Ella

Ella had been born and wasn’t the smartest dragon, in fact she was a bit ditzy and absentminded. Her parents kept her close due to this, trying to get her to focus on the world around her and not just the pretty little things she often saw around. It made her mad that they wouldn’t let her have free roam either, but she didn’t stay mad for long before she was distracted by a pretty flower.

Something nagged in the back of her mind as she stared at the pretty flower. Oh right, she was mad and annoyed at being confined! She looked away from the flower and got up and went back to her little nest of a bed. It was a little hole in the floor of the stone that was filled with soft materials, flowers and shiny coins. It was comfortable and it made her feel relaxed when she stared at the pretty flowers and coins. One of her parents was at the entrance of her door watching her with close eyes. It made her mad but also sad to see they wanted to watch her all the time. But at least they let her have peace and quiet with her pretties. She decided since she had no lessons right now and was bored a nap would be good. It wasn’t like she had freedom to do much else but do lessons, sleep and eat. And she wasn’t hungry right now so…

She fell asleep while grasping one of her prettiest flowers in her paws and holding it close to her nose. It smelled nice and soothing and helped her fall asleep. She woke up and stretched leisurely and yawned. Her bones cracked nicely as she stretched out and that always felt funny but good. It was what she got for staying curled up in her small nest rather than stretch out to her full length, but she didn’t care and continued to sleep curled up.

She looked up and saw no parent at her door. Her eyes widened and she got up and looked outside the entrance to her room and saw no one in the corridor too. She was shocked for a minute and decided she would use this little free time to go outside! She wanted to go exploring and see all the pretty flowers while she wasn’t under her parent’s eyes. She gleefully ran for the exit of the clan.

It didn’t take her long to find the pretty flowers once she had exited the stone part of the place her clan sat on. She went exploring and sniff all the flowers she could find, watched all the fishes in the stream she could and generally wandered around in awe of everything. Her parents kept her from so many good things and now she was mad again! She growled angrily before seeing some birds, some dark birds she had never seen before and followed them on foot to where they were flying to. She followed them and stopped as they lead her to something weird. She titled her head at what she saw.

There was an entire part of the light territory covered in darkness. Her parents had probably told her about it, but she couldn’t remember what it was called. But it looked harmless enough. She could see a very vague shape that looked like a tower. It must have been a city! She couldn’t see the dark birds now, they were probably blending in the dark since they were really dark as shadows too! It didn’t concern her that the city-like place below her was in the dark even though the Lightweaver should have been able to touch anything. She was curious and wanted to explore so that is what she decided to do. She giddily stepped into the dark and tried to find the city.

This is where Ella started to change. She explored all over and never noticed the darkness starting to consume her. It latched onto the end of her tail and clawed its way up her spine and she was never the wiser. She couldn’t tell the darkness in her scales was starting to consume her, she merely thought it was her eyes trying to adjust to the dark. When the darkness reached her skull and slipped into her mind and once it did that, did Ella cease to exist.

It melted away flesh where the corruption was strongest. Along its tail, along its spine, along its wings and along its face. Melting down until all that was left was the bones of its body. It then started to gather feathers to replace the flesh until there was only its skull and tail tip exposed. Impossible for it to replace the flesh with feathers in this places, not enough room or not enough leverage to fold the feathers in place. It accepted this condition and decided to leave its prison. It had been trapped here so long. It wanted to explore the world, and now with this body it could. It scope the world and then decide its next move.

It opened its wings, they were barely more than bone with strips of feathers and flesh. It ran, and jumped and was in the air in an instant. It left its prison in this new body, and had never felt so alive. It had been so long since it had been here, so long since it had been out in the light. She was evil and kept it trapped for her experiments and science, but she would never suspect this. It was free and it would explore, exploit and destroy the world once more.

Now it was time for the reckoning. It was time to exploit and destroy. It went for her domain, it was time to start the destruction. First to destroy the light and let darkness control the world. It was prideful and knew it was succeed.

It didn’t. It was defeated, battered and nearly destroyed. The light had mercy on it. The light started to –

Ella woke up in a strange place, a dark place. That’s what she remembered last, being a strange dark place. There were several dragons around her, strange dragons that she didn’t recognised. They looked wary but accepting of her presence. She stretched out her body and felt an odd sensation, she turned her neck and saw where her glowing white spine used to be, there was feather and bone. She was confused and moved to try touch them and saw her tail was all just bone.

“What’s going on?” She said out loud to nobody in particular.

“You are shade touched.” One of the strange dragons said, she didn’t see as she was still fixated by her exposed bones. She turned around.

“What does that mean?” She asked, confused.

“You are possessed by a spirit of the shade. You were corrupted and tried to destroy the Lightweaver. She stopped it and managed to help save you, but you are still possessed.” The dragon explained, the same as before, a pearlcatcher that was slowly approaching her cautiously.

“What does that mean?”

“It means that you are still corrupted by the shade, and its spirit can still manifest within you. It will be able to periodically control your actions and your mind, but won’t’ recall a thing.” The pearlcatcher was sat directly in front of her now and she managed to sit on a more comfortable position.

“Why am I here?” She said as she noticed several of the dragons behind were dressed heavily in armour.

“We are to be your guardians. We are few but many of our warriors are the strongest around, the power of all our magic users combined can subdue the shade powers. We will have one guard to follow you constantly, so that if you do become possessed we can deal with the subduing quickly.”

“Okay.” Ella said and looked towards the warriors. A wildclaw with a golden body and blue wings stepped forward and came to be alongside the pearlcatcher.

“I’m Deegan, your constant guard.” The wildclaw said. He was over twice as short than her but he could probably move quickly.

“Okay.” Ella said softly.

“Come with us. We’ll be showing you to your new quarters.” The pearlcatcher said and put their pearl in a pouch by their side and the warriors broke ranks to let them by.

“Am I allowed to roam wherever I want?” Ella asked as they got her to a private room. It was mostly stone now, but she could easily build herself another nest like at home.

“You may do whatever you wish, as long as Deegan is nearby to some degree.” The pearlcatcher said as they stood in the entrance to her room. She saw the pearlcatcher turn around and leave.
Ella turned to Deegan, slightly shyly. “Is there any way I can get materials to build myself a nest out of soft scrap clothing material?”

“Yes, of course. I can show you, if you’ll follow me.” Deegan said and was easily at the door before her.

“Okay!” Ella said and eagerly followed after Deegan to rebuild herself a cozy nest.

---

shade touched, kinda crazy, kinda ditzy