Monday, March 16, 2015

Dwagone Tale

The evening was festive and fruitful as the townesfolke trekked from one shop to the other in the village of Dragonscourge. During a warm September evening, the masses scrambled about, fearing that the local merchants would run out of their desired prospective purchases. It was a time of year in which business owners thrived, and customers struggled, traipsing through the streets and alleyways under lustrous lights hung in a phantasmagoric display all over Towne in celebration of the annual Dragon Sacrifice.

Many young ones grew up with fictional tales of olden times concerning the mythical beings that have prospered centuries ago and numbered by the thousands, but have since gone extinct. The legends have been foretold from parent to child and from generation to generation. As with any story spread through word of mouth, embellishment had tainted large swathes of the lore. Eventually, the adulteration begot the most fabled of all the Dragon Narratives: the downing of the Regal Beast herself by accidental hero Raman ad-Dahh
ān. 

After the story became sufficiently embedded into the fabric of the Country, given a hundred or so years of its supposed occurrence, its Elders decided to commemorate the epic slaying that put an end to an entire ancient species in the form of a great party with tantalizing music, colored lights and a plethora of goods to sell.

The
Dahhān Clan, however, knew fully well that their ancestor committed no such act of bravery, as there was no written record nor any material proof confirming the heroic act. Yet its members were quick to embrace the legend with fervor, hoping to gain countless riches and other perquisites. Thus, they kept the secret among themselves and vowed to designate a single Keeper in each generation to entrust him or her with it, and to hide it from the rest of the Clan.

One young
Dahhān happened to traverse the town square with her father in a hurry; many sellers were retiring for the evening and they were still one item short.

“Your father will have my head surely if we’re not back with a malignant squirrel stomach,” said Raman “Rami” al-
Dahhān XII in an attempt to push his daughter to make haste, as he did not like to keep his spouse waiting for long.

“That’s what you say every year in which you venture out for a last-minute addition to our pantry,” replied 11-year-old Ferian with bitter nonchalance. She was arbitrarily recruited for this mission all the while her older sibling had the good fortune of staying behind to help their father concoct the glorious feast-to-be.

“If only those dimwitted dragons were still here, we wouldn’t be blinded by lights and made to sweat like a common pig,” she continued with a sigh.

“Now, child,” Rami raised his voice with restrained objection, “if we weren’t in such dire need to wisely dispense our scarce time, I’d tell you to mind your foolish words, as you must maintain and be proud of our familial legacy.”

The two carried on in silence entering the last shop to remain open. Unbeknownst to them, a large lurking figure monitored their every move from the top of a dark table mountain. It had been a mere hour since she began to trail them, yet her tortured soul felt as if several eternities had passed by. She gazed at them with sheer contempt, plotting and perusing her mind for sadistic methods of murder, resisting the urge to torch the entire village of vermin.

The Regal Beast had her fill of watching and readied her mighty, pointed wings for flight. She took one last glance before the
Dahhāns disappeared into a small shop, inhaling and exhaling an air of pure vengeance. As she hovered away back to the hole whence she came, the Great Amber Dwagone resolved to make her existence known to the world once more sooner than later.