Dreams and Duty by Lutivian (Patreon)

I am not a dreamer. We kobold’s dare not to dream. The world is so large compared to us and whatever dreams we may have are often dashed against the rocks like the coming tides. To dream is to close your eyes and take your attention from reality; from what is there in front of your snout. To dream is to invite calamity and disappointment... and yet my dream stood there above me, concern in his eyes.

“You alright, little one? You took a nasty spill!” he said in that all too familiar dalish accent.

No, my dream was not the kin standing above me; a beautiful specimen of the furkin race that he was. Though I have often dreamed about him specifically. Soft red hair, piercing blue-grey eyes, and a smile that could disarm an army; the caracal before me was not ‘my dream’; though his presence was a grand representation that it could be possible.

Though we kobolds are often treated or mistaken for children, more so by ignorant furkin than our lizardkin brethren; we actually live to be quite old. The oldest on record lived to be 230 and she was a healthy saura at the time of her death. She could have conceivably lived another two-hundred and thirty years; we’ll never know. A kobold has never died of old age and most of us don’t live to see a hundred.

I am lucky, I am quite a great deal older than many would guess. I’ve lived long enough to see conflict, strife, battle and war. Constant and ever destructive struggle between Sauria and Lioncourt, between reptites and furlings. My dream, the dream that I dare not speak into existence, for to do so would expose it to the sun's brutal rays and turn it to vapor? My dream is peace. Simple and everlasting. Peace and cooperation. An end to a conflict that has seen literally millions of my kin turned to dust and decay. Peace... Well, that kind of peace and cooperation was staring me in the face with his charming smile. If only I could bottle it up and share it with others, perhaps they would know how good it felt.

“Aye, I am well, m’lord.” I responded. I winced as I did so as I saw his eyebrow raise. I knew he hated honorifics, but deference to our betters is drilled into us kobolds from the day we hatch. It’s not something that can be forgotten at the request of one man, no matter how adorable.

The man in question was Count Adolyn Valenrow. Former Commander of the 15th Company of Evandale’s Border Legion, I have seen his handsome visage many times in the past on the other side of a battlefield. We two have crossed blades and exchanged menacing glares many times, though I’ve never come close to besting the valley cat in any of our encounters.

Now though the young Count was the Primus of the Sacred Order of Raven Knights, and his concerns were greater than the petty skirmishes, battles, and hostilities in the borderlands between our Kingdoms. His was now the Raven Knight’s ‘duty beyond all measure’. A call to defend not just Lioncourt, but the entire realm from the dangers and abuse of magic and magical things. A duty that defied previous conflicts, hostilities, enemies and alliances. A duty that brought the two of us together on the same side for once.

A week before, a Spellbinder of Clan Kivets had come urgently to the castle; demanding an audience with the Empress. Spellbinder Qoshk was a powerful and well respected member of the great Clans, despite his very public membership in the Lindwyrm Society. A common reptite, an agama, what he lacked in stature he made up for in arcane ability.

The lizardkin was a scholar of the arcane artes and the histories of war, and had been for years trying to find a way to create enhanced war beasts through the use of subversive magics; trying to subvert and control the brutish troglodytes that stalked the Arzaki Mire in the north.

Large, brutal, and feral. They are by many who believe we evolved from lesser beings considered to be a failure of the ameliorative effects of mana, and proof of their claims. Troglodytes look like bestial lizardkin that time forgot. Capable of little sentient thought and dangerously aggressive to any who they encounter. They are two us as the orcs are to the Schweinen, a reminder that evolution is a crapshoot.

Unfortunately Spellbinder Qoshk had spent the better part of twenty years trying and failing to increase the intelligence and strength of these creatures in order to turn them into weapons against the enemies of the War Faction. His research had never yielded results and unlike the furkin lands whose laws would prohibit such experimentation, Sauria allowed his savage studies. The Comitium Magica actually allowed and funded his research. Curious that they did little but cry to Empress Ætheria when it went awry.

The damn thing escaped it’s containment within the spellbinders ‘mages tower’ and swam from the island of Kerxi to the mainland. Had the thing died or not spent the last week murdering every kin it encountered along the shoreline, I’m certain Qoshk would never have mentioned his blunder; but with the thing moving south he now had to. For the past the Mist Marsh were the furkinlands and the creature needed to be stopped before it made it to Lioncourt.

Qoshk cared nothing for furkin casualties, for furkin casualties were ostensibly the purpose of his research. No, he was mostly concerned about his machinations being learned of by our enemies and the reprisal of the Empress should his mistakes increase hostilities with our ancient rivals. Herald’s Keep was a tragedy still fresh in the minds of both lizardkin and furkin alike, her Imperial Majesty had done much to keep that particular disaster from becoming an all out war. She would certainly hang Qoshk by his entrails should his little ‘science project’ undue the work she had labored.

That is why Adolyn and I found ourselves in the Yakra Ruins, just outside the Mist Marsh. In her infinite wisdom Empress Ætheria took this burgeoning disaster and turned it into opportunity. Unconcerned with the protests and wails of the society, Ætheria decided to enlist the help of the Order to deal with this crisis.

She would contact them in the manner most common in their lands, via missive attached to a flying creature. In this case the diminutive pteranon. Small, excessively adorable feral lizards that looked like a mini dragon with four wings and the head of a lesser lizard with incredibly big eyes. They were common fauna in Sauria and on up to the cost to Drakon and were mostly adopted as pets; though the Empress and other nobles had trained them for the purposes of carrier creatures for the last three-hundred years. It is by one of these beasts that both I and Adolyn were summoned to the capital.

For Adolyn, it must have been an olive branch. She honestly admitted the situation in all of its details, correctly assuming that this would be considered more the business of the Order than the Courtian aristocracy. She did not ask the Primus to keep the issue a secret, only to aid her in this unfortunate incident, offering only her thanks and ‘gratitude’. I was offered naught more than a chance to serve as Dragon Blades do, but the opportunity to work with a Raven Knight was intriguing nonetheless. I hadn’t dared to hope that the Primus himself would show up for such a task, but I imagine a request from the Empress of Sauria demanded an equal response.

So together we appeared before the Empress. I learned my orders and he accepted her request. Together we would cooperate peacefully to bring an end to the crisis and Empress Ætheria would use the event to build bridges and mend fences. The dragoness was as always the clever politician; and I got to for at least a time live out my dream.

Adolyn lifted me from the ground with ease, standing me on my feet and whistling at the carnage wrought from our battle with the troglodyte.  It had been hard fought. Though Adolyn could have simply cut the thing down with that sword of his, the made Spellcaster had suffused the creature's bones with a magic that would poison. Should the creature die, it would rapidly decay releasing the poison in the air.

The beast had had it’s skin hardened and etched with runes that drew energy from mana stones embedded in its body. It was terribly resistant to magic and the more damage it took, the more ferocious it became. One of these things was a terror, an army would be absolutely monstrous. The implications were not lost on the Primus as he decided that capture was preferable to disposal.

I had been tasked with it’s destruction, but could not find a way to complete that mission without costing both him and I our lives. The Empress was appalled by the creation of the beast, but was never a fool. She would not throw away such an asset simply because she found it distasteful, nor did she wish to have such a thing fall in the hands of our rivals; but she would relent if there were no other way.

If it had been as simple as dying for the cause, then I could have done so for my Ætheria. It was my duty as one of her blades after all, but Adolyn seemed to play a part in larger plans and machinations the Empress had for peace. To lose him would be a blow she would not abide, so I assisted in the creatures capture, using my hydromancy to seal the beast in prison of water; while Adolyn cast a spell of ‘Permafrost’ so powerful it froze both the beast and the several yards around it. The kin never ceased to amaze me with his arcane abilities. He was curiously powerful for a furkin.

All had been well until I took my tumble off the ridge. Exhaustion and fatigue had finally caught up with me and the draw on my quintessence it cost to complete that last manipulation of mana lowered my mana quotient to dangerous levels. I’d nearly passed from consciousness before I fell and was blessed to have fallen no more than ten feet. Though we are often considered little, fragile, and weak, we kobolds are hardy kin and such a fall would only bruise my scales for about a week.

“We’ve won,” he said simply, smiling at me.

“Yes we have,” I responded, looking down at his arms around me.

I was well and could stand on my own, but he didn’t need to know that. I rather enjoyed his touch, though I normally hated being lifted from the ground.

“What now?” I asked, trying to be a bit flirty.

“Now I think we send this thing to Nest in Drakon. I think they’ll want to see what your kin have been up to.” He answered with a shrug. I could tell he didn’t want the thing anywhere near Lioncourt.

Momentarily I mused on whether or not I could find a way to secure the beast for the Empress in transit; but dismissed the idea almost as quickly. The trust and respect of the Primus Corvinus of the Raven Knights was a treasure few could claim to have. Especially among his enemies. The Empress would not value Qoshik’s monster of it, so neither would I. Instead I offered to help him make the trip, suggesting a chance to spend time together outside of the dangerous situations that often preclude our encounters.

He of course, intuitive kin that he was, joked that I simply wanted a chance to test his swordsmanship again. I laughed, agreeing. I had made it no secret that I desired him and that our last encounter had left me longing to have him rest that sword of his in my sheath.

I’ll not lie or speak falsehoods about myself. I may long for peace, but danger and battle often excite me. With him holding me, my excitement was clear for any and all with even the most basic sense of smell. I hoped a celebration would be in order. Thankfully, the furkin lord was more than happy to oblige. He took me right there on the hard ground, wit the glowing, icey monolith of the troglodytes cold prison looming behind us. We would share many such instances on our way to Drakon, and I would often wonder;

“If this is what peace and cooperation feels like?” If it is, then I will dream of it forever, until the day it attained. No matter how the merciless tides thrash against the rocks, I will dream. For I know kin as great as Empress Ætheria and Primus Adolyn share my dream. One day, I’m certain, that dream will be a reality. Until then I serve and if every mission is like that one; I will serve glady.

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