Prolouge
Adelaide
A thousand years ago, dragons agreed to take human form. Today they hold a secret meeting.
“Adelaide!” Mr. Powell’s irritated voice dragged Adelaide’s consciousness back to the land of the living. He sighed inwardly. He didn’t know what to do with the girl. She was quite truly one of the brightest students he had, if she could be persuaded to get her head out of the clouds.
“Miss. Havenall, as a English professor it is my job to encourage the imagination of my students, however, I must draw the line at day dreams that border upon sleep. Please, pay attention from now on.”
Adelaide nodded. A blush rose to cover her whole face. She was sure she had turned as red as a tomato.
It wasn’t as if she meant to daze off. She’d been a day dreamer since she could remember. She was constantly in her own little thoughts. She couldn’t explain it. She just saw things in her mind’s eye sometimes.
Incredible things, like the top of a mountain. How the snowy caps shone, like they had been layered with diamonds, in the early morning sun, almost blinding in their brightness. She could perfectly describe what the view from the treetops of the Redwoods would look like..
The best and also most terrifying was that she was sure she could feel in her fantasies. She could feel the cool wind whipping around her as she sliced through the sky, the heat of the sun beating on her back as she sunbathed in the woods, and the harsh sting of the sea as she sped over it. She couldn’t explain why she felt, she just did.
Her family and friends had told her that she had a great imagination and should put it to good use. This was why she was at university, studying English Literature and apparently failing. To be fair, it wasn’t as if she wasn’t trying, but lately her minds wanderlust had gotten extremely bad. She shook her head, twenty years old and still fantasizing like a six year old.
“Alright, for your homework, I want you to open a dictionary and use the first word you see as the first word in a scene. Get it done before the end of week. Dismissed.”
The class filed out and Adelaide with it. She pondered the thought that had entered her head during class.
Dragons are having a secret meeting... What on earth had made her think about dragons? She tilted her head up, yearning for the sky.
Cadeyrn
The king watched in silent disgust as the elders squabble before him. For magnificent creatures such as them to have fallen into such a pitiable state made him sick. They may have forgotten what they used to be, but he could never.
“If we keep to ourselves as usual, then those useless shiny bastards won’t know where we’ve gone.” Said one.
“You dolt head!” Screamed another. “They have a mass of power not to mention money.”
The king clenched his jaw at that. He had spent at least half his life atoning for his father’s spend thrift ways. He had gathered for his kingdom more wealth than humanly possible, yet to the old lizards it was still not enough.
“The most pressing issue to us right now is not the Paladins,” Archibald, perhaps the most sensible of the elders, fumed, “We’ve been searching for The Flame for centuries. It’s time to accept the truth. It’s been snuffed out, and soon we will be too.”
“Liar! We have been here for thousands of years and so it shall continue.”
He contemplated the man who said that. Henry, one of the oldest. As he surveyed this once paragon he could see nothing of his former self, just a fat, old man blinded by tradition and greed. Henry was refusing to see the truth of why they were having this meeting after so long. Or if he did see it, he refused to admit it. They were dying out. Only by finding the Flame would they be able to regain their numbers and strength. However, that hope was dwindling...
The doors flew open as a young warrior glided in. His scales glinted in the faint light, ever shifting between green and blue. His eyes were an electric blue that glowed in the darkness of the room.
He landed and his form began to grow bright. Then, with a deep breath he changed his form into that of a human.
Gone were the scales, wings, and claws, replaced by flesh, blond hair, and perfectly trimmed nails. Only the glowing blue eyes remained.
“My liege.” He rasped. Still out of breath, transformation always did that.
“Squire.” The king replied in a bored tone.
“I wish to give you news about my errand.”
“Can it wait?”
“No.” He gave the king a meaningful look.
For a while the king just stared at him.
“Leave us.” He addressed to the others.
“But my-”
“Leave.”
The king stood up as the elders left. He walked down to his squire. Gave him a hard look and then clapped him on the shoulder.
“Quinlan.” He beamed, “I’m glad to see you in one piece.”
“Glad to be so, Cade,” Quinlan remarked, “suppose I dropped by in the nick of time, you looked ready to kill the lizards.”
“The temptation was there. The only one who’s worth keeping around is Archibald.” he sighed in resgination. “But in all seriousness, did you find it?”
Quinlan nodded and began his tale.
