Chronicles From the End of an Age

Exceptional - 26Yrs BTA

Yova slowly padded down a rocky corridor, the world around him absent and blurry. Discombobulated words and growls from hatchlings rushing past echoed indistinguishably. Hazes of red and yellow scales were blurred in his vision. His talons clicked against the rusty stone beneath his feet. His head was hanging low, curled wings hugged close to his body as if trying to make himself as small as possible. Memories and words bouncing around his head.

'Human-raised dogs. At least I haven't been cast aside by my parents.'

'Element stone monsters.'

'The only power you have is unearned luck.'

A nudge against his side forced him to look up, facing the concerned snout of a hatchling dragoness.

"Hey," she said, "Are you alright?"

He looked away from her for a moment, sitting on his haunches, "I'm alright."

"Is it what they said?"

"I said I'm fine Ember," he growled at her, rubbing the beginnings of a tear away from his snout with the elbow of his wing.

She tilted her head, not put off by his growl. He hated that. He hated that she wasn't affected by their words. At least Zymre had reacted, threatening them with fire and burning, challenging them with claws and teeth. Ember had been angry, sure, but she had only sat there with an air of aloofness, as though she didn't care at all as the other clutch of hatchlings preyed upon the honour of the three siblings.

"You know they are stupid. Stupid lizards. With... with dull scales and weird tails," she hmphed with a snort, "Like... like dirt worms."

"Dirt worms?" even in his current mood he couldn't help but crack a smile at her attempted insults, "What are dirt worms?"

"They are!" she exclaimed, "Because when they sleep... they put their heads in the dirt, and sleep in it."

"They don't do that."

"Yes, they do," Ember nodded her head as if thoroughly convinced what she said was true.

Yova shrugged his wings, before getting up and walking past her, "It doesn't matter."

"It does matter!" Ember paced beside him, thinking for a moment, "We could talk to Mum. She might talk to..."

"Mum won't care," growled Yova, "She never cares."

The young dragoness opened her mouth to respond, before closing it again, walking silently beside her brother as the two exited the tunnel they had been walking through. Yova felt slightly guilty for snapping at his sister. Out of the three of them, she was the one that seemed to try the most to gain their mother's attention, despite being ignored almost constantly by their one and only parent. Instead, they were stuck with a human of all things to look after them.

"Look, Auntie Ana and Vitto are already waiting for us," Ember said.

Yova raised his head. An adult fire drake with scars across his snout sat waiting for them, and next to his foreleg waited a human woman. Her long brown hair cascaded over her shoulders, and her body was adorned with a long fiery dress that blended her in with the other fire dragons collecting their hatchlings. A small smile was on her face as she listened to another fire hatchling, Zymre, as he spoke eagerly to the two about their day.

The two siblings walked up to greet their brother as well as their human carer. Zymre was boasting about how he had scared off the three hatchlings that had been 'terrorizing' them. Fire danced over his scales as he retold the story, the abnormal connection to fire he had easily making itself known as the flames reacted to his every word. A connection all three siblings had, and one that Yova both loved and hated.