"Honestly, I couldn't tell you. We don't get many dragons of any type, even the friendlier types. You were big, red, scaly, and winged. And apparently breathe fire, though that one they didn't see. That hits about everything country folk know about dragons."

The other man walks his horse closer. "I'm more well-traveled than anyone in town, and I've only seen two other dragons, one from a mile away. You looked similar enough, like two different breeds of dog."

"I don't know what a dog is." Sigh. "I am happy to crash at the farmhouse not bothering anyone until my people find a way to grab me out of here."

"Cats? Goats? Chickens? Songbirds? In any case, we can get you a meal at the farmhouse. I hold all the sheriff's curiosity for him, so I'd love to hear more about your type of dragon while we eat."

Sam dismounts and gestures toward the farmhouse. Artur turns his horse around, headed back the way the two of them came.

"I know what cats and goats and chickens and songbirds are. What do you wanna know?" Kaylo asks.

"Well, you're clearly not like ours. What do you do with your time? How would someone recognize dragons from your country? Do dragons participate in normal humanoid society there?"

"I go to school, a - normal humanoid school, if that's how you wanna describe it. Dragons from my world come in thirty colors and the colors are different shapes too, different horns and spines and so on, so there's no single way to tell, especially since I don't know what yours look like. It's not a matter of what country we're from, dragons are the same all over the world we live in."

"I think we have a dozen types? I remember gold, silver, bronze, red, green, and black. They're very rare, though, especially in this shell. We mostly only see hatchlings and they usually leave when they hit a century or so. I've heard of them shapeshifting, but not young ones, and if they participate in - let's call it 'non-dragon civilization' - they never let on. Our dragons, even the nice ones, are very secretive."

"They just... leave their babies lying around? We have all those kinds except bronze."

"I think they wait to watch them hatch? But a newly-hatched one is the size of a big goat, as clever as a dumb man, and tougher than a bear; they're not in any danger.

Like, if you'd walked into town in human form last night instead of sleeping out here, everyone would know you weren't Formene but you'd pass for human effortlessly. If our dragons shapeshifted into a human form and walked into a town, they'd have to work very hard to pass for human. They're...not people in the same way humans, dwarves, or even goblins are."

"We don't have goblins. Also Elcenian dragon hatchlings start about two feet long."

"Then yes, it would be bad to leave them to fend for themselves. Um, goblins are short, greenish, mostly thieves and raiders rather than growing or making things for themselves."

"Gotcha. Uh, are people going to panic if I do other magic here? Only some of mine is broken."

"Please don't. Too much power is literally dangerous to the fabric of reality, and our dragons get an exception to that but i have no idea if yours do.

Most forms of power it would be dangerous just to have the capability, and I'm still me so that hasn't happened. But wizards and some scholars are only dangerous when they do magic, so I'd really rather not bet our lives on it."

"You're... still you?"

"So Spark is this thing everyone has, a mix of power and importance to the universe. If you have too big a difference, people around you start to be supporting characters in your story rather than independent people. It's extremely creepy."

"That does sound extremely creepy! I will try not to do anything too important here at least until I know more about that!"

"I am not the guy to explain the details, you'd have to go to the city and ask at the university. If you do need to do magic, stick to the beginner stuff as much as you can; if anything's safe, that will be."

"Okay. Uh, I'm not gonna promise not to fix it if I get seriously injured or something though."

"Oh, that's something i have a good sense of, practical experience. Healing limbs outright isn't doable safely, but fixing disease or blindness, repairing organs, closing wounds, and replacing lost blood is safe if done slowly. Bringing back the dead is never safe here, but most things short of that will be."

"And you're sure that's going to apply to my magic too?"

"Not..completely? But we have a couple different forms of magic and limits are pretty consistent between them."

"I don't expect to lose a limb while I'm crashing in a farmhouse for a week waiting for my teacher to come up with an interworld-castable version of a spell he came up with earlier but if I do I either heal it, let the form bleed to death, or shapeshift, and my third form is a bird. They don't have hands."

"The shapeshifting is definitely fine, you did that while we were here."

"Yes... but they don't have hands. Birds, I mean. I suppose I really don't expect to chop off a leg while I'm crashing in this farmhouse but I'm saying if I do I might fix it."