{{Please, please, don't scream again! That territorial lunatic will hear you!}} the voice pleads.
The curiously human, horrified expression on the monster's muzzle, though, is really what brings you up short. The dragon's muzzle is really akin to that of a cat in structure, with large, forward-set eyes, but the muzzle is elongated like that of a horse. Unlike a reptile, its face is quite expressive in spite of being covered in scales the color of kyanite. No, the expression is not quite human, but the expression is sort of like that of a cat that anticipates something unpleasant about to happen; it nevertheless powerfully conveys sentience and feeling, very much unlike the empty-eyed visage from your nightmare. {{It's speaking to me}} you realize.
The dragon's face looks quite frustrated and also sort of petulant. {{And stop that}} the voice snaps. {{Stop talking about me like I'm not listening. I hate when adults do that. You're just as bad as a dumb conservative elder, head stuck in the Warring Tribes Period, that thinks us whelps are unthinking beasts just because we're a fourth their size, and I'm tired of it}}. It draws itself up pompously and begins a tirade: {{Everyone knows that whelps are TOTALLY sapient by age eight. It's an arcanological FACT established by Eldest Bent-tail, Son of Long-nose, in Year 5018 after the destruction of the Second Citadel. If they didn't want us to know it, then they shouldn't teach it in lectures on History of Arcana. I swear, when I'm old enough to sit on the council, there's going to be a law--}}
{{A talking dragon!}} you realize, excitedly. {{It really meant to help me}}. You try speaking again, only getting growling, rumbling sounds that sound almost, but not quite, as much unlike speech as you could conceive of being possible, although it's not like the rock-crushing screams you were emitting earlier. What you had in mind to say was something like, "Hey, you! Are you really speaking to me?"
It backs away a pace and waves a paw in front of its muzzle, looking like it is going to gag. {{Now, that is some seriously funky breath. I think you have some stems in there that are decomposing. That turns into gingivitis. Didn't your mother teach you how to use your tongue to clean between your teeth?}}
{{I can't win}} you moan in your thoughts. {{It gets mad when I try to speak, and this conversation seems all one-sided. How am I supposed to speak?}}.
{{By focusing your thoughts like everybody else, and by the way, it's respectful to cloak your self-talk instead of broadcasting it for everybody. Have you no manners?}}
You try thinking in a focused manner, then. {{Like this?}} you ask timidly.
{{You're still broadcasting}}, it says, {{and if that territorial wacko flies into range, he's going to hear you chattering and come try to pick a fight. He's sent whelps home with wing-fractures before, and the elders won't do anything about it. You're in no condition to fight, and you're a fourth his size. Focus on ME. Make a picture of ME in your thoughts, and say something}}.
You try closing your eyes this time and forming a picture of the creature's face in your mind, and you try again. {{Better?}} you ask.
{{Much}} it replies, sighing with relief. {{Now, are you going to tell me how you managed to get into that cave and then get your fire-bladder so bloated you couldn't get out without burning off your whole load? And how did you manage to get larger? I thought you were some hapless eight year old whelp that got lost, somehow, but you look look like a whelp of sixteen}}.
{{Whelp? I'm a human, not a...a...whatever that is that you said!}} you think at him, perplexed.
{{Have you taken a look at yourself lately?}} it inquires wryly.
With some trepidation, you turn over on your side, and you look down at yourself. You think for a second that you are seeing another monster except this one a green tourmaline color, but as you try wriggling your toes, you see the see the monster toes move. You also see a tail tucked between your feet, and you try grabbing it between your toes to see if you can feel it as your own. It feels...sort of like the tail-bone at the end of your spine, only every vertebrae feels like that, and it gives you a giddy, dizzy sort of feeling to play with it, which causes it to flick itself away reflexively as it responds to your agitation.
You hear a giggling in your head, and you hear the dragon chortling. {{You're so silly!}} it giggles at you. {{Save playing with your tail like that for private! It's so undignified!}}
That causes you to blush hotly, which feels all the hotter with the heat being trapped by your fire-proof scales. {{Well...}} you think, {{I mean, I'm a guy...and you're a guy...}}
{{Umm...}}