A story by Rupert

'The difference between Faerie-Dragons and Dragon-Faeries' by Rupert the Mad Immortal (And Very Tiny) Dracologist



As most people know, there is a lot of confusion about two species in our Realities (also called Fantasies or States Of Mind; read more on that subject in the works of The Ruler Of The Universe -Ed.).

First is a race called Faerie-Dragons, which nearly no living being has ever seen, though many have encountered unknowingly, because they are very tiny, about a finger long (choose one, it will probably be the right one; unless you're a Giant or a Real Dragon, of course).



That is not the only reason near nobody has seen them, since they are also very fast.

Fast as in lightning-fast, or lightspeed-fast, and because nearly all living creatures rely on light to see things (except The Gods, yes I know that but The Gods are not really living now are they? I mean to be 'alive' one also has to be able to be 'dead' at some point, and since The Gods are supposedly Immortal and thus don't 'die' they also cannot be 'living' now can they? Q.E.D. i say, but I digress) thus they cannot be seen.

How can they be this fast, you ask? Well, it's quite easy to understand if you have any knowledge of the workings of the Ultimate Universe. You see, if you take in account [a.] the fact that there are multiple dimensions to any Reality [b.] there is a form of Magic in any Reality [c.] both [a.] and [b.] are some kind of wave hitting a point in time thus becoming Reality...



(For the interest of our readers and to save a lot of trees this explanation has been drastically shortened; anyone interested can turn to explanatory works such as 'The Death Gate Cycle' , ' The Cronicles of Amber' or just ask Belgarath or Polgara, if you can find them -Ed.)



...and when you put [a.] through [z.] together you'll find it is very easy for a Faerie-Dragon to travel at speeds up to 99% of ultimate particle speed, thus being as good as invisible when on the move (except to The Gods, yes I know we already covered that now didn't we?). So now you know why a Race nobody sees (Except...STOP BUGGING ME!) can still exist in a reality close to you (if I'm moving to fast for you I suggest you reread points [g.] to [r.], which have explained this clearly).



This does not explain though how we found out it's existence, but that is fully explained in my other excellent (if I say so myself) work called 'Discovering A New Race; Do They Really Exist' which also covers the discovery of the other Race under scrutiny in this work.



Having now satisfactory explained how the Faerie-Dragon Race exist and why nobody ever sees it (Except...Oooh I'm getting a headache) , we'll now turn to the matter of how this Race actually looks. "But how do you know?" I hear you ask? "They are nearly invisible to all! You said so yourself".

Well how I know this is also explained in my aforementioned work, so you will either have to read that first or take the word of the foremost authority on the subject (which would be me). Take your pick but let me go on with my explanation, please? Thank you. Now, as has been pointed out before, the Faerie-Dragon Race is only one finger (pointed out, finger; ha I crack myself up) tall.

This is of course the size of a fully grown adult specimen, the young being even harder to see than the adults because of their equal speed (Except...Don't you ever get bored telling the obvious?) but being even smaller. The actual growth rate and initial offspring size of the Race is still a mystery which I intend to clear up in my next work called 'The Life And Times Of The Incredibly Fast And Thus Near Invisible Race' (Shut up, it's an accurate title if it wasn't for The Gods).



Size explained we will now turn to appearance. As the name of the Faerie-Dragon Race implies they look a lot like , well, Real Dragons with a bit of Faerie thrown in for good measure.

A lot smaller than Real Dragons of course, not taken into account the various Sub-Races of Real Dragons that can change their size, either at will or under the influence of external sources (or of course the only dragon that shrinks when embarrassed and grows bigger when agitated; who goes by the name of Zwelgje, apparently he's Dutch).

Being more precise the Dragon-Faerie Race looks exactly like their bigger cousins (just a phrase, though they look alike they are not in anyway related to each other as a Race. This is one of the miracles of The Ultimate Universe, just like a pencil and a ballpoint look very much alike and have the same purpose they are completely different in their composition and their inner workings).



As most people are aware how a Real Dragon looks like (if not just turn to the excellent volumes of Pern or the exquisit works of Tintaglia, also know as The Liveship Traders) I will mostly explain the differences here.

Only one thing of interest can be noted as to the alikeness between Dragon-Faeries and some Real Dragons Sub-Races which is they can also breath fire, but the Dragon-Faeries breath exhaust is of course a lot smaller, more the size of a candle flame than the great roaring bursts of fire some Dragon Races are known for.

Apart from that the only really great difference is found in the Faerie part of the Races' name, which is the Faerie-Dragon's type of wings. They are Faeries' wings of course! (I wouldn't have given a whole Race a name that didn't make any sense now would I? Although it does happen a lot among the less diligent scholars in most Realities)



Looking flimsy and filmy instead of the great leathered pinions the Real Dragon Races usually possess, yet capable of moving at great velocity this is the main part of the reasons that enable this amazing Race to travel at their breakneck speed (the other reasons as explained in point [u.]-[v.] before) and thus is also the remaining reason for their near invisibility (Except...Ok that's it, now I've had it with you and your constant interrupting about The Gods; go read The Elder Gods or the American Ones or better yet go annoy Aldur himself, he'll know what to do with you).



Oh sorry, you are still here as well? I never thought anyone could concentrate on my excellent explanations with all that interrupting going on, not my fault of course. I hope you now can form a mental picture of how a Dragon-Faerie looks like and what makes the Race 'tick' ('tick' on a Dragon-Faerie, never seen that before, it would probably be dinner anyway, and a large one at that; I am so funny I laugh at myself) so you can fully appreciate the differences with the other Race mentioned in the title, which habits and appearance I will explain fully in the next chapter.



Rupert the Mad Immortal (And Very Tiny) Dracologist