Zabeth Firestone: Firebird

"Zabeth?"

Looking up from the computer screen she'd been glued to for the past several hours, Zabeth blinked at her youngest (comparatively so) adoption. "Yes, Ielta?"

"Zabeth, um."

She waited patiently for the copper-furred dragoness to find her thought again. Four years of having conversations with the schizophrenic young lady led her towards patience whenever her mind wandered in the middle of a thought. She usually found it again, and if she didn't, a gentle prompt was usually good enough.

This time no prompt was necessary. "Zabeth, my brother-- the one I go to lunch with. Boserro."

"Mmmhmm?"

"He's had children."

"I was wondering when you're branch of the family would get to that," Zabeth chuckled gently. "Do you want to go meet them?"

"Oh, I already did. Boserro invited me over the day after they were born!"

"Aaaah. That was kind of him."

"It was. But now he's looking for people to adopt them.... He had a lot."

"A lot?" Zabeth repeated, amused.

"Well, fourteen."

"Their poor mother," Zabeth commented. "And you bring this up because you want to...?"

"Oh, no no no no." Ielta shook her head vigorously. "I'd be a horrible mother. Or aunt. You know me. Crazy?"

"And responsible," Zabeth pointed out.

"But unpredictable," Ielta countered. "Bound to wander off and leave someone who's not really there looking after a child. No, I was wondering if you wanted to adopt one."

Zabeth raised her crest in mild surprise. "Wouldn't that amount to about the same thing?" she said, cocking her head at the youngling. "You do still live with me."

"Well, yes, but then you'd be the one looking after him. Or her. When I didn't." Zabeth forbore to comment that she would do that anyway, no matter who had officially adopted the child. If Ielta had it in her head that Zabeth was the one who had to do the signing and the paperwork, then Zabeth would humor her.

So, she just said mildly, "Is there a particular one I should be looking for?"

"Oh, no," Ielta replied airily, turning away as if she'd lost interest in the conversation. "Just... you know. The dark one."

"The dark one?"

But Ielta had already sauntered into another room, leaving Zabeth wondering what in the world she'd meant by "the dark one". Dark, to Ielta, could mean any number of things-- or nothing at all. Still, the next day-shift, she kept her promise and made her way down to the public bays. She'd looked up which one Boserro and his lady-friend had been sent to for the birthing and raising of the large brood.

Boserro, unsurprisingly, didn't recognize her until she gave her name, and even then did a double-take. Ielta had certainly told him about Zabeth's gender-shifting nature-- or... she would have hoped she would have! Sometimes Ielta left out important things, entirely on accident, but this seemed like something that would be hard for Boserro not to have figured out by now-- but even so, seeing someone who he had first met as a man, with wintery blue flames rather than flickering gold ones, always required the double-take. Zabeth smiled blandly at him, gave his lady-friend all the appropriate praises for her numerous children, then got down to the business of trying to find out which one was the "dark" one.

There was, of course, the black one-- a quiet but amusingly childlike young lady named Uilyni-- but that seemed too simple. There was also a pair of dark reds, differentiated visually by the strip of white along the belly of one and vocally by their very different personalities-- Tifaya was confident and outgoing, while Suyella was much less certain and more likely to back down in an argument. And there was a lovely bronze girl named Thidade who, though not dark exactly, seemed like she would have gotten along well with Ielta. Blue Aetila was certainly pleasant to be around, but she, though not white, wasn't in the least bit dark. If they were going that route, pigmentless Aunodo, the only male in the bunch who asked after Ielta, seemed a wonderful soul, but he was the opposite of dark!

In the end, Zabeth gave up on choosing, herself, and decided that if Ielta had a particular favorite, she could suggest to said favorite who to come away with on her own time. When she returned for the official adoption, she would take home whoever chose her, and be open-minded about it when it occurred. If that wasn't who Ielta was thinking of... so be it.

If, of course, Ielta was thinking of anyone real, at all.