*This story contains quotes written by famous dragons. ~Toothless

**These quotes will be named with the human name for the species of dragon who said the quote. Thanks to Jimmy for naming them accordingly. ~Toothless


'As a Dragon, once a Dragon, to be a Dragon, to see a Dragon. How the humans see us is different to how we see us.' ~Deserteye*, Sand Buster**


-It All Begins With Tragedy-


It's tough to start an autobiography. Where do you even begin? You can't start from the very beginning because as far as you're concerned I could just be making it up for dramatization. I could tell stories as told by my sire and dam*, but that comes with the complication that… well, how do I put this? They both no longer roam the land of the living. But if it was to be my understanding, I wasn't anywhere near the age where an episodic memory of such an event even occurred. My earliest memory dates back to when I was six months old, and even that is surrounded by a tinge of uncertainty. To put it as simply and succinctly as possible: I don't even know where I came from.

It's especially bad as a figure of my status because most of my stories would rely on the knowledge of a sire or dam or both. But I have neither. Or at least, neither for my exact hatching date. I still have an adoptive dam, but as far as I can tell, she only found me at two or three days after hatching. Or so she assumes, anyhow. There's only so much deducing a dragon of a completely different species can do to guess the age of a hatchling dragon she's just found wandering the woods. For as troubling as this is, I could attempt to summarize what likely happened, but remember, this is pure speculation.

I hatched from my egg in the very late hours of the night, in a rather undignified specimen. If my almost expert ability to trip over myself is anything to go by, this surely was the case. I slowly adjusted my eyes to the new lights I had to take in; a pile of logs burning softly with a light crackle and amber glow to my right. I stumbled my way slowly around the room, dripping what dragons call amfeores around the room before I eventually collapsed next to my dam and fell sound asleep. Surprisingly, hatching from an egg is apparently a very exhausting task. Most dragon hatchlings fall asleep within fifteen minutes of hatching.

All I know that followed is an explosion, screams, shouts, and by the end of it, I was left completely alone. Something had happened to my sire and dam, but to this day, I have only but a guess. It turns out, the cave in which I hatched is not too far away from a human salf**. When I eventually returned to that cave, many winters after I hatched, I found the salf not a kilometer away. So, not too long after I hatched, the humans attacked… yeah, I'm sorry I can't really apply much emotion to this. After all, this happened when I was mere hours old. This sounds like a huge deal but writing it out I just feel… nothing. And how can I apply the fear and anxiety you'd feel in such a circumstance when I was too young to even form a memory of it, let alone understand it?

As I stated, it's hard to write the start to an autobiography, but to continue, I was left on my own for a solid two days. When I awoke and found myself alone, I stood up and wandered about looking for my sire and dam, to no avail. Leaving the cave, I surveyed my surroundings. Looking around, I was actually hatched in a lovely place! Beautiful green fields and hills created a gentle skyline, contrasting against the forest that would be immediately to your right upon leaving the cave. Below and about six paces away was a small pond lined with stones, all smoothed over by many winters of erosion from the water lapping against them. However, as a hatchling now left with no sire or dam, I wasn't bothered about the beautiful surroundings, I only cared about finding my sire and dam. Unfortunately, I knew not the fate that had befallen them.

I took clumsy steps toward the forest, stumbling my way up the rocks and hills to get to my desired destination, sometimes with great difficulty. And so I walked in a straight line. For many hours. I walked for so long I became a master at just walking in a straight line. Or at least, I walked for as long as it took to be found by someone. A female kin-rage-fire*** who bore dull purple scales and dark blue outlines. She possessed soft amber colored eyes, contrasting as an attention grabber against the otherwise muted color-scheme.

She found me wandering alone, crying out in confusion and desperation, looking for anyone to find me. From there, she took me under her wing, adoptive now to a family with a total of ten kin-rage-fires: the sire and dam, and eight hatchlings. This dragon, who I learned later was named Rachel**** was essentially the one who rescued me from a life trying to fend for myself. I of course, was just shy of two days old, and so I had yet to be taught survival or communication skills. And I would spend many a winter adjusting myself to the new family I'd grown to be a part of.

*We're going to have quite a few of these for the first few chapters, so… here we go! Welcome to dragons having different words for certain things than humans do. Sometimes the dragon language is easy to translate, sometimes it requires a little more digging to solve. In this case, this is what dragons refer to "mother" and "father" as. This will be a very common word, so adjust well to the sight of it. ~Jimmy

**Sorry, we'll lay it off as quickly as we can. This is the same as what humans refer to as a "village". It's one of those things that, if I understand correctly cannot be translated perfectly into the human language. ~Toothless

***Again, I'm sorry, this is just meant for the confused and cynical human audiences. One of the earliest notes mentioned that the quotes are credited to the human counterpart names. However, we refer to dragon species as "kin- (two word property of said kin)." This is how the dragon species will be referred to in the main story portions. And yes, even I have one. In order to arouse speculation, I'll keep it secret for now. Kin-rage-fire refers to what humans call "Monstrous Nightmares." Certainly a better name than what we've come up with! ~Toothless

****This is kind of odd. Strangely, a dragon's name is actually somehow derived from the same or similar places to human names. I have no idea where they came from, nor do I have access to any works that would explain as such. All I know is that somehow, various dragon names translate perfectly out to human names. Or at least, the more formal dragon names do. Dragons themselves actually developed names similar in structure to how we humans named dragons when we had them domesticated. More on that in a little while. ~Jimmy


Many months had passed. In that time, I had learned enough linguistic skills to create a coherent sentence. Whatever else happened I'm not sure of, but Rachel has always called me extremely bright and a quick learner. I'd become accustomed to living with these kin-rage-fires, and I'd even developed great relationships with seven of eight of them. There were four boys and four girls, names consisting of: Tyler, Danielle (or Danny), David, Kathryn, Brandon, Ana, Eli, and Agnes. I'd also met the sire of the group, whose name I learned was Logan. He seemed like a nice dragon, but he also seemed protective, which was fine by me. I needed someone to protect me like him, especially as I didn't really know how protective my dam and sire were.

And yet somehow, both Logan and Rachel both either forgot about the other Eli, or didn't realise the implications of this, and so named me Elijah, and shortened it to Eli. As you would expect from a young dragon, the other Eli grew a small sense of ire for me, in so much that he often spoke ill of me when I wasn't around, and all because we shared a name. He was so frustrated by the fact that we shared a name that we hardly ever spoke.

And, finally, I learned about their nicknames. The first real day I was there, I heard Rachel call Brandon 'Silverhorn,' which I was confused about initially. But Rachel picked up on my confusion, and told me, "Sorry, should have mentioned, we have nicknames for each of us. Brandon is Silverhorn, Tyler is Crookedclaw, Danny is Silvereye, David is Flameripper, Kathryn is Snowfang, Ana is Frostsong, Eli is Shiverwing, and Agnes is Hookback. Each of the nicknames are basically just describing some characteristic about each of them. Most often they're obvious, but others aren't so obvious."

"What will I get, then?" I asked. Rachel looked up to the leaves above us in thought. Clearly, there wasn't a major quality about me that would be so worth note. Until one of the other hatchlings spoke up.

"How about Darkwing?" Flameripper said after a long silence in deep thought. Everyone looked at him and all but one of us nodded. I for one was all for the name. It sounded cool, but it wouldn't end up becoming the name I would be known by, even among the group of hatchlings I grew up with, or even Rachel.

"Of all names you could possibly think of, that's your best one?" Shiverwing said forcefully to Flameripper.

"Well yeah. He's got dark wings, so it fits."

"It's stupid. You really think he's going to be okay with that? How about something like Toothless or Hollowtooth? Why should his name be anything obvious? He's not got any teeth, I think other dragons are going to notice that before his scales, he's not the only black dragon in the world."

I began tune out Shiverwing and everyone else at this point and just listened to my thoughts. There was something about the name Toothless that, at the time, just stuck to me. So, as an argument raged out for a little bit about how I was the only dragon who was completely black and that Toothless or Hollowtooth were terrible names, I came back to my senses and spoke out.

"I think I like Toothless, though," I said softly, in response to a comment about how I wouldn't like that name. Everyone stopped talking or yelling and stared at me for a few seconds before the silence was finally broken.

"Wait, you liked that?" Shiverwing asked with blatantly obvious confusion and anger, the seething ire he'd developed over the past few months boiling over completely. The rage in his eyes was so clear to see, you could almost touch it.

I nodded. "Yeah, I think it sounds really cool! I don't hate it at all." The other hatchlings looked among each other before all attention turned back to Shiverwing. He darted his eyes back and forth between me and Rachel in bewilderment.

"Oh, come on! That was a throwaway name!" Shiverwing growled, turning around, and heading toward a pile of leaves he called his bed.

Rachel groaned and turned back to me before she continued to speak. "Sorry about him. Anyway, we have some nicknames, and it seems he's not happy with yours."

"He doesn't seem happy about me at all," I answered, rolling my eyes, and looking back over at Shiverwing. To begin I was just watching him in disbelief that he had such vehement disdain for me, but soon I quickly turned to sympathy. From a distance he was seemingly crying. My natural reaction, perhaps derived of my generally large measure of compassion, was to go over to him and give him some comfort. Even if he didn't like me, I should make an example and be nice to him in return.

I approached timidly but calmly, unsure of how to proceed once I was stood beside him. I could feel the eyes of the other eight dragons boring into my back with each step I took. Shiverwing was facing away from me, but as I got closer, his faint sobs got clearer and clearer. I took a deep breath as I crossed the threshold into his den. He eventually turned and faced toward me, with a light growl of distaste.

"I… I don't know what I've done to make you sad in any way Shiverwing…" I said, knowing fully well anything I'd done 'wrong' was completely out of my control. "But whatever it is, I'm sorry."

"Like you care," replied Shiverwing. He started to show a relaxed melancholy that I had never seen before. The look of despondency on his face was so clear even I was starting to tear up a little bit. A few seconds passed before any of us said anything. "Did you really like the name Toothless?"

I paused briefly, considering how to respond. For as cool a name as I thought 'Toothless' was, I started to realise an underlying aspect of the name that made me choose it: I just really liked Shiverwing and wanted to kindle even a small friendship with him. I looked him up and down, eyeing over his vibrant red scales, accented even more by the black outlines around his wings and yellow frills he had running down his back.

"Yes I did," I finally answered with sincerity. Shiverwing's eyes began to light up as he realised I was being genuine about my like for the name. "Even if it was a throwaway name, I still think it's actually pretty cool. I think you came up with a good name, Shiverwing."

The kin-rage-fire smiled in response, locking his eyes on the grass immediately in front of him. I slowly began to smile in return. "I'm… glad," Shiverwing stated, slowly looking back up to me. "I guess the rest of us didn't get to choose our names, so I'm glad I got to choose yours."


Several weeks passed after that exchange with Shiverwing. It was in that time that any premonitions I'd had about never becoming friends with him faded and he ended up becoming my best friend out of the whole group. The memories I have of the days I spent with Shiverwing are some of the memories I hold closest to my heart. The games we played together, the antics he and I used to pull, all of it reminds me of a time when my life was just… so much simpler. A time a yearn for every day that passes.

As a hatchling dragon, even at six weeks into my life, I had a lot of energy. Playing a game was one way to get rid of all that energy. I'd always ask Shiverwing if he wanted to play with me, and he would always say yes. We'd play such games as tag, hide 'n' seek, and our personal favorite was a little game we came up with called 'Who can annoy our siblings first?' The strategy was trying to seem casual but try and annoy the heck out of our siblings, within ten minutes.

We had been playing the game with a certain level of inconsistency, in hopes our siblings wouldn't catch on, but it usually fell within a weekly basis. We had also been keeping score, first to ten games is the overall winner. At one point, just before we declared the winner, our scores were tied up; Shiver had won five games and I had won five games. Once we managed to annoy all our siblings to the point of being rather upset at us—individually, we would count how many either of us had irritated, and whoever had the most would be the winner for that round. The next round would be the tiebreaker round. Whoever won that would win WCAOSF, as we abbreviated it to.

Logistical issues about the game aside, it worked out quite well.

And, that one late fall, was the day of the final game. It had been a week since the game where I tied up with Shiverwing. Now was the tiebreaker round, and we would see who the best was at annoying our siblings.

I woke up long after the rest of the siblings, but at around the same time as Shiverwing. I stood from my grass bed and went straight to Shiverwing to see if he was up.

"Hey, Shiver, you ready?" I said, quietly to not scare him. He turned and looked at me. His familiar smile of unbridled excitement was being expressed. I popped a smirk, and a sly look at him. "Then, let's go!"

Shiverwing stood and walked straight into the main area of our living space. We'd managed to get Logan involved with our little game. He was our adjudicator. He counted us down for beginning, gave us occasional time warnings, typically only when either of us asked. Again, we didn't want to arouse any suspicion. Of course, there's only so much you can do to keep a secret, and I think most of the other hatchlings had caught on before that final game, they just knew there was nothing they could do about it.

We trotted straight up to Logan, expressing grins in anticipation, and he immediately knew what was about to happen. His grin began to grow, and he nodded at us.

"You guys ready?" He asked. We both nodded. "Okay, remember the rules: you must start on opposite sides of the 'arena,' you can't cooperate to annoy your siblings, keep track of how many points you've gotten. If you get eight, then whoever makes it to me first is the winner. If the ten minutes ends before you hit eight, whoever has the most is the winner. Makes sense?" We nodded. "Okay, you ready?"

Another nod, and Shiver and I began to head toward opposite ends of our starting space; an offshoot area separated from the rest of the den, actually the space where both Rachel and Logan slept. We prepared ourselves for the final game of this exciting season of WCAOSF!

"Three…" The tension began building over something that will only serve as bragging rights. "Two…" The tension built higher, even though we didn't have any reason to be nervous. "One…" Shiverwing and I crouched down on our front paws, preparing to run straight to our first target. "Go!"

We both ran straight to who we decided would be the first kin who we would try our best to annoy. My first target was Snowfang. I knew she would be easiest to get to annoyed state. Pretty early on in our competition, we decided to make it go to the point that our kin said something along the lines of, 'Can you leave me alone?'

"Hi, Snow!" I said, so cheerily that even I became somewhat agitated by it. She turned towards me and groaned. I knew I was already off to a great start. And, even if I became annoyed at my own comment, I knew the others would too.

"What, Toothless?!" She responded forcefully. I started to giggle softly to myself but pressed onward.

"Whatcha up to?" I said, again with such over-animation and naïve jauntiness that I began to realise the hot streak I was going to go one for this game.

"Toothless, can you just leave me alone for one week?"

I laughed to myself but obliged to leave her alone. After that, it was off to the next target. This continued for the whole ten minutes. I'd managed to get seven out of eight. When time was called, I hoped that Shiver wouldn't have gotten anywhere near as many. Turns out, he got six of them. When he announced it, he made the 's' sound last for a long time. But, when he said six, I immediately broke into laughter. It was a nice way to end off our first and only season of WCAOSF.


Shiverwing and I had kindled such a strong friendship that he and I were completely inseparable. Not a single day went by where he and I wouldn't spend at least a few hours with each other. Whether or not we'd play games or just sleep together was immaterial because all that mattered was; finally, after months of uncertainty with regard to our relationship, it had gone from unnecessary ire to constant admiration and friendship.

In the months that followed the ending of WCAOSF, Shiver and I slowly apologized and explained to the rest of the nest what had been going on for those eleven weeks. This naturally meant we couldn't do another set of games, but I think Shiverwing and I had an unspoken agreement that we wouldn't do any more, not even if they were a full winter apart. It was more a consideration of trying to make sure the outlook the rest of the hatchlings had on us wasn't so negative that we were neglected by them. It took a while for them to relax, and many weeks of saying we wouldn't do it again, but eventually they landed back in our favor.

With WCAOSF now out of the picture as a game to play, Shiver and I resorted to games like tag and hide 'n' seek. This was all we needed to make the generally slow and tedious winter months feel like mere days. There were days of nothing, but in those cases, it was more to our benefit to just try and sleep all day… maybe that's where my awful sleep cycle came from.

Eventually we arrived at what Rachel and Logan called a "Winter Day," which to my understanding is similar to what humans call a "Birthday." It's essentially the day that is treated as a special You day, where everything revolves around you and your choices, and everyone else has to oblige. I ended up being last on the list, which in complete fairness to Rachel and Logan was only related to the fact that I was the late arrival to the nest. I would have probably had a different Winter Day if it weren't for that fact alone. Even so, I wasn't complaining because mine came the day after Shiver's did. There were many winters in which Shiver and I had agreed upon what we wanted to do for our Winter Days months before they even happened.

However, my first Winter Day went off uneventfully. I suppose having been hatched just shy of ten months prior wouldn't have invited the creativity enough to bring about anything even remotely like what I've done since for my Winter Day. None of the other hatchlings did either, actually. We hadn't been in the world for long enough to have even the vaguest idea for the day. Instead, I spent my first Winter Day cooped up with Shiver all day, just because of how cold it was! The archipelago I grew up on is known for its freezing winters, but I personally believe that first one to have been the coldest. Maybe it's just because I've grown accustomed to the cold as time has gone on.

The months slowly crawled by. Once the snow began to let up and melt away we were treated to spring, and the first full spring I have any memory of. I still remember it well. There's some plains to the south of our nest that stretch on for miles and miles. As we arrived at the start of spring, I could see the grass blowing gently in the breeze, and all the occasional patches of flowers with bees buzzing around them. The smell of the earthen, flowery surroundings mixed with the distant, salty scent of the sea. I can almost picture myself there now, looking out over the plains with the nearly endless sea of trees I called my home behind me. I began to feel rather lucky to live where I did. Lucky to have been allowed to survive, in lieu of my biological sire and dam. I realised while watching nature's beauty stretch before me how… happy I was to be alive.