It happened long ago that the One True Eye had not finished his creation. He longed for a way to build more mountains to the north, more streams and caverns for himself, and for his people. There was a great land of black and a great land of white, and they had nothing but long stretches of black or white, with nothing else there. This bothered the Eye, and he wished to do something about it.
But he had run out of materials, and his strength and creative powers were low. He longed to build, but he sat on the Throne of the Eye instead, taking petitioners as he always used to do.
Then one day, the Deity sat on his throne of gold and silver, and he heard a rumor from a travelling pilgrim. Many many leagues away, the pilgrim said as he kneeled before the deity, in a range of grey mountains never visited, there lived an invisible dragon with great powers. The pilgrim bowed his head even lower and said with great humility, “They say her power is even greater than Your Own, Your Greatness, or so the Dragon says…”
The One Eye granted the pilgrim his due blessing, and as the dwarf left the great deity pondered a bit. He felt no rage, no jealousy, nothing against this dragon. But he did feel a curiosity. An invisible dragon! That might be worth a journey and a visit!
So the One True Eye set out the next day. He traveled many days over white lands, and he traveled many more over black lands. He traveled until he reached the grey land, and stopped there, where the dragon was rumored to live.
He could not see the dragon of course, so he called out, “Great invisible dragon of the balanced grey lands, please show yourself! I am the deity called One True Eye, and I wish to speak to you.” After a pause, he added, “I mean you no harm!”
Sure enough, slithering and crawling from the Grey Mountain came the wyrm Herself: the Invisible Dragon. So powerful was her invisibility, the One sensed her only through sound and smell. Invisible, the dragon seemed nothing but the grey landscape around her. “What would you have of me, Deity of the One Eye? I am old and tired, and I wish only to rest in my lair. Soon I will die and leave this world behind.”
The Eye imagined the dragon’s magnificent form--its massive head, its spiny backbone, its sinuous tail as long as the tallest pine tree, and its four powerful legs. The deity could see nothing however--nothing but the grey landscape. The One True Eye was impressed, and he revered this dragon more and more as their discussion went on.
“Good Dragon,” he said, “your powers of invisibility impress me. You are one with the grey land, and you are holy as the grey land. I wish to ask for a boon from you.” (The deity had an idea.)
The dragon snarled and laughed a bit. “And what is that?”
“When you die, I wish to use your body to create a land, a land of beauty and life--a land of balance and law, that will give the people and the gods a place to dwell forevermore. It will be a land of high mountain ridges, caves and caverns, and high hills at their feet. It will be a land of lakes and streams, and unspeakable beauty, a land of brilliant greys to override the black and the white. I will fashion it from your body when you die.”
Now the dragon had no care for her body even now, let alone when she died. She laughed and snorted a bit of smoke and flame. “I have no problem with this. Go ahead; when I am dead you may do these things.” And the invisible dragon slinked back into her mountain hole.
A few decades later, when word reached the Eye of the dragon’s demise, he went with all speed: across the black lands and across the white lands, to the mountain where the dragon had lived. With his power, he entered the dragon’s lair. There she was; he could feel her massive head, her spiny backbone, her sinuous tail as long as the tallest pine tree, and her four powerful legs. He also saw all about her the massive treasures she had gathered--of precious metals and minerals and gems.
He was overjoyed, and he began to create at once. To the black and white lands he brought the greyness of her spine to build high mountain ridges over the black, over the white. He brought the blood of her sinuous tail to form the mighty rivers and the humble creeks that rushed to lower lands, over black and over white. He transformed her powerful legs into the foothills where the Hill Dwarfs dwell, that held up the mountains in their great height, over black and over white. The recesses of her skull became mountain caverns, her ribs were the veins of harder rock, her bowels and innards the lakes of the mountains and the caverns inside. Over black and over white The One True Eye laid out the invisible grey body of the dragon, and within the rock and stone of the mountain he scattered the precious metals, minerals, and gems, for the Dwarven people to find and delight in. Over black and over white, all of this the deity did.
“The Grey Land,” as it is still called by Priests of the One to this day, came from the body of the Invisible Dragon, and from the Creativity of the Eye. The people there revere the dragon and pay it homage every Equinox, with the festival of greys. The region is a place of the One, and the Deity has a dwelling there.
And there are dragons among those mountains, and no one knows if they’re invisible or not, but those that wander the mountains are wary to say the least.
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