Chapter 4 The Dragon’s Life
2071 Words
My hand fidgety out of excitement; I am zoning out in our class. It is over; time for me to visit my new friend, Raiden. I am eager to hear more of his stories.
I am in front of Raiden, my big wide, eye gazing at him, anticipating the stories that he will reveal.
I am willing to listen to the dragon all day long. I am craving for the history of our Fortress.
“Tell me more about dragons.”
“ Dragons have different breeds. My friend Cynr is a “wyvern”; they live in the highest mountains. They are three types of wyvern: fire breathing, icy breathing, poison breathing dragons. They have wings. They are almighty up in the air while my breed cannot fly, we swim. I am a Knucker. Our hissing sound can be deadly can cause someone’s death. If I hissed, the person suffers from strong unseen waves and vibrations. It will bring them pain like tearing their flesh, and eventually, they will die.”
The wyvern and the Knucker breed of dragons are the strongest. The wyvern in the air while the Knucker in the sea.
Each wizard paired with one dragon. At a young age, a wizard and a young dragon paired. They will technically grow together. The trust with one another formed in that way.
The World is at peace; the dragons can freely pass through barriers. I can swim until to the sea of the Human World, a free dragon.
The wizards choose their dragon, and I am one of the few lucky ones who do not have a wizard master. I am roaming free until I meet Cynr; he is a reliable friend.
Cynr is an upright dragon but paired with a vicious wizard Adeus. When Cynr is not on duty, we hang out together. We can transform into human form. We are like wolves that can transform into their mythical self when they want.
One time, I was out with Cynr. I met a beautiful Lady and enchanted by her beauty. My kind warns me not to be near her; she is a Maiden. I discover a Maiden is the one who rules the Mermaid’s Fortress. The Maiden is not bound to love and get married. The irony is they can enchant men, and they can collect them, trap in their Fortress.
I am different. I am a Knucker, a strong sea serpent, and mermaids enchant song does not affect me. Maiden Rosille is amazed by my power. I show her my dragon form as a sea serpent; she is in love.
A sea serpent dragon will not transform from our human form to our dragon form unless we want to. The person who will witness our transformation, becoming a dragon, will enchant that is the reason we are careful.
I admit, I intentionally transform in front of Maiden Rosille to entrance her. I am hopeless in love. Cynr warns me that I will suffer in the future for enchanting a Forbidden Maiden.
Cynr is a friend I can trust for me to be with Maiden Rosille. I remain in my human form and never transform into a serpent dragon. I wanted to protect Maiden Rosille and her position as the Maiden ruler. The Maiden is bound not to fall in love, get married, and bear a child.
Cynr as my most trusted friend knows it all, but he protected me. He never spills my secrets even to Adeus.
All the mermaids in the Mermaid Fortress are naive. I live in the Mermaid Fortress, and the mermaid thought I am one of the humans that trap in there, for I have an unfaithful heart.
Maiden Rosille is specifically fond of me that stir rumors throughout the Fortress. The mermaids are not allowed to be in love with humans or other mythical creatures. They are bound to get married to their kind.
The Maiden ruler cannot marry; a tradition passes through generation. They believe that a Maiden cannot bear any feelings of love. It will destroy her focus and distract her priorities.
The mermaids perceive me as a special one for Maiden Rosille gives me fondness that she never shows to anyone.
Secretly, we spent time alone; Maiden Rosille's mother found out about our affair. She wanted to protect her daughter from the wrath of the mermaids. She hides our relationship. My love, Rosille carries in her womb, our child.
Maiden Rosille hides that she is pregnant; she is mostly out of Mermaid’s Fortress and stays by my place. Maiden Rosille laws rule through the entire Fortress, even in her absence.
My love, Rosille gave birth to our daughters; our triplets are born. The baby grows up under the supervision of Celeste, the grandmother of our triplets.
None of the ordinary mermaids knows about our secret. It is only the four of us: Rosille, Cynr, Celeste, and I.
Maiden Rosille comes back in her position fiercer, stronger than before, although rumors escalating reach her. She remains unbothered.
Timepass as our daughter growing up to a beautiful girl; Our oldest Louverielle, second, is Lyriqa; the third is Shikia.
Celeste keeps them the truth about their mother and father. She kindly asks me to leave the Mermaid’s Fortress. I owe her; our safety. I listen to her. I never intend to cause any harm to my love.
Cynr recruits me in his league; he needs a strong group of dragons that will accompany him in the battles and wars. I notice one thing every time the wizards and dragons go into the war.
The other dragons are with their paired wizard, navigating them to win against the opponents. Cynr does all that alone.
I ask him once, “Why?”
Cynr laughs, “I respect Adeu's decision; if he does not want to ride and battle with me then, I cannot do anything about that”.
Cynr might be laughing, but I can feel his pain every time he fight alone.
“ Do not worry, my friend, the moment you agree to come with my league. I am not alone anymore.” Cynr is flying above while I swim in the sea.
Our combination in a fight is extraordinary; Cynr breathes fire, use the element air as his power. I have the element of water as my power. I splash the water and kill them with my hissing sounds.
The war we battle, we win every single one of it. Cynr opens up to me, one time that he is bothered. Cynr feels his wizard master had something suspicious up his sleeve, something Cynr is not in favor of. He warns me to be careful.
Cynr as the dragon of the wizard Adeus, it is hard for him to refuse the wizard’s commands unless Cynr proves that his worry is real. He has a reason to cast away Adeus as his wizard master.
I visit my daughter in Celeste’s caves before I head to another war. I wanted to see my daughters. My three daughters are young mermaid-like you that time have a dream to become the next Maiden. They admire Maiden Rosille the way you look up to my daughter Louverielle. My heart cannot take the lies. My love, Rosille visits Celeste at the moment I am there; we become complete. A family. It pains me; we cannot act that way. I witness Louverielle’s face shines bright as Rosille visits them.
Rosille told them each one of them is beautiful and fierce. Any of them can be the future Maiden. I do not favor that idea. I do not want my daughters to suffer like Rosille. I do not want them to be trap in a responsibility, close their heart, and not love at all.
Rosille loves me, but her throne and her people she cannot give it up. She promises me that when she passed her crown to one of our daughters. Rosille will come with me, and I happily look forward to that, but war is almost there.
I care for my friend and also for my family; we may be apart, but then I need to protect them from harm. I decided to investigate for Cynr and confirm if what he suspects is real. I turn in my human form. I follow Adeus and his group of wizards.
Adeus gather those wizards to have a secret meeting in the Forbidden Forest.
They are meeting the human named Mr. Daemon. They plan an attack against their kind, the war of white wizard versus black wizard.
I wanted to warn Cynr that the war we are about to start is a planned attack of the black wizard against the white ones, but I cannot move. I smell something that makes my flesh trembling inside.
I saw a flower in my vision; It is a cerulean flower. I am dizzy; I do not know what happens. I wake up in my dragon form.
My eyes meet Adeus, and he mighty orders me, “Go to the war with Cynr, work together like you always do. Win that war for me. Eliminate them all” I heard it loud and clear; I cannot control my body. I have no power against Adeu's power.
Cynr and I wake up that the whole Forest is devastated by fire from the woods to the sea. I panic that Rosille, Celeste, and my daughters are in danger. I swim fast. I help Rosille save the mermaids. I make sure Celeste and my daughters are in a safe place. I come back to Rosille. She makes sure non of the mermaids left in there before she leaves.
Rosille health suffers badly; she stays longer in the water when the temperature is increasingly high. She had burned, and Celeste takes care of her wounds.
I stay by Rosille side in the times she is weak as she lets her people live in the river of the Forbidden Forest.
Rosille thinks about her people; she got the news that the mermaids separated because of the sudden incident. The mermaids panic and flee to where their fins take them. Some of the mermaids are in Human World; some are in Enchanted Fortress.
Rosille cannot gather them anymore; she asks me to take her to the Fortress they hide. While Rosille is there, she assigned a Maiden that will look out for them while she is preparing a reliable Maiden to rule them.
When she returned to Forbidden Fortress. Rosille face me, and for the first time, we talk.
“My daughters can rule the Fortress. Each one of them can be a Maiden like what they dream. Louverille will be the Maiden of the Forbidden Forest. Lyriqa, the Maiden of the Human World. Shikia, The Maiden of the Enchanted Fortress.” Rosille said dearly to me while her hand softly lays in my chest.
I see in front of me, Rosille, my love, who loves me dearly.
I never regret I have a hard life for loving her.
Rosille is a smart woman; she knows she needs to prepare the future Maiden. She trains her daughters and instructs them they will be responsible in each Fortress they rule.
Rosille, however, hesitant to put up with the tradition that the Maiden should not marry and devote their life to their people and focus on their duties. Love a hindrance when Rosille knew that it was not, but love is a rare, beautiful thing.
Louverille, our oldest daughter, build a perfect image of Maiden Rosille, her mother, in her head. She is proud to herself that Maiden Rosille chooses her to be the Maiden of Forbidden Fortress.
Rosille health deteriorates; the effect of exposure to heat slowly shows up. She is in my arms when she asks me to change my form and be a dragon; she wanted to see me in my dragon form.
Rosille endearingly appreciates my dragon form, but a gasp, we both heard. We caught Louverielle spying on us.
Rosille holds the hand of her oldest daughter. She pleaded her not to tell anyone what she sees.
“He is bad,” Louverille uttered
‘He is with the fire breathing dragons, with the black wizards who kills a lot of mythical creatures. He is a killer.” Louverille's trembling voice shocks us.
Rosille hugs her oldest daughter and sings a calming song; she slowly calms down.
Rosille is weakening, “Louverille,” Rosille softly said
“it is time for you to know the truth” Rosille face our oldest daughter,
Copyright:
This story is solely my ideas and creative thinking. Please do not copy, use, distribute, or reproduce.
© January Garneth.2020. The Mystery of the Mermaid Fortress
- Writer
