A Dance of Flames

Finding a cave was easier said than done. I had to be sure the cave I found wouldn't be covered by a mudslide. These mountains looked pretty bare of trees so I had to be careful. And with the ground being so dry, I had to watch for mud, or flooding. Yeah, a good shelter is hard to come by, especially when it comes to mountains during bad weather. I ran as fast as I dared without dropping the dragon, diamond, or crystal mace/scepter.

When I got to the base of the closest mountain, I found a cave a few feet above ground. Still no trees, but it would have to do. I hefted the dragon up onto the ledge before climbing up myself. I got the two of us into the cave and laid against a stalagmite with the dragon on top of me.

I would have tried to start a fire, but with no wood, it wouldn't do any good to even try. I wrapped my arms around the dragon. Though, I couldn't tell who was trying to warm up who. The dragon was incredibly warm, even if it was wet. Soon, I fell asleep, forgetting to take off my wet clothes.

The next morning, I woke to the sounds of grunting. I looked down to see the dragon trying to remove my arms without waking me, but was having a hard time doing so. When I saw what it was trying to do, I let it go. The dragon jumped up and spun around to look at me. When it saw me, it's eyes widened. We started at each other for what seemed like hours. Then I broke the silence by saying. "Uh, Hi there?" I say a little nervously.

It looked around before picking up the mace and diamond. "Is… this for me?" It asked looking at the diamond. It's voice was female and based on the way it's body was shaped, this was a female dragon.

"Uh, I mean, I don't know where I am or the value of that thing so… screw it. Go ahead." I said waving her to go ahead and- *CRUNCH* She… she just took a bite out of the diamond like it was an apple. What. The. Fuck.

"Mmm, thanks. I really needed that." She said after finishing off the diamond, licking her fingers. I was still brain dead. She just ate a record breaking diamond. I mean, breaking a diamond is almost impossible, but Jesus fucking Crist, how the hell can she eat diamond?! "Are… are you okay?" She asked.

I wheezed for a few seconds before finally finding my voice. "You… ate… diamond… like… nothing. But wha-? How-?" Then I fainted.

(POV shift: Ember.)

I watched as the creature slumped over, fainting. Guess he's never seen a dragon eat diamond before, based on what he was trying to say. I walked closer to the creature and looked him over. He was tall, most likely bipedal, had no fur or scales, a kind of flat face compared to most of the species that live on Equis, he had hair on top of his head and on his face that was a fiery red.

A few spots were around his face and he had a piece of cloth around his neck. It had the image of a blue dragon spitting orange red flames. I reached a claw out and cupped one of his… things. It was very soft compared to my scales. The tips had a harder part on top. He had two and each one had five… extensions that had the hard tip.

He had a shirt and pants on but the pants had pockets. I reached into one and took out something that felt like leather. I opened it up to see green parchment, a few cards made of a material I don't know of. One had a miniature picture of the creature in front of me but a lot younger.

I closed it and put it back before going to the exit of the cave. My wing was fine, my scales protecting me fairly well. The shock of it though was what made me fall. I was about to take off when my thoughts went back to the creature. He had saved me, fed me, and what would I do in return? Abandon it. Guilt began to claw at my heart before I got an idea.

I raised the Dragon Scepter and began to focus on calling a dragon. A few minutes later, a rather large green dragon with light green scales comes flying down into the cave. "You called for me Dragon Lord Ember?" She asked.

"Yes Emerald, I need you to carry him back to my horde." I tell her. She raised an eyebrow and looked to the creature that was still fainted. Emerald raised an eyebrow and nudged the creature.

"This scrawny piece of meat? I fail to see how useful he shall be." I glared at her and she shrugged, picking him up with a claw and setting him on her back. Together, we flew back to the Dragon Lands and to my horde. Emerald set him down on a pile of gold coins before leaving.

I sat next to the creature and played with his hair. It wasn't like pony hair as it was slightly coarse. It actually felt pretty good against my scales. A few minutes later, he began to awaken. "Wakey, Wakey, Sleepy head." I teased as I stood. He groaned and sat up, rubbing his back. It was then that I saw he had been laying on a rather pointy gem, that now had some dark red blood on it. I winced as he removed his hand from his back and saw it had some blood on it.

I went behind him and saw his shirt now had blood stains. He removed his shirt and wrapped it around him, putting pressure on the wound. "I'm so sorry, I didn't know that the gem was there." I said apologetically. He turned to me and took a few deep breaths before saying.

"It's- It's alright. I don't think it'll get infected. Um, who are you? And where am I?" He asked looking around my cave that was lit up by lava falls. Lava poured from the walls into a canal outside that led to pools of lava.

"You are in the Dragon Lands or more specifically, my Horde. I am Dragon Lord Ember, and what is the name of my savior?" I ask as I stood once more.

"Um, it's Richard, Richard Morrow. But most just call me Rick." He said as he tried to stand but slid down the mountain of gold to the bottom where he stumbled to his feet. I glided down and landed beside him.

"You alright?" I asked looking up at him. He was a whole head taller than me, but I was used to that.

"Uh, yeah. It's just, I've never talked or even seen a real dragon before." He said looking at me, or more specifically my claws and teeth nervously.

"Really? Well what about that cloth around your neck, with the dragon." I said pointing it out.

"I had gotten this for my birthday. I think the reason I have never seen a dragon before is because I'm now in a different world." He explained. My eyes widened at that, if that was true, then the pony comic books had it wrong about what aliens looked like. Spike had shared some with me, and I had taken a liking to them. I had them hidden in the back of my horde so nodragon could see them.

"Well then, let me be the first to welcome you to the world of Equus." I said smiling. In the back of my mind, I was hoping he didn't have mind control powers or a hidden laser gun.

"Well, thanks. I guess. So, your a leader of this world? Guess I can't make that joke." He chuckled a bit. Now I was curious, what was the joke he was going to say.

"What is the joke?" I ask, tilting my head to the side.

"In movies back on my world, the aliens would say, 'Take me to your leader Earthlings.' or something like that." He had made his voice sound as high pitch as possible when he said 'Take me to your leader Earthlings.' I looked at him and giggled.

"Heh, that does sound pretty funny. Anyway, I'm just one of the leaders, if you can call me that. There is King Thorax, the King of the Changelings. Queen Novo and Princess Skystar, the rulers of the Hippogriffs/Seaponies. Princess Celestia, Princess Luna, and Princess Twilight, the rulers of Equestria. Princess Cadence and Prince Shining Armor, the rulers of the Crystal Empire. Lord Rutherford, ruler of the Yaks. There are some others, but can't think of them off the top of my head at the moment.

He blinked at the amount of rulers there are. "That's just… wow. The only Royalty I have ever met were ancient dead ones in tombs and temples."

"Tombs? Temples? So your kinda like Daring Do?" I asked a little excited. Rainbow Dash had introduced me to the stories and I was instantly hooked on them. The books were hidden along with my comic books.

"If that's this world's version of Indiana Jones, then yes. I suppose you could say that." I squealed in excitement before realizing I had done that in front of him. I blushed and rubbed the back of my head.

"Hehe, sorry about that. I've never met somedragon that does things like that and I got a little, uh, what does Pinkie call it? Fanfilly? I don’t know.” He chuckled and waved it off.

“It’s fine, I’ve met a few of my fans and they had the same reaction you did.” I nodded in understanding.

“So what adventures have you gone on?” I asked like a whelp getting to eat a gem for the first time.

“Hmm, well, there was this ancient Aztec Temple. I had accidentally set off one of the few traps that still functioned and found myself trapped inside with less than ideal supplies. Food to last me the night, some Rope, a Flare gun, and a Canteen. I had packed light as I thought it was going to be a, ‘Get in, take a look, then get out.’ kinda deal. So, using what little knowledge of the Aztec architecture I had, I knew there had to be another way out.” We took a seat on some gold and he continued his tale while I listened in earnest.

I was so transfixed, that I didn’t notice the dragon enter my cave. “Ha, what the heck is that? Some kind of furless monkey?” Said a quite annoying voice. I groaned upon hearing it.

“What do you want Garble?” I asked, annoyance clear in my voice. Too bad Garble was too thick headed to hear it.

“There was talk about some new creature you found, and I wanted to see it. But if that,” He pointed at Richard. “Is all it is, then I’m outta here. But first, think fast!” Garble yelled, throwing a lava ball at Richard. Richard put his hands up and to all of our surprise, the lava ball hit him but he was completely unharmed. He had told me he had burned himself on multiple occasions, but that was usually when he was trying to make a fire in the wilderness and it was a very minor burn.

Richard looked over himself and seeing there wasn’t any damage, grinned viciously. “Alright, my turn.” Richard went right up to Garble and to my shock, and slight joy, punched him right in the face. Garble stumbled back in pain as he held his muzzle. When he removed his hands, a few teeth were missing with blood leaking from his nostrils. Richard quickly moved behind Garble then put him into a sturdy head lock.

“Surrender yet ya red fuck?” Richard growled as he tightened his hold, making it hard for Garble to breath.

“N- Nev- ack! Okay, okay, I surrender!” Richard threw Garble to the floor and glared at him.

“Next time, I’ll show you what a human can really do when you piss ‘em off. Now get you bleeding varmint.” He said kicking Garble towards the exit in a voice reminding me of that orange pony with that hat. Garble weakly stood and limped outside. He then turned to me with a sorry look. “Sorry you had to see that, I just hate it when someone disrespects someone else.” I smiled and responded.

“It’s fine, dragons are used to small fights but next time, try not to actually hurt them. Most of the time it’s just two dragons seeing who is stronger, not actual violence.” He looked at me and smiled sheepishly, rubbing the back of his next. I couldn’t help but think. ‘How can he be so adorable?’ I had to blink mentally at that. ‘Why did I think that?’

“Heh, heh, didn’t know that. I’ll be sure not to mess his bread and butter up too bad next time.”

Meanwhile with Garble and Smolder…

“A- And then, he began choking me. I honestly thought I was gonna die.” Garble said looking at his shaking claws.

“It’s alright Gar-Gar. Now you know not to piss him off. Still, if that creature can take you down, I hate to imagine making a real enemy of him. It’s best if you try to make things up with him.” Smolder said rubbing Garble’s back. “I know it seems like a pony thing, but trust me, it’s better to have friends than enemies.” Garble nodded at that, agreeing with Smolder’s logic.

“I hate it when what they teach you at pony school makes sense.” Garble grumbled. Smolder just giggled and playfully punched his shoulder.

“Come on Gar-Gar, let’s go talk to this Richard thing.” Garble let his younger sister drag him to Ember’s hoard, really not wanting to meet Richard again.