A Dragon's Dream

Gold, rivers of it, flowed above him, each scale glittering in the light of thunder. Naqessa’s neck wove its way in front of Amisar, coming to a stop in front of Gostir. A deafening roar then rang out, Naqessa’s voice seeming to force Gostir back.

Falling to his knees, Amisar smiled as he grasped his cold, blood stained hand.

“Hello, sister.”

The roar eventually came to an end as Gostir backed away with his back against his hoard. Two additional roars then rang outside as Amisar felt his two other sisters approaching. Gostir was at this point creating holes in the ground from his claws gripping it too hard.

A duo of huge tremors then rang out. At Amisars left side, a torrent of green flame tore through the left side of the cave, collapsing it partially. Through the flames, the form of Drivessa appeared like a shadow, driving a spike of fear through Gostir as the she-dragon advanced out of the emerald shroud. Her scales, like Naqessa’s, were forged anew, having regained the iridescent shine of her youth. Eventually, she came to a stop, her head just behind Naqessa, eying the ‘king’ with hunger.

Immediately after to Amisars right, the cave was lit up by a white flame, licks of amethyst purple on the edges. The glow from it unintendedly made the two other she-dragons shine that much brighter when Karessa's slender neck crossed the threshold. She was akin to a serpent sometimes, not that I'd say that openly, Amisar thought. She walked slowly, methodically, turning her head at different angles as she eyed her surroundings before coming to a stop at her sisters’ side. Watching Gostir, studying him.

Using Naqessa’s wing as a brace, Amisar slowly rose to his feet and grasped the gauntlet at his side. He felt an overwhelming amount of relief from the appearance of his sisters, his fear seeming to wash away. Straightening his back, he rose to his full height.

“So,” He began. “What was that you were saying? About being a god?”

Gostir's gaze stayed on his sisters.

“What are they?”

“At least have the courtesy of asking ‘who’, wyrm.” Amisar spat. “You stand before Naqessa of the dawn, Drivessa the just and Karessa the magnificent. Dragons, all, and my sisters for that matter.”

The wyrm snorted in disgust. “Dragons? They are beasts! The light of the keepers is absent from all of you!”

Amisar’s eyes seemed to grow darker. “Careful, wyrm. I’m giving you one final chance. See reason and surrender, leave this place and swear never to come near my sisters again.”

Gostir’s jaw clenched.

“You would not survive, Gostir. The gods have etched our names into our bones, but it’s up to us to decide what they mean to both ourselves and others.”

“And what gods would that be, ape?!”

“The fourteen flames, the fathers and mothers of Valyria.”

The dragonlord extended his hand, as if grasping something.

“In the beginning, there was a void and within that void, a single egg. That egg, when cracked by lightning, was thrown open and gave birth to our world.”

Amisar lifted and motioned to his left and right respectively. “The one half had little land yet a bottomless ocean, the other, endless land and little in terms of seas.”

He then held his hands together as Gostir looked on. “But most importantly, out of this egg rose fourteen great volcanoes. The fourteen flames they were called and from them rose the gods, one for each flame.”

“The first and mightiest, Arrax, the father of-”

“Enough!” Gostir interrupted, his eyes full of rage. “I will not sit idly by and watch you preach such blasphemy! I am Gostir, the ancient scourge of the Everfree and Zawanda! You and your beasts are an affront to the keepers and I’d sooner die than suffer another second in your presence!”

Amisar’s hands dropped, sighing as he looked at the wrathful wyrm. “You are hopelessly outmatched. Leave and live, or burn. I only want what is rightfully mine.”

Gostir's tail suddenly swung out and threw part of his horde in all directions in the cave. Gold and jewels of all sorts clanked and echoed across the grotto. Falling within cracks and crevices it looked akin to snowfall as wealth untold glittered between the opposing dragons.

“I am not so meek to submit to an ape. I am their hammer!”

Gostir’s claws clenched and drove into the ground.

“I am the tip of their spear!”

His eyes dilated as he focused on the coins strewn about him.

“I am death!”

Suddenly the emerald wyrm threw his head up and let out a roar so loud that Amisar and his sisters all flinched. Gostir’s frills grew longer and his teeth sharper. His wings doubled in size and soon the rest of his followed as bones creaked and meat shifted.

Amisar could not believe his eyes at what he was seeing but nonetheless maintained focus. He shifted his gaze to his sisters and saw them all baring their teeth with their eyes focused squarely on the wyrm’s neck.

“I wonder,” he whispered to himself with a wolfish grin, “are you three as hungry as I am?”

Positive. Hunger. Thirst. His mind was suddenly filled with their emotions. Their needs.

Gostir’s roar slowly was drawn to an end and fell into heavy breathing. The fat wyrm was thus replaced by a behemoth rivaling Naqessa. His claws and teeth were made sharper, his wings more muscled. Even his scales were turned into a new sheen akin to his sisters.

Amisar leered at the feral creature before him. Gone were the calculating eyes and arrogant attitude. What stood before him was a beast, unthinking for anything more than blood. Amisar counted down the seconds in his head and weighed the chances of defeat. The wyrm was large and fierce that much he could tell at least. It was clearly something unnatural, a creation of blood by these so called ‘keepers.’

Suddenly however the thoughts in his head crashed like waves upon a cliff when a single word echoed through his mind.

Death.

Amisar’s eyes turned to Drivessa, her emerald eye was staring back at him. Begging, thirsting, but more than anything craving his safety like the sweetest fruit.

He knew then that despite the wyrm’s wrath that experience was on his side and if that wasn't enough then the love between the four of them would protect them.

After all… this wasn't the first time his sisters had fought another of their kind.

Breathing in and focusing back on Gostir he saw the wyrm rise to take off. Amisar thus steeled himself and uttered a single word as he put his gauntlet back on.

“Dracarys.”

The hulking frame of the monstrous wyrm wildly galloped forward with his wings flapping and striking the sides of the cave. Coming within a yard of the trio, Gostir’s eyes reflected a sudden onslaught of light.

White, green, blue and violet. A beautiful spiral of swerving colors that for a second blinded the wyrm. That is before throwing him back to the other side of the cave in a force unfelt by the wyrm since his youth. The wall crashed in around him as his wildly flailing limbs tried to regain balance. He had fallen on his back and his eyes were burned again whilst the two younger she-dragons advanced.

From where Amisar stood, the fact that the dragonlord had feared this beast made the man feel a deep regret, shame even. Shame that he would doubt his sisters. Shame that he believe that both he and his sisters, all children of Arrax would fall to this pitiful thing.

No longer would he doubt.

“Tear out his wings, sisters! Karessa, make him bleed, Drivessa, make him fear!”

The sisters roared with glee as their teeth gnashed against the flailing limbs of Gostir. The pale dragon then lunged past his neck, tearing off a chunk of flesh but quickly pulled back as a stray foreleg nearly caught her eye.

Drivessa then drew in her breath and released a torrent of fire, making the wyrm scream in panic and pain. Soon the green tide made his scaled hide pop open as his skin seemed to almost boil. The escaping blood from the wounds then made a horrific sizzling noise as the wyrm’s screams grew louder.

The torrent came to a quick close however as the wyrm finally rose off his back and whipped his tail into the ebony she-dragon jaw. Taking the strike and drawing back, Gostir opened his eyes to then see the winding neck of Karessa winding around his side as he suddenly felt a great pressure on his tail. Roaring and striking out he suddenly felt something snap and a great spike of pain followed.

Whimpering, the wyrm drew in his fire as Karessa devoured the ripped off half of Gostir’s tail. Unleashing a flood of fire and smoke, he blinded the two drakes. Hearing them draw in their breath used his forelegs to fling portions of his treasure into the she-dragons mouths and thus forced them to gag. Winding past the duo, great swaths of blood followed Gostir’s path as he passed the threshold of light surrounding the trio.

Amisar looked at the stumbling drake as both of his back legs were grabbed by the jaws of two quickly recovered sisters. His scales around his belly and chest were frayed by fire as his previously green hide had turned red and pink with boils covering the center of the wounds. Dotting his neck were Karessa’s bites that bled down his throat and made the wyrm cough blood as it roared.

Dear gods, he almost pitied the creature. Almost.

Suddenly however their grip on the wyrm faltered as the two sisters were beset by a foul stench. Flinching back, the two she–dragons narrowly avoided the defecations of a panicking wyrm. Amisar looked on in disgust as the feral Gostir left behind a trail of himself in both gore and feces.

The wyrm flailed its wings as it quickly ran towards the space left of Naqessa and Amisar. It had only one way of escaping left, Amisar thought, its wings remain unscathed. Hearing his thoughts, Naqessa responded accordingly.

Barreling past the two of them and but a half a dozen meters away from the precipice, Gostir extended his wings to their fullest. Just as his membrane caught the wind however, thunder lit up the chamber as the jaws of Naqessa ripped off the largest piece she could fit. It wasn’t much but it was enough to make the wyrm falter and his injured back legs soon were caught on the edge of the cave.

Gostir, rather than taking flight hurtled through the threshold and his frame, blanketed by thunder, tumbled down beyond sight. His screams echoed high throughout the mountain, they were bestial, afraid. Amisar held his breath as the screams continued until he felt a deep tremor in the earth. What followed were massive rockslides that flew past the cave entrance and down the mountain as several of the walls damaged in the battle cracked. Naqessa took quick action, calling to her sisters as they all gathered to cover their brother.

And thus, the mountain wept.

…

Amisar was surrounded by darkness. The rumbling and muffled noise of rocks falling on stone and scales had stopped and left him hacking up the dust leftover from the collapse. As the dust settled around him, all that was left was the sound of his own breathing and the steady rise and fall of his sister's stomachs above him.

“Sisters, are you alright?” The dragonlord asked in his native tongue, tinged in concern.

Yes. Never better. Rocks heavy.

The dragonlord’s gaze turned upward to the sound of shifting bodies and rocks. Naqessa tightened the makeshift chamber around him as further words and emotions jumbled his mind.

Worry. Okay? Hurt?

Amisar smiled at her concern. She knew the answer through our connection but the golden she-dragon was nothing if not protective and by the gods a worrywort, he thought.

“I'm alright, dear. You did well, all of you did.” Amisar smiled as he felt the happiness course through him from their connection.

Turning his gaze to his right as he saw movement in his periphery, he noticed the sudden appearance of a pair of eyes. Having such a long neck, Karessa had managed to wind her way inward, in between the sisters through a nock in Naqessa’s wings.

Her snout pushed gently against him as he chuckled at the middle child’s need for affirmation. Amisar could picture the almost human-like smugness that had no doubt tinged Karessa’s jaws. She gently chuffed and a wave or air blew against Amisar.

Impressed?

“Alright alright! I get it!” Amisar chuckled as he pushed back against the she-dragon, although to her it was no doubt just a gentle nudge. Straightening his back, he dramatically cleared his throat and swung his arms out. “Your fire was akin to pale moonlight on Meraxes Lights. You danced with elegance! You danced with gracefulness I say! Akin to a Rhoynish waterbender!” He swung his arms in different directions as he spoke.

As he finished, he slowly made his way up to the now purring she-dragon and traced her scales with his hand. Looking into her right eye, Amisar kissed her cheek and whispered to her.

“You were beautiful, my little moonlight.”

Love.

The dragonlord hummed, feeling the word and the feelings of both Karessa and her sisters wash over him. It felt like nothing else in the world existed at that moment. He felt fulfilled.

“I love you too, my sisters.”

The four of them settled into a comfortable silence as Amisar rested his weight against Karessa. The cold caress of blood loss was all lost, in its place came the warmth of love made manifest.

Amisar looked down upon his hand, the pain was gone. It meant one of two things he knew, he's either about to die or the magic of this place is so powerful that a wound would heal within minutes.

The dragonlord hummed, his senses shared amongst his sisters as they too grew curious of where they were. Amisar thus turned his attention upward.

“Drivessa, Karessa, display your indomitable strength. Free us from this tomb. We did not flee through a molten oblivion to die in this damp place. Rise, no mountain can hold your wings!”

Karessa's head retreated and Naqessa's chamber grew tighter as Drivessa shifted her immense weight. Soon thereafter rockd shifted and Karessa joined her younger sister in dislodging the piles of rock above them. A couple of particularly large ones, no doubt four times the size of Amisar shook the earth as they rolled off the trio.

If it weren't for Naqessa, I'd be dead right now, Amisar thought as he closed his eyes. He shivered a little at the thought of being crushed, the crunch of rock outside no doubt playing into his fear. It had dawned on him how close he had come to death, first in the caves, then to the wyrm and now to this.

Calm.

The feeling filled his mind, opening his eyes he saw that light had returned around him. The Inky blackness had been replaced by a smoky gray, clearer but dim. Yet even through the shroud he could see her, Naqessa. Two crystal blue eyes stared at him, into him. She slowly lowered Her head, gently caressing the dragonlord. Unlike Karessa’s previously playful nudging, this one was done with such precision that one could almost forget Naqessa could swallow a mammoth whole.

We're here for you.

The world stood still as the she-dragon manifested the words into the mind of the dragonlord. Amisar had never heard full sentences from her before. It had stunned him, he hadn't even registered that he instinctively had nuzzled back into her like used to as a child.

Forevermore.

“I was so scared-” Amisar whispered, the words falling out of his mouth. “When this place took away the connection I thought I had lost you, all of you.” His grip around her suddenly tightened as his warbled words hitched. “I thought I'd never see you again.”

Hush, brother.

Her words etched into his mind as he wept. To an outsider it would seem strange for a human to be grasping at a fully grown dragon whilst crying and speaking to himself, but for Amisar he heard every word and felt every thought. Eventually the two of them were joined by Karessa, and soon thereafter Drivessa. Both or the younger siblings leaning in to comfort their big brother.

We'll never leave you again.

The words were threefold as all three of the she-dragons spoke as one. And thus Amisar knew he would never lose them again. He promised himself there that he would never let that happen, by Arrax's will.

Sniffing and drying his tears, he rose to stand on his own as he lifted himself off of Naqessa. Amisar then looked around himself and noticed that all eyes were on him as his sisters had all surrounded him and pushed themselves gently up against him.

“Sorry-” He began, his voice slightly hoarse as he sniffed. “Your big brother is a bit of a softy It seems.” He chuckled to himself as the three sisters almost seemed to mentally roll their eyes at him. Nonetheless the she-dragons chuffed softly as they leaned into him before rising to stand.

As they rose, Amisar looked around himself, the cave was mostly intact, apart from a layer of rock that had covered almost everything. Strangely enough the hoard had remained mostly unharmed Amisar thought to himself. likely due to the increased integrity of the area the wyrm had for his magpie-like addiction.

“The wyrm can understand physics but not the sense to flee before three Valyrian she dragons.” Amisar said aloud as he frowned at the notion. “The fool.”

Walking gently over the fallen rocks, most of which were thankfully just pebbles, Amisar made his way toward the hoard. A Lot of it had been flung out and now lies buried beneath the rock and dust caused by the wyrm’s fall. To think that beneath his feet lie a horde that could buy him a dragonkeep three times over, he thought.

“Although I suppose it doesn't hold a finger the riches now buried beneath the ash and sea of Valyria.” Amisar muttered to himself before shuddering. “Or the bodies…”

Walking along the edge of the hoard, the dragonlord finally found what he was looking for. He bent down and in his left hand was a crown of weirwood, in his right a valyrian steel staff. Although at this point it might have switched roles from walking stick to polestaff, Amisar thought to himself.

Placing the crown on his head, the dragonlord took some time to get it just in the right place before putting both hands on his staff. Having felt out its center of gravity, he gave it a few practice swings as he bent his knees and moved with fluid motions. Imagining a human before him he struck at their legs, joints, and finally a thrusting strike toward the head.

Laughing, Amisar threw the staff up in the air before catching it with one hand. His three sisters watched on with amusement as the valyrian turned to them and walked over to them.

“Whether we're in the far reaches of Sothoryos, Ulthos or across the sunset sea, this place is full of magic!” Amisar spoke excitedly before looking up at them. “You feel it too? Don't you?”

Refreshing. Rejuvenated. Excited!

Their voices wove their way into his mind, each spoken with mirth as the she-dragons restrained their tails from whipping into the walls with excitement. Amisar smiled at the sight and feeling of both his own and his sisters newfound vigor. Looking out over the darken skies outside, breathed in a deep sigh.

“Even the air feels…” He trailed off as words escaped him.

Otherworldly?

He looked up at Naqessa as she stared outside as suddenly thunder lit up the canopy stretching beneath them.

“Yes sister, otherworldly.”