Callum looked down below the dragon's back. They were high in the sky, the lands below looked small and insignificant. Vast forests and tall mountains looked like patches of grass and ant hills. He was mesmerised by how lush and green Xadia was. He had never seen the human lands from high above but knew it was a mostly desolate place. Before humans were banished there, very few chose to live there. Those who did were hardened and lived a modest life without comfort. Xadia wasn't like that, at least that's how it appeared to Callum from high above, everything seemed plentiful.

Callum realised they had been hopelessly naive. Bringing Zym back might stop the imminent war, but it wouldn't change much in the long run. Humans and magical beings would still hate each other. Eventually, another incident would set off another war that would destroy both sides.

He had hoped his learning to connect to magic would in some way foster greater understanding between the elves and dragons and the humans. He had underestimated just how deep the hatred and fear went. He knew the human side already, Viren, his step-father Harrow, his aunt Amaya all feared and loathed the power of the elves and dragons. Humans had been banished for crimes their distant ancestors had committed. Humans lived their lives realising justice was dictated by those with power. Their fear and hatred made them unable to consider peace as an option, the very idea seemed ludicrous to them. Elves and dragons considered humans to be cold and heartless beings who had hunted their kind for power and had struck down the dragon king and his only egg, unprovoked. Humans were so corrupt and vicious the elves and dragons feared what humans might be capable of. They didn't see humans as beings but rather as monsters and had cast them away.

A small gesture such as returning the dragon prince wouldn't do much to change either side's beliefs.

Peace seemed to be an impossible prospect.

This made him wonder exactly what Sol Regem was upto.

A small fire burned at the center of his forehead. He didn't feel any heat from it or any connection to it. Unless he looked at it by squinting his eyes up, he wouldn't even know it was there. The moment he accepted the dragon's pledge, it had appeared. Sol Regem said it was a mark of his pledge and would disappear when the promise had been fulfilled.

Rayla had been quiet the entire time.

"It wasn't your fault" Callum tried to console her.

"I shouldn't have revealed your secrets" she said apologetically.

"I'm still alive thanks to you. If I had done it my way I'd probably be dead" Callum said.

"What do you mean?" Rayla asked.

"I was going to ask the Dragon Queen to teach me" Callum said, "Now I know that might have got me killed."

"You were expecting the Dragon Queen to teach you personally?" Rayla asked, incredulous.

"Well, a few tips maybe. And maybe point me towards some books I could devour. Answer a few questions here and there" he suddenly realised maybe it was unlikely, "Its not too much is it?" Callum asked.

"She's the queen, Callum. She will barely have time to talk to Zym, much less you. I mean, I'm sure she'd be grateful to you for returning her son to her, but she does have royal duties, She'd have a war to stop, I hope" Rayla said.

"Oh" Callum said despondently.

"I'm sure there would have been other people who could teach you more about Sky magic. I mean once they got past the whole "He's the first human to ever learn magic, kill him" bit" Rayla smiled. Sol Regem looked back at them for a moment but said nothing.

Callum was happy to see her in a slightly better mood.

Sol Regem descended for a break. The dragon stopped near an elven village. He tasked them with gathering supplies. They would arrive at the Dragon Queen's palace tomorrow and they'd need enough supplies to last them until then. He also reminded Callum not to do any magic under any circumstances, even if no one realised he was human, even if his life was in danger. Callum thought this was too cautious but didn't see any strong reason to object and agreed. Sol Regem took Zym on some flying lessons far from the village.

When the dragons were gone, Rayla set about preparing a disguise for Callum. His ears were easily covered with a scarf but his extra fingers were a problem. They decided that Callum was an elf who had lost his arms. He tucked his arms into his shirt and let the empty sleeves flow freely. She found some Morok leaves to fill his shirt, so he appeared fatter and made his arms indistinguishable under his shirt. Morok leaves were thick and had a flesh-like feeling. Rayla circled around him a few times to look at him from all sides.

"Aren't elves supposed to be slim?" said Callum as he looked down at his poofy disguise.

"True. You'd be a much more believable dwarf than an elf" agreed Rayla.

"Wait, dwarfs are real?" Callum asked.

"Hmm, they hardly ever show themselves, a reclusive bunch. They prefer to live underground, but they are expert crafters." Rayla replied, "but a dwarf would draw too much attention, and would be hard for you to pull off convincingly anyway. Fat elf is acceptable, we'll say you have a condition." Rayla decided.

"What kind of condition?" Callum asked.

"You can't stop eating" Rayla laughed.

Callum wasn't amused.

"Ok, seriously. There is a condition where elves can enlarge because their magic backfired. You were doing a replication spell and someone bumped into you, distracting you, you lost control of the spell and became... poofy" she smiled in such a way Callum couldn't be sure whether she was making it up or not.

"Its a real thing, trust me" she winked. Callum didn't believe a word of it, but he at least believed he would be able to enter the village without raising suspicion. They started walking towards the village.

"I'm surprised humans invaded that far into Xadia and then made it back out" he was talking about the attack that killed the Dragon King.

"The Dragon King lived permanently at the border and so did the queen and their egg" Rayla said, "After that attack the queen moved far from the humans. I'm not sure of her reasons. Perhaps she feared another attack, perhaps it was too painful to stay where she lost everything or perhaps she feared she would, in her grief and anger, devastate the human race."

"Why hasn't she, you know, attacked humans?" Callum asked.

"It goes against our beliefs. We don't take lives needlessly. We treat each life as precious and unique, irreplacable. That's why we consider what the human dark mages did long ago so abhorrent. That's also why humans were banished and not killed" she said, "Of course we're not above our emotions. The Queen could have lost it on that day and declared war on all humans. It would have been against our beliefs, but she is the queen and we would have followed her decree. Her power as queen is why she has to bind her own feelings and always consider the greater good. It is her burden."

Callum didn't say anything. He felt he was understanding the elves and dragons a little bit better.

"What's it like being an assassin when you believe life to be precious?" he asked.

"I can't really call myself an assassin anymore as I've never killed anyone and don't plan to" Callum was surprised to hear her admission, "I trained as a warrior from a young age, and volunteered for the mission and was accepted because of my aptitude. I hesitated to kill the soldier who found us and let him go, which put us all in danger. If I could go back and do it again, I still wouldn't be able to kill him."

"You could have tied him up" Callum offered.

"Yes, that hadn't occured to me at the time. I was so focused on being an assassin I thought my only option to kill, which blinded me to the other possibilites," she said.

"So what are you going to do now?" Callum asked.

"Well I'll stick with you for now. You'll need a guide in Xadia. Then who knows, I'll let the river take me where it will" Rayla said.

"I'm glad you're here with me Rayla" Callum said with a smile.

Rayla smiled back.

The were now at the entrance of the village. The village was mostly houses, but there weren't many roads. There were many trees though. The village seemed to be perpetually living in shade.

The houses were made of wood like human houses, but the shapes were different. There weren't any joints anywhere, there seemed to be long pieces of wood coiling around. Rayla explained that the tree branches grew to create the houses at the elves' request. As they walked through the village, people seemed to be giving Callum looks of sympathy. He was absolutely certain it had nothing to do with his missing arm. Rayla turned her face away everytime he looked at her, but he was sure she was stiffling a laugh. He couldn't ask anyone because he didn't want them to suspect him. He just had to dejectedly forget about it and try to enjoy his time in the village as much as he could. They soon came to a market and Rayla bought some supplies. The food seemed similar to the food at home but there wasn't any meat or fish anywhere.

"Do elves abstain from meat because you don't like killing?" he asked.

"We do eat meat, but only from animals who have met a natural end" she explained "We rear animals and wait for them to die, rather than kill them. In the forests we take care of we have an understanding with the animal inhabitants. They will often offer their bodies to us before they die. We watch over them as they pass on. Its symbiosis. Their bodies help us to live and we help their children survive."

"That's amazing" Callum marvelled.

When they returned they found the two dragons had returned before them. Zym had fallen asleep and Sol Regem was looking off into the distance. They cooked the food they had gotten and for the first time in a long while had a hearty meal. When they'd finished, Sol Regem breathed a yellow fire. "You're not the first human to ever connect to magic."

Callum and Rayla stared at the dragon.

"Rayla could you translate that?" Callum asked, "I thought I heard him say I'm not the first human to have ever learned magic"

"No, that's what he said" Rayla said.

"It is said that magical creatures had always existed in Xadia. Humans arrived later, it is not known where they came from or how. Some say they came from another continent by their sea faring ships, others say that humans are the progeny of some foul creatures and sprang from the ground, dwarfs take offence to that, the ground is sacred to them after all. Humans did not have any connection to the land when they arrived, they were feeble and struggled to survive. The elves and the dwarves helped them by teaching them to grow and make tools. Humans had an insatiable apetite for learning. Humanity prospered and there was peace in Xadia." The dragon paused to allow Rayla to translate.

"Humans soon discovered magic and saught to learn it too. Perhaps because they were not from Xadia, they were not born with Aracani. The elves told them it wasn't possible to do magic without Arcani. Along with their insatiable apetite for knowledge, some of the humans were more stubborn than dwarfs. They lived among elves and dwarfs hoping to tap into magic. They eventually succeeded."

Callum was shocked to hear this forgotten history. Rayla too couldn't believe what she was hearing.

"They discovered two different paths to magic, both ended in tragedy. Humans learned by copying what they saw and in the first path they tried to learn magic by copying the elves, dwarfs and other magical creatures. They learned to sense the magic around them, but couldn't harness it. They concluded they couldn't directly manipulate magic, but had the idea to cooperate with magical creatures to manipulate magical sources. This form of magic was crude and very few could achieve the results an elf or a dwarf could. Many of them wanted more power and discovered that by sacrificing magical creatures they could attain great amounts of power. They weren't even bound by the rules that limited the magic of the elves and dwarves who could only perform their magic under certain conditions. This was the birth of dark magic." The dragon's red flames had started turning darker as he continued recounting history. The dark fires were sending chills through Callum's body and he felt as if he could feel the dragon's sorrow, contempt and rage. Rayla translated the dragon's words to him and then he had the context for those emotions.

"You know how they turned out. There was a second group of human would-be-mages who set out to find their own path. They came much later after dark magic had already become common practice among human mages. The elves had forbidden dark magic, but the dark mages continued their practice in secrecy. Perhaps because of the elves' decree or perhaps for their own reasons they seeked a different path to magic and like you they found it. They somehow constructed bridges of their own, and could connect directly to the primal sources. But their success was short lived. They couldn't control the magic they tapped into. We were born with Arcani, but it wasn't until these humans bridged themselves to the primal sources that we realised exactly what their purpose was. An arcanum shields a mage from the magic in case there is a problem. Human mages who tapped into magic directly had no shield and were usually destroyed"

"So Callum's life is in danger?" Rayla asked with concern. Callum hadn't understood much of what had been said, so this unexpected question threw him.

"Not immediately, he will be safe so long as he doesn't do magic again" Sol Regem replied.

Rayla was relived. But she knew it would be heartbreaking for Callum.

Callum felt as if his world had been plunged into darkness.

(Author's note: There is a slight ret-con here. I wrote previously that Callum showing his magic was redefining the rules of magic for Sol Regem. Now I'm changing it to Sol Regem already knew about humans being able to do magic. I'm sort of figuring things out as I go, sorry for the confusion. Hopefully there won't be too many such changes and the story will remain substantially the same)