Magic.

There used to be magic, such magic! The sky was filled with it and it ran along the ground like wildfire. There were wizards, witches, elves and faeries and goblins. People flew on clouds and dwarfs created jewels of crying beauty and rings of immortal power.

And there were Dragons. Fierce, glowing, fire-filled, immense diamond encrusted reptiles of pure magic that rested on vast hoards of treasure.

Of course there were Dragons. Dragons are magic and magic means Dragons. One cannot have the one without the other. The mere presence of a Dragon conjures into existence fluorescing streams of magic, and the faintest spark of magic creates the microscopic seed of a new Dragon.

The Dragons ruled all and the only limit to the power of a Dragon was another Dragon. The rest of us lived creeping around on tip-toes, borrowing the magic of the Dragons and hoping that their Lordships would not deign to notice such small morsels as us.

But a Necromancer ended it. With one spell, the Dragons were banished and the magic lost.

Suburbia.

Two men stand on Melville Koppie, a hill overlooking the northern suburbs of Johannesburg. They stand amongst the veld grasses, rocks and wild flowers. Bees drone lazily from flower to flower. Flies buzz and a small gecko drowses on a sun warmed rock. If you cast your eyes down, only the odd piece of litter and the distant roar of traffic hint at the nearness of the city.

If you lift your eyes the endless boxy houses, neat gardens, and walls fill you a sense of suburbia. Smallness. Smallness of purpose. Smallness of mind. Smallness of space. Boxed in by kitchy houses, boxed in by hide-bound and fearful attitudes. Boxed in by tar roads busy with traffic commuting between empty hearted houses and spirit dead shopping malls.

The sheer ordinary everydayness of the suburbs gets to you. There is no magic and there never has been.

Children play and scream. Dogs bark. Wives lug shopping in from the car. Cats chase lizards amongst the rockery. Busses lurch from bus stop to bus stop. Empty and soul dead from plainness. Imagination is but a dull glimmer. Creativity a rare treasure that comes in a dribble to one in a hundred people on one in a hundred days.

One man is tall, gaunt and filled with a graceless energy. He gestures grandly at a strange collection of electronics, bones, feathers, cans, wires and gutted chicken. His voice is a harsh shout, "There is Magic! These instruments show that there is magic, vast and untapped! It is a bottomless sea underlying all of reality!"

The other man is placid, unruffled and faintly amused, "By your own theories, magic equals Dragons and Dragons equal magic. No magic, no Dragons. Where are the Dragons then?"

The gaunt one frowns, "I don't know. I just know there is this tightly bound Fermi sea of magic. Therefore there are Dragons. To tap the magic, I must release the bounds."

The gaunt one chants, not in tones mystic and eerie, but in a boring monotone. Like a lecturer reciting the elements of the periodic table. Like a lecturer naming the elementary particles and forces.

The sky explodes with colour.

From every house, from every wall, from lying basking on every sun warmed rock, from under the very claws of cats, the Dragons that were lizards rise roaring their might.

The world from horizon to horizon is full of great winged Dragons, shining, sparkling, glowing, flaming, screaming Dragons. Dragons of every hue and colour. Dragons of every shape and size. Dragons spewing magic in fractal strokes of lightning across the landscape working a fearful sea-change on the very heart of all nature.

The gecko that was drowsing on the rock is now a ninety foot horror of scale and teeth and claw. Smoke issues from his nostrils and a kaleidescope of colours whirl in the pool-like depths of his eyes. The Dragon stretches, flexing diamond claws that scratches the hard rock. With an amused smile he rumbles, "Priorities prevent me from, ah, 'rewarding' you properly. Firstly there are far too many Dragons and we must battle each other until there is sufficient space. Then, then we will hunt every damn cat on the planet for what they did to us when we were confined as lizards. Then we will turn our attention to humans. On second thoughts, merely sparing you to watch will be quite adequate, ah, 'compensation' for you."

The two men cower as Dragon slaughter, flame, claw, and eat Dragon. Dragons fly, crash and die. Die writhing and flaming. Thousands and thousands of vast Dragons full of Magic, thrashing and fighting across the shattered city..

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