Dragon Valley

There weren’t always dragons in the Valley. A curse had been inflicted upon them long ago. A curse that also affected the residents of the Valley. Dragons that tried to enter turned to stone and humans that tried to leave suffered the same fate. Once a human entered the Valley, they were never allowed to leave. The Valley was encircled by statues that taught all the fate the hard way. Only one woman carried the capability of inflicting such a curse. Medusa's anger at the people and dragons of the Valley could not be contained by a simple death or even a simple time period. The statues had surrounded the Valley for centuries, long after her death of seeing that fateful mirror. She got her revenge on him though, he tried to leave the Valley, now a sign hangs on him, tossed from the cursed border, “Savior and victim.” That was only within the first five years of the curse, and it prevailed. Many tried to find other solutions to break the curse, but resources were limited. Medusa’s library was immense and written in languages that were unknown to many. Time passed and generations soon accepted their fate of never leaving the Valley. Signs were posted to warn the weary traveler to not venture on. Most heeded the warning, some ventured too close to the signs. They would take a step across the invisible line only to step back and turn to stone.

Then a rider came to the Valley, mounted on a speckled pegasus. She landed right next to Medusa's dwelling, carved out of a gigantic rock pillar. No one knew who the woman was or what she did once she passed the threshold of it, but as the pegasus carried her off into the sky, the statues started to move. None transformed back into dragon or human of skin and flesh. Instead the earth shook as stone creations searched for explanations and help by migrating towards the area that showed signs of a type of life they once knew.

A dragon flapped its stone wings in hopes to create the lift necessary to take off. He pushed himself off the ground only to crash back to the earth and cause all the aimless statues to fall to the ground. Those closest to the landing, chipped off pieces of their stony exterior or lost pieces that were too frail to sustain the cumbersome fall of statues who had not walked for centuries. Upon closer inspection of the missing stone a skeleton of rough gems in various colors were seen. The dragon’s tail chipped off a slice and revealed an emerald interior. There was no pain and statues recklessly broke off pieces that would have been clothing or decorations. It wasn’t until they chipped far enough on their stone skin that they found more of the gem skeletal structure.

People rushed from their dwellings to escape falling debris from the shaking of the earth only to panic at the sight of statues that now moved. Some wandering aimlessly for answers while others worked to reveal their entire interior.

One man walked to a statue that he had watched turn decades before. His brother was determined to break the curse and reading incantation upon incantation of possible cures in a language he struggled to speak. The brother claimed he felt the curse break. Before the man could stop his brother, he crossed the line and turned to stone some twenty years ago.

“Damian?”

The statue picked up his pace to embrace his brother. He tried to open his mouth to call out, but his mouth was immobile. Still getting used to his stone legs, his feet mistepped and he began to fall forward. Out of panic, Damian’s brother stepped aside to let him fall. His face coming in contact with a stone foot that had broken off its owner. Chipping off a portion of Damian’s cheek to expose an opal interior, he wiggled like a snake to figure out how to get up. His brother rushed to his side to roll him over on his back.

He took Damian’s hand and went to pull him to his feet, but he was not the same weight he was when he was of flesh. He went to his brother’s head and tried to lift him by his shoulders to no avail.

While he struggled to get his brother to his feet, others, flesh and stone, tried to deduce the current twist on the centuries old curse.

Two teenagers rushed to the site of a dragon statue they had admired all their lives and wondered what developed from it. The dragon had moved hundreds of feet from the border to leave the Valley. Without the statues to clarify the boundaries, the teenagers rushed towards the dragon. One stopped just shy of the border noticing the landmarks of boundary. The other took too long to notice the disappearance of his companion. He crossed the border, but did not turn to the stone statue they had seen all their lives. Instead his body transformed instantly into a polished and gleaming sapphire. His gait was not impaired and it took a couple hundred feet to realize the transformation. He turned to look at his friend then down at his hands, unable to open his mouth to scream.