A commission for anonymous.

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Ysera and Her Friend

Starlight shined a pool of pure Light upon the cavern floor upon which the crimson dragon Vharr, the golden Kyr, and their offspring Teadhyr and Naraluxra slept soundly. In Vharr’s dream, the Light flashed and carried him to a new dreamt land. In this land, instead of crimson leaves, emerald leaves grew from the trees and the plants. The wildlife was prospering and happy, defended by elven druids whose long-flowing manes were the colors of sky and ocean and earth and fruit. Druidic magic hummed serenely through the atmosphere, and drifted as cerulean mists where it was most concentrated.

In the center of a verdant grove that was teeming with flowers, on a grassy bank slept a great and beautiful dragon, the land’s primary defender. Bright scales of the most perfect emerald scrawled her nature along her sturdy frame. Interwoven underbelly plates of lavender-coral arced down from her throat to her belly, and adorned her long talons, which were armored by tough segments of hide. Her wings, whose membranes were fabricked from see-through cerulean magic, were tucked gently against her flanks. Her head was a fierce piece of artwork: an ivory horn cleaved up from her snout, like the horn of a rhinoceros, while two pairs of horns of lavender-coral membranes jutted from her cheek bones. Like a gazelle’s horns were the massive ones that crowned her skull, just above her emerald-browed eyes, which glowed cerulean even in their closed state.

Vharr stood with a body that looked ghostly before her, and awed. She measured more than twice his height, perhaps six meters tall from foot to shoulder. He started to pace around her at a distance and observe her, wishing to learn more about this dragon without disturbing her sleep. But then came the terrible crackling of a tree being uprooted, and the emerald dragon snapped awake and rose, releasing a mournful snarl. Her wings ruffled open, and she widened her stance, readying herself for danger as Vharr whirled around, bared his fangs and hissed at whoever had encroached upon the grove.

A satyr of nightmare, of death, of hate … ruby horns, hooves that blackened and deadened the earth where he stepped … He paced over the body of a defender of the forest, a giant born of bark and leaves. Apparently the satyr had struck the giant into a tree, and from the blow the tree had fallen.

The satyr cackled, and tread down a hill toward the emerald dragon. Behind him tramped ugly imps and elves and bears. Shards of ruby and skin of black had afflicted them all. All of them had been twisted into nightmarish forms of their former selves. It was an army, an army of hundreds and hundreds advancing on the lone emerald. A flicker of fear entered her composure. She loosed a cry of determination; and from the verdure, centaurs and elven druids and forest creatures of goodly nature tramped to her side to defend the grove. And not just the grove, but the forest entire.

Vharr cried out, and tried to send a telekinetic thought to the emerald dragon, to tell her that he would fight alongside her. But oblivious to him, she unleashed a wailing blast of emerald breath on a wall of enemies, which on contact petrified flesh, and crumbled bodies to earthen dust that could be decomposed by the natural forces. Natural creatures of the forest blitzed past her, and clashed with the forces of the enemy, tooth and claw and and horn and druidic magic against fangs and talons and filthy sorcery made from fury. The shouts of hawks and stags and wood nymphs and corrupt forces and the rushes of bodies became a blur, and then the blur a void of black; and so Vharr awoke beside his dragon family, in his real-life cavern, eructed through the cave a dreadful sound, for he despaired of what he’d seen, things yet to come from a world yet to be seen.

Kyr and the hatchlings awoke in distress, the red dragon’s doleful echo continuing to resound. They worried for him, and comforted him with mind-pictures; and for what he put them through, he felt blameworthy, and sorry, even though he couldn’t have kept himself from crying out.

Of the realness of his dream, he was sure. It was a vision of the future of a parallel world. And it was his duty to find a portal leading to that world.

He tried to explain the concept of future to his family by telepathically showing them images of Teadhyr and Nara growing older and bigger and wiser. This would have delighted them under normal circumstances, but because the maturation of the hatchlings seemed to be what was troubling Vharr, they found themselves troubled by the prophetic air of the pictures. Vharr shook his head. He then showed them the grove and the emerald dragon and the satyr’s despicable legion, but that only puzzled Kyr and the hatchlings.

It took from dusk to early sunrise to calm his beloved dragons down, to explain the vision as best as he could. When this was done, his family was soothed and understanding, but still sad to see him depart. Vharr nuzzled each of them, then paced his way out of the cave. He spread his wings, tensed his limb muscles, then sprung arrowing into the morning sky. His sunset-pink membranes and the thermals of the heavens and his instincts carried him toward the hidden portal.

Seven turns of the world and much flying did it take. Vharr found the portal inactive, and covered by giant brambles, in an underground cave. For him it whirred, and in the center swirled to life with a cyclone of transportational magic. His approach measured but bold, he dipped his snout inside, and then paced into a different universe, into a land he suddenly knew somehow to be named Val’sharah. He descended from a stony gate, and found himself on the bank of a stream; and he blinked to the strange, neon greens of the plant life, for the forests of his planet were colored red; and the contrast of color here came as much more a shock to his real-eyes more than it’d done to his dream-eyes. The emerald dragon did not seem to be around, so he pumped his wings and ascended to the forest’s rafters just below the overstory, so that he could search for her. His nostrils flared and sniffed to a scent he faintly remembered from his dream, one of honeydew, lavender and frankincense. The smell brought him to the emerald dragon, who, slumbering there, looked just as gorgeous and powerful as she did in his dream.

When he beheld her with his real-eyes, her name at once echoed in his mind. Ysera. Upon hearing it, the Flame of Life in his belly blazed hotter and his muscles relaxed. His soul felt energized and serene, the second of these two despite that he knew of the evils to come.

Crossing the air above the lake of the grove, Vharr alighted next to her; and unlike in the dream, her eyes opened to show their smoldering cerulean eye-fires at his approach, for she had sensed him coming.

“A ruby dragon?” came her voice, its rumble and timbre enough to drive away things such as unease and grief. She cocked her head, and studied the smaller dragon. He made a gruff trilling in his throat, and snorted in greeting. She studied him stoically for a time, then said, “But not one of Alexstrasza’s, no. You are … not from Azeroth. You cannot be. Tell, dragon, who are you? From where do you come? And what brings you to me?”

And so Vharr concentrated, and accumulated enough of his dream-memories to form a morphing mental tapestry that he presented to Ysera, one that depicted her, then the satyr and his army. When Ysera beheld these things, she beat her translucent turquoise wings and bellowed a roar of outrage.

“This cannot be allowed to pass! The children of the forest and the forest itself shall not be harmed!” She battered the air with vicious wingbeats and hovered up toward the canopy of the ancient trees, and trumpeted her metallic, druidic voice over the woods, warning the creatures that lived there of the impending war.

And so Vharr spread his broad wingspan of pastel-russet membranes and whipped up a great draft. He rose alongside her, and called out too; and they went tearing along Val’sharah’s sky of darkening, swirling stratus clouds, and beckoned to the beasts and the druids and the other creatures, who were currently at ease. The calls of the dragons reverberated through the hearts and bones of all who heard, and impassioned them; and then the beings of the forest spotted the dragons soaring, and tailed them from the ground.

Where were they going? Based on Vharr’s dreams, they headed east, from whence the future-satyr had imperiously advanced on the grove. As they headed further east, a despicable sight reflected over the eyes of Ysera and Vharr, and sickened them. Trees had been plagued by nightmare, blackened, possessed and transformed into palpitating monstrosities: tendrils of ruby-red vines and thorns. Infected roots glowed red beneath the sullied earth. The blight of nightmare had corrupted several acres of eastern Val’sharah, having twisted the flora and fauna into things no sane being would ever wish for; and the amalgamation of darkness crept across the ground, marching toward the lands where innocent creatures dwelled and night elf cottages stood.

There. The two dragons spotted the menace.

Leading his wicked army forth, pushing the tide of earthen corruption farther, the satyr was clomping his hooves. In every place he paced, his bovine feet fouled the soil, and caused it to produce a miasma of death and dream-disrupting. When the two dragons spotted the satyr, the healthy beings of the forest became of aware of him, too, and presently charged on him and his army. War cries of unison reverberated through the air, and the rumble of rushing feet. A tide of thousands surged on the militia of darkness. Although the good beings were passionate, they were outnumbered by double.

The satyr—Xavius was his name, came a voice from within Vharr—sought to end the battle before it could even begin. Xavius conjured a bloody gem into his hand, as long and as sharp as a spear. He lunged backward his throwing arm, and aimed the point of the gem at Ysera. This was the weapon with which Xavius corrupted life and dreams, and turned them into grotesque mutations, which cared for nothing but murdering, obeying the nightmare and wallowing in dominant misery.

With a demonic cackle, he pitched the gem at Ysera, sending it hurtling toward the emerald dragon. The gall of the satyr filled Vharr with such rage, his scaly chest swelled up with a conflagration of the Flame of Life. He reared backward in midair, corked his serpentining neck then straightened it, bellowing a streak of brilliant turquoise flame at the satyr’s projectile. Once the gem stole into the flame stream, it was incinerated into sparkly bits—which, too, disintegrated, and lasted no more than a split second in the cleansing fires.

Seeing what had happened, the satyr loosed a great roar. He curled his fists, and prepared to conjure two gems into each hand to attack both dragons. At that instant, the wave of pure druids and stags and bears and hedgehogs and tree nymphs crashed into his evil forces, an unrelenting tide; and they swarmed on his black-and-red minions, gnashing fangs, ploughing stag-horns through anthropomorphic demons, launching cerulean magic and incinerating, smoldering evil hides and flesh into charcoal billows.

And then Vharr and Ysera alighted on the sloping battleground, plodding forward as soon as they did. Vharr, nearly doubling the size of most of his enemies, mauled through the devilish flesh of multiple enemies at once, sweeping the atmosphere with gore, severed corrupt limbs and bloodied crimson gemstones. He zagged through the horde, pumping his wings to accelerate his dash, sinking his fangs into shoulders and ripping corrupt elves and draenei off the ground. He chewed through the foul-tasting bodies, crunched on spines, then spat them out with an acrid taste in his mouth.

He did not take pleasure in his wrathful defense, because each of these beings had once been good, and their choice was never to become enslaved to Xavius’ nightmare sorcery; but, alas, there was no saving them in this lifetime; death was the only way to put them to good rest. In time, they would reincarnate, and be reborn with free will once again.

Imps jumped on his ruby backside, and climbed on the nape of his neck. They scratched at the crevices between his scales, trying to find weak points, as they cackled and skittered along his lithe throat and body. But they couldn’t penetrate his armor. Vharr hissed, rose up on his hind feet then gusted his wings; and the hurricane beats of his membranes broke bones, and caused several fatalities before all the imps were inevitably pummeled to the ground. Those who survived had multiple fractured bones, or were so injured that they could only squirm or crawl on the ground; but Vharr didn’t let them get away, especially since the voice within him told him that these imps were and had always been demons, and willfully chose to serve Xavius. Down came his forepaws, and smashed the remaining bones in each of their bodies, when he stomped upon them one after the next, driving his sole deep into the ground to snuff the wicked life from the forest’s murderers.

Ahead of Vharr tramped Ysera. She slowed down, for, around her, the horde of demons and nightmare-beasts conglomerated around her, but her resolve did not crack in the presence of mere vermin. She ejected her wings to full span—unintentionally smacked away the foes round her flanks from their opening drafts. She took a breath that channeled ancient druidic energies, then belched forth a breathtaking flamethrower of emerald breath, whose stream was acidicly sporous; and when the spores contacted the skin of her foes, they dispersed as twirling, vociferating bodies being incinerated by the corrosive ichor. For the enslaved, the suffering was as brief as a stroke. For Xavius’ free-willed servants, her magic prolonged the sting of her acids; so even when they fell, they writhed and twisted for several minutes of a slow, intolerable pain before their amoral souls departed, unless the forest’s children slayed them while they were downed first.

It seemed, as a rule of thumb, the slaves and servants of Xavius were slow learners: for, right afterward, more hateful beasties gathered around her sides to cast baneful magic or try to sink their grubby jaws into her impenetrable hide. She simply glared at them, and lashed her stocky tail, sweeping around one flank after the next. The blows from her bulky appendage swatted the pests down, and left them croaking, trembling and perishing with fractures and internal bleedings. Joining Ysera, raced forward night elves and wood guardians and faeries, who laid the finishing blows to any wounded villains they found lying.

Beings of good stormed on the walls of evil, and crumbled them with an enheartened offense. Unfortunately, the forest’s children were not without casualties. Claws, jaws and unholy magic ripped through the bodies of druids, guardians, faeries and animals; and the best news was that many fell without ever feeling Xavius touch their souls. Alas, the satyr saw some of them dying on the bloodstained battleground, and launched his blood-red spears and punctured their hearts. Lo, the spears’ corruption spilled through their bloodstreams and rewired their chemistries, covering their flesh with tough, black, stony substance and throbbing rubies; and they arose, revived, as enslaved wretches.

When Vharr saw what the satyr was doing—reanimating the fallen and turning them into his puppets, and keeping their souls from peace—he fell into a deep rage, and could think of nothing but killing Xavius. The satyr’s actions disgusted him more than the taste of the servants’ blood in his mouth. His frenzy burned hotter, until the he shot forward without thinking, tramping through the sea of Xavius’ minions. Those who dared block him were trampled down, overshadowed by Vharr’s paws a split-second before being crushed and becoming a squished corpse half-buried in his pawprint. Other nightmare-beings were lacerated across the throats and chests as his sharp wingtips carried past, and clipped through their flesh; and the maimed danced drunkenly to their death, squirting blood from their gashes.

Obstructed but not hidden behind dozens of battlers, the satyr saw Vharr coming for him, and anticipated a solo match. The satyr backhanded a wood nymph who’d charged at him, as though she were no heavier or stronger than a faerie, and sniggered as they fell to the ground, choking up green ichor; then he returned his eyes to Vharr, and closed them, and concentrated on a dark transformation magic.

The scrawny, elf-like satyr became no more. The corrupt reserves in him exploded through him, and reacted with his body to change it; then something huge and brutish became of him. The demon stood straight, shrugged back his juggernaut shoulders, and measured over a storey tall. No longer did he look like a night elf in any way. He could be described as a blackened ogre of antelope horns and gargantuan, petrified hands of crimson claws.

He thrust his hands apart, and in doing so battered his own minions to the ground, then charged at full speed at the dragon, who was now comparatively small. Vharr was not afraid in the slightest. Did Xavius think that he would get away with ruining the rest of the forest simply because he had inflated himself? The dragon hissed at the thought. He refused to let this monster hurt Ysera and continue to spill the blood of the innocent on Val’sharah.

The dragon hopped up. His foretalons curled open, and aimed directly at the broad, stone-like chest of his demon-lord. The claws hooked into the skin of the juggernaut’s ribcage, then drove deep into the flesh; then Vharr yanked his forelegs down the abdomen, gouging all down the behemoth’s torso, just missing the heart but rending asunder the bloated, filthy intestines all the same. The megalith demon uttered a horrible noise from his throat, as decayed sausages tumbled out of his exposed midriff and swayed, his blood spraying, sullying the already-corrupt ground. Xavius was lurching in his backward stumble, hacking up blood, reaching out blindly with those egregious talons in an effort to lash at his adversary; but the pain blinded him, it did; then he was falling, and because he was so huge, the fall promised to hit hard.

There came a karmic quake of the earth. Although the thud itself was not so great, the shudders that rolled through Val’sharah then could have come the topple of Deathwing himself. Yet, the demon-lord wasn’t done: He was gasping for breath, stretching his terrible jaws open before Vharr, who had alighted on his chest with claws in rib meat buried. Did Xavius plan to bite Vharr, or to hurl a glob of corruption down the dragon’s throat, and convert him, as he did the other many creatures? A harsh, gurgling sound formed in Xavius’ gullet, as though he would indeed spit something; but Vharr tucked his upper throat into his lower throat, lunged forward then spat a spray of venom breath straight into the dying thing’s maw.

The eyes of the demon rolled into the cavern of its head, as its mouth began to froth. It was gagging, wheezing out phlegm and parasites, shakily fumbling for its neck with fat, awkward fingers … It wanted to catch the venom before it could fall, but nevertheless, he stomached it. The neurotoxin took effect in a heartbeat, and laid him there, foaming and shuddering, while the malodorous guts and ink-black life-ichor of the satyr seeped out, and soaked into the earth, where it became inactive, thus powerless and cleansable.

Thus, Xavius, Demon-Lord, Bringer of Nightmare, croaked beneath the claws of the ruby dragon, and left the nightmare creatures devoid of a leader or a cause, and thus full of fear.

And when the demon-lord was done forever, a wave of astonishment and quietude rushed through both forces of good and evil; and then trumpeted from Ysera a roar of triumph. And hearing it, the goodly beings felt inspired and victorious, and rattled the air with exclamations of cheer. And hearing the trumpetings of good, the nightmare creatures felt their eardrums pound and reverberate painfully; and wailing, they, distraught, began to spin themselves round and fall back, like dusk-shadows pressed back by the morning sun. Galloping forth with great speed came Ysera, and belched her emerald breath-streams, and felled the dark stragglers in the fogs of her smoldering billows; and behind her charged the druids and the guardians and the nymphs and the faeries and all animals, and swarmed the retreating ranks, and cut them down and trampled their bodies and stampeded on the subsequent lines of enemies.

The demons banked down a pathway, and ran for their nightmare-infested headquarters in the heart of the nightmarish woodlands as fast as they could; but Ysera, Vharr and their army hastened themselves, anxious to finish the threat to the forest once and for all. They stormed into the heart of nightmare, and hacked down the afflicted; and soon, they had weeded out most of the dark creatures of the heart. Some twisted beasts burrowed into nooks, and hid where those of good nature would never think to look, but soon they would die, anyway.

They would die because, without a leader, their hearts would soon fail.

Unfortunately, the death of Xavius would not immediately reverse the damage that he had caused to the forest. About a third of Val’sharah, Eastern Val’sharah, was riddled with ugly earth and writhing tendrils and plants created from the most haunting of dreams. Ysera and Vharr soared over these lands; and Ysera unleashed her glowing breath to cover the afflicted soil, flora and fauna with cleansing billows; and when contacted by this breath, the traces of nightmare suffocated, and soon withered away. But while free of corruption, the land was still lifeless, so Vharr used breathed his Flame of Life over the land to help speed its recovery. Months later, new saplings would grow; and, perhaps, the stronger trees would revive; and young, pure animals would thrive here again. Much time was needed.

Fortunately, the curse of nightmare had stopped spreading throughout Val’sharah, and aside from the large portion of land that was healing, all was well again. The goodly beings of the forest felt a somber serenity spread through the atmosphere; and feeling more prone to loss in the future, they savored the present moment, and began spending much time with family and friends. The druids, the satyrs, the elves and the nymphs washed their sorrows with fruits, salads and wines, and soon became untroubled enough to sing and dance and frolic. It took a while, but the animals of the woods returned to their natural routines of the day as well, and went hunting, sleeping, playing and exploring.

Waters of the sacred grove shimmered when a pair of beating wings descended from the treetops. Ysera had expended much of her magic to soothe the hurting land, so she was glad to return to the grove. She landed, loosed a long sigh then plodded into the grove’s lake. The glowing waters welcomed her with splashes, twinkles and sways, and slid over her. Soon, she had bathed her underbelly and her flanks fully beneath the surface. She flitted her wings to splash some of the water on her upper body, where the relatively shallow pool couldn’t quite reach. The druidic magic of the waters eased her, and slowly replenished her mana reserves.

After a time, “Traveler,” rumbled her voice.

Vharr replied with a rah of curiosity, and then paced to the edge of the lake-bank, while she twisted to face him.

“You are an anomaly to I and Azeroth,” she said. “Who sent you your visions of our world’s plight? Could it have been Val’sharah herself? Val’sharah’s world tree, perhaps? Your presence baffles me … What I do know for certain, Vharr, is that you are a friend of Azeroth and Val’sharah. And so you are a friend of mine! Crimson one, you are welcome in these woods anytime. Feel free to live and hunt here for as long as you like, so long as you are—” She paused, and laughed at a thought. “I know I needn’t say this to you, but, so long you as you aren’t greedy.”

Vharr bowed his head, honored by the words of Ysera. But he could not stay. His family awaited him back home. It wouldn’t be fair to keep them waiting any longer. Besides, he had come to protect the forest, and he no longer sensed the mental voice of guidance that had urged him to do so.

He communicated this to her through mind-pictures: the portal from whence he came; and a cave far beyond that portal, in which his lover and two wonderful hatchlings dwelled.

Ysera closed her eyes. “I see what you see … Nevertheless, my friend, you are always welcome to return to this world, you and your family. And I shall not let you leave without imparting my gratitude!” She chuckled. “What does a ruby dragon such as yourself desire that I could grant you?”

After the heartache that Xavius had caused her, he didn’t wish to ask a favor of her, to trouble her further. Yet, he could not deny that the emerald dragoness had an enrapturing beauty, as well as lovely paws, and his fantasies trickled into his mind-pictures before he could cut off his telepathic transmission. Keen was Ysera; so, although these fantasies were buried deep beneath the pictures he had intended to send her, she spotted them, and focused on them intensely. Her belly boomed for a chuckle, and made the waters round her gyre.

“You’d like to be a plaything for my paws, Vharr? That, I am more than willing to grant you. A dragon has never cared to be beneath my soles before. I’m glad for you to be a first.”

The blankets of water rolled off of the glittering, wet fractals of her emerald hide as she strode onto the bank, and shrugged her wings out to three-fourths of their full span, gusting off some of her wetness, casting a spray of water about and bespeckling the grass and the flowers. He stumbled backward to allow her to step onto land, and gazed up at her largeness in awe. Because she stood twice as tall as him and his head only came to the level of her forechest, she had forepaws longer than his skull from the snout-tip to the posterior side of the dome.

She narrowed her glowing gaze on him for a teasingly dominant look, then raised to the level of his shoulders a forepaw whose talons were of lavender-coral scales and sharp hooks of shadowy gold. The sprightly light of the grove winked off of each deadly finger and scale as she twiddled the talons, letting Vharr see the muscles under that marvelous hide work their fibers and fold the lengthy soles with phenomenal showmanship.

Not only was Vharr mesmerized by the aura of druidic color that the grove cast upon her long forepaw; he enjoyed the scent that her foot presented. The musk of the paw resembled the overarching metallic and extravagant scent of her draconic musk, and shared hints of the unique tones of her body’s scent (the ones that smelled like honeydew, lavender and frankincense). But her paw smelled less fruity, less floral, and more draconic and musky.

And she did not use easy force with him, simply because he was her friend. She knew that Vharr wished for her to be forceful, after all. She would eagerly be so.

She lunged back her foreleg, then slammed her forepaw into his lower neck with all her great forest-guardian’s might, treating him with strength, almost as though he were an enemy of the forest. The blow winded him, and pleasantly shocked him. His adrenaline shot up, and the feeling of fight-or-flight awakened; and he temporarily suspended his disbelief of the notion that they were simply playing. The blow rolled him onto his backside and bathed his back scales in the coolness and the magical electrical sensation of the grove’s grass-leaves.

There, her great head of horned muzzle and lavender-membraned jaws and spindly sixtuplet of horns loomed over him. Her eyes on him narrowed, feigning righteous judgment. She smirked then lifted her forepaw above his muzzle, splaying her claws wide, showing off the curvature of her supple sole. There he awed at the creases and the architecture of the foot-scales, and the stretches of scaly skin between each talon. He snorted eagerly, and then she planted her foot down, curled her talons around his muzzle and muzzled his muzzle with them. He received a subtle asphyxiating feeling, not so much that he couldn’t breathe, but just enough to be thrilling and enjoyable. Up close he experienced her physical power, and trembled, thinking that she could crush his jaws in her clutch if she chose. The claws around his snout tightened and his face felt compressed, trapped within the embrace of her richly fragrant sole.

She gave a laugh, then released him. He barely had a chance to gather his breath before she trotted to his side and roughly heaved him off his back onto his belly, then stepped over him. As soon as he looked up, her paw stepped on his muzzle from above and squished him against the earth, grinded his face against the sweet, nutrient-rich loam of the grove. She rumbled. He lifted his head upside-down briefly, just long enough to see the muscles of her foreleg contract and convulse beneath her hide’s resplendent armor, before she stomped back down on him and smothered him in the canyons of that same hide, enforcing her quadrupedal strength.

Through him trembled a spindly warmth. Her earthen grip shared some of her body’s natural humidity with him. She added pressure and pushed him deeper into the dirt, and he could hear the slow scratches of contentment of her talons slowly curling and uncurling ahead of him. Vharr made an attempt to raise his head again, but failed to do so, for she pinned him beneath her predator’s clutch as soon as he tried. From his lengthy neck came a crackling sound, for the vertebrae was jarringly pushed down at her discretion. She had stomped on him, which clamped his jaws together with a soft crunch. Under the pressure, he heard snaps and pops from the bones of his neck-base.

The feral power of Ysera both tantalized and invigorated him. To be at the mercy of another dragon, to feel their muscles course over his snout and scrunch his scaly facial features as the cool, firm flesh of the sole molded over the dome of his skull … it prompted him to hiss a metallic chirrup and breathe happily. His breaths came a bit labored, for she exercised more of her weight on him while she curled her talons around his slits-for-nostrils and squeezed them. The pulsations of her blood vessels were superimposed over the pleasant coolness of her paw soles’ scales as she continued to treat Vharr to the medley of sensations, and assert her dominance.

For this he was thankful, delighted and entranced. To let her know how he was taking the facial massage, he sent a string of mental sensations to her: one of a field of growing saplings, another of the sun rising and embracing the field in its warmth, a third of Vharr basking in this setting and in the pleasurable atmosphere. A metaphor for his enjoyment of the process, he presented this to her, and he felt her stall in her work, only for her to snigger with amusement at his reaction.

“My forepaws have sharp claws, and are dexterous, as you may be able to tell,” said Ysera. “But I don’t spring off of them, nor could I balance on them. I could do so on my hindpaws, however. Yes, my haunches have much more pure muscle corded through them than my forelegs, and I will show you this power of mine.”

And so Ysera lifted her paw. He got chills as he anticipated what thrill she would next impart to him. She gradually tread over his body, passing her scent to his nostrils from overhead, until eventually he caught a waft of a more intimate female scent. The black spines of his head perked up a bit at that draft, but he dipped his head, not wanting to think of such things when she had been kind enough simply to give him the carresses of her feet.

She stood directly ahead of him, and exposed her female anatomy as well as her hind legs. Her thighs measured thicker than the base of his neck at their narrowest parts. She stepped back with one foot, then came down with the front instead of the heel with the other foot, the one she had placed in front of Vharr’s face.

He watched attentively and traced the lines of each scale along the heel of her lengthy foot, and took a sniff at her back paw. It was pleasant: musky, like the front paw, but darker and earthier in scent. He stretched his neck, reached out with his tongue and lapped at the bare sole of the paw just before the foot descended and planted its full power upon him.

Indeed, he thought with mirth, Ysera had been right about the power of her haunches. She shifted her weight and wiggled her foot back, sliding her foot toward the bridge of his snout. The gleaming emerald heel filled his vision. She glanced back at him and smirked, then the muscles of her calve twitched and covered his vision in shadows. She drove his entire head into the ground, with such strength that he thought his neck had cracked.

Submitting to the whim of the larger, queenly dragon gave him great joy. He trilled out a rumble and swayed his tail as his body pressed flat against the verdant bank, for she pinned him there. As he lay buried there, he could feel the vibrational motions of her body: the membranes of her wings fwooshing and her tail swaying, all of the movements of her body coursing through his own and down his spine and sending him tingles.

The strong foot-paw pedaled down on him more strongly, and beneath his muzzle, which was wedged between her sole and the loam, he could hear the earth shifting and crumbling from her might. His skull throbbed from the force asserted, as though he could feel gravity bunching in on his head, while also his draconic jaws pulsated with soreness. And still, she pushed down further until the largest posterior bone of her ankle displayed itself most prominently, protruding from the layers of gleaming lavender scales, just below the magic-infused bracers of her lower hind leg.

After a time of indulging her friend with her body, she lifted her grand, quadrupedal foot, and the tension on his muzzle fell away, yet he could still feel its imprinted presence, just as much as she could still smell her scent wafting in his nostrils. She turned to him and hummed. She allowed him to get up and stand, and he was content from having spent the time with her, although he still wished he could have spent more. He knew that he had spent plenty of time in this world, and that now was the time to return to his home-world. He communicated this with her, and she smiled and bumped snouts with him.

“Remember, crimson one,” she said, “there is always a place for you in this forest.”

He smiled and gave her a snort of the affirmative, then scampered off, and flew off the ground, and made his way to the portal, where he vanished, and was sent back to his own world.

After several turns of the sun, of an adventure across the land of his home-world, Vharr returned to his family. When they saw him finally, their troubles melted away; and they forget what they had been doing the moment before, and rushed to him to embrace him with their wings. Vharr, he felt again the feeling of being with family, a feeling he had not realized he’d been deprived of for so long. Wishing to deepen this feeling, he recounted to them the story of the nightmare and of Ysera. Someday, perhaps, he would visit Azeroth with his family to accompany him. And they, too, would be able to meet the lovely Ysera.

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