The lead male, a large green, looked at his mate. Thrintar wished she had waited with the others; in her condition, she would be vulnerable if it came down to fighting. But she had insisted. Mylvara didn't want to wait any longer than she had to, and she was convinced they would be welcome. While Thrintar didn't share the cream female's conviction, he hoped she was right. He nuzzled her neck briefly, making sure she had managed the trip without overly tiring herself, then approached one of the others.
"Melinar, would you go find something for us to eat? It doesn't need to be huge, but try to keep it quiet. I don't want to give away our location in the night. Take one of the others with you; if you can catch two, we'll have breakfast, too." The second green male nodded, and gestured to the final male, a purple.
"Khellendar, come with me. We'll bring back plenty." The two males headed into the forest, while Thrintar turned back to his mate and the other member of their group, this one a blue female.
"Kinlara, keep watch here, I'm going to check the area, and make sure this place is reasonably defensible. I don't want any nasty surprises in the early hours. And remember, no thought-speech. It'll give away our location. That male has incredible hearing." He nuzzled Mylvara once more and strode off.
The cream laughed lightly. "He worries about me far too much. But I suppose that's to be expected from someone who loves you. I just wish he'd realize I'm not as helpless as he thinks. Just because I'm egg-heavy, doesn't mean I can't defend myself if I need to."
"I think his point is that you shouldn't need to. If you had stayed with the others, there'd be no risk for you if we turn out to be unwelcome." Although she had tried to be as different as possible, she still understood her brother pretty well.
"I know, but I think we'll be welcome, and more so, if one of us is an expecting female. You know as well as I do, that there aren't many of us left here. In the past few years, we've only heard the two. I don't know what happened to the others, but I'm sure the ones who are left will welcome us," Mylvara responded with conviction.
"I know how you feel, but what happens if they blame us for not coming back sooner. That maybe if we had come back sooner, then whatever happened to the others may have been prevented." Kinlara would have continued, but the cream stopped her.
"There's no way we could have come before whatever happened. We only never reached the goal we were aiming for. Even now, we're less than half way to the goals our predecessors set. The atmosphere on the moon, while liveable, was not sufficient to build our numbers the way they hoped it would. By the time the elders decided that the experiment couldn't succeed the way it was meant to, and we needed to come back to the planet, whatever catastrophe killed all but two dragons had already happened. So they wanted to wait, this time to make sure it was even safe for dragons to to return to the surface. So we studied anything we heard, I think someone was even sent to the surface at one point, extremely secretly, to find out what they could. It appeared that all the bugs had finally been wiped out. So the elders decided to send a delegation to the only remaining dragons to confirm that it is safe to come back." Although, she didn't appear to be done with her argument, she did seem to be out of words, so Kinlara spoke up again.
Or would have, had Thrintar not returned at exactly that moment. "Everything looks safe enough. We should be able to sleep soundly here for tonight. Then, if you insist, my dear, we will go and talk to this Storm you keep hearing. Are you sure that's his name? That's not a normal Malnevian male name." This had puzzled the green for some time, but he had never thought about it long enough to ask anyone about it before.
"I don't think it's his real name. I just know that's what he's had others call him." This puzzled her a little too, but she decided just to ask him when they met him.
A few moments later, the two younger males returned, each carrying a medium-sized deer. "Have no fear, we have brought sustenance to our poor, starving companions," Khellendar announced with a flourish, as they entered the clearing. Melinar just shook his head at his friend, who was well known for his overdramatic tendencies. He laid his catch in front of his cousin, saying, "Here you go. You need plenty of food, so that you lay a strong healthy clutch. If you don't want all of it, we'll cache it for tomorrow."
Mylvara watched her cousin head back to the other deer, and take a haunch. He had probably caught both deer; he was a better hunter than his friend. She ate about half her deer, before setting it aside. While not full, she knew she wouldn't sleep well if she ate the whole thing in one sitting. After he finished his meal, Melinar got back up and took the remaining half of Mylvara's meal, and placed it up a tree, where nothing except possibly a large cat could get it.
The three males and the blue female settled on a watch rotation, with Khellendar taking the first watch, followed by Kinlara, then Thrintar, and finally Melinar. The purple male took his post, and the others went to sleep. Thrintar curled next to his mate, and Melinar and Kinlara near each other, but not touching. She had a suitor back at their temporary home, and the young green didn't want to seem like he was interested; he knew the male that was courting her and he was a very jealous dragon.
The night passed quietly, with nothing more than normal night sounds. Melinar was yawning at his post when the others woke the next morning.