Lucette is nine and a half years old when the tragedy at Heaven's Edge occurs. 

She's met Daeran Arendae, before, but he mostly lives at his family's estate, and not in the capital, so it's only been in passing. 

Lucette's Mama is at home, when it happens, and when Lucette finds out that the only survivor is a boy only a little more than three years older than her, she begs her Mama to go see him. 

It's an easy enough request to grant. He's been brought back to Nerosyan, for the moment--his family did have a manor in the capital, among other places, and it was deemed the safest place for him at the moment. 

The poor child. Seeing all that death, including...

Well. 

If Lucette seems to be making anything worse, Lavinia can always remove her and not come back, at least not soon. But...if Lucette understands the word pity, Lavinia hasn't seen the evidence of it yet, and she thinks maybe if she were in his shoes, she would want someone who didn't pity her. 

(Lavinia, herself, cannot say that she doesn't pity him. It's an intensely pitiable situation.) 

Lavinia brings Lucette to the Arendae Manor, solicits the young, new-made Count's location from the servants, and proceeds to release her daughter to do as she wills. 

Probably if she needs to interfere there will be screaming. 

(There is a reason Lavinia Wex is only Neutral Good and not Lawful Good, and it isn't anything Hulrun Shappok can pin on her in a court of law.)

Lucette goes to the door of Daeran's bedroom and knocks on the door. 

"Go away!" 

"No!" 

...What. 

He doesn't recognize that voice. Or, maybe it sounds sort of vaguely familiar, but he can't place it. It sounds like someone else his age, thereabouts; probably one of the fairly dull on-their-best-behavior children he met once at a party Mother (ow) was obligated to drag him to. 

Well, they're not on their best behavior now. If they won't go away on their own he'll just wait for someone to remove them. 

Nope she's going to continue pounding on the door for a while.

Uuuuuuugh. 

He pulls a pillow over his head. 

Eventually the pounding stops. 

Thank you.

It is replaced by a soft clicking sound. 

Yes well he can't hear that on account of he's still got a pillow over his head. 

"Hi," says a very obviously half-dragon girl from beside his bed. 

That, he can hear. He whips the pillow off his head, pushing himself up to stare at her. 

(Oh, now he recognizes her. Terendelev's daughter. Hard to mistake, that.)

"How did you get in?" he demads. 

"Picked the lock!" 

"Does your--" what is the correct word here. Terendelev is a female dragon, but "Mother" (ow) would be an ambiguous word, and presumably one of them turned into a man to make her, but he doesn't know which one, and anyway he's not sure if that matters or not, "--does Terendelev know you can do that?" 

"Probably not, why?" 

"Silver dragons are like paladins, and paladins have to be Lawful, and picking locks isn't very Lawful." 

"It's not? How come?" 

"Well--stuff that's behind locks is stuff you're not supposed to get into." Is he in a position to DEFEND rules. What in the abyss is happening. 

"Only sometimes!" 

"Well..." she's not exactly wrong. Demon cultists lock stuff up too, presumably, and there's, like, shackles, if you get--not thinking about getting captured by demons--if you get, like, kidnapped, by ordinary criminal humans or something. But. "You weren't supposed to unlock my door." He is totally defending the rules, and it makes him feel weird and funny and not in a good way. 

"But Mama said I could see you." 

...Asking whether "Mama" means Terendelev or the other one sounds like more engagement with the concept of motherhood than he's emotionally capable of handling right now. He flops back down. 

"Why'd you want to see me, anyway?" he asks suspiciously. 

In response, Lucette half-climbs, half-flaps onto the bed and hugs him.