Tara giggled nervously and then clapped a hand to her mouth in shock. Serryah twisted back towards her curiously.

"What was this sound?"

Tara goggled back at the dragon and blushed, "Ah. Human magic? I don't have any magic!"

Serryah sniffed, and Tara's hair danced a bit in the rush of air. "We shall see. For the moment, I should take you to the place of the Last Passage."

Serryah rolled her shoulders and thumped heavily across the rocky expanse towards the steeper slopes and the sparse tree line. Tara stared after her for a moment before realizing she was meant to follow and scrabbling along to catch up. Once she got her breath collected, Tara glanced up at Serryah who was moving with deliberate but focused purpose. "What is the Last Passage, Serryah?"

Serryah's eye rolled over to her Rider briefly before returning to the middle distance. "The Overlay was not...instantaneous. When it happened, I was not the only dragon still on the surface. There were...a few others."

It was a moment before Serryah continued, but Tara only listened. This didn't require any great strength of character -- much of her attention was divided between maintaining enough of a pace to stay abreast of her large friend on the one hand, and not collapsing into a broken mess on the treacharously uncooperative terrain on the other.

"We were all frightened, it is important to understand. This may seem strange to you, to think that I was frightened, but these times were calamitous. We knew we were in grave danger. We knew that our our world was changing drastically. But we did not know whence the danger came, nor what form the change would take. So many among our number had taken refuge beneath, in the ancient caves, that the rest of the surface stalwarts fled below to join them, seeking security and comfort in numbers. I was...not welcomed below. I knew this, and I did not follow. The final exodus from the surface to the caves was clouded in despair. We knew an end was upon us, if not the form. I wached my people slink through the few remaining openings, and then I watched the final moments of the Overlay lock them all beneath the stone. In the end, they were too afraid to run away."

"Serryah..." Tara began cautiously, but she paused when she realized the dragon was no longer walking forward.

"We are here," Serryah said, looking at the ground before them.

Only then did Tara recognize the clearing. The circular patches of gray stone inexplicably precise in their pattern among the grass. The mountain rising behind them. "The symbol of the Elders," she said, in tones of shock and confusion.