A long time ago, man and dragon lived peacefully together. Man didn't go far into the mountains where the dragons lived and the dragons didn't go to the valleys for there was enough game in the mountains.
Of course it occurred that a dragon stole some of the cattle belonging to farmers who lived near the mountains, but those were the old and sick cows and the losses were easily compensated. But a few severe winters made the game move away from the mountains into the warmer valleys and more cattle started to disappear on the meadows near the mountains.
Afraid of what next year might bring, a king from a small kingdom near the mountain ordered his son and a couple of his best knights to go out and kill the dragon, responsible for killing the cattle.
The party, in strong, shining battle-armour and long mithril lances, mounted their war-horses that winter and set off to hunt down the dragon and kill it. They traveled far into the mountains. Troubled by strong wind, rain and snow the search took long and was exhausting.
The moral of the party was dropping fast, until one morning the prince saw a dragon approach in the distance. Getting back in the cave, which they used as shelter, he alerted the men. Leaving the horses behind, they followed the dragon to his hiding place.
A dark cave was the home of the large dragon and the knights waited for the nightfall, so they could enter the cave unseen. As soon as the sun was away the knights sneaked in and surprised the dragon. The dragon understood what was going happening and started to hit around him in a rage. The party was scattered and a few knight were crushed by the dragons strong claws. The dragon took down many men, until the prince saw his change to drive his lance through the heart of the dragon. The dragon gave a loud roar and fell down to earth. In a strange tongue the dragon mumbles his last words before he closed his eyes.
The prince realized that the roar would have alerted other dragons and ordered the party to carry the wounded men to the horses. They rode as quickly as possible away from the cave in the hope that the dragons would not find them.
At the cave the first dragons arrived and found the big dragon lying dead on the ground. Longing for revenge the dragons flew up in the sky and saw a group of armed men riding through the mountains. They knew the could do nothing in the mountains so they waited for the party to be in the valleys so they would be easy targets. More dragons joined and when the prince and his men entered the valley, the dragons attacked them and killed all of them.
Some of the dragons were not satisfied with this and wanted to kill the whole kingdom. They took off and head towards the castle to slaughter more humans. Other dragons thought they had done enough killing and didn't want to risk a war with the humans by attacking the kingdom. They took the forms of the killed men, wore their armor and went to the castle in order to warn the king.
When they reached the castle they were already to late. The dragons had already started their slaughter. The knights changed back in their dragon form and started to fight the other dragons. Surprised by the attack of their own kind, the dragons fled back into the mountains, but not before they swore to kill all human beings.
To save mankind, the defending dragons decided to take the human forms again and would
live among the people to save them from their evil kindred. From that day on they lived
among the people, banned from their home ground by the other dragons.
This is the story of the..
