Bound To The Dragon Who Dreamed Of Me

Vaelrion Rhaziel — Aethrakar, centuries before Lyra’s birth

On the night his mother died, Crown Prince Vaelrion was arguing with his best friend about a cracked practice sword. The weapon lay across the council table, its edge ruined by a blow Tharok Virex insisted had been perfectly fair. Beyond the high windows, dragons circled Aethrakar’s mountain spires, their scales flashing copper and blue through the evening mist.

“You struck the stone pillar,” Vaelrion said, inspecting the blade. “The pillar won. I cannot imagine why you expect sympathy.”

Tharok grinned. “A wise prince would have moved it out of my way.”

“A wise prince would appoint a different second-in-command.”

“You’ve threatened that since we were boys. I’ll believe it when you find someone willing to tolerate you.”

King Rhaziel entered before Vaelrion could reply. He wore no crown, only the dark armor he favored when walking among his soldiers. Though his reign had endured a thousand years, he still remembered the names of the stable hands and visited wounded warriors himself. His son had learned more about kingship from those visits than from any council lesson.

“Leave the sword,” Rhaziel told them. “Your mother wishes to see you before the child comes. She says the two of you have spent enough hours pretending a broken weapon is a matter of state.”

Vaelrion smiled. Queen Aelthira had been tired throughout the pregnancy, but that morning she’d taken his hand and described the little sister she hoped would inherit his stubbornness and none of his temper. He had promised to teach the child to fly when she was old enough. His mother had laughed and reminded him that first she would have to learn to walk.

Their laughter still lingered in Vaelrion’s thoughts when a scream tore through the palace. The sound struck him with such force that he dropped the sword. Rhaziel was already running, and together they reached the birthing chamber as healers rushed through its doors. Blood stained the white stone near the threshold. No one would meet their king’s eyes.

“Tell me,” Rhaziel ordered. His voice was steady, but his hands had begun to shake.

The eldest healer lowered her head. “Queen Aelthira exhausted her fire bringing the princess into the world. We could not restore it, Your Majesty. And the child…”

She could not finish. Vaelrion pushed past her and found his mother beneath blood-darkened sheets, her silver-black hair spread across the pillow. Beside her lay a tiny bundle wrapped in velvet. Lyrielle, the sister he’d already imagined carrying through the gardens, had never taken a breath.

Rhaziel knelt by the bed and laid his forehead against Aelthira’s motionless hand. The king who had ended wars with a word made a broken sound Vaelrion would carry through every century that followed. Tharok stood at the doorway, unable to offer comfort, and Vaelrion hated him briefly for witnessing a grief he could neither hide nor survive unchanged. The fire within Vaelrion rose in a violent rush, demanding an enemy, a target, anything he could reduce to ash. He forced it down because the healers were still trembling at the doorway, and they had done everything they could.

Seven days later, the bells of mourning were still ringing when the council gathered. Every banner in the Hall of Embers hung black, and beneath them stood generals, healers, keepers of ancient law, and clan leaders who had crossed half the kingdom to attend. Aelthira had been the last living female dragon known to their race. Her daughter’s death meant there was no longer even the promise of another generation.

Dragonkind had been failing for centuries. Fewer mate bonds awakened each generation, and no female hatchlings had survived in living memory. Dragons were each born for one destined mate; when the bond finally called, distance and denial could not silence it. Losing that mate often shattered the survivor. Some died within months, their fire guttering away, while others lived on in unbearable pain until grief turned their magic against everyone nearby.

And there were those who had never found their mates at all. Their centuries stretched longer, lonelier, and sometimes crueler, until the longing became an illness their healers scarcely understood. Vaelrion had seen soldiers plead for an honorable death after their minds began to fracture. He had seen others recover enough to serve their clans again, only to relapse when hope seemed furthest away. He himself had never felt the call of a mate. For years he had pretended it was a small sacrifice beside the privilege of serving his people.

A map of the southern world lay open before the council. Far beneath the ice of the continent humans would one day call Antarctica stood the White Exile, a fortress bound by runes and guarded against escape. Murderers and traitors were sent there, but so were dragons whose unstable fire endangered villages. Some had gone willingly, begging to be confined before they hurt someone they loved.

Vaelrion remembered sentencing a warrior who had destroyed a watchtower during a violent unraveling. The warrior had accepted his chains without argument, asking only that his family be told he had tried to resist the madness. At the time, Vaelrion had believed the punishment necessary; he still did. Yet he could not forget the male’s face when the gates closed, or the unsettling knowledge that no one could promise the exiles would ever be released.

“How many more can we imprison?” Tharok asked quietly, standing beside him. “The fortress was built to contain criminals, not the slow collapse of our people.”

“I know.” Vaelrion kept his eyes on the map. “And I will not turn dangerous dragons loose among families simply because confinement breaks my heart. There must be another answer.”

King Rhaziel rose from the throne. A week without his mate had hollowed his face, and silver fractures of uncontrolled fire ran beneath the skin of his hands. Every dragon in the hall recognized the signs. A king was not exempt from the laws of a severed bond.

“My queen is dead,” Rhaziel said. “My daughter is dead. If we continue as we are, our children will inherit nothing but empty halls and names carved into stone. I will not ask this kingdom to call extinction dignity.”

He turned toward Morwenna, the witch whose silver eyes had watched three kings take their crowns. Her staff struck the floor once, and the hall’s ceremonial flames bent toward her as though listening.

“There is an enchantment,” she said. “Deep sleep will preserve the fire in your blood and still the decline of your bodies. Those who enter will endure until the waking call passes through the old magic. It may take centuries. It may take longer.”

“Will it cure us?” a clan elder demanded.

“No,” Morwenna answered. “It buys time for a future none of us can yet see. The sleepers may dream, and some dreams will be cruel. Nor can I promise that all who close their eyes will open them again.”

A low argument spread through the chamber. Vaelrion watched frightened faces turn toward him, searching for an heir who would tell them their king had found the right answer. He wanted to refuse the spell, to order the forges blazing and the healers back to work. Instead, he saw his mother’s still hands and understood how little strength mattered when the thing killing his people could not be struck with a sword.

“Then we give them time,” Vaelrion said. His voice carried to the furthest pillars. “Not because sleep is victory, but because our people deserve the chance to live long enough to find one.”

Morwenna studied him with an expression he could not read. “The enchantment has a condition. A dreamer beyond the sleeping realm must one day reach its heart. When that voice is heard, the first seal will break. I cannot tell you who will call, or what the waking will demand.”

“Then I will be ready when the call comes,” Vaelrion replied. “But the sanctuaries need guardians, and the exiles cannot be left to starve behind their walls. Who remains awake?”

“I do,” Rhaziel said.

Vaelrion turned sharply. “Father, the loss of Mother is already hurting you. You cannot carry the vigil alone.”

“I do not intend to.” Rhaziel looked toward Tharok. “The wardens will remain at their posts, and those appointed to guard the sanctuaries will be exempt from the spell. Tharok has volunteered to command them until the prince wakes.”

Vaelrion faced his oldest friend. Tharok’s usual humor had vanished, replaced by a resolve that hurt more than any argument. They had trained together, buried comrades together, and planned the kingdom they would one day build. Now one would sleep while the other endured an unknown span of years.

“You could join us,” Vaelrion said.

“And wake to discover your enemies had stolen every crown while I snored beside you?” Tharok managed a thin smile. “Someone must ensure you still have a kingdom worth arguing over.”

When the council dispersed, Vaelrion followed his father to the balcony overlooking the mountain fires. Far below, families gathered around the ceremonial braziers, comforting frightened children and carrying supplies toward the sleeping sanctuaries. Rhaziel watched them with the concentration of a male committing every face to memory.

“I thought protecting them meant never retreating,” Vaelrion admitted. “I sentenced those who frightened us, defended borders that might not exist when I wake, and still I could not protect Mother or Lyrielle. How can I ask them to trust me?”

Rhaziel gripped his shoulder. “Because you remember the names of those you condemn. Because you grieve the ones you cannot save. A king without mercy becomes a tyrant, but a king who cannot act when others are threatened is no king at all. You must learn to carry both truths.”

“Will you be here when I wake?”

His father looked toward the darkening peaks. For a long moment, he seemed unable to answer. “I will do everything within my power to keep our people safe,” he said at last, drawing Vaelrion into the embrace he had denied himself since the funeral.

The ritual began before dawn. Vaelrion lay upon a slab of black stone while Morwenna traced molten runes around his hands and throat. Beyond the chamber doors, thousands of dragons surrendered to the same terrible stillness; cities quieted, wingbeats faded, and Aethrakar’s great fires sank to embers. Tharok stood beside the doorway with his sword drawn in salute, while Rhaziel remained at his son’s side until the last seal began to close.

Vaelrion tried to memorize their faces. He thought of his mother laughing in the gardens, his sister who had never seen the sky, and the prisoners beneath the southern ice who would wake to another day without answers. There were still so many wrongs to mend, so many lives he had sworn to protect. Sleep crept through his bones, heavy and merciless, and his final thought was not of a crown, but of the people who had trusted him with their future.

The kingdom fell silent. Somewhere beyond its guarded borders, the world continued turning, indifferent to the dragons beneath the stone. And deep within the enchanted sleep, Vaelrion waited for a voice he did not know existed.