Fluffy's Return

The Twin Moons hung low over Moonhaven, their light drenching the cobblestones of Starlit Veil Alley in silver and crimson. Silas carried Stella on his back, her honey-crusted fingers tangled in his shirt, her breath soft against his neck. Liora’s guards trailed them at a distance, their starlit armor clinking like wind chimes in the dark.

“Uncle Si,” Stella mumbled, half-asleep. “Why’s the red moon sad?”

“She’s not sad. She’s just… tired.”

“Like you?”

He didn’t answer.

When he handed her off to Liora’s waiting handmaidens at the Celestria villa, Stella clung to his sleeve. “Promise you’ll teach me skyfall thingy tomorrow.”

“No.”

“*Proooomise*.”

He pried her off. “Go to bed, brat.”

She stuck out her tongue. “Fluffy would’ve said yes!”

The name hit him like a lightning strike.

Silas took the long way back to the café, his boots echoing through empty streets. The alleyways of Moonhaven were never truly silent—whispers lingered in the wind, carried from the Shattered Expanse or the depths of the Midnight Trench. But tonight, the air hummed with something familiar.

A high-pitched trill echoed off the walls, a sound like glass shattering in reverse.

Silas froze.

*No. Not possible.*

The trill came again, closer now. From the shadows of a crumbling archway, two glowing eyes peered out—violet, slit-pupiled, and brimming with mischief.

“Fluffy,” Silas hissed.

The creature slinked into the moonlight, its form shifting. Scales rippled into fur, wings folded into sleek shoulders, and where a dragon the size of a warship once stood, there was now a small black cat with violet-tipped ears and a tail that sparked faintly.

Silas crouched, eye level with the cat. “You’re supposed to be dead.”

*Fluffy*—because of course it was her—butted her head against his knee, purring like a thunderstorm.

He sighed. “You’re a pain in my ass.”

She leapt onto his shoulder, claws pricking through his shirt, and nipped his ear.

Silas shoved Fluffy into the café’s storage room. “Stay. *Stay*. And no transforming.”

She blinked innocently, tail swishing.

“I mean it. You look like a rat.”

By dawn, Fluffy had:

- Knocked over six jars of moonberry jam.

- Terrorized Smudge into hiding under the oven.

- Stolen three static scones.

Elara found Silas scrubbing jam off the ceiling. “Since when do we have a cat?”

“We don’t.”

“She’s on the counter.”

Fluffy sat regally beside the cashbox, licking sparks off her paw.

“*Out*,” Silas growled.

She yawned and ignored Silas comment. He sighed and went back to doing what he was doing.

The entire day she sat near the counter whoever came to pet her she hissed and scared them away.

Once everyone left That night, Nyx slipped into the café long after closing. Shadows clung to her like a second skin, and Smudge—usually her shadow—was cowering beneath a table, his fur puffed into a void-black dandelion.

“What’s wrong with you?” Nyx crouched, scratching his chin.

Smudge hissed at the storage room.

Fluffy sauntered out, tail high, and leapt onto the counter.

Nyx froze. “...Fluffy?”

The cat’s eyes glowed violet.

“You’re supposed to be dead.”

Silas emerged from the kitchen, drying a mug. “Tell her that.”

“She’s a *cat*.”

“She’s a disaster.”

Fluffy sneezed, igniting a napkin.

The next morning, Stella burst into the café, Kael trailing behind. “Papa says there’s a *dragon* here!”

Fluffy, napping in a sunbeam, cracked one eye open.

“That’s a *cat*,” Kael said.

Stella gasped. “A *magic* cat!”

Silas grabbed Fluffy by the scruff. “She’s leaving.”

“Nooooo!” Stella latched onto his leg. “Pleasepleaseplease! I’ll do *all* the money! Forever!”

Fluffy wriggled free, transformed mid-air into a dragon the size of a teacup, and landed on Stella’s head.

The girl squealed. “SHE’S PERFECT!”

Kael paled. “Is that—?”

“Yes,” Silas said.

“*Fluffy*? But she’s—”

“Annoying. I know.”

Squad and their kids:

- **Veyra** brought Ember and Marina, who immediately tried to ride Fluffy. (“She’s a *dragon*, not a donkey!”)

- **Thalia** arrived with Terra and Sylvan, the latter attempting to feed Fluffy illusionary mice.

- **Rurik** and Magnus built a “dragon throne” out of magma rocks, which Fluffy incinerated.

As chaos reigned, the squad gathered around the firepit, passing a bottle of tidal ale.

Nyx smirked. “Remember when *Fluffy* set your beard on fire, Kael?”

Kael rubbed his scarred cheek. “She was the size of a barn. And *you*—” he pointed at Silas “—said she was ‘harmless.’”

Silas grunted. “She was a hatchling.”

**Flashback Interlude:**

*Years ago, during the Eclipse Wars, the squad had stumbled upon a crater in the Shattered Expanse. At its center lay a wounded stormdragon hatchling, her wing mangled and scales dull. Against Veyra’s protests (“It’ll eat us!”), Silas had hauled the creature to camp, feeding it charred meat and dubbing it “Fluffy” to spite Nyx. The dragon had imprinted on him, growing into a tempest of claws and lightning that followed him into battle—until the war’s end, when she vanished into the storms.*

As dusk fell, Fluffy curled around Stella, now asleep on a blanket fort of stolen aprons. The squad lingered, voices low.

Veyra swirled her ale. “Why’s she back, Si?”

“Dunno.”

“The Void Spire’s stirring,” Nyx said. “Coincidence?”

Silas watched Fluffy’s tail twitch. The dragon had always sensed danger before anyone else.

“She stays,” he said.

“And if the Towers find out?” Kael asked.

“Let them try.”

That night, Fluffy padded into Silas’s room, transformed into her dragon form (small enough to fit on the bed), and flopped onto his chest.

“Off,” he muttered.

She purred, shaking the walls.

He didn’t shove her away.