(Content warning: minor descriptions of wounds and blood; violence; death/murder of a human by a dragon)
It was quiet. The gentle sound of slight waves lapping at the shore created a melodic, almost meditative sound. Thick, dark clouds hung heavy in the sky, their color promising rain soon to come. An occasional splash of fish breaking the surface of the lake interrupted the silence, but otherwise, it was serene.
Standing at the chill water’s edge was a woman covered in blood and sweat. It coated her armor, painting the layered plates, coming to a rest inside the rivets and gashes left from battle. Her boots were caked with mud and grime, and several of the ties on her gloves had snapped. She held a battered helmet under one arm, and for some time she just breathed.
It was over.
Slowly she began to strip herself of her damaged armor, letting the gloves drop to the ground before beginning to undo the laces to the cuirass that had undoubtedly saved her life several times over. As every piece of leather and iron scale dropped from her body, a new pain shot through her. A bruised… maybe cracked rib? Two? A shallow wound on her upper left thigh, fresh scab opened once again as she undressed. Innumerable small scratches littered her skin. She was lucky the damage wasn’t worse, but it was all right. She would have plenty of time to heal.
It was over.
Goosebumps appeared down her arms as she stepped slowly into the cold water of the lake. Fish darted away from her intrusion into their realm, and she waded just deep enough that she could kneel while still keeping her head above water. The chill crawled up her skin like walking through spiderwebs, a slow biting shock that inexorably told her senses that everything was only going to get rougher from here. She closed her eyes and began to wash the muck off her face.
Behind her eyelids, flashes of memories manifested - sword swings, flung torches and knives, crossbows latched back before bolts were loosed. The Scal Exriag had not known she was coming, and they were not prepared to have to fight for their lives. Screams had echoed through the hall, anguish and anger intertwined, interrupted by the booming crack of lightning and primal roars of challenge. She had left members of the group wounded, dismembered, bleeding out, begging for help or mercy. Her partner, however, had refused to leave any of the Scal Exriag recognizable as having once been human.
An exceptionally curious fish brushed against her foot and brought her mind back to the present. A rumble echoed from above and she looked skyward, peering into the cloud cover. For a long moment, there was nothing, and then suddenly a bright flash immediately followed by a loud crack of thunder. The air in her lungs rattled from the force, and cloud bank after cloud bank lit up as lightning lashed from one to another.
The celestial light show continued for a moment, then two, before the various crackling bolts simultaneously leapt to a central point. The blast of the convergence nearly blinded her for a moment, and once she blinked away the worst of the spots, she saw something dark hurtling from the sky toward her. The shape plummeted so fast that she barely had time to stand before it crashed into the central part of the lake, sending a towering wave out from the impact point. She managed to turn her face and close her eyes just before it hit her, knocking her back and into the water. The fall sparked pain through her entire body, and a hiss escaped her as her face tightened in a grimace.
Before her, the surface of the lake broke and out of it rose a beast of water and lightning. Its wedge-shaped head was covered in tiny, smooth scales that grew larger as they snaked down the long, sinuous neck. A regal mane of horns and spikes reared off the back of its head, narrowing to a single ridge down its nape. A broad, scaled chest and muscular forearms surged up in front of her as the creature came to a halt before her, landing on webbed paws adorned with dangerous-looking claws. A huge pair of wings extended off its back, stretched wide, and they beat once, then twice before furling in against its sides. Across its body were little pulses of light, discharges left over from the storm above. She could see that behind the great beast the water churned as its long tail swung back and forth.
“That hurt, you know,” she chastised her Altum companion. The dragon raised his head and turned it so he could look sidelong at her while a reverberating thrum echoed from his throat.
“I’m glad you find this amusing. I didn’t make it through that fight as untouched as you did.” She sighed and slowly got to her feet. Once she was stable, he dropped his massive head down and lightly rested his chin on her shoulder. She wrapped her arms around his nose and for a moment, Rider and dragon lost themselves in the peace around them.
“It’s over,” she said, aloud this time. Her words sounded firm, and the Altum replied with a low churr.
Even still, though, a bad feeling was taking root in her stomach. The pair had torn their way through the main base of the Scal Exriag, killing and maiming as they fought to clear a path to the Macin himself - the ruthless leader of the group of dragon-hunting assassins. Upon confronting the man who had been responsible for the slaughter of many of her and her companion’s kin, he didn’t hesitate to return their ferocity with his own. The Macin had claimed his share of Rider and dragon kills, and his blades were responsible for the majority of wounds that ached across her body. Her companion, too, had been hit by thrown knives, some each laced with a poison that slowed dragons’ movements and reactions. The Macin had almost gotten the upper hand, knocking her back and to the ground, but her Altum swept in on his blindside, smashing the Macin away from the Rider and into the nearby wall. She fought to right herself as quickly as she could, reaching for her sword to defend herself once more, but the dragon wasn’t going to let the head of the Scal Exriag have another chance to attack. The Altum lunged atop the fallen man, one of his clawed paws crushing the man’s chest, a growl rattling in his scaled throat. The Macin gasped in pain and managed to drive one of his poison-coated knives into the dragon’s foot in an effort to fend off the beast. The Altum let out an unbridled roar of pain and reared up, but almost immediately came back down on the Macin once more, this time with both paws. She could hear the man’s ribs cracking from across the room, and the Macin let out a guttural scream. Her dragon snarled in anger and struck, teeth digging into the Macin’s collarbone as the Altum snapped his teeth down around the man’s head. The sickening sound of bones popping and flesh tearing echoed in the room. The Altum did not spit the head out, and as he swallowed, she felt nauseous.
As they flew away from that site of carnage, she realized that the sickness in her stomach was not just from the pain and shock of their encounter. The triumph over the Scal Exriag tasted bitter in her mouth and felt rotten in her soul. They were a band of killers and torturers who deserved to die, yes. They had threatened her family's very existence. They had captured and tortured many of her friends, threatened others who followed her same way of life, and even killed people she knew and cared for. Anger had become the only thing she knew and pain was the only thing left in her heart. She had been sure that with the Macin gone, the group that the dragons had named the “Scale Torturer” would scatter.
But now that the deed was done, she found herself uneasy, wondering if it had been the wrong action to take. She had been so lost in her rage and grief that all she had wanted was to shed the blood of those who had harmed her and hers, to end their influence and danger. However, as the fury had begun to fade away, she realized that the tyranny of the Scal Exriag wasn’t something that could be ended at the edge of a blade. It wasn’t a person or a place. It was an idea, a way of life that bound those who followed it together. It was a belief system and a vision of a future without dragons in it. A person could be ended by cold steel, but an idea was an entirely different beast.
The Scal Exriag had commoners supporting them across the world. They had backers and patrons from every walk of life and every corner of the globe. In her quest for vengeance, she hadn’t thought about how the rest of the world would see her actions. How would her own kind react to what she had done, what her companion had done? Would they now look at him as a monster, a killer of men, even though the humans of the Scal Exriag were far more vicious and had done much more cruel things in their pursuit of the dragons and those that supported them?
Stiffening her spine, she stood, and her Altum lifted his head from her shoulder.
“It’s over,” she repeated once more, but this time there was a quaver in her voice. “And I think it’s over for us, too.” There was a twist in her gut as she said the words, feeling them ring true and wondering how she had managed to stray so far from the proper path.
The majestic beast before her dipped his head and turned it away from her, shaking it gently to rattle the spines that arched off the back of his head. As he gave off a low, disappointed croon that echoed out over the water, she felt a tightness around her heart. This battle hadn’t just been hard on her - it had also affected the Bond they shared, and for just a moment, she felt the distance that had grown between them. The Altum was a staunch ally once she had won him over, but he was also unbearably proud; with the suspicion they had made the wrong move starting to take root in her mind, she knew her growing regret would end up at odds with his self-assurance.
The dragon rolled his shoulders then to bring the sparse saddle into view. She climbed astride and looked around at the serene lake once more. She was so far from what had once been home. Perhaps this little oasis could be a new place for them, far from discovery, far from battle, and far from the blame and guilt that was bound to follow them.
“Let’s go.”
Her words were barely spoken, but he heard them anyway. He pulled his wings close to his body, reared his upper half up, and then lunged forward, diving into the water’s depths. The Dragon Rider Miyoko disappeared into the darkness of the lake with her companion, never knowing that their actions would lead to the downfall of everything they have been trying to protect.
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