Blinding rain and rocks thin and sharp like shattered glass, sprinting away from angry faces and sliding on the slick, rocky terrain. Jagged peaks rose all around him, shaded in dark tones of blue and gray that gave him an escalating sense of foreboding. The wind was unforgiving and driving rain into his eyes, but at least it was pushing him away from the unmarked edge. His merciless pursuers seethed with rage, screaming obscenities at full volume, voices barely rising over nature's fury. They screamed for revenge, that thought driving them to run him down at any cost. But they didn't know...
He hadn't meant to run into them then....
he hadn't meant to insult them beyond repair...
he didn't mean to kill that man's wife.
Their voices got closer. He knew that they would probably all slide off the cliff soon enough anyway, but he wasn't to give up, he wasn't to be caught. He slipped suddenly, losing all balance and sliding to the edge of the cliff. He clung onto a small rock on the edge, but it wasn't enough. As he let go, everything suddenly faded to black, no noise, no wind, no rain.
Black eyes opened, all bad deeds forgotten for the time. Drake sat up slowly, grunting at his sore back. He looked around himself, rather confused. 'Where am I?', he thought. My clothes are dry, and I'm definately not in the mountains anymore... He felt a warm breeze caress his face, green trees rustling leaves. Pleased by his surroundings, he stood, and surveyed his condition. Sore, but quite alright compared to what he could have been. A lovely pancake. He grinned to himself for a moment. That magic kicks in at the strangest times. Then, he realized how hungry he was. After all, he had been running for his life, and asleep for who knows how long. He instinctively reached into his pocket to pull out a slice of bread, then realized that he had plunged his hand into a moldy lot of crumbly mush. With a dissatisfied grunt he discarded the somewhat disgusting once-food, then decided to get himself something to eat the old fashioned way- hunting.
A while later he came back with a fat rabbit. For a reason he never could understand, hunger didn't come as often to him as to others. In fact, many things about him differed from average people. Never could he figure out what was exactly different, but he had always known he wasn't....human. It didn't bother him, the only thing that bothered him was the fact that he didn't know what he was instead. It confused him, but he often discarded this thought, as he did now, and prepared his meal. He only ate one meal a day, and this would be fine. After eating, at this point it being afternoon, he took a little walk to find out where he was.
During this walk he discovered something he did not expect to see. At first he just saw the faintest rust, then realized it was blood. He sniffed. It smelled different than normal human blood, somehow, but not particularly an average animal either. He had always had a strange sense of smell. He followed the blood, difficult becuase it was dry and not an exact path, and quite old. Then, he saw more red....but a different red. Scales. Shining scales red as wine and the somehow elegant figure of a dragon, somehow untouchable, refined in one way or another, perhaps the very quality besides their ferocity that captivated the minds of storytellers. He well knew, however, that the dragons were not just in stories...although he had never 'met' one himself. He peered out of the trees, knowing the dragon could probably detect him. Most people would run for their lives, but god dammit he was not most people. He said, quietly, "Hello."
