Drakes

Drakes are a group of different draconic species/subspecies which live in the Red Plains of Yehv. Appearing similar to a typical dragon, but lacking wings, drakes ranges in size from that of a medium sized dog to the size of a house, depending on the subspecies. All drakes share this similar appearance as well as the ability to breathe fire, but besides their size differences they also display a range of color, from bright red to more earthy tones as well as, occasionally, black. Although clearly physically draconic, drakes have an obscure origin, with it being unclear if they are simply devolved Fire Dragons, if they were perhaps created by the gods (such as the popular theory for the creation of Wyverns), or if they are a separate creature entirely.

Drakes are usually ambush predators, and they have excellent burst speed but struggle with endurance sprints; this betrays their place as a near-apex predator. The only threat to most drakes are other drakes as well as actual dragons, but drakes do have one benefit over dragons: burrowing. Due to their lack of wings, drakes are able to dig burrows under the surface of the plains, where they base their hunts from and can avoid dragons. Smaller drakes are of course more adept at this, but the large ones have little to fear from most dragons anyways due to their weight.

Generally, drakes stick to the red plains, but a few subspecies have made it into the ogre steppes or into the mountains to the north or south of the plains. As a rule, the larger drakes live within the red plains, while smaller drakes are the ones to have expanded their range and diversified. However, because drakes don't like rain, there are no species which have moved south over the mountains or east into the Great Butterfly Meadows, thus limiting their potential zone of settlement to the currently inhabited region, unless they were to be manually introduced elsewhere.

There are a number of drake species, each of which occupies their own niche in either the plains or the mountains. Some of the larger species have been used by the Pogodorn as mounts or to pull caravans (tamed or otherwise) due to the lack of other large beasts of burden found in the plains, while smaller ones may be found as pets (though dangerous ones). Depending on the species and their familiarity towards sentient beings, they may see people as masters, friends, foes, or even prey, and without an extensive knowledge of the drakes interacting with them can be deadly, as many species are easily confused with one another. However, despite the threat of large drakes, it is estimated that perhaps 60% are of under 2 feet in size, with 30% being between 2 and 10 feet and just 10% of the drake species actually being large. Of course, the large ones are much more useful to sentient races, and are much more of a threat, so they dominate the popular depiction of drakes.

Much like the imbalance in diversity between large and small species of drakes, their coloring is very skewed towards a brownish red, with over 50% of drakes estimated to have colors that could be described in this way, though of course the ratio is different for each species. Second most common are the drakes which have a purely red coloring, but one that is more faded, counting half of the remaining drakes. Most other colors are quite rare, with earthy tones of dark brown, ochre, and sandy colorings each making up about 6%. Bright red drakes make up just 3% of the population, but are often cited as the most beautiful of the drakes besides the exceptionally rare black drakes, a color which less than 1% of all drakes have. The final color to make up over 1% of drake scales is dark red, with ~1-2% of drakes having this color. The rest of the drakes are rare colors, usually just odd tones of red or brown which are visibly distinct, but there are also occasionally albino drakes as well as the rare cave drakes. These cave drakes make up an unknown percentage of drake populations, and are made up of small drakes which found their way into caves and never made it out, breeding over generations and losing their pigment. There are known to be at least 3 species of unpigmented drakes as well as the exceptionally rare clear drakes, reputed to be the oldest drake species in existence and which has no eyes, hunting within the pitch black.