How to train your rider

~Open to story names, not really sure what i was going to call it, but if anyone has a suggestion, feel free to tell me.

Prologue

The Dragon Thieves - sounds like a nasty bunch don't they? Well, I had to grow up around them, so to me, they were family. It didn't matter that they only liked me when I showed how well I could control a dragon. Or that they would whip me over some of the smaller stuff. I thought it was normal; that every other kid lived in a ship filled with dragons, and was taught the very same lessons I was taught, and actually obeyed.

I was taught that the only way a dragon would listen to you was by force. It didn't matter that they didn't attack me when I would pat them as I passed from one end of the ship to another. It didn't matter that they never even spewed flames in my direction. I was taught to fear dragons. To make sure that they never got out of line, because if they did; nothing would keep them from keeping you out of the way of their freedom, even if it meant killing you.

The whole time I spent on that ship. I only lost control of two dragons. One had been because of someone bashing into it while in a race. I had been knocked half off the saddle, and because the dragon was newer, it saw its opportunity to escape. I fell into the ocean below before it could take off with me still on its back. That was a bad night for my back.

The usual small thing whipping was one or two, maybe three whips, but that night, I had received twenty three before passing out. The second time was worse. Drago and his son Roth'Var had been watching us compete, it had almost been the same thing as last time, but I was able to regain control, until someone's dragon began spewing fireballs. I had to jump from the Nightmare I had been on as the flames raced up its hide.

That time, I had been forced through around or above forty lashes, every time I would pass out, they would force me awake and begin again. The only reason they had been so mean that time, was because Drago and Roth'Var had been there, he brought out the harsh side in everyone. Most days were a fight against some sort of pain, most small annoying pain, but it all lead up to resisting the larger pains and being able to function under extreme conditions.

Since I was the youngest there for quite a long time, nobody was sure how to deal with me, and I learned after a few years that if I couldn't get it myself, I should stay quiet till I could. It was probably around age ten that they brought in the first timber jacks to ever be caught. It was with not that first one, but the second one they caught that I found a certain allure to. They caught a total of three timber jacks in the time I was there, and I named all three.

Of course they had seen me taking a liking to the second Timber jack and that raised more concerns from them, more of the usual 'If you don't break them, they will kill you.' speeches. Of course, being who I was, I believed them, but my childish desires had me going against every rule they had lashed into my mind and body.

It was a late night and a cold one at that, so very few people were outside of the boat, making it easier for me to run around topside without being caught. My breath crystallized in the air like a frozen curtain of stars. The hangar that they kept the dragons in was warm and thawed my chilled nose in no time. I made sure to tiptoe down the hanger, calling out to the few dragons I had names for and could remember. The farther in you went, the colder it got as you got closer to the exit.

"Daisy, Jade, Rose, Jasmine, Dal, Jack." Those were the only ones I could remember and probably the only ones I liked. That night I just sat in front of his stall and watched him, curious if he knew the human language, if they had the ability to speak if they so wished to. Childish thoughts, I named him that night, not because of the type of dragon he was, but because of the way the cold crept up and over his scales and covered him in a thin blanket of ice crystals. The only reason this was possible was because he and the other two Timberjacks were at the end of the hanger, and never seemed to emit heat like the others - they never seemed bothered by the cold. His name was Frost, and he was the first dragon I took a liking to, but certainly not the last.