10/02/2020

Hey guys! This is the first chapter of the Master of the Mind! As I explained in my comment, the actual book won't be out for a while, at least until I've finished part 1 of the book. But I'm putting this up here to give you a bit of an insight into what the book will be like. So have a read and enjoy. I'll be writing several short stories over the next couple of months as well, so feel free to read those. The next time I post a book though, it will start like this...

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"Eldawin! Keagan! You're up!"

Four-year old Eldawin winced when he heard his name, and then inwardly groaned as he heard who his opponent was. He didn't know why he was surprised. It was like this every single lesson. The weakest of nine hatchlings against the strongest of the nine. It was unfair, it was cruel... and it hurt a lot.

The young dragon looked up at their combat mentor with a pleading gaze, silently begging the other dragon to not force him through this torture again. Their mentor was an earth dragon named Buffer. He was a massive creature, Eldawin was barely bigger than his foot, with moss green scales and a brown underbelly to match the earth of the cavern surrounding them. He was also rather old, one of the few dragons that made it over a century, the battle-hardened scars and not properly healed scales showed it. His tail was thicker than a tree, and the tip came to a massive round spiked ball, that could easily squash any of the nine hatchlings in front of him.

"Don't give me that look, young dragon. You know this is the only way for you to get stronger," Buffer rumbled at him, not feeling any remorse.

Eldawin gritted his teeth, but there was no use complaining. He got up from where he had been sitting and made his way to the fighting circle. He hated that word. 'Stronger'. It was all he had ever been told; from the moment he had hatched. Strength was key to everything! If he wanted to be a hunter, he needed to be stronger. If he wanted to fight, he needed to be stronger. If he wanted to mate, be stronger. If he wanted to live, be stronger! It was infuriating. It wasn't his fault that fate had decided to screw him over with the most useless powers a dragon could ask for.

He glanced over at his opponent, Keagan. Keagan was a fire drake with ruby red scales that flickered in the dancing fire pits on either side of the cavern. He had two straight brownish horns and a yellow underbelly. Small spines started at his neck and ran all the way down to the tip of his tail, like most dragons. Eldawin was the bigger of the two, by a slight margin, but that was likely because he didn't have to share his food with siblings, where as Keagan had two brothers he was forced to share with.

With a deep sigh Eldawin spread his wings, crouching, ready for the battle to begin. The young drake's powers were relatively simple. He could read minds. At first glance this ability was incredibly useful, and it did help him in many ways. At all times he would know what his opponent was thinking, at could react accordingly. The speed in which he learned was astounding as all he needed to do was take the information he needed from the adults, and he knew so many secrets about the small underground dragon haven that it was hard to remember them. But when it came to actually protecting himself... his powers got him into more trouble than anything, as it happened that dragons didn't like to have their deepest darkest secrets viewed by an inquisitive hatchling.

'Eldawin again?' Keagan was thinking, 'Why doesn't Buffer give me a challenge for once?'

The obvious downside to knowing everyone's thoughts was that he also felt all their emotions and knew every negative thought that they had. The amount that were thrown to him was... depressing. Even his parents, who knew first-hand how damaging their thoughts could be to him, didn't always hide everything. Especially his father, Hynder. The large telekinetic dragon loved his son, of course, but there was always an underlying feeling of pity, guilt and disappointment whenever he thought about the young 'mind-reader' dragon.

'Should I end this quickly? Nah... may as well have some fun,' Keagan thought, making direct eye contact with the other drake.

Despite Eldawin being slightly bigger, the fire hatchling seemed to have a way to make him feel smaller than ever. Keagan was the worst of them. He enjoyed beating the mind-reader drake into the ground day after day, and he knew that Eldawin couldn't help but listen to every single one of his mean thoughts. He couldn't exactly tell anyone though. What was he going to say? That the fire drake's thoughts were making him feel sad? That was true with everyone.

The worst part about it all was that everyone had a reason for thinking what they did. It made it impossible for Eldawin to hate them. Buffer pushed him hard because he truly felt it was going to make the hatchling's life better. Hynder wanted his son to have a good life and felt as though he had already failed. Even Keagan was trying to live up to the reputation of his own father, a fire dragon named Brazen, who founded the underground haven and was a hero to them all. He felt that his fights against Eldawin were useless, and that if he taunted and humiliated the weak hatchling enough, he would disappear and give him a chance to really prove himself. Eldawin couldn't exactly blame him. If their roles had been reversed, he would have felt the same way.

Eldawin saw Keagan going into a pounce long before the fire dragon began to move. He tried to counterattack with a pounce of his own. The two small dragons clashed in mid-air, clawing at each other. In close quarters combat, Eldawin was relatively good. His mental lock on his opponent meant that he saw every strike before it happened and could react accordingly. But there was only so much prediction could do when your opponent was stronger, faster and more powerful than you.

The two rolled, snapping and growling as each tried to gain the upper hand. Eldawin managed to keep a step ahead, trying to focus his strikes at the other dragon's face to keep him from using his own powers. But it was only a matter of time.

It seemed Keagan finally had enough. He snapped at Eldawin's leg, forcing the other drake to leap backwards out of fear of his leg being disabled. Eldawin knew what was coming after though, but there was simply nothing he could do about it. That was the worst part about his power. For it didn't matter if he knew what was about to happen if there was nothing he could do to stop it. He braced himself with his wings, then screamed out in pain as they were scorched by a torrent of blistering fire. He couldn't count the number of times he had been flamed by Keagan, but every time it hurt the same.

He fell back, not having the strength to stand as the fire disappeared. He whimpered a sob, tears in the young dragon's eyes as the repulsive smell of charred dragon wings filled the cave. Keagan let out a snort, not feeling any remorse for what he had done. Instead he turned and walked back into the circle, giving his two brothers a smirk.

'He's so slow, and fat, and useless. I hope Buffer decides to put me against someone else next time,' were the fire dragon's thoughts.

Eldawin curled around himself, his wings not quite as responsive as they usually were. His small whimpers echoed in the cave. He could feel the eyes of the others on him. He could feel their pity, their sorrowful looks. That was all he ever felt from them. He couldn't hate them. But he hated what they were thinking. If only he could trade his sky-blue scales for the deep red of a fire dragon, or ocean blue of a water dragon... or even be a wind dragon like his mother. He would accept that. But no, fate decided to stick him as the first mind-reader dragon, with the weakest element on the spectrum.

"Get up Eldawin," he heard Buffer say, "Go to Pantela. Get your wings healed."

Slowly the young drake forced himself to his feet, his body shivering in pain. He couldn't fold his wings, so he held them out as much as he could as he began to walk out of the cave, his head lowered as he tried not to cry. The thoughts of his classmates followed him.

'Poor Eldawin,' the water dragoness named Seashell thought.

'His wings are charred black... ouch,' the earth drake, Timber, thought.

'Not again. Keagan needs to learn to control his flame,' the acid dragoness, Timber's sister, Tirella, growled mentally.

There were four clutches that made up Eldawin's class. The most prominent were the three fire brothers, Keagan, Kander, and Kent, the sons of the leader of the underground haven. Then there was Tirella and Timber, the acid dragoness and her earth brother, one of the few two-dragon clutches. Acid dragons were green dragons that ranged from light green to dark swamp green and had strange colourful patters on the inside of their legs and a dangerous poisonous barb at the end of their tail. The next clutch was Seashell, her water brother Swivel, and her wind sister, East. Water dragons looked nearly identical to fire, except with deep blue scales and light blue underbelly, and wind dragons were a nice creamy white that faded to nearly brown. They also had incredibly large wings for their smaller size.

Eldawin ignored them all as he walked out of the room, or at least tried to. It was hard to ignore the thoughts about him. He held back his tears as he padded into one of the many long corridors of the haven. He couldn't feel any minds around him, besides the ones where he had just come from. He was glad though. He didn't want anyone to see him with burnt wings and tears on his snout.

Thankfully, Pantela's cave was not far away, and he found himself getting a little excited at seeing her again. The one good thing about his tail constantly being kicked was that he was often sent to the life dragoness after. She was one of the few dragons who's mind he liked to read, and she was the only one who didn't see him as a weak no good who should simply learn to be powerful, and she had a lot of hidden secrets that were always fun to find. She didn't seem to mind that he knew them either.

He walked slowly toward the entrance of the cave; the fire pits dug into the walls of the corridor offering more than enough light for the young dragon to see. He immediately felt Pantela's wonderful mind as she rested in her cave. He saw images of a land unknown, a massive mountain that stretched high into the sky and hundreds of dragons of all different species flying around it, species he had never seen except through the minds of others.

As he poked her head around the corner he let out a small trill to make her aware of his presence. Her head popped up when she saw him, giving him a soft smile. It wasn't a fake smile. She was genuinely happy to see him. Her smile quickly disappeared however as she saw the state of his wings.

With a sigh she pushed herself up from her nest, "What happened this time?"

"Keagan scorched my wings," Eldawin said, walking inside and using his forepaws to quickly wipe away the tears.

"Yowch," she rumbled as she took a step toward him, studying the burns, "He went a little overboard this time."

"It really hurt," Eldawin pouted.

'That worthless lizard,' Pantela's thoughts echoed in her head, 'They are lucky I am here, or Eldawin would never be able to fly again.'

"I bet it did," she said out loud, leaning down so her head was just above his wings.

She opened her mouth and let the most wonderful green energy flow outwards, smothering the blackened burns. Eldawin purred in delight as the pain was swiftly replaced by the cool and lovely power of a life dragon, the burns steadily disappearing as his wings were made whole again. As she healed him, Eldawin studied her mind, wondering what new things he could find. It seemed he always did.

Pantela was an interesting dragoness, as the only reason she was there was because of the desperate plea of help Sapher, Eldawin's constantly worried mother, had sent out. She had been worried that she had only lain one egg, and both parents agreed that they needed some help in making sure he had survived. Laying one egg never happened, so they had cause to be worried.

The reason the life dragon had come however wasn't for the reason she was called. It seemed the dragons of her home, Sky Mountain, knew what a single egg meant, and Pantela had been sent to make sure that the new species of dragon not only survived, but that more were hatched. At first the life dragon had been upset about being chosen for this job, but now she enjoyed it. Eldawin knew that without her he likely wouldn't have survived so long. She had already saved his life from several mortal injuries given to him by the other hatchlings.

She was fascinated by him as well. Through her head he could see many uses for his power, and the possibilities of what it could mean. He could snuff out traitors, see other's true selves, and figure out where the best hunting spots were. All things that were incredibly useful. She also believed that there was much more to his powers that they hadn't figured out yet. He didn't hold quite the same hope, but he enjoyed fantasising about what he might be able to do in the future.

The only thing that really made him uneasy around the dragoness was that she seemed rather intent on taking him back to her home when he was old enough. Eldawin didn't want to go. It was much safer underground, away from the horrors outside. Sure, the survival rate of hatchlings wasn't high either way, as there was barely enough food to go around, but it was much safer than the horrors of the beings that lived on the surface. He had seen in many of his elders heads the pain they had gone through before they found this underground haven.

Pantela stepped back with a smile as her job was done. Eldawin said a quick thank you, giving his wings a flap. They felt as good as new. It always surprised him how easily the life dragon healed his wounds, no matter how bad they were. He understood she was quite a powerful dragon for her species, but what she managed to do for him was startling.

"Alright, off you go," she said, bumping him toward the exit of the cave with her paw, "Try not to get too badly battered again Eldawin."

"Aww... can't I stay with you. I don't want to deal with my mom's head now," he told her.

She laughed, "I know, but you have to learn to. Have you been practicing what I asked you to?"

"Yes," he lied, knowing very well he hadn't.

Pantela seemed to think that if he delved deep into someone else's thoughts that he might be able to control them. The thought of doing such a thing frightened young Eldawin for a few reasons. First, he didn't like going too deep into other's minds, as there was a lot of pain that he didn't want to see, and second, the thought of controlling another dragon made him a little queasy. It didn't seem right to force himself to do that. Besides, he doubted he could do such a thing anyway.

The life dragon tilted her head. She knew he was lying, somehow, but didn't say anything about it. Instead she sighed, "Well keep trying. You never know. You might find something out about yourself that you never knew before."

He bobbed his head, before turning around and racing out of the cave. With a flap of his wings he pushed himself into the air, flying back to where his cave was. He mentally prepared himself for the erratic thoughts of his mother, and tiresome thoughts of his father, and turned the corner to fly inside.