Dragon Transformation

Many dragons turn into humans these days, but why would they do that when they could be a bear? Just look at what druids get up to when they have shapechanging powers, which is an odd thing for them to have, historically speaking.

The Adventure of the Glass Dragon

Daszel crushed the last nut-sized concentration of magic between his fingers. Removing the alarms had been arduous and unrelated to his safety, for the mage who owned the place would have been worse off for acknowledging the intruder. The client wanted secrecy though, and Daszel the Stymph's clients got what they wanted down to the detail.
The main thing this one wanted was among the treasures deep below the earth in the mage's sanctum mirabiliorum, some of them plainly valuable and others coveted only by the knowledgeable. Daszel touched none of them save for the requested item, a glass figure the size of a rich man's stomach which represented a dragon and had inside it an unnatural gem which gave the thing a pleasing radiance. There it was.
He sent a charm of comprehension to caress the dragon; he was ever wary of traps and curious too about the importance of this innocuous gewgaw despite his policy of not bothering his clients with questions. The item must have some secret to it, and so it did. The gem within was a dragon's heart, something few realized could be so small. The work of converting the figurine into the core of a new body was well underway; a dragon reduced to its heart was a play reduced to its script and awaiting the right actor.
What use someone (whether mage or client) might make of a dragon was likely to worry the moral, but since Daszel contented himself with ethics, he absconded with the dragon and brought it to the client, whose gratitude came in a substantial form.
"Although," the man said, "It seems a bit different from when he displayed it before. The color is a little fuller, but duller too."
"It's closer to reviving, that's all."
"It's what?"
The resulting conversation left the client quivering like a tax farmer who saw his books in a judge's hands. "Oh, that's, not quite what I . . . Are you prepared to take on another job? Immediately? It's to put something somewhere. Without being noticed."
"I'm Daszel," Daszel answered.
Finis

Dragon Incentives

It's probably Pern's fault that riding dragons and their dragon riders so often have some kind of magic/psychic/empathic bond, but let's be honest: Both parties probably just liking wrecking stuff and pillaging what's left. The will to evil is sufficient without such contrivances.

Addendum

A few of those entries will need to be altered in certain settings. For instance, in a far-future interplanetary milieu, the judge may have invented the space piano.

Types of Circuit Judges

Seize upon your favorite randomization method and challenge fate!

1. Stern
2. Amused
3. Lax
4. Mage
5. Priest
6. Dragon
7. Secretly looking for something
8. Philanderer
9. The king in disguise
10. One of five mighty guardians animated by the country's founder
11. Impostor (conman)
12. Vampire
13. Forbidden to enter capital on the grounds of worrying popularity
14. Sports lover
15. Impostor (comrade on expedition fulfilling his dying friend's request to take his place rather than let that scoundrel have it)
16. impostor (supernatural being)
17. Tourist who resents all these cases that keep spoiling his travels
18. Rumored strongest swordsman
19. Collector
20. Inventor of the piano

Come to think of it, first generate a number to decide how many of these to use. They aren't mutually exclusive. Before that, in order to determine whether to include a circuit judge at all, consult the random official table, which does not exist. Here at least.

Paying the Mage Fee

Obeying the long-standing decree, every mage recognized by the realm save those currently abroad presented himself at the palace to enrich the treasury by one magical item. Fifth-rank mage Hufden handed over a bronze frog whose tongue could be pulled in order to receive an aura discouraging to flies for five hours, after which he returned returning home.
The next morning, he awoke to find the single chair near his bed occupied by a person who happened to be the king.
"Fifth-rank mage Hufden, what was that?"
"Well, Your Majesty, as commanded, an item 'proportional in power to the skill of the producing mage.' Wasn't it?"
"Either you are attempting deceit or else you yourself have no comprehension of your capabilities. Either is a great crime, detection of which is the point of the annual mage fee."
"Your Majesty . . . isn't the point to strengthen the kingdom?"
"Any policy possessing fewer than three sharp points such as a mighty trident has is unworthy of its proclamation. Now forget you heard that, for it is a lesson for rulers, irrelevant to the mage's lessons you have neglected."
Then began deep, assiduous study on the part of the mage overseen personally by the king or, when that august figure was busy, a strangely rare circumstance, the royal executioner. The next year, fifth-rank mage Hufden submitted a bronze frog whose tongue could be pulled in order to learn one secret of the swamps each month. He went on to destroy six armies on the plains of Yezniss, reduce a dragon to draconic extract, raise the Ninefold Bastion, and in general justify the assessment of the king, who knew little of magic but much of men, suitable priorities for his office.
Finis

Addendum

Unless dodo magic facilitates travel between worlds of course, which, upon reflection, it almost certainly does.

Big Idea Fantasy

How about this: In another world, the dodo still exists! Probably not for long, though. Our world doesn't even have dragons, recently, and look how well that dumb bird fared.

Addendum

On another note, how many Christmas spaceships have you seen? Looks like fantasy wins again, losers!

Christmas Dragons

Anybody else seeing more Christmas dragon decorations? I don't object, but neither do I understand. I suppose the typical dragon wants to receive presents, but so does everybody else. Especially characters from Bluey, apparently.

Today's Halloween Fashion

I'm seeing more yard dragons this year. Is the dragon finally returning to the category of frightening monster instead of walking around in human form all the time? Everybody takes dragon transformations as a given nowadays. I attribute this to Dungeons & Dragons.

Fantasy Travel Question

Q. Can riding a dragon or pegasus cause jet lag?
A. No. Dragons and pegasoi never submit to being ridden by someone who might succumb to jet lag.
Q. Suppose however that a passenger is suffered to come along. A rescued princess, perchance.
A. In that case, yes, but the problem can be resolved by curative magic of Rank D or better.

Draconic Lifecycle

I know we've all considered the possibility that planets are dragon eggs waiting to hatch and wondered what will happen to us when the time comes, but have you considered that these eggs might not have been fertilized yet? What's that going to be like? That's why I support migration beyond the planet as soon as it can be effected.

Dragon Fashion

More dragons should dress up all fancy. I'm sure some do, in some books, but it should be widespread. Entire countries should be compelled to knit nice dragon hats.

On Vanity

If a kingdom minted coins that have a picture of a dragon on them, does that make dragons more or less likely to want them? Or no change? This is the principle question the writer must ask when deciding the nature of dragons in the setting.

Rule of Power

Once, the people were distraught at the state of their laws and begged for a lawgiver to come to them. Hearing their supplication, Power Dragon descended.
"Shouldn't Law Dragon have come?" the people asked.
"I am stronger than Law Dragon. Therefore I conquered him and assumed his role."
From that, the people learned one important law. They desired to have more laws still but were perplexed by manifold considerations and subtleties.
"Then let the strongest among you decide."
"Is strength same as wisdom?" the people wondered.
"By no means!" Reason Dragon declared that during his descent. Soon Mercy Dragon and Harmony Dragon arrived as well. Their discourse on the science of law soon became bickering.
Power Dragon allowed them to engage in that for a moderate interval before he slapped all three away with his terrible claws and sent them tumbling. He departed without another word, confident the people comprehended the incident's significance.
Finis

Fearsome in Its Parts

A terrible creature ravaged the lands all around. All who saw it gave this description:
"The beast has the head of a dragon, the body of a wyrm, and the hindquarters of a drake!"
The greatest slayers of monsters converged on the kingdom and assayed to strike down the creature in response to the king's pleas (to say nothing of the rewards he promised). The search demanded skill and the battle unflagging courage, but they killed their quarry and presented it to the king before all his people, who objected.
"That is a fearsome creature, certainly, but it has the body of a drake."
"Does it?" the hunters wondered.
"It does," all agreed.
Confused but moved by kindliness and integrity, the slayers sallied forth again and brought down a beast that had the head of a drake, and one with the hindquarters of a dragon, and one that was a wyrm all the way through.
"I am beginning to question," one among them opined when away from the capital, "whether we are not being deceived."
"I have had the same thought," another concurred. "Looking at him, the king's body is not immune to weaponry, and while I have said nothing about it before now, I . . . What is that?"
They saw in flight far off a creature that was obvious in having the head of a dragon, the body of a wyrm, and the hindquarters of a drake, so much so that they marveled they had ever made any mistake about it. Soon they freed the kingdom from its worry.
Finis

Addendum

The secret is that I just wanted to roll out "thaumatocracy."

Against Thaumatocracy

Given that being capable of magic is better than being incapable, what are some reasons mages might not be in charge?

- There aren't enough of them
-- It requires innate talent which few have
-- It takes too long to learn
-- They keep dying
-- Numbers are limited by the need for some external resource. For example a mage has to bathe in dragon's blood or make a contract with a manticore
- There are too many of them. Being a mage isn't a big deal, and hiring some is less of one.
- Magic isn't that good
- The kinds of people who learn magic are bad at maintaining political power
-- They're too busy with magical studies
-- Magic is linked to certain characteristics such as lack of ambition or gullibility
-- Magic alters mages, for example removing the need for food and replacing it with an insatiable urge to visit places of power
-- Magical expenditure requires long periods of isolation or hibernation
- The kinds of people who learn magic don't want to maintain political power
-- Magical talent isn't hereditary. Ensuring your family will be passed over for some genius discovered in a village is distasteful.
- The kinds of people who learn magic can't maintain political power
-- The gods who give them power forbid it
-- The terms of their contracts forbid it
-- The dragons who rule the world forbid it, and they do check regularly
-- Magic circulates through the bonds between people, so that the more subordinates one has, the more his magic is divided among them - The rulers are capable of preventing it
-- They aren't mages, but they have magic
--- Divine sanction
--- The approval of the land itself
--- Contracts with manticores
--- A store of artifacts
--- Hereditary talents
--- They're the source of magic
-- They're above magic
--- Gods rule directly
--- Dragons/manticores/basilisks etc. rule directly
--- Aliens rule directly (they came to research magic)

There are a few reasons. As for how mages might become an oppressed minority, they can't, cut that out, your allegory stinks.

Doubts Regarding Space Dragons

If we find space dragons, will scientists be reluctant to call them space dragons, or will they be all for it? Komodo dragons were a long time ago. Long enough to be retro. All right, I've decided, it's all space dragons from here on out. Though the "space" part might be a problem. Star dragons. Void dragons. Vacuum dragons. Stellar dragons.