I've been leveling in Nektulos Forest and collecting monster drops for the Spurned Armor quests. So far I haven't seen a single Ash Drakeling so far. Where are they located within the Nektulos Forest? On Live and P99, I usually see them all over the zone including the newbie area.
I remember hunting them over the hill near the lunatic fanatic halflings, along the path. I had a tracker though. They are not so common as you may find on other servers.
I don't specifically know about this quest, or ash drakelings. But I do remember people complaining about their rarity when doing newbie armor quests on the EQMac forums. So it seems AKurrate.
I was helping a friend with that quest a few weeks ago. Track was def my friend. But iirc they seemed to spawn closer to the lavastorm zone line. though I mightve created that correlation based on coincidence. And for all I know they spawn everywhere.