"Hey, don't you think you should be getting back to your kingdom?" I asked. "Not that I don't enjoy your company, but kings can't exactly go around doing whatever they want, especially a king of the deities."

My blonde friend snorted. "Not like I ever wanted to be king. None of them have ever accepted me. Not Iadra, not his followers, not even my own followers. The only part of me that's been accepted by anybody is my power." 

He smiled bitterly. I was reminded of the first time we met; when he came across a young boy, dying in the wilderness. Truth be told, I hadn't expected him to stop to help me. Dragons were known for being uncompassionate, not even accepting the concept of family. Something about him was different though.

I closed my eyes, allowing the memory to replay in my head.

I was around sixteen, a lone boy, bleeding out in the snow. I condensed some aura in my palm, pressing it on the side of my ribs, trying to stop the bleeding. The wound sizzled and steamed, causing me to wince in pain. In the light created by my aura, I could make out a figure. It was much too tall to be a human, but seeing as we were in the middle of Orrostuma, I assumed it was a beastperson.

"Help me! Please!" I strained. "I'm bleeding out."

The figure approached me. I couldn't make out its face at all, but if I could, I surely would have bowed my head to the ground. He was completely motionless. I poured some more aura into my hand in the hopes of cauterizing the wound. This finally caused the man to react.

"Aura. An Aesir? You would ask me, a dragon, to help an Aesir?" he growled.

"I'm not an Aesir!" I shouted. "They're the reason I'm like this! I-" I was cut off by my body seizing up.

"Your bloodloss is making you susceptible to the storm. You can tell me about it after." He swung his arm, and I felt a ripple of power before I passed out. 

I woke up in a cave. I could see that the storm had subsided and the person who saved me was sitting by a fire. Even though I was shaking with fear, I couldn't help but admire how ethereal he looked with his pale skin reflecting the light of the fire. He had extremely sharp facial features, and his eyes shined with a mysterious glow. Upon closer inspection, I could see that he had eyes bluer than the ocean, with accents of pink hidden inside.

He noticed my gaze and turned towards me, his eyes boring into mine. Approaching me slowly, he sat down next to me and sighed.

"Explain to me how a human can use Aura. Don't bother lying, I'll be able to tell. I'm very sensitive, you see." He smiled, his sharp teeth glinting in the fire.

"To be honest, I don't know. I was born with it, I guess." A lump formed in my throat. "I-uh, I was taken by the Aesir a couple months ago. They told me they would teach me to harness my powers." I pulled up my tattered tunic, revealing the injury. 

"An Aesir did that?"

I nodded. "It was Mars. He was the guard of the prison."

The man raised an eyebrow. "How'd you escape? If I remember correctly, Mars should be their greatest warrior."

The comment made me chuckle. I clutched my side in pain and responded, "Mars is all brawn, no brains. It wasn't hard to outsmart him."

The man smiled softly. I remembered he mentioned he was a dragon, and I suddenly got curious. He opened his mouth to respond, but I accidentally cut him off.

"What's a dragon doing this far north? And in a storm this massive, no less."

The dragon frowned. "Long story."

"We've got time." I said, hoping he wouldn't just leave me now that I was awake. "Besides, you wouldn't have saved me if you didn't need company."

"How do you know for sure? What if I just left you here to die?"

I smiled. "You would have done that a long time ago. Dragons are usually uncompassionate, so I can't imagine any sane one would go out of their way to save a human."

He pondered quietly for a bit, and then spoke again. "I suppose you're right. I come up here to clear my head sometimes. It's peaceful."

"Even in the storm?" I asked, craning my head to see if the storm had come back. 

"It won't come back, if that's what you're thinking. I was the one that made it." 

I was dumbfounded. If he had the ability to conjure storms at will, that could only mean one thing. I scrabmled to stand up and dashed in front of where he was sitting. I bowed to him, making sure my head touched the floor.

"I apologize for my impudence, Lord Styrmir! Please forgive me!"

Styrmir's normally blank face morphed into an expression of shock. "Wha-? Do I know you?"

I pressed my forehead deeper into the ground. "Prince Donghai Wang of Heiguang, Sir. I met you very briefly when I accompanied my father to Dralossle to meet with King Iadra."

"Alright, Donghai. I don't care for the whole 'bow and kowtow to your superiors' thing, so you can raise your head." he said.

I lifted my head and saw him scowling. "Is something wrong?" I asked.

He touched his forehead and noticed he was scowling. "Ah. I was just thinking about my father."

"I thought dragons rejected the concept of family." A gust of wind blew into the cave, causing me to shiver and wince in pain.

"That doesn't change the fact that he's still my father." Styrmir said as he created a wall of ice to block the wind.

"You're weird, you know that?" 

He chuckled. "Yeah, that's what they call me."

Even with the wall of ice blocking out the wind, I was still freezing. Styrmir's mana was so powerful that the massive blue block was radiating cold. I sneezed, and he whipped his head in my direction, only now realizing that I wasn't as accustomed to the cold as him. He had used his shirt as a makeshift bandage for my wound, leaving his chest bare. 

He stood up and shot a ball of fire at the ice, melting a hole for him to walk through. "I'll go get something to keep you warm." 

I nodded, feeling lucky that he had stumbled upon me. I absentmindedly played with my silver hair. Truth be told, I wished I was born with either of my parents' darker hair colors. The Aesir wouldn't have recognized me as an Aura user if that were the case. No, I thought to myself. They would have sensed it eventually, even if they didn't think I was some sort of mutation.

A loud roar snapped me out of my thoughts. Styrmir had returned, and in tow, four massive Titanice Bears were following him. Each one was at least twice his size, which was impressive, considering he was at least seven feet tall. 

"Why would you bring them here?!?" I shrieked, fearing they would barrel right through him. 

"Didn't want to carry them all the way." he smirked, looking back at me. 

The bears lunged at him, and all I could do was watch as their midnight blue claws tore him apart. 

Except that's not what happened. 

In the blink of an eye, lightning had condensed itself around Styrmir's hands. They burned a bright blue, and were sharper than the finest daggers humanity could ever dream of forging. I could barely process what happened as he swung his arms to the side, tearing through the bears effortlessly. 

The lightning was so hot that there was no blood; just a clean cut through the midsection of all four bears, their flesh still smoking.

He turned back to me and smiled. "You hungry?"