If you're like me, you love shiny things. From metals to gemstones to the coruscating waters of the ocean at sunset. This is why I base each of my dragons in Partheus off of different metals or gemstones. What I especially love to do is take a gemstone appearance and design the dragons' personalities, habitats, and even breath weapons off of them.
For example, my Labradorite Dragon, based on the gemstone it's named after, is a water dragon. Its scales resemble that of a lakebed, smooth and still and coruscating, with traces of various colors disrupting the blue in flashes and lines that create an even more vibrant appearance. Instead of full wings, theirs are designed to "fly" through the water and scale down their entire bodies to the tips of their tails. Even their breath weapon has to do with water, a pressurized jet of steam so hot that it can boil water around it.
Coruscate | kȯr-ə-ˌskāt: verb: to give off or reflect light in bright beams or flashes, sparkle; to be brilliant or showy in technique or style
While there's little in the etymology of the word besides its Latin root, coruscare, meaning to flash, there is a good reference to all of you wonderful Star Wars nerds out there. Coruscate has an adjective, coruscant, meaning glittering or sparkling. While I'm sure you all already made the connection, I'll go ahead and fill in for those who are unfamiliar.
The Imperial Center of the Galactic Empire in the Star Wars universe is named Coruscant, though pronounced slightly different from the adjective it's related to (without the k sound). This capital planet is what is known as a city planet, meaning the entire world is covered in shining buildings, all glittering like beacons in the starlight. Yay for perfect words!
Coruscate | kɒrəskeɪt: verb: (of light) flash or sparkle
Going back to gemstones, let's talk about today's example. Now, of course, we could say that the dragoness and one of the main characters in the Inheritence series by Christopher Paolini has coruscating sapphire scales. But seeing as we have already talked about those, I was pleasantly surprised to see that the verb was actually talking about the reflections off of giant gems found in dwarven architecture.
The mile-long hall ended in an arch flanked by black onyx pillars. Yellow zircons three times the size of a man capped the dark columns, coruscating piercing gold beams along the hall. Saphira stepped through the opening, then stopped and craned back her neck, humming deeply in her chest.
Even Saphira, the dragoness I mentioned, showed her pleasure at dwarven crafts. Dragons do have an eye for shiny, glittery, beautiful things, after all. And gemstones are definitely that!
Sometimes, we just need a nice replacement for a drab word, and I feel like coruscate is that word for sparkle. What do you think? Do you like other words better? What else would you describe with it? Let me know, and until next time, happy reading!
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