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A dragon is sleeping here, but it wakes upon your arrival. After a huge yawn and deep bow, he says, "Mexnar, at your service." He is a beautiful green dragon, with eyes of icy flame.
![[Dragon Mexnar]](greendrag.gif)
"I see you have reached the top of my mountain. Let me tell you a brief story about it."
Many years ago, there lived a man by the name of Xemran, who dreamed of only one thing: climbing this very mountain to the legendary Fountain of Lamneth. He journeyed many days, for the path was not yet well-formed, and it was truly a great task to reach the top of the mountain.
He stopped a couple of times along the way; first in grief when his friends left him to journey on alone at the bridge of Willowdale. He continued on in a kind of half-daze until he found the home of Kaisha the Healer. There he stayed a single night before continuing up the mountain. Higher still he found a hermit, who shared some wine with him, and still he journeyed on.
When he reached the top, Xemran found the fountain. It was only a little waterfall from a spring, but since the climb and the sight of the fountain was all he had lived for, he imagined the fountain as magnificent as it should be. After a bit of soul-searching, he went down the mountain again with the promise to return someday.
Time passed, and the day to climb the mountain again finally arrived. But when he reached the top the second time, Xemran found the spring as it was: a spring, and a waterfall. Now, the Fountain of Lamneth really was magic: it was supplied by the same source that feeds what is now the Magic Pools. And when Xemran's anger mixed with that magic, it transformed him into a green dragon, and his rage was frozen and crystallized in his eyes.
Time has worn away some of the mountain's splendor, and destroyed the legendary Fountain of Lamneth. The dragon that was once Xemran took up an anagram of his old name, and has remained on the mountain ever since, to warn those who seek the Fountain of Lamneth of the dangers of living entirely for a single thing.
"Be careful of what you live for, in case you find yourself living a lie."
There is a rope with a pulley on the south side of the summit. The rope leads off into space and vanishes. Mexnar explains that it can be ridden into the Dreamstorm, but the path is only one way. Paths also lead to the north and west.
Author's Note: The story is the story of the Fountain of Lamneth by Rush on their Caress of Steel album, with some interpretation and extrapolation applied. That's also the album that has Lakeside Park on it...