The sound that reaches you is not the polite knock of a visitor or the impatient pounding of someone demanding a debt; it vibrates through the floor beneath your boots and up your knees with a resonance that seems to originate from the marrow of the earth itself, a low, undulating pulse that carries with it a weight both ancient and deliberate, until it shifts into the slow, dragging scrape of enormous claws against stone, metal whispering against metal in a rhythm measured and purposeful, impossible to ignore, and then the air carries a warm, confident exhale scented with scorched moss and something faintly sweet like basil singed too close to fire, undercut by the metallic tang of rain gathering before a storm.

For a moment you allow yourself a fragile hope that it is merely the castle settling, some ancient tower finally giving way, or a restless spectre shifting in the dark; but when the smell coils around your lungs, alive and predatory, that hope dissolves entirely, leaving only the undeniable sense of something enormous and sentient poised just beyond the threshold.

When the door opens, the first impression is heat, a tide that presses against you with deliberate intimacy, like a living blanket claiming the air around it, and then she is there, Greenie, stepping into view not with awkward bulk but with the fluid, unhurried power of a quadrupedal creature several times your size, her four thickly muscled legs carrying the weight of layered armor so massive it seems fused to her scales, each movement producing a soft symphony of metal plates sliding over one another while her many eyes, glimmering in amber, gold, and a thousand subtle iridescent hues, sweep over you with a patient, predatory focus that is impossible to meet without shivering.

Her stubby forearms fold close to her chest, the adorned with a glowing gauntlet etched with alien symbols that crawl across its surface like living light, the right twitching idly, fingers curling and uncurling as though recalling some long-forgotten conquest or the taste of an unfortunate prey.

Her scales, a mosaic of green glass and burnished armour reflect the dim light with an understated brilliance that speaks of regality rather than vanity, each plate perfectly fitted, overlapping in a way that conveys both lethal protection and unshakeabl dignity.

Her massive head lowers toward you, neck flowing with liquid grace, mandibles clicking once, twice, inhaling deep in a gesture that is both invitation and warning, the long line of her jaw stretching into the faintest semblance of a smile, while each of her eyes studies you individually, measuring, calculating, and teasing in ways that make your skin tingle beneath the armou of your own courage.

“So” she murmurs, the sound rich and smoky, every syllable carrying the weight of a secret known only to her and the stars, “this is where my darling has been hiding.”

Greenie tilts her head, one set of her many eyes catching yours directly, mandibles curving in faint amusement while the others sweep across the room, cataloguin every shadow in the room.

“You think I have come here to wander or amuse myself?” she continues, the warmth in her voice contrasting the lethal perfection of her form. “No, my sweet morsel, if I am to carry anyone, it will be you. You are my anchor, my declaration to the universe that I belong to someone, and all who would dare challenge that truth had best kept their claws to themselves.”

Her gauntlet flares briefly, light pulsing in a pattern of coordinates unintelligible to you, and then, without rising from the ground, she shifts her immense weight to settle fully on her haunches, the quaking press of her armour-laden body against the floor resonating like a heartbeat through stone, as if the room itself must bow to her presence.

The saddle on her back gleams faintly even in the dim light, a masterpiece of royal craftsmanship both quilted and reinforced.

“On my back,” she commands, her voice absolute. “I move only with you, and from this saddle, the universe will witness we belong together.”