Fantasy
Temple Wings
There weren’t always dragons in the Valley. I can remember running around with my friends day after day, fighting each other with sticks and rolling around in the dirt. Our mothers would scold us and make us wash up before dinner. We would do it, of course, but we wouldn’t be happy about it. Then one day, from the sun, they dripped with molten sun spots and burned everything in their path. Men in white armor lined with pieces of bright light came from the woods and grabbed everyone they could. The sun burned brighter and moved closer to watch. Those who resisted were slaughtered. My best friend was one of them, and I can still hear her scream. I can hear it now, it echoes through the depths of the mountains as I let out muddled sorrow. The last memory I have of her, on her knees, arms and throat slit as an offering before her body became agonizing fire and then ash. I watch her die all over again. Then my other friends, our other village families. All lined up in the center of the Valley’s main trail, they were cut and they were angry, and they screamed. Every single one. It blocked out the wind until they became it themselves. I screamed with them, but not at the sun, it was at the guard that held me. I squirmed and snapped my teeth, because next was my family. My father, a man hidden behind dirt and grime with the purest of smiles. My mother, a small woman with a heart bigger than her body. My brother, a couple months old but was already determined to gnaw through my finger. None of them were forced to the ground. The last thing I saw on their faces were looks of shock as tendrils of light slithered through the clouds and pulled them up into the sky until they were a memory. The guard tossed me to the ground and sneered down at me.
By Roger Bundridge4 years ago in Fiction
Mandolina's Dragons
There weren’t always dragons in the Valley. This thought keeps reverberating through my brain in time with the slow and steady rhythm of horses’ hooves muffled by mud. We are riding through a light but constant rain over the rough trail to the spring where we meet for the quarterly gathering (three days there, two days at the meeting, and three days back). Our horses are handsome, sturdy, and well-bred, unlike the mangy, bony ponies that the peasants own.
By Kelly Jones4 years ago in Fiction
Fire & Fog
Prologue There weren't always dragons in the Valley. Until I led them to us. The dragons used to keep to themselves. They stayed where they belonged, at the rocky cliffs where earth meets ocean and sky. They built their nests and raised their young at this precipice, hunting in the depths of endless dark water. They laid their eggs when the constellation of Attenu was highest overhead, under the watch of the full moon, marking the end of the season of Rain and the beginning of the season of Fog. Three full moons later, the eggs would hatch and new dragons would be borne into the world.
By Lindsay Rae4 years ago in Fiction
Tudy and the Beast
Tudy and the Beast Chapter 1 There weren’t always dragons in the Valley, I thought to myself as I stood on my tiptoes atop my thin mattress to watch one cavort in the sky outside my high window. Truth be told, if someone had asked me yesterday, I’d have said there weren’t any dragons anywhere to the best of my knowledge. But as I watched this one possessively eye me from outside my barred window, I knew that if I ever got out of here, I’d ensure the world was rid of this solitary specimen if it was the last thing I ever did.
By Dorothy Callahan4 years ago in Fiction
Voice of the Sea
There weren't always dragons in the valley. This was what the watchers knew, and Clandar had heard them tell the stories beside crackling Umari bonfires since before he could walk. The Umari were the "tall people," and everything they made was tall--their houses, their sea-going boats, their churches with soaring rooftops not even they could see the tops of, and their swords which were taller than he was.
By linda rumpf4 years ago in Fiction
The Problem with Dragons
There weren’t always dragons in the Valley. They didn’t exist, not here or anywhere else in the world. We didn’t have unicorns or zephyrs or griffins running around, either. We only had normal animals, like dogs and cats and horses and rabbits, the kind of animals that made sense, that you knew how to deal with, how to control. But that’s all changed now.
By Nikki Bennett4 years ago in Fiction
Ciaran and the Mystery of Mt. Croghan
There weren't always dragons in the Valley, and the Valley wasn’t always a verdant wonder. Instead, the Valley was once filled with lava from the bowels of Mt. Croghan. Mt. Croghan had been the home of dwarves as long as memories and stories had existed. They had of course mined the volcano and surrounding mountains since the beginning of their time there.
By Noah Glenn4 years ago in Fiction
Craven
There weren’t always dragons in the Valley, fantastical beasts didn’t always prowl our forests. Those days are only remembered in children’s songs now. I feel the ground shake beneath my cheek, the ground cool, smelling of earth, sweet grass, and something more; metallic, copper, blood. My eyelids flutter open inviting a scorching pain through my head, I reach to feel for the source, but my arms catch on the rope that has them bound behind my back, along with my legs. The earth shakes again, stronger this time, indicating that the beast is moving closer and I should be moving farther. I don’t remember what happened, how I got here, or why I’m bound.
By Hope Townsend4 years ago in Fiction
From Ember to Ash
There weren't always dragons in the Valley. According to most, there still aren't. They thought they hunted us down—slaughtered us to extinction. Many fell. But, did they think us such simple creatures we would not take measures to ensure the survival of our species?
By Jessie Waddell4 years ago in Fiction
Caretakers Valley
There weren't always dragons in the Valley. Countless moons ago, we lay under the stars recounting heroic stories to the heavens befriending the night.Flashes of that murderous morn, are etched into our memories, as we ran for our lives blinded by the cloud of ash and chaos. The only thing to break through the veil was the smell of searing human flesh.
By Christopher Head4 years ago in Fiction
