Book I: The Wastes, a dragon origin story

The Waste – An abandoned area of a coal mine judged to have no more accessible coal. This was an incredibly dangerous place because of the imminent collapse of the decaying columns supporting the roof. A place of tragic stories, like ‘the valley of ashes’ in The Great Gatzby. Some work there for easy money ‘robbing the pillars’. Some unworthy survivors work there to fulfill a death wish.

In 1904, Anna pretends to be a boy to work in the coal mine, like other children, to save her mother from starvation. However, she senses that if she were to go underground she would never come back up.

Trapped in a coal mine on fire, the group of children face death from carbon dioxide poisoning. They have no choice but to breathe in the brown, blood-like formula in the professor’s amulet. The formula allows them to breathe the carbon dioxide that is slowly killing them. But unexpectedly, it changes them in a way that prevents them from returning to the surface.

In the mine they meet docile creatures who live in the Below. The Below; a realm of vast beauty and unrelenting danger from fierce dragons. Survival depends on turning these submissive creatures into apex predators. Dragon’s blood and a young female’s rage transform this world forever.

The first story I remember making up was at age four. I was alone in a stranger’s living room as my parents and their friends talked at the dining room table.