Here Be Dragons: Book 1 of the Emergence Series

Pryce cautiously glanced over the bulwark to scan the beach. Nothing stood out as unusual no matter how hard he squinted, and he was left with the uncomfortable feeling that he might not be alone.

He didn't really have a solution, but for now Pryce used one of the ship's instant cameras to take pictures of the beach. It was a good idea to record the landing site for historical purposes, but that wasn't his only goal. Instead, he'd hoped the camera would help discern the location of the raptors. Pryce was not well versed in photographic technology, but he'd once heard in passing that black and white film was sensitive to ultraviolet wavelengths of light.

If Pryce couldn't see the raptors with his eyes, then maybe he could see them with the camera.

Pryce took a picture of the beach below, then turned the crank to spit out the now-developing photo. He took a few more in rapid succession, turning the crank after each picture. It really was convenient not to bother with the entire development process, Pryce thought as he peeled the negative from the first photo, which…seemed normal enough. Light sky, dark forest, and…a faint, dark shape upon the beach.

Pryce's eyes widened in alarm, and peeling open the other photos revealed a total of three such anomalies, each one slightly darker than the surrounding sand.

Slowly, cautiously, Pryce stepped back out onto the deck, rifle slung over his shoulder. He nervously glanced to and fro, just in case the raptors had somehow scaled the hull of the ship without his knowing. He might not have been able to see them, but he was fairly confident they wouldn't be able to perfectly copy the black painted deck of the ship. Even if they could, the bulwark of the ship was painted red, meaning that it was far more difficult for them to hide in this artificial environment.

A full minute of checking and double checking left him fairly confident that the deck was empty, until he noticed something strange. Pryce froze, his blood running cold as he realized the thing was a raptor! When could it have snuck aboard the ship? How did it-

No, there wasn't time for that. The doctor raised his rifle, training it upon the approximate center of the raptor. The creature was more easily noticeable with an artificial background, and it remained perfectly still even as Pryce slowly backed away, towards the ladder leading up to the ship's lookout. The creature remained motionless as he clambered up the ladder, giving him time to situate himself in the lookout.

Pryce had time to think now that he was relatively safe, and it was fairly obvious these creatures were ambush predators. Perhaps that was the reason for their cautious approach? He was about to try and scare the raptor away when the creature let loose an abrupt trilling cry. There was a pause and Pryce wondered what the creature was doing, then another raptor leapt up over the side of the hull to land upon the deck. The doctor stared in a mix of amazement and horror – the creatures had wings. He didn't know if they could fly or not, but evidently they could jump high enough to board the deck six meters above the beach.

A moment later another raptor leapt aboard the ship, followed by another, and another, until a total of five creatures stood upon the deck.

The raptors hesitantly explored their new environment, gradually meandering their way towards the first. Pryce gritted his teeth as he tried to think of a way out of this situation, but the rifle was the only real asset he had with him, along with six rounds of ammo. Rifle training had been mandatory, and Pryce wasn't a bad shot, but could he get them all? No, it was better to try and scare them off now before they grew too comfortable aboard the ship. Decision made, Pryce raised the rifle and fired once more into the sky.

The crack of gunfire clearly startled the creatures, and they flickered white for an instant, but that was all that they did. Unlike the lone raptor, these did not flee, almost as if…no, could they have learned? Pryce hadn't seen any other individuals at the time, but they must have been in the forest, watching.

Then the creatures began to move, interrupting his thoughts. He trained his rifle on the closest one, which remained stationary while its companions began to roam the ship. That one gave the impression of being the leader of the group, seeing as the others followed its orders.

Pryce pushed up his glasses as he squinted at the raptor. It was still camouflaged, but the creature no longer hid behind its bat-like wings, which seemed awfully small and suited more for cover than for flight. Pryce noted that its head and body bore a passing resemblance to an artist's rendition of a saurian raptor – though it was far more fleshed out than the usual skeletal depictions, and its unblinking eyes stared squarely back to examine him in turn.

Several tense minutes passed. The raptors gradually regrouped around their leader to trill and click at one another in oddly avian vocalizations. The leader silenced them with a decisive chirrup, and the others fell silent as one individual stepped forward to examine the ladder.

The volunteer tentatively peered at the rungs for a moment, then it extended a taloned thumb to hook onto a rung of the ladder.

"Don't do that," Pryce warned, training his rifle down at the raptor.

The creature paused, and its small eyes seemed to consider him for a moment.

Then it grabbed another rung.

"Stop!" Pryce bellowed, his vocal cords straining from disuse. This time the raptor didn't pause at all, instead it climbed even faster up the rungs. The doctor gritted his teeth, placed his finger over the trigger, and-

A sudden explosion of noise blasted through the air, striking Pryce like a physical force. A deep blue blur tore the raptor off the ladder, sending it crashing into the bulwark with a sickening crunch. The raptor crumpled lifelessly as colors erratically bloomed and withered across its hide, but Pryce had no time to observe this phenomenon.

The newcomer hadn't spared an instant more on its first victim – it was already tearing into a second raptor. The three survivors fled over the side of the ship, but the blue-scaled creature leapt after them in hot pursuit.

The two corpses on the deck twitched and flickered in their death throes, all while screeches and shrieks of pain sounded from the beach below.

It didn't take long for them to fall silent.

Pryce's mind raced as his heart hammered in his chest. There was no time to run, no time to do anything, so he did the only thing he could, and raised the rifle with trembling hands.

Several seconds passed, and then a foreclaw shot over the bulwark of the ship, followed by another as the new arrival hauled itself up over the side of the ship, gradually revealing its head, wings, and tail as it clambered onto the deck.

It was a dragon.

…Or at least, something resembling one. The mythical beast of humanity's imagination couldn't hold a candle to this creature, whose scales rippled along its deep blue and lightly scarred hide. Its sleek horns and serrated talons might have been the same matte black color, though the freshly spilled blood on the latter made it difficult to ascertain their true color. Its eyes, however, were a brilliant crimson; a trait that lent to the creature's intense gaze, which was currently focused entirely on Pryce.

For a moment neither of them moved; the two of them simply stared at each other, until the dragon gradually sat down upon its haunches.

"Lak tu ioh kana," it growled, in a guttural but oddly subdued manner.

Pryce gaped uncomprehendingly. Did it just…speak?

The dragon glanced away, muttering with what certainly sounded like words. After a moment the creature straightened itself, placed a foreclaw upon its chest, looked directly at Pryce and said, "Hironh-ǂ."

Well…that was much less ambiguous, but was that its name, or the name for its species? The pronunciation was a bit guttural, but Pryce didn't think they meant to sound aggressive, and what was that noise at the end? It sounded almost like an electrical pop or spark. He abruptly realized that the dragon was staring expectantly at him, so Pryce decided to shelve the questions for later as he assumed that they were introducing themselves.

"Pryce," Pryce said, tapping his own chest.

"Frrryce," the dragon said, evidently attempting to pronounce his name. "Pryce?"

"Yes," Pryce said, nodding without thinking. He immediately realized that the dragon – or rather, Hironh – wouldn't understand that, but then he supposed it was as good a way as any to teach the meaning of the word.

The dragon cocked its head, then copied his nodding to say, "Hironh-ǂ."

"Oh," Pryce said, realizing what he was supposed to do. "Hirrong-click?" he asked, approximating the noise at the end with a click of his tongue.

"Vam," Hironh said, drawing their head backward in obvious distaste.

"Hiron-click," Pryce tried.

"Vam."

"Hironh-click?" Pryce asked, feeling that the first part was quite close, though he has no idea how to pronounce the second half.

"Vam, vam," Hironh said, tossing his head. The dragon glanced around for a moment, then picked up a raptor. "Vauk."

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"Vauk," Pryce said, pointing at the raptor.

Hironh gave him a sideways glance, and Pryce had the feeling he hadn't pronounced that right either.

"Ral," Hironh said, and walked over to the edge of the ship.

Pryce hesitated for a moment, then reluctantly slid down the ladder to approach the dragon. It was obvious the creature wasn't hostile, and so long as that was the case then there was no point in antagonising it – or rather, them. Pryce didn't think it was quite right to call someone 'it' when Hironh clearly had a name for themselves, but he didn't know their sex either, so 'them' it was.

Pryce slowly approached Hironh to stand by the bulwark, making sure to maintain a 'safe' distance from the dragon. The dragon seemed peaceable enough, and Pryce knew on a rational level that such a small distance meant nothing if they wanted him dead, but he had just seen Hironh tear through several raptors with savage ease, and the blood on the dragon's jaws did little to settle his rattled nerves.

"Ranh," Hironh said, and Pryce followed the dragon's gaze to see two dead raptors on the beach, along with…a tree trunk leaning against the hull of the ship?

"A ladder," he breathed, realizing that was how the raptors got aboard the ship. The creatures were far smaller than the dragon, whose chin comfortably hovered over Pryce's head while they stood on four legs. Apparently the raptors had used this trunk as a makeshift ladder to climb aboard the ship. Pryce did note that their wings were oddly shaped, so perhaps that meant they weren't suitable for flying?

"A-lah-der," Hironh said, echoing his words while pointing a talon at the raptor's makeshift ladder.

"Yes," Pryce nodded.

"Hmm," Hironh rumbled. "vauk," he said, pointing at the two raptors.

"Yes, vauk," Pryce agreed. The dragon only stared blankly back at him, and he glanced back down at the beach to realize there were only two raptors.

"Ee vauk," Hironh said, pointing at one raptor. "Wy vauk, li vauk, fa vauk," the dragon counted, shifting the talon from raptor to raptor before raising a talon to point into the forest. "Na vauk."

"Ah," Pryce breathed. The fifth one had escaped, apparently.

"Na vauk," Hironh said, and drew Pryce's gaze down to the deck with a tap of a talon. The dragon slowly and deliberately traced a loop on the deck, then pointed at the forest before circling back around to tap the deck again.

Was Hironh saying that the raptor would return? Pryce rather doubted that, but he had no idea how else to interpret Hironh's attempted communication.

"Hironh shaka vauk," Hironh rumbled, and pointed at the closest raptor. "Ee. Wy. Li. Fa…" the dragon said, moving his talon to point at a new corpse with each word. They were clearly counting the bodies, Pryce realized, and Hironh ended his sentence by pointing into the forest. "Na. "Hironh shaka vauk na."

"...Yes?" Pryce slowly replied, unsure if the dragon was asking a question or not. 'Ee', 'Wy', 'Li', and 'Fa' were almost certainly numbers, and 'shaka' probably meant 'kill', though he noted Hironh had dropped the clicking part of their name. Did that have something to do with their grammar, or was the dragon just making it easier for him to pronounce?

Either way, Hironh seemed to be telling him that they were going to go kill the escapee, though the dragon seemed uncertain if he had successfully conveyed his message. They scratched their scaled jaw for a moment before abruptly leaping down onto the beach. "Ral," Hironh said, waving their wing in a beckoning manner.

Pryce took a minute to re-deploy the stairs, an act that Hironh watched with great interest until the human stepped foot onto the beach. For a moment the dragon's gaze lingered on the ship, but then they looked down to draw something into the sand. It only took a few seconds for the dragon to sketch out the simple shape, but Pryce found himself stupefied by what was clearly a depiction of a glass bottle. The doctor scratched his head, uncertain of what to make of this. It was quite clearly a typical wine bottle, but surely it had to be something else? Maybe-

"Jom," Hironh said, interrupting his thoughts. Pryce turned around to see the dragon holding out a stick. "Jom," they insisted, offering the unremarkable object in the palm of their foreclaw.

"Okay," Pryce said, picking up the stick. It looked like an ordinary stick, which meant…the dragon was probably teaching him the word for 'pick up' or 'take'.

"Jarm," Hironh said, pointing at the drawing.

"Okay," Pryce repeated uncertainly.

"Pryce jom vauk," Hironh said, gesturing at the raptors yet again. "Hironh jom jarm."

Pryce frowned. If he assumed that the drawing did indeed depict a bottle, then that meant Hironh was…asking for a reward in exchange for his services? But how did the dragon know what a bottle was in the first place? Pryce decided to test his assumption, and he scooped up a handful of saltwater to pour onto the inside of Hironh's drawing.

"Vrok!" Hironh said, sounding quite excited.

"…Wait," Pryce said, and climbed back aboard the ship to retrieve a bottle of wine. The ship had plenty of the stuff, especially when it was meant to satiate the whole crew. Of course, most of it was nothing special. Hopefully the dragon wouldn't be disappointed.

"Vrok! Vrok vrok vrok!" Hironh exclaimed as Pryce stepped back onto the deck, bottle in hand. The dragon's pupils were dilating in what was quite obviously excitement. "Jarm!" Hironh exclaimed, holding out a foreclaw.

"Oh," Pryce said, feeling very confused as Hironh accepted the bottle with great care. Could a bottle have drifted all the way from the Mainland? That was the only explanation he could think of, and it made sense, now that he thought about it; humanity had been making bottled wine for millennia, surely something would have drifted across the ocean in that time.

"Alcohol," he said, pointing at the bottle.

"Alcoo-hol?" Hironh said, glancing between Pryce and the wine bottle.

"Yes," Pryce replied, desperately wishing he could ask how the dragon knew of human alcohol. "Jarm is alcohol," he added.

"Yes," Hironh said, bobbing their head. "Ee alcohol. Hironh shaka na vauk, Hironh jom wy alcohol?"

Pryce scratched his head. He was fairly certain Hironh was asking for more bottles in exchange for hunting down the escaped raptor? Pryce didn't really care about letting the raptor escape, but he didn't want to aggravate the dragon either.

"Yes," Pryce said, mostly to appease the dragon.

"Yes," Hironh agreed, nodding again. The dragon looked up at the sky, and Pryce followed their line of sight. There wasn't anything in the sky that he could see, other than the sun, of course. "Mattak," the dragon said, pointing at the sun.

"Sun," Pryce said, mirroring the gesture.

"Sun," Hironh said, and made a sweeping gesture across the sky, below the horizon, then back up the horizon to point at the sun again.

"Day," Pryce answered, catching onto the dragon's intent.

"Ee, wy, li, fa, na," Hironh said, raising a talon with each word.

"One, two, three, four, five," Pryce counted on his own fingers, recognizing the same string of numbers that the dragon had used to count the raptors.

"One day. Hironh jom alcohol."

"Yes," Pryce nodded. The dragon would be back in one day to take their alcohol.

"Yes," Hironh nodded, popping the bottle into their mouth. The dragon began sniffing the ground, drawing Pryce's attention to the droplets of blood that led into the forest. The raptor must have been wounded, he realized, and the human watched as the dragon gradually disappeared into the forest.

It felt very strange to be alone again, and now that Hironh was gone he felt himself dubiously wondering if he'd imagined a talking dragon, even if the dead raptors said otherwise. Only now was the gravity of the situation beginning to set in – there were other intelligent species in the world, and he'd just spoken to one of them.

[JOURNAL ENTRY EXCERPTS]

Day 21,

Intelligent life! Unmistakably, unambiguously, intelligent life!

It sounds completely unbelievable, and yet I've made contact with a creature heavily resembling a living, breathing dragon! But I'm getting ahead of myself. First, I must recount the events leading up to and including our meeting:

…

The possibility of life on other continents has been a subject of great speculation in recent years, especially with the success of the Longshot program. Of course, many of these ideas lie firmly in the realm of fantasy, while others suggest that there may be other humans living across the sea. I imagine there would have been more historical examples if the suggestion of other lands wasn't considered blasphemous by the old Narunan empire, but I still don't think anyone would have predicted talking dragons.

Could the dragons of myth have been inspired by these creatures? That seems unlikely, considering the vast distance that spans our continents. Seraphs* are commonly accepted as one of the sources of inspiration for dragons, in the same way that rocs inspired thunderbirds. Still, it's something worth asking about, once we have the words to communicate at such a level.

*TL Note: Seraphs are a species of six-limbed avians native to the Mainland.

More importantly, 'Hironh' (my best approximation of the dragon's name) appeared to be familiar with man made objects – at least, they very clearly requested a bottle of wine before I ever showed them one.

There are several possible explanations for this:

Dragons are familiar with man-made flotsam that drifted across the ocean, meaning that they likely know little about the Mainland itself.

A ghost ship washed up on their shores at some point.

A past expedition made landfall on this continent, but they either never left or never made it back home.

The third option is concerning…the last expedition took place in the 930s, and yet Hironh doesn't appear to know any Murian speech despite their willingness to learn. Any past contact was likely quite brief (assuming that it had happened at all), which implies that no human has survived long enough to teach a dragon Murian. Perhaps they were killed by animals like the raptors before any dragons could help them, or perhaps they were killed by other dragons. No, that's too much speculation. I'll have to ask Hironh about any other humans as soon as possible.

In other news, I've done a quick dissection of the raptors – at least what's left of them. I haven't had the time for a thorough analysis, so I've merely preserved their organs for future study. The creatures notably possess two aortic arches instead of one (something that I'll refer to as a dual aortic arc), as well as a unidirectional respiratory system like that found in avians. These creatures appear to bear a superficial resemblance to dragons, so it is worth studying them in the event that they share a close common ancestor.

The rest of the day was spent preparing tomorrow's meeting…which will more or less be a language lesson in Murian, given my inability to correctly pronounce Draconic speech. Communication is necessary for anything else I can think of, so that takes priority over everything else.

The fact that Hironh has a language at all is fascinating – it's impossible for a species to develop a language without strong social bonds, and that means dragons must possess a culture of their own.

I have so many questions, too many to even begin listing them all…I'll just have to take this one step at a time.

Raptor dissection notes:
Length: ~4 m
Wingspan: ~4 m
Weight: ~100 kg

(Art by Rackiera)

(Art by IssacOwl)