Literature / To Shape a Dragon's Breath

The First Book of Nampeshiweisit

"The shapeless medicine of a dragon's breath is change."

Anequs (pronounced ahn-eh-KOOS, not anna-kiss) has lived her fifteen years on Masquapaug Island (a place off the Eastern coast of the continental mainland of Lindemarden, part of North Markesland) and among her people and traditions. She—and the rest of the Indigenous people of the land—have has not seen Indigenous dragons in their area since the Anglish colonized the lands and caused the great dying two hundred years ago. Her people remember and still tell tales of dragons from before and of those who bonded with them. When Anequs encounters a Native dragon that flies away and finds its dragon's egg close to her home island, she bonds with it at hatching and the people of Masquapaug revere her as a Nampeshiweisit— a person bonded to a dragon—and the first in several generations.

The colonizing Anglish, however, have different and very strict opinions about how dragons should be trained, where—and often who those dragoneers should be, and Anequs is none of it. Despite her differences, Anequs is offered the opportunity—or more accurately, required—to leave her native home, go among the Anglish, and train Kasaqua through a "proper" Anglish academy for dragon training to learn the ways they expect of dragons—or risk Kasaqua being put down if she does not do so. Anequs, however, is smart, determined, and resolved to do exactly as the Anglish demand to learn how to train Kasaqua—but will not become the kind of meek, cultured Anglish miss expected of her in the process.

Anequs and Kasaqua are coming both of age and into power—and in a world that hasn't changed in generations, they together might be the ones to do it.

To Shape a Dragon's Breath is the first book of the Nampeshiweisit series and the debut novel of Moniquill Blackgoose.

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To Shape a Dragon's Breath provides examples of:

• Alchemy Is Magic: Skiltakraft—the "shaping" and directing of dragon's breath—is a magical form of chemistry. It's done by drawing skiltas (various diagrams) to direct a dragon's breath to form various athers. The Periodic Table of Skilta, of which there are twenty-four known athers (and many more theorized), line up with the actual periodic table but are named in Tysklandish (e.g hydrogen is instead vetna, while carbon is kolfni) and symbolized with multi-line stars. For example, a seven-pointed star symbolizes zurfni (nitrogen). Containing circles are drawn around the skilta to keep the athers contained within during skiltakrafing.
• Alternate History: The book is set in an alternate 1840s where, rather than the "English" having been the ones to colonize "North America" (North Markesland) it was the Norse—they and the people from Anglesland are both collectively referred to as the Anglish. The Norse also conquered much of "Europe" including the British Isles, France, and Germany. The Roman empire never existed, nor Greece, so the ancient seat of art and philosophy was Tyskland ("Germany"). This reflects across the culture in the names used everywhere and for everything; from cities and places (North and South Markesland, New Linvik) to terms used for language in studies ("erelore" for history), and elements on the periodic table (athers) and the written diagrams to shape them (skilta). This also makes the dominant faith of the Anglish based on Norse Mythology, with festivals such as Jule and Valkyrjafax.
• Apocalypse How:
  • Class 0 for several native peoples of North Markesland, once the Anglish came. First there was the great dying, where nearly eight in ten indigenous people died of illness and the native dragons of the local area were wiped out, rendering the people without the connections to dragons they'd had for generations; dragons still exist in the west outside of Lindermarden. There are still ruins of the past on nearby Slipstone Island near Masquapaug, as well as Beachy Hill and Great Stone Pond. (Any cities that might have had ruins on the mainland have since been dismantled or paved over by Anglish settlements.) Anequs' grandmother speaks of the destruction of the Indigenous people of Naquipaug, the Naregannisit, and the Akashneisit; the latter two, along with the Maswachuisit and Lenni-Lenni, were forced to give up all their lands after losing the wars of 1757 and, while they still live in the now-colonized areas, they no longer own the lands or have much power among the Anglish. The Lenni-Lenni also gave up Narrow Island and Mana-hatta in their treaties.
  • The Naquipaug Island massacre—what the Anglish call the Nack Island Uprising—is the most brutal example of Native massacres in recent history, having occurred only seventeen years ago in 1825. Coal was discovered on the island, leading to the Anglish breaking their treaty with the Naquisit to get to it. They tried to grab land they had no rights to, ignoring how land was passed from mother to daughter. Anglish went so far as to burn farms, poison wells and corn stocks, and use dragons against villages and people to kill them. The Naquisit people first attempted to send a council to talk things out and everyone who went was killed. When the Naquisit then attempted to fight back, they were close to wiped out. Half of the population was killed or executed with several survivors of South Village having hid inside an empty corn silo storage to not be found, mostly children and elders. Those who were spared or survived were scattered—either having moved to the nearby Masquapaug, living isolated across various cities and towns of the mainland, or still living on Naquipaug but now only where they are allowed to be while the Anglish own much more of the island and control the port. Any family that leaves their land loses all rights to it under the new 1825 treaty, which is why Anequs' Aunt Shanuckee still lives there. The Naquipaug massacre is in active memory of many people. Anequs' father could have been among the massacred at the time but he had just left for sea, and his brother Motuckquas and father were both among the murdered. Women, even pregnant, were not spared either—Theod's mother Nepinnae was hanged the day after his birth, and his father Menukkis was executed. In what used to be South Village, no one between the ages of fourteen and fifty at the time survived.
• Bond Creatures: Dragons when born immediately bond with one of the people in the vicinity; from that moment on, the two are connected. Anequs "knew" Kasaqua's name soon after she was born, and feels all her discomfort, pain, hunger, curiosity, murderous rage, etc. Bonding is heavily influenced by those around them at birth; among the Masquisit, they are hatched collectively, and the dragon then bonds to someone nearby. Dragon eggs in Anglish culture are often purchased quickly after laying, registered immediately, and kept near the one the dragon is "intended" to bond to; the hopeful trainer interacts with the egg as much as possible to facilitate proper bonding after birth. Eggs may be hatched in front of multiple siblings so as to pick any one of them, or set with only one person, and to become part of the dragonsthede a dragon must bond with you. The bonding doesn't always go as wanted and if a dragon isn't bonded to anyone—or anyone they deem proper according to Anglish expectations—it can be labeled feral and summarily executed, with those blamed for interfering fined for the egg's high value or even killed for stepping out of their place. This is what happened with Theod's Copper; rather than the newborn hatchling bonding to the intended sons of his master Herr Melher, it immediately bit the older of the two, escaped from the presentation room, and went to where Theod was doing scullery work instead having bonded to him. The resulting scandal of a nackie having a dragon at all was large enough it rose to the level of a legal challenge, and it was Frau Kuiper's intervention and willing to take Theod into the school that let Theod keep Copper at all. Furthermore, dragons whose dragoneers are executed may also be put down, and people who are declared unfit to be dragoneers can have their dragons taken away or put down. Even if they ask for mercy.
• Bonfire Dance: During the student formal ball for Valkyrjafax, the staff of maids and dragonhall workers hold a celebration around a bonfire with much more casual, animated dances. Anequs and Theod (after making an obligatory appearance at the formal ball) slip off to spend time there for the rest of the night.
• Braids, Beads and Buckskins: While indigenous characters do wear braids (Anequs is old enough now to loop hers up), wear deerskins, and do beadwork, this is very much averted in the characters, and not by accident. The Native people of the area are based on Eastern North American Indigenous people (in what would be the Massachusetts/Rhode Island area) and not just generically stereotyped Plains Natives. However, pennik novels about the "brave" settlers of the western frontier loop all the nackies together in such a trope, being written by the Anglish.
• Clockwork Creature: Automated horses and oxen are just two of the many automated animals in North Markesland.
• Dances and Balls: The Valkyrafax celebration, after the rite of the Valkyrja, includes a ball; as there are many more male students at Kuiper's, they invite female relatives to attend. Anequs and Theod are persuaded to attend for social appearances, and Marta takes the opportunity to arrange to have both of them outfitted properly, with Anequs getting a bronze taffeta evening gown of the latest fashions. She also takes the next few weekends, with Sander's help, to teach Anequs some of the more expected dances. Anequs does exactly two dances—the opening dance with Theod for appearance's sake and a dance with Sander—before she and Theod sneak off and go to where the servants are celebrating.
• Dragon Rider: Part of the education of dragons is teaching them how to be ridden by those they've bonded with, as once dragons are large enough nearly every breed can be; from their early years they're outfitted with tack to get used to the feel of it long before they can be mounted.
• Driven to Suicide: Otrygg Otryggsson, a former jarl's guard who in the aftermath of the attempt on the jarl's life confesses to sending the threatening letter Anequs and Theod received during the winter break. He is brought before a moot and declared unfit to be a dragoneer with the consequence being that his dragon is sentenced to be put down. He hangs himself in prison the day before her execution, leaving behind a plea to spare her and claiming she won't harm anyone without him around. His dragon is still put to death.
• "Eureka!" Moment: Anequs has one regarding skiltakraft after nearly a whole term of struggling through it while at home for the whaler's return celebration. She realizes that the paths of dances her people have done for generations—with curved lines, rather than straight—are drawing skilta. She passes this on to Theod, with his promise that they both won't inform anyone at the school what they've discovered.
• Fantastic Slurs: All Indigenous North Markesland peoples—regardless of their many personal names and variances among different people—are lumped together as "nackies" by the Anglish, after Nack Island. This is used both as a general term and a slur.
• Fantasy Americana: North America—specifically, the New England area—if it was colonized by the Norse and had native dragons.
• Fantasy Counterpart Map: The front of the book has a map where—while based on the earth's continents in shape—the lands have different borders and names as befitting the history. For example, "Japan" is Zhippon, "France" is Frankland (a lot of countries that were colonized by the Norse in Europe are simply called -land at the end), and "North and South America" are instead North and South Markesland. Several countries, such as Greece or Portugal, do not exist, and most of Aprika south of the Sahara is undivided. Furthermore a good portion of North Markesland west of the Appalachians is obscured in fog, indicating it has not been explored and mapped (or controlled) by the Anglish; it is known as the western frontier.
• Fantasy Counterpart Religion: Due to the Norsmen being the major colonizers not only of Europe but no Roman empire to spread Christianity through it, the dominant faith of the Anglish is based on Norse Mythology. People use the names of Joden, Fyra, and Enki to curse ("sweet Fyra's milky tits" seems to be a favorite of Frau Kuiper) and annual festivals such as Jule, Valkyrjafax, and Fyrafax are based around their gods and the seasons. Other faiths exist—Zhina, of Kindah background, believes in one god with many prophets and doesn't eat pork or other unclean animals—but the Norsmen naturally believe their faith to be the most accurate and truthful.
• Feathered Dragons: Kasaqua is a feathered dragon of the kind native to North Markesland, in contrast to the dragons of Anglish lands. She's described as having pinfeathers that come in to full feathers.
• Fictional Political Party: Three are mentioned, all in conflict:
  • The Freemensthede, who wish to create a democratic society in the ways of ancient Tyklandish thought that includes and respects the will of smallfolk, along with innovation, social progress, integrating the nackies as civilized, and freethinking;
  • The Erikthedesman, who believe in maintaining social order according to traditions with rules by thanes, with strongholds, landholders and thedes' will taking precedence over any opinions of smallfolk and other lesser people;
  • and the Ravens of Joden, a minority who believe Norsfolk as the superior people should return to securing their rule and spreading their empire using the ways of old—namely, violent military raids into "lesser" lands and any people indigenous to the area either slaughtered or enslaved, and never mind the violence of it.
• Food Porn: The many meals among the Masquisit are described in fine detail; for example, the feast for Nikkomo has skunk pig, venison and turkey, fried corn cakes, apples and pumpkins, and baked beans. Anequs craves the food she has back home while among the Anglish as most of her school meals include boiled potatoes, cabbage, and sausages.
• Foreign Ruling Class: The Anglish (and Vakoshish) are not native to North Markesland, but as colonizers are certainly in charge of it.
• Gaslamp Fantasy: A blend of this and Steampunk; the novel is set in an alternate history 1840s where dragons exist, technology is powered by dragon's breath and/or athers using skiltakraft, and colonization in North America went differently but still happened.
• Insistent Terminology: By the Anglish; Masquapaug and Naquipaug are often referred to as Mask Island and Nack Island respectively.
• Kill It with Fire: Raw dragon's breath renders anything it connects with into ash and wind; while not technically fire, it serves as such and is called "dragonfire" colloquially. Kasaqua's first time doing this is involuntarily out of fright when she's pinched by a crab on the beach; she accidentally burns Anequs' younger sister Sakewa and leaves a wide swath of blacked sand and a melted boulder behind. The second time she does it—with Anequs and her mentally bonding during the moment—it dispatches the would-be assassin of Jarl Joervarsson, Birning Svenisson, turning him into nothing but ash and leaving a scorchmark on the grass.
• Local Hangout: Haddir's, a local Kindah coffeehouse, for Niquiat and the others of the tinker co-op. When Anequs stays with Niquiat before going to school, he expressly tells her to spend the day there while he's working rather than at his four-bed flat, because the coffeehouse is safer. When she comes to visit with her classmates, they take a trip there.
• Magitek: Skitakraft and the talent of it is used to transmute elements, often into other uses both common and highly trained. For example, automaton horses run on coal that "transmutes" into energy, and the wax tablet Sander prefers to communicate with uses copper wires, dragon's breath, and strahlendstone (radium) to allow him to write in the wax and cleanly erase the writing once it's filled to continue writing again. Dragons can be directed in the shaping of their breath to transmute athers, and in fact need to be.
• Mood Whiplash:
  • Anequs and Theod come to Masquapaug to celebrate Nikkomo together; it's the first time Theod's ever been anywhere near his native homelands and the first time his extended family and him connect. They not only attend the celebration there, but are invited via telegram to a midwinter celebration with mainland nackies as guests of honor and attend. The two receive another letter at the post office the next day. It's an anonymous threatening letter against the two of them and all their people for the "crime" of being nackie dragoneers and stating that once a proper jarl is in rule again, they'll be killed as they should be; it also demands they both give up their dragons and return to the islands. It's frightening enough Anequs wants to immediately return to the academy for protection rather than stay with her family for the rest of the break.
  • Anequs invites her younger siblings, Theod's younger cousins—escorted by her brother—and the young girl she's been corresponding with, Ingrid Hakansdottir, to the Fyrafax celebrations at Kuiper's in early May since it's a festival for children and many students invite younger relatives. Niquiat brings them all along with Zhina and Ingrid's brother, Aksel. Ingrid is excited at meeting Anequs and seeing Kasaqua for the first time, and all the invited children have a fine time with the Anglish children, trading how to do various crafts among each other. News is printed in the Vastergot Gazette, including pictures of Anequs and Theod with Marta and Niklas Sørensen respectively. This is followed by a scathing anonymous editorial by a "true son of Vastergot" in the Vastergot Weekly Review, accusing the academy of having a whole crowd of filthy nackies at the grounds and letting Anglish children "mingle" with them freely. It suggests that people who are true sons as well withdraw their sons from Kuiper's Academy, and write to the thane and the jarl about the travesty. The next day after the editorial is published, six people are are killed in a fight in a mill district mead hall—five nackies and one Anglish man. The Anglish man is Ingrid's father, the fight starting when someone insulted his wife and children in his presence.
  • Anequs manages, even while speaking out of turn, to impress Jarl Joervarsson, the head of the local government, during the council he calls. He states multiple changes that will occur regarding how nackie and smallfolk citizens have been treated, calling his thanes out on their overrule and neglect around their areas. He then invites Frau Kuiper, Captain Einarsson, Theod, and Anequs to have lunch in his gardens; he has a one-on-one conversation with Anequs about her dragon and her opinion on her people intelligently (though she deflects carefully) before seeing a torgar, Birning Svenisson, and saying he should go speak to him. Birning is there to assassinate him, and shoots the jarl, Anequs and Kasaqua before Kasaqua destroys him with dragonfire. Anequs and Theod are away from school for the entire rest of the term and then have to come back and do an end of term test—mostly because Sadist Teacher Professor Ezel insists on it and Professor Mesman needs to see Theod's flight skills, while the other teachers have given them final grades based on the term.
• Noble Bigot: The Anglish in general towards nackies and others. The book The Savage Peoples of New Linvik, which was written by the Anglish Emanuel Nordlund, has solidified the perception of nackies as primitive, unambitious, backwards, and nowhere near as "civilized" as the Anglish. Frau Jansen is a direct example; her first meeting with Anequs has her call Anequs a dear creature and treating her like a dog having done a trick when she identifies Sander's dragon as a velikolepni. Then when Anequs says (after Frau Jansen thinks she lived in a little bark house her whole life) that they have a telegraph office on Masquapaug, Frau Jansen laughs at the idea of savages "dabbling" about with such a thing—but that it's clearly the natural outcome of exposure to the Anglish "improving" the nackies that has them have such a thing.
• Not Enough to Bury: Birning Svenisson, the would-be assassin of Jarl Joervarsson, is reduced to ash and a scorch mark on the grass from Kasaqua's destroying breath.
• Of Corset Hurts: ZigZagged. Anequs' school uniform includes a steel-boned corset in the Anglish style, complete with waist narrowing. She's worn canvas short stays before—generally when going to Catchnet—but most of the time doesn't bother wearing any foundation garments back home on Masquapaug. She is not so much in pain after putting her school corset on the first time as discomforted by the way it squeezes against her body to fit the Anglish narrow-waisted fashion expected of women and frustrated at how impossible it is to bend at the waist with it on, due to its stiffness and boning. She finds the lighter canvas corset she purchases in the Vastergot shop with Liberty's advice much more comfortable to wear, and the corset she borrows from Marta for her ball dresses less stiff than her school corset but more structured and shaping. However, she's never in pain when wearing any of her corsets, just uncomfortable. When she's shot at in the attempt on the jarl's life, her school corset keeps her from being severely injured; the bullet glances off the steel and thicker canvas layers, resulting in severely bruised ribs and sharp pain from the initial heat of the bullet hitting the steel boning.
• Our Dragons Are Different: Dragons are beasts more than anything (especially as seen by the Anglish), with no human-like intelligence or distinct language, who immediately bond for life with someone near them at hatching. They have multiple variations by their location of origin and breed, with different strengths and weaknesses. Native North Markesland Nampeshiwe dragons like Kasaqua are born bald like birds, with small pinfeathers that come in as they grow and eventually become full feathers. They're different from other breeds from Anglish locations, such as Frau Karina Kuiper's Gerhard, a kessseldrach. Anequs compares Kasaqua and her mother's otter-like litheness to the bear-like bulk and build of Gerhard the first time they interact. Theod's Copper is an akhari, which is a Kindah breed made for flight and speed, and Marta's Magnus is a bjalladreki skilled in flight and racing. Many Anglish find the lineage of their dragons and breeding to be something to note at introduction, the way one would talk of a horse or dog's breeding. Most notably, dragons don't merely breath fire (or any other element) alone and instead breathe a kind of unique magic that destabilizes athers and can shape and reshape them with the skilta their dragoneers draw. Ms. Blackgoose states the trope by name in an interview with the American Booksellers Association.
• Pronouncing My Name for You: Anequs corrects Frau Kuiper about how her name is pronounced when they meet—ahn-eh-KOOS, not ANNA-kiss. The front of the book also says how to pronounce many of the names and terms used.
• Separate Scene Storytelling: Done often by characters to show how various cultures relate to dragons and tell their own mythologies and history, sometimes as a "Just So" Story. For example, Anglish Strida tells Anequs the story of the warrior-king Sigur Windtooth conquering dragonkind alone with skilta and force; he named the beast he quelled Dragon, but the proud chaotic lyndwurm destroyed itself with its own breath and crumbled to ash rather than be controlled. Sigur claimed the egg it left behind as a prize in victory and the dragon that hatched from it came out tamed for mankind, bowing to Sigur. Anequs' story to her dragon egg in contrast is of how the mother of the first Nampeshiwe, who had attacked the people of its lands, was drawn in by curiosity in the people's beautiful dancing they had learned from Crow. When told by the people she could not be taught to dance by them due to her wrongdoing against them, she asked to have her child taught instead as they were still in the egg and had done no wrong. The people agreed to, and the egg hatched among the people collectively; the newborn dragon approached a young man among them and called itself Nampeshiwe, asking to learn dance from him. Soon after, Nampeshiwe's mother left the world peacefully escorted by Crow, now that her time in it was over.
• Shoulder-Sized Dragon: Dragons can be born small enough to sit on their bonded one's shoulder. This doesn't last though, and they grow large enough to be ridden within a year or so of their hatching.
• Stay in the Kitchen: Very few dragoneers are female. Anequs and Marta are the only two female students in the year out of over a hundred, and before Anequs arrived there had been two others that had just left; one married and the other graduated and returned home, and Marta had worried she'd be the only female student for the entire year. Forty-five years ago, dragoneers in New Anglesland were limited to men in the dragonthede (akin to the military) and the jarl's guard only—unless they were the daughters of jarls, and then they were only allowed racing breeds like bjalladreki rather than any combat breeds. The first to break this rule was Karina Kuiper, the founder of the academy; she disguised herself as a man to try and join the dragonthede and stand before an egg to claim her. When she was found out, it went to the High Moot where they decided to allow her to prove herself skilled in battle like war maidens of folklore, which she did. But in Old Anglesland it's still illegal for anyone of less rank than a jarl's daughter to be deliberately set before a dragon's egg at all and a girl can be hanged for it.
• Steampunk: There's various steampunk elements along with automated animals. Professor Ulfar, Anequs's natural philosophy and minglinglore professor, was disabled falling off his dragon in a battle and uses a multi-legged automated chair resembling an crab or ant to move around. Marta's father owns and drives an automotor.
• Transmutation: A dragon's breath does not merely breathe fire — it transforms athers (elements) from one to another, and their trainers use skilta to shape it. "Fire" is the unskilled dragon's breath reducing living things to the base elements of kolfni and vetna (carbon and hydrogen), or ash and wind.
• Vikings In America: The colonizers of North Markesland) ("North America") were of Norse descent. The Norsemen also conquered much of "Europe" including the British Isles, meaning that England is not a country of its own; the term "Anglish" is used for both them and Norsemen, with Norsemen dominating.
• White Man's Burden: Anequs and Theod have both been given scholarships to Kuiper's under the idea by Frau Kuiper (and others) that they will accept their new "elevation" in life as dragoneers and never return to the primitive ways of the nackies, proving that the indigenous people can be "civilized." Frau Kuiper even tells Anequs that she expected her to be happy to leave behind her former life and not go home, and associate with the kind of social circles Marta frequents, becoming a example to her race. Anequs finds this idea insulting; her people are civilized in their own way even if it's not Anglish. She is only there to learn what she needs to be licensed and return back home with Kasaqua—with the second goal of bringing Theod back home with her too, once they've gotten to know each other.
• Wizarding School: Kuiper's Academy of Natural Philosophy and Skiltakraft (which is also a Boarding School). However, it's not a high or middle school; nearly every student who attends have already attended primary school, with girls and boys going to separate schools. Kuiper's is more accurately a college specializing in training dragoneers, with students ranging from ages 14 to 20 and taking about four to six years of education. Currently the only two students who didn't attend any primary school at all are Anequs and Theod, both there on scholarships.
• Written by the Winners: The Anglish about anything historical they have control over and especially regarding New Markesland. History in New Markesland is disregarded as fictional or unimportant before the arrival of the Norsman Stafn Whitebeard, and any history of the indigenous people is disregarded simply because they had no written word. Many Anglish people's only knowledge of anything indigenous are from books like The Savage Peoples of New Linvik or The Species of Mankind, which range from unflattering and patronizing to racist. In recent memory is the Naquisit massacre. It's called the Nack Island uprising among the Anglish and portrayed as the Naquisit rebelling against the Anglish and brutally slaughtering them, even women and children in their beds. The true story is that when the Anglish discovered coal present on the island, they immediately broke their treaty with the Naquisit to get access to it, staking claims to lands they didn't own (including when men in families died, disregarding that property was passed from mother to daughter). They tried to drive the Naquisit off completely—going so far as to burn farms, poison food and water sources, and turn dragonfire on whole villages. A group of Naquisit who led a war party to try to drive the Anglish off failed and were executed as traitors to their country if they weren't killed in the fight, including Theod's parents, and Aponakwe's father and brother Motuckquas. As Anequs puts it, it was a war the Naquisit lost—but losing the war doesn't mean they were wrong to fight it at all, and they're no more vicious murders than the Anglish were. The Anglish merely came out victorious.

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