A few more squeaks came in the following minutes, and then the egg gently began to rock in her hands. Lyroxia was confused and immobile... then it dawned on her. The egg was hatching for her! The egg rocked again, only much more violently. Lyroxia set it down as cracks began to appear in the shell. Seconds later, a small, shining head emerged to the world, and the rest of the egg split open with a resounding crunch.

The dragon was exactly the same colour as the egg, but it shone like the moon. Everything about it was slender, its head, neck, limbs, body and especially the tail. He fixed a pair of sparkling violet eyes on Lyroxia, and tried to take a few tentative steps towards her. However, he tripped on his oversized wings, stumbled, and fell. As Lyroxia bent to scoop him up, the dragon stretched out and nudged her right palm with the tip of his nose.

Lyroxia cringed and almost yelled out as icy pain raced up her arm and spread throughout her entire body. It was minutes before the pain eased, but her palm wouldn't stop tingling. There, on her right hand, was a shining silver oval, same colour as her dragon.

I can't believe it, she thought, a few minutes ago I was just a punished thief, running an errand for my master... Now, I'm a dragon rider.

She looked down to see the dragon sat on his haunches, staring up at her with its front paws on her legs. Lyroxia gently pulled him onto her lap and stroked his elegant neck. While she did so, she felt a strange presence against her consciousness. It puzzled her for a while, but when she realised feelings were emanating from it – that certainly were not her own – she guessed she must be feeling the dragon's consciousness... but that just confused her even more. She pulled some chicken legs out of the bags and gave them to the dragon, who immediately began to tear at them with the ferocity of a lion.

Still dazed, she then began to ponder on a name for her new companion, and after a while came up with three that she liked: Devlin, which meant fierce fighter, Kaileb, which meant faithful fighter and Kayden, which meant wise fighter. Unable to choose, she decided to wait till the dragon could understand, and choose a name himself.

She lay down, and fell asleep as the dragon tried to snuggle against her chest.

For the next few days, Lyroxia rode around the seemingly endless coast of Leona Lake. She kept away from the roads, with the dragon in her lap. He was always wide eyed and energetic, constantly gawping at new things with intensified curiosity.

Lyroxia's knowledge of dragons didn't stretch very far, but she did know some things, mostly little facts gleaned from stories she'd heard from various bards. She was aware that they came in every shade of every colour, were intelligent and had been in Alageasia much longer than humans. She had also listened to a minstrel perform a song about a war that took place between the dragons and the elves long ago, but she didn't know how true that was.

Although Lyroxia was utterly oblivious, the bond between her and the dragon was strengthening all the time. She found she was able to crudely communicate to him by vague emotions and images, though how it worked was beyond her.

She hoped she could find answers in Surda, if the murmurs of a new dragon rider who rode a sapphire dragon were true, of course. Even if she didn't, she knew that it was the safest place to be. But there were still an awful lot of miles to go for something to go wrong, she reminded herself.