It was raining.

Green eyes flew open, disoriented. Vladlena listened, unmoving, long enough to recognize the soft shushing against stone for what it was, distinguishing the rumble of thunder as distinct from the usual rumbles of the beasts inhabiting the Savitsky sanctuary.  Her feet hit the lush, thick rugs of warm browns, golds, and scarlet reds that carpeted her stone floor, and almost absently she returned the blankets on her bed to their tidy, original positions. The House Elves—the Sanctuary, isolated as it was, was more of a citadel, a castle in its own right carved into the mountainsides, and there were several House Elves who cared for the family and the dragonkeepers who lived in its walls—would have done it for her, but Vladlena disliked laziness.

She crossed the room to the passageway that led outside, slipping through the small stone opening and wrapping her arms around herself to ward off the cold present even in July.  Standing on the stone ledge that served as a balcony, she held herself quietly, and, in her way, unnaturally still as she gazed for miles.

The mountain range in which the Savitsky Dragon Reserve was nestled was a desolate, miserable, wasteland of ice in the winters. The brief summer—a month, maybe more—was the only time Vladlena ever saw it with any green. And the only time it ever rained. Fascinated, she watched the roll of grey clouds puff and fall over themselves, mix and drop the weight of water they bore without visibly appearing to diminish. She could see where the storm ended, an eon away in the distance, but the stone structure behind her blocked any view of its beginning.

As she stood there in the quiet morning, the horizon, looking for all the world like the edge of the Earth from this isolated perch so far away, began a watery, distant dawn that had Vladlena frowning. Rain and darkness aside, she shouldn't have slept so late.

Roars in the distance, disgruntled and displeased. The young witch tilted her head, bringing her gaze from the distance to scan closer, sweeping the valley and crevasses, mountain caves and massive plateaus  directly below that marked  the start of her family's dragon sanctuary. No dragonkeeper alive would dare venture to do much today. Accustomed to dry conditions –even the incessant snow fell from dry skies—they bests would be more irritable than usual today.

Which meant today was a good day to go ahead with her training plan.

For some time, Vladlena had been getting lost in the instincts of the creature whose form she echoed as an animagus. She'd been working all summer on rectifying that—on remaining a more dominant conscious presence, which was necessary for the magic to be of any use to her. It was an imperfection that bothered her in away few other things were. Her rival, she knew, had no such similar problem, and while she would ask him for assistance if it proved by the end of the summer to be necessary, it was a failure she was not ready to admit to. Particularly not to him. A thought flitted through her mind at how something … it was dismissed so perfunctorily she couldn't recall it. No time for that.

She changed quickly, layering against the summer cold, pulling her rain-damp hair back into a harsh bun, and making her way down the silent stone manse and towards the reserve. As she expected, the other dragonkeepers didn't seem to be on the grounds yet. She checked to confirm, and, satisfied they were still abed and inside, stepped forward into the valley.

The change was fast. It was always easy for her to sink into the small shape, infinitely easier than escaping it. It was natural. Smooth. This was a test—a test to see if her work in retaining full control and human thought capacity could withstand a situation where fox instinct would surely dominate.

And then her world was suddenly bigger.

Wind shifted, rain, wet, rustling through soft fur but not touching, nothing wet but paws. Then smells; wet smells, most prominent—musk, large, dangerous, smoky, acrid—PANIC. Ears flattened, body dropped, muscles tight, no movement. Fox instinct, stay away, human thought, not-fear. Not-fear, similar but not. Fox instinct, eat-you-things, stay away, human thought, not-fear. A struggle to express, then clarity. Not fear, just wariness, dragons—muskysmokyacridbigdangerrunbeware—no. Struggle. Clarity.  Be wary of them. Be wary, but smart. Cunning. Cunning the instinct gets, cunning it understands. Fox instinct, play? Human thought is distanced, not-play. Conflict. Clarity. The play instinct is similar—it can be redirected. Move from fear to play-instinct. Use the awareness that comes from fox-fear that isn't human-fear, re-direct as play-instinct. Memories, not real, not memories, feelings, outsmarting.  Clarity. Outsmarting, precisely. Outmaneuvering. Be clever, be quick, be cunning.

Clear, for once. Balance between thought and instinct. Not sharing—sharing implied distinction, power struggle, separate voices fighting to be heard, one losing. Not now. Not all witch animating fox-fur, awkward, unfamiliar. Not all fox, animal, all sounds and smells without filter. Witch/Fox. Fox/Witch. Rock Burrow/Father's House source of two-legger/people sounds. Feet/paws touching ground. Both. Both. Ears swiveled, heard everything, eat-you-things/dragons, scales scraping, wings beating air. Wind in grass, falling rain, echoed howls of storm and summer. Remember this. Remember this. How it feels. One mind. Simultaneous. Balance. Clarity. Success.

Time to test it.

Ground flew under swift feet, tail for balance, fur-lined paws for traction. Smells, sounds, she could hear for what seemed like miles. The chatter of the House Elves inside the burrow/father's house, the dismayed commentary of the two-leggers/dragonkeepers, awake, about the rain. The scamper of little feet underground, prey/lunch/not-lunchohgodnotlunch just rodents. Eat-you-things/dragon smell stronger. Smoke. Seething frustration—not hers, theirs she could smell it. Fox-instinct, run!

No! No! Human thought, hold onto the blend. The balance! Fox-instinct scared human thought play instinct, fox instinct clever butbutbutbutbutno they're just lizards. Logic dictates, a surmountable challenge fox instinct butbutbutbut human thought frustration. She was not afraid of dragons. Never had been.

Clarity.

It sunk in, finally. Smokymuskylargedangerousacridburning—wary. Not afraid. Clever. Cunning. Fun. Challenge.

Human-thought, precisely. Whipping around a boulder, the smell hit hard, and vision was overwhelmed by a scaly tail flying through the air. It hit the ground with a discontent whomping thump, the impact of which had weight dropping, legs bending, paws gripping on shaking rock.

AirwhooshLANDfreeze.

No movement.

Something like mischief—a foreign emotion, unfamiliar—scamper up the tail, up the back, eat-you-thing/dragon notices, surges up, paws/feet grip hard stay on keep scampering, eat-you-thing/dragon shakes, swats, tail coming—leap! Dodge! Missed! Triumph. Higher in the air, grip, hold on. Adrenaline—struggle to stay balanced—ROAR—more adrenaline more feeling more instinct human thought focusfocus, struggle, remember just—

EXPLOSION. Something burned the air, white hot, deafening crack, surface under heaved, eat-you-thing-airborne instinctinstinct jump, hit ground, bolt—just in time, fast enough, jaws snap air immediately behind too close roar echos, rings in ears, deaf for a moment, human thought …. fox instinct move burrow run, clever human thought … too faint, like air through ears. Ground under paws, weaving, dodging, scampering, entrance, two-leggers—

Dragonkeepers.

Human thought back. Remember. Remember. Balance.

--Bozhe moi! What were you doing out there?

That's right. That's right—time to go back to that. Trying to remember.

Your hair like so.
Your skin like so.
Your eyes see like this
Agonizingly so—so hard to focus, so unnatural, like being stretched and stretched and—focus. Focus.
Your arms like this.

Vladlena tried to remember. The shirts and pants were easy—they were like fur and skin, close. But her muddled mind struggled with the shoes and the flow of the robes—unnatural, not close, loose? And then it was too late. She straightened, wholly human, barefoot, shoulders bare and skin damp with rain, Hair no longer in a braid but half-falling out of the structured style, soaked strands blowing into her face as the storm raged and she faced the dragonkeepers who had come out to survey the damage from the lightening strike.

She was off-balance, going from four limbs touching the ground to two, and she swayed slightly forward. But Lena was a graceful creature, and she was correcting the movement even as hands reached to steady her. The contact of the dragon keeper's palms, too warm against her chilled skin, immediately dissolved the lingering confusion. The lithe girl recoiled before composing herself.

--You could have died! What would we have told your mother and father?

Vladlena was trying very hard not to shiver in front of the four men and woman employed at the Sanctuary. She spoke carefully, words forming, smooth and smoky, without any indication of her physical discomfort. "You would have told him precisely what happened." She said simply, holding herself even more still than usual to resist the temptation to wrap her arms around herself as the cold seeped through her wet skin. "Msr. Vladislav and Mdm. Anca would accept my failure on its own merit. It would have no impact on your employment."  Silence followed her words, save for the roars of the dragons and the thundering response of the worsening storm. Vladlena acknowledged the motion of one dragonkeeper, as she put a hand to the man's arm to stop him from saying anything else, recognizing it for what it was but failing to discern the motivation behind it. The girl, several years junior to the people who considered her a peer, looked to each one of them briefly, and then, taking their silence as a sign the discussion was concluded, inclined her head in what could only be considered the barest polite gesture possible. "Pardon, accept my regrets in potentially making your job more difficult today." For the briefest second, a wry smile flashed to her lips and she looked seventeen instead of an old woman staring out of young eyes. "Please inform me if there are any complications—I will attend to them."

Presuming the discussion was closed, she inclined her head ever so slightly once again, and walked past them, inside, to record the failures and successes of the experiment for her professors.