Morphs Part 1: Creatures Unbound

Part 1: Creatures Unbound
Chapter 1: Wild Lives
The owl cocked it's head to the right, to the left, and searched it's surroundings without emotion breaching its swamp green eyes. It gazed at the rolling hills around it, trees perched atop them, and saw no life amongst them. Until it's ears, asymmetrical, picked up the final trace of wind curled by the minuscule bristles of a dozen feathers beating against the shadowy night. Behind him. The owl turned and caught the enemy hawk's talons in his own. That magnificent golden beak glimmered in the moonlight, for half a second a marvel of nature, before it shot down to snap the vertebrae secured below the owls feathers. Darting forward with the precision achieved only by a predator, it felt the enemy's eye burst beneath the force of it's beak. The hawk whimpered (or at least as much as possible with only a beak to work with) and reeled back in defeat. That scar would buy the owl some time, but not enough. The hawk would recover. And when it came back, it would bring others.
It took half a day and two mice to reach camp. The owl glided, silently, into a small clearing bordered by pine trees rising up taller than any other the owl had seen before. To the outside world, it was a fortress of nature. The moment it landed it's ears pricked up with the sense of coming home. But then it emitted a sharp glow brighter than moonlight and of a pale blue colour, and when it receded the owl was a human.
His hair was a shade more gold than brown; his eyes a swamp green; his age little more than twelve and a few giant tail-feathers sticking out from his backside the only remnant of the animal that stood where he now did. Wiping a splatter of blood from his lips, he called out into the night, "Rävenn, I'm baaaaaack!" After a short scrabble of paws and a flash of crimson light, a young boy of around ten came before him, the only trace of his wolf form lingering in his eyes (not including his bushy tail, of course).
"Did you fight off some off the hunters, Dakk?" The boy asked almost hungrily, his eyes wide and begging for a tale. Dakk never stood a chance to those eyes and he gave in before he even started arguing.
"I... Uh... I sure did, though I might need to clean my mouth... Huh, that eye didn't leave a good after-taste..." He told the youngster, savouring his awed expression and ruffling his brown hair.
"Now come on, it's nearly dark and we don't have a lot of food left. I'll go over the fields and you hunt at the forests!"
The promise of food was enough to send the wolf morph sprinting out of the clearing, shifting into his animal form mid-leap. Dakk himself leaped up towards the moon, the bright light of transformation enveloping him as his wing feathers blossomed and spread.
Later on, enjoying some fresh hare and fox, the two sat by a blazing fire, sharing it's warmth and comfort.
"Dakk, why are they hunting us? Tell me the truth this time... I need to know." The question startled Dakk with it's suddenness; he avoided it as he usually did, positive the boy wasn't ready for the truth.
"I have been telling you the truth! We ran away from home and our families are angry with us! That's all there is to it!"Dakk answered, desperately trying to keep his voice steady and un-revealing. Rävenn was now pouring through his notebook, and Dakk could tell his companion still had questions, but he was satisfied. For now.

Chapter 2: The Hunt
Extract from Rävenn's notebook:
A word about dragons. Known as 'the banes of civilisation', these titanic beasts are coloured and armed according to their environment (for example, a desert-living dragon would be orange, and could dig into the earth to search for water). This advanced adaptability allows them to own the upper hand in any battle, wether it be against Morphs or Humans. There is no way to kill a dragon. You can only run and hope on some miracle it doesn't follow.

That roar. Sounding out through the night and creeping closer every time it did. Rävenn stood and tried to hide the worry in his eyes. Dakk always saw it. He thought what his family would scoff when they saw the little make-do base he was occupying, thought how they would drag him away and lock him in the basement while they burnt it, along with anything else that made Rävenn 'abnormal'. But he had a friend now, who to be honest was more of a brother than Rävenn would like to admit. His own little family. But then he snapped back to the present.
"It's a dragon, isn't it?" The young boy asked quietly, and a pale-faced Dakk could only nod in confirmation.
Before the sun had fully risen above the horizon, Dakk and Rävenn had disassembled their camp and were travelling at their highest speed away from the clearing, each carrying a small bag filled with fresh prey. Despite their efforts, the roars were growing in volume. The dragon was nearing. Taking drastic actions to avoid it, they dropped half their prey and dashed onwards in animal form, the reddish wolf Rävenn hefting a bag in his jaws and Dakk clutching one in his talons as he flew alongside his companion. Both of them knew that dragons were relentless, and would carry on till their dying breath. But most usually it was it's preys rasping breath that disrupted the night.
"Where are we going?" Questioned Rävenn eventually, upon sight of the great mountain Daggūl in the distance.
"Away from the forests and hills of Arador, I'm afraid. I reckon they'll be shelter, even against a dragon, in the tunnels beneath Bane Ät El." This was the answer Rävenn had been dreading; the Stone Plains (the common tongue translation of it's elvish name) provided protection against storms and predators, but it lay many miles away. And beyond the Daggūl range.
"That's a one-way-journey, Dakk. There's a reason no-one goes through those mountains. It's the reason we have stayed in Arador!"
"C'mon, Rävenn. The dragons of the pit haven't woken in years!"
"But they will wake when we lead a dragon over there!"
"Exactly! Dragons have dog minds, if they see something, it'll replace any thoughts they previously had! Seeing as they're so territorial, the dragons of Daggūl will attack the one that is chasing us, and it'll forget it was ever hunting us! In the action, we'll slip away!"
"That wonderful plan fills me with encouragement," Rävenn muttered darkly as he plodded onwards on now heavy feet.

Chapter 3: Don't Sleep
Extract from Dakk's notebook:
A word on the Daggūl pass. It as a thin yet strong path cutting straight through the Daggūl mountain range, and suspended high above the Trollwight Marshes below, and was constructed by the mighty dwarves of old. Some say that the peaks of the mountains hide an abandoned dwarven city, but none have ever searched it because of the same reason that the dwarves now live in Daggūl Peak: a chasm far below the pass was the home of a hive of dragons, who took great pleasure of cleansing the pass of travellers. The dragons from the chasm (often dubbed 'the dragon pit') have not risen from their lair in years... But none would dare try their luck and pass through anyway.

A storm was brewing in the heavy clouds above the pair. After a day's travelling they had reached the base of the Dagūl pass, a solitary path through the mountainous peaks of the Dagūl range.
"Let's get this over with." Muttered Rävenn; he'd been in a stormy mood ever since he had uncovered the truth on the path they were to take. As a peach coloured dawn slashed at the horizon violently, spraying it's welcoming light across a moody sky, they journeyed along the path, their breath becoming ragged and choppy as the it slanted heavily upwards and through the centre of the first mountain of the range: Frostfūl Dür. Eventually reaching the slopes of the peak that had blocked their sunlight for hours, the perilous path evened and led them into a tunnel that ran through the very mountain.
"We'll camp here for tonight," struggled Dakk, his breath uneven from the hours of walking in the frozen air. "I reckon we'll actually be able to sleep without worrying about rolling of the edge of the path... Those dwarves really should've added some safety rails." Being younger, Rävenn could only manage a nod of agreement before he was on the stone floor snoring. Dakk was preparing to follow suit until he noticed two words, etched into the stone hurriedly and messily, on the floor where he was about to rest his head. Don't sleep. Eyes widening in alarm, he turned to check on Rävenn's dozing form... To find it wasn't there.

Eyes opening slowly and drowsily, Rävenn tilted his head upwards to scan his surroundings. Through sleep-blurred vision he could make out various shapes with crooked backs perching atop various boulders in the ancient cavern he appeared to be in, their eyes glinting maliciously with a yellow light and short fangs curving out of their top lips. Hobgoblins. He groaned noisily and an explosion of activity suddenly occurred amongst the monsters. Cries of:
"It's awake! It's ready!", "Lets eat him!" And "Get him!" Echoed sharply through the cavern, piercing his ear drums and dulling his mind.
But then his vision cleared, a hobgoblin was charging at him, and his mind sharpened. He became aware of the weak rope bonds binding his hands and legs. And he smiled. With a flash of crimson light he was a wolf, the bonds were broken by his transformation, and in a second his foe was dying in his mouth (for the animal forms of morphs are usually the size of a horse, or less) with razor teeth embedded in it's scrawny chest. He savoured the victory for a moment, until rational thought reminded him of the other enemies around. Sliding into human form, he slashed at the bony and withered monsters with the swords he had borrowed (stole seemed too harsh a word, when he thought of what he had done to him) from his father the night he had run away. But then the sound of-roughly- two hundred hobgoblins darting down the tunnels towards him echoed down the caverns. There was no choice now. Rävenn turned and ran.
"Rävenn! Where are you?" Cried Dakk for what had to be the hundredth time as he paced around the tunnel, taking the same course as he had for the past half-hour. With a murmur about 'immaturity' and 'bad jokes', he got to his knees (not for the first time) and searched the walls for any clues to his friend's disappearance. None. Dakk sat down, exhausted, and ran a hand through his blonde hair. The roar of a dragon in the distance told him it had to be halfway between their camp and the foot of the path... But then he shook his head, cleared his thoughts, and listened again. Stupid, Dakk! he thought; the dragon had reached the pass of Dagūl and was gaining on him. But then he heard the faint sound of yelling and screeching far below him and he knew what had happened to Rävenn and, forming a plan, he stood. Now was the time to act.

Chapter 4: Dancing With Dragons
Extract from Dakk's notebook:
A word on dragon fire. Dragon's can breathe other elements than fire (such as ice, or water) but when breathing their most common choice, their fire will be different than normal. It has an explosive, concussive force that smashes and burns through anything, even rock and metal. Only the stone of Bane Åt Ell can withstand its force.
As a human, Rävenn ran swiftly. As a wolf, he ran like the wind. He sped through the tunnels of Frostfūl Dür, the cries of enraged goblins ever present behind him. He knew that this tunnel was probably never going to lead out of the mountain; even if it did he'd be stuck in the Trollwight marshes far below the pass of Daggūl and right next to the Dragon Pit. Yes, he wasn't perhaps the luckiest person in the realm. But there was nothing he could do on that matter, so he stopped thinking and just ran.
Dakk thought he'd felt fear. Of course, that was before he met the dragon. It scales were black, so black the muscles rippling beneath them were invisible and the dragon itself was but a shadow in the sky, and it was wreathed in smoke that billowed this way and that as the beast's great wings rose and fell. But, as the solitary pieces of colour on the beast, it's eyes were red with swordlike pupils and it's teeth were white as though polished every morn, though surprisingly small (he couldn't see the secondary, and many other, rows of teeth behind the first). And then, with a roar of pure, unrelenting fury, it came at him.
He hastily shook himself out of his paralytic fear and turned to the exit of the tunnel, a barn owl with wings spread as soon as he was out in the open and the dusk. He turned his head, gazing over the feathers of his back and at the following dragon with his head turned round so far that if he was human it would shatter his spine. Screeching a spine-tingling cry, in a way shouting, 'come get me!', he flew on; the dragon responded by widening it's jaws so much that even it's eyes couldn't be spotted behind them, and it released a firestorm. It was more of a wall of flame than a stream: the fire rushed everywhere and obliterated everything. The entire peak of the mountain (and the floor of the tunnel they had stopped in) combusted in a detonation of rubble as the fire weaved through all that the dwarves of old had strived so hard to build: thus revealing the small hidden stair-case that the hobgoblins had dragged Rävenn down. And now for the moronic part of the plan.
Dakk pulled his stomach up-wards so that his wings were a blockade against the darting wind, pulling him back past the dragon (before it even registered that it's prey was not actually panicking and shouting, 'please, have mercy!') and down towards Rävenn in a dive faster than even dragon-fire can travel. Pulling up as he came to the cavern Rävenn had awoken in, registering the hobgoblin carcasses with a smile, and dropping the smile as he saw the army of goblins in front of him, Dakk held his talons poised beneath him that sliced through the swarm as he flew overhead. Rävenn's bounding form came into view eventually, only visible in the dark because of the barn owl's keen sight, shouting in his rough wolf voice "What was that racket! It sounded like a drago... Oh. Right. How'd you find me?"
"The dragon destroyed the entire top of the mountain; I saw the goblin stairs and flew down. Now come on, we need to get back."
"Back?!" But without asking Dakk swooped Rävenn up in his talons (the younger morph could be quite stubborn; it was often best that Dakk just stopped arguing and did the deed anyway) and swung round swiftly, flying over the startled hobgoblins (with many a "there goes our dinner!") and soaring up the seemingly endless stair. They shot into the cold morning air, dived out of reach of snapping dragon jaws, and he dropped Rävenn onto the path as he swerved back towards the dragon with a realisation dawning on him. The dragon would chase them endlessly, and it would kill them long before they reached The Stone Plains. Unless he killed it first.
With an un-earthly screech of (completely moronic) bravery, Dakk flew into the beast's jaws and smashed through one of the Ivory teeth, grabbing the bone weapon as he shifted into human form and jabbing it upwards into the dragon's skull. It died swiftly and before any flame could spring up it's throat, and as it's jaws fell down Dakk leapt through the closing gap, a pure white barn owl in the morning air as soon as he had the room to spread his wings. He had slain a dragon.