Inspired by The Dragon's Rose by QueenOfPlotTwists

It was many a year ago, at least by mortal reckoning when a proud and magnificent family ruled the lands from a shining castle of marble and stone. They were both fierce and protective, yet kind and loyal and fair. Their reign was a golden age and the people were eternally grateful to them. It wasn't always like this, however. The royal family had been faced with many foes over the years. The most fierce and dangerous of the enemies came from within their castle.

The royal family had always had a royal sorcerer to protect and entertain them, but one day, the sorcerer's young, orphan apprentice found him experimenting with dark magic.

He had been planning on overthrowing the royal family for years. The apprentice immediately went to inform the King. The sorcerer was promptly exiled to the farthest mountains and his family name banished from the realm. The townspeople and the country flourished under the peaceful and prosperous reign of the King, Queen, and their son. The King, though had eccentric and unorthodox manners of ruling the kingdom, was an exceptionally good King.

His Queen was his equal in every way, an eccentric warrior whose strong spirit and golden heart could not be tamed.

Both loved their people and made the fact known both within and outside the walls of the castle. But the most beloved of all the royal family was the only son. He was truly a handsome man both externally and within. A proud and stubborn man but with a will as strong as a dragon and a heart brighter than gold, eyes as beautiful and green as a stunning emerald. Though it was uncommon in that day and age, the royals spent as much time among their citizens as they could.

Among his people, the prince was kind and fair, but when the people were in danger he defended them with the ferocity and power of a dragon, earning him a nickname.

The Dragon Lord. The people loved their rulers and their rulers loved their people, but the dark destiny of all kingdoms would soon doom this peaceful paradise. Deep in the mountains, the exiled sorcerer swore vengeance upon the royal family for their betrayal and his thirst for the crown. Yet above all he despised the prince. He envied the prince with all his soul. He hated how the people loved and respected him, how everyone idolized the Dragon Lord instead of him.

He hated how the prince commanded the love, respect, and attention of everyone who laid eyes on him without even trying.

He hated how, while he'd had to struggle and work for every little thing his entire life, the people simply gave the Dragon Lord their love on a silver platter. Yet the prince did nothing with it. Even if the King and Queen were the true rulers, the exiled sorcerer knew without a shadow of a doubt that it was the Dragon Lord who had the kingdom's love and respect. He vowed one day to return and rip away everything the Prince loved and treasured so deeply.

He wanted to do it in the most malicious and unforgiving manner he could concoct.

Banished to the darkest shadows and forced to live a solitary existence, his hatred festered until it consumed him. One dark day, after years of training in the dark arts, his bitterness, jealousy, and rage allowed him to unlock the darkest, unforgiving arts of the Cursed Realm. The darkness that consumed him made him a prisoner of his power yet afforded him the ability to control some of the darkest magic. Only one thing burned within his poisoned mind now. His never-ending lust for vengeance...

It was a day that should've been a day of great celebration. The Prince's coronation on his 21st birthday, the day he became a man, and the day he would be no longer known as the Dragon Lord, but the King. It was on this day that everything changed. The sorcerer, wearing a mask of glamour to hide his black hair and the wickedness in his eyes with an appearance more commonly seen among the people attended the new king's majesty with a terrible plan.

He was going to make the new king and his family suffer for their crimes against his person.

Only after everyone else had presented their gifts and their best wishes and promises to their beloved prince, the King stood from his throne, holding in his hands a magnificently sculpted crown in the shape of a majestic silver dragon with eyes of emerald and powerful onyx wings. Just as the King was about to crown his son, the Sorcerer revealed himself and spoke his impossible demands. He commanded that the Dragon Lord relinquish his crown and his throne to him or great doom would befall them all.

Naturally, the prince refused, claiming nothing would convince him to relinquish his throne and the lives of his people and loved ones to a madman.

The sorcerer's eyes narrowed at the defiant royals before a smile struck his face; a smile that sent a shiver of fear down the spines of everyone present, chilling everyone in the room to the bone. As the royal guards attacked and the people rushed to escape, the Sorcerer's wicked eyes turned black. Shadows and dark purple energy flooded his body as the sorcerer unleashed a deadly wave of black magic, consuming the entire throne room. While the townspeople had already escaped, the servants and those loyal to the royals refused to leave and screamed in anguish and fear as their very essences warped to that of the dark master's sick desires.

The sorcerer's dark magic ensnared the royals, and the King and Queen vanished before the prince's eyes.

The Sorcerer refused to reveal to the devastated prince what had become of his parents. He then invoked the magic of the Cursed Realm and placed a terrible curse upon the castle and a spell upon the kingdom. Proclaiming doom on the royal family and all who served them, friends and servants alike, the servants of the castle were warped into new forms for their loyalty, ones of creatures from the realm of fantasy. As for the prince himself, the Sorcerer wanted him to suffer the most.

He wanted to see him wither away and suffer alone in solitude and anguish just as he had suffered, before extracting the final act of his vengeance.

So he cursed him with the most terrible form of all. The form of the dragon. But his form was cursed to be neither monster nor human, but something awful in between. Trapped as a prisoner within his own body, with only his most loyal of followers in bodies no human would dare trust, he was imprisoned within his castle. To entertain himself, the Sorcerer gave the prince an ultimatum. The prince would have a century to find his one true love and break the curse.

It couldn't just be anyone, however.

It had to be a person that could accept the King for the monster he was, or else his soul and the souls of all the servants would never know peace and would instead be trapped within the dark depths of the Cursed Realm for all eternity. With a maniacal laugh and a haunting scream, he vanished, claiming to return once his time had come. The prince let out a shallow gasp as he collapsed to his knees before he screamed in horror at the body that was no longer his.

Instead of human hands, black claws had replaced his fingers and scaled paws his hands.

Thick scales and black talons adorned his arms. At his feet were the back legs and claws of a dragon. Confused and scared he turned to his servants, each holding a sad expression on their faces, and when a mirror was raised to the prince's face, he screamed. Black scales adorned his body, torso, and chest, a powerful, whip-like tail sprouted from behind him. From his shoulder blades sprouted two enormous wings large enough to consume his body, glittering with blood as they ripped from his skin.

But most terrifying of all were his eyes.

No longer were they the brilliant green he had grown up with, nor were they human. Instead, he saw the dark brown eyes and slit-like pupils of a dragon staring back at him in horror and fear. It was just as the sorcerer cursed him. He was neither dragon nor man but something terrible in-between. His servants and friends urged him not to lose hope, that they would find his love, whoever it may be, and rescue his parents from the evil Sorcerer.

But it wasn't long before hope began to fade.

As the years passed, he fell into despair. His followers and the people he'd worked so hard to protect refused to leave him or abandon the castle. The rest of the world forgot as the long years of the century rolled by. Alone in the castle, the prince began to chill and stiffen, angered and bitter towards the world that shunned him so cruelly as a horrible monster. As hope became an illusion scorned by the prince, his lonely heart grew cold and desolate.

But his servants never lost hope.

They prayed to the gods for aid, to save their master from the malicious fate cursed upon him and to help him find his love. They trusted their Master to find his love, knowing that whoever it may be would have to be a special soul to earn the heart and rescue the soul of their master. However, it didn't stop the servants from wondering who would lift their curse. They wondered who was the Dragon Lord's one true love...