I get higher and higher...'
Gavin laughed, and looked over the railing, to the city of Wyndia far below. He wasn't scared of heights; no member of the royal family would be. He climbed up onto the railing, waiting for his teacher to catch up to him.
Suddenly, his grip slipped, and he fell over the side.
"Aaahh!" Before he hit the ground though, he felt himself slowing down. He opened his eyes and looked down. The ground was still about ten feet below him, but he wasn't rushing down at it, in fact, he was just gliding down.
Gavin blinked. he looked behind him, and realized that it was his wings keeping him from falling. Although not large enough to actually let him fly, the pair of snowy wings on his back were breaking his fall. His feet gently touched the ground, and he saw his old teacher running towards him.
"Prince Gavin! Your highness, don't ever do that to me again, please. I fear my heart couldn't take it."
Gavin blinked. "Why do we have wings if we can't fly?" He asked.
His teacher smiled at him. "Well, a long, long time ago, the Wyndians could fly. They had the power to turn into huge, great birds. However, due to marriages between Wyndians and those of other clans, our wings grew too small for us to fly, and we lost the power to turn into the Great Bird."
Gavin blinked. He decided he would learn how to turn into a Great Bird, like his ancestors had. Someday.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"Fire!"
Sixteen-year-old Gavin gazed at the candle, willing it to light. Nothing happened. He focused his blue eyes on the candle, brushing a strand of his short, blond hair out of his face. He tried again to light the candle. Still nothing. He sighed. "Dylan, it's not working." He turned to glare at his teacher.
Dylan shrugged. "Maybe you're just not concentrating enough."
Gavin glared at him.
"What can I say! Magic's tricky."
"I'm a member of the Royal Family of Windia. Everyone in my family has used magic. So why won't the stupid candle light already!"
Dylan shrugged. "We'll try it again tomorrow."
Sighing, Gavin left.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Gavin sat on a high branch of a tree, staring at the sunset. He was bothered that he couldn't seem to do any magic. He wanted to get away from the castle, at least for a little while. The forest near the castle was fine, but...
Gavin sat up, he'd just remembered an old spell he'd seen in a book in the castle library. It was a transportation spell. Pity the Wyndians could no longer fly. Perhaps somewhere in that old library was a spell that would allow him to fly. He still had an hour before he had to go back to the castle. He grabbed his cloak, trying to remember the spell.
He jumped down from the tree, his wings helping to slow his fall. He pulled on his cloak, and then concentrated on the spell. He closed his eyes and chanted the words to the spell, not really caring where he would end up.
As he felt the spell beginning to work, he smiled, and opened his eyes. That perhaps was not a good thing, as he realized he was 15 feet above the ground. Worse, there was a huge brown dragon flying at him.
He tried to use his small wings to dodge the beast, before he realized that he was still wearing his cloak, and his wings would be tangled in it. He was falling to the ground, when suddenly the dragon dived under him, and he landed on its back. Not knowing what else to do, he simply held on while the dragon landed.
"Don't worry!" A voice called from the ledge they were on. "Kraiteth won't hurt you!"
Gavin quickly climbed off the dragon's back, trying to stay near it for as little time as possible. He turned away from it, to talk to the man that had spoken earlier.
"Um, excuse me? Would you happen to know where Wyndia is?" He asked.
The man looked puzzled. "I've never heard of a Wyndia Weyr, or Hold. You're in Sidra Weyr right now. I'm R'es, that brown over there is Kraiteth."
"My name is Prince Gavin." He said.
"Prince?" R'es just looked confused.
"Never mind, just call me Gavin." He replied when he realized he had no idea what he was talking about.
"Where are you from, and how did you suddenly appear in the air above the feeding grounds like that? You're lucky Kraiteth caught you so quickly, or you'd be dead."
Gavin told him his whole story, over the next couple hours, and discussed what to do, since he wasn't willing to try that spell again.
"Well...There is a clutch on the sands here..." R'es said.
"Clutch? Wait, do you mean..."
"Yep, How'd you like to be a candidate?"
Gavin thought about it. Maybe he couldn't fly like his ancestor's could, but if he had a dragon, it might be just as good...
"Alright, I'll do it. Oh, by the way, do you think I could get one of those little lizard things?" He said, thinking of the tiny dragons he'd seen perched on people's shoulders.
"Oh, a fire lizard? Sure, follow me." R'es said.
Gavin followed him until they came to a beach. He looked down and saw a small clutch of eggs in the sand. There were probably about ten of the rocking eggs. Gavin realized that they were hatching.
"Oh, just in time. Hurry, take one and feed it meat." R'es said, pointing to a bowl of meat beside them.
Gavin picked up an egg at random, and watched as a little green head popped out. The rest of the little fire lizard soon followed. He quickly fed it a peice of meat.
"What's her name?" R'es asked.
"...Nina." Gavin answered, thinking of his older sister.
Two other eggs rolled out of the sandy nest. They rolled toward the winged boy and the little green, unoticed, until they bumped against each other, cracking their shells at once.
A large blue tumbled out of one egg, the other, a bronze. Gavin looked up from the green, staring at the two males.
"Go on, feed them."
So he did. He decided to call the blue Aisleng, and the bronze was Ardon. Now that he had impressed three fire lizards, he suspected he would have his arms full until the Hatching.