Snippet #2321240

Gliding along on a sea of cotton and cream, Galiran was in a state of bliss. Whatever petty little disputations were going on beneath the layer of clouds mattered not to him, for he did not want to impede his relaxed state with such stresses. Although the air was thinner high in the sky, Galiran accepted this setback with the benefit that came with it. Being above the clouds allowed him to see far beyond the horizon, and no creature could get within twenty klicks of him without being spotted. Plus, no one on the ground would expect they had a neighbor in the sky just behind that cloudy door. With the glistening sun warming his scales, and the airy blanket of a jet stream settling gently under him, he young dragon thought that he might doze off. On the other hand, waking up in free fall did not sound quite as relaxing, and Galiran shifted his wings to get more blood flowing.

It was one of those partly cloudy days that cleverly balanced the gloom of a winter sky with the jubilee of a summer one. Having finished his morning routine, Galiran had decided to fly up to the more overcast part of the heavens and practice his gliding. While he was a proficient enough flier, it was gliding that really got one places, and learning to endure a long flight was a skill he needed to hone. After all, what would he do if he got into a situation where he couldn't land? Say, over the sea?

After a long while of travel, Galiran had completed an arbitrarily determined circuit, and he lazily searched for a break in the clouds. Finding a gap, he gazed through it, and looked down at the agrarian countryside. He sweeped his eyes to the North, and he saw the golden fields of the privileged and elite, the grains flowing in the wind looked almost more noble than their masters. The fields to the South and West looked almost the same as the fields of the nobles, but with many more breaks between plots where roads for troops had been slashed through the countryside. While these fields outwardly displayed prosperity, by the ends of the season a good portion of it would be gone to taxes, famine, and rampaging armies. Galiran then looked East, to the Moorish wasteland that had once housed the great population centers of the nation. Now with ground blackened and fields bloodied, it showed only the signs that the Wraith wanted it to. Signs of a recently crushed rebellion.

Galiran recoiled at the thought of the last revolt against Shade's power. Like he did with all revolutions, the crafty warlord sent only his weakest human armies to fight the rabble, those armies filled with conscripts from troublesome districts. Only after false confidence had been instilled in the rebels and Shade's political enemies eliminated did he crush them with his endless forces of Wraiths, ravaging the district for decades to come. It was here that Galiran headed, for it was there that he stayed with his companions in the little pocket of rebellion that still remained.

Sighing, Galiran left the protection of the clouds and descended to the ground as quick as was safe, landing in a small wooded field. It wouldn't do to have loyalist peasants seeing a dragon falling from the sky.