by Ryan Johnson
“I am Vaeludar. I am both human…” He lowered his sword down to his dragon legs. “…and dragon. I am a hybrid of a human and a dragon. In other words, I am half human and half dragon. I am the force of nature that dares to defy this ritual you are about to do. If you’re not convinced I am half dragon, have a look at this.” Vaeludar blew his dragon fire up high, away from the priest and the girl.
Both of them had priceless reactions on their faces.
“You… how dare you interrupt this ritual!” the priest said.
“Yes, I dare myself to interrupt this ritual,” said Vaeludar. Vaeludar flew up and around the dragon statue. At a close distance, the flying hybrid could easily cut the statue’s head. “I must know why you sacrifice little girls instead of animals.”
“Because it is the will of the Crystal Dragon, our God, who demands sacrifices.”
“The Crystal Dragon, eh?”
Suddenly, the blade began to glow brighter and whiter. Shinning bright as the sun, the sword showed the cloud within the blade to the people, which brought them to their feet, of the dreadful village.
“Is that the sword?” asked the priest, trembling.
“What do you mean by this sword?” asked Vaeludar. “I found this in a cave, and I would call it a magic sword. So how would you know about such a thing?”
The priest stepped back in horror. “The sword given to a mortal by a god!”
“What? This sword? You’re telling me the Crystal Dragon left such a weapon in this realm? How I should have known such a weapon exited? A gift from the gods then? Well, now I know why it’s so effective against evil forces and Lusìvar.”
“Don’t mention that name!” the priest exclaimed. “We do this because I want him to stay away. But those witches and that man with a fluting weapon take our girls away. They say they will only spare the girls we have if we give up one of our own instead of bunches of others. There is nothing we can do. And the Evil One! What a Dragon he is!”
“What do you mean by a Dragon?” ask Vaeludar, confused.
The priest looked at the hybrid with a blank face. He was beginning to sweat and his legs shook. “A Dragon with five heads,” the priest said, frightened.
“A Five-Headed Dragon? Like a Hydra?”
“Yes, like a Hydra that can change into five different Dragons. A Fire Dragon, an Earth Dragon, an Ice Dragon, a Water dragon, and an Electric dragon. These Dragons serve the Shadow King as his physical body. When his body takes over one of the Dragons, they all come together in one body. It is necessary for us to provide a sacrifice so that the Crystal Dragon can protect us from the Shadow King, the witches, and the man with a fluting weapon.”
“Un-huh, I see,” said Vaeludar, lowering his blade.
“Have-have you come to save us?”
“I don’t know. I did not know any people were living this far north. And I did not know this village has ever existed. I came to find a princess and a castle that holds an armor artifact that was found by two different people. My parents, who go by the names Ralenskrit and Belverda, tried to retrieve it but I hear they ended up failing.”
“A princess? A castle? A piece of armor? Ralenskrit and Belverda?” said the priest. “Are you the human-dragon mutant?”
“Yes, I am,” answered Vaeludar, sternly. “I’d rather be called a hybrid than a mutant. Ralenskrit and Belverda are my parents and I have no doubt you have met them, priest. What did they say to you?”
“How did you know?” asked the priest.
“I can read your thoughts and you are thinking I am a liar and killer and a small freak of craziness.”
The priest stood like a statue.
“The fate of life, and future lives not born yet depends on me, and it seems you. What did my parents say to you almost seventeen years ago?”
The priest sighed. “They came to this village,” he answered. “They asked us about an armor artifact: a gauntlet. They asked where they could find it, but we don’t know where it is. Only the legendary captured princess knows it is.”
“And where is the princess right now?”
“Held captive by the Ice Dragon as it did for a thousand years. She is still there. Before Ralenskrit and Belverda left, they said they didn’t want to get the princess because of the Ice Dragon.”
“Confound them,” blasted Vaeludar. “First they leave me with a friend of my mother. Next, they come up here and cowardly leave without taking a risk? Now, they want me to do the heavy fighting for them. They are what I call ‘parents who leave the hard stuff of their sons’. I swear I need better parents. But enough of that. I guess I need help finding my way to the castle.”
“I know of an old hermit who may help you,” said the priest.
“Where is she?” said Vaeludar, putting the sword back into the scabbard. “There is no time for me to lose.”
“Make for the northeast,” answered the priest, calmly. “There is a passage that will take you to your place.
“Thank you for your help,” stated Vaeludar, turning away. Vaeludar walked away and back to his group, walking through the crowd who stared at him. He saw the group starting at the back of the crowd. “Well, I have my next destination. And I just found out that the Ice Serpent is a Dragon and not a serpent. I have a feeling I must trail this path to the Lost Castle alone.”
“Must you?” asked Marina.
“Are you sure you must travel alone?” said Flavius. “We heard from right here. I think it is better if went there with you.”
The others were asking the same question with Marina and Flavius to asking if Vaeludar must go alone. Naìra was keeping quiet.
“I need do to this alone. I have a feeling some ill maybe lurking in this village. Investigate this village while I’m gone. I have a feeling some enemies are hiding nearby. And Naìra, stay with your brother. I don’t want to see you being captured again by the Piper.”
“Leave it to us then,” said Galvin. “I slew a few Dragons in my lifetime, but only rouge or insane Dragons. I can find them and slay them before even the Shadow King could eat a mouse.”
“That is impossible,” intupered the priest, making his way to the group. “They have scales strong as the Crystal Dragon. Only two swords can kill them. The one for the mutant, I mean, the hybrid is carrying and that one over there. Follow me.”
The priest walked to an outer part of the village. There were steps that went up to another statue but in the form of a knight, wearing the same looking armor as the White Knight of Trust they met at the mountains.
Below the statue, there was a sword in a stone pedestal.
“Only those two weapons can slay the five Dragons or the Hydra if the Shadow King possesses one of them. And two weapons had been given to the Mortal Realm the Crystal Dragon.”
The sword in the pedestal was muddy and worn out.
Vaeludar’s eyes glowed white just like the sword when it was glowing white. Something had sparked in his mind: this sword in the pedestal was also the same he was holding. But how could that be possible? He’d never heard of any stories of how two swords were given to the Mortal Realm from the gods.
Vaeludar’s eyes went back to normal.
“That sword is also the like the one you’re carrying,” stated the priest. “There is a legend about two swords. They were once forged as one sword, and it was spilt into two objects by its creator, dividing his power into one and leaving one sword powerless. Valverno was the one who received it when the Crystal Dragon, which made it from his godly spirit.
“As with the armor you’re searching for, legends say it was also made from the divine body of the Crystal Dragon. Only the one wearing an armor made from his scales can pull it and merge it with its twin sword and become what is known as the Crystal Sword.”
That would explain it then, thought Vaeludar. He was carrying the one that held the power of the powerful dragon while the other one was in front of him.
“So the
sword I have has his power?” asked Vaeludar.
“Half his power,” answered the priest, looking at the hybrid. “The other holds the other half.”
“There is something else you need to know, hybrid,” said the priest. “From what I’ve known, your mother is well known here. She comes in legends of all different kinds. And they portray her as not just a human, a witch as well.”
“A witch? My mother?”
“Yes, Belverda is a witch like the other three witches who rule this village as well as five other villages. In fact, she happened to be one of them.”
Vaeludar’s eyes were growling with anger. He thought his mother was a human scientist who studying science for the greater good of life, but being a witch was changing his view of what his parents were.
“But she didn’t take the youths of girls. She did something else but I don’t know anything else. These stories come from the hermit
“Then I’ll find and see where to find this castle and this princess,” said Vaeludar.
Before he left, Vaeludar said his farewells to his companions and trailed to find where this hermit would be and the location of the Lost Castle.
A PATH OF THE CASTLE
V
aeludar traveled into a steep valley with a single stream flowing downhill. From the village, he walked northwest. He traveled a mile away from the village and walked toward a valley of rocky hills. Upon entering a narrow passageway through a rocky canyon, his feet stepped on a ground of brown grass. For some reason, the sky was glowing bright instead of dark. The travel on foot was easy going and didn’t have to worry about falling off a cliff.
After some walking, he found a stream dripping downhill. He followed the stream hoping it would lead to the hermit.
Green trees began to appear and the night was beginning to turn into day. The sun was starting to appear from the clouds, and the clouds began to fade away. The clear sky was starting to show its ocean blue color. The life Vaeludar used to love was starting to come back in these lands.
The mountains were up close and rose up to four thousand feet high above the ground. It looked like a good distance for Vaeludar to fly. But he had no idea where he would start. The mountains stretched out ten miles wide. It would take him weeks to find the castle.
Vaeludar was starting to wonder how this was working or if this landscape was just another illusion. There was some kind of magic going on in these lands. Vaeludar knew it had to be some kind of dark magic. He would know it would have to be the Shadow King Lusìvar’s dirty work.
“I don’t know if this place is supposed to be natural like an apple grown from a tree or if it is made of magic. Whatever it is, I’d better find the hermit.”
Down the stream, he was coming across a hut built with layers of logs. A roof of hay was strapped over the top. An open gap revealed the hut’s interior. Smoke rose from a small opening from the roof. The hut was built more of a poorly fabricated cabin than an actual a hut.
Vaeludar sniffed the air and walked towards the hut.
As he walked closer, he peeked through the open gag the walls of logs made it easy to see in. There wasn’t much inside the hut: a small rectangle of hay with the looks of bed and a pot hanging over burnt firewood. He walked around the hut and followed several yards down the stream.
A grey hooded figure was carrying a basket and picking grapes and plants walking to the hut. The figure had to be the old hermit.
Vaeludar walked closer to the hermit.
“I knew you would be coming one of these days just like that dragon said years ago,” said the hermit, in a deep, soggy accent. “I knew you would stop by, but how would you stop by if you didn’t know where you were going?” Vaeludar didn’t know what to say in response. All he could do was breath.
“You’re quieter than I expected to be.”
“I didn’t know what to say,” Vaeludar finally responded.
“I thought you would be more than just words,” said the hermit.
“I thought so too, but we both just met and we haven’t introduced each other. My name is Vaeludar. I am here seeking aid to find the castle you definitely know about. I need to get there as soon as possible. Would you help me find my way there?”
“I thought you have wings,” stated the hermit, slowly getting up. She turned around and walked very strange-like. Her upper face was covered by the hood’s blackness, but her mouth looked grey colored and wrinkled. “Why don’t you use them?”
“I could, but where would I fly with my wings? I have a specific castle I need to be. If you could just show me the way and I follow, I would not disrupt you.”
“Just use your wings,” she replied.
“Where would I go? I would like for you to walk to the castle with me following you.”
“Look at me,” said the hermit, walking slowly to her hut. “If I walk to the castle hidden within these mountains, it would take many days to get to. Why would you wait for me?”
“Because I hear you are the only one who knows where the castle is. A castle holding a princess captive with an Ice Dragon as the guardian. I need your help to show me where I can fly to. If you can’t help me, then I gauss I am only wasting my time here.”
“You’re just like your mother. Mixed with patience and irritation. She was quite the witch she was. Stealing love from men to stay young while her three sisters stole the youths of little girls. I remember those days so well.”
“Wait a moment,” said Vaeludar. “The three witches are my mother’s sisters? And if they’re my mother’s sisters, they would make them my aunts. And if my mother is a witch, that would make me a—”
“A warlock,” replied the old, female hermit.
“A carrier of witch’s blood in a man’s body. That would explain a lot I have tough skin and magical abilities humans don’t have.”
“Yes, you carry the blood of a witch,” stated the hermit. “What a witch she was. Stealing men’s love to make her younger. She was doing that for years until the Dragon came in. She had changed a lot.”
“Years? Then how was she able to appear in the form of a child?”
“She can do it. Belverda was always aging herself after absorbing the love or a great desire of a man. She would always turn into a child so she would forget the old man and get to know a young man. For years, she had been doing that. Such a cunning witch she was.”
“Ok, I had enough of my mother,” said Vaeludar. “Would you please show me the way to the castle?”
“Why be so hasty? We just met.”
The hermit was just entering to her hut. Walking slowly, she placed the basket on the ground floor.
“Because I want to put a permanent end to the Shadow King Lusìvar before he ends up putting people back where they were, working in slavery for another four thousand years. I want to be there to kill him before he rises to power again. My mother was looking for armor for me to battle against him.
“And I wield half of this Crystal Sword, and I am in the middle between three witches who are my aunts, a piper taking children for the witches, and a Five-Headed Dragon that serves had a body element for the Shadow King Lusìvar.”
The hermit sighed heavily.
“Always like your dragon father, placing life-threating duties above people. You have inherited not only their blood and also their personalities.”
“Even if I have to sacrifice those I love. I need to bring an end to this king.”
The hermit sighed again. “I am old and I can’t take you there. If you want to get there at the quickest pace, you must let the wind of the stream to carry you there. You have wings. Use them to get there.” The hermit pulled down a clothed certain, covering the hut’s opening gag.
Vaeludar was alone now. He never heard of wind coming from a stream.
The stream was wide as a river but not deep. It was five inches deep. He knew that waters couldn’t create wind. Water was a source for plants, life, and prosperit
y. It couldn’t create a gush of wind.
Vaeludar stepped into the center of the stream. He could feel the water flowing with ease. Softness tickled his scales. His claws were digging into the mug of stream. He could feel a cold running up his scales like a human getting a winter cold. His figures went numb. His wings twitching like nerves reacting to ten pinches. His muscles in his dragon legs gripped his bones real tightly. His skin sweated if he was standing for hours in an extremely hot desert. Vaeludar could feel his lungs growing larger and thinner. The hybrid could feel both of his human side and his dragon side both taking control of his body.
Suddenly, he could feel the water boiling with no heat. A feel of propelling air pulled Vaeludar out of the stream. His wings were spread wide out, carrying him in the air.
Vaeludar somehow lost control and his vision blacked out.
Vaeludar reopened his eyes, to view himself standing on a mountaintop. He found himself seeing other mountains around him. Miles and miles surrounding him. In one open spot, there was a valley of deep, lush, green grass, stretching around for dozens of miles. In the very direct center of the valley stood a tall-squared building with four towers built on the four corners. Three were coned towers and the fourth was flat.
It was the castle the Crystal Sword’s cloud showed him days earlier.
Finally, he made to the castle where the princess was being held by the Ice Dragon, which served had one of five heads to Lusìvar’s dragon body.
A CASTLE, A PRINCESS, AND AN ICE DRAGON
Y
es, I have made it the Lost Castle where this princess is held,” Vaeludar said loudly. He talked aloud
Vaeludar was staring at the castle in great relieve. He was almost to his main destination, which would only take him to another destination that will be in a cave. Vaeludar was slowly discovering every time he ends up close to an objective. It was always turning into a longer pace.
“She knows where the armor artifact is. I’d never known the armor and two swords have been made from the Crystal Dragon himself. I’d wonder if Valverno ever used these things when he was living, even if ever existed. But he is considered to be the son of a god, a dragon god. Maybe the Crystal Dragon used scales from his divine form and made weapons and armor for his son.