"The Dragonologist" by Collette June Ellis

The Dragonologist - February 2011

“Once upon a time, in a dimension very close to but very different from our own; there lived a young girl fascinated by dragons. They were rare and illusive creatures hunted for their hides and condemned as savage man-eating beats, despite all this the girl grew up fascinated by these mystical creatures.
As she came of age she chose to study dragons more closely, reading everything she could lay her hands upon and educating herself within the subject of “Dragonology”. One day, with a team of just 9 brave individuals (or was it 10? I don’t remember the details), she set out on an expedition to the mountains and deep caves of Ancient China in order to conduct a study into the lives of the illusive beasts.
Time went by and she learned the creature’s ways, and that they were not to be feared. The dragons lived in organised societies similar to the ways in which human’s and wolves live. The alpha dragons were the head of each family group and therefore the most dominant. The elders were acclaimed for their wisdom and cared for by the family group, some were so old they had long lost count of their age. She kept records of many different species of dragon and how factors such as age, dominance, gender and even personality could affect their colouration and the length and shape of their horns.
On her return home she was acclaimed for her research and became a professor in the field of Dragonology, all this time she has been fighting for equality between dragon and human with the hope that if people understood how similar dragons and humans were they would stop hunting them.
One day when her children had grown up and her husband was taken ill she chose to return with him to the caves of China, they never returned. Some say they were eaten by the dragons, others claim that they are very much still alive living among a tribe of dragon humanoids who reside in the caves and others tell stories of how she cured her husband’s illness by transforming into dragons and now they live among the creatures she had worked so hard to protect from extinction. But then that's the thing with stories told over and over, you never do know what atually happened..”

Medium: Biro, watercolour and Photoshop
Size: A3