Humans and Dragons *contains spoilers for Liveship and Tawny Man books*

[maulkin]

Recently, I traveled to Siberia and visited an area of old-growth forest where bears were plentiful and tigers still roamed. Seeing the fresh tracks of these huge predators on the ground ahead of me made me very aware that I was sharing my environment with creatures that could eat me. Given that I did not carry a gun, there would not have been much that I could have done to stop them. It completely changed my attitude to the forest, turning it into a place of danger that demanded care and respect.

While nature still presents dangers such as diseases, hurricanes and earthquakes, as well as more insidious threats such as climate change, none of these has a body that we can picture or a mind with which we can engage. To me, dragons personify (or perhaps draconify) the stark power and hazardous beauty of nature. Perhaps that is why they fascinate us, despite their non-existence.