Razlan

R'Azlan pronounced Azlan


"Open your eyes." A voice broke through the fog of his meditation. He kept them shut. It was a hallucination. It was a fever dream, birthed from the years of solitary confinement. "Open your eyes, R'Azlan."

He squeezed them shut, harder. It almost sounded like... her. His child- no. The one he thought of as his child. Then a different voice.

"R'Azlan."

He flinched, almost opening his eyes. No. Her voice was too much. This hallucination wasn't fair. This torture, unjust. He had betrayed his order, betrayed his element, but he had stayed true to his heart- and the cost? His everything. His very heart. He could feel the empty hole in his chest where it should have been.

Then he heard the rattle of the door to his cell. His metal cell, specifically made for him. The only one in the Gaol. No ice could contain another ice blessed dragon, so they used one made of iron, shackled to him, staked through him. His fur, stained with the after math of it. A stain he didn't think would ever wash out.

Then he felt paws on him. Holding him. And his eyes opened for the first time in years. Through the foggy, disease tinted vision he saw her. Through a dusty, broken voice he said her name. The first thing he had said in years.

"K- kuh- S'korcelli?"

---

The gaolers were rigid in their rules. Their traditions. Their beliefs. Ice Warden's first children had the most to live up to. The weight of their flight rested on their shoulders. And R'Azlan had been determined, since birth, to bear that weight better than any other Gaoler. He rose through the ranks, from a sentry, to a keeper, to an overseer, and eventually, Warden Overseer. A position that wouldn't stay with him long.

As an Overseer, he was privy to most of the prisoners in the Gaol. As a Warden, he oversaw them all. That's how he learned the Gaol's most shameful secret. Deep in the dark levels of their prison? Where they kept the Horrorbeasts? Along side them was the other, bigger threats to their way of life. Gaolers that had been born, unblessed by the ice.

When S'korcelli was born of an unusual egg, with orange eyes that matched her firey fur, they held a secret, private Glacial Assembly that was deadlocked for days. The more conservative wanted her dead, unable to exile one of their own without revealing the whole species. The more progressive of their council pushed for her freedom. She was one of theirs, after all.

A compromise was found, and S'korcelli, one of a kind, was locked away in a cell, most Gaolers none the wiser to her very existence. From then on, every egg that was not of the right color, or shape, was thrown into the cell with her. Some were true ice eggs that contained sick hatchlings. S'korcelli watched over them. The ones who survived were ripped from her paws and given back to the tribe. Most didn't, and S'korcelli mothered them, and mourned for them.

Only one became her cell mate. One became her daughter. She named her N'Petra, and she hatched from a brown egg, with brown eyes, and she hid her away. This one would not be taken from her. Would not be raised alone in the dark, in a different frozen cell. It was shortly after N'Petra's birth that S'korcelli met R'Azlan.

The connection was instant, but R'Azlan fought it at first. He refused to acknowledge her, because if he did, he had to acknowledge his feelings for her. The way her eyes called to him. The way her fiery spirit en-rapt him. Until one day he could refuse no more, and he spoke to her. He broke the very rules he had always upkept. The rules he lived by. And dismissed the guards for the night, and approached her, alone. He asked why she was here.

S'korcelli told him of her imprisonment, and her innocence. Her only crime of being different. He listened, and she found a confidant in him. With hesitation, she introduced him to N'Petra. The timing was ideal. Every day, N'Petra got bigger, and harder to conceal. S'korcelli was desperate, afraid of the hatchling being found and taken from her.

R'azlan agreed to help.

Over the next few weeks, he prepared for their escape. He saved food and supplies, and as he grew more attached to both S'korcelli, he decided to save up for three escaping dragons. Not two. He planned to use his magic to stage a cave in, and report S'korcelli as dead to insure no one would hunt her down. But as time passed, the idea of leaving her and the pup weighed heavy in his chest, causing R'azlan to make a big mistake.

He went before the glacial assembly, begged for the release of S'korcelli and N'petra. The council roared in his face. Most had forgotten about S'korcelli. Those who hadn't didn't appreciate him bringing their shameful secret to light. They rushed to the Gaol, and opened the cell, dragging N'Petra from S'korcelli as she sobbed. Her eyes shot daggers to R'azlan, and her face was painted with betrayal.

"I didn't- I didn't mean- I thought I could make them see sense!" He called out to her, his heart shattering in pieces. "I just wanted a life with you! I'm sorry!"

It was too late though. S'korcelli's fear and grief had started to shift to rage. Unbridled and burning, and she couldn't contain it. Flames sprouted from her fur, melting the cage around her, melting the floor with every step. The gaolers tried to summon ice chains to wrap around her, but the inferno she had created melted them before they got close.

Stalactites rattled as they became unsteady, and R'azlan and the other Gaolers backed up, dropping N'petra. The hatchling scurried to her mother's side, and with a roar, S'korcelli brought down the spikes from the roof of the cavern.

---

R'azlan hadn't seen her since that day, save for his dreams. As far as he knew, she escaped, hating him, and he paid the price for her freedom. A cost he'd pay tenfold if he had to. But... now she was here. And N'petra was... almost full grown. Tears welled in his green-stained eyes, no longer blessed with the blue-white glow of ice.

"I-" his voice betrayed him.

"I know, R'azlan. I'm here to take you home." She smiled, softly, her eyes still aflame.

"hu-home?" he asked. "Th-ey won't let me luh-leave!" he was becoming frantic. "You have to ruh-run!"

"Calm now." The voice was deep and masculine, yet edged with a softness. The female gaolers stepped aside so R'azlan could see Ryna. "I come from the Sombre Shade. We live on an island, bordering the sea of a thousand currents, and the tangled wood. Though we are a shadow clan at heart. We provided sanctuary for S'Korcelli and N'Petra, but we could never locate the Gaol to come back for you. How ever, now that the Gaolers have emerged and revealed themselves, we are here to bring you to our clan. To be with your mate and kin."

"Th-they'll never let me le-leave." R'Azlan said again.

"They will. Or they will not like the alternative, where we come back for you with the whole clan." Ryna says, stoically. R'Azlan sees a goaler by the entrance to the cave, gazing down at the ground.

R'Azlan looks shocked for a moment, but then with a half sob, breaks into a smile. N'petra and S'korcelli to the same, rushing forward to embrace him.

---

The stakes were never able to be pulled from R'azlan's hide, and the red stains never left his fur, but he has a home in the Sombre Shade. He's the only dragon without a job, as Aural allows him to rest, insisting there's nothing he can do that won't upset his shackled body. It doesn't stop him from looking after the hatchlings though, and telling them of the pillar, and the time before the modern breeds. He's become a living history book and residential grandpa.