Faylanduil The Great

Faylanduil the Great looked down amidst the pitched night, his sight undiminished, as he beheld the small human child. Katydids and crickets cut through the humid darkness, a blanket of noise that enveloped the two beings that stared at one another, both unsure of what to make of the other.

Great pines heralded the heavens above, locking the light of the moon and stars behind their pitched canopies. Glimpses of the pale light could occasionally be seen, and served as a reminder that Faylanduil’s ancestors watched over him. The dragon continued to stare down at the bumbling child, who couldn’t seem to find its footing.

Faylanduil lowered his massive head, his scaled neck allowing him to do so without moving any other part of his body. He had the taste of prey still on his tongue, and his mouth was sticky from his earlier feast. Licking his teeth - a smooth, forward motion- Faylanduil bared them to the small creature, hoping for some kind of reaction.

However, the child just sat there, still attempting to find its feet, and made a motion as though it was waving at him. Huffing a steaming mist through his nostrils, Faylanduil, the great black dragon, leaned in closer, taking an actual step forward as he did so. Pushing his nose up against the young creature, he took a deep breath in.

The smell was that of food. His mouth watered slightly, even though he had just eaten. Sure, there wasn’t much, but it could serve as the “last bite” so to speak. Faylanduil began to part his mouth, feeling his teeth separate into individual spears, when he stopped himself. There was one smell that was missing from the child. Fear.

As the dragon sat still, inches away, mouth slightly parted, the child did something Faylanduil did not expect. It touched him. Not only that, but it made a noise as it did so. He recoiled slightly from the touch, and cocked his head to better understand what the child was doing. It was laughing.

For a moment, a terrible anger seethed outwards from the dragon, the already black night becoming a darker pitch of tar, and the noise of the life around them became muted. This affected the child, immediately cutting off its laughter, replacing that with tears.. At the sound of this, Faylanduil halted the rage, confused for the first time in a very long time.

He was Faylanduil the Great, the Black Terror, Master Over the Skies. His prey was that which whatever he deemed fit, and there was no equal to his cunning. But here was this child, defenseless prey, that he could not bring himself to kill.

“Hmphhhh.” Faylanduil said, speaking for the first time during the encounter. His voice grated through his mouth, giving a low resonance throughout the surroundings.

“I suppose I will save you for later, then I will eat you.” It was then that the child found its footing, and stumbled towards him, as though drawn by his voice.

Faylanduil felt his claws flex into the earth, digging deep, before he lifted his right leg towards the child, who had just fallen down. He pinched it between his claws, avoiding the tips, and with one mighty push Faylanduil burst upwards, breaking through the canopy above as though it were made of straw. He spiraled into the night, breathing in the rich mountain air, filling his enormous lungs as his wings caught the crosswinds.

***

The boy sat at the edge of a clearing, covered in moss, breathing very faintly. The soft, earthen smells from the last night’s rain still lingered in the air, and provided a sharper feel to the morning. The boy held on to his spear, tightly grasped in his right hand, as he stood very still behind one of the towering pines that formed the opening in front of him.

A small marsh enveloped most of the ground in the clearing, where several muddy pools of water lay. “Crack” A stick snapped to his right, very close to his location. He felt his adrenaline start to course through his body, and he forced his breathing to remain regular.

A large, brown animal stepped into the clearing, not fifteen feet from his position. The animal had three sets of antlers, all fanning out in a paddle-like fashion. Teramu, as Faylanduil called them. The broad, musclebound shoulder of the animal flexed as it bent down to drink from one of the pools.

Breathing one last time in and out, very controlled, the Boy sprung into action. In one fluid motion, he lifted his right arm up, leveled the spear, and thrust it as hard as he could, right behind the left front leg of the Teramu. As soon as he made contact and sunk the sharpened stone head of the spear deep into the body, he pulled back, ready to strike again as needed.

The Teramu threw its head back, screeching in its ancient language. It used its three pronged antlers to slash in a vertical line to its left and right. As the Boy tensed, ready for the second deliverance, the Teramu stilled. Swaying slightly from side to side, it fell, giving one last huff of indignation.

The Boy also released a breath, soon followed by a shout of joy. “YES!!!” He punched the air, and quickly admired the animal. He had never killed one so large, and certainly never had struck with such precision. He was getting better, and Faylanduil would surely be impressed.

Grinning, the Boy quickly dressed and quartered the Teramu with a mostly experienced hand. After only a couple of mess-ups on his part, he packed what he could of the animal on his back, and headed in the direction of the den.

Having been several miles away from Faylanduil and his den, the trip back was arduous. Ducking under fallen logs and working through the general deadfall of the forest, he finally made it to the mountain's edge that held the den. Breathing hard and looking up, he could see the trees begin to thin out as the slope reached towards the now bright blue sky, which contrasted the black obsidian peaks.

The peaks themselves seemed to soak in the color around them, always dulling the greens and blues that surrounded the area. They were not the tallest of the mighty mountains, but they were certainly the most unique. Jagged and broken, they seemed to try and cut through the layers of the atmosphere around them. “Bolishk,” the Boy muttered under his breath, having always been in awe of the mountain.

Over the sixteen years he had been with Faylanduil, the dragon had taught him the names of everything around him, taught him to hunt and gather, and occasionally would fill him with sage advice learned in his many years. He was tied to Faylanduil, through a bond that he could not fully understand.

He had been found wandering in the forest, unprotected and alone. Because of this, the dragon said that the Boy would forever owe him a great debt for saving his life (as opposed to eating him), which was something that he would never let the Boy live down.

The Boy knew he was not a dragon, for Faylanduil had reminded him many times that he was neither large nor tough enough to be claimed as one of their own. A human, he had once called him. The dragon knew no human name, so he had just called him “Boy.”

There were others like him, or so the Boy had heard. But he was also told that they were all savages, eating one another as quickly as you would eat a Teremu. Constantly going to war, and bickering over the smallest of issues.

“Worthless…” Faylanduil would always say, his gravelly voice echoing through the den. But the Boy was determined to make himself worthy of being a dragon, whatever it took. The Boy labored on, using a small game trail to snake his way back and forth across the open face of the mountain. By the time that he had nearly reached the middlemost peak, the sun was beginning its journey through the second portion of sky, descending towards a blissful sleep.

Rehearsing the story of his kill in his head, the Boy kept his eyes down and focused on his footing. Until he heard it.

“I AM FAYLANDUIL THE GREAT, YOU WILL DIE FOR YOUR TRESPASS.” The mountain shook under the force of the voice, and the Boy snapped his head up in the direction of the Den, which lay several hundred feet ahead of him. The den itself was situated in the crook of two of the largest peaks. A barren, black hole that was the mountain’s jaw.

Eyes growing wide, the Boy realized that, instead of the normal landscape, there stood many, many of his own kind. They were all dressed in armor, with what looked to be swords held in every hand.

“The Great, you say?” A strong, second voice, from the front of the assembly. “Nay, we would name you Faylanduil the Crazed!”

“THEN YOU WILL BURN!” Shouted the dragon in return, who the Boy could just make out to be at the edge of the entrance, still mostly hidden by shadow.

He heard it before he saw it. The great intake of air, followed by the noise of grinding stone. Even though he was several hundred feet away, the heat from the flame that washed out over the assembled bodies could be felt where he stood.

Throwing a hand up to protect his face, the Boy squinted as the bright blue and orange flames licked at the air around the entrance of the den, searing the wind itself in its power. Closing his eyes for a moment, the Boy prepared himself for the sight that would meet his eyes. But before he could open back up, he heard the same voice, once again, in the same tempo as before.

“Your flame will do you no good here, dragon. You see, we are protected from it.” The Boy looked back up, and instead of seeing a hundred burnt corpses, he found that all of the humans were still standing, unaffected by the torrential flood of flame. The color drained from the Boy’s face, and his knees weakened. That should have been impossible.

“What is it you want? Small worthless creatures that you are,” Snarled Faylanduil from within.

“Retribution.” The second voice, now separating from the rest of the group, took several steps towards the mouth of the cave. His helmet was plated with several different shining colors, and the rest of him was dyed blood red.

“Many years ago, you destroyed my village. Slaughtered everyone, and didn’t leave a single bone. I managed to escape, and have spent these long years awaiting retribution. As you may see, however, I had some practice on others of your kin before coming to you.” At this, the human talking took off his helmet, brandishing it about.

“Now… now I see the revenge I swore so long ago.” This time, he put the helmet back on his head, and unsheathed a weapon that appeared to be longer than the other swords held in the assembly.

“You will see nothing but death!” Hissed Faylanduil. The Boy dropped the pack off of his back, but seemed to be frozen in place. He tried to call out, but his voice failed him. He felt as though he were small, smaller than any of the bugs of the forest. All he could do was watch as Faylanduil emerged from the den, and a fierce and angry battle began to rage.

When he emerged, his scales appearing to be molded from the obsidian itself, the dragon towered over the gathered force. Legs as though tree trunks, scales that could not be pierced, spikes traveling along his spine, all the way up to his skull, which held eyes as red as dark flame. Faylanduil roared, showing teeth that were half the size of the Boy, and as sharp as the jagged peaks directly above them.

He flashed his wings, gray blankets of power, towards the group. There was a resounding crack as the air ricocheted forward, tearing up trees further down the slope. However, the men stayed firm, barely moving.

The Boy had felt a moment of hope. Surely men could not stand a chance against something so grand as Faylanduil. But as they all embraced the wind and stood their ground, the Boy knew that something was giving them strength beyond their means.

The men gave a collective yell and pressed forward, jumping and slashing and stabbing. The Boy saw as Faylanduil bit and clawed and stomped to match them, but some seemed extra resilient, and with every human he killed, it seemed another found a way to injure him.

The dragon’s impenetrable scales seemed to be cut by the weapons held by the men, and soon Faylanduil began to collapse, his legs no longer able to hold their own. During this the men also had been cut down a sizable portion, leaving only a quarter of the larger assembly left..

With a surge of strength, Faylanduil twisted and bit two men in half, swatting at a third and a forth, leaving them as collapsed and mangled bodies, spilling out their life into the cold hard ground.

The Boy caught a glimpse of the leader of the group, who appeared right below the chest of the dragon. With a yell that matched Faylanduil’s own intensity, a white bolt of lightning shot out of the end of the man’s weapon. It struck the center chest of the dragon, exploding on impact, sending black scales flying across the landscape.

Faylanduil reared back his head and screamed. The entire mountain shook. Every man, including the Boy, grabbed their head in pain as the noise pieced everything around it, sending rocks tumbling down the mountain, and began to split the den’s entrance into two. Just when the Boy thought that he wouldn’t be able to handle any more of it, Faylanduil cut off abruptly.

“Boy…” the Boy heard, looking up through a haze of pain. The dragon was looking directly at him, the fire red eyes unblinking in intensity, even in the distance. “Avenge me, Boy. Fulfill your debt.” Right as Faylanduil spoke, the Boy could see that the dragon's eyes then began to drift. With one final twist, Faylanduil the Great fell before the Boy, his body colliding with the mountainside.

A great plume of dirt and rocks shot out from beneath the body as it landed. There was a shift in the earth, and the Boy watched in horror as the area around the dragon began to shift, the entire ground starting to move. The few men remaining, including the leader, all gave shouts and sprinted to the entrance of the den.

The Boy backed up, and could only watch as a landslide then gave way, sending all of the bodies, including Faylanduil, down the steep slope of the mountain. The Boy fell to his knees, watching as the mountain was given a new scar, never taking his eyes off of the fallen dragon far, far below.

Anger began to well inside of him, and he clenched his fists and ground his teeth. Who were these, these humans that had just ruined his life? He moved his stare to the den entrance, where he could see the leader and several of his men. They appeared to be looking across at him as well, unmoving and saying nothing.

A crazy thought bubbled into his mind. A thought of revenge for his fallen instructor. A thought that would enable him to fulfill his debt. He knew that he was obviously no match for the mystery figure. But he did know that there were other dragons, ones that he had met before while with Faylanduil.

Tears began to well in his eyes as his loss began to hit him. He furiously wiped them away. Why didn’t he stop them? He shook his head in frustration. He would. He would find the others. He would kill the figure in red.