The Tale of the Half-Dragon

There weren't always dragons in the Valley. The treaty wouldn't allow it and there was a time—thousands of years' worth of time—when we dragons kept our promises.

But do you even know about the treaty anymore? Do any of you? You race down the mountain towards my lair—are you here on a dare? Because you have something to prove to someone? And have you now decided that your courage isn't up to the challenge? Or are you running from something? Did you seek out my help or were you in such a terrible rush that you forgot every story your people ever told you about not coming here? Or did you come here for me? Did you know I was here? Were you counting on it? Did you come because you wanted to hear my story?

Or have you forgotten all about me?

This valley didn't even exist when we left you. That was how we saw it: we abandoned ungrateful Humanity to the elements. Yet you survived and here, in the Broken Valley, you thrived. Even when other tribes came to conquer you, you dealt with them by retreating into your hidden caves, leaving attackers with the illusion of a Broken City to distract from the cultivated valley beyond. Sometimes, the Choni would stay and ravage your crops and savage the wildlife and burn down the villages for sport, but they never found the caves all your valuables were hidden in with their owners, so they quickly tired and bored and moved on.

And even when we did land, you Barzi of the Broken Valley barely gave us a second thought. If you even believed the accounts of the villages in the Sunlands being scorched, then at the very least you thought it wasn't your problem. No, that was a matter for the Kingdom of Maxillon (what was left of it) and the Ferathi and the Nemethi and, at best, it was something to occupy the White Empire and the Empire of Salt, since you all knew they had each been gunning for the territory. But you had not suspected that once they did subdue us, we would make our way into the mountains, as retreating armies always had, and find this valley.

I remember how frightened you were. Even before anyone here saw us breathe fire, they had heard of it and even if they hadn't, they would have seen our teeth and our talons and the scales that covered all but our wings and they would have known just how helpless they were against us. But fortunately, there were wise folk in the village trained by the Icathi at their academies and they had spread the word that dragons are reasonable creatures. "Dragons are not mutable as we humans are," they preached. "They have a code of ethics and will not harm us if we show them kindness ourselves."

These wise men spoke the truth, as they knew it. Dragons do not have the burden of choice, as a rule. From the moment our egg is laid, it is subjected to rituals and procedures that instill in the nacent subject all the behaviors and ancestral memories we will require to be functioning members of Dragonic society. It was this programming that had kept us on our far continent of Spinosa for more than five thousand years while you forgot all about us, forgot about the Dragon Wars and our promises to you, sometimes even forgot about each other. We found ways around the treaty, of course, designing elves who were like us but looked like you and infiltrated your institutions to bring us back word of what life among humans was like. But we remembered our promise, which was why no dragon left Spinosa in all that time. No true dragon.

Unfortunately, though, sometimes things go wrong. There can be any number of reasons why the etching of a dragon can fail. Talons slip. Distractions set in at just the wrong time. We have been striving for an ideal society for eons, but haven't reached it yet. And the results are Halflings: unformed dragons. Dragons with flaws that make us potential liabilities. Make us dangerous.

We had left Spinosa, almost a hundred of us, across both the Closed and Open Oceans, to Kilshara, to Geldiria and here, to Xanzyra, because we were young and impetuous and we had heard of impetuous youngsters among the humans from our elves and we were looking for a fight. But in our battles in the Sunlands, enough of us had died to show us reason.

So we hammered out a bargain. It is true that we use considerably more resources than the average human does, but there were far fewer of us and we dispersed ourselves all across the Agstli Mountains.

I stayed here, but you obviously knew that part. I assume they still tell the stories of me and oh, how their stories have changed over the years. I do try to correct them, especially when they try to say that I have always been here. Because of course I haven't.

But they never believe me. You have forgotten the time before dragons came to the Agstlis. Your grandsires never even heard of a time before I myself hoarded this ancient mine. Humans. Your memories are so short, I doubt you even remember my true name.

But I know you. I knew who you were before I even saw you round the mountain to climb down the dale. I could smell you for miles. A smell of courage and hope and also of leadership, but oh! how far down deep you have buried that seed! Will it ever taste sunlight?

Come, daughter of the Barzi. You need not fear me. Come into my lair. Drink the wine that my elves have prepared for you. I sculpted your chair myself—sit down. Stretch out your weary bones on the divan you do not remember. Let me tell you a story. And when I am done spinning the tale, wear it like a laurel wreath. Because I am here to tell you who you are.