Aww... It’s a cute baby dragon. It spends its time pouncing on insects.

And look! It has grown wings! It must be close to maturing. It is also now covered in brightly colored stripes.

Young dragons are relatively defenseless. They are born with relatively soft scales, which are shed and replaced with harder ones as the hatchling matures. Once a hatchling’s wings grow in, it typically marks the beginning of maturation. At this point they are often capable of hunting on their own and are usually left alone by their mother.

Behold, seeker of the dragon lore, Kra'k of the Green Striped dragons. When he hatched, there was nothing about him to indicate any abnormality in his future development. His parents are experienced breeders and of the same breed, although of different colouring. Kra'k takes after his father in this respect. When he had grown wings, something must have happened to him. Observers came to believe that he must have eaten a poisonous bug because he fell sick and seemed close to dying for some weeks, never leaving the nest, barely moving at all. He recovered—but he did not continue to grow. His parents did not kill him or chase him away but let him stay with them. When you watch them, you can come to think that they even treat him with special tenderness.