I-1528: Icarus Sinbad

The sun shone warmly down on a very strange scene indeed. Three drakiri stood in the shallow valley of a series of foothills, with their snowcapped mountain looming in the distance. Two of these drakiri were aware of each other, the third watched on from atop one of the graceful hills, the sun glinting off the gold streaks in his mane and along his feathers. Icarus Sinbad sat to rest his hooves, feeling each of them t...

It had only been a month since the downfall of the horrific ring of poachers that had captured drakiri with attractive traits and markings and harvested them to sell to the highest bidders. They had dealt with the injuries, they were dealing with the trauma, but one of the worst parts of the recovery process was trying to find where everyone belonged. Drakiri had been taken from every corner of the continent and some from beyond, no one really knew where they we...

The day had started out so…strangely. The sky seemed the same lovely lilac color as always, a few thin clouds scudded across the horizon but without the promise of more gathering for rain. But something had felt off regardless.  Icarus had traveled long and far enough that he didn’t really know where he was. He didn’t navigate the way that most drakiri would, he used landmarks in the form of people he had met a...

It wasn't so much a town where Icarus had wound up, it was more of a gathering of rural homes with a tavern somewhat close to the middle of where each home was settled. It had no name, and the folks who lived here were old. Their children had moved away long ago, and taken with them the hopes for the town to flourish with new blood and newer ideas. Perhaps that was the fate of such rural places, where new minds were hard to find and harder still the eagerness to...

Unbeknownst to either party, three drakiri arrived in the same town at a most auspicious time. They travelled separately and in fact had never so much as laid eyes on one another, but they shared such similar passions that their meeting was practically determined by fate. Two young sprites, one with short turquoise fur and an adventurous sparkle in her eye, and her tropical-colored cousin who prepared for everything yet seemed consistently blindsided, had arrived at a tavern that seeme...

My mother told me stories when I was young. Most were of daring folk who struck out on grand adventures and slayed monstrous beasts who ate good little boys and girls, or elegant creatures made of wind, water, fire and earth who soared through the air on gilded wings or lurked in the deepest depths of the oceans, waiting to be discovered. But my favorite stories weren't of the noble young thrill-seeker, but rather of the older wiser and often crotchety elders th...

Bright summer sunlight shone down on the grasslands, morning dew glittering on blades of grass that waved in a gentle breeze. It tugged at the stiff mane of the dracus who lay curled beneath a poplar tree, dozing as he took advantage of the cooler morning air. The clear sky above promised another scorching day, and he still had far to travel. Not for the first time—and certainly not the last—Leonidas wondered where his destination lay. He had a map and knew how to navigate using bo...