The Shining Wyrm

1.1

A fierce dragon faced a valiant knight.

From her perch, the great shining wyrm loomed high over her opponent. With her scales like a fine mesh of metal shields, her teeth like the sharpest swords, her wings poised to unleash the fiercest winds, her tail looped tight ready to crack like a thunderbolt and her breath an incandescent, all consuming death glowing with-

“Jewel! Not indoors!”

Jewel cut her flame with a choking gasp and buzzy hiccup at the chastisement from the sudden appearance of Her Governess. The aborted breath (which would only have been a spark of light!) rattled her scales slightly with the swallowed magic, wings flaring wide in shame.

“Ah! S-sorry, Muriel! It was only going to be a bit of shine, nothing dangerous! I swear!”

The brave knight, Once fearless against the dragon, cowered before Governess Muriel’s presence and immediately pointed at Jewel with the gleam of forced tears rushing to his eyes and a quaver in his voice.

Jewel would forgive the betrayal of course — he was her brother after all.

Also he was eleven.

“She was the one that wasn't paying attention! She was playing with the books and making a fort and-”

Muriel softly coughed from her position in the doorway of the study. Her cough brought silence to both of her ward's protests.

“Alexander, that helmet is an antique! It was stored on the top shelf! I was away for five minutes. Just how did you even get it down?”

Jewel shrank and curled up on herself even more. Wings clenching up against her bundle of coils, eyes looking down at the stone floor.

She still had the presence of a large pony or a small war horse, but besides bowing or groveling with her chin on the floor it was the smallest she could make herself.

“Uh, I got it down from the display for him. There was a mention of it in the book and he was curious about what the knights wore in the Tyrant War. But Alex is right! It wasn't his fault. It was all my idea. It’s just we’d been reading about the war and-”

Alexander’s tears were mostly forgotten at her stated guilt; he quickly rallied with his sister.

“See?! She admits it! It was her idea!”

Muriel however was unconvinced, squeezing the bridge of her nose for a moment then shook her head.

“I thought better of you both. But apparently you two have too much energy for history today. Pack up your work; We’re going down to the courtyard so you can run off some of this energy.”

“But It was her fault!”

Jewel nodded at Alexander's claim, Glancing furtively at her governess, trying to catch Muriel’s eye and convey her agreement with her brother.

“Alexander, you were obviously not forced to play with Jewel. You will be giving me at least three circuits of the courtyard at a charging pace”

“But that’s not fair! she-”

“And Jewel will be flying ten circuits of the manor with two lodestones.”

The wyrmling could not help a flinch, but quickly resumed her resolved gaze on the ground, and tried to give a dutiful nod of acceptance.

She started to pack up their quills, inkwells and blotting paper. Sliding around the room with soft shoves against the floor to keep her sailing gracefully.

The tools and materials were quickly wrapped, packed, and put away in the drawers of her father’s study.

Alexander continued to try and wheedle his way out of the ‘punishment’. But the sibling’s Governess might as well be an indomitable mountain for how well either child could sway her. Jewel had learned to stop trying when she was six.

“No, Alexander. if you keep at this, It will be ten circuits.”

Jewel did not interfere, focusing on using only her claws instead of her mouth to handle the latches. There were battles you did not fight and Muriel’s orders were one of them.

“But-”

Her older brother protested anyway.

“Four circuits.”

Jewel snuck a glance, but no Muriel was still watching, she had to keep to her claws.

“B-”

The slightly raised brow was more than enough to dissuade even peeling back her lips for a gentle bite to pull the drawer open.

“Five.”

That was too much for Alexander and he finally accepted with a muttered breath.

“Fine, I’m sorry.”

It was always so fiddly to grasp with any four of her claws. But that was the ‘proper’ way to do it.

“Sorry what, Alexander?”

With a soft breath Jewel gently pushed the last cupboard closed.

“I’m sorry Ms. Muriel, four circuits is perfectly reasonable.”

Jewel shook her head; Muriel really wasn’t being fair to her brother. She agreed with Alexander that he was not to blame: it had been her idea, and she’d wheedled him into it by talking about the battles against the great tyrant. She’d encouraged him when he suggested getting the helmet from the old armor on display to try out a re-enactment.

It was her fault, not his.

But she knew that Muriel could not be swayed.

Still, she did give Jewel a bit of a look. But this was one thing the wyrmling felt deserved her own meaningful glance back. Unspoken but heard, she nodded to her Governess.

Why yes she had cleaned up Alexander’s stationary as well as her own, Governess.

If they were alone perhaps Muriel might have said something but instead she turned her focus to herd Alexander into the hallways.

Jewel of course followed dutifully.

Their lessons had begun to delve into the historical importance of Fort Rochford. During the Tyrant War it had been a bastion and redoubt against the Conquering Wyrm and his armies.

A staging ground, too, for incursions and offensives deeper into the territory of the Tyrant.

But that had been many centuries ago and these days it was more of an overbuilt manor house for the Rochford Barony.

They remained rich; the sheep herds were said to have some of the finest hides for vellum this side of the Ridgetail Mountains.

But the histories were making Jewel appreciate just how underused her home was from what it could be.

Their battlements had been turned to gardens. The numerous rooms and twisted passage ways were rarely walked by anyone.

Entire wings closed off for half a year or more.

And then there were the hints of what it was once for.

The narrow windows.

The winding passageways that could have been straight.

So many things you just did not even think about. Honestly, Jewel had been enjoying the history lessons (except the writing, her limbs were poorly positioned for easy writing.)

But as the younger sister it was her duty to help her brother, and he had been getting incredibly bored and just seemed not very interested in the histories at all.

So she’d made a simple suggestion to help engage him.

It was totally Jewel’s fault it got so rambunctious.

The openness of the courtyard contrasted with the narrow halls and heavy thick stone walls of the indoors. A wide space partly overgrown where armies and cavalry would have mustered both winged and ground troops.

Now the marshaling grounds at attention were abandoned. Almost lonely with just Samuel the groundskeeper and his two dogs, tilled for vegetables with a few hunks of wood for weapons practice by the footmen and visiting knights.

The noonday sun was warm and enthusiastic as it greeted her scales and fresh air contrasted with the stern eyes of Muriel as she ordered her ‘squire’ Smithson (she knew for a fact he was still the stablemaster’s apprentice) to fetch her training gear.

Jewel settled into a proper and regal pose. As Alexander was ordered to start his laps, his sister waited for her equipment.

Eventually Smithson and three stablehands Jewel recognized but never quite recalled the names of arrived, hefting her weight harness and setting it aside the pile of Lodestones.

It was a finely crafted thing commissioned by her father to help her ‘train her strength’, fitted to be as comfortable as could be managed given the purpose.

Muriel rallied Alexander back to pace with a curt shout: he was now puffing around the courtyard at speed fit for breaking a defensive line with a spear.

Now it was her turn.

She shouldered herself into the leather loops of the harness, then bent her head down in a swoop to fit it through the straps. She wished she could fasten the buckles with her teeth. But with Muriel watching she had to fiddle with her foreclaws. Then the same for the buckle around her ‘midsection’, using her hind limbs this time.

Jewel had seen cats twist around themselves in grooming, but was not terribly impressed with their flexibility.

On good days, she agreed with her mother that she could poise and twist like the finest serpent. Right now she felt more like a worm (not a wyrm) or a particularly gawky ermine.

Smithson managed a few of the more fiddly buckles and clasps, and helped her tighten and adjust them. She honestly could have done it all herself, but only if she was allowed to use her teeth. Her neck was long and supple enough and her jaw was incredibly deft and flexible.

But ‘biting at yourself like a mangy dog’ was unbecoming for her stature and title as a Lady of Rochford.

So Smithson had a job to do on little notice as her ‘Squire’, when she knew for a fact his real master still had work for him to do with the horses and the family’s one Gryphon.

She would have to make it up to him later, maybe see if he needed any help with the larger horses. Muriel was making such a hassle for everyone except Jewel!

Finally she was settled and her harness secured, and Smithson could get back to doing something actually productive.

With a nod from her Governess, Jewel walked over to the pile of lodestones and slipped one into a pocket over each shoulder and thigh. The weight pulled down on her body, but not unevenly. It was honestly rather light as far as a punishment goes, a completely unfair token compared to how hard Alex was having to work to run around his circuits of the training grounds. Or the interruption to Smithson’s heavy workload.

What did Muriel have against both of them?

Taking a deep breath in and letting out a sigh kept distinctly clear and soft, Jewel put it out of her mind and ‘exhaled’ her wyrmflame. Not out of her mouth, where it could burn, of course; but inward and out along her wings and body, pulling her flesh and wings up against gravity. And then with a heavy flap of her wings she was airborne, dragging the quartet of lodestones along with her as she moved over to the archery posts before starting her own circuit.

Unburdened flight was freedom in itself, so effortless that Jewel had struggled not to simply float and glide through the air since she was three! Which had promptly been followed by a ban from going any higher than a hand span while indoors.

Without the lodestones this would have not even been a punishment at all but a wonderful diversion!

The sky welcomed her and the sun’s golden glow filled her with its warmth and gently stoked the heat of her flame with its own.

Jewel soared up and felt the currents of the world with her. Pulling her with the wind, or the wind with her. Filling her wings with the feeling of the storm and letting her draw on it and her own wyrmflame to sweep around the manor.

She carefully kept herself in sight of Muriel. And it was impressive how often her Governess was looking right back at Jewel as she flew. She had been told that humans could barely see anything about her at this distance.

But she was not sure she believed it: as she flew, Muriel’s stern but approving countenance always matched her gaze whenever she peeked over.