Dragon's Blood

Immortal

The day after Sam's most recent revelations, Iyla awoke from a disturbed sleep to the sound of excited voices. She heard a sound that was becoming familiar, the slow, steady beat of dragon's wings in the air. She dressed quickly, finally she had been provided with some clothes that couldn't walk about on their own, simple trousers and a tunic style top. Not as comfortable as jeans and a t-shirt but definitely better than three day old school uniform. Or was it four days? She quickly gave up trying to figure it out and, making her way to the clearing where the dragons had circled overhead the previous day, she was greeted by a magnificent sight. In the clearing, filling the clearing in fact was an enormous dragon, much bigger than Pandra. Alona was climbing down from its back and she patted its huge, scaly side as she reached the ground.

"Good morning Iyla," she said brightly, "Meet Nuriel, my dragon."

Iyla hesitated and Alona smiled warmly, encouraging her forward, "She is fully grown, that's why she is so much bigger than your dragon. There is no need to be afraid, she will not hurt you,"

Alona winked, "Unless I ask her to."

Iyla gave a nervous smile and approached the dragon. She really was huge, with a body the size of a large car. Strong muscles bulged under her tough hide, she had four powerful legs with dangerous looking talons and a long sweeping tail with sharp spikes running down its length and a particularly evil looking collection of larger spikes at the end of it. Her neck was long and slender and despite the scales and spikes, the overall impression was one of grace. Nuriel looked down at Iyla, her amber eyes suggesting great intelligence, and Iyla did not feel afraid. The dragon shifted her weight slightly and stretched out her wings, taking down a few surrounding trees as she did so.

A small crowd of Elfin children had gathered and they all ducked and scattered as the great wings spread wide. Iyla marvelled at their structure, like bats wings but, much, much bigger with thin leathery skin that stretched over what looked like long boney fingers, stretched so tight that the sunlight shone through it, highlighting the vast network of blood vessels within. Nuriel tucked her wings in once more and gave a yawn, managing to look thoroughly bored with all the fuss and attention that the Elfin children were now giving her. With her wings out of the way, they had regained their confidence and were clambering all over her tail which she gave a gentle flick, sending them rolling giggling onto the soft grass.

"The children always used to love it when dragons come to the forest," Alona said, "It hasn't happened for such a long time and even then it didn't happen often, dragon fire and trees aren't the best of combinations."

"How long has Nuriel been with you?" Iyla asked.

"Twenty years now," Alona said with fondness, "Dragons who had already been connected to their tamers stayed with them when you left, we hid ourselves well of course, but our presence was a deterrent to Kade, because of the risk to him from dragon fire. The Chandak took any eggs they knew of and hid, and young dragons disappeared with them. No-one new has felt a connection to a dragon since you disappeared Iyla, now people of all ages across our world are waking up to find they have always been Dragon Tamers, and their dragons are seeking them out."

Iyla smiled at the thought, remembering her own shock when she had first seen Pandra, "I bet that's come as quite a surprise to a few people." she said. She took a moment to look Nuriel over, comparing her to Pandra. The size difference was obvious of course but they did not look the same. As far as she could tell, from those that she'd seen yesterday, all dragons looked different to one another, just as people did.

"Why do they change colour?" Iyla asked. It was something she'd noticed with Pandra on occasion and now she could see that Nuriel, who had been a bluish shade of grey when she'd arrived, was taking on a more earthen green complexion.