Dragons

Dragon are ancient, highly intelligent race native to Alagaesia. After a war with the elves many of them chose to become rider's dragons, the remainder were from then on known as wild dragons. At the time of the Inheritance Cycle there are only five known dragons remaining: Saphira, Glaedr, Shruiken, Thorn and Firnen (allthough the latter two were still unhatched during a large part of the series). However, as revealed in Inheritance there several dragon eggs remaining in the Vault of Souls in Vroengard, the ancestral home of the riders.

Anatomy


 * The dragons of Alagaesia are reptilian and have large membrane wings enabling them to fly. Once a dragon has reached a certain level of physical maturity they develop the ability to breath fire. Dragons grow very quickly after their hatching however, this rate soon decreases even though dragons continue to grow for their entire lives. This means that very old dragons such as Valdr can reach very large sizes. Each dragon's scales are a certain colour with variants of that colour appearing all over their bodies. While dragon's each have individual features all of them have spikes running across their back and tail and the known ones have varying numbers of cheek spikes. All dragons have sharp teeth which the use in combat to great effect. Dragons are not capable of speech as other humans are but they instead communicate through their minds. This is commonly done not through words but instead through sounds, smells, pictures and emotions.