The great War between Dragons left fire and ruin and death in its wake. It ruined more lives than could be counted and continued to ruin them long after it ended and Dragonkind had disappeared into the pages of legends and children's stories. Cities were levelled. Entire nations wiped out in minutes of combat. The side that could be considered allies to humans were vastly outnumbered. They knew they needed more soldiers if they hoped to survive. If the humans they protected hoped to survive as well. And then an idea formed. Something to bolster their forces.
Had the eager, smiling, happy faces that unknowingly volunteered and been volunteered to be Dragon Slayers known that the ritual would make them outcasts, would change them on every level. Make them more, and simultaneously less then human. Had they known, they might have chosen differently. Or resisted the council of their elders. But they were just innocent children. They didn't know any better.
By the time they were older, it was hard to imagine the Dragon Slayers as ever having been anything as good or innocent as children.
The Dragons learned early on that it worked better with children. They took to it easier and with less chance of rejection and excruciating death. But the more they used the magic given to them, the more they changed. Slowly at first, before the violence of the war they were thrown into, the blood and the death, the anxiety amplified the side effects their 'parents' had hoped would be minor.
Braca truly believed that his Dragon magic was a disease.
"I don't give a fuck what Belserion says! If that Dragon bitch wants to fly her fucking high and mighty tail down here and rescue those hostages herself, she bloody well can, till then? I'm in charge. And when I say we push forward, you move your fucking backside! So consider them casualties of war if you want but that warehouse gets levelled. Am I understood?" The storehouse once destroyed would force a massive retreat. With no food for their soldiers, the enemy would be forced to withdraw.
There were a few unhappy mumbles from the men and women, his fellow Dragon Slayers, surrounding him, but reluctantly they all seemed to accept that. Their commander, here, now, had issued an order, for most they didn't see an option but to agree. Though not a single person there liked it. They all knew that Irene Belserian rarely gave an order like a retreat without very good reason. The first Dragon Slayer, now turned reluctant Dragon, was cunning and liked to plan out these battles beforehand. Wage the outcomes carefully. Maybe this would be the order that cost Braca his position, there were surely no shortage of Dragon Slayers hoping that to be the case. Despite a love of the fight, they were all sick of war.
The Dragon Slayers filed away. It was easy to tell the strongest in the group; scales now where their skin should be, clawed fingers. The newest generation would never have this problem, they'd be less, but have more control. More balance. But it was too late for them. They were too old. Gone too far. Their fates were sealed. They would eventually become Dragon's themselves. Doomed to eons of self loathing and loneliness.
"You shouldn't speak to them like that," A young girl no more than about fifteen appeared at his side, chastising him. "You aren't doing yourself any favors, you know, Irene is already pissed off about Cardis Valley. We should just withdraw!" Her eyes were glassy. "You know some of them won't be coming back..."
Braca's hard grey eyes snapped to the young girl.
"This is war. People die...and sometimes I give the orders that kill them. But if we don't, plenty of innocent people will in our place," He argued.
The enemy Dragons had withdrawn, all but beaten by the Dragon Slayers, but their new enemy had come in the form of humans, hearts filled with hate for anything and everything related to Dragon kind; even for the regular humans allied to them and living under their protection.
At present, armies were sweeping the land in the chaotic aftermath, burning crops and murdering innocent civilians. Most of whom had come to their Kingdom as refugees fleeing the wild Dragons, understanding that the only ones equipped to defeat them also happened to be ones themselves. Many of the Dragon Slayers had been orphans among these groups. Children too young to remember the monsters that dropped from the sky and murdered their families. Too young to realise their precious adoptive parents were those demons' kin.
There were many Dragon Slayers with regrets. Those were the only ones Braca trusted. If you knew the price to be paid and the truth of their existence, and still sought that power, well, there was something very fucking wrong with you.
"I... I understand all of that. But that doesn't give you the right to throw away their lives," Withering slightly under his hard gaze. "They're my friends," She half pleaded.
"I know... " He whispered. The cold exterior melting somewhat." You're your mothers daughter. Too soft hearted," He murmured, planting a light kiss on the crown of her skull.
"You weren't calling her soft when she was chasing you round the house with that skillet..." The girl laughed. "Merciless, I think was the word you used."
"Well, there are certainly reasons I married her..." Braca spared a quiet chuckle before tempering himself again. "I wish an end to this war, just like everyone else... and you don't win wars by retreating."
"Then let me fight, too!" Somewhere in their talking she'd grabbed his wrist. "My ice magic is much better than it was, I can help them," But the plea fell short.
"It's not good enough. Compared to a Dragon Slayer it will never be good enough. If I dropped you in that battlefield you'd only get in their way. They'd be as likely to kill you as the enemy," He rasped. His daughters eyes had teared up and he felt a hollow ache in his chest at the half lie that caused it.
He cupped her cheek, wincing as she pulled away from him, wiping her eyes.
"I want better from you, Vita, I want to know your life will be different to mine. That's why I'm fighting. For you! For your future," Braca pulled her back to him gently. "Yours and your mother's are the only fates I can change," He whispered.
"SIR!"
Braca heaved heavy sigh, withdrawing with a snarl.
"What!?" He barked. The Dragon Slayer had yet to develop more than a few obvious scales but he'd figured he had the temper of a Dragon already.
"They've hit some sort of barrier at the warehouse. Some kind of rune shield that they can't get through. The rest of the Dragon Slayers are sitting ducks in that town. You need to call for a retrea...ughhhh,"
Braca took the man off the ground by his throat.
"What I truly need are better soldiers," He growled and his daughter took several steps back from him. Day by day they lost more of him, more of all of them to the magic they carried. Or maybe to the violence, the bloodshed of war. Vita couldn't tell anymore.
"Dad?" His daughters voice wavered as she spoke. His mood swings were growing worse.
Braca snatched her by the collar and jerked her with him as he walked. The girl letting out a startled yelp.
"You want me to send you out with them, fine, let me show you what you should be expecting."
Braca surveyed the scene from a hill overlooking the town. The Dragon Slayers he'd sent to take out their enemies food stores had been surrounded. Over three hundred berserkers at their rear pinning them between the barrier they couldn't breach and the living weapons their enemy had made to counter them. The closest a human could come to a Dragon Slayer's true savagery without that vile Dragon magic these humans despised so much. Berserkers in these kinds of numbers made for a steep challenge, even for veteran Dragon Slayers.
But like them, Berserkers weren't invincible.
"Get me a canister of black wyvern venom," Braca ordered and the young Dragon Slayer with them blanched.
"... but, there could still be people hiding in that town," He stumbled over his words.
"Don't be a fucking fool. The only people in that town are our men, and our enemy," He snapped.
The man fumbled in bag for the container and reluctantly handed it over.
Braca turned to glare evenly at his daughter.
"Don't you dare look away," He uttered darkly. If she wanted to go to war that badly, he'd show her what she was asking him for.
With greater than human strength Braca hurled the canister overhead, the vessel sailing nearly a hundred feet before smashing amongst the crowd of berserkers releasing a mist that spread, burning their skin away like acid; those that inhaled it died silently, though far from painlessly, capable of only thrashing as the venom devolved their vocal cords, lungs, lips, leaving behind grotesque, fleshless grins.
The acid continued to spread, passing through the injured Dragon Slayers harmlessly. Wyvern venom was their secret weapon. Dragons were close enough to the mindless beasts to be uneffected by the poison, and that was a resistance the Dragon Slayers had all inherited. Not so much for the regular people fighting them, or their berserker mages.
Panicked screams, shrieks sounded from inside the warehouse as the acid drifted unhindered beyond the shield and crept inside.
Braca felt an unfamiliar pain in his chest, a burning ache that put his lungs in a vice. A sudden blinding terror took hold and to his daughter's startled features he bolted from their hiding spot down toward the small town. Feet pounding dirt. Lightheaded with an indescribable fear.
He ran right through the sea of liquefied bodies, blood and gore splashing his legs and soaking his boots before he made it to the warehouse, coliding with the still active barrier and falling to his knees. In his chest, his very soul, there was a painful, festering space and he knew without a shadow of a doubt his wife had been in that building. Hostages. Belserion had mentioned hostages. Told him to withdraw, to cancel the attack. But he hadn't known his wife was among them.
She'd been in there. He knew that with the same certainty that he knew she was dead. That he'd killed her. He'd killed his wife, more than that, his mate. Braca barely heard the muttering around him. The man didn't even realise he was wailing; digging his hands into the dirt, screaming like he was giving voice to the army of Berserkers he'd silently just slain.
Inside him, his spirit lay broken. An inescapable guilt poisoning him.
Someone put their hand on his shoulder and Braca snapped, teeth bared he turned, hands now suddenly white granite claws, every tooth a fang, eyes gleaming murder. The Dragon Slayer that had dared to touch him, to check him because he certainly wasn't responding to words, roared as he plunged an open hand straight through her. Blood flowing like a fountain as the life left her eyes, body twitching. When he pulled back his bloody claws the corpse fell to the dirt, unmoving.
The remaining Dragon Slayers stepped back, a group now gathering to hide the sight of their deranged commander from his daughter, the girl trying to push through to see something that they knew would haunt her forever.
She wouldn't forgive them for it, but they also knew they would have to kill him.
There were reasons that Dragon Slayers fell in love and got married, but never exposed their partners to their Dragon Slayer magic. Kept it out of their relationships completely, no matter the urge to bond with them like their Dragons did with their chosen halfs.
Losing a wife, or a husband, a daughter or a son, that was painful. An unimaginable grief.
But losing a mate... that was downright dangerous.