Unnamed

pinstripe arrow

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http://www1.flightrising.com/dressing/outfit/846693

skink trail stained?

Citrine Flourish Necklace

Apparel

A finely-wrought citrine necklace.

1400

first name larch

ygorroath avanassar vythanth

Wolf, Coyote, Fox, Jackal, Dog, Fennec, Corsac

Dons Heytun, Burtur, Kalld, Chzzuk, and Vonnornoth; the Sisters Matuy and Kohmatiyneit; Lady Red; and even the illusive Baron Ryuseih

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Names were a funny thing.

There were families that documented every syllable and brushstroke, guarding their family names as though it were a precious jewel, treating the blood running through their veins the same way a consecrated priest would bow to their Deity. These dragons would watch their children like hungry vultures; they weren't being mated, they were being selectively bred. To strengthen the innate power within them, to bolster the weight of their precious family names.

There was no greater joy than watching two feuding families go to war for a bunch of scribbles on paper saying who's who.

He was a vulture too. A starving, ravenous, famished vulture that dwelled on the fringes of a battlefield, lapping up blood and animosity in equal measure. The broken blades and torn cloth could be salvaged; there were merchants that traded in the lost and shiny remnants found in war, or for the small birthrights and tokens ripped away from young heirs too stupid to realise that they were outmatched. If he was lucky, two rich families who placed more value on their names than their lives would duke it out where he can watch. The trinkets he'd pilfer from the dead and dying could feed him for months.

It was necessity that made him watch these battles as a hatchling, but it was the futility of it all that had him continue the habit, even as he grew.

Nothing could match the sweetness of a dragon being so proud of his name as to go to war for a perceived slight, the irony of an entire bloodline dying out for the arrogance and foolishness of a handful that wanted to propagate their lineage. Like watching a game of chess between a pair of dragons that were taught different rules. Squabbling, arguing, and soon, the chessboard would lie in the corner as blood began to spill.

He grew into a vulture with sharp claws and a sharper mind, always circling the edges of a battle, a shadow that turned scraps into gold. And, at times, he would join the fray. A wild element that could just as easily side with one faction as he could slaughter both sides. A vulture that swallowed pride and consumed desire, devouring the names that started such petty violence in the first place.

He was a vulture and no one would ask him how he became one in fear of his fury and capricious whims. No one would ask, but if they did, he'd blame everything on his Father.

A vulture breeds a vulture.

He was a vicious being, true. He would not hesitate to kill and steal if it meant furthering his own survival, but he was a different kind of beast. He was one of those dragons that craved to have a name, to be revered among nobles and envied by the common folk. Desperate to be remembered as something other than a power-hungry minor noble that squabbled for scraps like the rest.

So desperate, in fact, that his own family became nothing more than a footnote in his quest to glory.

Names were a funny thing.

See, a legacy can't be created in your own lifetime. No matter how infamous you got, or many battles you've won, no matter how rich you are or how many dragons know your name, it never becomes a legacy until after you pass, until your earthly possessions and name are bequeathed to the ones you left behind. You can cultivate it as much as you wished, nurture it to leave a fond memory of you, but in the end, you weren't in control.

Your legacy, your name, would be in the hands of your sons and your daughters. All you could really do was hope that you taught them well enough that they wouldn't squander all that you've done.

Father didn't quite get that.

See, father wanted instant results. He fought with so many of his fellow nobles that even as he grew in riches, he failed to see all the lives he left behind, all the lives he dug under his claws to get an inch further in achieving his impossible dream. Father wanted an Empire overnight. He wanted towering spires and banners, he wanted sprawling forests in his territory and a coffer full of gemstones. He wanted to elevate himself to the upper echelons of nobility at the expense of everything around him.

After watching so many battles, scavenging for scraps to further Father's dream, he knew how to tell when a fight was brewing in the horizon.

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She's not the first Wolf. There were dozens before her, warriors and thieves and scholars who took the mantle with the intention of making it theirs. They were all savages. Barbarians who couldn't gain a single sliver of class even if it was handed to them on a silver platter with the fork already spearing it through. Nothing more than roaming vagabonds and mercenaries with heads far too big for their brains.

Vy wasn't the first Wolf, but it was her face dragons thought of, her claws they envision encircling their throats, her teeth they see snapping away at their lives. As they should. Vythanth bled for the Wolf, fought for it, killed for it.