Dragon settled, huffing some as he listened. A maned wolf? He'd never heard of that before, but he accepted it at face value, promptly dismissing it from his mind after filing it away in some tiny memory which was unlikely to ever be accessed again.
As for himself, he was Dragon, of course, and repeated such, loudly.
"I am Dragon." This, to him, was who and what he was. He listened more sombrely as Layla spoke of a missing friend--but that was what happened in the caves. You were born, you lived, and you died--unless you survived, and found the truth of things.
"You are both young, but I will tell you what I know. If you listen, perhaps you will learn," he rumbled thoughtfully.
He chose his words carefully, and he gave them slowly, and as clearly as he could. There were too many who would see it as ranting, or miss details that might be important to their survival, and so he had to make sure they understood as much as possible. The more they knew, the better their chances--the better all their chances.
"Many cycles ago, the caves began to awaken. I awoke into a battle within the black lake, here. There were others, but all were young--very young. There were no adults. Before I continue, I will say: we do not know what came before, do you understand..? There are those who are old--vast, and powerful. I will tell you of them in a moment. But they will not tell us what came before. There are caves full of bones, where things hid, and died. There are caves with structures, and there are pictures on the walls. There is a throne where a leader perhaps once sat. There are things built throughout the caves. Yet, we do not know what made them."
He stared at the two, dark eyes intense, words solemn. He wanted them to understand how serious this all was. "Whoever came before, whoever built it all, died. And we do not know how. Or why. And so we began to awaken: young things, from stone, with no grown Gembound to tell us what had happened. But there are grown Gembound. Raheerah, the great dragon, has turned to chaos. Aquarian, my father, lays within the black lake, and he survives, and teaches us that to survive, we must find knowledge--and to find knowledge, we must survive. The Betrayer, Nemean, she buzzes about with her lights and tampers with what happens, for her own amusement or for some goal we do not know. She is dangerous," he added slowly.
"The rest--the stag Astraea, the phoenix Tenzin--the birds--they serve their own ends, now. They know things... they know, perhaps, what came before. How the ones who came before us, died--and why. But they will not tell us. They serve some other master, one that keeps them silent out of fear, I believe. If they tell us why we are here--how we came to be; what might become of us... then something will be taken from them. Their lives? Our magick? I do not know." Dragon eyed the two cats closely. "That is why you must seek it yourselves--why we must all seek the truth ourselves. You must not let them know that we seek it. That we are learning. We must keep it a secret--we must remain safe."
Dragon sighed through his jaws, looking off with a distant stare. "When I was younger, those who were born into this cave--I cared for them, watched over them. We hunted together, and we brought my father his food, and he taught us. We called ourselves the Children of Rot, the children of those who had come before, and died. We intended to survive, and to find the secrets of the cave. But one by one the Children have gone, and only I am left here. Perhaps the Children could rise again, if enough sought the secrets. But... Now you know what I know. Whatever disaster befell those who came before us--it could happen again. Whatever killed them all may return to kill us as well. We must find out what happened before it repeats. Seek knowledge wherever it may be found. Steal what secrets you can from those who will tell us nothing. Learn, yourselves, from the memories of rock and magick. Look to the carvings on the cave walls. Find the truth, and perhaps we will find survival."