Battle Mage: Dragon Mage (Tales of Alus) (2 page)

Recoiling like she had been slapped, the little blond slid from her stool to wander sadly towards the outer balcony. Kel’lor placed a brotherly arm around her frail shoulders, but waited to speak until after they were back on the balcony.

“Don’t worry, little sister,” the man said leaning down more than a foot to whisper in her ear. “Mor’treya will get over it and whether you had said anything or not, the master was going to make the
threat either way. Now pull yourself together, if you don’t you will draw attention to yourself as a naked little human.”

Cheleya started as she glanced down witnessing her clothing disappearing into wisps of air. Her human form was natural and never wavered, but the clothing they wore was all illusion. An amulet changed the body, but clothing wasn’t part of that form. A wizard had to imagine the covering into being with the change or come into the world as they would from a womb, though full grown.

“Dragon scale,” the little blond ordered as the remainder of her clothes disappeared. New red scales appeared like armor, but just covering the parts of her that humans had warned were supposed to be covered for modesty. Cheleya was a che’ther after all and what did a land dragon know of clothing. They were born with scales and lived that way all their lives. Only those with magic played with such things as clothes and other bodies.

“Well, that wasn’t exactly what I meant,” Kel’lor stated standing tall and seeing the equivalent covering of a bikini covering the dragon’s human form. If he were to look closely, the man guessed that he could follow the shape of her even with the scales, but from a distance at least she looked covered.

“I am just flying home a short way, Kel’lor. I can imagine up something better there, unless my mother makes me change anyway.”

Nodding, the mar’goyn’lya had heard her complaints about her mother before. Though magic was both rare and cherished by their races, Cheleya’s mother didn’t like certain things that it brought into her home. Pulling her closer for a hug, Kel’lor tried to encourage her as he released the girl again, “Well, don’t worry too much anyway, Cheleya. Don’t forget that we are learning your magic, not our own. Mor’treya and I are already masters of our own race’s spells. We may be novices to dragon magic, but we will catch up eventually.

“This is your first full school of training, little one. Enjoy being so good for being so young and I will see you tomorrow,” he finished as the human facade turned back into the giant mar’goyn’lya form once more before Kel’lor propelled himself over the rail of the mountain top school.

Cheleya stood for just a moment longer. She glanced back at the doors and Malaketh who had moved from her sight. Shaking her head forlornly once again, the pretty little blond stepped up onto the rail and dove over the side.

“Dragon wing,” the girl stated bringing her magical wings into being. The feel of the wind rushing past and the exhilaration of the speeding fall through the air, were almost enough to make Cheleya smile once more.

Chapter 2- Of Eggs and Caves

“Mother, I am home,” the voice of the blond girl called as she walked through the gaping doorway that extended several times her height above and almost as many feet in width. There was no door. Che’ther homes didn’t need them.

The land dragon bodies weren’t the easiest by design to operate doors and handles, though all her race were far more dexterous with their large clawed hands than most realized. Her race had artisans and wizards after all who could create very delicate pieces of jewelry for example, but shifting their weight to maneuver to open a doorknob that wasn’t necessary just wasn’t worth the effort.

Like individual giant caves created above ground and patterned into neat squares, the city of Mar’kal was filled with hundreds of similarly created spaces. Che’ther of lesser means lived almost spartanly, though Cheleya knew of a few that had much more creative and expensive tastes that had
created mansions filled with gold and other trinkets. Those were guarded even in a city with almost no known theft.

Che’ther were communal living creatures and shared much between their neighbors, but there were still those that looked out for themselves more than the whole. It was considered slightly odd behavior, but the che’ther didn’t judge them for it. Those who didn’t need such things lived happily as they were and let the others do as they must.

“Mother?” Cheleya called again. Her mother was almost always home these days. She had given birth to another egg less than a year ago and it would be a couple more months before her sibling hatched. Maintaining warmth and checking the egg regularly kept her mother near it almost continually when her father couldn’t be around to guard it for her.

“I thought that I asked you not to call me that while in that ridiculous body,” a deep voice complained from deeper in the cavernous house. “It is just too strange to see that pink little thing and think of you as my daughter, Cheleya.”

Close to twice her size as a che’ther, the dark blue scales of her mother appeared in the lamplight as the ground trembled beneath Cheleya’s feet. Golden eyes, long sharp teeth, and the bulk of a dragon would be intimidating to a true human, but the little blond took in her mother who had raised her for seventeen years and didn’t flinch.

“Well, you are still my mother, even if magic let’s me look like this,” she replied feeling tired of this discussion and not wanting a revival of her mother’s dislike of the spell created by the amulet. “How is the egg doing today?”

“Don’t try changing the subject, Cheleya. Change into my girl before entering this home. You aren’t even trying very hard today anyway. All that pink skin is just... disgusting. You look more like dinner than my daughter.”

Looking down at her body, Cheleya looked on her naked breasts complete with light pink nipples, which were features she still didn’t understand, though her human mentors had told her that they did serve a purpose at least in females. The pale white, smooth skin was exposed from head to toe like a new born babe. Cheleya understood her reproductive and excretory areas for the most part, though they looked only vaguely like those of a dragon. She had even heard that humans gave birth to live little humans instead of eggs. It made little sense to her. An egg was so much more practical and a che’ther egg secured the young until they could exit the protective shell to begin walking almost immediately.

With a big sigh that inflated her lungs making her petite breasts move in that peculiar way that humans always did, Cheleya grasped her amulet inciting the words, “Neruter emis ot flesym sa et sawen.”

Light swirled around the human growing and lengthening. In seconds, sky colored scales formed within the light as Cheleya’s body grew into her real body. A long tail and elongated torso dropped her from two feet to four as her arms helped take the weight of a land dragon. Inside a che’ther home, one rarely stood on just their rear legs. While it was possible, most homes had ceilings that limited such movements still Cheleya was able to stretch her long neck to look up at her mother from all fours with plenty of room to spare. Still dwarfed by the elder female who was nearly twice her size, Cheleya wished that she was back in her adopted form almost immediately.

She felt so clumsy like this, though the girl had only learned how to change into a human a little more than a year ago.

“Is father home yet?” the little blue dragoness asked in a much deeper voice than before, though by comparison it was higher than her mother’s. Cheleya had always been closer to her father than her mother. While che’ther were not known for their warmth, even between those in their immediate families, she had always felt more of a bond with him.

Her father was a brown scaled land dragon, powerful and having some use of earth magic that allowed him to work the land better than most che’ther who farmed. It was from him that Cheleya had apparently derived her much greater gift of magic. Whether he was proud of his daughter becoming a magician wizard or not, she didn’t really know, but he hadn’t discouraged her when the wizards had tested her and found her power growing. The fact that he hadn’t complained or found a way to interrupt her enrollment in the magic school was basically all the encouragement most che’ther would ever give their young, she supposed.

Having been able to transform into a human for even just the short time she had, Cheleya was already beginning to feel a change in how her heart reacted to her family. She wanted to love them as the girl had heard other races loved their parents and bonded closely, but they were che’ther and that was not their way.

“Your father is still out in the fields. He had to help prepare more farmland now that the snows have started to clear in the valley. You know this is one of his busiest times of the year. If you wanted to see your father more often, then you should have spent more time here during the winter while he was bored. At least I could get him to watch your brother while I went out.”

Cheleya’s eyes moved to her mother curiously and she asked, “You know that it will be male?”

Looking as if she had been caught in a lie, her mother replied, “Well, not exactly, but I have a feeling this one will be a male. He will probably grow up big and strong like his father and help him in the fields.”

The words cut without intending to perhaps, but they did cut. Cheleya knew that she was a disappointment to her mother. She was small for a che’ther even after seventeen years of growth. Though most of her kind continued to grow for almost thirty years, her body had been slow and virtually stopped growing a few years ago. Like a permanent adolescent of her race, she knew that other che’ther pitied her when she wasn’t there to hear them speak.

Having checked with healers and magicians among her kind, the simple conclusion was that Cheleya was nearly full grown. Her body simply refused to gain the bulk of most of the che’ther. She was healthy for her size, and her magic continued to grow where flesh would not. It was simply what she was and her mother didn’t enjoy the fact that her daughter brought humiliation on her household by the simple fact of being a dwarf, which was nearly unheard of for their race.

“Well, I think that I had better go to my room and study,” Cheleya decided ending the awkward silence.

Her mother nodded. “I will call you when your father returns and we’ll have dinner.”

Having dinner was one of their customs intended to bring the family closer together; but conversation was rare and awkward, especially since she had started with the Academy of Magic. Cheleya merely nodded and plodded to the farthest room from the front doorway. Like the rest, there was no door in the frame, but it was still far enough back to bring some privacy.

Grasping the amulet again, she cited, “Ekam emet tahway et ma desopus ot ebem.”

The light returned but the end result was her tiny human body once more. She had let some red shade her blond hair to more of a strawberry coloring this time for fun, but aside from that Cheleya always adopted the same face and body. Her green eyes looked on the naked, nubile form a moment before the dragoness chanted a second spell.

Turning her fore finger in twirls from her neck towards her feet, a dark pink scarf appeared following the line of her thought. Clothing meant little to the che’ther, even in human form. She didn’t feel the cold anymore than she had in her dragon body, so the pretty scarf started from her neck twisting behind her along her left shoulder blade before coming back around to cover her chest. The line continued to snake covering her private areas to continue down and around her left leg to stop above her ankle.

Such magic came from the summoning school, a class of spell that was closely associated with being a dragon mage. Dragon magic summoned the attributes of a legendary dragon essentially and enhanced the body. It was different, but similar enough for Cheleya to have found a book from the Academy library and taught it to herself without any help.

The girl looked around the nest that served as her bed as it had for all of her life. A large wood chest sat against the wall holding all that she had acquired in the seventeen years of her life. “Dragon claw,” she called the spell extending her hand towards the chest standing a little taller than the human girl positioned before it.

Thinking perhaps remaining a dragon a bit longer might have made things
easier; Cheleya guessed that easier would have made her miss out on using her magic. She was supposed to be training after all.

With the spell driving the top of the chest up against the wall, Cheleya used her dragon wing spell to jump up onto the edge of the large bin. Sitting with her legs dangling into the box, the girl caught a brown pack with her right foot lifting it up and bending her leg to bring it into arm’s reach.

She turned and stood on the eight inch thick outer wall of the chest. Walking like a gymnast along its length, the dragoness thrilled in the agility of using just her two legs and feet. She jumped down and felt a little pain from the soles of her feet. Sitting on the ground to rub the feeling from her appendages, Cheleya considered the delicateness of her form.

While she inherited certain strengths carried over from being a che’ther, this body was still much more delicate. The speed and grace that she had as a human lost her much of the power and invulnerabilities of her dragon form. Still within certain areas, Cheleya found herself more at home as a human than as a che’ther.

As the pain in her feet went away, the girl delved into her backpack. She had been given one from the Academy to keep trinkets like the amulet stored safely, but Cheleya had found that she liked other things as well. A sky blue blanket, the color of her scales, was pulled from inside the sheltering pack. It was soft and on occasion the girl had used it in human form at night. The straw and grasses used to make her bed were not as comfortable as a human as they were as a dragon, so the soft cloth was one of her favorite things.