Tom Cornhill

Tom had left home when he turned eighteen, an adventurous young man who set out to make his fortune with a small loan he received from his father. He wasn’t sure where his aptitude for combat came from, but with it he established a small mercenary force; the ‘Crystal Lance’. They were few in number but highly trained and skilled individuals from across different species, and he was their gallant leader, always leading them into whatever mess they’d been paid to get into and then dragging them back out of it. Seven in total, the Crystal Lance would be hired to hit an enemy hard and fast. With such few numbers, it was all they could do. Make a hole in an enemy force to allow their customers forces to break through. Things went well for a time, until the Human Kingdom of Tariland and the Draconic Dominion of Dian Verthicha declared war.

Little did he know that one fateful contract would change his life, forever. The Crystal Lance was hired by the Kingdom of Tariland early into the war. At this point there had only been one confrontation between the two sides which ended in the total annihilation of the Human Kingdoms expeditionary forces and they needed new scouts, a much smaller force that was under no banner to try and gather information without as much suspicion. Sadly, it failed. Mere weeks into the Crystal Lance’ exploration into the Draconic Dominion they were confronted by a singular dragon in finely polished and impressive armour, wielding a huge halberd. They took one look at Tom and that was enough to begin the attack, no questions asked. He was a human, and that was all they needed to know.

The battle began how it would end, with silence. The first strike was a costly one; the dragon was so fast, so strong. It was hard to even keep up with its movements when it charged forward and drove the spike of the halberd straight through his forces healer; they knew exactly who to strike first and things would only get worse. There are negatives to running a mercenary force and leading it yourself, issues with it being such a small, close-knit group. Emotions. While Tom became close friends with them, treated them like his second family, some of them had gotten even closer than that and it immediately showed when their paladin screamed out in fury and charged the dragon head-on, with no thought, only pure anger. The fight didn’t last long. Even with such strength that an equine could muster; the two-handed sword was easily deflected away off of the dragons bracer as it yanked the halberd free with one hand, with the Paladin’ attention captured by the weapon, the dragons tail swung in and impaled him through his plate upon the point of a spike attached to the end of its tail. In less than five minutes since meeting the dragon, both their healer and emergency healer were dead.

Things were looking grim. Five of them left, including him. No healing support. And a dragon that seemed far too skilled for them to handle, but handle it, they must. There was no running from this fight; even if they tried they’d likely be taken down in mere moments. At least that is what he believed at the time. He would look between his few friends, to his dead friends, focussing on the Paladin as they were thrown aside from the dragon’s tail like he weighed nothing even in his full plate. There was no time to formulate a plan, no time to speak and luckily for them all he had developed an order system based on hand signals. Within moments of twitching some fingers and shifting his hands the group encircled the dragon. And with a loud cry, he commanded the attack. But, less than ten minutes since the dragon stood before them, he was alone.

Within another five minutes he’d lost three more friends and the fourth final friend, lay in his arms bleeding out. He stared at the dragon with silent rage, hatred, sorrow. Lay his friend down is they coughed and gurgled on their own blood and drove his sword through their heart to end their suffering. His eyes had dulled and what little gold in them that shimmered in the light had tarnished and become dim. Forcing himself from the ground onto his feet, he eyed the dragon, some of its armour dented, scratched, a shin guard had been stripped free, a pauldron hung loose. But he was in much worse wear. He’d lost his helmet to a direct strike from a tail swipe that dented and flung the steel helm from his head and took him out of the fight long enough for two of his friends to be struck down. He’d lost his shield when it shattered from blocking the halberd when it came down on his last friend only for them to be impaled by that damned tail spike instead. He was in trouble.

He stared his death down. This was it. Might as well go out in a flourish, right? As he kept his distance and stared the dragon down while it fixed the pauldron. He began to strip out of his armour, tossing the heavy pieces of plate on the ground until he stood in his clothes, not even a chain shirt remained. ‘Well, I guess this is it, you monster’, not the best final words, but they would do. Without the weight of so much extra metal he hoped his speed would be on par with the dragon, maybe if he could at least draw a single droplet of blood it would all be worth it, to prove that he and his friends weren’t utterly weak to this beast, this monster. As he threw himself forward he bent down to grab one of their fallen spears, hoisting it in the air and tossing it at the dragon as a diversion so he could close the distance. Surprised, the dragon threw down it’s halberd to meet Tom in close quarters combat.

The fight lasted longer than he could have imagined; five full minutes. And by the end of it he’d broken the tail spike, ripped a hole in some of its wings membrane, dented the helmet and put the smallest of gashes in its left arm. Not bad, for a human. But he was so much worse for wear. His steel sword had been shattered and with it the arm he wielded it with, he had a hole in his other shoulder, claw marks across his chest and a splinter of metal protruding from his gut. He was fucked. But still he stood, kind of. Brandishing his shattered sword in a death grip as his shattered arm hung limp down his body, wrist propped upon his hip. He breathed heavy, laboured blood rumbling breaths. And the dragon just stood there.

It was silent. The sounds of combat were long over. And the dragon pried its helmet from its head. Tom wasn’t sure if he was delirious or just a fool, but he could have sworn its features looked feminine, or maybe it was a concussion. The dragoness dropped the helmet on the ground and approached him, slowly. Tom stood as tall as he could, so exhausted and beaten as he was. Closed his eyes and took a deep breath, held it and- nothing. He could feel the dragoness looming over him, but it did nothing. He wanted to peak, take a look, see what it was doing, but his adrenaline had ebbed away and he passed out.

After the Crystal Lance was destroyed, Tom found himself in the ‘care’ of Emeratta. The dragoness had claimed as some kind of prize or trophy as much as he could figure. It didn’t make sense to him why she didn’t just finish him off then and there where she’d killed his friends. But here he was, in her home, under her ever watchful eye.

Tom’s life wasn’t an easy one at this point. He survived days of gruelling rehabilitation as his arm slowly healed and his gut recovered. He spent months in and out of what appeared to be some kind of Draconic Dominion apothecary; he would spend hours until the watchful eye of the dragoness being poked and prodded and given medicines. Some made him sick, some made him feel better. Dragons, or at least these ones seemed to have no knowledge of humans and he had to wonder why he was chosen as an exception to not be killed and instead experimented on. Although things never went too far with her there to watch what happened.

It wasn’t until half a year into his situation that she even tried to communicate with him. Usually there were just glares, snarls, growls and lots of gesturing. He had heard draconic before whenever she spoke to another dragon, but it was difficult to deconstruct and replicate with his human tongue. But one day he surprised her when he said something. She knocked him out for it, but it was the first step in their relationship. He spent the next half of the year learning rudimentary draconic for basic speech like a child of their species would accomplish within a couple of months. But they finally began to communicate and he learned of how the war was progressing. It wasn’t. The human Kingdom of Tariland had fallen a mere month after he and his Crystal Lance had met her. There was little left of the human kingdom as it had been known, and elements of those who were loyal to the previous kingdom before it had been betrayed and absorbed had reclaimed the lands. The dragons left them to rebuild because it would be dishonourable to destroy an enemy that was no longer able to fight.

In time, Tom became part of the Dominion, assisting the dragon in learning about human culture and the human language so that peace could be maintained as best it could. He became akin to an ambassador, sent with Emeratta to meet with any who would breach their borders to negotiate and warn off, or in some cases to facilitate trade. But as the years passed by, Tom lost his value, as the dragons he had taught, taught other dragons. He was encouraged to return to his home, if there would be anything left of it to go back to, but he decided to stay, with Emeratta.

Over the months of working with Emeratta to learn draconic and in turn, teach her the common language and about human society. Tom and Emeratta fell in love. As crazy as it seemed for a human and an almost eight foot tall dragoness to be able to become mates, as dragon society would call it. After-all, Emeratta wasn’t the typical thing that caught most people’s eyes, but he did always have an obsession for those of a scalier persuasion. And she was cute. The eight foot dragoness was short as far as other dragons went; slim with a modest body that suited her equally modest personality.

Their relationship was met with disdain, distrust and fear. If a dragon and human could fall in love, then what was to stop their pure blood from being watered down by other possible occurrences of such disgusting pairings? But tom and Emeratta went ahead with their joining, their wedding and would live together in relative happiness. As with all relationships there were trials and tribulations, arguments, misunderstandings, but they were both strong and both truly in love and managed to overcome the difficulties of such overwhelming differences. In anything they had become too comfortable with each-other, setting aside their previous skills in combat to settle into newly wedded life, living off the income they made with their ambassadorial duties.

But, as with all stories, happiness is soon buried with sorrow. After five years of happy marriage and failure to conceive a child, Emeratta finally broke the good news to Tom about an egg she believed would be their first child together. Everything was going well until her brother turned up; he hadn’t shown any interest in her life or marriage until she informed the family of her hopes to have a child. It was only then that he decided to deign them with his presence. As like all families, there were problematic elements and her brother happened to be the one in hers. A die hard purest who became enraged that his sister not only married a human but dared to have a child with him. It was too much, so he snapped. Though Tom tried to intercede, the man was four feet his better with pounds of muscle and impenetrable scale that set about demolishing the happiness that was so hard fought for. During this fight Emeratta was gravely wounded, and their egg they had nurtured was destroyed in her brothers ‘purging’ before leaving Tom to lay broken both emotionally and physically.

With shattered legs and five broken ribs, Tom dragged himself to Emeratta over an hour of agonising pain, listening to her breathes steadily weaken as he tore up his clothes, and the skin beneath upon broken shards of glass, crockery and fragments of wood, until finally he reached her. It would be the second most scarring moment of his entire life. As he tried to pull himself up to lay against her, their broken egg in her arms, her breathing stopped, her eyes staring at the shards of egg, he was too late to even say goodbye.

Months later, Tom awoke in a hospital, Emeratta’ parents stood at the end of his bed with grim expressions on their faces. They blamed him for the death of their daughter and the coming death of their son. He would be ostracised from the land he had grown to love, from the only family he felt he could be part of. Never to be allowed to return or visit the grave of his beloved, not even allowed to witness the punishment of her brother for what he had done.

And so, he returned to the only other place he knew.

Tom returned to what was once known as the Kingdom of Tariland, unsure what he would find. would his parents even still be alive or even around? It had been years since he would have been declared dead or at least missing. And upon returning home he would find that his family house was in disrepair, though the windows were broken and the door loosely hung from the hinges, it did not appear that anyone had been here in some time, not even looters or scavengers.

It would be here that Tom would discover the truth. While searching the house for anything useful, he would find a box hidden in the top of his parent’s wardrobe, full of papers and instructions that were old and faded. He learned that his parents weren’t his parents at all, merely surrogates he was put upon to be raised until of age before they would receive a large payout and could be freed of their duty. His whole childhood life was a lie and he was unsure how to feel about this, closer inspection through the boxes contents he would find a letter with a wax seal addressed to him by first name only.

‘Tom,
I do not know how old you will be when you finally read this, nor do I know where you are now, but know this. It is not lack of love, or desire to keep you that I have left you with these people, but the love I feel for you to live. I am the last princess of the Cronwell bloodline and you are therefore rightful heir of the Cronwell kingdom, such as it was before Tariland invaded.

I escaped days after they slaughtered my mother and father, my three brothers and my elder sister. I fear I shall not be far behind, for they have sent search parties out for me. My only ember of hope and joy is that they did not know that I was with child nor that I have given birth to a beautiful baby boy who will continue our lineage into the future. Fear not my son, for there are still many loyal to our family name. Seek them out, for if you are to help reclaim your rightful throne, you will have to fight for it tooth and nail until Arilands filth is wiped from our land.

I don’t have much time left. So I must end this letter here. I am leaving you with my most trusted royal guards. With what money we have left that I could sneak away with. They say they will find a way to make sure you are raised in a loving family, and I fear this might set you down a different path, but if you choose to ignore your royalty, that is up to you, my beloved son.

Please take care, and I love you always

Anistacia Cronwell’

Since reading the letter, Tom was renewed with a new resolve to live his life for the mother who had given up and lost so much so that he may live and while his false parents had disappeared on him with a huge payout for raising him, he still felt thankful to them for raising him even if it were under ulterior motives. He set out to restore the throne of Cronwell, now known as Cornhill within the collapsed kingdom of Tariland. Re-establishing the lost kingdom amidst the ruins of a war torn land where many other old kingdoms that had been purged would attempt to return to glory as well.