Dragonstone 01

"Now, that's all you have time to hear from me, young lady," the old storyteller said to his audience, a girl of roughly seventeen years. "It's about time you were getting back to bed."

"But, Mr Arag, I asked for something to help me fall asleep, not a story," Ellin reminded him.

"Did you? Hmm, I must be getting muddled again. Maybe you reminded me of my little one asking for a bedtime story, eh?" He winked at her, and smiled, and Ellin couldn't help but smile back.

"Please, sir, do you have something - besides a story - to help me sleep?" she asked again.

"Oh, alright," the old man sighed. He stood up from his chair and disappeared into the other room, then came back a moment later holding something tiny in his cupped hand. Ellin held out her hand and he dropped a little pill into it. It was white and perfectly round, and only about the size of Ellin's littlest fingernail.

"This should do it," said Mr Arag, with a kindly smile.

"Thank you, sir."

Ellin moved to put the pill in her mouth, but Mr Arag stopped her. "Best to wait until you're sitting in bed. It works awfully fast on some."

"Thanks," Ellin said again, before turning to go.

"Sleep well, Miss Ansay," she heard him say as she closed the door behind her.

In the dark and silent corridors of the school once again, Ellin's thoughts immediately turned back to the reason she had gone to Mr Arag's rooms in the middle of the night in the first place. It had been such a strange dream...it reminded her of home, though she had no idea why. Dragons all around her, all different shapes, sizes, and colors. She could almost see them even now, with her eyes wide open, and she could almost hear their voices again, whispering things she couldn't understand. They followed her as she walked back to her dormitory, where she carefully navigated the darkness between the door and her bed. They still whispered as she ate Mr Arag's sleep pill. It left a sour taste in her mouth, and an oddly familiar tingling sensation in her throat.

Suddenly the voices were silent, and Ellin remembered - Mr Arag had just told her a story about dragons! How had he known? Then, just as suddenly, she fell into a comfortable, dreamless sleep.



Old Mr Arag held the box tenderly, and gazed at it as if he could see right through it into another world. His hand moved as if to open it, but instead stroked the lid.

"Soon," he whispered to the box's contents through the closed lid, "very soon. She's been coming to me more often of late."

The old man sat there holding the box for a moment more, then sighed and carefully replaced it in its hiding place. Soon, indeed, the time would come for it to open.