Karn followed slowly after Hyndla, quietly walking for a time until the dwarf finally broke the silence “Hey, can I ask you something?”

Karn nodded before remembering Hyndla was in front of her and couldn’t see the motion “Oh sure, ask away.”

Hyndla looked back and smiled “I know King Beowulf told you all sorts of Dwarven legends and I obviously know them. So I was wondering, do Dragons have legends?”

Karn sighed “We have two, ‘The Story of The First King’ and 'The Golden Fall’ the former tells of our rise, the latter is our fall.”

Hyndla nodded “Well best to start at the beginning yeah?”

Karn smiled “Of course, in the interest of time I'll give you the short version. It’s meant to be performed across at least two days and we don’t have nearly enough people for all the parts in the story.”

Hyndla looked at her a while trying to see if she was joking, her eyes widened realizing Karn was totally serious, she turned around muttering something about over dramatic lizards and Karn laughed.

“One Hundred thousand years ago the Dragons could not transform. We had no humanoid form, we lived in caves, and we were territorial based around the color of our scales. One day among the red scaled dragons a pure white dragon was born, one eye was purest gold and the other a regal purple, they named their son Kori Norid Gan Von Tornis. Neither parent could understand what the color of his scales and eyes meant until a week after the strange birth when a masked elf arrived, no part of them was visible save for their pointed ears, their body hidden by robes, mask, and gloves.” Hyndla briefly stopped Karn and suggested they sit and rest. She was enthralled by Karn’s voice and didn’t trust herself to focus on both her surroundings and the story.

When they sat and Karn began again she started using her magic to add visuals to the story, enchanting Hyndla even more.

“Neither parent had heard or sensed the stranger's approach, the elf raised their hands in a gesture of peace and spoke ‘Greetings noble dragons. I have come to explain that this child must live. He is to be a great king who will unite all the dragons and bring many great things to your people. He will be a hero to the people of this world and all shall sing his praises.’ As quickly as the stranger came they were gone again and henceforth the parents of Norid Von Tornis made every effort to protect and raise their child well.”

Karn stopped for a moment to drink water and relax her vocal cords; she had a newfound respect for those who made storytelling their life’s work.

“Norid seemed to grow and learn faster than the rest of his kin and was nearly mature by the time he was only fifty years old. The day after he reached that age he went to his parents telling them of a dream he’d had and that he must set out to discover his calling.”

Hyndla held up a hand “Wait, his parents didn’t object to their child leaving? And also, what even is the standard ‘mature age’ for dragons anyways?”

Karn smiled “Dragons at the time were very big on the ‘shove the baby bird out of the nest and see if it flies’ school of parenting, plus they remembered what the strange elf said about him. As for age, don’t you know it’s rude to ask a lady that?”

Hyndla laughed “Shut up Karn. Fine, I'll go first. I'm forty, we dwarves are considered mature at twenty like humans but we live longer, though not as long as elves or you.”

Karn nodded “Ok, ok, I’m two hundred. That’s when we’re considered adults.”

Hyndla whistled “Man, you’re an old timer huh.”

Karn lightly punched Hyndla’s shoulder laughing then took a deep breath “Well, back to it.”

“Norid flew then from his nest as majestic as a bird and just as beautiful, as he flew he saw a human woman sitting by a overflowing river with the bridge ahead of her washed away, he landed and the woman looked at him with neither panic nor fear in her eyes, the dragon was impressed for in those days our kin were feared as simple brutish monsters but this woman showed no such fear, as such he offered her aid in crossing the swollen river.”

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“The woman smiled at him and accepted his offer of help; she named herself as Morgain. Norid laid down flat as he could and invited her to climb on, with some effort she did so holding onto small ridges on his back for purchase and they flew off toward the village where she lived. As the pair approach people naturally panicked at the sight of a dragon and began to fire arrows at Norid who made no effort to dodge the blows as he slowly began to descend, two of the town guard wheeled out a ballista and fired a sharpened stake into the chest of the young dragon but even still he descended slowly for the sake of his passenger.”

“What do you mean for the sake of his passenger?” Hyndla asked with a tilt of her head.

“Ah right, well the ridges on the back of a dragon are rather hard to hold, they have very poor grip. Later magic would be developed to help hold people on our backs but that came after these events.”

“Finally Norid reached the ground, golden blood seeped from his wounds and he lay on his side in pain as Morgain dismounted his back. She looked into his eyes, greatly saddened by what had happened, and explained to him that she was a priestess of a human Goddess named Frith. Morgain began trying to heal him, but it was of no use, for Norid was much too large. She begged her Goddess for help and, feeling moved by the kindness the two had shown each other, Frith decided to intercede. The Goddess first told Norid to help pull the stake out from his chest and he obeyed, but the bleeding became worse and Frith, acting quickly, granted a great boon upon Norid, the ability to transform and so for the first time a dragon took a humanoid form. This allowed Morgain to heal him and she wept now for joy.”

Hyndla looked confused but didn’t speak and so Karn stopped “Do you have a question?”

Hyndla looked up, seeming surprised she noticed “Ah well I was wondering, she only just met this guy today right?”

“Yeah, they’ve known each other a few minutes basically” Karn said

“So why does she seem so attached to him?” Hyndla asked

Karn frowned and thought for a while “I don’t wholly know, maybe sometimes you just meet someone and your heart says they’re the one.”

Hyndla smiled lightly and nodded in thought “You may be right, continue please.”

Karn nodded “There’s a whole year's worth of events in his life hence why the play takes at least two days, so I’ll summarize briefly.”

Hyndla nodded in understanding and after another drink of water and a few deep breaths Karn continued.

“Norid journeyed across the whole of the continent of Yeltor with Morgain, he learned great magics from the Elves and the Beastkin, from the Dwarves he learned of technology and architecture, from the Orcs he learned to use his strength and his magic to fight.”

“With how important they are to the story, one has to wonder why the Dragons look down on the other races so” Hyndla said, her voice faintly bitter.

Karn looked off into the distance sadly “The story ended up getting heavily suppressed and censored, we tried to destroy our own history because those who thought dragons superior found the truth inconvenient, my father began spreading the full true version as part of his reforms. I wish it wasn’t like this. I’m sorry Hyndla” she felt tears forming in her eyes. She looked up with a start as a hand touched her shoulder “It’s okay Karn, we don’t need to solve all the world's problems by our lonesome. People like your dad and King Beowulf, they're leading the charge for a new era and we’ll both help in our own ways yeah?”

Karn breathed slowly, calming down and Hyndla sat beside her.

Karn nodded “Ok, I’m ok. Shall we finish our little story?” Hyndla nodded, giving Karn her full attention.

“After a year of travel Morgain and Norid made their way back to the mountainous home of the Dragons. There Norid found an amazing sight, the leaders of every color of Dragon were there waiting, having heard tales of this young and powerful dragon they thought to unite against him to secure their power. Norid took on his draconic form and unleashed the full extent of his aura, the leaders immediately all fell in supplication for Norid’s power was so great that they could barely breathe let alone hope to stand against him. Accepting their surrender Norid suppressed his power once more, and all the dragons swore allegiance to Kori Norid Gan Von Tornis, the First King of Dragons. The new King began his reign by granting his gift of transformation upon them and thus they began to build and study under him. After one hundred years the Golden City was born.”

Hyndla had a look of wonder “I have heard stories of the supposed Golden City but I don’t know much about it really.”

Karn nodded “I’m not surprised you’ve heard things the old guard loved to brag about. My father lived there as a child, he said it was beautiful and that it was filled with art and music. It used to fly through the air from place to place. But that gold soon proved false and it flies no more but that’s a separate story.”

Hyndla looked into Karn’s sad eyes wishing she knew what to say “Is there anything else in the First King’s story?”

Karn shook her head “Not really, the last bit is him and his beloved saying they were leaving to explore the cosmos but they’d return and leaving one of Norid’s trusted aides in charge.”

Hyndla sat in thought for a time then spoke “I see, well I really liked the story, you’ll have to tell me more sometime, ok?”

Karn nodded “Sure thing, shall we continue our journey?”

With a nod from Hyndla they packed up from their impromptu rest and set off once again.