"When!"

And into the air leaps a shiny gold dragon!

He circles the city once but it's still a really short flight. He comes in for a landing over a pond in a park and winds up neatly on the shore.

"I'm not gonna be able to do that in urban areas in a hundred years," he comments. "But it's fun."

"That was awesome," she cackles, climbing down.

"I'm glad you had fun." He shifts, offers her an arm.

She takes it. "You're very charming, you know that?"

"Aw, thanks! I try."

"You succeed!"

He pats her arm. "Spicy or not-spicy?"

"Ooh, let's go with spicy."

"Flatbread stand it is." And they find a flatbread stand, which sells hot flatbreads stuffed with things and slathered in spicy sauce, rolled up in paper.

She has to let go of him to eat her spicy flatbreads but they are good spicy flatbreads so she doesn't mind much.

Yummy spicy flatbreads. And when they have finished their spicy flatbreads: theater!

Wintergarden is danced through, with heavy musical overlay. The costuming is great. The narrative arc is not super sophisticated but it maybe involves this one dancer getting lost from her (friends? siblings?) and then finding them again???

Anlei is confused but delighted. She solicits cultural translation from Aurin and has a good time.

"It's just kind of a sparse plotline, honestly, I can't tell you much," he says during intermission. "Unless it's all gonna pull together in the last scene but so far I think it's more 'concept album on stage' than 'story'."

"What's a concept album?"

"Somebody records a bunch of songs that are all around a theme and releases 'em together."

"Records, like...? Is this a nifty otherworldly magic thing?"

"Yeah! You magic 'em onto a crystal somehow. I don't know the technical side."

"Otherworldly magic is so great!"

"Yours can't do that stuff?"

"I guess you could probably make an artifact that played music but it'd take, like, months, with normal magic. And I don't even know how you'd try to make an artifact with the explodey kind."

"Well, I'm sure it's good for some stuff."

"Oh, I like my magic! I built my house with it! But yours seems like it's way more convenient overall."

"I don't practice it m'self but I've got an aunt and a cousin who're wizards."

"Cool! Maybe I'll pester them if I want to learn about technical magic details, are they pesterable types? I'd feel bad asking the accidental kidnappers a million questions, they like, owe me, I don't wanna lean on that too much."