Chapter 7: Chapter Six: The Savior (Part II)
Insert from Beast of No Nation: Studies of Dragonology: Radio Show (Segment Three)
[Dragon Elemental Roots: It should come as no surprise that dragons, amongst their other charms, have natural abilities that diversify them further within the species. Commonly known and popularized in books such as Beowulf and The Hobbit, dragons are often depicted in media with the fire root. These elemental roots are empirically noticed through their breath, wings, and horns. Such habits and behaviors can give way to a patent that has led many to see that these elemental roots are random amongst species (though climate and area can have a factoring degree of the type of root that may be inherited). Amongst the elemental roots is the Ice Dragon. With deadly cold breaths that can easily kill prey in a matter of seconds, this type of dragon is often found in cooler environments such as tundra or high mountains or ice deserts. With lighter scales and a blue underbelly and a white flattering, it can easily blend into its surroundings. Though it is not as common as its elemental partner, the water dragon, it can be noted that ice dragons are not a rarity when compared to light, phantom, or lightning dragons.
See excerpt from Segment Thirteen on dragons and their compatible elemental partners for more.]
~ Your Host,
R. Draekos
His father did not approve of his choice to join the King's army. Cyan had another long argument with him last night about it as his father was checking up on him after the move.
"There is nothing I can do to persuade you," he starts again, but Cyan doesn't answer him. This in turn makes his father angry as the man loses his temper over the phone. The silence from the other side of the line makes the older man squirm as he picks up a glass of his finest whiskey and pours it slowly into a glass. He downs in less than a second before takes another shot.
Cyan knew his father's drinking habits. Sky had inherited the worst from his father and it included a vile temper. Cyan knew that his father didn't often drink as it would upset his wife, but on the rare occasion he did, the liquor made monsters of men.
When his father drank, his mouth was just as damaging as any fist. The anniversary of his mother's death always brought the worst out of his father. The woman he loved more than life was killed by something he had gifted her. His father blamed all of their misfortunes on dragons. He hated them and cursed their uprising. Cyan, who had also known the injustices of these creatures, should have harbored the same emotions as him. Instead, his son was as indifferent as he was apathetic to it all. This only fueled the loathing in his father's eyes as he tried to keep the younger man closer to him.
It didn't help that Cyan looked very much like him with his shorter stature, fuller lips, and ivory skin. However, there was no denying he got his nose and heterochromia of the eyes from his mother. It made him very attractive: it made him more profitable. Along with his aloof and gentle composure, Cyan's father acrimoniously thought little of him as the boy never fought back and never spoke up for himself. His father's illusion of a controllable child was easily doused by the ambitions of a king who didn't care if they lived or died.
"You know she wouldn't want this for you." He tries to guilt trip again. "I mean, your mother was not a woman who enjoyed war. Violence and death, are you really going to look another man in the eye and kill him Cyan? You'll be a murdered ya know? And for what cause? The King?"
Cyan let him speak his piece.
He had very few memories of his mother. His stepmother only allowed him in the house because he was attractive and docile. His status was not that of Sky's but she took the liberty of having a rapport with him. Neither were close nor spoke to one another or interfere in the other's affairs. She treated him more like a business associate when she wasn't ignoring him all together. Cyan never spoke up about Sky's violent nature and his step-mother had seen enough of his bruises to know the older boy was harassing him. Still, his father insisted boys will be boys.
So the few memories he harbors of his mother are kept on repeat in his mind so that he shall not forget her. When he was younger, she would bundle him up in the most luxurious coats that his father would spend frivolously to show off to the higher Providence mayors at every Winter Ball that he belonged. His spending habits only worsened as his stepmother demanded a new dress each year to keep up with the latest trends. Though his father was a good man at heart, his character was easily conformed to fit the views of others.
It was at these luxurious parties where the men in bright suits and the women in long gowns laughed and sang. They ate food that was usually inaccessible to Providence C. It was only during these evenings Cyan snuck out warm apple cider to his mother and they sat on the roof of the row houses she lived in looking out at the world. As white steam rose flushing their cheeks in warmth, the two lone figures huddled together against the cold. Snow fell like stars to the earth and kissed his nose. They don't speak about the woes of below or how tomorrow, his stomach would grumble and whine for food. They didn't speak about how he wouldn't be able to see her as often once school began.
It was no secret to him at a young age why his mother didn't live with them. Sky often snickered at him for being a whore's son. Cyan wanted to ask what this meant but by the tone Sky used, it was a nasty word. He never repeated it to his mother. He would glance down at her bare fingers frowning since his stepmother always wore bright diamond rings on hers.
"You're not scared are ya?" she hummed softly, pulling at the edges of his wool coat making sure he was protected from the cold. Her own hands shook as the skin grew chapped. Removing his blue scarf, he wrapped it around her exposed neck where a single gold chain hung. It was the only piece of jewelry she owned.
"Too sweet puppet, but I don't need this."
A lie.
Cyan didn't back down, pushing it into her and she huffed in amusement before wrapping it around herself like a shawl.
Cocking her head, she smiled weakly. Words rested on the tip of her tongue but she swallowed them down. Hugging him closer, Cyan inhaled her spicy scent. It warmed him. A kiss on the forehead made him blink.
"I will always love you." She would whisper.
'I know.' He never said it back.
He remembers her vividly in these moments as if looking at a picture before the scene shifts and all he sees is red.
Red stained her blue winter dress and the golden chain his father gifted. The dragon hovers above her body weeping lowly as it turns and stares into his eyes. Dark blue eyes that bore so many human emotions reflecting his own. He sees himself standing over her dead body contaminated by death as her mauled face looks unrecognizable to him. Even in passing, it haunted him how still she was for a woman who rarely stopped moving. Being so young, he was the one who found her. He was the one who saw the dragon. His mother had heard it screaming when a bowl fell by accident triggering it. She had pushed him into the pantry and through the cracks he watched it kill her.
Cyan doesn't want to think of how his hands wrapped around a kitchen knife. He doesn't think about the feeling that washed over him when he gripped the dragon by its neck and stared into its eyes. The fear it had of him. It was afraid of him and the young boy could have laughed at that. Instead, he watches it hover over his mother as if protecting the most precious of metals. He stands there until his father comes to him wrapping the young boy in his arms.
The empty look in his eyes goes unnoticed by all except the dragon.
So when his father asks is he prepared to kill a man, Cyan almost laughs. Looking down at his hands, he slowly curls them into fists.
"Yes," he says slowly more to himself than his father, "it wouldn't be the first time I've killed before."
——————
He raises trembling fingers, shocked by his own boldness as his hand hovers mere inches from the dragon's head. Lips parted and eyes dilated Cyan doesn't realize the dragon can see the shift in his behavior. It growls at him though not as viciously as before when the young man continues to hold out his hand. The dragon touches the fingers with one of its long horns, scraping against the skin. The rough texture is strange against the soft flesh and both parties jolt at the sudden contact.
Jumping back, Cyan wanted to giggle at it. It seemed more shaken by his lack of reaction. Nudity at this point was not an odd sight for him considering none of the other dragons were dressed. However, it was much more human-looking than he expected. Cyan covered the lower half of his face in embarrassment though his eyes never left it. He was afraid that if he looked away, it would attack.
Half-crouched and hunched over, Cyan suspected that at its full height, it would be much taller than him. Judging by the kennel size, they kept it compacted for a reason. It looked like a man- a bit older than Cyan with bizarre shapes that didn't quite fit. Like an abstract painting, Cyan tried to make sense of what he was looking at. Its skin was an ashen resembling that of milk that clung to every contour of its bone leaving nothing to the imagination. Patches of spinous scales break up the pallid skin ranging from a deep blue reminding him of evening nights with his mother to the palest of frost whites that resembled the crunch of snow under his feet back home. The confusion of it was evident by the bright display of its scales shifting back and forth between colors. When it breathed, a cold smoke rose from its mouth like the mist that settled upon the Providence before dawn broke. Its dark hair was a greasy black that fell in its eyes and over its ears. Cyan suspected with a good cut and a nice wash, it would shine like leather boots freshly polished.
The young man couldn't ignore the scars and bruises that canvased its body like war paint. Bright red marks were now yellowing against its arms and wrists showed it fought its restraints daily especially where the collar rested as his neck had open wounds.
From behind long lashes and dark circles, irises flared an otherworldly blue that seemed haunted as the creature rose to its full height before him. It was a head taller than him causing Cyan to crane his neck. As they eyed each other down, Cyan felt like the naked one. Every inch of his self was being torn apart and slowly observed before swallowed in the dark void of its gaze of this antediluvian being.
——————
Aiden took in the young soldier.
Though, unlike the youth, he did so fervently.
And what he saw, confused him.
'Like sap dripping down the dark bark of Everest trees, the first spring sun kissed it golden. That is how he would describe the dark brown waves of hair loosely falling upon his face shielding the right side from full view. His skin is a golden color- the same color of when the moon hits the desert peaks resembling diamonds that Aiden spotted whenever he was taken to the bathing area. The man's eyes are equally puzzling as they are unique. From afar, one may not notice how the right eye is as blue as roaring rivers that flowed through the mountains that he remembered from when he was young. The other is a pearly grey-blue mix that reminds him of the sky he saw once while being transported to the Kennels. It was a darker shade than the sky he saw but the twinkle in his eyes were just as bright as the stars in the real sky.
Heterochromia.
The word is vivid in his mind and Aiden huffs as his slow mind begins to remember his teachings. The young man is already in training though his jacket lacks the usual badges and frills suggesting he is still a cadet. The slight scaring near his right ear suggests he is deaf (most likely an injury from a close-range shooting) and is accustomed to wearing a hearing aid which he dons . His face is stoic yet his body language is screaming with expression as he gapes up at Aiden. The dragon cannot decide if this is genuine fear or shock.
No human would reach out to touch a predator. He was a monster so why does the young man look at him like a hatchling taking its first flight? A small stature and deceptively athletic physique with openly soft features.
Everything about this human is a walking contradiction.
Aiden snarled before leaning forward and bearing his teeth.
'What do you see?'
The whisper of a guttural voice rumbled in his head like a burst of wind crashing into the canopy of trees. The hint of breath lingered in his mind and if he listened closely, he could almost make out the words.
'What do you see?'
And as if time began again, the violent jolt of the dragon's body made it scream out in agony as one of the handlers jabbed a prong into the side of its stomach. The curt arch of its body left it strangling and snarling at the air. Cyan forgot about the voice leaving it to his imagination as he stepped forward to stop the man.
An eruption of fury tore from its bleeding lips that crippled Cyan's movement making his knees buckle. Gentle white turned into a tortured, eruption of blues that seemed to burn the poor body alive. Its animalistic howls turned monstrous as it transformed before them into a full size ice dragon. Dark blue against white and as deadly as any ice storm, the dragon lashed out at the handler nearly snapping him in too. Farse snapped his arm forward, stabbing the beast with another prong and smashing the control button until the dragon was being shot up with electricity.
The giant beast shook the very walls causing the other dragons to whine in protest and fear as its legs collapsed under it. Head and tail swaying dangerously in a final lashing out, Cyan felt the curved horn slash into him. Blood trickled into the floor staining it a bright crimson. Dust settled around them as the monster was subdued. Eyes closed and chest barely rising, Cyan wanted to run over to it. Royce tugged him back. Turning the smaller man around to face him, the taller man's expression was grim.
"It barely missed your heart." He examined. Cyan was firmly pressing into the wound using his sleeve to slow down the bleeding.
"We should go." Royce suggested turning to pull Cyan along.
Distress calls of the other dragons only worsen with the smell of blood. Seeing the large dragon lying on the ground, the kennels rattled in fear.
Cyan heard none of it. He looked back at the dragon watching it. It resembles that of a myth- an immortal creature curses to the whims of moral men. It is not something he longs to posses. He wants to free it. Like a caged bird, he wants to see it soar and fly above this wretch world. It does not belong amongst them- it should not be tainted by mere human hands.
Cyan wished he had studied poetry more finding it hard to describe this euphoric feeling. Slipping out of Royce's grasp, he stumbles over to the red line. The words are said for all to hear and silence falls upon the kennels. It is a silence so profound, not even the dragons dare to take a breath. The looks castes upon him are all ranges of judgment. Each expressing their own concern or dissatisfaction.
"He is the one!" Cyan proclaims like a breath of fresh air.
He is the only one.
The young man cannot deny this fact. And if he is to be devoured and torn apart by knife long incisors or frozen to death by negative temperature frost, then he would like to die drowning in the ocean of mysteries lying behind those comely, intellectual eyes.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Emmy_a_Gemmy
Emmy_a_Gemmy I may be the only one excited that they have finally met and their journey is about to begin.
Have some idea about my story? Comment it and let me know.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone