she stood among them, listening to them, loving them, and remembering them.

  “It was strange, on the Wyrmcraft,” Bodran said. His voice was such a contrast to the tones around her, but it wasn’t unpleasant. “It was the first time I’d ever been away from Andonth. I’m so used to the harmonies and the tones of the planet itself I don’t even hear it anymore, but when it was gone, the silence was deafening.”

  An Andonthan handed Bodran a package. “This is the last of the items, My Lord,” she said. She formed the words in draconic, but they sounded like music in her voice.

  “Thank you, Oani,” Bodran said. His smile made the little woman giggle - a sound like little crystal bells. She gave a quick bow, and turned back to her friend. They walked away, chatting. They held him in reverence, as they should - he was one of their gods after all. But they didn’t fear him. They seemed to love him. No wonder he was having a hard time with what must be done.

  “Shall we,” Bodran said. He offered Etta his arm. She took it and they walked back toward his Eyre.

  There was a pinprick of pain at Etta’s neck.

  Bodran had betrayed her! As she sank to the ground, she readied a blast of white-hot fire. She intended to do some damage before she went down.

  Just as she was about to release her fireball she saw Bodran fall to the ground beside her.

  She could feel his emotions in her head. His anger dwarfed her own sense of betrayal, but it wasn’t directed at her; it was all pointed at his father. Under that, she felt his fear. Somehow, she’d been recognized, and Bodran was certain his father was going to kill her. Her hold on her magic vanished and her vision went black.

  I had fun writing this one... finally there is some magic happening, and hey, maybe a bit of action is coming next! It could be a thing!

  So I set up a Patreon for this fiction, but ran into a little bit of a problem linking it to Royal Road. The other fiction I write is with a coauthor, and Royal Road doesn't have a way to have different Patreons for 2 fictions under the same account... so this means I'm going to have to be annoying and link to it here.

  There are no advanced chapters yet, but when I get some time where I'm not traveling, that is going to change, but I made a special Hammy tier to reward early support.