Adult Spike is trying to work out exactly how dragon magic works, and after he expresses frustration at not being able to use the only text ever written on the subject, King Thorax, his boyfriend decides to find it for him.

The journey takes him to the Crystal Empire, where the author once lived, but finding secrets from before Sombra's Reign is not easy, as memory and trauma obscure everything.

Written for the 2022 M/M Shipping Contest, it ended up a bit less shippy than I'd hoped, but hey, I wrote something!