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Falcolf In reply to Murasaki99 [2015-01-25 02:34:38 +0000 UTC]

Thank you

They're horns, yes and they have two of them because of a mutated gene similar to the one found in Jacob's Sheep, which all drakoon have. They protect the back of the drakoon's neck, kind of like the frill of a triceratops. The ears are sort of hidden behind the horns along the jawline; they don't have external fleshy ears like we do. Their ears are basically just holes in the sides of their heads. 

Drakoon transform instantaneously - their transformations are disimilar to the ones in werewolf movies, where they must transform cell by cell. (Well, drakoon can transform like that under the influence of a certain drug which is used for torture because transforming that way is pure agony and it can kill.) Basically, normal drakoon transformations are like the switch of polarity in a magnet - one moment it's positive, the next moment it's negative. To try to explain it more clearly, when a drakoon is as-elf, his as-dragon self is hidden in another plane of existence, though he is only physically aware of the body that he is currently 'using' because his spirit/soul/whatever stays put in this existence. When he transforms, his selves switch places. Because of this, it doesn't take that much energy for a drakoon to transform as it would cell-by-cell, because the transformation is actually isn't stressful on his body at all, however, if he's hurt or weak like Ki, he may find transformation difficult or even impossible (as with Ki, who never once transformed growing up and who was stuck in his as-elf form because of his malnutrition.) If he's healthy though he can transform as many times a day as he wants, though he wouldn't be able to do it excessively. Twice in five minutes within the course of an hour isn't going to mess with him. I should also note that because of the way drakoon transform, it is absolutely impossible for them to transform only select body parts - their transformations are always 'all or nothing.' An as-elf drakoon can't call up just his as-dragon wings and he can't call up just his hands when he's as-dragon. He must transform his entire self.

Explaining how drakoon can transform so often and whatnot would probably take a long time and I'm not sure that I could because they are hideously complicated beings energy-wise and I just don't fully understand them yet, though I do know a lot about how they function. But, suffice to say that unlike us, they acquire energy from more than one source - not just food, as we do. Drakoon and many other Rimarian species (including falcolfs) can glean energy from another source, a source which I can't talk about yet in public until after some more books are published. Drakoon are actually even more complicated than that, but I won't enter it. Anyway, that's how they can transform, how they have the potential to live for six hundred or more years (it's true!) and just run their obviously energy hungry bodies on very little food sustenance at all. (A healthy adult can go without food completely for a month with no loss of condition.)

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Murasaki99 In reply to Falcolf [2015-01-25 03:55:33 +0000 UTC]

Thanks for the description, it makes sense to me.    My own winged steeds use a form of elvish glamour to vanish their wings when they aren't needed.  Heh, for a complicated process, it's often better in a story to keep it simple: "he switched bodies effortlessly", and then let the explanations get worked into the story in bits where appropriate. 

Of course my brain has offered up a impossible vision of an as-elf drakoon having a sneeze mid-switch and ending up briefly polyglot till things sort themselves out.   

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Falcolf In reply to Murasaki99 [2015-01-26 06:05:41 +0000 UTC]

Haha, I actually kind of gloss over transformation in the stories with sentences like 'Ki transformed and -' without really getting into it. I think there's been about two mentions of how transformation really happens (when Hunter or Ki specifically asked) and I have yet to explain how the complicated business of drakoon energy works - and this is all in the course of two manuscripts so far. The transformation isn't quite effortless, since Ki can't do it when he's weak. It drives him nuts a bit watching the other drakoon transform at first so easily because he really doesn't have any idea how to do it and Kelveniska has to help him. Luckily, in certain bodily positions such as standing on their hindquarters as-dragon makes them feel a strong urge to transform into as-elf and crouching down on all fours does the opposite; and certain situations, such as being in water, also makes them need to adopt a particular form. Drakoon do not swim as-elf - it's useless to flail about vulnerably in their biped form when they can move very fast with ease aquatically as-dragon, so getting in water triggers an instinct to be as-dragon.  Ki stubbornly ignores this instinct the first time he feels it, an admission which horrifies his drakoon elders, given the circumstances of the moment.

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Falcolf In reply to WolvenYoukai [2015-01-15 03:46:25 +0000 UTC]

Thank you

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WolvenYoukai In reply to Falcolf [2015-01-15 03:52:56 +0000 UTC]

As always.  

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