He tied a bandana around his head to keep the sweat from dripping into his eyes. The heat of this place was nearly unbearable, he thought, but knew it was to be expected--it was a giant chunk of land forged from a continuous outpouring of lava. The ground he strode on hardened, cooled lava turned obsidian.

The journey so far had been long. Up into the Viridian Labyrinth to check it off his list, then down through the Tangled Wood. Earthshaker damn him he wasn't about to go through the Scarred Wasteland, no matter how much he wanted worldly experience. From the Wood he went around the Sea of a Thousand Currents, admiring the waters from afar, and into the Sunbeam Ruins. There he had taken his time. Blending into the ruins, he'd observed the scholars busying themselves with their relics, but their philosophical whispers quickly bored him. The Shifting Expanse electrified him, literally, but still the inhabitants he came across were not quite what he had hoped for.

Now, standing in the midst of Hell he was beginning to think this journey was a waste--then snorted. A waste. Hah. I'm in the Ashfall Wastes thinking of waste and--oh, shh--you're getting distracted. A nearby lava flow sputtered. Making a face at it he shifted until he was well away from it and pulled his map from his bags. "Let's see..." He had started his journey with a few goals in mind. To gain experience traveling the world, seeing all the sights, and to find the lands with most interesting folk. The chatterers, the gabbers, the thrilling dragons. So far, he was left wanting.

"They say these fire folk are passionate... intense," he muttered, rolling up his map and tucking it away. "Could be exciting.... could be dangerous." He couldn't keep the grin from sneaking onto his face. Best be prepared, he thought and flattened a wing against the cool (as a cool a thing could get in a world of molten lava) obsidian and watched his skin take on the colors of it.

Lava bubbled nearby, a sickly boiling sound and he felt his stomach roll. No matter what, he lectured himself, stay away from that! For all the heat, the sounds of the lava traced a chill down his spine and made his skin prickle into gooseflesh.

Once his practicing was complete and he was certain he could blend into this environment well enough, he stashed his sweat-soaked bandana and bag into a cluster of obsidian rocks and set out to find one of the few clans that inhabited this molten wasteland.

It just sort of appeared one night near the gates and nobody knew where from. Did a passerby drop it? Who in their right mind would drop such a precious thing? The gate guards took it to Mariqa, knowing to not bother Sygard while he is at his forge.

Wriggling her nose, Mariqa sniffed at the egg covered in drying barnacles. "It's going to dry up and die here," she said, eying the egg. "Take it back to the waters and throw it in."

But Sygard stopped the guards on their way out with it and boomed in a hellish voice. "Get that in a bucket of water -- NOW!"

They couldn't scramble fast enough to comply with his order and after doing so I watched our dragon lord hover. He peered at it with his ever pensive expression and watched as the barnacles came back to life. Mariqa frowned and approached Sygard. One of few brave enough to do so. "Shall we send it back?"

"Has nobody come forward to claim it?" His surprise was well apparent.

"I'm not sure how long it has been lost," Mariqa admitted and turned to the guards. "How long was it at the gate?"

"We didn't wait long to bring it to you," one said nervously. "The heat and all. Maybe a couple hours?"

Sygard lifted the bucket and sloshed slightly as he carried it back to his forge and set it down. "If anybody comes for it send them here," he told Mariqa as he returned to his work.

"Understood," she answered, but I could tell she was uncertain of Sygard's actions. Still. Nobody questioned him.

It's been months now and nobody has come searching for the water egg. It also hasn't hatched. Mariqa insists to Sygard it has died from being so out of its element and exposed to such heat, but every day Sygard refills the bucket's water and works at the forge ever-watchful of the egg.