#the secret of dragonhome

[kedreeva]

I saw a post about not coming between a 13 year girl and her mediocre favorite book, and in response, I tagged The Secret of Dragonhome. I clicked on my tag and found your post. I loved that book so very much as a 13-14 year old back in the late 90s and read it dozens of times. In looking it up again, I discovered there are sequels! Anyway, it was nice seeing someone else who loved the book.

Oh AWESOME!! I don't think I even know ANYONE that even READ that book! I knew that there was a sequel, but the last time I looked I couldn't find copies of them anywhere. I don't even have my copy of Dragonhome, as I lent it and it was never returned, and then I couldn't find a replacement for that, either :( I feel a little like I fever dreamed it!

[terra-tortoise]

OKAY we have: chorus, mage from the water flight and one of ten mage representatives in the highland sanctum. chorus is not their given name, but one adopted when they were given the role of a wavesinger--a type of magician who shapes water using their voice alone. their true name is secret to all who had not met them before they took on that job, all except their charge...

meridian (meri for short), a former sailor of the outer sea that surrounds the land of sornieth. meri is strong, tattooed, and cocksure. meri holds multiple sailing records, and is a small-name celebrity among certain nautical circles. chorus has been the only dragon capable of calling them to shore, away from the ships and the sea, and oh how far they have called him...

the pair currently reside in the highland sanctum in dragonhome, chorus the mage representative of the water flight and meri their guard and companion. despite being a dusthide, generations of ancestors born and raised in the water flight have left meri with some features more equipped to swimming than to digging, and he feels out of place in the earth territories. chorus is the youngest mage in the sanctum, and while they are well regarded both for their attitude and aptitude, they have a heavy dose of imposter syndrome (but they hide it well).

[flameraven]

Lol. Reminds me of a favorite childhood book I recently reread, called The Secret of Dragonhome, which features a castle gate stylized as a roaring dragon head.

(The secret is that there are dragons in Dragonhome! Shocking!)

i firmly hold that it's my duty as a reader to believe it when an author tells me at the beginning of the series that the dragons are gone forever and never coming back. but god it's a struggle sometimes.

[reliquiaenfr]

I would, akshually, like to know more about the Coterie! What's their base look like at the cove, and are they managed by that paladin-looking spiral?

ohhhh you are in such luck because when i was reorganising my lair a while back i actually went through google finding some ref pics to use for the different parts of the lair and the coterie was one i had a really solid idea about.

bleakwater - both the island and the town - i imagine have a real innsmouth vibe to them, but the coterie and castle cordolium aren't technically part of the town, they're outside, and i did such a hard core vibe swap when i did that oops.

the coterie is a sort of compound, greco-roman stylings, but it was all run down when nim moved in, like an abandoned vineyard with lots of big spaces and a manor-type house with outbuildings and storage sheds. it has a wall all the way around it made of pale stone, it was crumbling in places but that was the first thing nim had patched up.

the buildings are whitewashed with red tile roofs, there are fluted columns (think corinthian or ionic stylisations), lots of open tiled areas with gardens and walkways and fountains and ponds and shit like that. this was clearly a very wealthy place but it fell into disrepair and the coterie are still fixing it back up.

this sort of look but more crumbling and overgrown with vines, shrubs coming through the pavement, whitewash flaking, all that stuff. they're fixing it up, but none of the members of the coterie (at the current time) are especially good at construction lmao. and they're all pretty wary of outsiders.

the coterie's lands sit on the south-facing side of bleakwater island, looking directly towards the canyon on mainland dragonhome. (bleakwater cove - the town - is on the north-east side, it's a dingy, dour place but it's in a good spot for trade between the labyrinth and dragonhome, and castle cordolium is on the east side overlooking the town, there's not a lot of distance between the three locations, you could walk all the way around the island in a day, it's a small place, but yeah)

and yep! nim runs the coterie... as much as anyone really runs the place.

she is a paladin, absolutely - i considered giving her a sword and shield but it cluttered up her outfit too much so just pretend for me, i felt she deserved a nice hat, too, but same problem. nim's hometown was destroyed by a powerful and greedy mage and she's hated most magic ever since. it has it's uses, but she doesn't trust it or anyone who uses it. she doesn't like monsters, doesn't like things that are beyond her fairly narrow understanding of the world. magic and creatures that are "abnormal" scare her and she wants to "keep others safe from them".

(this is kind of ironic given the company she keeps and the other inhabitants of the island, like... nim, honey... no one here is normal but she's a "means justify ends" kinda girl)

over time, she put together the coterie as it currently is and... yeah she might be drinking the copium about it because arisen is the amalgamation and reanimated ghostly conglomerate of a bunch of people who died at sea, hadal is a straight up sea monster (she and arisen do not get on), talamh is a tomb-raider style archaeologist who uses necromancy to uncover the secrets of the places she's robbing, her brother is an assassin, and aodar is the normalest of them all by being a blacksmith. but like. none of these people are the sort of company a Good And Pure Paladin like nim should be hanging around with you feel me? she's doing her best. and they all gave her Very Valid Reasons for joining the coterie. (like arisen's whole schtick is that they want to stop other folks from falling victim to weird shenanigans at sea, we aren't sure why she tolerates hadal, tho)

tuamach (the assassin) picked up some rumours about a safe haven for the kind of monsters and weirdos nim is always looking for and that's when they set up proper camp in the manor on bleakwater. because that safe haven is just over the water in reliquary canyon. and nim is determined to figure out what kind of monstrosities are hidden in there and see if she can't... eradicate them.

she's set up as a low-key villain for the reliquary but like... not really. eventually she's going to realise that she's been hanging out with monsters all along and maybe they're not so bad.

my fun fact about nim actually is that she's named after the little sea monster baby from the show surface. its name was nimrod but the kid called it nim for short and i thought it would be funny to name a dragon who dislikes monsters after one.

[frankenmouse]

I’m rereading some childhood favorite books and just finished Aliens Ate My Homework by Bruce Coville.

I am absolutely delighted and astonished to find that there is a same sex “bonded” partnership between two of the main characters that I never picked up on as a kiddo. The characters share a private room, are noted to be “bonded” mentally, and show significantly greater concern for each other than with their other coworkers. It’s absolutely so subtle it could be missed, but this was a kid’s book published in 1993!

When I did a little searching, I found that Coville has since come out as bisexual, so I have no doubts that this was fully intentional.

The same book also has an alien character that prefers “it” pronouns because it is neither male nor female, but a third gender, with the implication that the gender identities among its species are significantly more nuanced than a male/female binary.

What a wonderful thing to discover about one of my favorite childhood books and authors! Sometimes you revisit things to find that they’ve aged like sour milk (looking at you Secret of Dragonhome), but every once in a while things genuinely were as good, (if not better!) as you thought they were.

[m42-fr]

Here’s my Lore Post™ on various types of common currency around Sorneith! Note that this covers only major forms of currency that can be found broadly throughout their territories of origin, or are otherwise culturally relevant in some way. This post does not include forms of currency that may exist between individual clans. If you happen to find that any of this worldbuilding goes well with your lore, feel free to use it so long as you credit me somewhere for the idea!

And, of course, a mandatory disclaimer: the names and lore of these currencies comes from my own head (and a random name generator). Any resemblance to anything from the real world is unintentional.

Vahrani (vah-RAH-nee) are small bronze coins that originate from the Ashfall Waste. Thanks to the Flamecaller’s ceaseless forges, vahrani are the most common and well-established metal-based currency in the world - and, in fact, are the most well-established currency in the world, period. Trade with the neighboring Windswept Plateau, which exports the products of Fire’s industry to every technologically developing region on the continent, has spread Ashfall coinage far and wide.

Most vahrani have been in circulation for decades, their surfaces oxidized completely teal-black. Pristine, metallic vahrani, either newly-minted or freshly polished, are considered a status symbol by some, but certain dragons may refuse to accept them as payment for fear that they have been recently (and illegally) forged. Vahrani jewelry makes use of the holes at their corners, stringing them together into necklaces, earrings, and other forms of decoration. In a pinch, vahrani can even be tiled together to create makeshift armor. 

Vahrani come in units of one, five, and ten. These coins bear an identical picture of the Flamecaller on one side and have a number inscribed on the other, which indicates their worth. The runoff copper from the creation of vahrani bronze is pulled into small lumps and stamped with the sigil of Fire while the metal is still hot, creating small, misshapen coins called vasi - or, in common slang, slag - each worth a tenth of a vahrani. Vasi are not nearly as widespread as vahrani, but they make up the majority of the payroll for poorer dragons within the Ashfall Waste.

--

Suuram (SOOH-ram) are long, paper-thin copper chits used as currency within the southwestern Shifting Expanse. The very first suuram were copper wires that had been pounded into rough rectangular shapes, but modern suuram are machine-punched from massive metal sheets, ensuring an incredibly consistent size and weight. The asymmetrical pattern of crescent holes at their edges is meant only to distinguish them from simple copper pieces. In practice, the holes are often used to hold chains of coins together with cord or metal clips.

There is only one value of a suuram piece. Rather than create different coins with higher values, dragons exploit the extreme thinness of suuram sheets by packing pieces into small containers; informal higher-value units consist of rectangular boxes holding a carefully-counted number of coins. Carrying around large blocks of copper sheets can become awfully inconvenient, so five-and-ten vahrani pieces have become a popular alternative currency in the Expanse. Suuram are used mostly as pocket change. 

Due to the relative geographic isolation of the far coast of the Stormcatcher’s territory, suuram are not particularly popular outside of the Shifting Expanse, and lack traction everywhere past the Charged Barrens. However, suuram are acknowledged as a valid currency in every territory with flourishing trade and worldwide connections, including the Ashfall Waste, Windswept Plateau, Sunbeam Ruins, Tangled Wood, Starfall Isles, and Dragonhome. 

The northeastern region of the Shifting Expanse is home to independent scavenger-clans who have little need for formalized currency. Rather than conducting trade with stand-ins like coins, they prefer to directly exchange goods and services, determining the value of each with every new trade. That being said, they do occasionally make use of a form of unregulated, low-value currency, colloquially known as scrap.

Scrap refers to any collection of relatively small, portable, usually worn-down and otherwise useless metal chunks - rusty nails, old gears that don’t fit anywhere, spare nuts and bolts found half-buried in the sand, weathered iron spring-coils and copper wires, and so on. While scrap has no immediate survival value, it serves much the same purpose of currency in that it acts as a metaphorical stand-in for something that is of value, and can be exchanged with others for goods and services. Scrap is considered a valid currency within the northern Expanse, although it is often looked down upon as a ‘primitive’ coin in the more technologically developed regions around Goldensparc and the Lightning Farm. 

--

Paxa (PACKS-uh) are hand-carved wooden chits infused with sparks of magic that keep them pristine even under the worst of abuse. Native to the Sunbeam Ruins, paxa owe their remarkably high value to the painstaking process of crafting them. Each coin is hand-carved to impossible standards of consistency, stained a beautiful deep ebony, and protected from damage with ancient Light artefact-preservation magicks. Their magical ‘fingerprint’ is nearly impossible to fake, which guards them from forgeries. The secret to creating paxa is zealously guarded by a handful of dragons who have dedicated their lives to the craft.

Paxa are a universally recognized coin, spread throughout the world by Light’s investment in research as well as their inherent value. Future-minded dragons convert their retirement savings into paxa, knowing that unlike many other currencies, the tight control on paxa production ensures that their value remains constant. Paxa is also the coin of choice for most illegal operations in Sorneith thanks to their high value and their impossibility to falsify. 

The average working-class dragon, even in the Ruins, will struggle to get their talons on any significant amount of paxa. Paxa are used to facilitate expensive transactions, and as such are favored by merchants, the wealthy, and the criminal; throughout most of the Sunbeam Ruins, workers are paid in vahrani, with the occasional handful of suuram thrown in for variety.

--

The origin of wek-ya, (WEK-yuh) Shadow’s mercurial coinage, is shrouded in mystery. Nobody knows when or where the first wek-ya were made - and, in fact, nobody knows how to make wek-ya at all. Ambitious blacksmiths who try their hand at smelting some are invariably struck with tides of bad luck that force them to close shop. And, moreover, the Tangled Wood can hardly be said to have an established government, so the presence of such a widespread and standardized currency is a curiosity in and of itself.

Wek-ya are crafted of pure silver, or something that resembles it. Each coin has two unique patterns - one to either side - that depict an incredibly broad array of subjects. The most common motifs are crescent moons, mushrooms, thorns, and dancing dragon figures, but there have been wek-ya known to picture oddly specific situations, such as trees being struck by lightning, rats climbing atop bookshelves, and draconic silhouettes that bear a strange resemblance to the viewer in the midst of suffering some catastrophe. Many dragons believe that wek-ya are infused with divination magic; coins are commonly drawn from bags to determine future events, and some individuals claim that their fortunes are told by the wek-ya they receive in trades. 

While wek-ya are the most common form of money in the Tangled Wood, they’re incredibly rare elsewhere. Common superstition holds that removing a wek-ya from its homeland will curse the coin’s bearer until it has been returned. There appears to be some vague truth to the statement, as the coins are known to have a way of mysteriously disappearing when they’ve spent too much time away from the Shadowbinder’s influence.

Wek-ya are capable of emitting a dim glow for several hours after being exposed to moonlight. Conversely, they’ve also been known to spontaneously melt when placed in sunlight, permanently disfiguring their faces - such coins are considered overwhelmingly taboo by most residents of the Wood and are traditionally thrown into bogs, rivers, and liquid-shadow ponds, such that they may be forever forgotten. 

--

Dazal (day-ZAHL) are large, chunky coins cut from smoky quartz. They come from Dragonhome, make for an uncommon sight in the northern Starfall Isles and Tangled Wood, and are rare elsewhere. No one institution governs the production of dazal, but most dragons don’t go out of their way to fake them - the coins are used predominantly within the handful of high-population regions of Dragonhome, particularly Terraclae and the Colonnades of Antiquity. Thanks to Light’s vested interest in archaeology, paxa are the most common currency in Dragonhome’s urbanized regions, followed by the eponymous vahrani.

Unlike suuram, which are largely shunned by Lightning’s more independent desert-dwelling clans, the value of dazal is respected by clans among even the most rural and harsh environments of Dragonhome. Most groups will carry at least a handful of them to use in trades - a few dazal will buy a weary traveler water and other goods. The nomadic routes of the Snappers often bring them to urban areas every now and again, which makes holding onto the currency useful, if occasionally burdensome. 

    The distribution of colors and patterns in a dazal is unique to every coin. Dazal have no varied values in a legal sense, but many individuals within Dragonhome will accept morion dazal - that is, those made of smoky quartz so uniformly dark as to be nearly black - as being worth twice as much as a singular dazal (or equivalent to one wek-ya). Some seek out dazal with unusual color schemes for collection purposes. Another commonly-sought variant is a coin without any scuffs; though crystalline, most older dazal are ridden with chips and cracks. 

--

The Sea of a Thousand Currents has no legally recognized currency. The stinging seawater makes metal-based money impractical, and even the magical toughness of paxa and arcslivers will wear under the waves. Among the more isolated, aquatic clans, though, an informal coin known as vanes (VAIN) are used in some transactions. Vanes are seashells that have been chipped and polished into glistening, guitar-pick shaped chits.

The production, distribution, and value of vanes is entirely unregulated. Any dragon with strong hands and sandpaper can collect seashells and file them to the right shape and smoothness. As such, individual vanes vary widely in color, texture, and shape. The value of a vane is equally variable - no bank in the world accepts vanes as legal tender, although they are acknowledged as being incredibly low-value, presuming they have any worth at all. 

Bags of vanes are often exchanged by coastal and reef-dwelling clans as stand-ins for the payment of debt. If an individual needs a good or service, but cannot pay for it at the time, they can hand over some vanes that serve as a sort of credit, later giving something of real value in return for their lent vanes.

Among the roughshod sailors of the Sea, bilgespray is a tawdry term used to refer to any collective mix of multiple types of currency. The wide variety of territories that they visit throughout their trading routes means that they inevitably collect a number of different types of coin. The term, ‘bilgespray,’ usually refers to a singular payout given in more than one type of currency, but used more broadly may account for any messy assortment of multiple types of money.

--

Popular within the urban areas of the central Starfall Isles, arcslivers (ARK-slih-vur) are tokens cut from the same magically-refined arcglass that makes up the shell of the Astrolodome. Their edges are inscribed with faintly-glowing runes that, like paxa, protect them from damage, although their enchantments are comparatively weaker. The appearance and value of an arcsliver is standardized; their production is controlled by banks within the Astrolodome and neighboring communities.

Well-wrought trading routes have established arcslivers as a valid currency throughout the entirety of the Isles. However, they have very little steading outside of Arcane’s territory. Similar to suuram, geographic isolation has kneecapped their spread, with traveling arcslivers found mostly in the neighboring regions of Dragonhome and the Windswept Plateau; a handful make their way to the Sea of a Thousand Currents and beyond from there. Though rare, they are legally acknowledged in institutions around Sorneith. 

--

Given the extremely well-connected, trade-focused culture of the Windswept Plateau, every currency - even strange or worthless ones, like wek-ya and vanes - can be found in abundance among Windsinger’s children. Vahrani from the neighboring Ashfall Waste are the most common coin, followed by paxa and arcslivers. Wind does not have a traditional currency in the way that other territories do. Rather than use a standardized object to represent physical value, Wind’s unusual currency holds strictly social value. These objects are called kuo (KOO-oh). They are long, ribbonlike textiles, made from hundreds of tiny interwoven beads, and are as much art as they are money.

The length of an individual kuo can vary considerably. Most are long enough to be used as sashes and belts, or be hung up as colorful banners. The harvesting, sculpting, weaving, and painting of their miniscule beads takes a painstaking amount of time and skill. As a monetary system, they indicate debts, allegiances, and other forms of social ‘money,’ whether paid or owed. The perceived value of a kuo is usually based on its size and craftsmanship - the longer and prettier, the better.

    While more rural and traditional clans will use kuo for their original purpose, younger generations - particularly those living in more urbanized areas - forgo the social value of kuo and create them for artistic purposes. The creation of an individual kuo ribbon is considered a long and meditative pastime. The patterns in every ribbon are unique, and the abundance of beads and paints mean that elaborate images can be threaded along the strings; given the extensive length of most kuo, many are used to depict the events of stories, be they mythical or factual. The longest kuo is rumored to be a ribbon that stretches the distance of the Cloudsong and depicts an embellished version of the Windswept Plateau’s entire history. 

In recent times, dragons have begun to weave kuo as gifts and decorations. Many young lovers and best friends will create kuo for one another, its pictures personalized to the other’s interests and personality, and wear the bands that they themselves were given (usually as scarves, sashes, or bracelets) in an open declaration of their bond. Kuo are becoming an increasingly popular export of the Windswept Plateau. Eager to share their culture with the world, Wind dragons often sell and gift kuo to travelers, and some have even begun to export them to other territories. 

--

The rough, lonesome barrens of the Southern Icefield makes the establishment of currency incredibly difficult. Like other harsh environments in Sorneith - the Shifting Expanse, Dragonhome, the Scarred Wasteland, and so on - coins are not particularly useful for immediate survival, and so trades are preferentially conducted with goods and services rather than coins. Northernmost or otherwise trade-savvy clans may occasionally cut deals with foreigners using vahrani, arcslivers, and even suuram.

The ancient institutions of the Gaolers, for all their fervence with law and order, never had reason to establish an expansive currency amongst themselves. The basic needs of all individuals are cared for free of charge; anything fancier is either owned communally, acquired by advancing in rank, or traded for without monetary stand-ins. Among a few circles, though - and particularly popular in teaching discipline to younger recruits - is a token system using units called snowcoins.

Snowcoins are very simple constructions. At their core is a singular link of a metal chain, which is encapsulated in magically-unmelting ice. The surface of a snowcoin is smooth and convex, forming an oblong shape not unlike a river stone, and they are remarkably translucent. Snowcoins, then, are a small reward earned through various services and good behavior, and can be traded in for small personal luxuries. The things snowcoins can buy consist mostly of curios and other decorative trinkets. 

Given that snowcoins are used only by the Gaolers, their existence is almost completely unheard of throughout Sorneith, even in the neighboring Snowsquall Tundra. Only a tiny handful have ever made it out of the Icefield - and even then, most of those found away from the Icewarden are replicas, not genuine. Those who are in possession of snowcoins usually regard them as oddities and collectibles. They hold some mildly curious historic value, but little else. 

--

For all their hatred for one another, the territories of the Scarred Wasteland and Viridian Labyrinth share a similar trait: neither has much in the way of currency. The Labyrinth prizes self-sufficiency and its clans want for little. Their isolationist nature has created a strict limitation on the influx of foreign currency - not even vahrani have made it past their coastal regions. Those from Nature who detest outside influence often use the derogatory term rootmuck to refer to any form of outside currency.

While Plague has a similar lack of established money, they don’t hold the same wariness of foreigners that the Gladekeeper’s children do. Most Plague clans see no reason in shunning something that may help them acquire useful things in the future. Various currencies are common at their respective borders - dazal in the north, wek-ya in the east, vahrani to the south, and arcslivers to the west. 

That being said, their central clans, much like those of the northwestern Shifting Expanse, trade mostly survival supplies with one another. Guttergunk is an informal term from the Wasteland that applies to any assortment of individually worthless items that are bundled together to have some collective value. Guttergunk is not anything that could keep you alive; it’s made of things like small trophies - teeth, scales, horns -, the last of old food preserves, tattered pieces of canvas, balls of string, and so forth. Trade offers of guttergunk are considered trashy, greedy, or desperate; in other words, a sign of either arrogance or weakness, perhaps both.

Alternatively, the term may apply to anything considered gross and worthless: “Your efforts are guttergunk,” is an example of a common insult. The word has become popular in neighboring territories, particularly by residents of the Driftwood Drag and sailors of the Sea of a Thousand Currents, and among them it has much the same meaning.

[snailie-fr]

Earth Flight & Eternity

Earth is the eternal flight, built upon reverence and preservation of the past. Unlike Light, which seeks to archive and collect, Earth seeks to preserve and honor ancestors and history alike by preserving it in its most immortal self. This can take many forms: stone effigies, shrines, statues and other lifelike recreations, but perhaps most interesting is how this intersects with magic and spirituality.

It's no secret that ley magic of Sorneith can infect and possess all sorts of creatures both dragon and beast. The great undead wyrms that roam the Cairnstone Rest to protect what is inside are a great example of this -- beings who hold onto the past long past the point of death. Even Obelisks, creatures made to protect the deepest parts of Dragonhome, are eternally-lived beings of stone and gems that were given life by the Earthshaker and the leylines in the area.

To Earth dragons, there is no greater honor than to keep the past alive, however that may be. Clans in the area are often incredibly traditional with rituals that go back to the first and second ages. Physical forms are temporary, but memories and souls and magic, those are eternal.

This had lead to some clans adopting oddly spiritual connections to the concept. With many beings in Dragonhome willing themselves past death, there is a through line to many dragons that they, too, may someday do the same and become part of living history itself. Folk tales about dragons who go on to possess and inhabit statues, effigies, and other objects are common -- and so too is the practice of creating these sorts of objects for one's ancestors or even themselves to one day inhabit. Above all, however, seems to come a common thought:

There are two manners of reaching this zenith of existence. One, of obsession and burden, leads one's lay magic to corrupt and turn it into one of the great beasts that walks the land. The other, of clarity and wisdom, will allow a dragon to walk the lands as blessed by the Earthshaker himself. It is this spiritual strength -- not just physical -- that Earth dragons pride themselves on.

To be solid, reliable, and strong are revered aspects of an Earth dragon. And to be an eternal family member of the Earthshaker's is of the highest honor there is.

[saltminerising]

@ Navy Seals copypasta anon, idk about a dodged elim one, but if you haven't already seen it here's the Earth dom one...

What the fuck did you just fucking say about Earth, you filthy casual? I’ll have you know we graduate top of the dominance board every week, and I’ve been involved in dom organization since kickstarter beta, and I have over 500k exalted dragons and 300 confirmed alt accounts for fodder breeding. I am trained in split-second coli captcha recognition, split-screen multitasking, and I’m the top coli grinder in the entire FR discord community. You are nothing to me but just another pebble to push out of 1st place. I will beat your exalt numbers the fuck out by a margin so large it has never been seen before on Sornieth, mark my fucking words. You think you can get away with saying that shit about Earth on a drama blog? Think again, 12th place scorer. As we speak I am contacting my secret network of spies across pet site tumblr and your IP is being traced right now so you better prepare for the storm, plagueling. The storm that wipes out the pathetic little thing you call your profit push. Your flight is fucking defeated, kid. I can be online anywhere, anytime, and I can out-exalt you in over seven hundred ways, and that’s just with my mouse. Not only am I extensively trained in keyboard grinding, but I have access to the entire arsenal of the Dragonhome Coliseum Bots Network and I will use it to its full extent to wipe your miserable flight off the face of the dominance board, you little loser. If only you could have known what unholy retribution your little “petty” submission was about to bring down upon your flight, maybe you wouldn’t have filled the fucking captcha. But you couldn’t, you didn’t, and now you’re paying the price, you goddamn idiot. I will shit fodder all over Earthshaker and he will drown in it. Your push is fucking dead, kiddo.

[kedreeva]

Pssst betterworldbooks has a used copy of The Secret of Dragonhome right now! (8/14 at 7:56pm CDT)

Anon, you're a little blessing and I am wrapping you in a soft blanket and bringing you cocoa with tiny marshmallows. I snapped that one up and while I was there it occurred to me maybe this little site had something ELSE I was dying to have back- the Enchanted Forest Chronicles, but with the original art covers. AND THEY DID. I'm so happy I could cry! Thank you!

[magichats-fr]

“Earthshaker’s first creations were ones that they say he was proud of.

They were great serpents, able to cut through the very earth silently the way fish fly through water with ease. They were an indomitable force to be reckoned with. They were the vanguard of what remains of the pillar after all. The Pillar was the last piece of what had once been, and what the Earthshaker had hoped to preserve. He did not want that destroyed by the passage of time, or the will of his younger siblings thinking him a sentimental old fool. They could not get along well enough for the pillar to preserve; he had no reason to trust they wouldn’t try to destroy his pillar fragment to show him that times really had changed. After all, his pillar fragment was perhaps the entire base of which the pillar was built upon. To shatter that would be symbolically suggesting that they could never cooperate again.

It was such that he made his vanguard. They were great and terrible creatures. Enough to drive Gaolers to turn back, and to make Banescales pause. Hidden well enough below that not even the Veilspun could find them before being ambushed. Able to dig through hard stone and sift through loose sand, these first children were taught to preserve history above all else. Compared to their younger siblings, they were tactful and efficient in ensuring that none would destroy the history found within Dragonhome. Any who would come close would be driven back, one way or another, or perhaps would become part of that history in their entombment.

Old secrets were best kept buried deep beneath the earth. ”

[chazzfox]

Ahem, what say you is your favorite dragon made in media such as movies, comics, books, etc.?

Well, Elliot from the original Pete's Dragon is PROBABLY my favorite, but Draco from Dragonheart is close behind! Both friends of people, aiming to help humanity, though Draco is uh, more the self-sacrificing type...I also greatly enjoyed the dragons in the book The Secret of Dragonhome, which was my favorite book until I finally read The Neverending Story. Idk if ANYONE here would have heard of Dragonhome though.

[ashwindspires]

[fic] Sani: Stone Secrets (1/?)

Aboard the Singing Scamp, somewhere above the northwestern Ashfall Waste

“Y’sure you want off here?” The Spiral captain twisted herself in a jittery loop midair, frowning at Sani. Beneath his feet, the deck of the strange Wind skyboat felt flimsy, unstable. At least the airsickness had (mostly) passed. Flying himself really would have been the smarter idea, he thought.

“I’m sure,” he said, trying his best to sound as stolid and gravelly as his old teacher. Like he knew what he was doing. Like he wasn’t, in fact, scared out of his wits and flying on the leading edge of a hurricane.

The captain hissed thoughtfully, her pale green eyes considering the Ridgeback before her. 

“You paid for Churnscar, y’know, and there’s caravans heading into the Waste all the time from there, if you get there, hook up with one of them, that’ll do you much better. Dangerous land, down there.”

Three weeks ago the chattery rush that Wind dragons--especially Spirals--spoke in had left him reeling. But he had the hang of it, now (hadn’t realized that conversation was something he’d need to get the hang of, leaving the Monastery and Dragonhome).

Sani bobbed his head in a firm nod, fighting the urge to brace himself against a shallow buck and twist of the skyboat’s deck. Bracing made it worse. Riding it out felt... unsettling. Deeply unsettling. He wasn’t in the habit of lying to himself, Sani was well aware that part of his motivation for disembarking early was a deep-seated desire to get his feet on solid ground.

“I will be fine,” he said, “This is the shorter route to the Sanctum.”

The captain hesitated a moment longer, concern for her young passenger clear in her every movement. Sani tried to think confident thoughts, and resisted the urge to fidget. He knew what he was doing. He had come prepared, he had goggles and a finely-woven mantle to protect himself from the ash, he had maps, he even had the name of a contact at the Magma Sanctum.

“Well,” the captain said, “It’s your coin, and your wings. OY, KRESS, BRING ‘ER DOWN--” The captain shot off in a flurry of wings and shining scales, leaving a wincing Ridgeback in her wake. Stone of the Pillar but Wind dragons could shout.

- + -

The Arid Approach North and a touch west of the Magma Sanctum

The skyboat’s propulsion magic kicked up small whirlwinds of black-orange sand as it returned to the air, leaving Sani standing on the ground below. He watched it rise, slow at first, and then shoot forward in a single swift burst as it returned to travelling altitude. Only then did he let himself inspect his surroundings. For one disorienting moment, he could have sworn he was back in Dragonhome, staring out over a vast, arid plain of stone and sand.

But the burning pulse of magic beneath his feet said otherwise. Sani was no mage, but he was as sensitive to the flows of energy in the earth as any child of Dragonhome and the energy here... he’d never felt anything like it, so hot and fierce and deep. One of the little bits of magic he did know was barely worthy of the name, to his thinking, but also exceedingly useful. He paused, took a deep breath, and sketched a brief rune in the air. It pulsed, shone with a pale jasper-bronze light, and then spun. Magnetic north was there, so Sani’s target was... he oriented himself and squinted.

There. Somewhere to the south, somewhere through this strange plain, like looking at home through a warped mirror. Black cones marred the smooth plain, distant silhouettes hazy, the horizon shimmering. With the skyboat gone, the air settled into a heavy, hot stillness once more. The sky was a blue so bright it almost hurt, but at least it meant none of the Ashfall’s infamous... ashfall... was. Falling. Stones, he thought, shaking his head, couldn’t Fire dragons have been a bit more creative?

Earth was earth wherever he stood, though, and Sani took a moment to flex and stretch, digging his claws deep into the welcoming solidity of the ground. No skyboats again, no matter how convenient. He’d walk if he had to, if he couldn’t fly.

Checking his compass-rune once more, Sani set out at a steady ground-eating stride, already drafting his chronicle of ‘arrival in Ashfall’ in his head.

[ciaran-archive]

not sci fi but rather fantasy, also may be hard to find considering its been over 20 years since first publication but if you can manage it: the secret of dragonhome by john peel. it IS a series (which was news to me actually) but ive only read this first book and its solid enough on its own. it was one of my faves when i was younger!

ooh that sounds interesting!! i will check it out <3

[spiteweaver]

previous | next

(Note: this story takes place in October of 2019!)

--

Of all the dragons Achilles had expected to show up on his doorstep out of the blue, Yọmí was the absolute last. Yet, there he stood, shivering in the early autumn chill, and looking very much like a sheep among wolves. The dragons of the pleasure district, patrons and proprietors alike, paid him little more than a curious glance now and again, but if you’d asked him, he would have told you they were leering at him, biding their time until they could sink their wicked teeth into fresh meat.

“We don’t bite,” Achilles said.

Yọmí gave a violent start, and scrambled to appear as if he wasn’t petrified. “N-no,” he stammered, “no, of course not, I didn’t mean to imply—”

“Oh, don’t be so polite, darling,” Achilles cut in, “it makes me weak in the knees.”

“I don’t—I’m afraid I don’t follow.”

“Never mind.” Achilles turned, motioning lazily over his shoulder for Yọmí to enter. “Come along,” he said, “and explain to me what an upstanding young drake like you is doing calling on a courtesan at this late hour. I can’t imagine you’ve come to buy.”

“No,” Yọmí confirmed as he shuffled into the Nightingale’s dimly-lit foyer. “Actually, I’ve come to speak with you about a—a personal matter.”

Achilles arched a brow. “Oh?” he hummed. “Well, you’re lucky you caught me. I was about to head out for the Lighthouse District. The grand opening is next week, and the boys and I have hardly made a dent in the packing.”

“It seems a shame,” Yọmí said thoughtfully. “The Nightingale is—it’s a very beautiful building.”

“Want it?” Achilles asked. “It would make a mighty fine manor for a mighty fine architect!”

“O-oh no,” Yọmí replied, “I wouldn’t know what to do with so much space.”

“Get married,” Achilles suggested, “have a kid or thirty.”

The quiet hitch of Yọmí’s breath catching in his throat confirmed Achilles’ suspicions. There could be only one thing an aristocrat of his disposition could possibly want with a drake in this line of work. Sighing, Achilles braced himself for a long night. “So this is about all that then?” he inquired.

“Yes,” Yọmí mumbled after a split second of hesitation.

“I had a hunch,” Achilles said, and then cupped his hands around his mouth. “Darling! Dear!” he called. “If Arroyo or Jean-Baptiste come looking, tell them I’ve already gone down to the pier, would you?”

Another drake appeared in the doorway to their right. Yọmí thought he had seen the stranger before, recognizing his dark, mottled skin and smart dress, but wasn’t sure if he was Darling or Dear. “What should we do if they don’t buy it?” the drake asked.

“I’ll leave that to your discretion,” Achilles replied.

“Delightful,” the drake purred, and noticing Yọmí at his employer’s side, gave a short bow. “Lovely to see you, Master Architect!”

“You, uh, you as well.”

The drake departed, and Achilles led Yọmí up an unexpectedly modest staircase. He had imagined the staff quarters to be every bit as ostentatious as the rest of the building, but the third floor looked like it could have belonged to any of the houses in the capital. The drakes of the Nightingale were so famous for their showmanship, in fact, that when Achilles halted in front of an equally unobtrusive door, Yọmí stared at him as if waiting for him to go on.

“This is it,” Achilles said. “You did want to speak in private, didn’t you?”

Yọmí shook himself from his daze. “Er, yes,” he said. “I’m sorry, this is—it’s a first for me.”

“If I had a gold piece for every time I’ve heard that one...”

Achilles’ private chambers were more in line with what Yọmí had anticipated. Though lacking the rest of the building’s over-the-top decor, they were dressed in the deep purples and reds their inhabitant was so fond of, and Yọmí doubted a single item within was made of anything but silk, velvet, or lace. The intimacy of the space made him second guess himself, but Achilles appeared entirely nonplussed, moving immediately to pour his guest a drink from his exceedingly expensive stash.

“Sit—” He waved to the plush couch at the opposite end of the room— “start talking, and don’t be your usual bashful self. If you’re going to vent, do it right.”

Yọmí hurried to oblige his host, sinking so far into the cushions that he felt they may swallow him, but his mind was suddenly, inexplicably blank. “I don’t know where to begin...”

“You were a courtesan before you came to us,” Achilles supplied. “Start there.”

“That’s just it,” Yọmí said, “I wasn’t a courtesan. I wasn’t a—a—”

“A whore.”

“I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean—”

Achilles silenced him with another wave. “Don’t apologize,” he insisted, “it’s not an insult, sweetie, it’s what I am. I’ve been called far worse by far less charming drakes than you.” With a small, reassuring smile, he offered Yọmí a goblet of rich red wine. “What’s eating you then? I thought you were worried about that ugly ex of yours spilling your dirty little secret, but that’s obviously not the case.”

“I am,” Yọmí said, accepting the wine with a gracious dip of his head, “sort of. It’s complicated.”

“Try me.”

Yọmí stared hard into his glass for a moment, and then, to Achilles’ astonishment, drained it in a single gulp. Achilles was glad he’d thought to bring the bottle with him. “My father arranged my marriage to Abaeze,” Yọmí went on, “because he found out I’d been seeing other drakes behind his back. I was lonely. Without my siblings, father was all I had, and he wasn’t very much. I started seeking solace in the arms of my peers, wealthy bachelors like myself who understood and respected me.

“I knew it was wrong; I was meant to be saving myself for marriage, for the sake of our house. That’s why father was so insistent that I marry Abaeze. Abaeze knew I was spoiled, but he wanted me regardless. Marrying into royalty would cement our family’s influence in Dragonhome after father’s exaltation, so he made all of the necessary preparations without even consulting me. I simply awoke one morning to find that I was engaged to a prince, and father was gone before I could think to protest.

“Then when Abaeze turned up here, he—” Yọmí’s words stuck in his throat, coming out as a strangled sob— “he humiliated me in front of my clan. Now they all think I’m some kind of harlot who will spread his legs for anyone, and I can’t tell them any different, because I was, Abaeze is right, and—”

“Stop.” Achilles pressed a finger to Yọmí’s lips. “Breathe.”

Yọmí did as he was told as Achilles leaned forward to light a stick of incense on the low table in front of them. It smelled of lavender, and Yọmí found his eyelids growing heavy all at once. There was a gnawing fatigue in his bones that he hadn’t noticed until then, with a goblet of wine in his belly and a beautiful drake’s hand against his cheek. Unable to fight it any longer, he allowed his head to be guided down to rest in Achilles’ lap.

“There,” Achilles murmured, “now slow down, take your time.”

“How do you do it?” Yọmí asked.

“Do what, love?”

“Deal with it.”

“Ah—” Achilles ran a hand wistfully through Yọmí’s wild curls— “that. Well, I don’t.”

“What do you mean?”

“It isn’t about ‘dealing with it’,” Achilles elaborated, “there’s nothing to ‘deal with’.”

Yọmí didn’t find that a very satisfying answer, nor much of an elaboration. “What about what others think of you?” he pressed. “What about your reputation? Your status? Your family name?”

“Why should consensual sex between two drakes tarnish any of those things?” Achilles retorted.

“Because it—it isn’t done—”

“Stop,” Achilles said again, “breathe.”

“I just—” Yọmí took in another deep breath to steady himself, but his next words came out soft, barely audible and hoarse with emotion. “I just want to feel normal, like everybody else.”

“Oh, sweetheart—” Achilles bent to press a tender kiss to Yọmí’s forehead— “what did they do to you in Dragonhome? You’re such a darling thing, and still so young. Drakes your age are supposed to wear their hearts on their sleeves.”

“I’m two cycles already,” Yọmí said, a bit indignantly.

“I’ll tell you what,” said Achilles, evidently ignoring his guest’s displeasure, “come with me to the Lighthouse District tonight. It sounds to me like you’ve been taught an awful lot of awful things by the aristocracy, and if you ever want to get that weight off your shoulders, you’re going to have to unlearn them.”

“Un…?” Yọmí tilted his head back, so that he could catch Achilles’ gaze. “Unlearn them?”

“That’s what I said!”

“How?”

Achilles smiled, and Yọmí felt a peculiar stirring in his chest that he had not felt for longer than he cared to quantify. “Little by little,” Achilles replied. “It won’t happen overnight, but if we can start by changing your view of the world, perhaps we can change your view of yourself.”

“Will that really work?” Yọmí asked.

“Well,” Achilles said, “it certainly worked for me.”

“You…?”

“Do you think confidence like mine springs up out of nothing and nowhere?” Achilles scoffed, pinching one of Yọmí’s cheeks playfully. (The teasing gesture brought heat rushing into them, and Yọmí was glad then for his dark skin.) “I had to work hard for my vanity, darling, and a boy like you, with such low self-esteem, will have to work even harder. That’s why we ought to get started ASAP.”

Perhaps it was the wine, or the stress, or simply Achilles’ skill as a courtesan, but without really even looking for it, Yọmí had found his courage. Reaching up, he placed a hand on the back of Achilles’ head, and dragged him down into a kiss—the first kiss he had shared with another drake since leaving Dragonhome all those aching, longing eons ago. Achilles tasted sweet, like wine, and honey, and something Yọmí couldn’t name, but that made his entire body warm with desire.

When they parted, it was breathlessly, and Yọmí didn’t let Achilles wander far. “I am not,” he said, “a boy.”

“Evidently not,” Achilles conceded. “My, when you decide you’re going to do something, you commit! Here I had you pegged for a bottom, but that was raw, visceral top energy right there! I’ve got goosebumps!” Then his sly smile returned, indescribably beautiful beneath the pale pink color of his blush. “Are you certain you aren’t here to buy?”

“O-oh, n-n-no, I c-couldn’t—”

Well, so much for courage.

--

@nostlenne

[haphazardhatchery-fr]

Meet Magma’s Wrath Phoenix and Ravenora. They serve the clan as vigilantes and private investigators. Both are known for their ability to fade away and blend in despite their bright coloration, and both are adept secret hunters and keepers. Work often lands them in the many clans of Dragonhome and The Ashfall Waste, where they steal nests while investigating or hunting. Children hatched from earth clan nests tend to be more interested in self defense and vigilante work as their parents teach them to navigate The Scarred Wasteland on the way home to Starfall Isles. Children from fire nests tend to be more artistically inclined often called to dancing and singing (terribly) to The Windswept Plateau’s music. Children given the time to grow and travel with their parents tend to develop a variety of interests and hobbies and are often academic in nature.

Starting Price will be 400g/kt. I am down to haggle and accept mixed payments. Children will be available on the ah, in the hatchery, and can be reserved in comments and reblogs on this post with username id and specifications (if any).

[evilauthor]

I very recently discovered a seven year old theft.

I owned all the Harry Potter books. The first two were gifts from my grandmother who only knew that they were books for children and she liked the idea of her grandchildren reading. I bought the third...and four, five, six, and seven were all bought and paid for by me with my money when I went to midnight book release parties with my friends.

With the exception of the two grandma bought, I paid for the series out of my own money. By every right there is, I owned those books and they were no one else’s.

When my dad died, I had to reclaim my property from his house. Thankfully I didn’t have a lot at his house on account of moving after college and taking most of it with me, but I had left my Harry Potter books with him for no other reason then they were heavy and I had to carry my own bags at the airport and weight changes shipping rates for packages. He was my dad and he mostly respected when something was my property...Mostly. So I had to go to his house to get back my books, my bed, and the items he had left me in his will.

The items in the will were second edition Lord of the Rings books, the George of the Jungle animated series box set, and a DVD of the movie Wizards. Most of everything we came to collect and been left out on the lawn by my dad’s horrible second wife, but everything that had been left to me in the will was absent and I had to barge into the house uninvited to get them. Apparently, his bitch wife had been confused as to why my dad would leave me four books and a few DVDs while my sister got a gold and silver chess set with a marble board...She figured there was something odd about these items and didn’t want to give them up until she knew why.

Because she was so awful and had tried to keep everything my dad had left me in his will, I had sort of...not noticed there was a book missing from my collection of books that were properly mine. I had my Secret of Dragonhome, all three books of the Leviathan collection, the entire series of Unfortunate Events, but only six Harry Potter books had actually been returned to me.

I had read all the books in my collection before and mom had gotten me a kindle two years earlier, so I had been more keen on adding to my digital library so mom’s gift wouldn’t feel wasted. When I moved in with my fiance, I had limited space to unpack, so a few important items had gone into storage. My books, my plates, and my DVDs were all boxed up and neatly put away. I mentioned several times over the years I would like some bookshelves so I could put my collection up, but the closest I got was some shelves not really suited for books.

My fiance got a proper office recently. He didn’t have a lot of furniture that could go into the office, so it was just his computer desk and a trash can...but we put together some ikea bookshelves to make it look more office like. Problem is, my fiance doesn’t have very many books. Like my kindle, most of his stuff is digital. He had enough for a few shelves, but it wasn’t enough to fill up one book shelf, much less two...So he asked if I wanted to take my books out of storage and put them on the shelf. I was DELIGHTED.

I like reading. I have so many books. As I’m putting everything up, I noticed a box only had six Harry Potter books in it, but the box had been full, so I assumed it was just in a different box. Went through all of my boxes. No seventh book.

Called my mom. Asked if maybe I had forgotten it when I moved out. She checked my old room, up in the attic, and even my sister’s old room. No sign. Asked my grandma. She had ended up with a lot of dad’s stuff when his wife realized she had screwed herself over rather completely and gotten rid of anything of dad’s she didn’t think she could sell. And grandma told me a little something interesting. Apparently dad’s wife had my seventh book.

According to grandma, when dad’s wife had dropped off all the stuff, one of her two sons had been reading it. She had said they’d bring the book by when he was done, but they never came back. Blocked everyone in the family on social media and changed her phone number. Grandma hadn’t realized it was mine, so she never mentioned it.

So...seven years later, I realize my book isn’t just in a different box somewhere in the attic. It was kept by an awful woman and will not be returned.