Aww... It’s a cute baby dragon. It has brightly colored fins on its back.

And look! It has grown larger fins! 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.

Ciun Bree, Nina's first orphan, is a fierce, proud little thing. That pride is etched into every contour of the fatless muscle a hatchling should not have. Ciun's stunted legs and slender sides are covered over with tiny scars, highlighted by an odd silver sheen in the scar tissue. Bree is rarely seen with the other hatchlings, or more than twenty feet from Nina's side, for that matter. The little hatchling's stance is always stiff, with his head held defiantly high and his dorsal frill bristling. He refuses to let any but Nina and Albus stand behind him, and has left a scratch of his own on many a dragon who have tried. Despite his youth, he would recklessly charge into combat, claiming to have no fear of death if dying would protect Nina.