Dragons of Arasme Ch. 02

Hello again everyone, I know I said it might be a month before I posted a new chapter but I decided to go ahead and submit again after I got bit by the inspiration bug and my children took a nap. I hope you all enjoy this and feel free to leave comments or send me a message.

If you are interested in perhaps exiting my story please message me as I am looking for someone to help out, there are only so many errors I can catch myself!

Anyways, enjoy! There is no sex in the chapter, but when it does happen all peoples involved will be 18 or older.

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Footsteps pulled me from my deep slumber, my dreamless sleep ruined now by the slight sound. At first I thought it was the people of the dar'ha coming to try and pry the jewels from my scales, or even to try and take my scales themselves, but slowly as my sleep clouded mind cleared I realized it was only a single female.

She was heavily pregnant and from the smell of her, she was not far from pushing her child into this world. I raised my head slowly letting the sand that accumulated during my sleep cascade in soundless waves down my spiked neck to pool on either side of my powerful shoulders. I fought the urge to stretch my cramped wings, though I did slowly stretch my tail allowing each bone to settle silently back into place.

The woman did not hear any of my movements and when the smell of her blood wafted past my nostrils I understood why. Injured and in the midst of her birthing I could have roared to the heavens and I have doubts she would have heard me. As it was she had yet to notice my large form nestled amongst the rocks.

I watched as she removed her clothing, shaking silently in rage as I noticed the marks of her pregnancy on her skin, mixed with the marks of slavery. Bright red gashes marred her back and her legs, some of them reaching around her sides to mingle with the marks left on her body as proof of her pregnancy.

My alabaster scales colored brightly and it took much to stop myself from roaring in anger. Her shoulder had been pierced through and I could tell it was from a wound meant to impede her escape from whomever it was that had tormented her. Markings around her ankles, no doubt from manacles, were rubbed raw from the sand and her sweat causing her shuffling gate as she limped in her movements.

She slipped into an unknown pool that had not been there during the beginning of my slumber, but as I had been asleep for almost a thousand cycles of the seasons I knew that things were apt to change in the times. My own cavern had changed drastically and I had a fleeting thought as to what the outside world would be like when I ventured forth.

My attention quickly focused back on the woman as I heard her try to muffle her cries as she began pushing against the pressure of her child's birth. It was only moments to me before I heard the small scream but it was seconds before that that had my wings opening as I reeled backwards in surprise. I had felt the touch of new magic as it joined the world, seeking out the closest magical presence it could sense...myself. It was difficult to comprehend that such a magical touch, a small caress really, would be coming from a human baby.

Craning my long neck towards the source, I looked on as her small face broke the surface of the pool. She was small, but compared to the one dragonet I had birthed, she was tiny. Her miniature nose was pert, and the mouth that was opened in a single wailing cry would one day grow into a set of full and wide lips. Her skin was uncharacteristically light for the tribes I knew to live around the dar'ha and it gave me wonder as to how far her mother might have traveled in her flight. A full head of dark mahogany hair topped her head, her soaked locks were wavy and I had the feeling that her hair would curl wildly. Her eyes opened and as she looked at her mother for the first time, my reptilian features softened. They were the same swirling and changing blue-green as my own late child's, marking her sphere as one of the waves.

It had been many, many cycles of seasons since I had felt the slightest care for any of the other creatures who inhabited my realms, but this miniature Mage had my heart within her tiny fingers from the moment those eyes connected with my own. Her magic flowed around her seeking comfort within the folds of my own that I held close and the larger amount I had stored below her, far beneath the pool in which she was born, in a large node just ready to be harnessed.

I felt her as she attempted to heal her mother instinctually but the feat quickly drained her, her small magic not up to being used so forcefully, so I gently pushed more towards her to see if her natural instincts would guide her.

Her eyes glowed and I could feel her surrounding her mother with a calming touch even as she was placed in clean cloths and swaddled.

Her mother was fading and I moved out of my place of watching to stand close to the small Mage. She was starting to sweat with the amount of exertion she was putting forth to heal her mother, and it was working. Even through the water I could see her shoulder wound closing.

Dipping a talon lightly into the water I pulled from my stored magic beneath me to enchant the water, and as the mage's mother sunk to the shallow bottom I whispered into her mind, "Do not fear, I will keep watch over your youngling. Rest now."

A smile drifted gently across her face and as I felt her go I gently blew across the top of the pool, crystallizing the resting place of the mage's mother.

Turning my head and gazing at the now sleeping Mage I called upon magic I had only used twice in my long lifetime. Mists appeared around my feet as I gently called the magic foreword in my mind, it swirled through my limbs, gently lifting in the still air to wrap itself around my body moving slowly to encompass my long tail and neck, and lastly enclosing over my face.

I closed my eyes as the mist began to glow and I could feel the effects of the magic on my body now. My tail was quickly gone, absorbed into my body as my bones shifted to become upright. My talons receded and my neck shorted, my snout receded into my face quickly forming into more human features.

As the last of the magic was completed, I looked into the crystal to appraise my human form.

My hair was much longer than the last time I had performed this spell, and the face a little older, but I was still what most humans would consider attractive. Full lips, the color of the coral from the Amur seas pursed slightly as I surveyed my form. My hair was completely white, a testament to my alabaster scales, and my eyes a pure violet, a gem that held my magic as well as bound itself within my scales.

My figure was one to be envied and I could only chuckle at myself as I thought of what a thousand cycles of the seasons without eating would do.

Shaking my head at myself I turned my attention to my small charge. I had decided that I would raise her as my own, and when the time came take her to the aerie so that she could find a teacher in her sphere that was more skilled in the magic of the waves, I would be the one to carry her and plead her case.

It would be difficult as most of my draconian siblings had turned their back on humanity after the last two great mages who were trained at the aerie turned a petty squabble between them into a war that encompassed the whole realms, effectively killing the magic held within humans. Many would want to kill her on site for the past crimes against my people that were performed by the last mages.

Dragons had been enslaved, their magic bled to fuel the wars. Many were killed, even my own child taken from my chamber and bled of her magic right outside of my wards, it was a terrible time until the dragons as a mass began purging the mages who had turned their magic on each other.

It was as bloody time, and one I would rather not relive. I bent down to pick up my young Mage, gently brushing her long locks back. Just the touch to her had my magic tingling and reaching for her, and I knew that it was claiming her as its own.

Gently I bent down to place a small kiss on her forehead, and as I pulled away I smiled at the faint swirling design that appeared at her temple, winding its way to her shoulder, following her hairline closely. It was a mark that would let everyone who knew it know that she was under my protection, my magic brushing over her skin to help shield her from any harm that would try to come to her. Eventually her own design would start to weave its way in with my mark, combining our magic until a time that my mark faded and her own magic guarded her solely on her own.

I whispered softly, giving her a name that would be closely guarded, one that no other mage but myself would be privy to, a name held power and sway over oneself. Should someone learn of her true name it would give them the power to take her magic as her own.

"Arasme, you have been entrusted to me, and I pledge my life to you little one." at my simple words my magic flared out around me, encompassing Arasme in a faint purple light which quickly faded on her skin.

I looked towards the crystalline structure topping her mother's resting place. "Sleep well mother of Arasme."

I felt her approval as I turned to walk out of the cavern, seeking a new life for both myself and my new charge.

I failed to notice the slight violet glow emitting from the pool below the crystalline structure, lighting it delicately in the darkness of the cavern as my magic pulled away from its living places in the various jewels around the cavern.

It was time for Arasme's journey to truly begin.