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This is a book that I read in the mid-to-late 90s. It was from a bin of books that the library was throwing out, so it is probably from the 80s or early 90s.

There are halfling or hobbit type characters who live in relative peace, one of them being an inventor who is working on building a flying machine. Dragons are supposedly extinct, but drakes still exist. The difference being that dragons grow larger and can exhale fire, drakes cannot and are generally dumber.

A drake that can breath fire, maybe it was a half-drake?, is going around killing people, including a young halfling at some point.

There is a seed that either the humans or the halflings find that when crushed, makes a citrus scent that helps repel the dragon/drake.

I vaguely recall something occurring and the humans and halflings traveling to the far north to find/hatch a true dragon egg to take control of all of the drakes and the half-drake/dragon was trying to stop them.

At the end, the dragon/drake gathers all of the drakes together and is forced to show that it can use its breath weapon, which causes the drakes to go crazy and destroy it.

The dragon/drake had was a POV in the book as well, not just a silent antagonist.

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    Hi, welcome to SF&F. Do you happen to recall the cover art?
    – DavidW
    Commented Apr 26 at 3:59
  • Sadly, it did not have a dust jacket on it. But it was a light green hardcover.
    – Bob Bob
    Commented Apr 26 at 4:04
  • Knock off hobbits? Denis L McKiernan (sp?) wrote a series of books set in a pseudo Middle-Earth. He was going to set it in actual Middle Earth but the Tolkien estate issued a "cease and desist". I've not read them but it could be one of those.
    – Moriarty
    Commented Apr 26 at 6:26
  • Also sounds like a knock-off of The Flying Sorcerers by Larry Niven and David Gerrold.
    – Spencer
    Commented Apr 26 at 15:33
  • 1
    I went through the works of McKiernan and none of them rang a bell, sadly.
    – Bob Bob
    Commented Apr 26 at 19:25

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Dragonworld by Byron Preiss and Michael Reaves (1979)

This is definitely Dragonworld. I distinctly remember the knockoff halflings and the half drake, half dragon who discovers he can breathe fire (both shown on the cover).

The back blurb reads:

Somewhere beyond the northern mists lies a land where dreams live and dragons are real. This is the tale of the twilight of the dragons, of two nations plunged into war by a tragic misunderstanding, of a shy dreamer's incredible voyage of peace to a long-forgotten land where nightmares are born. A magnificient creation, a sweeping epic of high fantasy set in a richly imagined world, vividly brought to life with over eighty pages of stunning illustrations by Joseph Zucker.

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    Holy Holly, you found it! THANK YOU! I have been looking for this book for a decade!
    – Bob Bob
    Commented Apr 27 at 21:11

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