Saturday, 3 March 2018
On dragons
Posted by
Scott Malthouse
Dragons don't technically exist, but the collective bubbling of frenzied medieval imagination conjures them into the material plane. Dragons are merely composites of blackened dread - the unknown manifesting in the deep musty voids of the world, gestating in shadow while the nightmares of kings and paupers transmit from slumbering minds.
A dragon wakes when a god perishes. Amber eyes snap open and the slender scaled neck cranes naturally towards mother sky. Its breath takes the form of the element it awakens closest to - for some it's the chill of permafrost, while others emit the breath of the nine hells.
Every dragon is psychically linked to a baby born at the same moment. Their life bond may go years without becoming apparent to either of them, but as the child grows they develop small red scales on their brow and dream often of flight. Eventually, the child gains a honing instinct that drives them to search for the dragon. Once they meet the child becomes a willing servant of the dragon, an envoy to the world of humanoids. As they grow older still they more and more resemble their master - teeth becoming pointed ivory and eyes like polished bronze.
Once matured, dragons have an intrinsic need to nestle amongst gold to a point of obsession. The reason for this is simple - being born of human minds dragons also imbue the great greed for riches possessed by most people. Dragons are manifestations of such thoughts.
The dragon's servant descends on towns to recruit adventurers to plunder treasure for the dragon, or to threaten the ruler with fire and fury if a dragon tax isn't instated.
Dragons age but the sands of time can never claim them. Once their servant dies they gain the ability to speak, but they mourn for six days before flying into a rage, reaping destruction in their locality.
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