Much as Ellisaria dislikes the intimation of weakness, she dislikes being impaled on a mountainside even more. Her human form is simply more subtle, and thus better suited to evading the gronn.
Unfortunately, it is also conveniently sized to be eaten in one gulp by the mirror-faced snake (what) that comes out of literally nowhere.
At least she is alive to be indignant, even if she's no longer in Outland.
"I can't hover for more than a few minutes, but I can glide in a pretty tight circle for a few hours high up. I'll be fine."
Then back to the mountain.
Ellisaria will close the final distance in her mortal form. She wants to see how close she can get.
Nothing disrupts her approach to the gate.
Except the feeling of something waiting. Watching.
There's an answering roar. The mountain keeps shaking.
And, thundering from within: "Who dares wake me!"
She knocks at the gate again, and this time the mountain grows still at her touch.
A roar, and the gate wrenches open.
Smaug looms within, eyes glowing.
"Who are you?"
He just laughs.
"Is that so, little girl? Though I wonder - are you ashamed to be a dragon, that you take such a pathetic form?"
Ellisaria laughs.
"You would speak to me of shame, child? You, who corrupts the land and thinks this a mark of strength, who burns a single village and thinks himself a terror? You, who nests among trinkets like a common jackdaw? I have raised mountains and parted seas, battled demonic armies and spoken with Aspects. I have tasted the void between stars. And I have not failed my stewardship. I am not ashamed to be a dragon, but you and I are not of the same breed."
He growls, low in his chest, a golden glow building beneath his scales, setting the armor he wears on his belly into stark relief - and the tiny clear patch on one breast.
"Yet you dare not face me as a dragon - nor alone! You smell of a whelp - has some pathetic little dragon claimed to be your ally? Has she promised you riches, if only you overthrew me?"
She smirks.
"That you presume yourself worthy of such consideration is yet further proof of your fundamental... inadequacy. Step outside, o Smaug, and show me a single reason I should treat you as more than a spoilt brat, fearful his mother has come to make him return his stolen toys."
He snorts, but still the growl in his chest continues to rumble, and still his eyes narrow in anger. "You dare not face me here?"
"You step out of my power, not yours, child. Did I wish it, the peak of this mountain would meet the plain once more, and you and all your precious gold would be reclaimed by the earth, til the original delvers of these halls came to build them anew."
It is deflected by a wall of rock that rises in front of her. She siphons off the last few flickers and sets them to dancing around her person as the shield slides back.
"I fear I have greatly overestimated your intelligence, if you thought that such a thing would achieve any effect."
The fire seems to have been a screen for a lunge, teeth snapping at her just as her shield falls.
Tsk. Poor dental hygiene.
Still, it seems like the time for talk is over, so she blinks backwards a bit, away from the mountain gate.
She begins weaving a lightning spell, sparks playing around her fingers, intending to drive it at the gap in his chest when he gets just a little closer.
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