~Tabitha's P.O.V~

I gawked at the size of the beast. He was probably thirteen times bigger than Tyron. The mass of green scales reached high into the sky, as big as a small mountain, and when he spoke the very ground shook with the words. I shivered, taking a step back and staring with horror.

"And who, are you?" I heard him spoke, Tyron pinned beneath his overly large talons.

"T...Tyron." he stuttered

I shook myself out of my stupor and narrowed my eyes, quickly drawing out my bow. Without hesitation I drew it back, a magical arrow appearing in the bow. I aimed, and hesitated. The dragon hadn't noticed me yet.

"Why are you here Tyron?" he growled menacingly

"To... to find a safe place... to hide," he grunted nervously.

"To hide from what? How did you find this place?" he said lowly as he gripped tyron tightly squeezing him, and picking him up.

"G...Garagain. Hannah told us this would be a safe place from him!" he screamed

Before the dragon had a chance to answer, I took advantage of his momentary confusion and fired my arrow. The silver streak soared through the air, straight into the wrist of the massive green dragon. He let out a roar of pain as the magic went through scale and skin, and his grip around Tyron disappeared. The red dragon dropped to the ground, slightly dazed, before picking himself up and making a quick running leap for the cave, which was a little too small for the other dragon to enter.

"Aargh!" the green dragon shook his head, "Hey wait!"

Tyron was a little shaken but he seemed mostly all right. He gave me a nod of appreciation and looked back at the entrance of the cave. The light flooding into the cave was blocked as the massive bulk of our assailant flooded the entrance, until his eye was the only thing we could see as he looked inside.

"Not another move!" I yelled drawing my bow again and trying, and failing, to sound intimidating, "Or I'll send an arrow through your eye."

The large dragon snorted, "Despite it's magical properties I doubt your bow will do much more than annoy me little girl."

"Little!? To you, maybe so, but I can still take out your eye," I threatened.

"Need I remind you that all I need to do to kill you both is take a step back and flood the cave with fire for you both to be cooked alive," he growled right back, "So I suggest you calm down a little and answer my questions. I don't want to hurt you."

"You could have fooled us," Tyron snarled.

"Well I'm sorry for being a little suspicious of two travellers coming into my kingdom for the first time in two thousand years, one of them being a dragon, who I had thought that I was the only one left. Yet you look to be a little over a twenty. So, how does that work young dragon? And how do you know about Princess Hannah? She was killed with everyone else."

Tyron hesitated and I glanced at him, wondering how much we should reveal. I seriously doubted this dragon was an evil beast, despite his terrifying size and the fact that he attacked us at first, and he didn't seem to want to kill us anyway. As he had said, it would be easy for him to do so. But should we trust him?

"Should we tell him?" I asked Tyron.

"I think we should," replied the red dragon, "It's the only way we have a chance to get everyone else in here anyway."

I nodded in agreement.

"Do you know Theno?" Tyron asked the large dragon.

"Theno?" The green dragon blinked slowly, "I do. He was one of the palace guards under my tutelage."

"Well... Hannah and him escaped together during the attack and sealed themselves away with safeguard amulets, until me and my mate broke them and well, you can see for yourself what happened."

The one large eye narrowed in on Tyron, "Safeguard amulets were forbidden in my time, only to be used in the most dire of circumstances."

"Well... it was pretty dire," I said, "It was the only way the two thought they would be able to survive."

The large dragon narrowed his eyes, seeming to think about it for a moment, "Then where is the princess?"

"He.... she is coming, though she may be a bit different than you remember," Tyron replied, wrinkling his nose at his attempt to explain it.

"He?"

"Yes, Hannah chose a male host, more specifically my brother," I spoke again, "They kinda became one in the same and their bodies... mixed, in a way."

The dragon snorted, "That is... strange."

"So...will you help us? We have thousands of refugees seeking shelter here," I said.

Once again the massive beast rumbled in thought, "Why would I allow strangers into my kingdom? This is a place for dragons and for dragons it will remain."

"Cause the princess is expecting and she's among the refugees," I said, deciding that 'she' would probably be the more appropriate term here.

This caused the large dragon to become rather startled, "What... who's the father?"

I saw Tyron shuffle his wings and look a little embarrassed as a chuckle escaped his mouth, "Aah... that might be me."

That large eye turned rather sinister as it gazed maliciously down at the far smaller dragon, as if taking in everything the dragon was. Tyron shivered slightly under the gaze, looking to the ground, before seeming to gather himself and stared right back, as if daring a challenge from our scrutinizer.

"You dare defile the princess!?" the large dragon roared.

"It was her choice," Tyron said with surprising confidence, "We love each other. And that is that."

He snorted, and fell silent for a long while. I shifted slightly, never letting go of the bow string that I held in my fingers, and I could see Tyron ready to make a move at any sense of hostility from the other dragon. Finally he moved, seeming to let out a long sigh.

"Very well. If it is as her majesty demands then I cannot say no. But if I find out what you are saying is false your death will be painful and fiery," he rumbled.

"That is fair," Tyron bobbed his head.

"Now, the gate you are undoubtedly searching for is at the end of this tunnel. There is a lever at the end that you will need to transform into your two-legged state to reach."

Tyron glanced at me in slight confusion, "Two-legged state?"

The green dragon frowned, "Yes. You shrink in size to around the same proportions as your human friend there, but with scales, wings and a tail."

"He can do that?" I asked

"All dragons can do that my dear," replied the large dragon, "Here, let me show you."

Suddenly his form seemed to convulse, and before our very eyes the massively large creature began to shrink. It was slow at first, the wings, feet and back all shrinking, and than changing. The back became straighter, more upright. His forelegs became arms, with opposable claws on the end, which looked as strange as it sounded. His back feet became narrower and slightly longer in proportion to his now smaller body, and his snout flattened slightly, though not fully as a human's would. There was a white beard like growth on the front of his chin, and two horns protruding from his head, with his wings folded neatly on his back.

When the transformation had stopped standing in front of us was a tall green, humanoid shaped lizard looking being, with wings and a tail. He was still about seven foot in height, but that was rather tiny considering his eye alone had been three times that size when he had been in his dragon form.

"Aaargh!" he stretched, flapping his wings, "I haven't done that in ages. I forgot how weak this form feels."

Tyron and I stared in utter shock, never having seen something quite so bazar before.

"Now, young dragon, I have transformed. Now you should as well," he said to Tyron.

"But... but I don't know how," he replied a little shakily, seeming to be rather hesitant at the idea.

The green dragon frowned and crossed his arms, "Hmm. Most hatchlings learn to do it at a very young age. You should easily have been capable."

Tyron shrugged his wings, "I've really only been a dragon for a couple of months. I'm still learning stuff."

"Aaah, that explains it then," the green dragon nodded his head thoughtfully, twirling his beard around his foreclaw, "But Theno should know how to. If you are his reincarnation then you should be able to access his skills."

"I'll do it!" I spoke up and both dragons looked at me, "That's why I came anyway. You can teach Tyron about it later. But I kinda wanna get those gates open so we don't leave the others waiting on the other side."

The red dragon nodded in agreement, "Yeah. We'll get back to this later."

The older drake snorted, "Very well. Follow the tunnel and you will get to the gate. The lever is in a small compartment off to one side."

"You're not coming with us?" I asked.

"Of course not girl. I dislike using this form nearly as much as I dislike eating slugs. And besides, if you two are setting up a trap I would rather be outside in my full power rather than trapped under a mountain like this."

I opened my mouth to argue that we weren't trying to trap him but than let out a sigh of frustration. I understood where he was getting at, and there was no use trying to talk an old paranoid dragon out of it until we could get him to trust him.

"Very well. We will be back with the rest of our people soon," I said.

The green dragon nodded before stepping back and once again transforming into the enormous beast from before. This time it was far quicker and more sudden, though I feel like he was purposefully doing so to intimidate us and remind us at what was waiting if we decided to betray him.

"Bring the princess through first!" he yelled as he turned away from the cave, "I cannot promise to refrain myself from burning anyone else if they emerge beforehand."

Tyron nodded and together we turned into the cave.

~Blu's P.O.V~

I sighed and yawned tiredly, shaking my head as the sun slowly began to sink toward the horizon.It was getting late, but Aaron had made the everyone continue regardless, knowing we were very close to our destination. We had begun walking beside what seemed to be a massive mountain wall, and as soon as we had reached it Hannah had become obscenely excited, saying that it was this wall that hid the dragon's kingdom. Of course, we still had a couple hours walking to go, considering the gate was still another ten kilometres away.

Harry was sleeping on my back again, with Mother holding him in her arms and lightly stroking his head. The sight made me smile. She saw my look and smiled back, before following my example and yawning herself.

'Man, this last stretch of the journey is taking forever,' I grumbled to Hannah.

She only laughed, 'That it is. I guess I'm glad I'm not the one that is doing all the walking.'

I snorted, shaking my head with a sigh as we continued to pad down the worn path. The closer we had gotten to the hidden kingdom, the more I noticed that the path we were walking on became more apparent. At points there was even evidence of broken stone work hidden in the foliage that had gathered over two thousand years. Most of what we saw seemed to be fractured pieces of white sandstone. It made me picture a beautiful city like Telarian once was.

Eventually we hit a rather large clearing that stretched out for a couple of miles in either direction. I looked around as Hannah's excitement spiked suddenly as if she recognised the place but didn't want to get her hopes up. There weren't any gates that I could see however, so I wondered what she was getting excited for.

"Ok everyone! Let's rest here for now." Aaron shouted.

This made everyone groan in relief as a lot of folks fell to their knees. Almost immediately people began setting up their tents, in a hurry to get everything done before dark. I grunted softly as I lay down, this jostled Harry up who woke up with a adorable snort.

"W..wha? Huh? Ma?" he looked at me tiredly.

"We are just stopping for a rest dear," I replied with a smile, "Go back to sleep."

He looked at me blankly for a moment, before laying his head back down on my mother's lap.

"I'm glad you adopted this kid son. You did a good thing for him Anthony."

I looked back to mum in a shocked expression, "I haven't heard that name for years. I'm surprised you even remember."

She gave me a triumphant smirk, "I'm your mother. I should know what I named my own son." she then laughed.

I laughed as well, "I guess that is true. Still, it is a long time since I've heard that. It feels almost strange now."

"Your real name is Anthony?" I looked to see Aaron standing beside us with a surprised expression on his face.

"What?" I smirked slightly, "You really thought my birth name was Blu?"

"Well... I thought it was strange but yeah," he shrugged, "You never mentioned you were called anything else."

"Blu has been my name for as long as I can remember," I shrugged, "As I said to mum, I haven't heard my real name in a long time."

"Hmm... so should we be calling you Anthony then."

I shook my head, "No, just stick to Blu. Anyway, what did you come to talk about?"

"Oh, I just thought I would mention that something strange is happening to the mountain."

"Hah?" I looked to the giant wall beside us.

At first it seemed like nothing was happening, but then I noticed the side of the mountain seemed to be moving, sliding open. The rock creaked and groaned, sending a large cloud of dust into the sky. People who had set up their campsites began crying out, pointing toward the opening abyss. It was like the very ground shook with excitement at the prospect of the doors being opened.

'It's the gate! It's opening!' Hannah screamed happily.

I blinked, looking at the 'gate' in slight awe. It was probably a hundred feet tall, and nearly twice that distance wide. The rock integrated seamlessly with the surrounding mountain, and even as it opened I had difficulty figuring out where the moving part of the mountain was going. Behind it revealed a large tunnel, lit by thousands of flaming torches whose light didn't even reach the top. And standing at the exit, was Tyron.

He quickly spotted me amongst the crowd, smiling and waving his wing. The people, seeing it was Tyron, quickly calmed down, before slowly beginning to cheer as they began to realise what this meant. They were at the end of their journey. I opened my wings and bellowed a greeting, giving a quick running jump to glide over everyone, being careful with my still damaged wing. I landed beside him.

"You found it!" I exclaimed.

Tabitha came from a small door, looking a little worn out, but that didn't stop her smile, "That we did."

Tyron nodded eagerly, "Yeah, it's amazing! The city is bigger than Teleran, with long valleys and rivers and surrounded in its own natural walls. I would have never had guessed it was there if I hadn't have flown over it."

"That's awesome," both my excitement and Hannah's mixed in my head, making me feel giddy inside.

"Yes but we ran into a snag." Tabitha said

I tilted my head, questioning, "What?"

"Well, apparently one dragon managed to survive the massacre two thousand years ago. And he has grown into a massive beast that probably wouldn't even be able to fit into this opening! And at the other side his eye is big enough to cover the mouth of the cave."

I blinked in surprise, looking back over my shoulder at the gigantic opening in disbelief.

"It's narrows down a fair bit as we go in," Tabitha explained with a chuckle.

"Oh."

"And he wants to see you first. Anybody else that that goes in will be killed," Tyron said, shuffling his wings a little uncomfortably.

"Me!? Why?" I explained, definitely against the idea of talking to this seamingly massive dragon face to face.

"Cause you have Hannah inside you. He was happy, and surprised to hear his ruler is alive." the red dragon sighed softly, "But he doesn't quite trust our word, and wants to make sure we are telling the truth before we move in."he allows thousands of stranges into his home."

"Alright, I'll meet him then."'s that necessary," I shuffled a little uncomfortably.

"Tabitha! Tyron!" Aaron called as he climbed up to where we were talking, "You made it! That's great! I'm guessing that the hidden kingdom is through there."

Tyron nodded his head, "Yep, but there is a problem."

He went on to explain the situation, and the mage was left with a thoughtful look on his face.

"Okay, so if Blu and you go and see this dragon, I'll have the people wait here. Then, you guys come back and get us when it's safe. The people need a rest anyway from all the travelling. We will join you tomorrow."

"Alright," I nodded my head, "Let's meet this dragon shall we hun?"

Tyron grunted in agreement, "Let's."