Chapter 41
After a long expatriation of the past few days and the marking of Ashley, my father let me know that I will never be without my mate. As dragons, we have long lives almost immortal. That's not the issue for me it's the fact she told me dragons are all gone in her time. How can I have my mate and there be no dragon? To have a dragon offspring take several things. Take my family for example Mia is two years older than I am but I am the first born. How you ask well that's because I am a dragon I have a birth date and a hatch date whereas Mai just has a birthday. Let me explain if all your parents are dragons then you are a dragon but if just one of your parents is a dragon it's a fifty-fifty chance of being a dragon. After becoming pregnant a female must travel to the medical center to find out if she is caring for a dragon or not. If it's a dragon arrangement is made for when the birth of the egg grows inside the mother. Only mother-caring dragons need a special clinic. Mothers then give birth to the egg after three months of caring for it. The egg is then incubated in hell fire for two years.
Ever wonder where the legend of the phoenix came from well here it is. Dragon egg shells are as hard as stone. It takes two years in hell fire to burn it away in that time the dragon forms and grows inside the egg. Dragons are covered in a thick layer of down and feathers and look like a large birds of various colors. The colors at hatching mean nothing they just show the lines the dragon came from. So for me, they said my down and feathers were both fiery red and ice blue showing one parent is ice and the other is a fire dragon. When a dragon is ready to hatch the shell burns away leaving a pile of ash at our feet. For the next three months, we grow and slowly lose the down and feathers still in the incubation chamber. No matter the breed of dragon you are you need to be in the hell fire. after we lose the feathers and down our scales are visible. The moment the last fuzz drops off our skin we shift into normal-looking human infants.
If your caring anything other than a dragon the gestation is that of the race you are caring so a fox is five months so Mia was born six months after my father found her on a trip to the far east where a blackness had started to plague the land and a new pack of wolves. He had gone to intestate the claims from a grass dragon that his land is crawling with some kind of curse. It was there that my father found Kiko. She was in a field chasing a butterfly. They both stopped dead in their tracks. Rushing to each other but my father was able to stop anything from happening right away. Stopping Kiko he explained he has a mate with the child back home and without her and Kiko creating the bond they need it would feel as though my father was cheating on my mother. The pain and stress could cause her to lose the egg she's caring for. What my father had not counted on was for Kiko to start laughing hysterically.
“you found me in the middle of a dragon's garden on your way to meet with a dragon and you think I do not know about dragons?” it was at that moment my father fell in love with the little fox. She then explained she was here in the dragon's garden because her brother was mated to the dragon master's youngest daughter. Her brother being her guardian brought her with him to the dragon's lands. While searching the rotten land they couldn’t track down the source of magic or erase the stain on the earth from the magic. They all agreed to keep an eye on the darkness in hopes the earth will find a way to heal from it. What they didn’t know was it would be the birthplace of a wicked rotten witch. When the investigation was concluded my father and Kiko traveled back to the medical center where my mother was living for the time being. As dragons, my mother knew they had another mate out in the world so when my father brought Kiko to meet my mother it was not a shock to her. Kiko couldn’t contain herself and rushed to my mother kissing her and her now round belly. The look of pure love in her eyes radiated and illuminated the room. That night they marked and mated each other and conceived Mia.
Now my thoughts are again on Ashley what will happen should she fall pregnant with a dragon but goes back to a time she has told me several times not that dragons are no longer a part of. How would she have it? Not being a dragon she would need the help of the dragon birthing center for delivery and the incubation chamber for the egg. If there are no dragons then would she lose the child and if there is no one to help her birth the egg would she die along with the egg. So much worry flooded into me at this moment that I could no longer stand it. Dropping to my knees and looking up at my father all hope was now lost for our kind. One look at me he ask my mothers to leave so he could talk to me alone. Letting him into my mind to see what I say to hear what I heard to feel what I felt so there is no chance of being lost in translation. When my father takes a seat with a heavy sigh I know he knows that I know that we have no idea what to do next.
