Chapter Eight: The Chosen (Part II)

The drive back home was severely uncomfortable. It did not help that Fatima's sobs seemed to single-handedly infuriate Cyan's dragon- who snapped at the bars. With the clink of the metal chains serenading them as they drove, Cyan's mind was not at ease.

It was difficult to focus on his racing thoughts as dark smoke began to rise nearly suffocating them. Cyan caught sight of the grimace on Royce's face. Seeing that his dragon's lungs were drowned at the Kennels, she wouldn't be able to light a flame in a day or two. The stress of a new environment would not help her recover faster. Royce begins to talk to Fatima encouragingly in an attempt to preserve their air quality.

Cyan's dragon fares no better. In a trance of agitation, its protests fall short of changing the situation. The outcries can only be described as agonizing both for the dragon and the rest of the party. Delilah clutches the steering wheel a bit tighter, nervously rolling her shoulders as they grow louder in volume. It is interesting to see how other dragons responded to it- Cyan had picked something far more powerful than he had originally anticipated. However, this thought was put on hold as the crate rocked back and forth banging against the trunk of the car. Wincing at this, Cyan turned unable to soothe it with his voice and worried about more injuries.

Delilah eases the car around the bend making sure the tilt and added commotion doesn't tip them over the mountain guard rail. Hesitantly, she glanced over to her lord. Face unchanged by the noise and headphones in, turned his head toward her.

"Speak." He says curtly. Farse doesn't even try to hide the annoyance in his tone. His shaded eyes don't conceal the visible frown on his face that deepens as the wails of Cyan's dragon grows. Delilah winced again at the sounds bothered by the atmosphere. Ignoring her lord's rudeness, she clears her throat and nods.

"My lord, it would seem that Lord Blue's dragon is suffering from extensive heat exposure. As for his colder composition, it may benefit him to be wiped down," she pauses for a moment before adding. "There is a small spray bottle under Lord Blue's seat. I do concur that his dragon shall find it most profane…"

Another inhuman roar rumbled the car as Delilah quickly snapped her mouth shut. Farse raised an eyebrow questioning her stoic expression before turning to Cyan and scowling.

"Do it."

Cyan bends over quickly knowing no one else is going to volunteer to do it. Hopeless at this point, he prays this will get the dragon to stop. Leaning forward, he sweeps his hands furiously under the seat until he feels out the spray bottle and holds it up like he's revealing a preset of reverent value.

He spritzes the air releasing a medicated scent into the air. Farse turned his head, those shades eyes on his while his face reveals nothing but seriousness.

"Don't fuck this up. He's a Western, after all, and their strength isn't just in their jaws but their necks and face structure. With enough force, it can take off most of your arm if it decides you're a threat!"

His words are enough to make Cyan freeze. Swallowing down his nervousness, he nods in acknowledgment. The bars of the cages are covered in a hard, plastic-like cover that provides air holes. It is big enough for his slender hand to fit through, as well as most of his arm, but he doesn't jump at the idea of doing it. Inside the crate, his dragon was discombobulated. Its anger was not lost on the young man. That's why Cyan thought twice before going through with bothering it.

Yet, he couldn't ignore its labored breathing and the half-lidded eyes that were streaming with tears his heart ached at the sight. There was no way of avoiding it. His dragon was suffering and if he couldn't make it stop screeching then he had no idea how he would get it home much less inside the flat.

Cyan felt the bags under his eyes grow thinking about another sleepless night deprived of sanity if he had to listen to it cry out all night. Closing his eyes tightly and cocking his head slightly to lean further away from the crate, he clenches the spray bottle and angles it so that it's nearly inside the crate.

A gentle mist was sprayed onto the dirty face of a heaving creature.

Cyan watched the muscles in its defined jaw tighten as the water touched its scales. He cringed inwardly, peeping through closed eyes, waiting for it to snatch off his fingers and show off killer incisors that could cut through flesh like paper. Neither of those things happened. In a moment of awe, Cyan froze, almost dropping the spray bottle in the crate. The dragon blinked once or twice before wearily snorting out a puff of frost. Turning its head more, it poked at his hand demanding more water like a child begging its parent for more.

Cyan narrowed his eyes at the sudden realization that the Kennels have severely overheated and left this dragon to become dehydrated to the point of delusion. They have even caused mental delays in its development if it fried its brain cells.

He continued to blink as his body slacked, trying to digest the idea of what he was seeing.

Cyan Blue was cooling off a dragon.

A part of him felt giddy and acting upon this emotion, he turned around, removing the spray bottle before rummaging through the underbelly of the seat again. Once he found what he was looking for, he turned back and placed his hand on the dragon's right cheek. This time, his fingers itched at the contact.

The dragon didn't seem to miss his touch that much, but it restlessly sought out more of the moisture dripping from the wet rag he held. Cyan watched its unfocused eyes as they glossed over him in confusion. They were slightly open and narrowed revealing a keen intelligence that he had never seen before.

Beneath the cloth, the dragon's skin radiated warm heat that was similar to his own. Something was wrong with his dragon and knowing that ice dragons are supposed to be cooler, it startled him how hot its scales were. His frown only deepened becoming hard to hide as he thought. However, his thoughts were quickly interrupted when he realized that his dragon was not in its full form, but its humane-like form.

The dark, jet black mop of hair and flushed, pale skin meshed with scars; its face was hidden behind a restless blue-white wing.

Subconsciously, Cyan was aware he had chosen a male dragon, but it became more prominent by the outline of muscular shoulders. His fingers ghosted over the sinewy flesh met thick and unyielding scales. To feel the dragon slowly shift under his touch was awesome because the flesh and bone shrunk, pulled, pushed, and twisted. It was as if he were witnessing a Rubik's cube as the different parts and pieces began to fall in place matching up so that new sides matched the new colors.

Cyan stared in marvel silently wondering to himself if he would ever be able to feel something like this again. He pressed his palm firmly in between the shoulder blades. Large, bat-like wings twitched at the sudden contact didn't go unnoticed by Cyan as the dragon changed. Flesh meshed with scale and scale formed to flesh magically transition in such a subtle manner it was hard to tell where man started and creature ended.

Except he thought he saw something dark and festering at the base of one of the horns, marring the transition and making a jagged cut across the dragon's hairline. He scowled, recognizing it as a sign of infection; however, he didn't dare to touch it lest the sluggishly bleeding wound hurt the dragon and it attacks him. Like molasses dripping from its forehead, it is an ugly, foul thing. Cyan, against his better judgment, gave into his doctor's instincts and slightly lifted its head to get a better look. The dragon snapped his jaw open as his mouth was not quite done shifting and long incisors snagged the sleeve of his jacket cutting through it easily like scissors cutting paper. Drops of blood stained the metal bars as Cyan fell back against the seat in horror.

His heart was pounding in his chest as he tried to calmly hide the wound. Farse glances at the young soldier from the rearview mirror, shaking his head in dismay. Cyan caught his gaze and his cheeks burned bright red in humiliation for dropping his guard. Trying not to bleed out over the interior of the car, he slowly takes his jacket off. He struggles to open the medical kit as he reaches for some bandages.

"Here dude, let me..." Royce speaks up as he holds out some gauze. Cyan nods and turns his body so the other man can take his arm. Stiffening at the pain, Royce doesn't comment on how torn his jacket is and they haven't seen war yet. Cyan can already tell this won't be easy. His body aches as the adrenaline high begins to recede and he feels heavy.

Leaning his head against the back of the chair, he listens to the lull of the dragon's lowly wines. With his limited knowledge of the Dragon anatomy, he wasn't sure what may have caused his Dragon's out-lashes. It could be from the infection to the sores to something psychological. The workers at the Kennel had warned him about signs of madness becoming more prominent. He was a bit nervous about this, especially after the two attacks. The Dragon didn't seem fully aware of its surroundings or its actions. Cyan knew this wasn't normal. Speaking a glance behind him, his dragon slept faithfully letting out low whines. It seemed a lot better than earlier probably due to the wet rags, but it still seemed to be suffering. He scanned it once more. The dragon was definitely in a poor condition: it smelled horrible. The stench of both dragons made his nose wrinkle and left a sour taste in his mouth.

They smelled of piss and rot.

Cyan shivered at the idea of trying to wash a

He drapes an arm over his face trying to hide the discomfort in his face. He hadn't even brought the Dragon home yet wasn't proving to anyone he could handle this, much less himself. His mother had always spoken of dragons so highly and it ended up getting her killed. He wondered if his father was worried he would meet the same fate. They never spoke about her, but when he was young, he remembers sneaking downstairs to his father's study. A single light crawled through the crack in the grand doors as he peeped into the room. Inside was the faintest hum of an old war song about two lovers separated by the war.

It was his mother's favorite song to listen to as she waltzed around the house doing her daily chores and avoiding all other guests. His stepmother made her life a living hell. He remembers the woman pouring hot substances on the floor or childishly hiding her cleaning supplies. Before Cyan could say anything, she would cover his mouth and hush him. He never understood why she refused to stand up to the other woman until he got older and realized his mother was trying to survive a cruel fate. He wondered when she died, what her last thoughts were? She didn't even cry out for help when the dragon attacked her. It was as if the light in her eyes had faded by then.

His father harbored some resentment of dragons after that. The one he gifted his mother wasn't vetted to be a house servant, yet his stepmother easily persuaded him it would be alright.

In the end, it got his mother killed. The scar of her death still lingered in his mind. As much as he wanted to hate dragons, a part of him knew that humans were at fault. Though he had his suspicions that his stepmother wanted his mother dead, he could never prove she was the reason behind the attack.

Biting down on the inside of his lip, the bitter taste of iron assaults his senses. He stayed like this for the remainder of the car ride, too absorbed in these thoughts to do much else. And very suddenly, he felt something curl around his ankle. Startled, he glanced down to see a deep, night sky blue-colored tail. The creatures growled a low rumbling noise that vibrated through its entire body sending chills down his spine. The odd smoothness of the scales and the faint coolness made the young man's heart beat faster. It was this subconscious action that made Cyan giddy with hope that possibly he had a chance.

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For the first time in eternity, Aiden dreamt of ice forests and snow falling upon his skin. He felt soft fingers trace his scales- a fleeting touch like that of wind brushing through the treetops. He whispered words in Dragonic- the official language of dragons. With wide eyes, Delilah sucked in a sharp breath. The words brought forth a type of longing for freedom once chanted by their nation. It was only an instance this servant thought to a time before when dragons reigned free. Her senses were sharped as she felt a pair of mismatched eyes resembling that of an odd-eyed cat she had seen roaming through the Providence. Observant and far too keen, the young man, lounging lazily covered in gauze, was possibly more attentive than she gave him credit for and was far more dangerous than any creature she had met.