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Order Only: Letter from Charlie
Sep. 13th, 2011 10:25 amI had passed along our question to Charlie concerning how difficult it would be to get dragon heartstring. It is difficult. Of course dragon heartstring is needed for wands, and dragons live for a long, long time. When one dies and a heart is harvested, it is a big event.
Our one hope, Charlie thinks, would be if we could get lucky on those rare occasions that a dragon manages to hide a clutch of eggs somewhere in one of the caves along the coast AND one of the eggs hatched is a runt who later dies, as they sometimes do within a day or two of hatching. Generally, the dam will quickly push carcass outside the nest, and then there might be a chance to retrieve it when she goes hunting. Of course, a runt's heart is much smaller, but it could still provide enough heartstring for a good number of wands. The dragons do try to hide their eggs--it's instinctive--but usually the dragon reserve handlers manage to locate the nests before the hatching. So that's another level of complication: we would need a situation where Charlie can locate the nest, but keep it a secret from the other dragon handlers.
He doesn't quite come out and say it, but I think it's an unspoken understanding in his letter between the lines: we would need to think very hard about whether we would be willing to kill one of the dragon hatchlings to get the heart, again, while the dam is away hunting. Specifically, if we can ask Charlie to do it. If he were caught, of course the repercussions would be terrible. There's no need for me to tell you that the very idea would revolt him; it's antithetical to everything he's doing as a handler, to safeguard the dragons. It would also be quite a practical complication for him to hide and dispose of the hatchling's body after he's harvested the heart, without anyone else in the reserve being the wiser.
I think he very much hopes that we'll not put him in that position. Maybe because we'll find an easier (and less dangerous) source for unicorn hairs.
Our one hope, Charlie thinks, would be if we could get lucky on those rare occasions that a dragon manages to hide a clutch of eggs somewhere in one of the caves along the coast AND one of the eggs hatched is a runt who later dies, as they sometimes do within a day or two of hatching. Generally, the dam will quickly push carcass outside the nest, and then there might be a chance to retrieve it when she goes hunting. Of course, a runt's heart is much smaller, but it could still provide enough heartstring for a good number of wands. The dragons do try to hide their eggs--it's instinctive--but usually the dragon reserve handlers manage to locate the nests before the hatching. So that's another level of complication: we would need a situation where Charlie can locate the nest, but keep it a secret from the other dragon handlers.
He doesn't quite come out and say it, but I think it's an unspoken understanding in his letter between the lines: we would need to think very hard about whether we would be willing to kill one of the dragon hatchlings to get the heart, again, while the dam is away hunting. Specifically, if we can ask Charlie to do it. If he were caught, of course the repercussions would be terrible. There's no need for me to tell you that the very idea would revolt him; it's antithetical to everything he's doing as a handler, to safeguard the dragons. It would also be quite a practical complication for him to hide and dispose of the hatchling's body after he's harvested the heart, without anyone else in the reserve being the wiser.
I think he very much hopes that we'll not put him in that position. Maybe because we'll find an easier (and less dangerous) source for unicorn hairs.