Chapter 16: Once Upon a Time

"As thou knowest," Quentin began, "Thousands of years ago the Necromancer and his forces of darkness wiped the elves from the earth. Towards the end of this purge, some of the remaining elves sought refuge across the sea. Piling into hastily put together ships with almost no means of navigation, they set off for the New World. Almost none of these elvish explorers made it across the sea, and those who did had perished long before humans started crossing the ocean. But at least one passenger did survive - a silver dragon egg, quite possibly the last of it's kind.
Of course, there were no dragons native to North America, so this one was quite alone. He eventually settled in the Appalatian mountains. As European settlers began to arrive, he was at first quite friendly to him, as they reminded him of the elves he had known as a wyrmling. But the humans didn't return his kindness. They had heard stories of the dragons of the old world eating young maidens and burning villages. So they feared him and avoided him where possible.'
"On one side of the mountain lived a tribe of natives. They lived far enough away they had little contact with the dragon, but they often saw him flying above them. They began to call him the Skylord.
"The trees on the other side of the mountain were prone to occasional forest fires - these were neccesary to help the trees grow and they were a natural part of the ecosystem. But the settlers immediately assumed they were caused by the dragon, and began to call him the Woods-Burner.
"The dragon grew and developed, living a life of solitude, cut off from his kin. Then the dragon hunters came. Dragons were nearly extinct in the old world by then, and thousands of disenfranchised dragon hunters, having no quarry, came to America, hearing rumors of new bounties there. One of them nearly caught the dragon, and he decided he needed to hide. He took human form and chose as a human name a clever permutation of the only two names he'd ever been known by - Skyler Woods Brimmer.
"Eventually Skyler had a son. some time later he went off to war, where he apparenlty died. His son, however, Skyler Woods Brimmer Jr. , survived. He moved to the city of St. Louis, at the time one of the largest in the nation, and it was there that he began developing his powers. Being fully half dragon, it took him a lot less work to develop them than it does draconics these days. As he got older it became apparent to him that half-dragons were not the most popular people, and he soon learned to keep his powers secret. He still used them though - whenever he saw someone being oppressed or taken advantage of, he would transform, save them, and turn back into that harmless street man. Slowly, stories of this urban reptilian superhero started to circulate. Other Americans with dragon blood, rare at the time, began to flock to St. Louis in hopes of learning more about this man. It was there, in 1891, that the MLF, or Magical Liberation Front, was founded, by a collection of disgruntled draconics, elvishes, and other arcane relics, supported by quite a few nonmagical workers, mostly Chinese immigrants. The Chinese, as you know, revere dragons, and were somewhat upset at how draconics were being treated by the government, especially after the Draconic Registration Act of 1901.
Skyler Woods Brimmer was installed as its first president. And, until the eighties, a Skyler Woods Brimmer headed the organization for it's entire existence, accept for a brief period between III and IV. About that time the MLF absorbed HOUND - the Holy Order of UNdead Defenders. A group of Vampire hunters, HOUND had become aware that the chief Justice of the supreme court had been bitten by a vampire,and feared they would use this to gain control of the government. During World War II, the employment of dark magic by the Japanese inspired Americans to even greater anti-magic sentiment. The order was driven completely underground by ensuing legislation. Since then we've kept a low profile, focusing mainly on keeping the undead in check, but also trying to fight further anti-magic legislation.
Lisa Brimmer rather controversially accepted the presidency in '84. When she was captured a few years later, you were only a baby - we resolved to keep an eye on you and let you live a normal life, then ask you to accept the post when you came of age. Unfortunately, there's been some dissention on that point lately - which is what we came to discuss with thee,"