Leyazara

The Middle Earth was nothing like the Diragonistan. Everything seemed so powerful and mighty: the mountains with their sharp and dark rocks, standing fierce above the clouds, the turbulent streams that ran down to the valleys with the violence of a herd of oliphants, the ginormous trees that cloaked hills and lowlands…

Leyazara had to admit that she was quite intrigued by that savage and hostile world, so different from the land she came from.

Until that moment, the most difficult part of her journey had been crossing the Holy Mountain Chain. She had almost lost the use of her wings, because of the ice and the snow that had covered them. It was always winter on the top of those mounts and her coloured feathers couldn't do anything against the cold, since they covered only her backbone from the head to the tail. However, Leyazara never stopped; she kept flying even if all of her body was trembling without any control.

No one of her kind ever tried to go beyond those mountains. According to the stories, there was nothing on the other side but desolation, desert and death, but now Leyazara was seeing with her own eyes how wrong they were. Itching to explore those unknown lands, the dragoness kept flying for entire days, and sometimes even for entire nights. Until that moment, she hadn't seen neither other dragons nor humans yet. The thought that she had just discovered a new land excited Leyazara more than everything.

Probably in the Diragonistan, all the dragons believed that she was dead, telling to their younglings that Leyazara had dared the Valars and They punished her behaviour.
"Don't get too close to The Holy Mountains or you will end like Leyazara!" they would say.
The dragoness chuckled to herself, imagining the faces of all of them when she would come back alive and with thousand stories to tell. She would be remembered as the dragoness that reached the opposite coast of the continent, the brave explorer that crossed the line imposed by Valars and returned.

At the end of the twentieth day since Leyazara had crossed the mountains, she reached a river, so wide that it look like a lake or a sea. The dragoness could barely see the other shore. The surface was rippling gently, following the flux of the current, which was powerful enough to drawn an incautious dragon. A deep dark blue, just like the scales of Leyazara, coloured the water. She wondered if even in this unknown land there were enormous waterfalls like in the Diragonistan.

The dragoness drank avidly from the river, tired and thirsted after the long journey she did that day. The water was refreshing and cool. While she started to wet the peacock-like feathers on her head, sighing relaxed and thinking that it would be a perfect place to sleep during the night, Leyazara smelled a scent. It was new but familiar at the same time. It smelled like cinder and sulphur, mingled with masculine pheromones. After a few instant, she had no doubt that it was the scent of a dragon, even if it seemed so different from the one of dragons like her.
The track was less than a week old, so the dragon could have been just a few miles away.

Leyazara felt a thrill, as she became aware of the fact that she had just discovered a new dragon specie. Innumerable questions stared to crowd together in her mind: how did these dragons look? Were they similar to her? Did they live in nests or were they lone? Why did they smell like a volcano?
A few instant later, the dragoness was following the smell towards north. Her curiosity was stronger than the fear of finding an enemy. However, Leyazara checked the spine on her tail, making sure it was sharp enough. She opened her fan-like feathers on her tail, revealing the secret weapon of her specie. It looked like a human blade but it was as long as an adult man and it could kill a dragon, perforating the armour made up by his scales.

Her spine in that moment was perfect. The dragoness would be ready to fight if this dragon that she was chasing became a threat.

With a new energy, Leyaraza soared again in the sky, flying towards the source of the river. She followed the river for many miles. Probably the dragon wanted to stay close to water so that he could find easily something to eat. In fact, the third day since the pursuit was begun she found the bones of a bear right on the shore. The smell of the dragon was stronger on them; the track was just a few days old.

Afraid of losing too much time, the dragoness barely hunt during this chase and she slept just a couple of hours a day. She didn't want to lose the track, and with it the chance to see a new kind of dragon. The smell of sulphur and cinder was everyday stronger, just like Leyaszara was getting closer to a volcano.
On the horizon, a solitary mountain was standing high above the forests and the river. It seemed that the dragon was going exactly to that ginormous peak.

After seven days, the dragoness was less than a mile away from the dragon. The stomach reminded her that she wouldn't be able to fight without energy, so Leyazara stopped an entire afternoon to hunt a big boar. The taste of the meat seemed even better after many days without food. Curiosity made her forget that her body was weakening.
Then, she controlled one last time that the spine on her tail was ready and after she honed it a little bit, the dragoness was ready to meet the dragon.

The scent guided her to a smaller branch of the river that flew in a wood. Trees where so high that they could perfectly allow a dragon walk underneath them. The air was pleasantly cool, despite it was summer, thanks to the big leaves that filtered sunbeams. Leyazara heard the sound of a waterfall and, in fact, she founded one after a few minutes, but the smell of the dragon was disappeared. She sighed frustrated. Probably the water concealed the scent she followed for a week. But…but it had to be somewhere nearby!

She heard a low and guttural hiss coming from the inferior level of the waterfall. She stopped, listening carefully and opening her fan-like tail. Was it the dragon? Did he smelled her?
The dragoness waited, fearing that the dragon would attack her at any moment, but nothing happened. She was hearing only the thud of water.
Cautiously, she reached the edge with stealthy steps. Looking down, she finally saw the creature she chased for days, while he was drinking at the river.

The first thing Leyazara noticed was that he didn't have any feathers on him. He seemed bigger than her, with the muscular boy fully covered of green scales, which were darker near his backbone and lighter in the inferior part. Just like Leyazara, the wings of the dragon were fused together with his front paws, looking like a couple of enormous furled sails. The lineaments of his snout were sharp and marked, as though they had been sculpted in the stone.

Within a few moments, curiosity took the place of fear. Finally the dragoness had the chance to talk to a dragon of a different specie, but what if he would become aggressive? Yet, the desire of talking to him was stronger every instant that passed. She also wanted to ask him why did he smelled like a volcano.

Leyazara had always been a good fighter and a brave traveller, but when her greatest defect showed up, the curiosity, she couldn't help acting like a cub. For example in that moment, her tail was moving quickly because of the excitement.

Suddenly, the dragon stopped drinking and looked directly in her direction. His eyes, as yellow as the purest of the topaz and with a vertical pupil, enchained the ones of Leyazara, as green as her feathers. He saw her.

Author's note: Hey guys! How are you? Did you like the new chapter? What do you think about it?
If you have seen some mistake, please tell me and don't be shy. I'm here to practise my English, so your help would be appreciated.
Then I've a few thing to say regarding the story:
1) Diragonistan means "The land of dragons" in Aramaic. It comes from "Diragoni" that means "dragon" and "-stan", which means "Land".
2) This story is inspired by DONOVA94's fiction "Dragon-bound", but I guarantee that the story would be very different, although situations may be similar. Soon you will realize that Leyazara is nothing like Saphira and there will be a lot of new characters.
3) I think that in the fourth chapter we will see Smaug for the first time. What do you think will happen?
Stay tuned and pleas leave me a comment if you like the story.