Summer 1, 115
Odd was it for Caelum to end up sleeping in his own home as of late. Despite spending most of his time amongst the aelves and humans, his actual home was quite a ways off from the center of town. Sometimes he would even spend the night further than that, venturing so far that he was damned near the edge of the forest. It brought back memories being so far away from the center of the city. He knew this path would eventually lead outside the forest and out towards where his mother had first nested.
There were many reasons why he might want to venture so far. For one, it gave him plenty of alone time. It was also one of the only places he could actually practice his dragon breath ability. He'd come for the former, as it so happened. He was a supposed dragon of fertility and sometimes that became a little much. He had an innate sense for who was fertile, who was not and sometimes the aelven females swarmed him, trying to gauge by his interest whether they were fertile or not.
Sometimes he enjoyed the attention, other times he just wanted to get away from it all. Though, there was no truly getting away from it. His sense for fertility extended to plants and animals as well. It was a constant feeling in his gut and was often the first thing that came to mind when he looked at something unless he tried not to think about it.
Aelfs inhabited basically the entirety of the forest, but they were definitely less dense out towards the edges. An aelf came into his field of view as he walked down the path. He carried a spear and was dressed in typical armor that associated him with the armed forces of the aelves. Just a glance at him told Caelum that his chances for having a child were basically none. They nodded to each other as Caelum approached.
"Anything interesting?" Caelum asked out of politeness.
"It's been a quiet evening," the aelf said calmly, never taking his eyes off Caelum. "Headed to the desert?"
"Thought I'd blow off some steam," Caelum said with a nod.
"There's some scouts out that way. They might have something for you to do. Enjoy your evening, dragon."
Caelum continued on his way, wondering if he was walking into a dicey situation. Scouts typically didn't group up and search an area without reason, but then again the guard had said that it'd been quiet. He was fairly confident that he'd be safe but he started covering his body in bark for good measure. He couldn't manage to completely cover his body, but he could protect his vital areas like his throat and torso. The bark came from his very skin and melded with it seamlessly as he poured life essence into it.
He wandered for hours, taking the only trail that he knew that led out to the desert. He could see the plant life slowly become less and less dense until finally he was at the very edge of the forest where it met the sands of the desert. There was still no sign of the scouts, as far as he could tell. He was no hunter or he might have been able to pick up on some aelven footprints but even that would be difficult at night since he lacked their wonderful eyesight.
"Came all the way out here for nothing, eh" he said to himself as he leaned against a tree. His legs ached from all the walking. He let a yawn escape his lips then thought that he'd made it this far so he might as well breath fire to light up the night sky.
He focused on his throat, thought about how mighty he used to be as a dragon. He envisioned himself as the embodiment of raw power, and sinking his teeth into an enemy. His eyes took on a murderous glint and he felt the heat flow through his throat and into his mouth. A thick, black smoke started to escape his lips as his eyes darted around for something to fire at.
Seeing nothing, he chose to angle his mouth towards the sky. He inhaled through his nose, filling his lungs all the way, then he opened his mouth. The night went from black to nearly fully lit up as a torrent of flames hot enough to melt metal streamed from his mouth with reckless abandon.
Heat. Simply being near flames of this caliber would be enough to kill someone, and as the very source of the flames, Caelum would have been toast had it not been for his innate resistance towards his own breath weapon. He still felt the heat though, and it felt good.
Having expended a good amount of life force, He finally let the flames die down and closed his mouth. He slumped against the tree and thought to sleep right there but he heard rustling in the trees.
"Oi! Dragon, what's happened?"
Before he even had time to get up, Caelum was surrounded by a group of scouts. Their weapons had been drawn, expecting a fight and some looked disappointed to see that he was one of their own.
"Nothing," he said, rubbing the crust from his sleepy eyes. "thought I'd practice a little. What are you doing out here? A guard told me you were here and that you might have something for me to do."
"Said that, did he?" asked the leader, more to himself than to Caelum. "We're on a training mission, practicing scouting and the like. I suppose it might do some good if you can demonstrate your dragon breath up close. To let the green ones know exactly what they might come up against."
Caelum let out a huge yawn. "do I have to? I'm so tired."
"It would be helpful, and we could guide you to more appropriate shelter. It's unwise to sleep here."
"Okay fine," Caelum said. He stared at the younger aelves that still stood in front of him then cocked his head to the side.
"You gonna move?" he asked as black smoke started billowing from his nose.
They scrambled out of the way and Caelum pointed into the sky. "I can do about a hundred feet. A little more on a good day. Probably best to try getting out of the way if you're up against dragon breath… mine can melt through metal and I'm sure other varieties are just as deadly." As he spoke he slowly got to his feet and beat on his chest with his fists to pump himself up. The last breath had been wild and uncontrolled; it'd simply been a release of his saol. This… this he wanted to be impressive.
After mentally preparing himself to deliver a spectacle, he roared and allowed a stream of fire to shoot into the night sky. It travelled in a near perfect column of spiraling red fire with hints of blue at the edges. He wanted to do more, but he always saved one of his breath charges for actual emergencies so he allowed the column to slowly die out.
"How's that?" he asked to the leader who looked unimpressed, but appreciative all the same.
"Thank you for your demonstration. You've gotten stronger, it seems. Last I heard you could only clear fifty feet on a good day."
Caelum smirked. It didn't surprise him that an aelf in the military was aware of what he was capable of. After all, he was sometimes called upon to put his fire to good use.
"Contrary to what you might have heard, I actually do train," he said as he stretched. He looked at the other aelves, all of which were sweating from the intense heat they'd just experienced coupled with what he assumed was awe. He assumed that they had seen dragon breath before, but perhaps not up close like this. It made him smile to know that he was getting stronger, enough to make an impression at least.
"So, I believe you said something about lodgings? Where are we headed?"
"AEsalia can create some appropriate shelter for you," said the leader. "The rest of us will continue our route, she can join up with us when she's finished."
Caelum's heart sank. He'd been expecting an actual room, not some hastily created wooden structure up in the trees. Still, it was beter than nothing. "Alright, good meeting you all. AEsalia, I'll follow your lead?"
He paused, looking at the aelf properly for the first time. He was immediately aware that she was incredibly fertile which always had a certain effect on him. He was always inexplicably drawn to people like that. He was usually able to resist his urges when they weren't visibly pleasing, but looking at her in the glow of the bioluminescent glow of the forest, he was overcome with lust. He did his best to suppress those thoughts as he followed her a ways back into the forest until they were at a nice, sturdy tree. He watched her as she constructed a small wooden hut that jutted out from the side of the tree.
