"No, you've got the wrong lady", I say, shaking my head at the young hero, my tail lazily flicking behind me. "You're thinking of the Lady of the Lake. I'm the Lady of the Mountain. I don't have any swords to give you."
I see in his eyes that this young man is destined to change the world. To face the mad king, to reshape this land. Into something kinder, or something worse, or one and then the other, I do not know.
But dragons live long lives, and I could see from my perch: the era had grown stagnant. Unchanging, stifled. Still air, lacking the vital wind of change; any change. Peasants toil in the same fields worked by their great great grandathers. Knights and kings still dance their dance, alternating between steps of courtly majesty and horrible tyranny. Priests in their temples, cultists in their dens. The same circles, again and again and again. The world used to change; it doesn't, anymore. Not without a spark.
I look at him for a moment. He stands patiently, waiting for me to shoo him off. Hmm. I pause for thought for a moment.
With a shake of my wings, I make my decision.
I turn around and root around in my hoard, and dig up in my claws a stick-shaped weapon of iron, wood and clockwork, and the bag of strange, grey-black grains and small iron balls that it was paired with. A mad dwarven smith had brought it to me, fearing that what he had wrought could change the world. But it was time for change.
I curl my neck to face the young man, holding it gingerly. Even I can tell this thing holds a power beyond a magic sword. The power of efficiency, of reproducibility - certainly the power to reshape war, but perhaps also the power to ignite more, beyond that. The smith had spoken of blasting tunnels in mountainsides, of metal beasts powered by flame and smoke.
"But I do have this."
