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Dragon 's Justice by James Decker
CHAPTER ONE
Silver lined jade wings unfolded softly as Varede de Virere sailed out into the multicolored skies over the plane of Drakco. This was his first arrival via the high gate and it provided him a glorious view of the volcanic Mount Drakc as it rose to dominate the landscape. A peak on a size and scale befitting the Drakcyn race it held the Jewel of the empire, the Nexus, as well as the capital city of Draco Prime within its craggy walls. Use of this gate was a minor luxury his recent appointment as ambassador to the house Rubere afforded him. The true prize, his newly completed estates on Argentum Virere IV made up fully one quarter of that entire plane encompassing some of its richest mines. Still he relished this simplest of rewards more than he cared to admit, certainly more than was seemly for a Drakcyn of Silver class. He laughed nervously adjusting his glide path for a better view thinking this was only the beginning. Marcus had located the missing piece and now the endgame would lead to wealth and power beyond his dreams of avarice.
Spreading out from the base of the massive volcano he saw grasslands filled with fattening beasts. Meadows cut into triangular fields by the broad black roads leading to and from the heart of the empire. Each marked with pennants of red, black, green or blue to denote the house that controlled it. As he watched a wagon driven by one of the thousands of gargoyle slaves overturned, its' axle broken in a rut causing a chain reaction ripple through the flow of traffic slowing it to a crawl, but only for an instant. The leathery slave was on his feet almost before he had stopped tumbling tail over wing and heaved the loaded cart oxen and all off to one side barely escaping the bite of the overseer's lash. This caused Varede to laugh again but the nervousness had left him, this was the fundamental truth of the empire unfolding in microcosm, nothing could be allowed to disrupt the flow of goods into the city or the hauling away of its tons of waste. The balance of the nexus must be maintained.
Soaring low over the caldera's rim he glanced at the ornate carvings and golden columns adorning the walls. Marvelous the green and silver drakcyn mused as he began to pass over the Virere quarter of the city. Lavish estates terraced down the inner walls to the caldera floor where they met the homes of lesser drakcyns the dichromes or lower yet the monochromes. He sniffed. These mingled with palatial gardens all divided by golden walkways bathed in the tricolor light of the nexus. At the city center, some five miles away, the imperial spire rose high above the capitol with the Polus Auroras perched precariously at its pinnacle. Varede peered at the metal shaft, pure Kaot forged in the flames of the first true drakcyns. The five-foot diameter spire supported 5000 tons miles above the city. to be continued. I will be adding pages or you can download the first few chapters on the file sharing page.