The Dragoness

As you walk forward, passing by the wall of steam, and approach the crack in the floor where the lava flows sluggishly by far below, the deep sniffing stops. It's definitely just on the other side of that lava pool. You can hear something scraping across the floor in the darkness.

Standing now at the edge of the crevasse you might catch a glint of firelight reflecting off one, or a few, ten foot long claws. If you happen to look up you may catch the glint of a pair of golden eyes looking down back at you from high above. They blink once, their dim shine disappearing for a moment then reappearing again. A mouth opens up a bit, enough for the firelight to catch on the white, sharp teeth inside as a lowered voice speaks. Muffled echoes bounce of the far walls.

"Greetings. Be welcome to my lair. What brings you here, wakening me from my nap?"

The voice sounds deep yet somewhat feminine. The flash of teeth are gone but the golden reflection of the eyes moves closer, lowering as it does, until a wedged shaped head the size of a small cottage reveals itself in the light of the lava below. The ruddy glow illuminates a deep red velvet-like hide, golden dual pupiled eyes over rounded cheekbones and a snout. A lock of her red-gold mane falls between the dragoness's eye ridges and down the side of her snout as she examines you from a distance with her eyes and the soft snuffles of her nose.