Magical Beans...

The chimes finally stopped after Aralt crawled grumpily out of bed to do his packing for a trip he still wasn't sure he wanted to go on.  "I need my Brew!" he muttered to himself.

Taking a few minutes to whip it together he then took a deep breath, inhaling the sweet smell of his drink made from his magical beans.  Nothing started his day off better than his first mug of his special blend.  

​It was those mornings where he could enjoy his drink in silence that helped focus and energize him.  "I still have those blasted chimes going off in my head,"  grumbled Aralt.  "I just might need a double shot this morning," he thought to himself.

"Dragon's will be the death of me yet," he growled as he continuing drinking.  It wasn't as if Aralt talked to himself more than anyone else.  It was that since he was a herald, he found out long ago that he talked out loud more than others.  "So what if I talk out loud," he told himself, "it's not like I hear strange voices telling me what to do."  The problem was that occasionally he did hear voices in his head.  Dragon voices.  "It's all because of that emerald," he told himself as he was deciding what to wear and what else to pack for the journey.  "I better check to make sure I have packed the emerald dragon heart," he reminded himself.  

"I'll need it for sure if I am going to communicate with the Dragons," he thought.  "Who knew discovering that emerald stone would enhance my ability to 'mind-talk' with Dragons.  Though the first time I went into a Dragon's mind was like talking to a bouncing child who had drank my magical brew.  No direction  and just jumping all over the place," he remembered.

"I'll need it too before facing the Council," Aralt mumbled to himself.  "It always helps in persuading the Council members to see things my way, and seeing my way is the only right way."

As Aralt turned to check that the emerald Dragon Heart stone was indeed packed in his travel bag, he took one last look around the room.  There on top of his dresser was his gift from the ruling she-Wish Dragon.  The corolla had come directly from the Wish Dragon's personal horde.  

​While she had been trying to buy Aralt's favor, she didn't realize she had actually given him the perfect portal for controlling her Dragons.  "If that cantankerous old she-demon of a Wish Dragon only knew what her bribe did," smiled Aralt.  For every Dragon had their pile of gold to sleep on knowing that gold was a perfect conduit for magical energy to pass through.  It was this extra power that also increased Aralt's mind-talking ability to her dominions giving him the ability to persuade them.

"I am the only thing that keeps these Dragons from creating total chaos and havoc in the Realms," he told himself each time he used the corolla and the Dragon Heart stone together.  "And I am the only one who knows what's best for them too," he said as he took one last took in his room and started out the door with his packed bags.