Anguish

There weren’t always Dragons in valley, but thankfully that was about to change today. Arutoj could hardly control his excitement, as his arduous journey finally neared its end. He had left nearly a month ago with a simple goal in mind. And now, all that was left was to reap the fruits of his labor.

For the hundredth time in the past few days, he turned around to look at the crate he was towing. From the outside it looked like any other cargo crate, suspended a few inches off of the ground, tethered to him with a spell bound to his back. The energy needed to sustain the spell had slowly sapped him off of his strength, but the prize inside was more than worth the deep exhaustion that had begun to settle in his bones. He waved his hand, muttering a soft spell under his breath. The crate grew translucent, letting the tired Jaleen inspect its contents yet again.

Inside were two dragon eggs, sitting safely among scarce straw padding. The deep crimson moonlight shone darkly on them, illuminating them just enough for Arutoj to silently inspect their colorful striations. They were deep red in color, with splotches of green on either end. A band of yellow ran in between the two colors, like a cloak someone ripped and had patched with golden thread and emerald cloth.

Emerscaar eggs can be recognized by their unique coloring.

His heart skipped a beat just like every time he had peered at the eggs. They were certainly the biggest Emerscaar eggs that had ever been found to the best of his knowledge. Emerscaars were the perfect kind to introduce to the valley as the first few dragons in his opinion. They were among the largest of the Iruvitar classification of dragons. Like all others of the same classification, they couldn’t breathe fire, but instead were capable of dispersing an aerosolized poison from their breath. While there was no antidote for their poison, it was hardly dangerous to humans, and was mainly used on smaller prey to induce paralysis.

The specimen that had lain these eggs must have been a good 35, maybe 40 feet long, one of the largest Emerscaars on record. Thankfully the parent was nowhere close to be found, and the olfactory obfuscation spell he had put on the eggs prevented him from being tracked. The sense of smell of Iruvitar dragons was definitely too weak to scent the eggs from a different volcano, but just to be safe, he had travelled through every possible public portal he could. While he had spent nearly a month travelling to the neighboring volcanic peak of Kaitaan, it had only taken him 3 days, and a truly staggering amount of shards, to make the return trip. But that was no matter. Once his eggs hatched, and the dragons within grew mature enough to hunt, the shards their bones would yield would be enough to cover his costs tenfold.

He muttered under his breath once more, turning the crate opaque again. The crate had nearly been too small, since he hadn’t expected to find such large specimens. But fortunately, dragon eggs were notoriously tough, and removing all the additional padding had given him just enough space to fit them inside. Satisfied with the state of his prize for the moment, he turned back around, and continued to climb.

He had left the populous cities of the slopes long behind him, as he made the final climb to the crater that sat at the peak of Ghaar, one of the three populated volcanos in this cluster. Finally cresting the ridge, framed against the deep red moon rising above the opposite side, Arutoj laid eyes on the town he had left a month ago, the town he was going to save.

For decades, Karthage had languished under the “favor” of the other volcanoes nearby, reduced to menial labor and selling the fruits of their lands to earn the shards they needed to keep their community alive. In the ages past, when the town had been established, there were giant mines of Kranthium buried deep in the crater, remnants of a long dead violent past. Back then, they were the masters of the local volcanic cluster. But the mines ran dry nearly two centuries ago, and since that time their town had been reduced to barely a pale shadow of its glorious self. Now their Veenati went out to hunt dragons for the companies on the slopes, bartering their very bodies and souls in exchange for a paltry sum of shards, plucked off of the refuse pile of bones that they laid their lives down to create. Soon he would put an end to their misery.

Arutoj shook his head, he could think about that later, once the eggs were safely in a hatching circle. He turned around to peer at the volcanic peak rising in the distance. Rising far above the volcanoes in his cluster Kaitaan was an oddity. It was one of the few volcanoes in the new world that wasn’t a part of any cluster, it stood alone. Yet, covered with an impenetrable deep jungle, it looked like any of the other uninhabited peaks.

He still couldn’t believe his luck, Kaitaan had been completely overlooked by the Veenati on their everlasting quest to find and hunt dragons. They had just left their claim at its base and then seemingly forgotten about it. He silently wondered why, and then thanked whatever gods had made it so. It just meant that it could be his own little dragon egg paradise. He could go to the peak and find eggs whenever he needed them. The thought made him nearly giddy. Arutoj finally allowed himself to smile, Karthage would be alright.

Just then, the sky was torn asunder by the most ferocious roar he had ever heard. It seemed impossible, but the roar definitely originated from Kaitaan. Later people all over the local cluster would describe the roar as terrifying, but also full of anguish, and unadulterated anger.

As he watched, he spotted the moonlight glint off of something close to the peak. He heard the roar again, this time closer. Much closer already.

His heart started drumming a primal beat of fear as he hurriedly fished out a spellstone of Focus Eyes from his bag and crushed it between his fingers. Immediately the red veil of the night fell away, letting him see further into the distance, as if the sky was illuminated by the suns of the old legends. He turned his gaze towards Kaitaan, and nearly crumbled into a whimpering ball when he saw it.

A gigantic red dragon, nearly invisible in the moonlight, but rendered in sharp relief thanks to his spell, beating its large wings, bearing down straight towards him. It opened its maw again, and let out a bone chilling roar, this time loud enough to shake the windows of every single building on the slopes of Ghaar and her sisters.

It was a Bloodwing, there was no mistaking it. No other dragon grew this large or could roar loud enough to make his bones quake from such a distance. None other had the crest of horns above its eyes, like the crown of the mad god Viceris. Why was there a Bloodwing making its way towards their valley?!

x—x

She beat her mighty wings again, getting ever closer to the faint but unmistakable scent of her children. Her mind was clouded with fear and panic, her great heart thudding rapidly, ringing loud in her ears.

THEY WERE TAKEN!! WHERE ARE THEY?! THERE?? THERE!! THAT CRADLE, THEY ARE THERE!!

She yelled out for them again, knowing they couldn’t respond yet, but uncaring. The terror that tore through her body was familiar, yet long forgotten. It had been a lifetime, tens of thousands of heartbeats since she had felt terror like this. The two-leg-flesh-walkers had killed her mother when she was but a hatchling, and she absolutely would not let them do the same to her children.

She yelled out again, hoping against all hope that they would hear her, and would know she was coming. She was not going to let anything happen to them. She hoped they knew that, wherever they may be.

WHERE ARE YOU?!

x—x

Keena stared at the sky, shaking like a leaf in the wind. The mad scream pierced the sky again, this time much closer. Never in her short life had she felt terror like this before. The kind of terror a mouse must feel as he watches the falcon get ever closer, knowing in the heart of its heart that it could not escape now. It was too late.

She turned to look up at her dad. He wouldn’t be scared right, he was a Veenati after all. But to her shock and horror, he too looked like a trapped rodent. His hands, wrapped around his bow, were shaking so bad that the charms hanging off of the notched wood were making a rhythmic clinking noise.

However, he shook off his reverie much quicker than her. As another scream ripped through the sky, getting ever closer, he grabbed a hold of Keena’s hand, slinging his bow onto his back, and dashed through the forest, heading away from the town, and the screams that seemed to tear open the night sky.

x—x

Arutoj sprinted towards his tower, standing on the overhang of the ledge, looking over the town. The town itself was partially hidden under the overhang, directly underneath the tower. The Jaleen tower was an old remnant of the Karthagian fort, built long before Ghaar had been cleared completely of dragons.

What had happened? There was only one explanation for why a Bloodwing would be coming towards Ghaar, but it wasn’t possible. The eggs he had with him matched every description of an Emerscaar egg. He could not have made a mistake. The color patterns, the gold band, even the ratio of the green to the red. It matched every single description he had researched.

Except size.

With a chilling revelation, Arutoj realized his mistake.

Camouflage. The Emerscaar camouflages its eggs to look like those of the most dangerous predator in the world, and being misinformed as he was, he had grabbed Bloodwing eggs instead. And he was soon about to find out the reason for that fact being missing from all natural sciences books that he had consulted.

As he ran towards his tower, there was a thundering boom nearby. An instant later the very ground shook violently, throwing the Jaleen off of his feet and sending him rolling. The crate followed and stopped by him as he slammed against a tree trunk, his arm snapping with a sickening crunch.

x—x

Keena was dragged to her feet by her father, who had managed to keep his balance. This time he picked her up under his arm and carried her the rest of the way to their destination, an old hunting cave. There, he shoved her inside, rapidly checking to make sure that all the defensive traps were still set.

Wordlessly, he slung his bow off of his shoulders and thrust it into Keena’s hands, ripping her old training bow from her. She tried to protest but the words died in her throat under the intensity of his glare.

“I am going back to help. Kill anything that gets too close, and do not leave until I am back.”

With that, he rushed out, but stopped right before he hit the tree line a few feet away. There, he turned around, and shouted over the wind, “I love you.” Without waiting for Keena’s response, he dashed away, but she yelled after him regardless, “I love you too Papa.”

With him gone, Keena stared at the bow in her hands with tears in her eyes. She had always dreamed of a chance to shoot it, but she never thought it would be under these circumstances.

x—x

Finally alighting on the edge of the cradle, she peered at the town in the clearing underneath her. She remembered others like it from her childhood, when they had invaded her own cradle and her mother had tried to escape with her. But they had caught her in a great net made of light, and in trying to save her child, she had lost her life. Many days she had thought about taking her revenge on the humans, but she had always been too afraid. But not anymore. What they had done to her mother, she wouldn’t let them do to her children as well. She had come so far from her own cradle, and yet she still faced these horrid insects.

She let out another piercing yell, trying in vain to pinpoint the origin of her children’s scent. But for some reason she just couldn’t. She could tell that they were within this cradle, but why couldn’t she find them?!

WHERE ARE THEY?!

x—x

Arutoj finally reached his tower, cradling his broken arm. He dashed up the stairs three at a time, ignoring the paid radiating from his side, his arm, practically his whole body. Reaching the top, he stashed the crate in a corner, removing the suspension spell from it and letting it thud to the floor. The olfactory spell seemed to be holding so far. The spell wasn’t designed to work on Ishvaar Dragons, but in the end, they were all similar enough that it was obscuring them, not letting it pinpoint the eggs.

He rapidly searched through his library as he crushed a spellstone of Numbness to deal with the pain. There was still a chance he could win, he could save the town, and also be the first human in this age to kill a Bloodwing. They were extremely territorial, and there was no chance of another one in a 100kms radius. If he could kill it, it would make their town the richest one in the cluster.

All he needed was the poison of Kandahar, it could stun even an Ishvaar dragon, like the Bloodwing. After what seemed like an age, but was in reality closer to a minute, he found it. A stoppered bottle of a darkly purple liquid. Normally it would coat the tip of a giant crossbow bolt, but the town’s giant crossbow had long since fallen into disrepair. He desperately looked around the tower for anything he could infuse with the poison.

x—x

Keena climber ever higher, her father’s Veenati bow slung over her shoulders. The boom, which must have been the beast landing, had come from the other side of the crater. A beast that large moving nearby would have created more noise, but she hadn’t heard anything. Meaning that it was staying on the other side of the crater. Right where the town, and everything she knew and loved was. She could not hide in a cave waiting for it to end. She had to at least see.

She had to see the Veenati in the town fighting back and driving the beast away. How had it known that their Jaleen was away? It could not be a coincidence that the beast was attacking right now. She prayed fervently to Kartaag, the towns patron deity. Someone, something had to stop it.

x—x

She gripped the edge of the overhang with her talons, peering over the edge, staring straight at the town. Her giant red eyes flitted from building to building, as she drew great big gasps of air, trying in vain to locate her children, and growing more agitated by the second.

She let out another pained yell, the desperation in her voice evident to anyone that was paying attention. But yet, she could not find them, and already she could see the two-legs-flesh-walkers starting to group up and form ranks. Within their ranks she spotted the purple armor of their hunters, the exact kind wore by the ones who killed her mother. They shouted and yelled at each other, clanging their blades against their shields above the din of her yelling and the other insects screaming.

Her pain and anguish were swept away by anger, as she let out a roar of challenge, raising her wings up high. If they wouldn’t yield to warnings, she would burn them all to the ground. She had to find them.

“SORRY CHILDREN, THIS WILL BE SOFT BITE.”

x—x

Arutoj stared straight up, gripping the poisoned dagger, the Bloodwing’s long sinuous neck stretched out over the overhang, as it peered at the town. The Jaleen tower was hidden inside a large volcanic crevice, and as such could not be spotted unless it was to look directly over the top. Even so, the eggs, safe in their crate would be hidden away. The olfactory spell would hold as long as he was nearby.

Thankfully the bright blue lights and loud sounds of the town seemed to have grabbed its attention completely for the moment.

He breathed a prayer to any god that was watching over him at the moment and pulled out a spellstone of Flight. It was one of the costliest spells to cast and would only let him fly for a few minutes at best, but it would be enough to reach its neck. Once there, he was sure he could find a chink in its scales to slip the dagger between. It only needed to hit its bloodstream and would incapacitate it within minutes. 10 minutes at the most, and the Bloodwing would be entirely unable to move, or crucially, unable to breath fire. The Veenati blades could then complete the job and reap the fortune in bone shards that it carried.

He crushed the stone and grunted mightily with the effort as the spell took a hold of him. He flew straight up, making a beeline for its neck. Just then it opened its maw and let out another roar, raising its wings up high.

The Bloodwings often use their wings to give the impression of an even larger size before a battle.

The air whipped his hair around as his ears started to bleed, this close to the Bloodwing’s roar. He winced in pain, both from the spell and the effect of the roar on his body. Yet, he flew upwards, ever closer to it, obscured by the night.

Stage one, aeration

Suddenly, the dragon reared up onto its back legs, throwing its head up and taking large gulps of air. Its chest rose and fell sharply, the screams in the night punctuated by the rush of air entering its mighty lungs.

He flew ever closer, crossing the lip of the overhang, now nearly upon the dragon’s chest. He stared at the overlapping scales covering it, breathing hard himself with the effort of maintaining the flying spell. He turned the dagger around in his hands, the blade merely 7 inches in length, he couldn’t just stab it into its heart, it wouldn’t even make it past the first layer of muscle. The poison needed to be in its bloodstream for at least a few minutes before it would affect it. As he watched, the dragon fell back to all fours, having filled up its lungs to capacity.

Stage two, preliminary ignition

The terror was rising in his chest, as he rose higher. Or was it just bile from his stomach? Before he could decide, the air inside the dragon’s lungs mixed with the large quantities of pressurized methane stored in the dragon’s belly. The methane normally helped the dragons fly without expending much energy, but all Ishvaar Dragons could do what he was about to be the first to witness in this age. The preliminary ignition turned the air mixture inside the dragon into a hot pressurized semi liquid, to which Ishvaar Dragons were all but immune.

Softly at first but growing rapidly brighter the skin on its neck and chest started to glow from holding the inferno inside. The light escaped from around its scales, as the dragon aimed its head towards the very heart of the gathering Veenati forces. They had hastily thrown up their shields, which were designed to hold back the fires from much smaller Ishkaru Dragons, but they might hold the Ishvaar breath at bay as well, at least they hoped. The dappled glow from the dragon’s neck fell across the Jaleen’s face as he dared to smile, the chinks in its armor. He was nearly there, if he could just stab through, it would all be over in minutes.

Stage three, expulsion

The dragon opened its maw and let loose the fire in its heart.

The torrent of flames that poured from its mouth pounded the earth, throwing up chunks of soil where it tore the first foot of the ground apart. The men standing in formation were completely eviscerated, their flimsy shields only prolonging their life by mere seconds. Everything in a 5-foot radius caught ablaze, stone, timber, and flesh alike. It swung its head, cutting through buildings and streets like butter, tearing a wide gaping wound through the town, bisecting it into two halves, leaving behind a trail of softly glowing rock. The meagre Veenati force was gone.

The heat of her breath nearly made the Jaleen’s face burn as he hung in the air, his mouth agape. In mere seconds it had destroyed nearly a tenth of the town. He could not believe what he was seeing. In his utter shock at watching the people he protected die like so many insects, he looked down at his hands and the pathetic little blade he wielded. He let out a manic bark of laughter, a few minutes? Even if he could get the poison into its system, the dragon would kill every single thing in valley in that time, and then peacefully sleep the poison off. Even as he watched, it opened its maw and let loose again.

This time it carved a channel straight through the edges of the town to the center throwing chunks of the earth into the air, slicing through the main street, killing hundreds of his townspeople within seconds. Over and over again she pounded the earth with her flames, tearing open the ground as a dragon would tear into the flesh of carrion. The open wounds on the town’s surface bled with flames. The smell of burning flesh swept up with the heated winds, assaulting his nose.

The flight spell had burned through all of the energy he had and had begun to slowly burn up the very tips of his feet, moving up and consuming the rest of his flesh as the Jaleen plunged down faster and faster, speeding towards his tower at unnatural speeds. If he could get the eggs, if he could only give them back before she managed to destroy the whole town, there was still a chance that some of the people could be saved. He had to save them, it was his duty. He finally got close enough to the tower to cast a summoning spell. The crate with the eggs flew out of the tower, and came to rest right beside him, floating high up in the air. The spell had claimed his legs to his knees already, as he turned around and flew back up, screaming madly, “Here they are, please look, they are here! STOP!”

But the dragon was too far gone in its rage and bloodlust to listen now. Over and over again it strafed his town, his people, with its torrential downpour of flames, much like the Jaleen of old had done to clear the town of its layer of jungle. Only now, the Bloodwing cleared the population of the town that had taken its children.

x—x

Keena stared at the town from the other side of the crater, her eyes wide open, the bow hanging loosely from her fingers. She couldn’t believe what she was seeing.

The town seemed to be a cookhouse fire now, the ground like deeply glowing coals and the remaining buildings just large logs with the flames engulfing them all. There was scarcely an inch left of the town that wasn’t covered in flames, blood or debris thrown up from the ground being plowed through with the force of the Bloodwing’s fire. Even as she watched, the beast took another deep breath, and spewed its hellish torrent again.

Thankfully Keena was too far away to hear the screams, but the winds swept up the smoke, and the stench of burning human flesh to her in waves. Her eyes were watering from the smoke, but not yet tears. Her mind was nearly blank, unable to comprehend what she was witnessing. The complete and utter destruction of her people.

Then, as she gazed at the beast ripping her world into shreds, a bright light lit up directly underneath it’s neck. Shooting up like a meteor, the light could only be one thing, or rather one person.

The Jaleen! He was fighting back! There was still a chance!

A peal of laughter escaped from Keena’s lips as hope leapt back into her heart.

x—x

Arutoj screamed out in pain, specks of blood flying from his mouth. The flare spellstone he had just crumbled set his robes ablaze in shockingly white flames, but he had no other options left. He had to make the dragon see him and the eggs he towed.

The town was nearly gone, the people were almost all dead, and it was all his fault. But he could still set it right. He could still save the remaining people, and maybe, just maybe save the others living on the slopes. His tears were immediately vaporized by the bright searing fire that surrounded him; his flesh completely numbed to the pain for the moment.

Finally, though, it seemed to work. The dragon noticed the bright light shining underneath its neck. It swung its head around to look underneath itself, drawing another great breath.

x—x

She focused her large red eyes on the source of the burning light, but the flames quickly died out to reveal the burned-up husk of a two-legs-flesh-walker. Had it somehow been thrown up from the ground? But how was it flying like she could? This was another one of their mysterious powers, wasn’t it? No matter, it wouldn’t wield it for long.

As she prepared to torch the insect, it muttered under its breath, and the large object flying behind him grew transparent, revealing its contents.

“THERE THEY ARE!!” She chirped happily, her anger forgotten for the moment as waves of relief washed over her. She leaned over and grabbed the eggs, wincing slightly in pain at the splintering box left chunks of wood embedded into her burnt mouth. But she hardly noticed it as she swung her head back and securely tucked her children into their safe place, under the large scales on her back.

When she looked back at the insect who had them, the bright light had faded away, and even with her strong eyes she couldn’t spot it.

“HOW DARE THEY TAKE THEM?!”

She bellowed out in rage and grief, leaping down from her perch on the overhang lip and landing in the middle of the town. By now, it was barely hanging on, engulfed in flames and blood. Despite that, she turned around, and with mighty slashes of her claws and tail, she brought down every single stone tree that was still standing in the town.

“HOW DARE YOU?!”

Roaring and breathing flames, stomping and crashing through the place, she reduced the town to rubble, crushing bone and brick alike beneath her talons. She snapped up the few insects who had managed to escape into the forest, peering through the treeline for every last one of them.

With the town now reduced to a memory, she looked straight down at the ground and let out one final roar. A roar of domination, of a challenge accepted and delivered upon, of vengeance from ages past, and of pain that only a mother could feel.

x—x

Keena kneeled on the ground on all fours, screaming her lungs out at the rocks beneath her, overwhelming grief washing over her. Specks of blood covered her throat, her lips, flying out as she kept screaming.

But she couldn’t hear them. She could feel her screams tearing her insides apart, but she couldn’t hear them over the mad screams of the beast as it tore her home apart.

Eventually her voice died out in her chest, her body having expended all of its strength. She fell to the ground, every single fiber in her body taut with tension and exhausted beyond belief. And yet the beast kept screaming on and on and on, trampling her people underfoot.

After what seemed like hours, she willed herself to her feet, using her father’s bow to support her weight, as the beast finally stopped screaming at its kill. It looked up at the sky, drinking in the scent of the burning thousands that surrounded it, and with a final sigh of a beast having had its fill, it leapt into the air, its wings beating hard. Within a few seconds it was airborne, heading back to the cave it crawled out from.

Keena stared at it leaving, the soft burning glow from the town glinting off of its scales as it made a beeline for the lone volcano standing off into the distance, Kaitaan.

“I’m going to kill you”, Keena fired an arrow into the sky after it, her hoarse voice unheard by anyone that would comprehend it. Then she fell to the ground, unconscious.