Aww... It’s a cute baby dragon. It spends a lot of time stalking and pouncing playfully on the tails of adult dragons nearby.

And look! It has grown wings! It must be close to maturing.

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.

From the moment she hatched, all of the Copper dragons of EG's Cave predicted that Yearning Wingspread was going to be the most beautiful adult copper in all the Cave. However, when she began to learn to fly, she took a nasty tumble and broke a wing. The atrophy in her right wing and the infection that spread throughout her body- that was eventually halted by the White healers- left her flightless and stunted in her growth.

Now, she travels to the top of Mount Hagsip, spreading her wings into the sun, her scales bursting with fiery light, and she thinks sadly to the future that will never come for her.