Dawn of a Hybrid Page 4

  “I don’t blame him,” said the Dragon King. “Being a half human will feel like being an outsider to anyone. Even the Centaurs may look half human but they are not human.”

  The Dragon King looked at the sun setting behind the distant foothills. He saw it was getting late, and the peasants were returning to their homes.

  “The sun is setting, and I must get my dragons back to the Valley of Creatures,” he said, walking away.

  “I must, too,” said Geraldus.

  He reined the horse to run back to his village. The horse galloped at a fast pace. It took the horse five minutes to get back to his big house.

  Two soldiers relieved Geraldus of his horse.

  Geraldus went inside his house (or manor). Once he got inside, he took in the entrance hall as he always did, sparkling with gold and a sapphire diamond hanging on the roof.

  Geraldus walked toward the narrow kitchen, which had two narrow wooden tables and several sharp knives on the tables, and saw Arron scrubbing an oval shaped plate over a bucket full of water.

  “Arron, that is good enough. Finish cleaning the plate then you can go.” Arron lazily dumbed the plate in the bucket and ran away.

  Geraldus grunted. Just then, his twin daughters came running into the kitchen. “Father,” they both said. Geraldus smiled at them and picked them up in his arms. Then Flavius walked through the door, carrying a wrapped cloth like a present.

  “Father,” said Flavius, in a soft, manly tone. “The blacksmith is having some trouble with his furnace again. He gave me what you requested before the fire mysteriously died down.”

  Geraldus placed his daughters down. “It must be your younger brothers dumping mud in there again. Make sure the servants have dinner ready when I come back, Flavius.”

  “Yes, father,” replied Flavius.

  Geraldus rushed through the entrance hall and out the front door. He paced himself in the glimmering of the bright night.

  It was near night, with the light of the sun still shining with the night sky. Stars and galaxies gleamed overhead. Purple and red novae twinkled in the dull sun’s light.

  Geraldus finally made it to the blacksmith’s workshop. Basically, it was an open view for all people to look at. There was the furnace, the hammer, the weapons hanging on the wall, and the blacksmith himself who was banging on metal.

  “What’s wrong with the furnace this time?” asked Geraldus looking at the fireplace that had a weak, low fire. The blacksmith turned to face Geraldus. He was well built and lean, his head was bald, and his poor clothes were dirty. “That’s the problem: I don’t know,” answered the blacksmith, in a deep, solemn tone.

  “Did Arron or Nerio come in here by chance?” asked Geraldus.

  “No, sir,” the blacksmith answered.

  “Then, how did…”

  A fireball flew into the blacksmith’s workshop; it headed straight for the furnace. The furnace was booming with fire again. “Ah, that’s what the fireplace needed,” said Geraldus. “Dragon fire.” Geraldus turned and exited the blacksmith and headed back to his manor. Geraldus knew the flying fireball didn’t come from a dragon.

  Geraldus entered through the front door again and headed to the dining room, which had a long table able to fit ten people. On the far end, Alaric sat with grace. On the left side of the table sat his three younger brothers: Flavius, Arron, and Nerio. And the right side sat his three younger sisters: Eliana, Naìra, and Andrei. Geraldus seated himself at the other end of the table.

  The food was placed on the table by servants and maidens. There were honey-glazed chicken and turkey, boiled vegetables, fruits that had been lightly glazed, and hole-cut sweet potatoes.

  It was a spectacular feast the family was enjoying. At least it was until Arron and Nerio started to mess around with the chicken bones. They were using the bones like swords, fighting and poking each other.

  This caused a major distraction to the entire family. Everyone couldn’t see their plates peacefully since the twin boys were causing so much noise.

  Alaric got up to take away the bones from the two boys.

  Arron saw him coming and threw a chicken rib at his oldest brother.

  “You should never play with bones, boys!” said a distorted human tone.

  Suddenly, the rib stopped in midair, floating in front of Alaric’s face. The bone began to fly away from Alaric, soaring over the table, going passed a standing Geraldus, and right towards the dining room entrance.

  The rib was grabbed by a strange figure; the figure happened to be a male human but half a human.

  From the waist was a human torso and skin was bright red if the skin was sunburnt. His head was rounded and had thin crimson hair. He had odd colors for human eyes: the sclera was as sparkling as the sapphire ocean, the yellow iris shined like gold coins, and crimson pupils that sparked like a fiery ruby.

  His legs were curved like a wolf’s leg with red scales. A thin dragon tail was softly swirling like a snake. From his shoulder blades, a pair of crimson dragon wings hung.

  And dragon scales covered a short length of his lower arms if he was wearing gloves that stretched near to the elbows. His hands consist of five fingers and small claws hung at the fingertips.

  This figure seemed to be half human half dragon, in the house of Geraldus where the family and their servants were looking at him. This human creature was unlike anyone had ever seen before: a human-dragon hybrid.

  A HUMAN DRAGON HYBRID

  T

  he human-dragon hybrid stood still holding the rib in a hand. He was seventeen years old. His face was a bit mushy and the skin was almost snake-like but still retained human skin. His dragon features were very crimson like burning fire.

  “You must never play with bones, boys,” he said. His voice was deep, soft and distorted . “You might end up choking on them,” he continued. “And if you choke on them, you will eventfully die from choking. It was also extremely rude playing with your food and a great insult when you are embarrassing your family members in front of your servants who kindly placed their time and efforts in making this wonderful meal.”

  The hybrid creature walked over to a small, non-burning fireplace and threw the bone into the fireplace. The bone burst into flames as soon as it hit the fireplaces ashy ground. He inhaled the smoke and blew out water droplets from his nose.

  “Thanks, Vaeludar,” said Alaric.

  Vaeludar heard Alaric thanking him, but paid it no mind. The hybrid only focused on what he did. He grabbed a flying bone without touching it, flung it over to the fireplace, and lit the bone on fire without making any fire from his mouth or hands; it was all done by magic.

  “Pay it no mind, Alaric,” said Vaeludar. “I’m only doing what needed to be done, and I was doing nothing else at the moment. So I decided to do something about it.” He turned to leave the dining room, dragging his legs like a real dragon moving his back hind legs.

  “Hey, freak, catch,” yelled Nerio, throwing a wishbone.

  Vaeludar halted. Instead of turning and dodging the throwing attack, the claws of his left wing caught the flying wishbones. Vaeludar stood still while his wing caught the bone. He turned and swung the wishbone back at its thrower, with his wing at a hard speed. The wishbone landed on Nerio’s plate then flopped on his head, with the two endpoints sticking straight up.

  The twin boys had a shocked look to them.

  “Remember, Nerio,” said Vaeludar. “I have unique senses. Unless you come more stealthily, a more sneaky way that doesn’t make any noises; you better keep your attacks to yourself and your twin brother.” Vaeludar withdrew his arm and the wishbone fell back on the place. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have some cleaning to do.”

  Vaeludar left and went out the front door, his legs bending like a deer. But as soon as he walked outside of Geraldus house, he saw dozens of strangers looking at him oddly. He wondered if they were strangers from distant lands who were lost in a small village
or if he was the stranger.

  For all his life, Vaeludar always saw the oddly faced eyes staring at him, always staring, always glaring at an odd specimen. Never before had there been an account of a hybrid that was a human and a dragon, for Vaeludar was exactly that: a human-dragon hybrid. He was told by Geraldus that Vaeludar’s father was a Dragon and his mother was a human.

  It is not known of how a giant, winged lizard came to love a two-legged creature five times smaller than the lizard’s size. And there was no record of any love made between dragon and human, but Vaeludar was the first ever to be the child of two different species. This was why Vaeludar always had eyes staring at him, even among the Dragons; he was considered to be the first hybrid ever to be seen by human or dragon or any other mythical creature.

  The hybrid paced himself toward the armory where Geraldus was earlier. He saw the blacksmith hammering on a large metal

  “Look who’s here,” the blacksmith said. The blacksmith showed a sign of relief to see the hybrid walking to him. The blacksmith was the only stranger Vaeludar could call a friend, outside the house of Geraldus, and the blacksmith was the only human, in the entire village, who didn’t give Vaeludar a strange look. “Can you help me out with the furnace?”

  “Well, I don’t have anything else better to do,” said Vaeludar. He walked over to the furnace and saw the fire within slowly dying. “Have the two small boys been causing trouble again?”

  The blacksmith nodded before resuming his hammering.

  Vaeludar sighed. “I swear, if those boys keep messing these small things up, they’re going to ruin this entire island if they ever get to the capital city when they become adults.” Vaeludar wreathed a small heating, steaming breath exhaling from his mouth.

  Then a small fire puffed from his nose and mouth and the furnace was lit bright and fiery. The fire was working again and the blacksmith could resume with his heavy-duty work of hammering the metal and forging the weapons that needed to get forged.

  “My thanks,” the blacksmith thanked.

  Vaeludar nodded his head in response. He turned to leave the blacksmith, with his ears listening to the hammering of a hammer the blacksmith was pounding with. “I got nothing else to do around this village, except for maybe walking around the village,” he whispered.

  In a single flap of his wings, Vaeludar rose into the air and sat himself on the roof of Geraldus’s house. He sat next to an open window and looked at the horizon changing from light to the dark.

  Is that what I am good for around here? wondered Vaeludar. Keeping the blacksmith’s furnace on fire?

  Vaeludar threw his back on the roof and looked toward a twilight sky. Few stars sparkled brightly as three moons were dimly lit: one purple, one a haze of green, and the last dark blue like the night sky. Light of the sun still flickered from the western horizon.

  Several red-violet supernovas and small, star-like galaxies, and the two yellow-striped, purple moons and one blue moon lit the twilight sky with speculator. Much light flickered in his dragon, humanoid eyes. The sight of the twilight sky brought wonder and peaceful thoughts to Vaeludar’s mind.

  He could just fly up there into the sky and thought what could be beyond those novae and stars and could travel through an infinite space. Perhaps he could fly and see the Three Gods the ancient legends spoke of, the three believed ancient creators of the universe. He had been told the gods live up in the sky, away from the mortal world and where things are said to be immortal.

  Vaeludar had been an outsider and the only place he felt like he could go would be the stars floating above the world. He could just fly up there and go into an infinite abyss and feel like he was an afterlife where small dots and sparkling lights would flicker all around him and have no human or dragon eyes looking strangely at him.

  He always wondered where his parents were, and if they really wanted him. He was told several times by Geraldus his parents’ names were Ralenskrit and Belverda. Ralenskrit was a fire-breathing Dragon and Belverda was a human, and both were scientists trying to make science better for lives: medicines, medical treatments, and all sorts of healing drugs.

  Ralenskrit and Belverda were considered to be an odd pair of scientists since they had different body sizes and were two different species. It was highly unusual for scientists of two different species to be working together. It was always human scientists working with human scientists and dragon scientists working with dragon scientists, not a pair of cross-species scientists.

  Over the years he heard of their names, Vaeludar heard a few rumors that Ralenskrit and Belverda were trying to find ways to bypass life and live longer than a usual lifespan of human and dragon. Trying to bypass the power of evolution wasn’t something a mortal could do, only an immortal like one of the Three Gods.

  Those were only rumors Vaeludar had heard but couldn’t bear the thought of them trying to become gods themselves. He thought he was only made from love the two different species had and somehow managed to make him, but Vaeludar had always debated if his parents did love each other or if he was just made in the process outside of parental love.

  Whatever the reason was, Vaeludar’s final thoughts of them were parents who didn’t want him and wanted to get rid of him. He always wanted to see them all his life, but he had no idea where to search for them or where to start looking for them.

  “I thought I would find you out here,” said a voice.

  Vaeludar knew Geraldus’s head would be popping out of the open window, even as the hybrid would be looking toward the stars. “You’re thinking about joining me on your slippery rooftop?” Vaeludar paid Geraldus no mind, only looking at the starry sky.

  “You have the outsider-looks once again. You shouldn’t be too hard on yourself, Vaeludar. Being half of anything shouldn’t be that hard to live by. In fact, the Centaurs, the Faeries, and the Merpeople are…”

  “Are not humans like I am,” Vaeludar promptly interrupted, standing back up. Vaeludar turned his full attention toward the man who raised the hybrid all his life. “They look human but are not human. My mother is human, and my father a Dragon. I’ve been told they were partners of science and left me behind to be an outcast for the rest of my life. To be stared at. For years, people and creatures alike have all looked at me with complete blankness. In all of history of all kinds, I’m the FIRST ever hybrid of both dragon and human. Basically, I’m a nobody around in this village. A nobody!”

  Geraldus sighed. “Your mother, who was my friend, was having some sort of nervous breakdown when she and your dragon father left you here. They said they were into making an extraordinary weapon that could purge these lands from evil creatures, and said you were caught in the middle of the making of this weapon. They also said servants of evil have discovered what abilities and the tremendous amount of strength you have and that kind of power could be used for evil.

  “Whatever the reasons they have for leaving you here under my protection, I trust they were doing it for your own protection and your own greater good. When your mother and I were younger, I owed her a debt in saving my life from a falling tree and made her a promise into repaying it however I can. So I repaid that debt by raising you as a son when she and the Dragon needed to keep you safe from watchful eyes where they were working in a part of the island.”

  Vaeludar himself sighed sadly. “I wish I could have seen their faces once. I wish they could be here right now that way I wouldn’t feel like an outsider.”

  “You should always know: if they hadn’t left you here, I wouldn’t have gained the most perfect son for the blacksmith, and teaching my two youngest sons the lessons they need to learn.”

  The hybrid finally smiled.

  “Even as I stay here, I don’t belong here. I have a lot of questions about my past, of what I am and who I am.”

  “If you feel like you don’t belong here, you can always leave and find a life of your own out in the world. You’re old and strong enough to take ca
re of yourself. I know you have a lot of questions left unanswered, but I don’t have all the answers. If you ever need answers of what you truly are or where you come from, you can always leave my village and find them, my foster son. You can always come back if that is what you choose. Remember, you’re the free one here while I have four sons to leave in charge of this village.”

  “So, I leave whenever I wish, like right now?”

  “Yes, you can leave right now. The choice is yours, Vaeludar. I’ve kept my part of my promise to your mother. I’ve seen you grow to be strong and able to lift heavy logs fifty men couldn’t lift, and you managed to breathe fire and fly on your own, without any help from anyone.”

  Vaeludar huffed “I’m still half dragon, which would mean I have half the abilities full dragons have. Still, I don’t want to stay here. So by tomorrow morning, I’m planning on starting my own journey and will walk alone. I don’t want anyone to come with me, and need to be alone.”

  “As you wish,” said Geraldus, he went back through the window and vanished from Vaeludar’s view.

  Vaeludar took one more look at the village; it was quieting down and the sounds of cropping were ceasing and the people were going back into their homes. He jumped to the ground and proceeded to walk into Geraldus’s house.

  Vaeludar made his way into the kitchen where the servants were cleaning. Unbeknownst to them, an expensive, well-designed plate was about to fall from a lazy stacked pile of plates.

  In quick reacting time, Vaeludar’s dragon tail caught the falling plate with a bunch of other falling plates, moving his tail quickly catching them like an acrobat. He caught about twenty-three falling plates in no less than seven seconds, with his pointed tail holding them in one complete, straight, vertical pile.

  Vaeludar’s skills, with his dragon tail, caught the attention of the servants; who were staring at him very oddly like everyone else did outside the house.