Scales and Steel

The terrestrial globe that we have become accustomed to calling Ailoon knew for thousands of years the hatred that existed between two of its largest congregations of Humans who wandered the length and breadth of the continent of Ei: to the northwest lied the fearsome Frevoss Empire, an ever-changing and resilient nation, due to the inadequacy of its inhabitants in the use of the Magical Arts; to the southeast stood the Reitian Federation, an economically stable, proactive nation, kind with its states. The latter, thanks to its - albeit sparse – armies of sorcerers and healers, managed to take back the territories that the Empire took away from it in order to compete with it in the maritime market.

The Imperials, tired of rubbing steel against steel with Reitia, realized that the excessive proximity to the Federation did nothing but expose them to constant danger, placing them in a state of reactive belligerence, and that it would be necessary to find a new home to live in peace and give birth to a better and quieter Frevoss.

They opted for the only land known lying west of the Gloomy Sea: the wild and hostile continent of Anjo.

However, the Imperials were oblivious of the fact that another sentient race occupied that land: Dragons. The Dragons came from East, hunted from the foggy Vjellend by the In'ner: slender and with forked ears. The Dragons thus flew over Anjo until they settled in the small tropical region of Kariolia, which with its tall trees and huge forests reminded them of their lost, eastern home.

Then the Frevossi secret expeditions reached Kariolia, too.

At first, Dragons didn’t mind their new, noisy visitors, as they were few and sparsely inhabiting small seaside areas. But then one became a hundred and, as quickly as they were born and died, these little magicless men conquered the lushest of forests and the richest of hills Kariolia could provide, leaving no suitable preying field for the Dragons. In fact, fierce with steel and willpower, the Imperials posed a not-so-small threat to the lone wandering Dragon seeking food; yet another race of scaleless beings incapable of sharing lands with giant lizards.

One fated day, the Dragons’ wings were resting atop Mount Vhùm’u’lài, their Broodnest in Kariolia, but their voices were blazing with rage, crying for the reclamation of their space.

“They are plenty, and keep proliferating like moss on stone,” complained one.

“They mature into fierce hunters, and can easily steal all the game we keep for hoarding from under our noses, hidden under the tall awaraimë! Ought our tribe migrate West again?! I don’t think so!” yelled another.

Among those thundering voices sat Gunn’Aari, a young dragoness, yawning as she couldn’t apprehend the angry arguments her peers exposed in order to further the process of land reclamation. She spent years gazing at Humans, fascinated by their unfoundedly complex lives; she found them curious in the same manner a Human child would find an ant colony interesting.

“Silence!” a fearful voice roared in Vhùm’u’lài, “Kill them we must not. The In’ners we maimed have taught us their mourn through reflections of our might.” It was Ashakk-Heta, the oldest of the Kariolian Broodtribe.

“These Humans need to understand this is our land, and that they are not the only ones forced to flee from theirs. Our Broodtribe just ended preparing the Nests, yet they arrived and started disrupting what we created. We must not become the threat we posed to the Vjellenders, yet we also must not let them grow into that selfsame danger. Skinning of this much-hated scourge is then due.”

Gunn’Aari didn’t love Humans - nor hate them - but lately felt like they were a big nuisance for her Broodsiblings; though silent and reserved as she was, she decided it was time to reach an agreement between the sparring parties.

“I apologize for being in contrast with your opinion, Ashakk” began Gunn’Aari “yet it is, in my minuscule opinion, a fairly despicable plan which wouldn’t be beneficial in the long term.”

Ashakk-Heta, not used to being contradicted, quickly asked the dragoness “How can you be so sure, Gunn’Aari? We are mightier and must exercise our right to own this land”.

“Powerful as we may be, our race’s aggregate is but a fraction of what it used to be, and this Broodtribe features a sheer number of Broodclans, which also are fairly reduced in their members'' elaborated Gunn, “These Humans are Imperials hailing from the Empire of Frevoss and yes, it may look favorable since they are unable to wield magic abilities, yet their adaptability and intense support of each other means that destroying the small colony they founded here will without question call all of their kind here to exterminate us. Our scales may look solid, but I’ve seen their firemongering tubes pierce even the hardest of steels. I must press that it is not a wise course of action”.

Ashakk-Heta was not amused with someone questioning his decisions, yet being the only other dragon having gotten to know Humans, he acknowledged drops of truth in Gunn’s thoughts: “Very well. As you are the only one grasping onto a contradictory belief, I order you to start scouting: fly over the humans’ settlements and define objectives. Everybody else may return to their Pikes.”. The Kariolian Dragons roared flames, opened their wings, and went back to their respective families’ Pike.

Gunn kept sitting there petrified, amazed by how easily her words swayed Ashakk’s mind. The Elder Dragon woke her up “So? Haste before I exhume my previous stand on the matter.” And so, she headed humanswards.

As Gunn’Aari batted her wings, her eyes were staggered by Kariolia’s astonishing beauty and lush, jungly greenery, even when sparingly spotted with those wood-and-stone structures which humans built and called home.

In her return to the Broodnest, though, a high-pitched screech reached her hearing; after pinpointing it close to a riverbank, she noticed a Humanling contained in a wicker chest floating in the water, entangled in resilient awaraimë roots. Gunn descended to check the motive of the pup’s distress, resting her wings upon a rock; waiting an hour or so, no other Human seemed to be in the whereabouts ready to aid their crying little one, making it clear the poor creature had been abandoned.

The purity of her heart made Gunn’Aari rush to the Humanling’s aid, casting the chest out of the water and depositing it on the grass.

Was it the long-awaited rescue or the warming breath of the dragon which suddenly calmed the baby? Nobody knows for sure, yet its stillness resonated with Gunn’s feelings.

She started gazing upon it: it looked so regular, its head fur was brown as a bear’s and such were its eyes, further socketed with tiny, roundish specks of sage; it seemed as it had been breathing air for no more than three years.

A spark lit in her chest, taking over her body’s movements: she clenched the chest softly between her teeth, firmly enough to keep it fastened, and took off, the fragrant grass bowing under her wings.

She brought it to a close gorge, inside an eroded rock shelf embroidered in the sun-facing stonewall; there was a short cliff in front of the entrance to this cave-like structure that served as a balcony, to put it in human terms. On the said balcony, a relatively young mulberry tree shot proudly its arms towards the firmament, hiding the hole in the stonewall, but tall enough to leave space for chest-bearing Gunn’Aari’s landing.

As gently as she picked the toddler up, she likewise placed it on the uneven floor. The baby’s face instantly reddened, its eyes got wet and the blistering screech returned, piercing the dragoness’ ears and through them restoring control over her body.

The toddler had become accustomed to the cuddling warmth of Gunn’s breath, and she understood that. She went outside and bowed to the mulberry; she asked for its forgiveness, in that she was about to borrow some of its boughs from it. The mulberry slightly bent an arm towards her, in acceptance and mercifulness.

She turned back inside, made a bundle out of the mulberry branches, and spat a tongue of flame to lit it, then moved it close to the child; a lick of wind blowing the smoke outside.

Gunn’Aari left the burrow to find more firewood and food for the child.

Since that fateful day, the Dragoness stuck to living a circular life not to raise suspicion, in which she fed information to Vhùm’u’lài inhabitants - about new crop fields to spoil, watchtowers to shatter and preys to steal - while in the meantime she flew to the gorge and took care of the Human.

As a result of her watchful surveys, she learnt what mothers cooked for their younger ones, how they played together, and even got a hang of how to talk with them; she was a lucky Dragoness, as she was smaller and slimmer than her Broodsiblings, so she could handle the child with great dexterity.

She even stole one of those hollow metallic orbs to put water and mashed vegetables and meat in for cooking, with the enormous appreciation of the infant.

Gunn’Aari also learned they had a plethora of names to choose from, but they all sounded so highfalutin and awfully mushy; this last point made her realize their throats were far more capable of producing ominous sounds than the ones of Dragons. Hence came the name she chose for it: Sallan. It could resemble a human name.

As time passed, the cave in the gorge started to feel a bit cramped and, above all, cold.

She wondered whether her peers managed to salvage some human possession that wasn’t entirely composed of ashes. She knew Humans tend to feel better inside wooden structures.

As Gunn’Aari entered Vhùm’u’lài, the Dragons greeted her with bows and gnarls of warmth: they had finally regained some land from a vast encampment shrouded by the tall trees, one of the most important expansion attempts towards the inland, but still close to the bigger village.

“We know the Humans won’t push as far as there to rebuild what was lost” gloated a laughing young wyrm, coming out from in-between two stone pillars.

“Pray tell me, then, how you managed to scare them away'' muttered Gunn’Aari softly, slithering behind the wyrm’s half-open wings.

The young wyrm shuddered for a moment, then calmly replied with a grin on his face, directed at the dragoness: “The trees fell down. And we didn’t use fire, just as you ordered us. There were some flames, yes, but nothing the Humans didn’t make before our arrival”

“So you blatantly concurred in harming them despite my orders not to. Mine, and your Broodfathers’” told Gunn’Aari the wyrm, while rigidly butting her head against his, fixing his eyes.

The young wyrm spat a lick of fire on her throat, and in doing so almost got its snout clawed away by the dragoness. Ashakk-Heta chuckled as he witnessed from afar.

But Gunn’Aari got what she wanted: a destination to reach, in order to try to salvage a home for her human baby.

She saluted her peers, who were still cheering for her, and flew towards the encampment.

At her arrival, she glared at the mess her Broodsiblings made, but on second thought, who was she to judge, when she was the one taking advantage of the enemy’s loss for her own gain?

Setting this thought aside with a shake of her head, she plummeted and quickly noticed - amongst a host of flame-gnawed buildings crushed by the trees - one, almost untouched cabin.

Close as she was, she realized it felt like a castle for Sallan, even though it was a small abode. And it felt even much smaller than the cave, in dragon terms. She couldn’t even interact with whatever was inside, as she couldn’t fit through any hole.

She irritatedly clicked her tongue and, while turning, she whipped the cabin with her tail, gently detaching the roof in one move. Feeling a rotating object around the tip of her tail, Gunn’Aari gazed at the rolling roof incredulously, stopped it and laid it right on the side of the cabin. Then, she smiled. She found home.

Time passed quickly, with not much going on between the sparring parties aside from gains and losses.

Sallan grew into a healthy kid, yet something bugged her constantly: she could tell the difference between male and female in other Humans, but this kid was different. It had rough facial elements, yet caged by an elongated, soft-edged cranium. Its wavy hair naturally stopped growing as soon as they reached the bottom of its neck, just a feather above the shoulders. Its body was slender, yet fit, almost like those of the In’ners that live in Deora’s hillwoods, where Eastern Dragons used to dwell. Its mammaries and buttocks were slightly swollen, but Gunn’Aari had never seen what Humans held in the midst of their legs, always hidden in leathers, so she couldn’t understand what she was seeing when the kid washed.

Sallan had an amazing brain: it grew able to speak the Dragoness’ language and read the Imperials’ books Gunn’Aari salvaged from the dragons’ bounties, even though it manifested the desire to train this language with its most similar.

“Freedom will be bestowed on thee as soon as the right time comes and you will become ripe, for the seed contained in the fruit must receive care and hard work.”

The Dragoness poured all her heart into learning what resources the Humans needed and how they put them to use, only to then transmit this information to the kid, for it to ripen and enter their world with knowledge.

The frail skins of the humans needed herbs to heal when damaged, otherwise they would infect; their tiny stomachs couldn’t hold such things as the huge Kariolian ox, so they required salt to preserve its delicious meat; and they obviously loved ores, used for weaponry, tools and other shiny things they love to attach to their body.

Her wings could carry Sallan in the darkest nooks of the land in seconds, reducing supply times to mere hours.

Gunn’Aari’s heart blazed with happiness every time they went gathering; the kid’s amusement was so evident you could read it through its teeth, always shining open. For humans that was a sign of friendship and happiness, the opposite of what that meant for dragons.

She realized Sallan needed new strips of cloth: she noticed, from most of the Humans living in the greater settlements, that theirs looked more complex and refined rather than the rough leathers the child was fitted with.

So, she scavenged a gown and a shirt from a Human tree-cutter’s shelter just outside the village and dressed it androgynously, as she learned when visiting her Broodsiblings in the Humbrian Archipelago in the North.

Then, the fated request arrived again. One night, the Dragoness brought it back to the cave in the gorge to let it admire the moonlit view from up high, Sallan all curled up on top of her belly, in a cocoon of wings. The kid softly murmured “What if I go live among them, mom? Maybe I was meant to stay there, and you wouldn’t have to keep hiding me from your brothers.”

The kid looked ripe enough, yet Gunn’s heart was reluctant to give it away to the “enemy” so easily. But the kid was right: they both were in constant danger of being discovered.

It was in that moment of indecision that Gunn’Aari had the brightest of ideas: by gaining their peers’ trust, Sallan could prove an ambassador, and a way for Dragons and Humans to communicate and satisfy both parties’ desires, define each other’s space without losing dear ones along a trail of blood. This was exactly the solution her Broodtribe needed, the thing their whole race couldn’t manage to do when they inhabited the In’ner lands.

At the rise of the next sun, she started sending Sallan to the village with a sack crafted out of rags, filled with all kinds of wares, and a book lightly enclosed in its armpit, with the cover clearly in sight; the book was supposed to make the other humans trust it since it was the most common to find, so Sallan would be just considered a taciturn oddball, and not something smelling unhuman.

As soon as the child reached the village for the first time, it saw beautiful plants growing in every corner, kids running around without a care in the world, and crafters in sweaty workwear turning their heads to Sallan and saluting it. Sallan was incredibly happy, but it kept all the emotions inside, as Mother Gunn’Aari told it.

The market street, colorful and boisterous, opened up before its eyes as it reached the center of the settlement. There, while scrolling with its eyes through all the weird shapes and smells of the commodities, Sallan searched for a spot in which to lay down its bag and start selling.

It sat close to a costermonger, opened up its rags, and displayed everything in a very tidy manner, organizing everything by category for easier browsing.

For the first few days, sales weren’t that good, until Gunn’Aari decided to use her trump card: a rare ore, easily found in the gorge, if you knew where to look.

The bait worked. An old blacksmith, armorer of the town, casually passed by as Sallan was packing things up.

“Tell me kid, where did you find that?” asked the blacksmith, pointing at the shiny, vermilion ore. Sallan understood the question, yet answering in their tongue was too hard, so it mimicked the act of striking with a pickaxe.

The blacksmith laughed, then gazed deep in Sallan’s eyes, and realized they were pregnant with seriousness and truth. The blacksmith gulped, then said through a smile “If you have the hands to extract such refined ore, then they’re able to craft stout blades and sturdy nails! And I'm in need of a pair like yours. Care to join?!”.

Sallan, not understanding a word of what the hairy, sweaty man said, nodded in approval of his enthusiasm towards it.

A few months passed, and the kid became a skilled blacksmith; it started gaining a handful of pretty yellow metallic discs with faces on them - the same kind it got for selling its wares - but never used them. But there was something it couldn’t have without those: books.

Sallan, with simple words, asked where it could buy some books to read, and the blacksmith sent it to a nearby village that happened to host an old sage, importing books from Ei.

Sallan added a new destination to its daily routine, and it instantly devoured the books bought. Seeing such commitment and passion, the old sage was drawn to the kid, and offered it to become his apprentice, “to learn everything about anything”. Obviously, Sallan accepted.

The old sage recognized and unveiled the knowledge the kid acquired thanks to Mother Gunn’Aari and the life in the forest, in order to give it new applications and use them as basis to explain everything about anything to curious, not-so-little-anymore Sallan.

With the new theoretical expertise gained through the old sage’s lesson, the kid decided it was time to put it to a practical proficiency test.

Sallan started exploring the unknowns harbored by many different endeavors, all aimed at supporting the community that so warmly took the oddball in, such as tirelessly working the fields, gathering herbs with the pharmacists, and heartedly raising livestock for the smaller settlements’ farmers.

While Sallan was busy becoming a key member of the Human settlers, Gunn’Aari, witness of the kid’s achievements, decided to report her plans to the Dragons of Vhùm’u’lài.

Every wyrm was shocked to see how Gunn managed to live a double life without anyone noticing, even Ashakk-Heta and the other Elderdragons. At first, they were skeptical since the kid was a Human, but the trust the Dragoness gained with her services was repaid by Ashakk, who gave carte blanche to whatever needs Gunn had in order to further her plan.

She had the idea to include Sallan in the attacks as a savior, as a means to elevate it even more within the Humans’ ranks; she ordered her Broodsiblings to only attack structures and resources, and absolutely avoid the kid.

Knowing nobody would be harmed, Sallan proved its bravery by rescuing children and retrieving important items through the flames. The plan was working fine, as after just a few raids the settlers were already calling Sallan “a fierce warrior”.

Yet, in the kid’s heart, conflicting feelings arose: growing up with a dragon, it always felt like the Humans were the invaders of its mother’s home, so Sallan was kind of happy to see them retreat and suffer material losses; though, it couldn’t perceive Humans as the enemy, as it was one of them and felt their adoration, compared to the distrust the Dragons had for it.

But all the love Sallan received was about to be balanced out.

As the kid grew up, it started glimpsing something ugly within Humans, something never seen before: they had a horrible side, one that didn’t care about the harm they caused to nature and to its inhabitants, one that came out also whilst working and having fun together, lurking secretly in the depths of their minds and hearts, stuck to them with roots of envy and other nasty vices…

One customary afternoon, after all of Sallan’s duties were fulfilled, it was one of these expressions of the dark Human mind that decided the kid’s fate from here onward: suspicion.

During the stay at the old sage’s bookshop, Sallan made friends with a pair of exuberant, less gifted dregs, Juli and Huebriss. These two wanted to be explorers, but as heartfelt and true this dream may have been, they were merely being embarrassingly nosy. And, obviously, being suspicious of the successful yet mysterious kid living up in the tallest of nearby hills.

Gunn’Aari, before sending it to the village for the first time, asked Sallan to tell the Humans who might’ve asked that it lived with a very sick mother, who couldn’t get out of bed and couldn’t have other people in due to how fragile she was.

But Juli and Huebriss knew better than this. They were explorers. And so, they followed Sallan home, always staying hidden in bushes as their hunter-fathers told them.

A sudden, forceful gale swept the trees. They couldn’t believe their eyes. Sallan, with a Dragon. A small one, but still a Dragon.

Trembling, they sneaked towards home through the thick bushes, and as soon as they were shrouded by the tall trees, they ran as fast as they could, frightened.

The next morning, Gunn’Aari told Sallan she had to travel away from that region of Kariolia for some days in search of better lands for a newborn Broodtribe to prosper, by order of Ashakk-Heta. She wanted the kid to stay safe at home and wait for her to come back.

As she was about to leave, with the kid hugging her snout, she wanted to explain to it her plans to use it as an ambassador, and that if the survey went well there was no need to do so anymore, and it could choose whether to stay with the Humans or with her. But she never spoke those words. Instead, she just whispered in its ears: “You are the most precious thing I was ever blessed with”, and smiled.

She made sure she provided everything Sallan needed to survive without I having to stray an inch away from home, then she flew Westwards. But she didn’t take books into account, and the kid wanted to read a new one so badly.

After three days, the kid couldn’t resist anymore, and went to the old sage’s village to get a new read, but the villagers told Sallan he probably went to the bigger settlement to teach.

The Humans’ little hero rushed to the other village.

But as Sallan approached it, something felt odd: the village looked gray and muddy, the wood rotten and cracked, and the white stone walls were covered in a black, spotted mold it had never noticed before.

The settlers, as Sallan walked towards the market street, ran inside their abodes and closed all the openings. The kid could still feel the sharp gaze of the villagers’ eyes cutting its cheeks through the closed windows, and the deafening murmur dripping from every wall around it.

What was going on? Why would they behave like that? Did the Dragons launch a devastating surprise attack? That must’ve been it.

Suddenly, someone’s scream broke the silence: “Here comes the Dragon Lover!”

Wait, what was that again? How could they know such a thing?

“Stop right there, criminal scum!” thundered a voice from around the corner, followed by the sound of stomping, metal-clad feet.

It was the village elder with the city watch, with all of their weapons drawn towards the kid.

“You have been sighted mingling with the enemy, and that is disappointing yet clarifying evidence, explaining why you suddenly appeared in our lives…”

“...bringing despair and horror!” shouted a civilian.

“Bringing flames and deceit!” yelled another.

“N-no, that’s untrue!” muttered Sallan, growing scared of them “I was just…”

“Plotting with them to seize us and subjugate this village and subsequently all the other colonies in these lands! Yours was the help to define which places to strike, and no wonder you were the one rescuing us fearlessly, because you knew they wouldn’t harm you!”

Vain was every attempt to contradict the Humans, or even complete a sentence.

“We, founders of the new Imperial Province of Kariolia, sentence you to the same flames that destroyed our lives!”.

As the last rays of sun hit Kariolia, a pyre was made ready, Sallan tied up to its central pole.

All the settlers, even those from nearby villages, gathered ‘round it to witness the grim spectacle.

They were about to give Sallan a shameful, horrible death. An ancient Frevossi tradition, it was named “The Halvbrent”, meaning half-burned, so to still distinguish the dead’s face and not even deign it of turning to ashes. Yet, in that shame shone a spark of respect.

“Any words before you crisp, Stranger?” asked the elder, torch in hand.

“Are you really sure you want to burn me alive after all I’ve done for you? Pray remember was the only reason they didn’t kill anybody.” Sallan asked in turn.

“Yes. We are sure because you still dare to blabber false nonsense even when your end is near” concluded the elder.

“Then burn me, and let these flames be the spark to light those that will hug you” replied the kid.

And so, the torch was tossed and the wood turned black, as cracked screams danced with fire.

Everybody cheered, spat and cursed at the kid. Everybody but two, petrified and terrorized dregs, standing there with their teeth chattering.

The elder passed by them, placed a hand on Juli’s shoulder and smiled at them; “Well done, young’uns. You have done the Empire a great service” he said, and walked away satisfied.

Soon after, as they turned off the flames, a shadow bolted through the sky over the hills nearby the village.

It was Gunn’Aari, so happy to finally see Sallan again.

But that little pest wasn’t home, it must have gone to gather firewood!

Fire… wood? The scent of burnt wood that filled the air made Gunn’s head turn around to check her whereabouts, when she saw plenty of smoke coming from the big village.

She rapidly flew there, getting more worried each time she flapped her wings, only to see Sallan’s half burnt body, with its facial muscles straining its face in mute agony, being kicked around like a rock.

Gunn’Aari’s senses turned off. She simply watched. Then, the ethereal force controlling her movements drew her to Vhùm’u’lài.

She could barely mumble what happened, but it was enough for her Broodsiblings to understand.

That night, the Imperial Guard started marching towards the hill where the kid with the Dragon lived, in order to find evidence on where the Dragons’ nest could have been and prepare a Hunt to exterminate them.

A soldier, as he climbed the hill, turned his head down to check on a friend, and in the background saw the smoke coming from the village.

“Didn’t we water the pyre? How long does the damn smoke last? My house’s gonna be covered in tar!” complained the soldier.

“Smoke? We departed without smoke, pal” replied his friend while scanning the same area of the soldier. His eyes opened wide, and then he screamed at the top of his lungs: “The village is under attack!”. As soon as his mouth shut, multiple bright red clouds of flames lit the village.

All soldiers fell back, running faster than wind, only to see their wives, parents and children being encapsulated in crystals of ice, half-burnt and suffering, in front of them.

The morning sun vanquished the cold night and, through the surviving Humans’ sobs of mourn, its rays melted the ice prisons, caging the village in a thick fog.

As the warriors were digging holes in which to bury their loved ones and getting ready to leave Kariolia, a quaking growl shattered the skies.

Then, through the fog, a young dragoness crying in sorrow flew fast through the village, setting everything and everyone in her path ablaze, until only ashes were left.

Who was in the right, I will never know, nor care to know; after all who am I to judge?

But one thing is for sure: the scales, once again, were made even.

The Timeful Historian