The Dragon' Son

Table of Contents

• Epilogue: The Prophecy
  
• Chapter 1: To Begin
  
• Chapter 2: Under Attack
  
• Chapter 3: In the Forest
  
• Chapter 4: Meeting a Dragon
  
• Chapter 5: Becoming a Dragon's Son
  
• Chapter 6: Now a Young Man
  
• Chapter 7: The Princess
  
• Chapter 8: Strange Things
  
• Chapter 9: Promises
  
• Chapter 10: Trouble at the River
  
• Chapter 11: The Start of the Journey
  
• Chapter 12: All In Time
  
• Chapter 13: A Runaway
  
• Chapter 14: In The King’s Castle
  
• Chapter 15: Princess and Prophecy
  
• Chapter 16: Explanations
  
• Chapter 17: Two Hearts
  
• Chapter 18: Dark Mysteries
  
• Chapter 19: The Last Piece of Home
  
• Prologue: The Witch
  
• About the Author
  

Tales of the Wovlen:

The Dragon’s Son

Kathryn Fogleman

http://kathrynjfogleman.com/

Tales of the Wovlen: The Dragon’s Son

Copyright © 2013

Kathryn Fogleman,
http://kathrynjfogleman.com

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author / publisher.

Independent publishing and design services were provided by

Melinda Martin of
http://TheHelpyHelper.com
.

Dedicated to God the Father,

who created the world and the universe

and the human imagination.

And also to my mother,

who saw a gift in me and encouraged it to grow.

She has been my cheerleader to the very last letter.

Epilogue: The Prophecy

The world you have known is passed away.

It cannot come back, it cannot stay.

The time has come, the shadow has woken.

Your kingdom is gone, your people are broken.

One will arise from among you; a dragon-slayer's son,

Turned a prince of dragons, now a dragon's son.

Dragon shall fight dragon, and dragons shall unite.

The son shall be your king; a protector grown to fight

A princess fair, a silver star on her golden head.

A witch powerful: both shall rise and tread.

One must overcome the other, a dual of fate

To free land of shadow or fill with darkness great.

The dragon's son must share the dragon's blood,

Unite the broken, darkness flood.

Save the princess, share the light, undo hate,

Slay the dragon cursed to free the land of a dark fate.

Sit he shall on the throne, Bowen's blood, in mountain lone.

Rule he will, no more hated, no more cursed to roam.

Blood shall stain his hands and mind forever

And dragon's blood will leave his heart and veins never.

This was not going over well at all. In fact, it was turning into a fight. Of course, Bowen had not expected his older brother, Sloan, to readily accept the thought of placing new kings on the four thrones, but he had not supposed Sloan would act so immaturely either. Sloan had changed, and sadly, for the worse.

“I’ll be dead before I see all four of the thrones in the hands of a younger brother!” Sloan’s voice boomed through the stone courtroom of the Great Mountain.

Bowen straightened his shoulders and flexed his chest muscles. “I was not speaking of a younger brother, Sloan. The thrones deserve to go to the ones whom you have mistreated. Our time is over.” He made the statement as calmly as he could.

Sloan stood in flustered thought for a moment. His wide eyes shifted from Bowen to the polished granite table. He then looked sharply at his younger brother. “Give it up to the common folk? Are you mad?” he asked in a quiet, hoarse voice. “We are the line of kings! If you do not believe our older brother, Wolfspar, is capable of ruling the kingdom as high king, then he must step down and the next eldest in line must take the high throne, which would be me!” Sloan slammed his fist on the table, adding emphasis to his words. The sound echoed throughout the huge room.

“I do not deem you capable of taking on the high throne either,” Bowen said as he spread his hands out on the cool, smooth table before him. “Our time as kings is over. It is time for a new line of kings to be brought forth.” He added in a quiet tone, “It is the word of Dayspring. Master Felnost, Dayspring's prophet, passed these words on to me. You know that we cannot ignore them.”

A deadly silence reined throughout the great room for a long moment, and the two brothers glared at each other. Sloan fingered his sword hilt, and Bowen refused to lower his eyes from Sloan's.

Suddenly, there was a high-pitched scream. A cold shiver crawled up Bowen's back. Cries of fear and horror followed the scream and began to fill the stone halls of the mountain with their echoes, “A dragon!”

Both men stood straight to attention at the sudden cries.

Bowen turned toward the mouth of the cave to look over the lands that stretched out from the mountain's shadow.

“Master Felnost's words are coming to pass. I'm out of time,” Bowen gasped as the terrified screams of warning rang in his ears.

Like the sound of an arrow shot into a tree, there was a thump, and pain shot up Bowen’s left arm. A sharp yell entered his throat and escaped from his mouth unexpectedly. He slowly raised his arm and was shocked to see Sloan's dagger embedded in his tricep. He looked back at his brother with the pain of this terrible betrayal evident in his eyes. How could Sloan do this? But when Bowen saw the smug look that his older brother wore, he realized that Sloan had no remorse over this cruel deed.

“No one is going to take the throne from me,” Sloan hissed. “Not you and not Master Felnost. I don't care if Felnost is some great prophet who hears from your tight-fingered deity! He cannot dictate my actions to me! But you, especially you, my younger brother, will never have the throne!”

Bowen stared at his brother for a moment in complete shock. Sloan had just verbally rejected Dayspring! Now he had really gone too far. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. With his good hand, he grasped the dagger that extended from his left arm and slowly withdrew it. Bolts of pain shot through his arm as he pulled on the knife. He dropped the bloody dagger onto the stone floor and glared at his brother.

“How can you deny Dayspring?” he asked with a fire glowing in his eye. “Felnost said that if you do not give up the throne willingly, it will turn to dust in your cold, dead hands and our people will be killed and scattered.” Bowen balled his fists and tightened every muscle in his body, “I don't want this prophecy to come to pass. I will do whatever it takes to save our people.”

The mountains shook with a great roar from outside that echoed through the chambers.

Sloan charged over the table with an angry shout and collided into Bowen. He wrapped his hands around Bowen’s throat and shoved him backward toward the great opening of the cave. He slammed Bowen against the old stone railing of the mighty balcony and pushed him against it, threatening to push him over and to the ground nearly a mile below. Bowen struggled against his brother fiercely, twisting his strong wrists and kicking him but to no avail.

“It’s not yours! It’s mine!” Sloan hissed with a mad flame in his green eyes. He pushed Bowen further back on the balcony.

Bowen's muscles were on fire from the strain of the fight, and his back felt like it was going to snap across the hard stone railing. The toes of his boots were barely touching the floor, and his hands, clamped to the railing behind him, were slowly slipping. He was certain it was his end. He let go of the railing and grabbed Sloan's arms again. He desperately tried to free himself of his brother's choke hold when a mighty roar arched across the sky above, causing both men to pause their struggle and look up.

A great red dragon soared gracefully through the bright sky. His giant red wings were spread far apart, his massive tail flowed gently behind him in the wind, and his crimson scales glittered in the sunlight, casting him as a sharp contrast against the blue sky. Orange and yellow flames shot from his mouth and vanished in the fall air, leaving behind curls of black smoke. He spiraled toward the village on the ground with roars of fiendish delight erupting from his mouth between flame bursts.

At the sight of the dragon, Sloan’s face drained of blood, and his fingers loosed from around Bowen's neck. He sprinted for the door inside the giant stone room. Bowen fell to his knees, rubbing his throat and gasping for air. The rusty hinges of the inside door squeaked, diverting his mind from his pain to the only escape out of the stone room. He stood and turned toward the door.

Sloan looked at him from the doorway with a malicious glow on his face. “Perhaps you are right, Bowen. Perhaps the kingdom will come to ruin. But as long as that happens, then no other will have the throne for themselves, will they?” he smirked before slamming the door shut behind him.

Bowen ran up to the door and yanked on the lever, ripping skin from the pads of his fingers in his effort. Sloan had locked the door. There was no other way out. Bowen spun around to the cave opening just in time to see the enormous red dragon fly directly past it. “It will pass the cave mouth again,” he said to himself as a wild idea sprung into his head. He sprinted over to the wall opposite of the door and took a large rope from a hook. Swinging the rope over his shoulder, he ran up to the cave mouth and watched as the dragon circled in the air gracefully and prepared to pass the hanging balcony.

Just as the dragon came low, Bowen charged forward, up onto the railing, and jumped into the air. He landed atop the enormous shoulder of the red dragon with a thud that jarred his whole body. He leaned close to the beast's warm scales to catch his breath as the chilly air rushed past him.

The dragon looked back at Bowen with intense glowing eyes, yellow and with deep, narrow, black slits for pupils. It bared sharp, ivory fangs and growled loudly, sending warm vibrations through its body, voicing its displeasure with Bowen.

Bowen cringed as his injured arm throbbed with numbness and pain. Warm, sticky blood blew and the cold rushing wind blew up his shirt and past his ears, but he paid little heed to that. He scrambled up the shining, ruby scales to the base of the dragon’s neck as quickly as he could, using every muscle in his body. When he was settled on the dragon's neck, he swiftly took the rope from his shoulder and uncoiled it. He tied a knot at the end, swung it around his head once, and tossed it underneath the right side of the dragon’s thick, scaly neck. He then kicked the dragon fiercely with the heel of his left boot.