She refused to let anyone else do it. She refused to let them have their way. The Society was wrong. They wanted to be done with it. They wanted to take centuries of tradition and cast it to oblivion. The Society, feckless group of upstarts, did not understand the ramifications of their decision. “Leave them to their own devices,” they said. “Let them kill each other off. We’ll all be better off once they’re gone.” The words rang in her ears, insulting here. Indeed they were insults to everything she had been raised to believe and knew to be true.

For centuries it had been the responsibility of the CHACRONA to steward the installation of the new dracolord to the society. A bond existed between chacrona and dracolord, nurtured through time and strengthened through common experience. When the time came, the chacrona and dracolord reunited, to defeat the old dracolord. What the Society refused to understand was that this was the covenant that had kept humans and dragons at peace for longer than anyone remembered. Perhaps that was the problem. Time is the wind that turns the stones of truth and understanding to dust.

Her father had seen to the last dracolord installation. Brahma had been strong and wise as a dracolord, but he had been overtaken by the madness. The madness was rare; occurring when a dragon flew too high. Brahma enjoyed flying more than any other dragon. Now Brahma, in his madness, had attacked people. He had slaughtered thirty over a year ago. One of those slaughtered had been her father. He had given his life attempting to maintain the covenant. Now the Society wanted to do away with all of it, do away with dragons.

Now, the task was hers; hers and Ramsus. She and Ramsus had both grown since that first fateful day 19 years ago. So innocent the two of them were. Now the future of everything hinged on their bond. The first task of a chacrona was to renew the bond. If the bond could not be renewed, if a dragon refused to remember its steward, then it was the task of that steward to kill that dragon before it could come in contact with the society.
She would not let that happen. She would not allow the covenant to be broken. In the future, there would be dragons.