Dragon Blood Jasper

From Limpopo Province, South Africa. The green is epidote, the red piemontite—two minerals combined. The pairing suggested "dragon's blood and scales," and the name followed.

Ancient legend held that a fallen dragon's body turned to stone. Green for scales, red for blood. Warriors carried it into battle as a talisman to return without shedding a drop.

Mineralogically, it is not jasper at all, but a composite of epidote and piemontite. The common name took hold long before the classification caught up. Imagination moved faster than taxonomy.

A long campaign ahead, and he spends all his reserves on the first move. Momentum without endurance doesn't last past the opening. This stone was chosen for the long-distance runner, not the sprinter. The person who paces the first mile because he's thinking about the twentieth.