"But how did you two meet?" asked Serali.

"It was actually more than a hundred years after Atlantis fell, long enough that humans were already forgetting. We happened to be in the same city. Of course people always noticed my appearance. Silver hair and purple eyes are hardly common. Some fellow told me that he'd seen a man that looked like me in the market that day. I was half curious and half scared silly. Humans might be beginning to forget Atlantis, but my mother's scare stories were still quite fresh in my mind. I'd never seen an Atlantean, and I was curious, but to meet someone who had terrified my mother so much was a horrible thought. At last my curiosity outweighed my fear and I went looking for him."

"Meanwhile," said Janus, "I'd been hearing things about a silver-haired girl and having similar thoughts, except that I knew what an Atlantean was like. So I decided to avoid this stranger at all costs."

Ariel grinned. "I had a hard time finding him, that's the truth. But he'd been living with elves too long. He didn't know the first thing about cities. I'd been a city girl for many years. So I managed to track him down. Sometimes I wonder why I put so much effort into hunting up somebody I was half terrified of, but I just couldn't let it go. When we both came face to face, I'm not sure who was the more scared. But it only took me a moment to notice that poor Janus was scared too. Surely an awful Atlantean wouldn't be terrified of me? So I introduced myself like a civilized being."

Janus shrugged his shoulders. "I was still a bit suspicious. Atlanteans were capable of all kind of tricks. But I knew that I was different, so I hoped that Ariel might be too. It took us both a long time to get used to each other, me more so than her I think. But we were both so curious we couldn't keep apart."

"Both of us were just there temporarily," explained Ariel, "so it wasn't long before we parted. But we kept meeting each other in the oddest places. Atlanteans are like dragons in that they live forever if nothing kills them, so neither of us was in any rush. Sometimes it was centuries between meetings."

The mention of time gave Serali a sudden realization. "Wait a minute. Earlier didn't you say that Atlantis fell during the age of Might? But that was something like two thousand years ago!"

"Yes, it was. Ariel and I have been around at least that long."

"I can hardly imagine that much time!"

Janus smiled. "Well, you may someday live out a longer span than that."

Serali shook her head. "I suppose I might, but right now that much time is hard to even imagine."

Ariel laughed again, that warm, silvery sound. "One year passes much like another does, no matter how many of them you pile up, really."

Something about the sound of that laugh seemed almost familiar to Serali. Serali couldn't place it, she certainly had never seen Ariel before, but the nagging familiarity refused to leave.

"Ariel, I know it's insane, but there's something vaguely familiar about you, and I can't place it."

Ariel looked rather startled. "You have a better ear than I thought," she said enigmatically, but suddenly it triggered Serali's memory.

"Ear, of course! I've heard your voice before. I heard... you singing! You were the silver dragon at the dragon's moot, the one that tried to sing out."

Ariel nodded. "Yes. I love the dragons. I've seen what Skrissish is doing to them and I don't like it. I've tried to do what I can, but he has gathered a great deal of power, so there isn't much I can do. I didn't actually think I'd succeed, but I wanted to remind some of the dragons what they are, what they should be. They are starting to forget, and what will happen if they do could be very bad. I wish I could do more to stop it, but if I tried to upset the way things are done now, he'd probably kill me. I was risking a great deal just to try and change the song."

Remembering the way that he's slain the brass dragon, Serali didn't doubt for a moment that Skrissish was capable of killing, but, "Ariel, I did change the song, and he didn't do anything worse than glare at me."

"You're different. For one thing I'm a fake and all the dragons know it. They tolerate me well enough, but I'm not really one of them. They know I'm more or less a human, and it's not considered a crime among dragons to kill a human, any more than it's a crime among humans to kill a dragon."

Serali sighed at that. She couldn't help but feel that it ought to be! But there was nothing she could do about it.

"It's more than that though," Ariel continued. "You're a royal gold. They have an immense amount of respect for you, and Skrissish could never kill you openly. You belong with the dragons, and they know it."

"I don't really feel that I belong. Not here, not with the dragons, and not back home."

"I know what it's like to be an outsider Serali, but there isn't anything I can do about it. You'll have to fight that battle yourself." She glanced at Janus and smiled enigmatically. "And if I'm any judge of things you may well someday manage to do more to fight it than anyone else."

Serali was a little puzzled, but she smiled. "I suppose compared to you I don't have much to worry about. I've one set of parents who loved me very much, and though I never met my dragon parents, I suspect they cared for me too."

"Yes you're very fortunate, in more ways than one."