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Pale Rainbows

Started by Magyar, November 25, 2016, 10:33:40 PM

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Magyar

Hvittraak lounged lazily on the peak of a mountain in a blizzard, the weather affecting him as much as the rain affected a fish. His breath fogged up in great clouds, a sauna of heat clustering around his nostrils. This was living. Gods he loved the snow. It was like a fluffy blanket of chill on his scaly skin, and he'd missed it in that mine he'd been sleeping under for all of those years.

A large, reptilian eye cracked open, revealing a bone white orb with a lighter slitted point in the centre. His view extended across the peaks and down the valleys. Up here he was a god, and none could sneak up on him, none could challenge his might. None. And yet, some could disturb him. His ears perked up and he raised his great head from it's perch. Something was amiss, someone was here who traditionally shouldn't be. He scanned the horizon, and then the valleys below. Nothing. How very odd. It was only then that he looked up, to the skies, and saw very far away, a speck. A colourful, flailing speck. He beat his mighty wings, and with two flaps he was raised two hundred feet in the air, and angled towards his target. This day would be a tad different it seemed.

DragonSong

She'd never felt a storm so powerful in all her two centuries.

Serves me right for flying out over the ocean when I saw storm clouds, she thought vaguely as the raging winds tumbled her head over tail. Her wings beat desperately against the gales, and she keened as she felt feathers ripped from their pinions.

She was on the mainland, she knew that much- the storm had lasted two days, starting out over the ocean and sweeping her along its path. She seemed to be approaching a range of mountains- at least, that's what she could see every so often when she managed to maintain a right-side up position for longer than a moment.

Melisma wasn't used to feeling helpless, and it was not something she enjoyed. She keened again as thunder crackled in the air around her.

Magyar

Hvit gauged perhaps four kilometres between them, the speck and he, so he decided to let himself be known. Four kilometres was nothing to his roar, and as he loosed it, it undercut the howl of the wind and echoed across the mountain peaks. Unless this flailing thing was deaf it would hear that.

Unlike the much smaller and struggling creature, Hvit was a Mountain Wyrm of old - as such, the mountains were his domain. He rode the winds as a boat would cut the waves, zigzagging through the gale and flying upwards, soon about a kilometre away from the beast (who seemed to be a feathery dragon herself) and two upwards. He fully intended to dive this thing out of the sky, for their own good. The ungainly wails that she was making on a regular basis began to annoy him, and so he decided the time was now, and tucked his wings in close to his ribs.

The wind ripped at his tail and filled his nostrils as he sped downwards at breakneck speeds. Once he hit terminal velocity, he sped his approach with a flap that rocketed him forwards even faster. He was now only one hundred metres from his target, and extended his claws to receive her.

DragonSong

The roar seemed to vibrate through her very bones and Melisma gasped, trying to pinpoint the source of the sound.

But there was too much- the rain, the thunder, the wind, she could barely orient herself, let alone figure out what was happening around her. Her wings flailed and she gave a squawk like a massive bird of prey.

"H-help!" Whatever could make a sound like that had to be big, right? Could probably navigate this storm. "Please, help me!"

No sooner had the words left her when she was careening into a pair of open claws. She gasped, suddenly stationary as the world seemed to twist and writhe around her. Utterly stunned, her head curled down on her sinuous neck and her wings wrapped around her body as much as they could in a feathery cocoon.

Magyar

Hvit landed on his back feet in a snowbank, causing what might have been an avalanche. Oops. Either way, a colourful feathery thing that reminded him of a parrot was in his claws, and it was kinda freaking out.

"Steady yourself little bird. The wind no longer takes you." His booming voice was never soft, however hard he tried to make it. His size simply denied him that. The mountain he had decided to settle one was home to a few mountain hermits, and quite a few now abandoned housings.

He twisted his neck around to the feathery bundle, "Can you take the form of a biped, little bird? It may come in handy to escape this storm."

DragonSong

Panting heavily, Melly stared up at him. Her feathers twitched and she shivered- she was certainly not built for this cold.

A biped? What- oh!

She was so disoriented it took several moments for the booming voice of the dragon that held her- she could see he was another dragon now- to actually make sense. Nodding quickly, she attempted to disentangle herself from his claws as she took her human shape.

"Storms and crows!" she yelped as fur and feathers melted away, leaving her in her fragile human skin. She wrapped her colorful wings around herself in an attempt to preserve some warmth. "Wh-where am I? It's freezing!"

Magyar

Hvit set her down near the door of a small building made of stone, and himself went through a similar transformation, but much more violently. It didn't pain him, but it looked like it should. His tail fused with his spine and his digitigrade legs snapped forward. His skull delongated and his ribs straightened, all of them shrinking until he was in humanesque form. Even then he was much larger than she was, but now not nearly so large was the difference.

"Shall we?" He asked as he opened the door to the hermit house

DragonSong

Melly stared up at him with wide eyes as he took his humanoid shape- she'd never even met another dragon, let alone seen one transform.

Was that what it looked like when she did it? She winced internally.

"Um...thank you." She ducked her head to him and scurried into the house. Looking back at her rescuer, she let loose a barrage of question. "Where are we? Who are you? Thank you for helping me, but oh, why did you? Why are you so big? Do you live here?"

Magyar

Hvit closed the door behind them, shutting out the chill he so loved. But this little bird was not built for the cold, so for now, he would abide.

He managed to get out a, "You're welcome," before he was overwhelmed by the flood of questions which he proceeded to try and sort through, "These are the Thunderblacks, my home, and I am Hvittraak Vaengi'Katleinn, Great White Drake of the peaks. I believe that answers three of you questions at once. As for why I saved you, well, if we dragons do not look out for eachother, who will?"

In all honesty it was simple curiosity that had spurred him on, but he had learned long ago that it was a benevolent disposition that led others to be trusting, and therefore more easily swayed in the future. A simple trick, but one that worked, "As for my size, I am a dragon. I am old, and I have grown. Surely your dam or sire were of a similar size, if perhaps not just as large, little hatchling?"

DragonSong

Melly blinked, then shrugged, allowing her wings to open up slightly. She was still cold, but at least now the chill no longer felt like it was biting into her bones.

"I don't know," she answered honestly. "I've never met them. Do you really live in this listtle house? Wouldn't that mean you must spend all your time like that?" She gestured to his human form.

Magyar

Hvit frowned, but caught on, "Oh no, this place is not mine. It's owner is far from here, perhaps no longer alive. I live in an old dwarven mine, several kilometres from here, but you seemed cold, so I decided to land here."

He took notice of her nakedness, but didn't think much of it. Human physiology simply wasn't attractive to him, at least not in the way it would be to a bipedal creature. He did however recognize how the cold would affect her, and a fire sprung to life in his hands. He sat cross-legged, and set the remnants of a fire pit  alight. It wouldn't last too long, but hopefully it would be enough for now.

DragonSong

"Oh!" She gasped and practically threw herself down before the fire. "Thank you," she said brightly, smiling up at him. She allowed her wings to relax, sprawling from her back rather haphazardly.

"I don't think I quite caught your name," she said sheepishly, looking up to him again. "Its was...rather long. I'm Melisma, by the way."

Magyar

"Call me Hvittraak, or Hvit. It is nice to meet you Melisma." He lounged now, his wings spreading out from under his dragon skin cloak, and stretching the entirety of the one room house.

"So what is a tropical dragon doing this far north." He inquired, genuinely curious, " The cold certainly doesn't suit you."

DragonSong

She blushed and ducked her head, wings ruffling in embarrassment. "I, um... I got caught in a storm a few days ago. Stupid thing to do- I didn't realize how fierce your winds are on the mainland."

Magyar

"I'd say the tropical winds get worse," he commented, "But you also don't have mountain updrafts, at least not nearly as strong as here. That's probably what caught you off guard, if it were anything."

He studied the dragoness, taking in every detail. He'd never seen such a colourful, but feathery dragon, and yet that was indeed what she was, no mistake there. He approached another subject, "You've never met your dam and sire? Were you stolen as a hatchling?" His tone lowered, "Did you give them hell for taking you?"

DragonSong

"Hm?" She blinked up at him, then shook her head quickly. "Oh no, nothing like that! They were- well, I think something bad must have happened to them." Her brow furrowed and she added a little softer, "That or they just abandoned me..."

She was quiet a moment, then shook herself out of it and flashed another smile. "My Papa found my egg. There wasn't anyone around, at least not when he looked, so he thought I must be a dud and took me home." A little shrug. "But- well, then I hatched."

She smiled again, shifting a little closer to the fire. Her eyes flicked over him curiously. "You're very big," she told him plainly, as though he might not know that. "Do all mainland dragons get as big as you?"

Magyar

Hvit smiled, amused, and answered, "With time, most dragons get to be my size. Regardless of whence they came. You probability will, given you grow in the right conditions." He looked her up and down, trying to gauge her age, but in her human form, he couldn't distinguish a thing. He really could only tell children from adults, and adults from elders.

"How old are you, exactly?" He asked.

DragonSong

"Two hundred twenty-" she replied promptly, then paused. "Um...no. No, two hundred and...thirty? Thirty-six?" She offered him a sheepish sort of smile. "Somewhere around there. I'm not always good with keeping track."

Her head tilted. "What about you?"

Magyar

"Hum..." he thought back towards the days of his hatching, and then the millennia under the earth, and then the last two or three millennia.

"Perhaps around 10,400, or so. I too have lost count over the years, but I did sleep for quite a while underneath a mountain, so... yes, about that."

DragonSong

Melly's eyes widened. "Um...wow." She shook her head. "I- I knew we were long-lived, I guess I just didn't realize how long."