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[Kayliana]

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Edited May 8, 2019 by Kayliana

[Grum]

This part of the story should have had Kayliana flying into a couple of trees and brick walls a couple of times, but I decided to be kind :twisted:

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While the wind soared past his wings, Grum realized he was starting to enjoy flying high up in the air. The first few times had been a bit uncomfortable, but with the combat training he had received from Kayliana yesterday, he had now gotten used to using his dragon wings. As his Empress had predicted, the sore feeling in his shoulders had disappeared completely over the night. Within minutes they had left the island behind them, and now they were flying over the sea, but in a different direction than the one they had come from before.

 

Kayliana flew swiftly in front of him, as if in a hurry. Realizing that the throbbing feeling was still located in his forehead, he knew they were flying in the correct direction. After what must have been an hour of flying they reached land again. Kayliana turned her head towards him.

 

"Normally I would not fly over populated areas. Not yet, at least. But now we have no choice, for we must find our brother before man does. Yet I do not wish to draw too much attention, so we shall avoid to fly over towns and villages."

 

Grum nodded, he clearly remembered what had happened to them in Corren. They flew over lands he had not seen as a human before, only in distant dragon memories. With every stroke of his wings the feeling in his head got stronger. After another hour, he heard Kayliana sighing in a relieved way.

 

"What is it, Kayliana, is everything all right?"

 

"I think it is. If my guess is correct, our new brother is with the elves in the Tirnwood region. Even though they probably haven't seen a dragon for centuries there, the elders will probably remember, and know how to treat him with the respect he deserves."

 

The morning had halfway passed when they reached a forrest area, with giant trees towering hundreds of meters up in the air. Even with his top view from the skies, Grum was impressed with the monumental forrest. Kayliana lowered her speed a bit, and Grum followed suit.

 

"We are there, Grum. This is Tirnwood Vale, one of the homes and shelters of the elven race. This place is overall quiet and peaceful, the last succesful invasion was by orcs some two hundred years ago."

 

She let out a bitter laugh.

 

"You can see the world was in quite a bit of turmoil at the time. Anyway, we must find a place to land here. I am sure the elves have seen us already."

 

Doing a few more circles above the tress, they found an open place where already a number of people had gathered. As the dragons lowered their altitude, Grum could hear the excited voices from the ground. They glided to the ground, and as soon as her claws touched the ground, Kayliana folded up her wings in a majestic manner, and threw her head high up. Then she seemed to just wait in silence for a while. Just as Grum was starting to lose his patience, and wanted to ask Kayliana what to do next, he saw a group of elves coming towards them. In the middle of the group walked and age-old man with a staff. When the group was near enough, the man sent the other people in the group back to the other elves. Then he turned to Kayliana, and bowed to her. He greeted her with a surprisingly clear voice.

 

"Be welcome, Mighty Black One, to our humble home in the woods. It is an honour and a surprising pleasure to see the dragons return to the world they belong to. You had been gone for such a long time, that the younger started to think you never existed. You must be Kayliana, for the stories tell of only one Black Dragon after Kshirtan, blessed be his memory."

 

Kayliana bowed her head a little.

 

"Thank you for your kind words, Elkira, and it is a great pleasure to be here.

 

"I see you have brought company with you, may I ask who he is?"

 

"This is Grum, the Brown, one who has awakened not too long ago. Yet he has mastered to become a good friend of mine in the few days since we have met."

 

Grum bowed in the way he had seen Kayliana do it, only a little deeper. He hoped this was good enough as to not offend the elves, for he knew nothing of their customs. Apparently it was, because Elkira smiled to him."

 

"We extend our welcome to you, dragon friend Grum." He then directed his words to Kayliana again. "What brings you to these forrests, Kayliana Empress?"

[ivanowitch]

The next day, Ivanowitch woke up as usual, ate some breakfast and went to his magic teachers home for his daily lesson. While he walked there, he noticed a lot of unusual activity in the city, and everyone seemed to be preparing something big. He didn't stop to ask what was going on, but decided to ask his teacher instead, since he was one of the wisest and oldest among the elves.

 

But at the time he reaced his teachers home, he found it empty. At first, this seemed a bit strange, since they always trained magic at this time of the day, but then he decided to look for him at the preparations.

He did find him there, and he asked him, what there was going on? His teacher only answered: Dragons! The dragons has finally returned!

This filled Ivanowitch with great fear. Were they under attack by dragons? But then he realised, that IF they were under attack, people would probably not look as happy as they did, so his fear dissapeared.

An hour later, the dragons appeared, and the crowd was ready to welcome them. Ivanowitch was in the front row, since he had never even heard about creatures like dragons and was therefore wery curious.

The dragons landed, and a small group of elves walked forward. Then the leader of the group sent his followers back, and started to talk to the black dragon. Ivanowitch looked at the elf. It was his magic teacher.

 

Elkira and the black dragon, who were called Kayliana spoke a little, and then Elkira asked the same question as Ivanowitch were asking himself, why was the dragons here?

 

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I guess it's all up to you now Kayliana

[Grum]

Sorry for slow updates, I'm also trying to make a short story for el.net

 

EDIT: hence, please don't mess around with the events before the fall of Tiral too much, since I've already written part of that story, and I don't want to change too much

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Grum was fascinated by the sight of the Ivanowitch's experience, during his own awakening he had not known it was such a grand event. Also the elves seemed very impressed, especially the younger ones. Elkira approached them with a smile on his face.

 

"Welcome, Ivanowitch the Green. It has been too long since a dragon has associated itself with someone we consider one of us. I am very pleased to see the Dragons growing in number and strength again. Tonight we shall have a banquet, as we did in the old days, to celebrate this memorable event. May I invite the honorable Dragons to my house to discuss the events that lead to your disappearance, and perhaps your future plans?"

 

On behalf of the three Dragons, Kayliana accepted his offer, and they followed Elkira to a house that was located in a giant hollow tree. Elkira offered them all a cup of mead, and once they were seated he opened the conversation.

 

"Hail Empress Kayliana, we were afraid the Dragons had left this world forever. For so long we have heard nothing of you after the fall of Tiral. Too many lives were spilled in that massacre, elven as well as Dragon. We had heard rumours of precautions made by you after Garn's prophecy, but we did not know if they had been successful. I am glad that the line of Black has survived to gather the Dragons again under the green and white crest."

 

Kayliana smiled.

 

"Aye, Elkira, we had taken precautions, with the help of the grand magicians of Elendof. A number of Dragons volunteered at the time to bind their essence to silver statuettes, as the one you saw today. We have hidden the sculptures across the known worlds, to make sure that at least one would survive. The locations of the statuettes have been noted, and stored in the Great Library. Little did we know that it was exactly the scrolls from the Library that the Betrayer was after. We must find our brethren, before the humans can decipher our writings. They have been partially succesful already, for I have heard that the Betrayer is still alive, which means he must have been able to extend his life to an unnatural length. We must move on as soon as possible, but tonight we shall celebrate the finding of Ivanowitch. We will leave tomorrow, as soon as dawn breaks."

[Pocal]

*It was mid-afternoon in Kamara Desert. The day was cloudless and hot, as per normal for Kamara. There was the usual crowd outside of Grim, the local storage manager. He was taking items frm some and giving items to others. One person waiting was a dwarf with a load of iron bars to be deposited for future use. Just as he was about to hand over the bars to Grm, his hands started to uncontrollably shake. Grim looked at him oddly.*

 

"Boy, are you okay? That doesn't seem normal to me, ' Grim remarked. he was unused to seeing people suddenly start shaking, especially in hot weather. Maybe in cold weather, but not in the heat of the desert.

 

'I don't know Grim. It's been happening increasingly more often. I'm getting scared myself. i have no idea what's going on I've ruined batches of iron bars because of it. It feels like something's stirring inside me, but I can't explain it.

 

*Grim looked startled, but took the iron bars the same from Pocal. He knew the lad as much as could be expected in his line of work, and he was scared to for the fellow dwarf.*

[Arafin]

Ouch....I will try to catch up tomorrow morning.

[Kayliana]

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Edited May 8, 2019 by Kayliana

[Grum]

"...Desert Pines..."

 

Grum's heart jumped up. Back to Desert Pines, perhaps to Corren, his home town, or the caves where he had spent so much of his time. It seemed like ages since he had last been there. In reality, it had been not more than a couple of weeks. So much had happened in this time that his mind started to spin if he tried to think about it. And now they were flying back. He increased his speed a little, and flew over to Kayliana's side.

 

"Kayliana, we should not be seen in Corren. People there know us, and our last encounter was not very encouraging."

 

He could still feel the pain in his heart, when he realized that the villagers had come to try to kill him. Kayliana look at him with a thoughtful expression on her face.

 

"You are quite right, Grum, and we shall be very careful. But we must not loose this chance to find another one of the lost Dragons."

 

Ivanowitch, who had heard shards of their conversation, asked what had happened. When Grum told him where he came from, and how they had been chased away from the Evergreen Woods, Ivanowitch was shocked.

 

"How could they do this? And why? A Dragon is a beautiful creature, according to the elders in Tirnwood. Why would they want to attack us? You say it is out of fear, but why would they be afraid of us? We have done them no harm, have we?"

 

Grum could not find the words to answer these questions. In his stead, Kayliana responded.

 

"Men's fear of Dragons has two reasons. The first is his natural fear for things unknown to him. The second, I am sad to say, is a set of outright lies and dishonest rumours that have been spread willfully by Nirak and his kin."

 

In silence they flew on, and after somewhat more than an hour, Grum noticed that he started to recognize the lands below him.