by Ryan Johnson
Then Vaeludar raised the chicken leg to his mouth and softly exhaled a small flame. The chicken was consumed by a fire lightly burning the red color away and black coloring taking over.
After lighting the chicken on fire, Vaeludar blew out the fire with a solid breath and ate the meat until there were only bones left. After having some nicely, roasted meat, Vaeludar blew a larger flame, engulfing the bone and shattering it to dusty ashes that melt in his hands.
“Good meat and disposable garbage,” said Vaeludar, before he turned to exit the kitchen.
“Where are you going?” asked Flavius, with a mouthful of food.
“I’m going to dispose of what I have and take some private time at the beach. Time for me to take break from the fame and spend some private time somewhere I won’t have to be bothered by kids riding my tail.” The hybrid walked out of the kitchen and out of the house. Once he got outside, he was in the clear to dump the ashes on the ground and fly to the sky.
Vaeludar flapped his wings and headed to the western shorelines, hopefully to have some time to himself and think of where to go from there.
He has yet to start his personal journey.
ON THE SHORELINES
V
aeludar flew to the shorelines some dozens of miles away from his adopted father’s village. For a human it would take an entire morning to walk from the village to the ocean shorelines. Lucky for him, Vaeludar could make it in several minutes and not sweat from his human-dragon-scale-mixed skin.
Vaeludar stopped in midair while he was looking at an endless horizon of the blue ocean. He could see the blue waters stretching out as far as his eyes could see. Vaeludar was hundreds of feet in the air and even from the height he was floating from he couldn’t see or find any other landmarks. He knew the island of Isla Maeli was about a hundred miles away, but he couldn’t even see its nearest shorelines.
After gazing at the horizon of the vast ocean, Vaeludar landed on the shore and let his feet sink a few inches into the wet sand.
This was a romantic sight for the hybrid, seeing how the flowing of the ocean’s waves caressed against the sand, under a bright sun reflecting on the ocean’s surface. This was another place for Vaeludar to put his mind at ease, whenever he felt unneeded by the people, he would came here and look at the distant horizon of blue ocean.
He always felt some kind of love of the ocean’s shorelines and the presence of a water goddess waving beneath his feet or the presence of the Three Gods, letting him know the gods were beside him if no one else was. He would quickly close his eyes and feel the water smoothing against his feet and let them sink beneath the sand.
“It’s a surprise seeing you here,” Geraldus’s voice call out.
Vaeludar grimly opened his eyes at the sound of Geraldus. It seemed everywhere Vaeludar went; Geraldus would follow behind the hybrid. Vaeludar had always been alone for seventeen years, and Geraldus would end up trailing closely behind the hybrid.
“What’s wrong? Wanting to sink to the bottom of the ocean?” asked Geraldus.
“What else can I do or what more can I be?” asked Vaeludar.
“Trouble,” said two female voices.
Naìra and Andrei ran toward their loving hybrid foster brother. Naìra was the first to jump on Vaeludar’s back before slipping halfway down.
Vaeludar smiled and lifted her by her legs and she quickly wrapped her arms around his neck, giving her a piggyback ride. “You think I’m trouble, little girl?”
“Yes,” laughed Naìra.
“Oh, really. I guess I can be the biggest trouble any hybrid could be.” Vaeludar released one of his arms from Naìra and wrapped his tail around him and her. Naìra didn’t look in fear, only laughed. She knew Vaeludar was only playing with her.
“Bet you can’t get me,” said Andrei.
“Oh, really? Second little girl? Here I come then.” Vaeludar released his gripping tail and gently flew toward the other twin girl. Before he took off, Vaeludar made sure his one arm holding Naìra was tight enough for the girl riding on him to not fall off.
Then Vaeludar landed in front of the running Andrei. “Think you can get away from me?” Vaeludar caught the giggling Andrei with his free arm. He held her by the belly and lifted her up; both the girls were playfully laughing as their favorite hybrid trapped them both in his gripping arms.
“And say: how about we go for a little spin? Up in the air?” Vaeludar soared into the air a few feet and slowly spun himself around. He held the twin girls tightly enough so they wouldn’t fall from him. He went slowly that way the girls wouldn’t want to scream in horror, but he heard them screaming in laughter.
After spinning in the air for several seconds, Vaeludar touched back down. He bent his legs a bit so the smaller girls could get back on the ground.
Once the twin girls were back on the ground, they were dizzy enough for them to barely stand on their own feet. Vaeludar used his tail and a wing on the twin girls so they wouldn’t get their clothes wet or dirty.
Once they were back to their senses, the girls suddenly jumped on the hybrid, wrapping their arms around his head and pushed him to the ground with all their might.
Vaeludar vilely smiled as he just stood there and watched as the girls tried to push him to the wet ground. His weight was too heavy for them to push. This time around he went to go to pretend the twin girls were strong and he faked being pushed by a pair of small girls younger than he was.
Then Naìra and Andrei were crawling all over the grounded hybrid, but Vaeludar waved his arms around the girls. Against the twin girls and waving his back into the sand, Vaeludar played a bit with the twin girls as he and they smiled and laughed.
“Alright, girls, that’s enough. Get up before you end up sending your rescuer to a watery grave,” said Geraldus.
The girls’ smiles faded to big frowns. They loved playing with Vaeludar so much they considered him to be their favorite brother.
“Oh, come on, girls, don’t let your smiles turn upside down, otherwise I’m going have to eat those frowning faces.” Then Vaeludar made loud biting noises with his teeth.
The girls’ frowns turned back into smiley faces and ran away from the hybrid’s biting teeth. They ran with all their might, even running past their own father.
“Trying to eat my daughters again?” asked Geraldus.
“Only if they make such sad faces, which I don’t want to see in such small, sweet, innocent girls,” said Vaeludar, who stood from the ground and used his wings to wipe the sand covering his back. “How did you get here so fast? I saw you talking with Alaric and there was some distance between the beaches and your home village.”
“A Dragon offered me and my daughters a ride here, and I couldn’t refuse,” said Geraldus. “And the question is: what brings you out here?”
“To get away from the fame. At first, it was pleasant: big crowds and everybody coming and thanking me for my actions. Then it becomes too much for me to handle and kids are riding my tail.”
“Just like Naìra and Andrei?”
“They know how to be gentle when trying to ride my tail. But they aren’t as picky as your eldest daughter is. She would be tailing me everywhere I would go. She is one girl I can’t stand being around.”
“That’s a thing with young girls, especially sisters; they always follow their big brothers around.”
“Sometimes I wish they looked more toward Alaric and Flavius than just me. They remind me of that one sister from those old stories. What is her name? That unknown half-sister of the legendary demigod Valverno?”
Geraldus stroke his chin. “I’m not quite sure. If she does have a name, I wouldn’t know it. She is known for only being a half-sister of Valverno, and one of the original White Knights. Only the Demigod and his mother are named. There are no mentions of any other names.”
Vaeludar sighed. Then he walked alongside the shoreline where the waves came crashing one after another a
gainst Vaeludar’s feet and back to the ocean. Geraldus followed after the hybrid.
They spent some time walking on the shoreline until Vaeludar came across a small terrain of rocks and boulders piled about a tenth of a mile. Black and silver rocks and brown boulders had were covered with bird poo and a few seagulls cracking open sea shells.
“This is where you rescued her, isn’t it?” asked Geraldus.
Vaeludar looked at the rocks layered upon each other. These rocks weren’t layered by the ocean’s current or by a natural disaster; those rocks were layered by men. Wicked men who lured prey to an unwanted death.
Vaeludar walked a bit closer to the rocks built in the form of a tower wall and bent over. He sunk his hands deep into the sand. He made fists once his felt his hands went deep enough and lifted to see a large, torn net covered in sand.
The net seemed to have been buried for some time; it had rotted away in the wet sand. Vaeludar dropped the net and saw it was some twenty feet long and wide. It would have been good as a fishing net, but not to capture small fish. The net Vaeludar knew was built to catch something bigger than fish.
“This is the spot where you rescued the Siren, isn’t it?” asked Geraldus.
A small flare of anger sparked in the hybrid’s eyes. “Yes,” he replied. “This was where I found the Siren almost butchered to death, surrounded by cruel men and growling dogs. The Minotaur wasn’t my first kill. I was twelve years old when I made my first group of kills, when I rescued a creature of the sea.” Then the anger faded away from Vaeludar’s eyes.
“It had been five years,” said Geraldus.
“From the humans’ perspective, Sirens are monsters. From the Sirens’ perspective, they are not monsters. Since they aren’t considered to be humans nor Mermaids, it is hard to consider what Sirens are meant to be,” Vaeludar turned his back to the rocks and proceeded to walk away from the sight. “And it had been five years today since I rescued the Siren from death.”
“What was her name? Marina?”
Vaeludar nodded.
Geraldus then shook his head and dropped the subject. “That’s right. After you rescued the Siren, the island’s king, Uragiru, decided to take her back to the capital city. I’m sure the news of your fight with the Minotaur had reached the king by now.”
“Of all people to come, King Uragiru is the last person I want to see,” said Vaeludar.
“Why is that?” asked Geraldus. “He has Marina as a daughter. I’m sure you would want to see her if he does come to this village.”
“Of all people, King Uragiru is the only human I’ve come across to laugh in my face and spread unkindly rumors about me. He would make me angry enough that I’d want to kill him. I’d rather people stare at me all day instead of a single person spread insults about me.”
Geraldus sighed, “He is the king, you know. He has the power to say or not say what needs to be done. His ancestors have been kings and queens for thousands of years.”
“But he doesn’t have godly power like the Demigod does in the old legends. He can’t conquer Spirits of the Dead or transform tall mountains into small valleys. He may be a king of the island of Shimabellia, but he was a mortal human who doesn’t have the power to wield magic.”
“King Uragiru is a powerful man on this island. He had the loyalty of hundreds of men and commands vast legions of soldiers. Not to mention that he commands all Regions of the island. When war comes, all his bannermen must come to his aid, and I am one of his bannermen.”
“I’m not sure I could be called one of his bannermen; I would not call myself a loyal person to come to the aid of a supposed higher-up.” Vaeludar found a small stone sitting a few inches away from him. He walked and picked it up with one hand and tossed it at the ocean, watching the stone spinning and pouncing on the ocean’s surface. The stone peddled across the ocean’s surface before disappearing into the horizon.
“The future holds many potential paths and you could be called a leader one day,” said Geraldus, joining Vaeludar into watching the pouncing stone disappear. “Then you would end up answering the king’s call.”
“Then for future reference, I’ll be clear on this: I’m not going to serve King Uragiru or answer his call. I won’t come running to his aid.”
“If that’s what you want, go ahead, but you do know what happens to someone if they don’t answer the king’s call?” asked Geraldus.
“I could care less what consequences my choices could bring,” said Vaeludar.
Geraldus stroked his chin. “Best we get back. My eldest sons will be wondering where I am.”
“What about the girls?” asked Vaeludar.
“Don’t bother yourself. They’re my daughters. I’ll take them back myself.”
Vaeludar nodded and rose into the air again, without a single flap of his wings giving him the power to fly. He looked once more at the staggering rocks and the net he saw. “I do wonder how the Siren is doing living with the king. I do not know much about a Siren’s personality, but I do know and they do have a good judgment of character. After I saved her, she quickly judged me by my character, and fell in love with me at first sight. I wonder how that will work out: a human dragon hybrid and a Siren falling in love.”
He faced toward the east and flew off in that direction.
LOOMING THREATS
V
aeludar had spent a few more days staying in the village and has yet to come up with a plan of where he wanted to travel. He all, of a sudden, felt he should stay in the village. A week ago he felt the need to leave the village to search for answers, but when the Minotaur attacked, he no longer felt the need to depart. He felt like the gods were calling him to stay in the village for a bit longer, and he stayed a week after the attack.
The hybrid felt an attachment of this village, some kind of feeling he never felt before. He had the plan to move out, yet he couldn’t now. The killing alone brought some delight and discomfort to his mind.
From the time he made his kill, it was a disrupting thought Vaeludar couldn’t stop focusing on. He fought and won against a large, seven-foot bull that walked and fought like a human. But killing the beast was bringing some unbalance. Vaeludar was feeling okay about it, and he was feeling the opposite at the same time. He didn’t know if he was okay about the killing.
The few days after his battle Vaeludar felt relatively well, with many people praising him for a heroic action of protecting the village from harm. As more time passed though, Vaeludar started to feel dread and trauma from that experience.
He lived in the village for seventeen years and never had to make a kill. He was considered to be old enough to be recruited into a military.
When the disturbing thought was suddenly brought up, Vaeludar would fly above the village, walked closely to the bordering forest in the south, swim in the ocean shorelines west of the village, and did multiple things at once, to make him forget about the discomfort and pleasure of the killing. He would try to find some way to bury the thought deep away in his brain, but to no avail.
The head of the Minotaur was still at the place where it was hung. Vaeludar paid it no mind, as it would trouble his mind and body even further. He told no one of his mixed feelings, and he didn’t want to.
Playing with the twin girls relatively eased his mind and placed him in a state of joy. Even as babies growing to be toddlers, the twin girls were one of the few kids not afraid of Vaeludar. He liked playing with them and they liked to play with him. The twins saw him as a good, protective big brother and spent most of their time with him.
Vaeludar was happy in keeping the girls happy. While having fun and playing kept the girls and Vaeludar busy, Geraldus could tend to his duties easier, but sometimes his wife would oppose to having the girls playing with the strange creature.
Geraldus refused his wife’s requests and let the twin girls play with the hybrid. The father didn’t care that much, since he was raising Vaeludar and the twin gir
ls under the same roof. He knew Vaeludar would be harmless to the girls, although he did worry about the claws on Vaeludar’s feet that could easily cut his daughters’ skin.
However, Vaeludar was careful enough and didn’t let the baby girls get any cuts. But life came a little harder when his wife had passed away from a sickness a year ago, and the girls began to play with their other siblings instead of Vaeludar.
Vaeludar wasn’t surprised to see the twin girls going away from him and playing with their other brothers; he was quite used to being alone for all his life. But now he had the attention of the entire village looking up to him, if the village came under attack again.
Still playing with the little girls, his thought of his battle a few days ago made him feel like doing some hand-to-hand combat training. As he was flying in the sky, he decided to head to the training grounds. This is where the soldiers of the village would drill daily with bow and arrows, spears, swords, axes, and any other metal weapons that can be held by hand.
The training ground was located to the east, half a mile away from the farmland. There were three large barracks and soldiers training daily. It was the largest military force the Western Region had to offer; Geraldus had about ten thousand men under his command. A large army, but Vaeludar knew that King Uragiru commanded an even larger army.
Vaeludar flew over the training grounds and landed where teenage boys were drilling with blunt swords. On one side was a group of boys not training with the other boys swinging swords, watching the people sweat heavily.
One of them happened to be Alaric, who was standing by watching the boys. He saw Vaeludar walking toward them. “Doing some training today?” asked Alaric.
“Yes, ever since I killed the two-legged cow about a week ago, I haven’t had a moment’s rest,” said Vaeludar. Vaeludar came to look at a load of swords lying on a wooden stack. All of them blunt and dull, not well enough for real battles and soldiers. The swords were good enough for training, even though they could still cause broken bones. “What about you? Fully healed from your little squirm-ish?” Vaeludar joked.
