Act 1: Friends in the woods.

Isabella, an emerald green anthro dragoness, golden spirals running across her body walked along the forest path out of the city. Away from the scent of coal fires and oil. Her body was clothed in a brown jacket with matching booths, a lighter brown leather corset around the coat and white undergarments that was the only covering of her breasts. Around her elongated neck, she wore a silver pendulum with a beautiful cut opal. To finish everything off, she had a pair of flight goggles that helped to protect her eyes against bugs. The yellow glass also helped to block out most of the bright sun.

Her mind was already trailing off from the busy city life. Being a woman of the higher class, she did not have to bother with filling up the boilers with coal, to make sure the machines where oiled. No that was lovely work compared to the politics of four different species trying to work together. Dragons, Humans, Dwarfs and elves. The first, the dragons were evenly split into two subgroups. The andromorphic or bipedal dragons, like she. Who shared a strange lineage and were relatively new. The other group, the often mislabelled “feral” dragons. They were not genuinely feral at all, most were more intelligent than your basic human, not that it said much. The other dragons where an older species, the origin of dragons. The stuff humans used to tell horror stories about. Fire-breathing lizards on four legs with broad wings and a powerful tail.

The humans were not happy with the diet the dragons got, they, in their ignorance, had the idea that the dragons are obtained too much meat. The elves accused the humans of eating meat while they could eat from the land and not harm an animal. The dwarfs where mostly grumpy on the failed hop harvest making beer scares. It made her head spin. Isabella could not see a solution to the human and dragon problem. What was worse is the elder dragons, who still get children who were also elder dragons. The population lately exploded, and they lacked the means to trade. They relied on hunting and often came into conflict with human hold cattle.

Her favourite spot in the woods to think was nearby a small waterfall fed by a stream of cold glacier water from the mountains. It was her place of inner peace that was under threat from the ever-growing city. Yet she made work of that problem, buying the property to secure it from being turned into a farm, into a factory or just cut down. The place was not only a part of tranquillity only to her, but a lot of forest animals would also gather here and drink. It did her good to see life flourishing, it made her proud like a mother would be on her son or a daughter. Animals from all over the forest could feel her unique abilities when closed they would come and take notice of the dragoness.

This time, this time another creature would come and see the dragoness. One that was bigger, one that scared anyone away with a will to live, anyone but Isabella. She was not that large, about twice the size of a horse. Her wings spanned most of her body and down her tail. Her feet were white, her belly and wings a coppery green. Horns and ridges across her neck and her face painted white in the centre. The rest of her body was a brown. Her eyes were what finally caught Isabella’s attention. A fine aqua blue. Softness showing a trough in the eyes of someone that could crush bones like twigs.

“You are not running away?” the dragon asked with a growly voice. To the untrained ears of a human or elf, she would sound like a thought dragon. But to Isabella, a dragoness. It was soft, Feminine, kind and surprised. Something else was going on there, something she could not place, pain? Fear? No, not quite. “Why would I?” Isabella asked back. “You are not going to hunt a fellow dragon, and I am not afraid for one of my own.” The dragon snorted, amused by the answer. She moved to the other end of the river from the waterfall. Making the river a sort of neutral ground for the two species of dragon. “Why are you calling me one of your own?” The dragoness asked with sharp eyes fixed on the anthro dragon before her, one of the ‘new’ generation. “Because we both come from the same ancestry. We are both dragons, no matter if we walk on four of two legs. My name is Isabella, Just Isabella. I don’t fancy family names. What is your name, my mysterious visitor?”

The elder dragon looked sharply at Isabella before her, before softening up. “Orlena, Orlena of the northern clan, daughter of Hyrta, daughter of clan chief Gorlen. But…if you like you can call me Orlena.” Isabella nodded softly at the dragoness. “Orlena, what a nice name. You come here often? The northern clan is quite a bit away. What made you fly twenty moons with luck to land here in my sanctum of peace and quiet?”

Orlena shuffled a bit, moving about and wondering. She hoped this far out no one would know the northern clan. Now she was mistaken and had to do a whole lot of explaining to do. “Wait. Your sanctum? I do not smell your scent here, you did not claim it like traditional.”

Isabella gave a small motion with her hand to the stream. “I own this land legally. We only have a few elder dragons here, and they respect my right. I do not have the need to claim like the old clans. However Orlena, you have not answered me. Why does a daughter of a clan chief, to be in line for the next shaman? Fly all the way here. No scent of a clan on her body.” Isabella might be anthro, but her nose was sharp. Orlena grows uncomfortable by the minute, and with just a glace Isabella knew what was wrong, why she fled. “To find the right male is a hard quest. Especially when the male if forced upon you. Don’t worry, I will not tell your presence here. In fact, you are free to come here any time to hide, to rest, to drink. I just ask you not to mark my place. Be my guest but don’t burn my house.”

Orlena was surprised by the generous offer from the dragon,  a stranger who offered her a piece of her land to stay, to hide. Did she know how much trouble she could get in? Orlene wondered for herself first. Or did she even care? The larger elder dragoness gazed upon her smaller companion on the other side of the river. It was not like she could hurt her in any serious way. And with that, it was settled “Alright, I think I will use your offer.” Orlena forced a soft smile to Isabella before her.

Isabella on her turn acknowledged that her offer was accepted and went on to her business. A flower this time. Every time she came here, she tried to create a new form of life out of nowhere, just with the magic she embodied. Never she let it be genuinely alive though, it was just a creative process to ease her mind. To make a phantom of life, to think of it in all its complexity and then try to reshape it. The building blocks remained the same, it was just a matter of reassembling.

The stem of her flower started to take shape, the stem was a slight purple. Leaves, a more pastel purple and the flower. A vibrant yellow, every bit sculpted, formed by magic. The flower, only a breath away from being real, from being a new species within the realm. Before that breath was taken, the magic that holds it in place died off. The flower withered away into nothing, not even dust was left.

“What are you doing?” Orlena asked. Isabella forgot that she was here now with someone else. “Magic” she replied. “Illusions, just to meditate. To relax and let the world take you.” Isabella’s answer to the question was unusual, her voice was in a haze. Like she was temporarily on another plane of existence. “Why?” Orlena asked the dragoness again. Wanting to know how a new dragon could process such powers. “To relax from politics. I want to…no I am an artist, a creator, a mother. Not someone who spends her time locked up with ignorant people who refuse to listen to a single word I say.”

“Mother? You have children?” Orlena looked at the dragoness, she did not look like she had any nest so far. Far to free, now to uncaring. Thinking back to the dominant mothers from her clan. She was a world of her own.

“Yes my dear, Many, Many children.” Orlena smiled softly “I have had my fair years on this realm. More than I can remember” Orlena gazed interestedly at Isabella, interested at how she could look so young. “Magic” Was the answer from Isabella when Orlena asked. “Trough you don’t want to pry to fast. Some dragons might become suspicious to the motives” Isabella continued with a grin.

“something tells me, little two scales, that you are not worried about me asking questions” Orlena’s eye slits narrowed when she asked the question to the dragoness opposite of her. Scanning for Isabella’s reaction, a reaction that came calm, controlled. If she was angry, she hid it well. “I am not, Trough some things I will remain silent upon.” She gave a gaze up at the larger dragon. “Some things are best to remain unspoken.”

When Orlena realised that the dragoness was not going to spill her beans about the magic, she tried to pry other answers from the dragoness. Trough it was a trade, for every answer she wanted, the dragoness asked two in return. Orlena hungry for answers to the strange dragoness did not care that the other knew more about her then Orlena knew about the other. What was curious where the questions, she would expect fundamental questions about how the tribe was constructed. But instead, the dragoness asked intimate questions about members of the clan, their ranks, how their numbers were doing. It strikes Orlena as odd that any two-legged dragons knew such knowledge about any dragon tribe. A trough with the question of how the choosing of a mate was done, she realised that the knowledge was old, outdated old. Maybe it was written in some kind of those books the humans and two-legged dragons loved to write and read. Maybe.

Trough Orlena could not ask that question, Isabella made an excuse to leave, taking her belongings with her. The promise that she would be here again tomorrow. For the first time, Orlena felt strange and alone.  Since she ran away, she had not much time to think about what to do next. Only the urge to fly far, far and wide. To focus on mantras to keep the pain out of her muscles and wings. Isabella provided distraction enough to keep her mind of the wonderings. Yet now she was alone, the soft rumbling of the small waterfall near her. She laid down on the ground, the tip of her snout in the water. Letting the fresh water flush over the scales of her nostrils. She did wonder what the two-legged dragons were up to own their own in that city of metal and brick.

Isabella made her way to her home, a lovely stone home at the edge of the docks. Some would say was because Isabella was cheap and dock homes were as affordable as they came. Trough it was for a different reason. In the morning, before the coal fires started in the docks. The fresh sea air flushed away the stench of grease, shit and coal. Isabella had a whole house just for herself, something hardly anyone could afford these days. The house next to her had at least three complete families living in it. All dock workers, kind people even when they did not trust Isabella. She was a dragon, and in the council, trust in the board was somewhat fragile around the docks.

Isabella looked out of the window from her library. Most books she stored there where old, some predated human existence. Somewhere about the old gods. Every dragon who lived a long time would forget the past at some point, there was only a certain amount of things that could be remembered. The need for dragons to note down was great, the ability to do so for the elder dragons was limited. Isabella turned around, gazing at the collection. Memories of the past. “something in here must help my situation” she came to a conclusion. Something from the old days. Slowly she took one of the older books from the shelf. It was a direct record of the ancient caves deep within what was dragon territory. The lands had no name, other than ‘the wild’. She opened the books to the first page, every letter was written out in an array of stripes. Stripes that in the cave would be claw marks. The elder dragons did have a complete alphabet, made in such a way that only clawed front paw was needed to write. The first page could be described as the ‘story of appearance’, how the gods created dragons, elves, dwarfs, even humans. Isabella found the story highly inaccurate to what really happened, but it could stand. Maybe someday she would go back and correct the story, refine it.

The next pages of which the early conflicts with elves, humans, dwarfs. The last species, dwarfs, took up most of the space in the story. Their need for gold conflicted with the dragon’s attraction to use shiny objects as trade. That deal was settled trough, the first form of paid labour the history knew. Dragons dug the ground, dwarfs gave them some gold in return. Not that the deal stood long, dwarfs being greedy and tried to skim on the dragons, more conflict.

The conflict with the elves was a strange one, it was over something the elves nowadays cared little. Territory, animals to hunt. Back when elves were hunters. Relying on their magic to shoot and kill animals for food. They grew in numbers but conflicted when they spread their lands into dragon territory. The elder dragons cared little until they noticed their food became scares. It was a bloody battle, across all the territories. Many an elf and dragon died. Lazeratus was busy that era. He carried more souls to the afterlife than ever before. It was Yerana the goddess of fertility that took charge. She altered just one thing to the elves, their need to only eat meat. She taught the elves how to forest berries, farming. With the need to hunt gone, the need for war was gone. Trough it took centuries for the two species to get over old blood. Trough the respect the species had for each other never died off. The elves were the only other species that had a written record that told a tale of a full-on dragon war, how it ruined the lands.

Thus nowadays elves and dragons kept the peace, in multiple ways. Isabella slammed the book closed. “what if…” she thought back at the creation of the anthroposophical draconic species. A bound between elves and dragons formed and created the species. Elven blood was still running through the veins of the new species. She had to know how an elder dragon would hold with a companion. She closed the books, maybe Orlena could be the key to this. If she could get to know her, bound with her a bit more. Gain her trust and respect. Then maybe she could try out a bound. Enforced by magic and law. The law part was the most tricky, a soul bound magic spell was nothing compared to trying to gain support for a radical new idea that would change the meaning of owning something.

Isabella was called by a massager later on in the day. An emergency meeting of the council. The elder dragons of the town killed a human. She rushed off to the board, a knot in her stomach, knowing how the humans would respond. She had to speak for all dragons now, being the only dragon in the council. Even when she was not at liberty to discuss anything about the elders.

“I tell you, those dragons must go back to their own territories. They are nothing but mindless killing machines.” A younger blond human woman, dressed in fine purple silk. Called out in the council chambers when Isabella entered. “Fine, must I tell my kind to leave this city to crumble? Hold the work they do in the boilers?” Isabella shot back with furry. “The elder dragons have a mind of their own, they can talk, think.” Her eyes fixed upon the younger women. The elven councillor stayed on the sideline, the dwarven councillor was out of town and could not come. “Ah, Isabella.” The human said, “Of course you would defend your blood because dragons are oh so pure.” The tone was pure acid. Disrespectful.

“dragons are pure like humans are good-natured.” Isabella looked sharp “Why do we have to waste our time with these meetings every time a conflict between a human and an elder dragon happens. We have laws for that.”

For the first time, the elf spoke “The laws fail to work, Isabella. I do believe you are right, but we both know how elders respond when they feel unjustly treated. Without dwarven comrade gone, I can remind you all to the dwarven fallout with dragons. “ Isabella nodded softly and turned to the human. “So Amanda. Tell us what happened. Why did the human get himself killed by an elder.” Amanda, the blond women, was clearly offended by the phrasing of the question. “You make it sound like it was the human's fault!” Isabella frowned and tried to at least regain some peace back in the council “I ask what transpired, I know the three elders who are around here. Non feel the need to just go out and kill for fun.”

Amanda turned a sour face. “The human was transporting some gold he found in the forest.” Isabella’s face hardened “So from that you couldn’t conclude yourself that the gold was stolen?” Amanda returned with a typical, dragons are own judge, they do not abide by the laws. “The elder dragons clearly stated that they would punish those who stole from their territory. We all agreed to that condition. Now they act on that agreement, and you are here like a child whining about it.” She paused to let it sink in with the human in the room.

“Isabella, we had a discussion before about the elder dragons and intergradation in modern society. Do you have any luck with an idea on that? I feel that the situation will be softened with at least an idea on how to improve it.” The elf spoke kindly to Isabella. “Well, I might have.” She returned “The idea is forming, but I cannot tell you just yet. I need to refine it, to make sure it is accepted with at least one of the Elder Dragons.”

The elf nodded “But could you give me some idea of what you are planning” Isabella searched long for an answer, what would describe the situation best. Then two works came to her mind “Dragon riders.”