"It could be that you had them once, and once they were gone, they became legends and symbols. It's what happened to a lot of species where I come from, dragons included," Alex says after considering it. A lot of the mythical animals on heraldry in his world have some grain of truth in their existence. In the case of a few Covenant families he knows of, it usually meant that line had served a part in turning existing creatures into myth.

"Having met some of the surviving members of the species, I can imagine any group of humans that allied with them would be able to hold a lot of power." Thankfully, the ones he knows are less concerned with world domination than they are just starting families and reestablishing their species out of near-extinction.