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The sound of scales on dried leaves whispered, the only notable sound breaking the misty darkness of the forest. The creature clawed its way forward, dragging its body. There was a trail of blood behind it, it knew, but there was nothing to be done about that now.

Spears were jutting out of his rear flank. He would prefer to have flown back to the cave he and his mother share - well, the cave they used to share. The attack that brought her down had left him wounded, his right wing shredded. It ached, and he was dizzy with pain.

They hadn't done anything wrong, he didn't think, to provoke such an attack. They had flown over that village countless times before and had never had a problem. This time was different. This time, there was a loud crack below. As he looked for the soure, he spotted a large bolt, like the kind hunters use in their crossbows, but a hundred times larger. It sliced into his mother's chest, cracking scales and slicing muscle and sinew. Her screech was something of nightmares.

He should have run. He should have flown away as fast as he could. He knew that now. But that never occured to him at the time. He folded his wings and dropped into a dive, following his mother's plummeting form. Angry faces looked up at him as he approached the ground. Too late, he slowed his dive, and a launched net fell over him. He didn't see what happened to his mother at first. There was so much yelling and screaming. People were throwing things. It hurt. But he knew this: his mother never rose from the place where she crashed into the dirt.

It had taken three days of gnawing through the ropes that bound him. All the while, villagers poked and prodded him, tormenting him. The first time he was caught gnawing at the ropes, they had added several more, including around his snout. After that he was more careful, only clawing at the fibers when no humanoids were near enough to see. Some of the young ones threw rocks. These were what had ruined his wing. He didn't understand what had happened or why. He had only seen two winters, and had no context to understand something like this. He just had to get away.

He reached another claw forward, pulling himself another few inches. A glance over his shoulder showed that there wasn't anyone immediately behind him, but that he was leaving a trail of blood and broken brass scales amidst the leaves behind him. He let out a mewl of despair, and collapsed, no energy left to continue.