The dawn sun was bright and malicious; as she opened her eyes, Yona was confronted by a roiling cauldron of colours framed by swaying trees. She wouldn’t be cowed, though, not by something she couldn’t lock horns with. Forcing her eyes to remain on the spectacle above, Yona began to assess the sensations that had joined the sunlight in creeping over her body.
Her forelegs were aching, and her spine felt as though she had carried the world on her back while she slept. A taste of iron lingered in her mouth, and a quick probe with her tongue confirmed that at least one of her teeth was loose.
Now fully awake, Yona was also becoming aware of a dull pain blooming across one of her cheeks. It dragged a memory out of the hazy morass of her mind, one that made her lungs tingle. One of Smolder’s horns, all jagged and fierce, had sliced into it after being deflected by Yona’s. The dragon hadn’t waited before trying again, her eyes narrow and lit by determination and exhilaration. Her breath, hot and smokey, had singed Yona’s hair.
Yona grinned. It had been a great evening.
As she returned to playing with her teeth, humming a merry yak melody, Yona became aware of another sensation—a small, dense weight pressed tight against her stomach. Smolder was still asleep, her snores cutting through the morning birdsong. A bruise was forming on her face, darkening the skin beneath her scales, and tiny streams of dried blood were snaking down her arm.
Yona watched her for what felt like hours. When she was young she had often listened to the songs of her kin during ceremonies and festivals; the ones about fighting and smashing things had been easy for her to follow, but some of the others had left her confused.
Until now.
Yona draped a foreleg across Smolder, finding pleasure in making the already minute distance between them even smaller.
After a few moments the dragon stopped snoring.
“Ouch,” she said, without opening her eyes.
“Yona sore too,” Yona conceded. “Smolder wrestles good for a dragon.”
A hissed laugh escaped Smolder’s lips. “And you throw rocks pretty good for a yak.”
Yona laughed too, and immediately regretted it as pain bloomed in her chest. She prodded at a rib and winced, although further investigation confirmed no serious damage had been done. As silence returned to the clearing, a second ache began to join the first. Yona swallowed, wishing that the elders back in Yakyakistan had taught her about this before she had left—about how wrestling created such an ignorant bliss of certainty, and how its aftermath brought with it a terrible absence of resolution.
“Does Smolder regret it?” Yona considered it the mark of a true yak, a fearless warrior, to open herself up to the risk of serious harm to obtain the outcome she sought, but that still didn’t stop her from wanting to stuff her braids into her ears after asking the question.
She had to know, though. She just had to.
“Maybe the whole using rocks part.”
“Yona being serious!”
Smolder opened her eyes and twisted her head around to face Yona. The dragon’s eyes were shimmering in a way Yona had never seen before. They still resembled the forges of Yakyakistan, but now shook and wavered, seemingly unwilling to settle on anything for more than a few seconds. Smolder’s body tensed, and Yona felt her heart do the same.
“Do you?”
Yona was shaking her head before Smolder had even finished speaking. “No. Yona wants to date Smolder.”
The dragon closed her eyes and grinned. “Sounds like we’re dating then.”
She didn’t say anything more, but Yona could feel Smolder’s arms wrap around her a little more tightly, and her tail relax as it coiled around Yona’s. The yak grinned again, before pressing her muzzle into the cool angles of Smolder’s spines and closing her eyes.
canon disagrees with you, now go think about your life choices
9793656
My life choices disagree with canon. I have made peace with this fact.
9793660
don't make peace with your error, fix it
Yona/Smolder is an unusual pairing, it's nice to see an exploration of characters like these.
Also ignore this clown: 9793656
According to them if it's "not canon" it's not okay. That's not how fan fiction works, thankfully. Someone that doesn't understand that basic premise should think about their life choices.
9793672
oh hey, mods
gonna ban me for wrongthink?
9793677 You wish you were worth the effort to ban. No, I'm simply pointing out that you come across like one of those individuals who have a very fixed way of seeing things, literally provide/create/contribute nothing, but feel entitled to share their disregard and contempt for people that don't think the same way under the excuse that "canon" justifies something in a medium that directly contradicts canon by its very existence.
Perhaps rather than being here dispensing your "opinion", you could go back to canon and limit your exposure to dissenting ideas by watching the show and keep contributing nothing.
9793683
i only respect canon when it comes to relationships. everything else is fair game.
and the only thing keeping me from contributing is my crippling fear of failure.
also, spolder best ship, fight me.
9793685 Gladly! But not here, since it's kinda rude to the author. If you really wish to chat, I'm available via PM or Discord, whichever you prefer.
9793660 I look forward to seeing where you take this!
9793688
i'm actually glad we could resolve this in a mostly peaceful fashion.
i'll be needing those discord details btw.
never know if we'll walk away from this as friends...
9793672
Oh well thank you very much! They are two of my favourite characters so figured why the hell not. As you say, this is fan fiction after all. I'll do my best to keep things fun and interesting, and not squander that unusual tag.
9793670
Nah, I'm good thanks.
I will now proceed to use the word "wrongthink" completely unironically. This is what well-adjusted people do. I am very intelligent.
Seriously, I'm gonna take a look at this later. Before I do: Your short description implies a comedic tone, but I don't see the comedy tag anywhere.
Am I wrong in guessing that this will be one of them RomComs that the young folk are always talking about?
9793708
Oh, I'll have to have a look at that again in the morning then, thanks! Short summaries are not my strong point at the best of times, but I definitely don't want to mislead anybody. I mean, it'll have some comedic/offbeat chapters, but I wouldn't want to label it as an out and out comedy.
Romcom, eh? Well it might be? Though I'm now worrying that I'm too old to be writing something as youthful as a romcom. Oh dear.