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There were two things that bothered Spyro when he flew out of the umbra and touched down in Peace Keepers.
The first was the location. His whole life, the balloon would always drop off the passengers at the small dock at Peace Keepers, and then they would go through the castle 'entryway' and come into the homeworld. The new portal, used to go from homeworld to homeworld, opened up next to one of the old antique canons Spyro recognized from his Gnorc fighting days. The first few moments Spyro had no idea where he was.
The second was the foliage. Never before in all his years had Spyro seen such a drastic change in the habitat. Where once there was just sand, dirt, and huge deposits of rock, now lay mounds and mounds of dark dirt contrasting with the dull orange and yellow of the sandstone formations. Dotting the new soil was small green growths, weeds, patches of grass, and the occasional flower. The purple-black goop he had come to know was flowing freely like water, and had become translucent. Spyro stood, mystified.
He was quick to get oriented, though, as Molli and Titan had already started off. The large dragon turned back.
"Did you need any help there, Spyro?"
"No, I'm good, thanks anyway." Spyro gave him a flash of a smile. "I remember where Cliff Town is. That's the easiest one to find."
"I thought you would remember. Keep your goal in mind and don't let anything distract you."
Spyro laughed inwardly; dragons were known for their good advice, if not for their take-action attitudes. The big orange dragon turned away, heading for the rift that sheltered the Dry Canyon portal. "Take care of yourself, Spyro."
Spyro gave a wave as he watched Titan lumber away. It wasn't until after he was gone, and the faerie long flown off, Spyro shook his head and expressed his initial confusion.
"Man, Sparx, I dunno how much more of this I can take." He kicked at a weed growing from the cracks of a rock. "You think all the worlds are gonna be this different?"
Sparx looked at Spyro with empathy. His voice buzzed out his opinions. "BzzztBzzzt. bzbzbzzbzz?"
Spyro nodded. "Yeah, if there is anything wrong, it's up to us to fix it. We had better quit lollygagging. Cliff Town is this way."
Spyro and Sparx made their way to the portal, ever observing the metamorphosized scenery.
The glide to Cliff Town was much more pleasant than Spyro remembered, a cool breeze blowing from the side, and the sun partially covered by creamy clouds. Once he landed, the shock that had taken him when he first came to Peace Keepers returned, ten times stronger.
The barren land beyond the river had been transformed into a huge grassy plain, stretching far further than he or Sparx could see. But the main shock came no from the grass, but from the town carved from the cliffs in front of him. Atop each small shelter a huge tree grew, the roots flowing over the sides. Every wall was coated with vines growing down towards the goo river. Around the base of every wall leafy shrubs and miniature trees thrived. All of it seemed to originate from above the town, atop the vast cliff shadowing the entire area. Huge vines as thick as trees poured over the cliff, partially hiding the town in slender greenery.
Spyro had to mentally kick himself to get going. He remembered the dragons that he had saved from this area, three of them. As he left the entryway large castle-like structure where the portal had left him, a tall, thin, grey-brown dragon who looked very familiar to Spyro came from around a clump of sharp-looking bushes. The dragon, who would have normally blended in perfectly with the stone of the town, now stood out against the lush green of the plants. He looked annoyed at first, but once he spotted Spyro relief and gratitude washed over his features. "Spyro!" The dragon rushed over the bridge to them. "Spyro, you finally made it. We've been waiting ages. Thank goodness."
Spyro looked around his surroundings again. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say I missed my destination a few stops back."
The other dragon nodded in understanding. "We've been working on it, but it seems the more we try to stop all this plant stuff the more it comes." He shook his head. "Now where are my manners? I'm Marco, the one you saved from Point S."
"Point S?" Spyro was unaware of the location.
"Yeah, they named the point after you and Sparx. I know, I know, it should have been M, for Marco. I mean, I was the one you saved, right? If it hadn't been for me-"
"Okay, okay, I get the point." Spyro smiled. Same Marco he remembered. "Where is everyone else?"
"They're up at the Town Centre. Right now they are in a conclave, but you're the main topic of discussion, so you'd be okay to interrupt."
Spyro nodded, recognizing the word for meeting in the Old Dragon tongue despite how he hadn't heard or spoken it in years. Marco led him to the top of the town, babbling about the changes and temperature and foliage and how his home had changed and how the vines had slowly crept down the cliff edge, which had all resurrected old superstitions with some of the other dragons who had since come to Cliff Town and caused them to flee the area. They stepped into the shadow of the cliff, the dark shade providing a drastic change in temperature.
The young dragon prepared himself for a hike up the side of the cliff. Marco led him around a corner at the base of the town. To his surprise, the whirlwind still functioned to transport them to the top. Where there was once a soft twinkle and sparkle, the wind spinning about was a shimmering white, blowing much fiercer than Spyro remembered. Marco gestured and, hesitantly, Spyro stepped through the blanket of air. Inside the column the air was almost still, but after a few seconds he felt a strange lift between his feet. He soon felt himself rising straight up, no spinning at all. He flew upwards, barely grabbing on to the edge of the stone before being launched to the sky. Sparx flitted behind as always, never phased by rough weather. Soon after Marco came up, spreading his thin wings at the last second and giving one stroke, sending him upwards and landing gently on the stone a few yards from the whirlwind. He looked at Spyro. "Takes some practice, you'll get it soon enough."
They continued walking, the distance now much shorter.
"What made the whirlwinds change? These are much nicer than before, as much as I hate to say it."
"I know what you mean. But I think I'll let the council explain that."
"Council?"
"Yeah, this place has modified into a sort of headquarters. There have been some really weird things going on, Spyro. Somebody needs to check it out."
"Why aren't you in the council?" Sparx's voice piped up over the soft whine of the whirlwind.
"It's hard to explain. Since you left, and all this stuff happened, we needed somebody to guide all of us and to help re-group and re-build. Some of the more, uh, motivated dragons decided to meet up and discuss and give orders. Council stuff. In through here."
Marco gestured to what Spyro first thought was a wall covered in vines. He looked forward, puzzled, but soon saw that the vines covered not a wall but a doorway stretching the several feet of the building. From inside a soft white light glowed. He turned to Marco, who stood a few feet away and didn't look like he was coming any further. "You aren't going in?"
"I've got to guard the in-spot, incase anyone else comes. If I wanted to join in the meeting they would have let me in before it started. Good luck, Spyro." He nodded, then turned and, with a leap, dove off the edge of the cliff and glided with unexpected grace to the grassy ground below.
Spyro walked up to the vines and, in one swift motion, pulled back the living curtain.
Inside the large circular room three other dragons, much taller than him and larger than Marco, stood or sat along the wall, arranged around a pit of burning coals. The heat from the pit was invigorating and Spyro felt alert and rejuvenated, ready for anything. At first nobody moved, but the dragon to Spyro's right stood from his lounging position on all fours and greeted Spyro, his lengthy forelimbs outstretched and his claws pointed up in a gesture of friendship. Spyro knew the vibrant pink and purple dragon to be Halvor, a dragon possessing one of the grandest pairs of horns that didn't belong to a Beast Maker. "Spyro!" He bellowed, letting himself land heavily back on his front legs. "What a pleasure to see you again after so long. You've been growing while you were away."
Spyro nodded and smiled, replicating the gesture with his own much smaller hands. "You too, Halvor. I probably won't reach your height any time soon."
"You came just in time, Spyro. We were just coming to you in our discussion." He nodded to the other two dragons. "This is Enzo, he thought of the idea for our regular Conclave." Spyro nodded at the greyish pink dragon leaning casually against the wall, his memory not failing to remember another he had saved from crystal so long ago. Enzo bobbed his head and raised his claws in greeting.
"And this is Vulric. He came from Beast Makers several months ago." The most massive of the dragons in the (thankfully quite large) room nodded his head, ivory horns glistening in the light. The rest of his body was a deep red, his belly fading to a burnt orange color. Spyro nodded back.
Halvor continued. "Before you came we only went over our own domestic problems, where to house those coming from other worlds and what we would do if we ran out of room. This Conclave is open to all comments and opinions, Spyro, so just speak up if you have any input. We'll try to answer any questions you have as well." He looked expectantly at Spyro, who wondered why they even bothered to call it a conclave with the total lack of secrecy going on. He wasn't complaining, though.
Spyro took advantage of the situation to find out everything he could of the changes specific to the Peace Keepers. As Halvor explained, with a few comments from Enzo and Vulric, the incredibly fertile soil that he had seen when he first arrived came from beneath the rocks, where it must have been since the time before Peace Keepers was a desert. The incredible amount of magic, the council had presumed, was responsible for pushing up the soil and keeping the various plant seeds alive when carried on the wind. The actual water that was mixing in the goo also originated beneath the ground, a spring which must have burst from magic right below the lake of slime. This only egged on the growth of a number of plants non-native to Peace Keepers or any of the surrounding worlds. As Spyro already understood every object had its own well of magic, but when excess magic had nowhere to do objects would undergo unnatural changes. The dragons themselves gave off magic, radiated it from their bodies in small doses and conducted already exciting bodies of magic, but with the extra charge they themselves were just adding to the pollution.
Spyro next questioned them about the structure of the council. Vulric took the liberty of explaining that any dragon could attend the Conclave, but it was required that at least two different races of dragon would be present to help spread any word of changes or setbacks among the few worlds which remained open. As Spyro had guessed, any communication with other worlds took much longer than normal. They still had kinks in the portal plan and some would occasionally have to fly between worlds, taking days to get news back and forth. Any surviving dragons in Beast Keepers could relay information through the faeries, but dragons in the Artisans and Dream Weavers had lost all contact long ago.
The small purple dragon nodded at the familiar information. He pondered, giving a few moments of silence for all to go over their thoughts. "So how have you found out so much information on what is happening?"
Enzo looked at the others with an uneasy expression. This made Spyro feel uneasy himself.
"Well, you know that magic has been collecting in unusual amounts here. Us dragons are natural conduits for magic and so we're pretty sensitive to its flow. But recently there has been some... events happening. Small things, mostly, but some dragons have reported magical occurrences that..." He trailed off, not sure how to explain.
Vulric took over. "There have been instances where magic has done the bidding of dragons."
Spyro stared, aghast.
"Nothing like wizards, I assure you. But the thought is concerning. If dragons continue to use magic as a tool, the current situation could easily get out of hand."
"What exactly has happened?" Spyro's voice sounded, to him, shrill and shaky. He cleared his throat and mentally steadied himself. 'Keep calm Spyro.'
Enzo put a claw in the pit in an absentminded manner and fiddled with the embers. "Flashes of insight when we are frustrated and need information. Fruits flinging themselves from bushes into our outstretched claws. Views of other areas when we stare into the lake. Various small and apparently unrelated incidents. No dragon has yet experienced it more than once. But we all feel it when it happens." He looked down and sighed.
Spyro did indeed know the feeling. Whether it was the simple-minded magicians all those years ago in Magic Crafters, Ripto's flashy staff, or the Sorceress' and Bianca's very presence, magic casting was an obvious feeling. For Spyro it felt like a caged animal, pitiful and under pressure, physically forced to do what it didn't want to. Other dragons described it in different ways; depending on the dragon's disposition, it was like commanding the wind or beating a hatchling. One thing everyone would agree on that it wasn't supposed to be done. Magic was a part of nature. It occurred at its own pace and flowed through dragons like air through a mountain forest. If any magic was being cast, dragons nearby could feel it like it was being pulled out of them. Only faeries had mastered the skill of using magic without forcing it. All they did was re-channel the magic they wanted and pointed it in the right direction. Add some energy of their own to spark the reaction, and they have successful casting. Fortunately there was a lot of healing, blooming, and bursting magic just floating around to put to use.
"Only the dragons controlling it don't feel the magic being cast, but they do feel the unease later. Fortunately it hasn't happened many times, but we've no idea why it happens. Our only idea is the excess magic present. But that is all we have."
Spyro nodded. He had learned some of these things when he was on the other side of the Dragon Worlds, where he had taken out the Sorceress and Bianca… Well, almost Bianca. But he had always thought that magic could only be controlled if you had immoral reasoning, if you wanted it for the wrong causes, or did things strong enough to force it and change it. He had always assumed it was something meant to be left alone and let it deal with nature in its own way. But now, his kin had done what the Sorceress had done with just their thoughts. And how would anyone stop it? The problem wasn't some bad guy or monster, it was dragons themselves, and he couldn't fight his way out of this one. He was uneasy about this.
His company seemed to feel roughly the same way. Wordlessly they all began moving for the door. Spyro and Sparx were the first out, and he paused and looked over the ledge. The feel of the cool air was unwelcome after the comfortably heated room, but Spyro was already adjusting to the change. He was about to mention the climate change of Cliff Town to Enzo and Halvor when he saw something out of the corner of his eye.
He stopped suddenly, staring in wonder down at the base of the cliff. Spyro looked down, his hairless brow furrowed.
"What in this world…"
Marco, way down by the first bridge, had been joined by two other dragons, almost Spyro's size, both up on two legs. One was the deepest blue Spyro had ever seen, the other a pale pastel green.
But it wasn't the dragons that had taken the breath out of every member of the council, but the ten or so figures they were trying to fend off.
Even the years that had gone by hadn't eased the images and memories out of Spyro's mind.
They were fighting Gnorcs.
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