It takes a couple hours of sunlight for the chlorophyll to filter enough energy for the mountain to rise. But when it does -
- low over the Ozarks, the rolling hills of mountain-bones ground down to nubs, to river valleys and forested dells, green slopes unending, cast down like jacks in disarray, covered with oak and kudzu, ash and maple. Through this jumble slides a hill in motion, drifting low between the rises, barely visible as just one more rise of green; until you get close enough to see that these trees stand on an island aloft, a wide mound of earth almost two hundred feet wide, studded with trees and flowering plants, the soil held in place by thick twining roots. Beneath the flying mountain is a mouth, a gaping orifice lined with tendrils as long as the trees they pluck branches and limbs from, feeding the fresh greenery into the maw - along with whatever birds, squirrels, and other wildlife might happen to be too close, ground down into a feeding-paste the beast swallows hungrily, endlessly. Its oblong body, like an oversized frilled bladder, floats low over the treetops as it grazes on the forest like a goat would blades of grass. It's difficult to glimpse, but in the early morning light, flickers of gleaming orange glisten against the morning light, reflective of tiny orbs set far back in that crusted, earthy skin.
Yama Kurai: the Floating Peak Dragon, eldest of Elder Dragons, come to rest among the bones of its forebears.
Between the trees on its back are strewn low structures, braced against scales so old the dirt between them has given bloom; a wide, low barn to the left, over a scar crossing long and high over the amorphous beast's maw where the dirt has dragged clean and the scales torn loose to bear slick flesh against the sunlight, only just starting to scab over with kudzu. A watchtower girds the right side, with a long loop of rope crossing under one feeding tendril and the beast's entire body, with a windmill set into the back, barrels set about the back to catch the rain from the clouds they ride through. A vegetable patch grows fitfully, no farmer's touch here but adequate for the purpose; and a smithy huffs smoke up and safely out of the dragon's way, where it won't irritate its delicate nose and cause it to buck the entire arrangement off.
This morn, as the placid mountain feeds its ever-sharp hunger, its occupants are rousing; one, like nothing so much a draconic caterpillar, an orange-and-green morass of thorned scales, highlighted in toxic colors, slumbers in a passive lump towards the Yama's head, out on the fringe where no branches can block its loafing in the sunlight. It appears entirely content to ignore everything else going on. The other, a blue-scaled, winged variant with a craglike horn nearly a third of its own body length, brays annoyance as the saddle settles around its shoulders but holds still nonetheless, attuned to the needs of its herd - the Pyrenean, the Ram-Wyvern, guardian of its chosen flock, recessed, beady eyes flicking about as its deep nostrils huff the new scents of the area, sniffing for wyvern musk and finding none - this is no predator's range, yet.
Below and beside, a salt-haired, tall fella tightens the saddle-straps, steps aside to check his gear - a bandoleer strap of various packs and pockets, gut-strip canteens of various liquids sealed tight, and a monster blade his own size and weight, gleaming and sharp, already mounted onto the Pyrenean's side; he hops onto its back with a grunt, and the wyvern honks in recognition, squaring its stance and flapping out its wings, ready to take off, raring to go.
"Let's see what's going on here, Tupe," he murmurs, whiskey-rough voice easy on his partner's ears, and with a shriek the partners throw themselves off the side of the floating mountain, off to investigate this new territory they've invaded.
- low over the Ozarks, the rolling hills of mountain-bones ground down to nubs, to river valleys and forested dells, green slopes unending, cast down like jacks in disarray, covered with oak and kudzu, ash and maple. Through this jumble slides a hill in motion, drifting low between the rises, barely visible as just one more rise of green; until you get close enough to see that these trees stand on an island aloft, a wide mound of earth almost two hundred feet wide, studded with trees and flowering plants, the soil held in place by thick twining roots. Beneath the flying mountain is a mouth, a gaping orifice lined with tendrils as long as the trees they pluck branches and limbs from, feeding the fresh greenery into the maw - along with whatever birds, squirrels, and other wildlife might happen to be too close, ground down into a feeding-paste the beast swallows hungrily, endlessly. Its oblong body, like an oversized frilled bladder, floats low over the treetops as it grazes on the forest like a goat would blades of grass. It's difficult to glimpse, but in the early morning light, flickers of gleaming orange glisten against the morning light, reflective of tiny orbs set far back in that crusted, earthy skin.
Yama Kurai: the Floating Peak Dragon, eldest of Elder Dragons, come to rest among the bones of its forebears.
Between the trees on its back are strewn low structures, braced against scales so old the dirt between them has given bloom; a wide, low barn to the left, over a scar crossing long and high over the amorphous beast's maw where the dirt has dragged clean and the scales torn loose to bear slick flesh against the sunlight, only just starting to scab over with kudzu. A watchtower girds the right side, with a long loop of rope crossing under one feeding tendril and the beast's entire body, with a windmill set into the back, barrels set about the back to catch the rain from the clouds they ride through. A vegetable patch grows fitfully, no farmer's touch here but adequate for the purpose; and a smithy huffs smoke up and safely out of the dragon's way, where it won't irritate its delicate nose and cause it to buck the entire arrangement off.
This morn, as the placid mountain feeds its ever-sharp hunger, its occupants are rousing; one, like nothing so much a draconic caterpillar, an orange-and-green morass of thorned scales, highlighted in toxic colors, slumbers in a passive lump towards the Yama's head, out on the fringe where no branches can block its loafing in the sunlight. It appears entirely content to ignore everything else going on. The other, a blue-scaled, winged variant with a craglike horn nearly a third of its own body length, brays annoyance as the saddle settles around its shoulders but holds still nonetheless, attuned to the needs of its herd - the Pyrenean, the Ram-Wyvern, guardian of its chosen flock, recessed, beady eyes flicking about as its deep nostrils huff the new scents of the area, sniffing for wyvern musk and finding none - this is no predator's range, yet.
Below and beside, a salt-haired, tall fella tightens the saddle-straps, steps aside to check his gear - a bandoleer strap of various packs and pockets, gut-strip canteens of various liquids sealed tight, and a monster blade his own size and weight, gleaming and sharp, already mounted onto the Pyrenean's side; he hops onto its back with a grunt, and the wyvern honks in recognition, squaring its stance and flapping out its wings, ready to take off, raring to go.
"Let's see what's going on here, Tupe," he murmurs, whiskey-rough voice easy on his partner's ears, and with a shriek the partners throw themselves off the side of the floating mountain, off to investigate this new territory they've invaded.
