Chapter 2 (Turin)

Dylan is a young man who is obsessed with dragon's. Though dragon's are extinct for over 500 years, his knowledge about the creatures is beyond great and on top of that useless according to his people

Chapter 1

Dylan stared at a sign above the inn; 'Dragon's nest'. He chuckled amused, tightened his bandana tighter in his brown-reddish hair and pulled his bag further onto his shoulder. "The closer we get, the more dragon related things we see, don't we Grey?" He looked down to his knee high griffin with a small smile on his lips.

The young creature frolicked next to the young man's feet, clicked with his beak and wagged its lion's tail cheerfully.

The griffin was far too small for its kind and because of that it had been outcast.

Dylan and Grey both came from a city called Leaves the city of Griffins, where people and Griffin's live side by side. It was a peaceful and hardworking city, what meant that Dylan and Gry were the outcast. Gry because he was too small and Dylan because he was obsessed with a subject nobody was interested in anymore; Dragons. The creatures extinct about 200 years ago and knowledge about the creatures was rare, but still Dylan had done anything to find every single fact that he could find about dragons. The people in Leavis, and probably the rest of the world if they knew, saw him as an outcast. Knowledge about dragons was all that he had. He wasn't a hardworking man, he was obsessed with knowledge. He couldn't fight, he couldn't cook, and he knew nothing, except everything that could be found about dragons. Though he never regret learning so much about dragons. It was his life and he didn't want it any other way. Not even when people looked down on him.

Dylan chuckled and turned back to the inn. "Let's see if there is still a bed left for us." He said and stepped towards the front door. The young man opened the door and let his griffin in before he followed.

Despite that the inn was in the middle of nowhere it was surprisingly crowded. Almost every seat was taken and the tables were filled with empty tankards, while the still filled where held by the people, ready to be emptied. The people in the inn were loudly laughing or yelling their stories to people only a few steps away from them.

Dylan took a quick glance to Gry, to make sure the animal was behaving and then stepping towards the innkeeper behind the bar.

The man looked up at Dylan and then turned his eyes down to the small griffin. He took a tankard from the bar and start cleaning it, not speaking a single word to Dylan.

"A room for one." Dylan said, not bothered that the man didn't ask him what he needed. "And the daily dish."
The innkeeper pulled his eyes off Gry and turned them back to Dylan. "12 silver." He said surly.

Dylan reached for his pocket and grabbed his purse. He turned to Gry for a moment and saw the creature sniffing around. It reminded him that his griffin was probably hungry as well. "Could I order a fresh fish or an uncooked chicken as well?" Dylan asked the innkeeper.

The innkeeper stared at him slightly annoyed. "13 silver." He then said, still cleaning the same tankard and in the corner of his eye looking at Gry as if he was hoping the half bird would do something that would allow him to throw Dylan and Gry out.

Without complaining Dylan paid the innkeeper, then turned away from the bar and looked through the inn. "Come, Gry." He said. "Let's find ourselves a table."

It didn't take him to long before he found a small table in the back. There was only a single seat left, because the others in the inn had taken the other seats to sit down with their friends. Luckily Dylan was the only one who needed a chair.

Dylan sat down and placed his bag next to his chair. He saw Gry was still sniffing around and petted the half bird's head gently when it passed him.

That same moment a friendly looking man walked up to the two and reached for the small griffin. "I've never seen a griffin that small. " He said interested. "It is a griffin isn't it?"

Gry immediately reacted to the man's hand. He unfolded his wings, opened his beak dangerously into the man's direction and screeched deafening.

The man backed off quickly and the whole inn was suddenly quiet.

Gry stopped screeching as soon as the man backed off, but his wings were still unfolded and he was staring dangerously at the man.

Dylan kneeled next to the griffin. "Don't do that, Gry." He said and then turned to the man who had tried to touch his pet. "I'm sorry. Gry doesn't like strangers." He said. "Yes it's a griffin, but nobody understands why it's so small. Where I come from griffins are very common. Gry was repudiated, because he was different from the others." Just like Dylan was. Not that he was disowned, but he was different than his people. In the end he left on his own. Just to relieve his people from him. He wasn't adding anything to the city anyway.

As soon as Dylan told the griffin to calm down, Gry did. He folded his wings back and continued sniffing around the table.

The innkeeper's wife walked up to them and placed a poorly filled plate on the table. Without a single word she threw a dead chicken into Gry's direction. The animal quickly turned to the chicken and smelled it. He grabbed the chicken with he's front claws and just wanted to eat when he suddenly stiffened. His eyes were fixed at something and his pupils became smaller. He slowly lowered his body, wings and head and positions his back legs as if he wanted to jump onto something.

Dylan, who noticed that Gry wasn't eating, turned to griffin. "What is the matter?" He asked Gry, not expecting an answer and tried to see what the half bird was looking at.

Then out of nowhere Gry suddenly took a sprint. Dylan lost him out of his eye, but the yelling women and irritated men indicated where the griffin was.

"Gry!" He called for the griffin. He was slightly shocked and curious at the same time. He wondered what he was after and tried to find the half bird within the crowd.

After he called for Gry a few times more it suddenly became quiet. Gry had stopped running and after a few second he walked back to its owner with a giant rat in its beak. He threw his head back and worked the rat down his throat.

Dylan chuckled at first, but then reminded himself of the nuisance he had cause. He turned to the innkeeper's wife, who still stood close to his table. "I'm sorry for my griffin's beha..." His sentence was cut off by the woman.

"Don't worry son. My husband wasn't able to keep that filthy rat out of my kitchen." The woman had a slightly friendlier expression on her face when she walked away again.

Dylan chuckled again and turned to the quiet people in the inn. When he did so they slowly started to talk again and turn away from Dylan and Gry, except for the man who had tried to pet the griffin before. "That is indeed a very extraordinary pet you have." He said still interested. But before he could say anything more, someone interrupted him.

"Extraordinary?" A cracked voice suddenly overwhelmed the noise in the inn. "I'll tell ye what's really extraordinary!"

The friendly man sighed and placed a hand in front of his eyes. "O no, there he goes again." The man said and quickly turned away from Dylan's table.

An old man walked towards Dylan. At first he looked like quite a normal man, but the closer he came the more insane he seemed to look. He walked limp and his back was bend in a weird way; forward and slightly to the side. Dylan couldn't help, but think this man was the local nutjob.

The man walked straight to Dylan and pointed his cane to his face. "Dragons son! Dragons! I'm tellin' ye!"

"Dragons?" Dylan asked, slowly leading the cane away from his face. The nutjob had his attention within a few second. A sparkle of interest shown in his eyes while he waited for the man to continue.

"Leave the boy, Tom." Another man told the nutjob strict.

Dylan didn't take his eyes off the nutjob. "No, tell me." He said. "What about dragons?"

Everyone stared at Dylan, visibly thinking what on earth he was thinking. Even the nutjob seemed surprised that someone actually wanted to hear his story.

The nutjob ordered his thoughts back in line as far as that was possible for a nutjob and walked even closer to Dylan.

"Dragons, son!" He said and touched Dylan's arm. "They exist!" The nutjob's eyes widened. "Giant creatures! Wings longer than I ever saw on a bird!"

Dylan didn't say a word and quickly grabbed his bag. He took his journal out of it as well as a charcoal to write with.

"Claws that can break every single bone in your body!" The nutjob continued not interrupted by Dylan's action.

"What did it look like?" Dylan asked. "Eye colour, scale structure, that sort of things." The story of the nutjob probably wasn't true, but he still wanted to know what kind of dragon the man believed he had seen. He quickly scribbled down the things the nutjob told him thus far and waited for the rest.

The nutjob looked at him quietly, either because he was really surprised that Dylan was curious or because he was thinking what the dragon had looked like. Then he looked into the distance, not seeing. "Dark blue almost black, its eyes red but as dark as th' blue, scales shinin' as if they were wet and two horns where ones ears should be."

Dylan quickly wrote down everything the man told him. "Did you see his teeth?" Dylan asked the nutjob.

The nutjob was quiet for a second time. "I did nae." He finally answered. He seemed a little defeated that he couldn't answer the question.

"Did it breath anything? Fire, gas, lighting?" Dylan continued asking.

The man shook his head slowly. "But its tail was twice as long as its body." He said, trying to give Dylan better information. In the meanwhile he tried to see what the young man was writing down and what was already written in the journal.

Dylan suddenly stopped writing and looked up at the man. He was clearly surprised and a twinkling in his eyes indicated that he was amused by the information. He turned back to his journal and started leaving through it. When he found the page he was searching for he turned it towards the nutjob, showing him a picture of a dragon with a round snout and a long tail. "The Dew Gatherer. It's a dragon from the southern parts of the land. It flies through the air as if its swimming through water. Its scales are slightly pointing out. It flies through the clouds to gathers water drops under those scales. That way it can cool itself down, because it can't sweat." Dylan explained the nutjob enthusiastic.

The nutjob on his turn widened his eyes. His lips moved while he tried to say something, but it took him longer to find the words than he had expected. "That's it son! That's th' dragon!" He almost yelled.

Dylan chuckled amused and placed his journal back on the table, looking at the drawing. Then he took a deep breath. The corners of his mouth slowly dropped in disappointment. "I'm sorry." Dylan then told the nutjob. "They extinct more than 500 years ago." Even though it was amusing that the nutjob thought he had seen such a dragon alive, it was impossible. Dragons had extinct 200 years ago and the Dew Gatherer was one of the first to die out. The man had probably seen a picture of the dragon and imagined the dragon to be real in a drunk mood.

"Nae, son!" The nutjob said quickly and looked at Dylan "I saw it! Flyin' 'igh above me head!" He brought his hands into the air to empathise his words. Dylan look at the nutjob to make sure if the man was really speaking the truth, if he really had seen a living dragon, but before he had the chance one of the other man in the inn pulled the nutjob away from him.

"I had enough of your wild fantasies, Tom!" The man said irritated and pulled him toward the front door to throw him out.

Dylan stood up to follow the nutjob, but he was pushed back onto his chair by the innkeeper. "Bring him back and I'll throw you out as well." He said calm but with a strict tone in his voice.

Dylan looked at the innkeeper and doubted shortly, but then he decided to stay. Being thrown out wasn't an option, because he needed a place to sleep for the night.

Gry, who had been eating next to Dylan on the floor, screeched dangerously towards the innkeeper, warning him to let his owner go. Dylan looked down at Gry and shushed him quickly. An angry griffin would probably worsen the mood of the innkeeper.

The innkeeper raised an eyebrow, let go of Dylan and walked back to his bar.

When he was completely out of sight, Dylan bend towards the griffin. "Follow him." He said as he pointed carefully into the direction of the door, where the nutjob just had been thrown out.

The rather intelligent creature understood the request of its owner and quickly walked towards the door, where he waited for someone to leave and slipped out of the inn.

Dylan slowly sat back up and looked at the door until Gry was outside. Then he turned to his dinner, which was already cold. He chuckled, not bothered by his cold food. His eyes travelled to his journal that lay next to his plate and smiled satisfied. Without complaining he start eating.

---

At the end of the evening, he walked to the innkeeper to ask him which room he could use. The wife of the innkeeper walked him to his room and gave him the key.

When he opened the door, Gry just came back. Without the nutjob.

Dylan let the griffin in his room, closed the door behind him and sat down on the bed. "You didn't find him, did you?" He asked the half bird. He petted the griffin on his head and grabbed his bag to find a snack for the animal.

Gry clicked cheerfully with his beak when he received the chicken that he hadn't finished downstairs.

Dylan smiled at the griffin and watch him eating for a bit. Then he grabbed his journal and walked towards the window. He sat down on the chair that stood there and looked at the notes he took from the nutjob. "I want to believe him, Gry." He said and stared out of the window. "I really do, but it is impossible." He took a deep breath and tried to imagine what he would feel or what he would do if he would have seen the dew gatherer. A small smile appeared on his lips. Probably he would just stand there and stare at the amazing sight.

Gry, who was completely ignoring his owner, cooed soft and satisfied, while he pulled the chicken's meat of its bones, making a mess of his surroundings.

Dylan chuckled. "Don't make a mess, ok?" He said and stood up. "I'm going to bed. Tomorrow will yet again be a long day." He sat down on the edge of the bed and pulled his shoes and shirt off, before he lay down and pulled the sheets over him. "We are getting so close." He mumbled satisfied. He closed his eyes and fell asleep before he had the chance to say goodnight to Gry.

---

The next day Dylan and Gry were literally thrown out of the inn. During the night, Gry had managed to make one huge mess of their hired room. Chicken bones were spread through the room and even the ceiling was covered with blood stains.

Dylan rubbed the back of his head while he tried to apologise to the innkeeper and his wife, but they did not listen and with a loud bang the Innkeeper shut his door, leaving Dylan and Gry outside.

Dylan sighed and looked at Gry. "Next time I'll give you chicken breast again, just like always." He informed the griffin that softly cooed next to his feet.

Dylan turned his back to the inn and stared over the empty fields in front of him. In the distance he saw the beginning of a forest that grow on the mountain's foot and partly over it. That forest was the place they would start searching. It was the last place where dragon's had been seen by humans and he was positive that there would be remaining of the giant creatures.

"Let's go." Dylan then said. "We'll have to search for our breakfast during the day." He threw his bag over his shoulder and walked into the direction of the forest.

"Son!"

Dylan looked up when he recognised the cracking voice. The old nutjob from the night before walked up to them.

"Where are ye headin', son?" The nutjob asked slightly panicked.

Dylan smiled. "I'm searching for dragon remains; bones or maybe if I'm lucky even more." He carefully referred to the story of the nutjob the night before.

"No, son!" The nutjob said. "Don't go there! It's t' dangerous t' go t' th' forest!"

Dylan stared quietly at the man. For some reason he started to believe him. This man was actually trying to protect him; at least that was what he looked like. "You really saw a real dragon, didn't you?"

"Of course son!" He nutjob said with the same panicked tone in his voice. "I saw 't with me own eyes!"

Dylan frowned slowly. He really wanted to believe this, but it was difficult to ignore the facts. "When did you see it?"

The nutjob who seemed to be glad that Dylan was interested again, grabbed Dylan's arm and looked him straight into his eyes. "Years ago, son. I be still a young man."

Dylan licked his lips, thinking what possibilities there were. "The Dew Gatherer had a long life span. It could be hundreds of years before it dies. Maybe the one you saw was the last one which had been hidden for 200 years. A dragon has a strong sense for danger. It must have hidden itself."

The nutjob stared at Dylan. "You know a lot about them, son." The nutjob commented frowning.

Dylan smiled proudly. "I've been interested in them ever since I could understand what a dragon was. They fascinating me. I would love to find the one you saw."

The nutjob blinked and let go of Dylan's arm. "Be careful, son. Dragon's be dangerous creatures."

Dylan nodded. "Thank you, Tom." He said, remembering the nutjob's name. He pulled his bag further onto his shoulder and smiled at the nutjob. "I'll be going now. It was nice to speak with you. You are the first with whom I could talk about dragons." With that he signed Gry to follow him and walked away, heading for the forest.

Author's Note

English is not my first language.
Please let me know if you find any errors :)