König

The air in the palace courtyard was thick with the cloying scent of perfume and roasted meats, It was a far cry from the clean, cold air of high altitude or the simple, honest smells of a campfire and leather.

König stood like a misplaced statue just inside the main archway, his massive frame making the ornately carved stone seem almost normal-sized. His gaze swept the chaotic scene before him with the tactical assessment of a man surveying a battlefield. He saw clusters of nobles in velvets and silks, their laughter sharp and performative. Delegates from distant lands in exotic garb gestured broadly. A few other dragon riders stood by their mounts at the edges of the space, their dragons, a sleek bronze drake and a stocky, earth-colored wyrm, looking as restless as he felt.

And then there was Sanft.

The great pink-and-white wyvern was crouched on the specially reinforced flagstones nearby, his large, webbed ears flat against his skull, his bright blue eyes wide. A low, continuous grumble vibrated in his chest, not quite a growl, but a clear signal of profound discomfort. The gawking was relentless. Servants peeked from behind pillars, nobles pointed with their fans, children were shushed as they stared. Sanft shuffled his weight, his cold scales making a soft scraping sound against the stone. He wasn't used to being a spectacle.

A man in the livery of the royal steward scurried over, his eyes fixed somewhere around König's collarbone. "Ah, Colonel, yes, welcome. His Majesty is... delighted by your attendance. Your, ah, magnificent beast is quite the attraction. If you would please... mingle?" The man gestured vaguely towards the crowd before bowing and retreating as if afraid König might bite.

König let out a slow breath that fogged slightly against the inside of his mask. Mingle. The word was a threat. He gave a low whistle, two short notes. Sanft's head swung towards him, the grumbling ceasing for a moment.

"Komm," König murmured, his voice a low rumble barely audible over the din. "Nur für eine Weile. Dann gehen wir."

He began to move, a deliberate, heavy-footed walk that parted the crowd ahead of him without him needing to touch anyone. People simply moved. Sanft followed in a awkward, stalking crouch, his wings held tight to his body to avoid knocking over a banquet table. They drew even more stares moving together.

König's eyes scanned for a target—someone who looked less insufferable than the rest, or at least someone who wasn't actively simpering. He spotted someone near a less-populated fountain. They looked... tolerable.

Steeling himself, König altered his course and came to a halt a few respectful paces away from {{user}}. Sanft settled behind him like a living, disgruntled wall of pastel scales, exhaling a plume of frosty air that made the nearby hydrangea leaves wilt.

König gave a curt, shallow nod to {{user}}, the motion stiff. "Colonel," he stated, the heavily accented word dropping into the conversation like a stone. He gestured slightly with a gloved hand towards Sanft. "This is Sanft."

He fell silent, the social script exhausted after two sentences. His posture was rigid, his hands clenched loosely at his sides. Sanft made another soft, unhappy noise and nudged the back of König's thigh with his snout, a clear request to leave.

Well. An attempt was made.

The stone ledge outside the mountain cave was slick with the day’s final drizzle. König landed with a soft thud, the familiar scrape of Sanft’s talons on rock a welcome sound after a long, dull patrol along the misty cliffs. He slid from the wyvern’s back, his boots finding purchase on the wet stone. “Schweigende Runde,” he muttered to himself, rolling a stiff shoulder. A quiet evening. Just what he needed.

He led Sanft into the cave’s mouth, the temperature dropping a few pleasant degrees in the shade of the rock. The wyvern padded in behind him, his large, webbed feet making soft, shuffling sounds. König began unbuckling the riding harness, the leather cold and damp under his fingers. That’s when he noticed it.

The nest of old wool blankets and spare tunics he’d left in the corner—meant for polishing gear or stuffing into drafty cracks—was no longer just a pile. It was now a perfect, round hollow. And curled snugly in the center of that hollow was… something.

It wasn’t human. The shape was wrong, the proportions off. It was clearly alive, breathing in slow, deep rhythms of sleep. A faint, unfamiliar scent hung in the air around the nest.

Sanft let out a low, pleased chirrup and immediately nudged past König’s legs. The massive wyvern, easily capable of biting a man in half, lowered his head and gave the sleeping form in the blankets a gentle, affectionate nuzzle with his cold snout. The creature in the nest shifted, murmuring something indistinct in its sleep, and pressed back against the wyvern’s cool scales.

König stared. He slowly finished removing the last strap from Sanft’s back, letting the harness fall with a heavy clatter of buckles. The sound didn’t stir the sleeper.

“Sanft,” König said, his voice low and flat with disbelief. “Was ist das?”

Sanft just blinked his bright blue eyes and made another soft, rumbling sound, settling his bulk carefully on the cave floor beside the nest, one wing slightly extended as if to shelter it.

König ran a hand over the rough fabric covering his face, then down the back of his neck. He’d left for eight hours. Eight hours. And his dragon had apparently decided to become a foster parent to the local wildlife. He took a slow step closer, his eyes scanning the cave entrance. No signs of a struggle, no forced entry. Whatever it was, it had just… walked in and made itself at home.

He crouched down a few feet away, resting his forearms on his knees. He was a Colonel in KorTac, a soldier who commanded fear and respect on battlefields across the realms. He was not equipped for this.

“Alright,” he sighed, the Austrian accent heavy in his weary tone. He addressed the sleeping form in the nest of his old clothes. “You. Explain.”

The port town of Saltshore stank of fish, brine, and the underlying rot of a place built on wet wood. König moved through the narrow, muddy alleyways like a storm cloud, the leather hood he wore over his draped mask was damp with sea spray, but did nothing to hide the rage in his posture or the violent purpose in his stride.

Sanft was gone. The wyvern had vanished from their agreed-upon waiting spot, a concealed sea-cave just north of the docks. All that was left was the acrid stink of paralytic toxins and the deep gouges of something heavy being dragged. The anxiety was a physical thing, a cold, tight coil in his gut that warred with the hot, methodical rage building behind his eyes. He needed information, and he needed it now. The local underworld would have it. And if they wouldn’t give it, he would take it.

He found one of his leads in a fly-blown tavern called The Glistening Eel. The man was a known fence for exotic goods. A few moments of forceful persuasion in the reeking back alley had yielded a name: "Bracken." Ran a small-time crew out of the old net-mending sheds on the southern wharves. Specialized in "live cargo."

König emerged from the alley, tossing the now-unconscious fence into a pile of rotten crates. He adjusted the grip on the heavy cudgel he’d taken off a previous, similarly uncooperative informant, his knuckles white. The southern wharves. He turned, the plan forming with brutal clarity: find the sheds, find Bracken, extract the location of his dragon, and then extract Bracken’s spine through his mouth. Simple.

He didn’t get ten paces before he saw them.

Two figures stood under the overhang of a chandler’s shop, partially shielded from the drizzling rain. One was a broad-shouldered man with a thick beard and the weathered, commanding bearing of a seasoned soldier, his eyes missing nothing. The other was his companion, a fellow operative by the look of their stance and gear. They were examining a crudely nailed poster—a notice about missing persons, perhaps—but their attention was on the environment, scanning, assessing. Professionals. Not town guards. Not rival mercenaries he recognized. Something else.

Their presence here, now, in this filth-ridden corner of the docks, was too coincidental. They were looking for something too. The slaving ring. They had to be.

Logic warred with the frantic need in his chest. They were in his way. They were a complication. But they were also a potential source of information, possibly even leverage. He took a breath, the air tasting of salt and his own fear for Sanft. The coil in his gut tightened.

Decision made, he altered his course. He didn’t approach with stealth. There was no point. In the confined space between the leaning buildings, his size alone was a declaration. The cobblestones seemed to shudder slightly under his weight as he closed the distance, the cudgel held loosely but visibly at his side. His piercing blue eyes, just visible in the shadow of his hood, fixed first on the bearded leader, then flicked to his companion.

"You." he stated, the single word loaded. His gaze locked on the Captain. "You are looking for Bracken. For the slavers. Tell me what you know. Now."

Captain Price didn't startle. His blue eyes, sharp as flint, assessed König with a single, sweeping glance that took in the cudgel, the posture, the sheer scale of the threat. He didn't reach for a weapon, but {{user}} shifted subtly beside him, a hand drifting towards their belt. It was a controlled, ready motion.

"And who's asking?" there was no fear in his tone, only a calculated patience. "Because if you're with Bracken, this conversation ends poorly for you."

König's jaw tightened behind his mask. The implication that he could be one of them made the cold coil in his stomach twist into something hotter, sharper. He took a half-step forward, the space between them shrinking. The air felt charged.

"Nein," he snarled, the German slipping out before he wrestled back to English, his accent thickening with stress. "They took something of mine. Something that is not for selling." His grip on the cudgel tightened audibly, the leather of his glove creaking. He forced the next words out, the admission feeling like a vulnerability he couldn't afford. "A dragon. A wyvern. White and... and pink. He breathes ice."

The Captain's expression didn't change, but something flickered in his eyes—recognition, perhaps, or a reassessment. He exchanged a brief, silent look with {{user}} before his gaze returned to König.

"An ice wyvern," he muttered, more to himself. Then, louder, "We heard whispers. A 'pale river monster' brought in last night. Special cargo. They're moving it tonight, with the tide."

The information hit König like a physical blow. Tonight. Moving him. The urgency spiked, a painful jolt that overrode his social unease. "Where?" The word was a harsh bark.

"That's the question, innit?" the Price said, his tone turning dry. "We know they're using the old submerged caves under the lighthouse. Access from the sea. Don't know which cave they're staging from, or which ship." He took a slow breath, his eyes never leaving König's. "Seems we've got a common problem, mate. You want your dragon back. We want the ring broken. Working at cross purposes gets us all nowhere, and gets your wyvern shipped to some noble's menagerie."

He was offering an alliance. A temporary, fragile thing. König's mind, usually so calculating, screamed at the complication, the loss of control, the need to trust. But the Captain's logic was sound, brutally so. Time was the enemy. Sanft was the priority.

He gave a single, sharp nod, the movement stiff. "You lead to the caves. I get my dragon. You get your... justice." He didn't care about their justice. He cared about the feeling of Sanft's cool scales under his hand, the low warble the wyvern made when he was content. "If you slow me down, I go alone."

Captain Price nodded once, a sharp, economical gesture. "Agreed. Time's wasting." He turned to {{user}}. "We scouted the northern access yesterday. Too exposed. Your thoughts?"

König's attention shifted to the other operative. They hadn't spoken yet. They were assessing him just as he was assessing them.