A rumor was spreading throughout the city of Yesul. No one was quite sure who started the rumor, but everyone knew that it wasn't him or her who did it. And, of course, no one would admit to having started it even if they had, for this was quite a nasty rumor.

Rumor had it that there was a dragon lurking in the mountains and forest just outside of the city. Rumor also had it that the dragon had enslaved a human woman and was forcing her to do his bidding. No one was sure if the rumor was right, and no one wanted to go find out. Dragons were dangerous creatures, and someone could get hurt.

Once the rumor started including a baby it grew to be too much for certain citizens of the castle city. A few women, including the wife of the captain of the royal guard, had heard that the dragon and his slave had gotten a hold of a human baby. These women did not like that idea, so they pressed for their husbands to go out and check out the rumor.

And so the captain of the royal guard led a group of reluctant husbands who were more afraid of their wives than the thought of a dragon out to the mountains that border the kingdom to the east in search of this dragon. They walked for hours, looking for any signs that a dragon might have been in the area recently, but they found nothing. Finally, they were about to give up, go back to their homes, and reassure their wives that there was no dragon out in the mountains, when they heard voices coming from nearby.

"He is beautiful," a woman's voice said, and they started to creep closer to get a look at who was talking.

"Yes, he is," a man's voice said.

The men crept up to the edge of the circular area where the voices were coming from. Sitting inside of the area were a young human woman and a huge dragon. The men froze at the sight of the beast, who was the source of the male voice that they had heard. The woman was holding a small baby in her arms, and both woman and dragon were staring at the child.

The woman was in her early twenties. She was short, with dark brown hair that cascaded down her back in waves. Her eyes were bright blue, and brimming with tears of happiness. She wore a dark green dress, and the cloth in which the baby was wrapped looked to be of the same material.

The dragon beside her was a grand beast. He had bright golden scales that glittered in the last rays of the sun, for it was late and the sun was almost set. His wings, which were folded against his back as he rested, were blood red, the color of rubies. His eyes, which were also filled with tears of happiness, were golden brown, and they sparkled with a strange sort of power.

The men at the edge of the cleared out area looked at each other nervously. They were well aware that they were no match for a dragon, especially without a mage. But they were equally afraid of their wives, so they stayed, and tried to get a better look at the baby.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity to the waiting men, the woman held the baby out in front of her, and they got a clear line of sight to the baby. It was a boy, and he was obviously a newborn, not more than a week old. His skin was slightly darker than normal for the area, with a distinct copper tone to it. His eyes, instead of being the normal blue, were an odd gold color. He had wisps of bright red hair on his head, and as the men stared at him, they thought that he certainly didn't look much like the woman.

What the men had stumbled upon seemed to be almost like a naming ceremony, though they were certain that it couldn't be that because there was no father present, and the dragon couldn't serve as a father. Those thoughts flashed through the captain's head, and he decided that, whatever was going on, if he didn't stop it his wife would not be fit to live with for quite a long time. So he whispered to the men behind him and found that they were all thinking much the same thing.

The finally decided upon a quick rush forward with drawn swords to attack the dragon, hoping that he wouldn't notice them until it was too late. Most of the men felt that it was a dirty way to fight, especially since the woman didn't seem to be armed at all, but they knew that it was most likely their only chance of attacking the huge dragon and living to tell about it. The men, despite being men of honor who liked to fight fairly, were very conscious of their mortality.

With a word from the captain the men rushed out into the clear space, their swords drawn. They immediately fell upon the dragon, though one or two of the men also went after the woman just in case she had magic and was of a mind to use it. The dragon, surprised by their attack, hesitated, and that hesitation proved fatal for him as the men attacking him stabbed him repeatedly. He was dead within a few minutes.

The woman did not do anything as they killed the dragon. She simply watched, tears streaming down her face. When he was finally dead she continued to stare. She did not move a muscle, and the men started to wonder if maybe she had been under the dragon's control and had not been released with his death. One of the braver men started to go up to her and see if she was all right, when she set the baby down on the ground and turned to face the men, her eyes cold and hard.

"You killed him," she said, her voice cold as ice. "I won't forgive you. After all that we've done for you, you killed him."

"That was a dragon woman!" the captain exclaimed, not quite sure what she had meant with her last statement, but astonished that she could actually be defending the dragon.

"Shut up!" she snapped, and she pulled a knife from her storystylet and ran at the captain.

She was not a very skilled fighter though, and it was obvious that she didn't know how to use the knife properly. The captain, out of instinct and reflex, met her with his sword. She continued to run at him though, and before it could register on him that she was not stopping, she had run herself onto his sword. She did not cry out, though the pain must have been great, and the captain stared with horror at what he had inadvertently done.

"I'm coming my love," she whispered with her last breath, and then she died, falling limp on the captain's sword, which he was still holding in front of him.

The captain stared, in shock at having killed one of his own kind. Then, acutely conscious of how awful the woman looked spitted on his sword, he drew the sword out of her body and laid her on the ground, muttering a prayer to the gods for the woman's soul and begging forgiveness for having killed her. One of the other men, seeing how upset the captain was, walked over to him and laid his hand on the man's shoulder.

"It couldn't be helped Captain," the younger man said. "She was clearly still under the dragon's control. At least she went quickly."

Most of the other men nodded at the comment, but a few were inspecting the dead bodies. All of a sudden, one of the men by the woman's body cried out, and the others clustered around him to find out what had upset him. The man's face was white as a sheet, and he was shaking.

"Mory, what's wrong?" one of the ones nearest the man asked in a worried tone.

"She…" the man said, his voice shaking as much as his body was. "I knew her. She grew up just down the street from me."

"Wait, you mean that weird girl whose parents wouldn't let her play with the other girls?" another man said. "I remember her. Her name was Kariana, right?"

"Yeah," the man said. "But what was she doing with a dragon?"

He looked around to see if anyone might have had an answer for him, but everyone just shrugged. Many of the men knew who she was, though not very well. She had been a strange girl, and almost no one in the whole city of Yesul had known her well.

Meanwhile, the baby was being ignored. He was beginning to get hungry, and cold, so he reacted in the only way he knew. He started bawling, proving that he had very healthy lungs, and every single man in the area turned around to stare at him, guilty looks on their faces.

"We forgot about the kid," one man said. "Captain, what should we do with the baby?" The captain looked up from the ground and stared at the baby for a few moments.

"I don't think he was involved in any of this," the captain said after thinking for a while. "Anyway, he's too young to be a problem. Any volunteers to take him in?"

A thin old man stepped forward from the group. He was by far the oldest man among the group and clearly not a soldier. His hair was white, though slightly dirty and limp. He had sharp brown eyes that looked upon the mass of younger men, many of whom he had punished at one point or another while they were growing up, and they practically dared the men to protest. He was dressed in a farmer's garb, plain, but functional. The captain eyed him as he walked forward.

"I'll take 'im," the old man said.

"Juolgo, right?" the captain said. "Aren't you a little old to be taking care of a baby?"

"M'wife 'n I got more kids th'n yuh c'n imagine, but dey're all grown up now" Juolgo said, his tone clearly saying what he thought of the captain. "We c'n 'andle 'nother one. 'N dat's more'n I c'n say 'bout most of yuh."

"Hey!' one of the younger men, just recently become a father, said indignantly. Juolgo looked at the man, and his expression conveyed that he though him quite humorous.

"Yuh dunno nuttin' 'bout kids," Juolgo said clearly. "What? Yuh think dat 'cause yuh got a babe now yuh're a expert? Well, yuh're dead wrong. Leave dis one t' someone who knows what 'e's doin'."

The young man looked about to reply, but with a look from the captain he shut his mouth. He was also a member of the royal guard, and he knew that if he were to cause trouble with Juolgo he would regret it in weapons practice for a long time. The captain stared at the old man for a while. He was about to say something when another man stepped out from the crowd.

"Captain, sir, well, if it wouldn't be a bother, I think maybe you should give the babe to Juolgo," the man said nervously. "My family's lived near him all of my life, and I used to play with a few of his sons. And well, they all love him a lot, and they say he's a great father. So maybe letting him have the babe wouldn't be such a bad idea."

The captain eyed the man carefully. The man was wringing his floppy hat in his hands and was clearly not comfortable being scrutinized by the captain. He didn't seem to be lying though, and the captain's eyes went back to Juolgo.

"Does anyone else have anything to say?" the captain asked, moving his gaze away from the old man to look over the others.

The men were silent.

"Very well then Juolgo," the captain said. "Take the child with you. From now on he is yours."

"Yuh're a wise man," Juolgo said, moving to pick up the baby.

At the touch of a strange man's hands the child started to cry even louder. Juolgo, not seeming to be worried about the child's rejection of him, opened up the blanket to make sure the baby was all right. To his surprise, he found a pendant inside of the blanket, which was more of a cloak than a blanket.

He took out the pendant and looked at it carefully. There was a word inscribed on the pendant, but, being illiterate, Juolgo could not read it. Out of frustration, he thrust the pendant into the captain's hand.

"What's it say?" he asked, sounding quite irritated. The captain looked at the pendant closely, and his eyes widened as he read the word on it.

"It seems the child's name is Zhelenstilo," the captain said, and the group of men surrounding him all stared at him in disbelief, a few of the more superstitious muttering wards against evil.

"Kid's got a damned dragon name!" Juolgo said angrily.

"It can't be helped," the captain said. "That must have been a naming ceremony that they were finishing up, and we can't go against it. It would be wrong, even if that couldn't have been a properly done ceremony."

The other men nodded reluctantly. They all knew that going against the name a child was given at his naming ceremony could end up in a life of bad luck for the child, and none of the men wished that on the baby, even if he did have a dragon's name. All of the men knew though that they wanted to get themselves as far away from the dead dragon as they could, so before long they were all on their way back to Yesul. Each man returned to his own home to assure his wife that the dragon was dead, and the baby was safe, and Juolgo returned to his old wife with the baby Zhelenstilo.