Balloon Dragons are so named because they are filled with a gas that makes them almost lighter than air, similar to balloons. However, they are not prone to bursting, as they are covered in tough skin and can deflate themselves if necessary. In addition, they generally are slow moving. They use their gas bladders to float to the tops of trees, where food is more abundant. They can shift their weight from their backs to their fronts, allowing them to reach leaves and fruit.

Dragons are highly-intelligent reptilian creatures that—from a human perspective, at least—appear to live forever. Many different varieties of dragon exist, each with their own unique qualities, habitats, and behavior. Adolescence in dragons is usually marked by the growth of a hatchling’s wings, although not all breeds of dragons grow wings and some breeds have other traits that indicate the beginning of maturation. In Galsreim, dragons and humans coexist peacefully.

Poor Cervez is not the most attractive of dragons. For a start, he's pink, which has earned him no small amount of teasing from other, more traditionally coloured males. Secondly, he's fat. Well, not fat, but full of gas, which comes with its own insults as he's found out to his cost. Despite this, he refuses to dye his scales and keep himself deflated and instead takes great delight in floating to the tops of high trees, devouring the ripest fruit and raining discarded skins and pips down upon his tormentors—who remain clawing ineffectually at the sparsely laden bottom branches far below.