Many years had passed since they had last flown the skies together; the king wondered if he ever would again. Part of him grew sick at the the thought of man, their swords and knives of cruel steel and biting iron only brought pain and bloodshed to his people. But the great dragon remembered.
He remembered that boy, no older than he, taking the sky from him, confining him to a small valley on an island. He remembered how that boy held the knife, and instead of cutting his flesh, cut the ropes that bound him. He remembered how the boy loved him, and how he loved the boy. He remembered how the boy took the sky, but gave it back.
But that was a long time ago. Now, the great dragon king spent his time presiding over his kingdom, and tending to his family. He and his mate had three children, all young and full of fire. He had no doubt that his first-hatched son would make a fine king someday, after he was gone. But before that would come to pass he had much to worry about.
One day, as the black dragon sunned himself on the rocks just outside of the massive waterfall that guarded his home, watching over his family, he saw a familiar shape in the mist. It was a shape he had not seen in a long while, but the sight of it made his stomach turn.
Out of the mist came a ship, single masted and small. Its rough wood looked hand hewn and the figurehead was painted in a rainbow of colors. He would deliver a warning, then.
Landing on the figurehead, he stared the man down, but the man did not draw a weapon. His face seemed familiar, yet was alien to him. But when he spoke? The king was taken back to times of flying with another, the boy who gave him back the sky.
And so once more, they flew.
When one year had passed, the king of dragons climbed up to that rock once more and waited for a ship, a ship to bring him his boy. Out of the mist it came, that same ship, with the same figurehead in a myriad of colors, with the same rough, hand hewn wood and woven sail. In that same ship, holding the same wheel, was his boy.
He jumped, wings outstretched, overjoyed at the sight of his boy. The viking chief received him with open arms, much stronger than the arms that had received him all those years ago. But he did not care, for he was here, and that was what mattered.
Every year on the same day for ten years the viking chief flew with the dragon king. Sometimes the boy brought his mate, or his children, and sometimes the dragon would do the same. Yet the years he came alone were the sweetest for the dragon king, for it reminded him of a time when all he had was the boy, and all the boy had was the dragon. Each year the boy’s hair grew a little greyer and the wrinkles on his face grew more in number, and each year the dragon’s scales shone a little less brightly and his eyes a little less green.
The eleventh year, the boy came, same as always, and met the king on the rock. His hair was grey and his face seemed thinner, but it was still his boy. He sat down on the rock and wept, telling the dragon king that he had lost his mother. The king could do nothing but hold his boy close to him, wishing he could fly beyond the stars to wherever souls live.
It got harder and harder to fly together, but still, with every passing year, the dragon king would come onto the rock and wait for his boy to come out of the mist. Their children were no longer children and their bones no longer young, but the promise of the skies and togetherness made them forget the pains of growing older, and in their hearts they were still young. The dragon met the boy’s grandchildren, and the boy met his. The great dragon suspected that the boy may be one of the last to remember his kind.
And then, on the fifty fifth year, when the great dragon king climbed out of the waterfall and onto his rock, the ship came slowly out of the mist. There were two figures on board, neither of them his boy. Something was amiss, the king could tell, for the boy’s children were here in his place. He struggled to his feet as the boy’s children stepped off the ship and onto the rock. The fair haired man unwrapped a parcel and presented it to the dragon king, his face full of sorrow. In the man’s hands there was the boy’s shoulder plate, adorned with the image of a red dragon. The king wished for all the world dragons could weep, for he knew his boy could never fly with him again. Affixing the plate to the gear mechanism on the king’s tail, the fair haired man and green eyed woman sat with the king in silence. The king vowed to himself that he would never again feel the wind beneath his wings above the sea, not without his boy.
Still the fair haired man came, wearing the ornaments of chief, to sit with the king, year after year.
After five years time, the man returned to the rock to see no dragon. Worried he grew, searching for the familiar dark outline that his father had loved so dearly and that he had grown to care for as well. When at last he turned to leave, he saw a dragon climb onto the rock, a great and proud dragon king. Dark like his father and light like his mother, the new king stood tall and strong, ready to fly.
To this day, there’s a place at the edge of the world where the sky meets the sea, and a great viking chief meets the dragon king in secret, one day a year. It will be carried on by their children, and their children’s children, until the world is safe for dragons once more.
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