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Description
Acceptance I: The Tattoo Tent

Standing alone with no direction
How did I fall so far behind?
Why Am I searching for perfection?
Knowing it's something I won't find

-from “No Roads Left to Run” by Linkin Park

The sun rose over the land of Ithor on Nessus. My wings flapped slowly and my tiger daemon, Perfida, clasped my back. I dove down sharply and she let out a sharp yelp. I laughed as I pulled up. I was glad none of the Outcast dragons of Ithor sought me out. The fear she felt, the fear I felt also, gave me adrenaline that raced through my blood. Any sense of fear or pain gave me pleasure. But I didn’t know why.

I just knew that it gave me pleasure and that’s all that I needed to know. All anyone needed to know was what caused them pleasure. Myself, I enjoyed racing through the sky and running across the ground. Pain and fear were like hard liquors to me.

While flying high in the sky, I noticed some of the humans coming out of their tents. Humans living in Ithor tended to be more in tune with nature than humans elsewhere on Nessus. Except for a few cities in Ithor, the majority of humans lived in tents and small groups. I saw their daemons, mostly crows and ravens, flying around and greeting each other. However, I noticed only one had an Ocelot daemon.

I flew by too quickly to take any real notice of who the Ocelot belonged to. Besides, I was too concerned about making it in time to Jesse-Dali who seemed a more immediate problem to me. A few roars in the distance announced  two White Dragons flying to me remind me that I was not welcome here. Maybe I would be welcomed here, but I never felt welcomed anywhere. Jesse said it was normal for Sunset Makers to never feel welcomed anywhere. We had a job where we could be sold out to the highest bidder and mostly killed for fun. Those who hired us never knew anyone in the organization and were always given false names.

Perfida growled at the two Whites, though we both knew that they couldn’t do us any harm. Whites were notorious for being pacifists. I could never understand anyone who never enjoyed killing, not even a little bit. I loved pain, especially going so far as to actually kill someone. Cruel, yes. But it gave me purpose, at least a little. Though, recently, I had started to doubt how much I really enjoyed pain and fear.

I noticed one of the Whites had a “V” carved into its chest. Though I enjoyed pain, I would never mutilate my own body unless I needed to. I tried to out fly them and when that didn’t work I flew towards them, knowing that they wouldn’t fight me. I roared once, they looked at me angrily, and went back to report my behavior to their clan. I assumed they were from the Ithor Clan. I felt more powerful than a clan, at the moment, and continued heading toward Mucar. Mucar was the only city in Ithor that kept up with the times of the rest of Nessus.

I looked towards a slight clearing in the forest that was Mucar. While not a large city, it was the biggest and longest standing city in Ithor. Though it appeared small to me, it would appear bigger to a human. I flew around the city, my light blue lines, that were on my otherwise light brown body, shinned in the sunlight. They went from the tip of my tail to my neck. On my fourth flight around the city, I noticed Jesse-Dali and her Pine Marten daemon, Grey, setting up her tattoo tent. She was in her human form, of course, and looked up to the sky as I roared in greeting. I then flew a few miles away and landed. Perfida jumped off and looked at me angrily. She didn’t like me drawing attention to myself.

I smiled at her and winked. My whip-like tail, that had given my species the name Whiptail dragon, seemed to disappear into pants that were starting to form onto hind legs that were becoming human. My wings seemed to become part of a weathered shirt on a back that was quickly becoming a human back. My front legs became human arms and the transformation ended with my head becoming a human head. I brushed my tongue against my human teeth, teeth that were a far distant cry from my dagger sharp dragon teeth. Without looking at myself, I knew what my appearance was now. I was a black haired human with a tan shirt, brown pants, and black boots. I paused only a moment and then Perfida and I raced to where Jesse was waiting for us.

I raced through the bushes that were so common in the wilderness on Nessus and finally came to where Jesse was located. While Jesse held a calm expression when she looked at me, Grey held a very cold expression for me. I bowed to her and followed her into the tent.

“When will customers start to arrive, Jesse-Dali?” I asked as I looked at the medium sized tent I had found myself in. Most of the tent had basic tattoo designs and one corner was where she actually put tattoos on people.

“Soon enough, Cassius-Raphael.” She said softly as a human entered the tent. This human had a dove as her daemon. Once she had entered Jesse seemed to become a different person. She still had red hair, a green dress, and sandals. But she seemed happier and more cheerful. Within thirty minutes, five more humans had entered. It was an hour before I had any time to talk to Jesse again and I wasn’t going to talk to a human if I didn’t have to. The humans recognized me as a journeyman  for the Sunset Makers and tried to get me to talk to them. They knew me to be assisting Jesse, but scheduled to be a master soon enough.

“What is it that bothers Cassius?” Jesse asked as the customers became more intent on finding a design that they liked.

“I just…I don’t think I have anything to offer the Raphael clan, or Sunset Makers.” I said as I watched Perfida and Grey greeting some daemons into the tent. “I don’t mind helping you with your tattoos. Even designing them is enough for me. The part that bothers me is that the Sunset Makers are so secretive. When we’re truly hired for our ‘talents’, we have to hide who we are and send unsuspecting humans to play the middle man.”

“So you want to be an honest assassin?” Jesse asked and laughed. Then she was pulled away as a customer told her he had decided on a tattoo he wanted.

Did I want an honest assassin? I held no hope that there would be any honesty in my life. I just wanted to be known as an assassin. I would officially be an assassin in the Sunset Makers once I became a master. I walked over to a woman. I pretended to help her choose a tattoo when I was really looking at her ring. It had a diamond in the middle. She was engaged. The fact that two people could trust each other  wasn’t anything I would be comfortable with. As a Sunset Maker, I would only be able to mate with another member of the Raphael clan. And the mating wouldn’t last long. Just long enough to make an egg or two.

I walked her to Jesse once she had chosen her tattoo. Once Jesse had put the tattoo on her, I was again able to talk with Jesse. “Have you chosen your specialty?” Jesse asked me. She was referring, of course, to the unique way that each Sunset Maker killed others. The method was never used on actual assignments, but for fun.

I looked at the woman as she walked out of the tent. “She’s engaged.” I told Jesse. “She’ll settle down with a man that will love her for all eternity.”

“That’s not an answer.” Jesse replied angrily. “Besides, most relationships will end in disaster. You think you’re in love and then you realize that it was all a lie. Nothing was real.”

I sighed, Jesse was going on yet one more of her love rants. “I meant her ring.” I said. “For some reason rings have a power that attracts me.”

Jesse pretended to be checking on customers, but she was really just annoyed that I had sighed at her. Maybe it wasn’t just the sighing but the fact that I sighed at her past relationship. “Listen, Jesse,” I told her and dared to put a hand on her arm. “I know what happened must have been horrible. It’s ruined you and made you dead inside. I don’t mean to say that it wasn’t real, just that you had confused what I had really meant. I do wish you would heal up inside.”

“I can’t heal.” Jesse said and stared me in the eyes. “What I’ve been through, I can’t heal from. Maybe, once you’ve been through what I have, you’ll understand.” The look she was giving me told me that I didn’t want to go through what she had gone through.

“Did the breakup really remove any goodness from your heart?” I asked. It was the common myth going about Jesse’s cruelty.

Jesse’s only reply was to shove my hand off her arm and to start walking around checking on customers. I stood in the center of the tent and Perfida came up beside me and pointed to an Ocelot daemon that was walking around the tent without an owner. The Ocelot daemon walked around, looked at me, and then left.

I sent her. Mind to mind. Something dragons didn’t do unless they had to.

Jesse replied.

This, coming from any other dragon would be reasonable. Most of the Sunset Makers worked as a team. No matter the clan, each was loyal to the other. But Jesse-Dali was different. She didn’t care much about any other Sunset Maker, not even of her own clan. I shrugged it off, it probably had the deeper meaning of her not wanting to be caught along with me.

For an hour and a half I was trying to remain calm outside while scared inside. The people were calm and Jesse seemed to be holding up but Grey, her soul, was staying closer to her than he had before. Perfida, also, was staying right beside me. All four of us were waiting for the Ocelot and his owner to come into the tent. Finally, when tensions were highest, the Ocelot and her owner came. The owner was a red headed man, with a beard, and wearing the clothes of a traveler.

He looked at Jesse and she, along with Grey, came to meet him. I went to the very back of the tent, trying to hide, and watched the exchange.

“I’m looking for a murderer.” The man said while his Ocelot daemon looked around the tent with its eyes. “I heard it was the one serving under you, Cassius-Raphael. He’s hiding under the Sunset Makers while he’s part of an order of assassins. He’s a new member and I, along with my superiors, believe that the rest of the order knows how to hide their killings better.”

“Who are you and why should I believe you?” Jesse asked him.

“I am ValinHorn and this is my daemon Lina. We’re on the ruling council of Nessus and have been set to capture him.” Valin replied.

I doubted that he would just ‘capture’ me. There’d be torture involved and I didn’t want to take any chances of them finding out the truth. Jesse yelled out as I made the slightest motion to leave.

Unfortunately, Valin had seen me and started after me. Jesse made a move to grab him and they seemed to struggle, but I was more concerned about getting out. Perfida growled as I looked at the back of the tent. I ran at it and crashed through and fell down. I felt pain on my right leg. I turned back to look and saw that Perfida and Linda were in a fight. I saw a twig on the ground and touched it, muttering a few words under my breath, and it turned into a stake. I then threw the stake at Lina’s back. It missed and hit her front right paw. I heard Valin roar from inside the tent and Jesse most likely throwing him down.

Jesse shouted to me. It was unnecessary for her to say that as all dragons knew that the true rulers of Nessus were dragons. And since Valin was on the ruling council, it was most likely that he was a dragon.

I shouted back to Jesse.

< I promise I will not.> I replied. Perfida and I then raced into the woods with Lina showing signs of recovery.

Description
Acceptance I: The Tattoo Tent

Standing alone with no direction
How did I fall so far behind?
Why Am I searching for perfection?
Knowing it's something I won't find

-from “No Roads Left to Run” by Linkin Park

The sun rose over the land of Ithor on Nessus. My wings flapped slowly and my tiger daemon, Perfida, clasped my back. I dove down sharply and she let out a sharp yelp. I laughed as I pulled up. I was glad none of the Outcast dragons of Ithor sought me out. The fear she felt, the fear I felt also, gave me adrenaline that raced through my blood. Any sense of fear or pain gave me pleasure. But I didn’t know why.

I just knew that it gave me pleasure and that’s all that I needed to know. All anyone needed to know was what caused them pleasure. Myself, I enjoyed racing through the sky and running across the ground. Pain and fear were like hard liquors to me.

While flying high in the sky, I noticed some of the humans coming out of their tents. Humans living in Ithor tended to be more in tune with nature than humans elsewhere on Nessus. Except for a few cities in Ithor, the majority of humans lived in tents and small groups. I saw their daemons, mostly crows and ravens, flying around and greeting each other. However, I noticed only one had an Ocelot daemon.

I flew by too quickly to take any real notice of who the Ocelot belonged to. Besides, I was too concerned about making it in time to Jesse-Dali who seemed a more immediate problem to me. A few roars in the distance announced  two White Dragons flying to me remind me that I was not welcome here. Maybe I would be welcomed here, but I never felt welcomed anywhere. Jesse said it was normal for Sunset Makers to never feel welcomed anywhere. We had a job where we could be sold out to the highest bidder and mostly killed for fun. Those who hired us never knew anyone in the organization and were always given false names.

Perfida growled at the two Whites, though we both knew that they couldn’t do us any harm. Whites were notorious for being pacifists. I could never understand anyone who never enjoyed killing, not even a little bit. I loved pain, especially going so far as to actually kill someone. Cruel, yes. But it gave me purpose, at least a little. Though, recently, I had started to doubt how much I really enjoyed pain and fear.

I noticed one of the Whites had a “V” carved into its chest. Though I enjoyed pain, I would never mutilate my own body unless I needed to. I tried to out fly them and when that didn’t work I flew towards them, knowing that they wouldn’t fight me. I roared once, they looked at me angrily, and went back to report my behavior to their clan. I assumed they were from the Ithor Clan. I felt more powerful than a clan, at the moment, and continued heading toward Mucar. Mucar was the only city in Ithor that kept up with the times of the rest of Nessus.

I looked towards a slight clearing in the forest that was Mucar. While not a large city, it was the biggest and longest standing city in Ithor. Though it appeared small to me, it would appear bigger to a human. I flew around the city, my light blue lines, that were on my otherwise light brown body, shinned in the sunlight. They went from the tip of my tail to my neck. On my fourth flight around the city, I noticed Jesse-Dali and her Pine Marten daemon, Grey, setting up her tattoo tent. She was in her human form, of course, and looked up to the sky as I roared in greeting. I then flew a few miles away and landed. Perfida jumped off and looked at me angrily. She didn’t like me drawing attention to myself.

I smiled at her and winked. My whip-like tail, that had given my species the name Whiptail dragon, seemed to disappear into pants that were starting to form onto hind legs that were becoming human. My wings seemed to become part of a weathered shirt on a back that was quickly becoming a human back. My front legs became human arms and the transformation ended with my head becoming a human head. I brushed my tongue against my human teeth, teeth that were a far distant cry from my dagger sharp dragon teeth. Without looking at myself, I knew what my appearance was now. I was a black haired human with a tan shirt, brown pants, and black boots. I paused only a moment and then Perfida and I raced to where Jesse was waiting for us.

I raced through the bushes that were so common in the wilderness on Nessus and finally came to where Jesse was located. While Jesse held a calm expression when she looked at me, Grey held a very cold expression for me. I bowed to her and followed her into the tent.

“When will customers start to arrive, Jesse-Dali?” I asked as I looked at the medium sized tent I had found myself in. Most of the tent had basic tattoo designs and one corner was where she actually put tattoos on people.

“Soon enough, Cassius-Raphael.” She said softly as a human entered the tent. This human had a dove as her daemon. Once she had entered Jesse seemed to become a different person. She still had red hair, a green dress, and sandals. But she seemed happier and more cheerful. Within thirty minutes, five more humans had entered. It was an hour before I had any time to talk to Jesse again and I wasn’t going to talk to a human if I didn’t have to. The humans recognized me as a journeyman  for the Sunset Makers and tried to get me to talk to them. They knew me to be assisting Jesse, but scheduled to be a master soon enough.

“What is it that bothers Cassius?” Jesse asked as the customers became more intent on finding a design that they liked.

“I just…I don’t think I have anything to offer the Raphael clan, or Sunset Makers.” I said as I watched Perfida and Grey greeting some daemons into the tent. “I don’t mind helping you with your tattoos. Even designing them is enough for me. The part that bothers me is that the Sunset Makers are so secretive. When we’re truly hired for our ‘talents’, we have to hide who we are and send unsuspecting humans to play the middle man.”

“So you want to be an honest assassin?” Jesse asked and laughed. Then she was pulled away as a customer told her he had decided on a tattoo he wanted.

Did I want an honest assassin? I held no hope that there would be any honesty in my life. I just wanted to be known as an assassin. I would officially be an assassin in the Sunset Makers once I became a master. I walked over to a woman. I pretended to help her choose a tattoo when I was really looking at her ring. It had a diamond in the middle. She was engaged. The fact that two people could trust each other  wasn’t anything I would be comfortable with. As a Sunset Maker, I would only be able to mate with another member of the Raphael clan. And the mating wouldn’t last long. Just long enough to make an egg or two.

I walked her to Jesse once she had chosen her tattoo. Once Jesse had put the tattoo on her, I was again able to talk with Jesse. “Have you chosen your specialty?” Jesse asked me. She was referring, of course, to the unique way that each Sunset Maker killed others. The method was never used on actual assignments, but for fun.

I looked at the woman as she walked out of the tent. “She’s engaged.” I told Jesse. “She’ll settle down with a man that will love her for all eternity.”

“That’s not an answer.” Jesse replied angrily. “Besides, most relationships will end in disaster. You think you’re in love and then you realize that it was all a lie. Nothing was real.”

I sighed, Jesse was going on yet one more of her love rants. “I meant her ring.” I said. “For some reason rings have a power that attracts me.”

Jesse pretended to be checking on customers, but she was really just annoyed that I had sighed at her. Maybe it wasn’t just the sighing but the fact that I sighed at her past relationship. “Listen, Jesse,” I told her and dared to put a hand on her arm. “I know what happened must have been horrible. It’s ruined you and made you dead inside. I don’t mean to say that it wasn’t real, just that you had confused what I had really meant. I do wish you would heal up inside.”

“I can’t heal.” Jesse said and stared me in the eyes. “What I’ve been through, I can’t heal from. Maybe, once you’ve been through what I have, you’ll understand.” The look she was giving me told me that I didn’t want to go through what she had gone through.

“Did the breakup really remove any goodness from your heart?” I asked. It was the common myth going about Jesse’s cruelty.

Jesse’s only reply was to shove my hand off her arm and to start walking around checking on customers. I stood in the center of the tent and Perfida came up beside me and pointed to an Ocelot daemon that was walking around the tent without an owner. The Ocelot daemon walked around, looked at me, and then left.

I sent her. Mind to mind. Something dragons didn’t do unless they had to.

Jesse replied.

This, coming from any other dragon would be reasonable. Most of the Sunset Makers worked as a team. No matter the clan, each was loyal to the other. But Jesse-Dali was different. She didn’t care much about any other Sunset Maker, not even of her own clan. I shrugged it off, it probably had the deeper meaning of her not wanting to be caught along with me.

For an hour and a half I was trying to remain calm outside while scared inside. The people were calm and Jesse seemed to be holding up but Grey, her soul, was staying closer to her than he had before. Perfida, also, was staying right beside me. All four of us were waiting for the Ocelot and his owner to come into the tent. Finally, when tensions were highest, the Ocelot and her owner came. The owner was a red headed man, with a beard, and wearing the clothes of a traveler.

He looked at Jesse and she, along with Grey, came to meet him. I went to the very back of the tent, trying to hide, and watched the exchange.

“I’m looking for a murderer.” The man said while his Ocelot daemon looked around the tent with its eyes. “I heard it was the one serving under you, Cassius-Raphael. He’s hiding under the Sunset Makers while he’s part of an order of assassins. He’s a new member and I, along with my superiors, believe that the rest of the order knows how to hide their killings better.”

“Who are you and why should I believe you?” Jesse asked him.

“I am ValinHorn and this is my daemon Lina. We’re on the ruling council of Nessus and have been set to capture him.” Valin replied.

I doubted that he would just ‘capture’ me. There’d be torture involved and I didn’t want to take any chances of them finding out the truth. Jesse yelled out as I made the slightest motion to leave.

Unfortunately, Valin had seen me and started after me. Jesse made a move to grab him and they seemed to struggle, but I was more concerned about getting out. Perfida growled as I looked at the back of the tent. I ran at it and crashed through and fell down. I felt pain on my right leg. I turned back to look and saw that Perfida and Linda were in a fight. I saw a twig on the ground and touched it, muttering a few words under my breath, and it turned into a stake. I then threw the stake at Lina’s back. It missed and hit her front right paw. I heard Valin roar from inside the tent and Jesse most likely throwing him down.

Jesse shouted to me. It was unnecessary for her to say that as all dragons knew that the true rulers of Nessus were dragons. And since Valin was on the ruling council, it was most likely that he was a dragon.

I shouted back to Jesse.

< I promise I will not.> I replied. Perfida and I then raced into the woods with Lina showing signs of recovery.