A War Of Traitors( ARTK, Book 2)

Chapter 185+186

Ferdrar 3rd, 3330 A.G

Maude ran her fingers over the old, crumbling pages and sighed. No matter who the lord or lady, king or queen was- there would always be books shoved in the corner of a library somewhere that desperately needed to be copied. She'd done a few on her own back at House Beckett, but none of the others had been so bad they were becoming dust. The same could not be said of these. How old were they? Four hundred? Were some over a thousand years old- from when the dragons still lived?

  In that case, she could only be proud of their resilience and angry at those who were supposed to care for them beforehand. How many years did they have left without her? One? Five?

  Maude pulled her hair up and twisted it into a bun, too annoyed to be bothered with a braid. She took the tie from her wrist and secured it before her eyes drifted back to that small bookshelf. With her status as the young warrior and a spot on the queen's council she could easily send for Fenthos devotees to travel to House Tomhend. Perhaps she'd do that too, but it was more imperative the information in those books be committed to her memory and written down.

  She opened the first, so old it's title had rubbed off and the binding had detached. Many of the words were unreadable, the pages all different shades of yellow and brown- but some of it could be made out.

  ...It is known that at the times of their deaths, the dragons Aythos and Paddos both had eggs left to hatch. The numbers are still a source of confusion, however- as written word was not common during this time. Multiple books claim Aythos had over a dozen eggs left to hatch, while Paddos had just two or three- yet all but two of these sources were written over a hundred years afterwards( if the timeline is to be believed). Some believe the skeleton at dragon's grave belongs to Nyrandith while others insist it must be Aythos- and others would swear to each of the gods that it and the old egg belong to Vaelaynth, a massive red beast who hatched from one of Aythos's eggs.

  Maude yawned. So the first one was nothing special, at least. She'd read different versions of the story a hundred times. At least this author had included each of the legends. Maude flipped a page.

  ...and as a result, the grandfather or great grandfather of Ashhwood( the first Ashhand known by name, the language as to which ancestor it was is unclear) became Vaelaynth's rider.

  The gods had to be playing some sort of joke. The only unreadable words on that page had to be the ones that said how the queen's ancient ancestor became a dragon rider? Maude took a deep breath and calmly flipped to the next page.

  It is known that Vaelaynth's rider tried to cross the short sea on dragon back with the belief that flying far above it would protect him, but what happened during and afterwards is unknown. Multiple sources claim a horrid storm took them down, but others say it were only the rider who fell and drowned. On top of that, other accounts swear they saw the dragon flying over Bracari soon after- but none of those records confirm if he had a rider or not......

  Maude was forced to flip another page as the words became one blur of ink.

  I would not dare to dishonor Fenthos by guessing what happened and spreading disinformation to the masses, but might I suggest something?  We have physical evidence of the dragon's existence- at dragon's grave. Dragonshore claims to be a village where the last living dragon was spotted close to fifteen hundred years ago, and there are ample accounts to confirm this- so why can we as humans not be satisfied by this? Why must we poke around for information the gods did not deem us fit to receive? If it were meant for our eyes, we would not have to search each and every corner of the world.....