I roast marshmallows with a dragon over the ruins of a burning village. The atmosphere’s a little dreary – the seating, non-existent – but the smell of burning camphor adds a smoky note to an otherwise sweet flavour. Not a bad combination, if you can ignore the knights slowly melting in the fields.
“I’m sorry,” she says.
“It’s all right,” I offer cheerily in return. “Everyone makes mistakes from time to time.”
I turn the half-melted rapier I’ve been using as a skewer, shifting the heat to the other side before my set chars.
It’s been… about a month, by my reckoning, since we took up together. A decent run considering I hadn’t planned on being much of anything to a dragon at first, other than maybe breakfast. As much as I wish I could say it was the hands of fate or some cosmic force that drew us together, however, you’ll find no such mystical beginning at the start of this tale.
No – our relationship began in a far more orthodox manner.
I was trying to steal something.
* * *
I held my cowl close as I entered the passage, feeling my way across the rough stone. It was dark – terribly so – and I couldn’t afford a light for fear of being detected. Instead, I feel my way through, running my hands across the walls until rough stone turns into the smooth cold of metal.
I work my way slowly across the hoard, my hands running across each item until they reach the one I seek.
I’m about to lift it when a voice comes from the dark.
“Go on, then,” it sobs. “Take it.”
“Excuse me?” I say.
The entire cavern groans as something immense moves in the darkness. The type of noise my nightmares would have nightmares about, and then –
A light flickers in the darkness, revealing an enormous, scaly face.
“It’s my gold you’re after, isn’t it,” says the dragon.
“It is,” I say.
Partly because it’s the truth, partly because my brain decides now’s not the time to start getting disagreeable.
“I don’t need very much,” I offer, as if that makes it any better.
“I don’t care how much you take,” the dragon says. “Just don’t hurt me anymore.”
I have nothing to say to that.
“It’s always the same,” continues the dragon, unprompted. “I never eat their livestock, I never attack their towns… Here I am, minding my own business, then along comes some knight, or a squad of guards, and they want my money or my scales.”
A spray of embers lights the cavern as the dragon offers something akin to a ‘hmph’.
“No one ever stops to ask how I feel,” it says.
I let go of the object in my fingers.
“How do you feel?” I say.
A brief silence falls before a small voice echoes in the cavern.
“Lonely…”
“I could find you some friends,” I say.
“Really?” says the dragon, the first signs of excitement entering its voice. The pile of gold glitters as its giant, scaly form turns towards me.
“Sure,” I say.
I don’t know why I said that, but… something in me means it.
* * *
“More?” comes a voice.
“Hmm?” I say, unaware I’d been off in the stars.
The dragon raises a clawed hand, the remains of the sugary treats picked cleanly from the waggling tips.
“Let’s see what the bag says,” I say as I go to our stash.
And as I do, I wonder.
What am I doing…
Making a promise to a dragon is one thing; keeping it almost a month later another entirely.
I reach down and unfasten the strings on my weary camp pack.
It’s not as though I haven’t had the chance to escape, you know. I’m actually quite a good thief when the supernatural senses of a magical creature aren’t focused on my detection. But even the best plans, they say, have holes in them. It just so happens that the hole in my plan is in the shape of a tunnel.
And right now, there’s a dragon stuck in it.
Act I
How (not) to train your dragon
“Push!” I shout as I push my back against a giant wall of scales.
“I am pushing!” comes the reply through several feet of stone as we both put ourselves into the motion.
I press my back against the dragon’s side.
The dragon’s scales shiver.
The cave trembles for a moment of tempting victory… then stops.
I collapse in a heap of sweat, dust, and regret.
“Sorry, sorry!” comes an apologetic voice through the stone.
“It’s okay…” I mumble, but the sound is too soft to make it through.
The dragon’s side wiggles as it attempts to turn around, and I pat the scales until the motion stops.
“How did you even manage to get through here?” I shout when my voice has enough room to find me again.
“I was very, very young,” comes the dragon’s muffled voice through the stone.
“How young?” I shout.
“Five… six hundred?”
“What, years?” I shout, and the cave wiggles in agreement.
My eyes widen in surprise.
“And you’ve been here the whole time?” I say. “What did you eat?”
“Fish,” calls the dragon. “Underground river.”
Not the answer I expected.
I have no idea how old she is in dragon years now, but surely she can’t be that big if all she’s had is a diet of fish.
Can she…?
The dragon mumbles something, but the sounds are too difficult to discern.
“What?” I shout, but something’s shifting.
“Hold on!” calls a voice, and the tunnel starts to shake.
I rattle about in place a moment as a series of tremors run through the stone, the scales in front of me shake and shiver, and –
Thoooomp!
An almighty echo runs through the tunnel like an earthquake as the dragon’s scaly rear comes free only to go tumbling down the mountainside. I stumble forward as a ray of sunlight enters the freshly created void, running towards the edge to see what’s happened.
Oh…
Oh, dear…
I take a deep breath and, for the first time, realise the size of my problem.
“Got any food?” says the dragon as she comes upright. “I’m famished.”
…and my problem’s appetite.
* * *
Dear reader – I don’t suppose you’ve ever seen a dragon fishing, have you?
I imagine it’s a rare enough sight these days, so let me paint the picture for you.
Imagine, if you will, a lethal killing machine the size of a farmhouse and shaped like a harpoon, moving at approximately the speed of a cruise missile and capable of seeing, smelling, and catching you from more than a mile away.
Now imagine that creature has been stuck inside a tunnel all morning and hasn’t eaten in days.
Because this one hasn’t.
* * *
A huge spray of water flies up into the air as the dragon’s body strikes the ocean in a needle-like dive, spearing into the rough waters at the base of the cliffs. She’s so fast that I can barely leap for cover before a spray of seawater and seaweed covers me from head to toe.
But that’s just the entry.
A second gush of water shoots up into the air nearly a hundred feet away as the dragon reappears, catch in her mouth, and for a moment, I am spellbound.
A fine rainbow casts through the air as she spreads her enormous wings, turning around in a graceful arc as she makes her way down to the rocks and –
With a splat, she drops her catch onto the ground in front of me.
“What’s that?” I say as I stare at the mangled remains of a… sturgeon?
“Fish,” she says, shaking the water from her scales like some giant, fire-breathing labrador. “Want some?”
“Um… maybe later,” I decline politely.
She shrugs – a curious gesture that ripples from shoulders to wing-tips – before snatching her prey off the ground, tossing it up into the air and gulping the thing down in a single bite.
It’s only as I watch a creature twice my size disappear down her throat with barely enough time to chew that I realise it’s a greater eastern tide shark.
* * *
Evening.
The two of us sit on the edge of the cliffs, spent from a day of tunnel excavations and new experiences. The dragon’s full of assorted sea creatures and I’m… full of nothing, still not game enough to touch the half-eaten tail of a sea lion she so generously left me. We haven’t figured out the cycle of catching fish (real ones) and the dragon starting a fire that will sustain us through the coming days, but right now, it’s a problem of a different sort that’s running through both our minds.
“Where are we going to find some people?” she says as she turns to me.
A wave strikes the cliff sides below, kicking up a spray of water almost high enough to reach us.
“Oh,” I say, “I have some ideas…”
Act II
There are no wrong questions (except the one you just asked)
Dear reader – claws, teeth, armoured scales, fiery breath and incredible size aside, there’s one thing I learned rather quickly about dragons. And that is, once you’ve got them talking, there’s not really much to distinguish them from the average five-year-old.
Well, curiosity-wise, that is.
* * *
“What are they doing?” asks the dragon in a whisper that’s not quite a whisper and more of a low roar to human ears.
“Collecting grain,” I say.
The sun beats down on a series of rolling hills inland from the coast, and the dragon and I are… hiding.
“Why?” she says.
“So they can take it home,” I reply.
“And then?”
“Eat it,” I say.
“They don’t eat their prey where they catch it, then?”
“Not generally.”
“Why not?”
“Because they don’t want to hunt every day.”
“Why not?”
“Because it’s a lot of work, and people are generally lazy,” I say.
“They seem to be doing a lot of work for lazy people,” she counters.
She’s got me there.
We sit amidst a copse on the top of the tree line and peer down on a pair of serfs attempting to free a cart that’s gotten bogged in mud from the recent rains. It’s been about ten minutes since we made our approach, and in that time, the only progress the serfs seem to have made is in the direction of ‘making things worse’.
“They don’t seem to be making much progress,” says the dragon.
“No, they don’t,” I agree.
“Why not?”
“Because they’re stuck,” I say.
“Why?”
“The cart’s too heavy, so it got stuck in the mud.”
“Will I get stuck in the mud?”
“Probably not.”
“Why not?”
“Because you can pull yourself out again.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re big and strong.”
“Is the cart not big and strong?” she says, and I scratch my head for a moment.
“I guess ‘big and strong’ is one of the defining features of a cart,” I say as I embark upon an avenue of philosophy heretofore unconsidered. “It just… can’t move itself.”
“Shall I move it, then?” she says, and I shudder as an image runs through my mind.
“I’m sure they’ll get things moving again,” I say.
The moment the words pass my lips, however, one of the serfs falls face first in the mud. We see the motion first, then a slightly sticky splatting noise as the sound travels over to us.
“Then?” says the dragon, unperturbed.
“They’ll go home,” I say.
“To their caves?” says the dragon.
“They don’t have caves.”
“Where do they keep their gold, then?”
“They don’t have any.”
“Is that why they keep stealing mine?” she says, the question hanging in the air a moment too long.
“Actually,” I say, “why don’t we try and help them after all.”
* * *
Dear reader – I know how this looks. One cannot simply walk down a hillside with a dragon in tow and expect those on the receiving end to greet the arrival of the world’s largest apex predator with the relaxed air of an ‘ah, help has arrived at last’. Please give me, if you will, a modicum of credit. Much like every good act of thievery, every delicate beginning requires a plan. I have one of those, and it goes a little like this.
* * *
“Ready?” calls the dragon from somewhere out of sight
“Ready,” I cry in return.
I lie down atop a grassy hillside, looking down on a herd of sheep in the craggy valley below. They munch on a patch of grass, unaware of our presence (recent noise excepted) and the stage is set for my Five-Step Plan for Dragon and Human Friendship.
Step one – the hint.
The dragon’s ears appear above the rise, a safe hint of the much larger beast that follows. The herd of sheep steadily mowing the grass remain calm, none of them even noticing the motion.
Step two – naturalisation.
She rises a little higher, eyes still unseen, a flicker in the ears to mimic that of a cow. A gentle bleat escapes the sheep closest to the ridge as those nearby turn their attention to the approaching figure, but there are no signs of alarm.
So far, so good…
Step three – the reveal.
The dragon shuffles forward, her face coming into view above the ridge as the outline of a body takes shape. The sheep stop and stare this time, and so do I.
Even after a few days, the sight of her still touches something ancient inside me that makes my life want to flash in front of my eyes.
But it doesn’t, and –
Step four – make yourself appear smaller than you are.
The dragon creeps forward, wings close to her body in a sort of comical gait to make herself appear smaller than she really is. The sheep hold a moment, emitting some intermittent sounds of alarm as they gather closer, and then –
Step five – the approach!
The dragon rises gently, waving a clawed paw at the sheep.
The sheep pause a moment, then emit a loud bleating noise as they turn and run for the hills.
I stand up and watch as they go.
“How’d I do?” says the dragon as she bounds over, her footsteps causing miniature earthquakes as she moves.
“Good job,” I say. “Almost ten seconds this time.”
“Really?” she says.
“Uh huh,” I say, and she starts hopping on the rock in excitement
I watch as she plays, and realise.
It’s surprising how, if you take away the scales, the teeth the size of spears and the tail like a harpoon that could make a battleship blush, dragons are just like oversized dogs in the end.
Yeah…
Lethal, fire-breathing dogs…
“Come on,” I say, “once more, from the top.”
And, for a moment, I tell myself there’s a real chance.
But, of course, I am terribly, terribly wrong.
* * *
“Greetings,” I cry out as I approach. “I’ve been trying to contact you regarding your cart’s extended warranty.”
From somewhere amidst the muck, the face of a village serf rises up, mouth agape, as I wave.
“Need a hand?” I say.
Caught off guard, the serf offers a string of noises I interpret to mean something akin to ‘Who are you?’
“I’m but a simple traveller,” I say as I come nearer. “Come to your village upon hearing about the incredible, very friendly magical creatures that dwell in these hills.”
The serf furrows his brow as another of his kind appears from the other side of the cart.
“Ah, greetings there, good fellow,” I say with a wave.
The serf frowns, the two exchanging glances for a moment, but their attention’s on me.
In an exaggerated motion, I turn and point towards the crest of a nearby hill.
“Goodness,” I cry, “what is that!”
The two serfs peer in the same direction.
“It seems to be some sort of… friendly hill dragon,” I cry, emphasising the last few words.
The serfs squint at the ridgeline, but nothing appears.
“I said,” I cry again, “I’m absolutely certain I saw a FRIENDLY HILL DRAGON.”
Still nothing.
The serfs’ attention turns to the cart just as a pair of dragon-shaped ears appears above the hilltop.
“Look!” I say, pointing at the ridge, but the serfs continue working.
I panic as the ears start twitching like a cow, and the next step is almost imminent.
I hop down to the cart, grab the shoulder of the nearest serf, and shout.
“Look!” I shout. “A dragon!”
This gets their attention, but not the way I hoped
Instead of a friendly pair of ears peeking above the hilltops, the serfs stand and stare at the exact moment the full body of the dragon comes creeping over the hillside like a big cat coming in for the kill.
They don’t take to it lightly.
A shout somewhere between fear and surprise passes through them as they go running over the far hills and away.
“Wait!” I cry as they run. “Wait, it’s okay! It’s okay!”
I watch as they disappear over the hills.
Behind me, the dragon is reaching step five – the approach – but the audience is gone.
Or so I think.
A few moments later, a tremor runs through the ground, and I turn my attention in the same direction the serfs had gone.
Nothing at first, then a bizarre parody of the same act we’d been attempting.
Small spikes appear above the tops of the hills, a forest of tiny pine needles at the start.
The tremor grows.
The spikes grow longer, then longer, until a flash of metal appears above the ridgeline and the gravity of the situation is upon me.
I turn and wave my arms.
“Abort!” I shout as the cavalry quite literally arrives. “Abort!”
I start running as the ground begins to shake and even the dragon’s eyes turn into dinner plates at the approaching force.
Honestly… how was I supposed to know the king was planning military exercises in the fields that day.
Act III
Fantastic projectiles (and where to get shot by them)
And so a new rhythm forms.
Breakfast.
Approach.
Arrows.
Retreat.
Days turn into a week, and a week, a sorry fortnight. The dragon and I are getting tired of eating fish, and even I can see the glint in her eye as the local cattle pass us by.
The holes in my five-step plan are growing larger every day, and I’m running out of ideas.
The dragon, though, has one.
* * *
“Maybe I could try smiling?” she says one morning.
I’m suspicious, but also curious.
“I could have a look?” I say.
Never look a gift horse in the mouth, they say.
More importantly, never turn down a request from a dragon when it’s upset.
Rocks shatter and slip into the ocean as the dragon unfurls at extraordinary speed. She sits up, clawed hands outstretched like a sphinx, looks me in the eye, and –
A giant maw full of teeth the size of broadswords opens up as she pulls back her lips in a giant grin. A look that might have helped from afar, but all I see is death.
“Um… maybe you’re more of a ‘lips closed’ dragon?” I offer.
The giant teeth disappear as she closes her mouth more fully, but somehow it’s even worse. Half-closed eyes look out from a face that’s giving less ‘let’s be friends’ and more ‘my, what big teeth you have, Grandma’.
“More teeth…?” I suggest.
The jaws open slightly.
My life flashes before my eyes.
“It couldn’t hurt?” I say.
But, of course, it does.
* * *
The next few towns are ready for our arrival. We barely crest the nearby ridges before a signal fire goes up or the arrows start flying. The craftier among them wait until we’ve approached well within range before opening up, but even those can’t seem to wait until it would truly be a trap. One even empties a perfectly good vat of boiling cooking oil from the castle walls as we stand hopelessly far away in the fields, both sides staring in silence as the serviceable (but now unusable) liquid cuts a trail down the road ahead.
It isn’t until we arrive at the town farthest south on the coast, however, that the residents have something truly special for us.
* * *
“What’s that?” says the dragon.
We’re standing in a field on the outskirts of a town. The dragon, grown accustomed to the recent dance, now stands behind me with her wings folded as though in hiding. And together, we stare at what appears to be –
“Some sort of festival?” I posit.
As one, we lean forward, squinting to make sense of a set of details that defy all understanding. But there, sure enough, sits an array of coloured tents outside the walls, troupes of people in brightly coloured clothes dancing about on top as though they hadn’t a care in the world.
And it’s… strange.
Not the way clowns are strange, when you see one at the circus. More, the way it would be strange to find a clown in the middle of a street as the sun goes down, staring at you, unmoving.
That’s to say – ‘strange’ strange.
Almost… unsettling.
Most of the other towns have battened down the hatches by the time we arrive. The only sounds that greet us are the shouts of alarmed stragglers and under-used weapons being given a good working for the first time in years. Not… whatever this is.
I can’t quite figure it out until it hits me – quite literally – all at once.
Close to the middle of the tents, a flash of coloured light appears. Before the sound can travel here, however, it’s a noise of a different type that draws our attention.
A deep thrum rises from the opposite direction as an arrow appears from the woods, growing unusually large.
And unusually close.
I emit a noise that would have offended an entire pantheon of minor deities had any of them been within hearing distance, and freeze.
It’s only as a large shape swats me out of the way that I realise we’ve been staring at a decoy, but the epiphany’s a second late.
* * *
Dear reader, I don’t suppose you’ve had the experience of being shot at by a ballista before, have you? I can’t imagine so, if but for one simple reason – not many people tend to survive the pleasure of being hit with an object the size of a tree, capped with enough steel to make a knight blush.
I don’t suppose I would have, either, if not for the strength of a dragon’s scale.
But, as it turns out, some things can hurt dragons, too…
Act IV
People can be bastards (too)
A buffet of wind knocks me slightly off balance as I step down onto the cliffside arch we call our home and the dragon comes to rest. A motion far stronger and less careful than the ones she shows when things are at their best.
“It’s not your fault,” I say, but the dragon doesn’t answer.
Instead, she curls up on the rock face near the edge of a cliff, rolling up into a tight ball like a cat. The limp in her right foot from where the ballista struck is nasty, slowing her motions.
I remain silent.
Deep down, part of me knows I should thank her. After all, it’s because she moved in the way of the incoming bolt that I’m standing here to pass these words on to you.
But, deep down, some part of me knows that’s not the wound she’s worried about.
I could find you some friends… come my words from the cave. So confident at the time, I can’t avoid the note of self accusation that follows them now.
I see a vision of my past self, wagging their finger at me with a know it all look on their face. Part of me wants to slap them, but another part of me knows they’re right.
Friends…
What do I know about those?
I don’t have any friends, I tell myself, but that’s not exactly true.
Or, at least, it used to be.
* * *
Dear reader – if you’re reading this tale from atop a carriage or some other form of transportation, now might be a good time to step aside for a bit and have a break. Honestly, it’s been a while since the story started and absolutely nothing is about to happen for a while. Certainly not anything worth bothering yourself about missing.
…please?
…
…
…
…
…still here?
…
…
…
…
…fine, have it your way.
But don’t say I didn’t tell you.
* * *
“C’mon,” says Samuel, the way he always does before signing me up for things I didn’t ask for. “The wife’s pregnant and costs are building. Help a guy out, won’t you.”
“I’m not in that business anymore,” I say, although I really am.
He grins like he knows it. “One easy mark. Nobody gets hurt,” he says, “and I go back to farming.”
That’s how it always starts, but who am I to disagree?
As I stare at the man who took me in when no one else would have me, my resolve melts into guilty silence until only three words remain.
The same three I always say.
The same three that always get me into trouble.
“Alright,” I say, “just this once.”
Samuel smiles.
“Meet me in two day’s time, then,” he says, “scene of our first take.”
I nod my assent, closing the door as my mind runs through the series of events that follow.
What it doesn’t account for, however, is me running for my life.
Which is, of course, exactly what occurs.
“Left!” I shout as the city guard gives up chase behind. Samuel, however, has a different idea.
He leaps over the side of a walkway and I follow without thinking. First, his feet on the ground, a heavy thump before taking off on another street. Then mine, landing more nimbly before taking up chase without thinking where we’re headed.
The job was easy enough, a simple entry into a manor at the edge of town.
Too easy in hindsight, but I was following Samuel, and my biggest mistake’s yet to catch up with me.
“This way!” shouts Samuel as our pursuers pause a moment, turning to come down after us.
“Where are we going?” I shout, but Samuel doesn’t turn to respond.
Instead, he runs down an alley – a place I’d never been before.
His form disappears into the nooks and crannies for a moment before opening up into a space and –
I come to a shuddering stop as a row of torches comes to light about the edges of a dead end.
My senses tell me to turn and run as the city police appear about me, so I do, and –
Thwack!
Something heavy strikes my temples, stealing the energy from my limbs in an instant.
And, as I fall, I see Samuel’s face grinning at me from the impending fog as he leans down into my face, sap in hand.
“Sorry,” he says, “but the wife’s pregnant, see. Costs are building up, and a thief collected is a reward in hand these days, old friend…”
I swat my hand at the face that starts to laugh, but whether it’s anger or sadness that guides my hand into the cobblestones, only the past will understand…
* * *
Sparks float up from the fire into the night sky, rising like tiny dying embers until they disappear into nothingness.
I sigh.
It’s the first fire I’ve set myself in weeks, and my hands have almost forgotten the rhythm. The wood was wet anyway, but that’s not so much a problem when you’ve got something as powerful as dragon fire to get things going.
Dragon fire…
I look at the dragon, still asleep, still curled into a ball.
What was I thinking…
Both at the manor and maybe now as well.
I’m a thief by trade; mistrust is my business. All I do is steal the nice things others have built; not build anything nice of my own.
I throw some more driftwood on the fire, watch as it takes.
What was I thinking, making a promise I have no way of keeping. A sudden change of conscience? A temporary lapse in judgement, even? Either way, it’s growing clear to me that whatever error moved me to say those words is about to catch up with me soon.
And sooner or later, I’m going to have to tell her I’ve failed.
And then what do I do?
I turn the events over in my mind, twisting them every which way and that until only a single path remains.
I pick up my bag, packed the night before, and start tracing my steps clearly to the edge of the clearing.
I’m almost free when a voice stops me.
“Don’t scare the people, Lollipop…” mumbles the dragon in her sleep. “They’ll hurt you…”
I turn around.
Lollipop…?
Who – or what – is Lollipop…?
The answer eludes me for a few short moments until finally it hits me – she’s referring to herself.
Something inside me shifts.
I’m not quite sure what kind of name ‘Lollipop’ is for a dragon, or even how she got it. But that small detail is enough for me to see her – actually see her – clearly. Perhaps for the first time, as something more than she appears.
Someone who’s spent the last few centuries alone, their only contact with the outside world in the form of a sword or spear.
Someone who’s only ever had themselves to talk to.
Someone who – despite all of that – still chose to come outside and try something new.
I put down my bag and pull out my cowl. With a tear, I wrap a strip about the wounded part of her leg where fresh skin peeks out of a gap in the scales.
A loose scale peeks out from underneath, and I gently pull it free, wrapping the fabric in place to keep out some of the cold.
The dragon shakes her head slightly as she sleeps.
“Step four…” she mumbles. “Make… smaller…”
A deep, rumbling exhale escapes her scaly lips as she draws her wings in closer and, all of a sudden, the tension is gone.
I curl up against the rocks, plumping my camp pack into a makeshift pillow, and fall into a deeper sleep than I’ve had in… months.
And I’m glad I do.
Just… not right away.
Act V
Strangers in the night (exchanging daggers)
It’s early in the morning when the change comes. The herald – a lone rock slipping down the cliff face and skittering into the ocean. I leap to my feet to face the oncoming noise, but the dragon notices the sound before I do. In the same space of time it takes me to leap to my feet, she’s already on the pounce, and it’s all I can do to shout a warning before she strikes.
“Oh, jsyfharhshiungh!” shouts a voice, the words starting out legible then turning into a word salad as their owner’s life flashes before their eyes.
The dragon and I stop, mid motion, as a scruffy looking man falls to his knees.
“Please don’t ‘urt me,” he says, his accent a thick countryside drawl.
I step forward, hands extended.
“Who are you?” I say.
The man continues kneeling, but refuses to raise his head.
“‘m just a f- f- farmer,” he says.
The dragon and I exchange a glance. Her expression is just as confused as mine.
“What are you doing here?” I say, placing a hand on the man’s shoulders.
He flinches at the motion, but the drip of words steadily turns into a more informative flow as he finally gains enough courage to raise his eyes.
“Heard you were out this way,” he says. “You the ones tearing up the coast, isn’t you?”
I bristle a bit at that.
‘Tearing up’?
Really?
We’re not the ones hammering hoof and steel across the countryside every time someone sees a shadow. But… I suppose exceptions must be made if something’s to be had.
“What are you doing out here?” I ask again.
“P- p- please,” he says, a fresh edge of some other emotion entering his voice. “You have to ‘elp us.”
“Help you?” I say. “How?”
“Oh,” says the farmer, “the king an’ his men are awful cruel! In the summer, they take our food and money, and in the harvest, they do it again! They flog us whenever they please, and whenever one of us says something, they disappear forever!” he cries, bursting into a shower of tears. “Pleasssir, you have to do something!”
The farmer grabs hold of my pants and begins weeping openly now as I stand there in shocked silence.
The dragon and I exchange a look.
“Let me confer with my associate,” I say.
* * *
“Do you think -” I begin.
“Yes,” nods the dragon.
“- because I have a couple of -”
“Yes,” she nods again.
“- and it could always go really -”
“Yes!” says the dragon, nodding enthusiastically again.
I stop.
I haven’t even gotten a word out edgeways, but then it dawns on me.
The dragon’s not just okay; she’s excited. All of the tiredness from the previous evening is gone. Even the limp in her leg seems far forgotten as a fresh surge of energy runs through her at the arrival of the first person who’s not, well… me.
I look at the farmer, twisting and turning his hat in his hands as he stares at the dragon intently. Instead of fear (well, there’s a decent amount of that, too), the expression I see is… hope?
All this time, I’ve been playing it safe. But where’s playing it safe gotten us? And, more importantly, what’s the alternative?
“Where is this king of yours?” I say.
“In that there castle,” says the farmer.
He points at a rugged structure amidst the cliffs inland, and the dragon and I look as one.
* * *
“It’s not my fault,” says the king, a lone bead of sweat trickling down his forehead above an uneasy smile.
I’m not sure what to say to that.
I’ve never spoken to a king before, but even I can tell it would be a social faux pas of some magnitude to tell them they’re a liar. Especially if they’re telling the truth.
But this one isn’t.
“How so?” I say, biting my tongue in the most figurative of senses.
A simple question, one that doesn’t feel quite sufficient for the room in which it was uttered. And yet, something in this phrase seems to unlock the king’s tongue and let the words spill out more freely.
“Have you ever heard of the three kingdoms tax alliance?” he says.
I honestly can’t say I have.
Something tells me I’m about to, though.
The king flicks a hand at a page, who dutifully rolls out a map showing three kingdoms sitting in a triangle.
The dragon and I lean in, but the dragon’s head blocks the sunlight.
The king’s guard raise their spears.
The dragon tilts to one side, allowing a ray of sunlight to grace the weathered paper on the table.
The king clears his throat.
“Years ago,” he says, “my father, King Roland the First, pledged allegiance to King Morner of the Stone Hills Kingdom for protection along our borders. Years later, King Farder of the island kingdoms pledges the same, but then -”
The king stabs the map with a finger.
“The forces of Haverdale attack from the south, defeating King Farder and leaving his lands in ruins. King Morner’s forces arrive in time to stave them off, but not before the lands are plundered and King Farder’s head on a pike!” he calls, sitting down as though the tale were complete.
I stare at the map again.
The lines beg me to make some sense out of them – for my sake, perhaps, or maybe their own. Despite their encouragement, however, I just can’t see it.
The king looks at me expectedly.
“And then?” I say, stupidly.
A flicker of incredulity flashes across the king’s face. The first sign of a person who’d like to put my head on a pike if there wasn’t a dragon behind my back at this very moment.
Ah, there it is…
Note to self – don’t rob this one.
(Not for a few months, anyway.)
“King Morner comes to town and says he’s dutifully done his job,” says the king, as though explaining the matter to a small child. “One kingdom less doesn’t mean one less border, and with the damages mounting, he says we’ve got to pay if we want to rebuild a garrison.”
“So you ask the farmers to pay?” I say.
The king raises his hands and waves them about as if to say ‘who else?’
“Who else?” he says a few moments later.
Okay, should have seen that one coming…
“Have you tried talking to him?” I say.
“I would,” says the king. “Unfortunately, he’s rebuffed all attempts at negotiations. His is the superior military force, and it would take… some considerable leverage to make him see otherwise.”
He closes his eyes as though in uncontrolled anguish, but one eye opens just a touch and rests on the dragon.
“And where is this king Morner?” I ask.
The king points out the window.
The dragon and I spy a slightly larger castle nestled amongst some slightly larger rocks a ways off in the distance.
* * *
“Is that what he says?” says King Morner as we arrive.
“It is,” I say.
He’s a more confident one than Roland, this one. A little older, his beard a little grayer and longer, and a little less afraid of dragons, at that. He sits at his table, eating a bowl of cherry tomatoes with a slurping motion, the seeds spilling down his chin as he speaks. Altogether, he has the air of a man who’s a little too eager to set their son’s funeral pyre alight before checking for signs of life.
“It’s a little more complicated than that,” he says as he reaches for some more.
A slightly taller page than King Roland’s steps forward and produces a slightly larger map, unfurling it on the table as the light from a slightly larger set of windows graces its surface.
The one thing that’s more than just slightly better than King Roland’s is the detail. What I’d mistaken for a puddle before actually turns out to be a forest, and the distance between things is actually closer than I imagined.
“Long before the days of King Roland the First,” says King Morner as he attacks a passionfruit now (in this part of the country, at this time of the year?), “these lands belonged to my ancestors.”
He points at a circle on the map that encompasses the territories.
“We were pushed out after an attack by the wildmen of the north, only building enough strength to reclaim the lands after a generation,” continues the king. “By that time, King Roland’s skulking about in my ancestral kingdom with nary a footsoldier to step outside his doors, so what am I to do?”
He stares at me in silence now, a seed from some other tropical fruit slowly making its way down his beard.
“Retake it?” I say.
The question stops the king’s hand mid-motion.
The question feels like an obvious one, so when the king reacts as though I came up with the funniest joke of my life, the surprise is entirely mine.
“With what army?” he says. “Ours is the superior force, it’s true, but that castle sits atop the highest peak in the realm! Any force that approaches it would be exhausted, pelted by arrows and siege weapons. By the time they arrived, they’d be a shadow of the force that started the climb and in no shape to take over a whole castle, let alone the garrison on even ground.”
His laughter continues, a gentle spray of seeds and other accoutrements adorning his beard and vest at the motion.
This much is true.
I hadn’t realised how high up it was given the approach on the dragon’s shoulders.
Another part of me wonders how the wildmen of the north managed to succeed.
Another part of me chooses not to ask.
“So what do you do?” I ask as the king reaches for a paw paw.
“I make a deal,” he says as he tuckers in, “like any reasonable ruler would. Protection over the realms in exchange for a tax on what’s rightfully mine. What other person would suggest any less?”
Fair enough, and yet, I can’t help but ask –
“Have you tried negotiating?” I say.
The king pauses midway through a bunch of loganberries.
“For what?” he says.
* * *
“Well, how should I know?” says King Roland, his guards a mote less careful now. “Did he send you with terms, or just to waste my time?”
I blink like an idiot for a few moments.
An idiot who should have thought of the next question before making a twenty-minute trip by dragon just to deliver a message.
Because, at this stage, that’s what I am.
“I’ll ask,” I say.
And so a rhythm begins.
* * *
“Well, that depends,” says King Morner, donning a fresh set of clothes. “Is he willing to come to the table and talk about it?”
* * *
“Of course I am!” says King Roland, “if he’s coming, that is. I imagine that’s the point of this whole exercise?”
* * *
“What else would it be!” cries King Morner through a spray of pumpkin seeds. “Don’t tell me he’s chickening out on us.”
* * *
“Hah!” cries King Roland. “I’m game if you are!” he continues, before pausing a moment. “I mean… ‘he’ is,” he says, correcting himself.
The hall falls silent as he raps his fingers on the edges of the throne in thought.
“He’s really going to come?” says King Roland, and I can see, for the first time, his surprise at the notion.
“I believe so,” I say.
“Oh,” says King Roland, suddenly calm. “Tell him I’ll be there.”
“Of course, your majesty,” I say.
I’m not sure why I say that last bit.
I hadn’t used it until then, but given the increasing number of guards on the walls and the king’s increasing irritation, it seems the prudent thing to do.
It’s only as I turn to leave the hall when King Roland posits a question of his own.
“Where?” he says as we reach the doors. “When?”
* * *
King Morner’s brow furrows as he listens to the words. His jaws make a surprised munching sound as they hew through the seeds of a paw paw.
The king doesn’t speak for several moments. In fact, there’s nothing at all that would indicate he even heard my words as he bites into a blood orange except for the faint growing lines of a smile.
And something inside me tightens.
* * *
The last rays of the sun are setting below the peaks of the nearby mountains as the dragon and I return to Castle Morner for the fifth time that day. The winds are as cool as the first time we made the climb, but somewhere beneath it all lies a warmth that wasn’t there this morning.
“This is going well,” says the dragon, and I can only agree.
At the most, I’d expected a brief conversation before arrows again. Instead, we’ve somehow struck up a fully fledged conversation. It’s a nice change from the rhythm of the past few days, but as buoyed as I am by the change of pace, an older sense inside me has been growing louder with each interaction.
“Do you think they’re going to be friends again?” says the dragon.
“Mmm-hmm,” I say, letting the wind steal my words before they reach her ears.
And I’m glad when she doesn’t press the point.
* * *
King Roland massages his forehead as we approach. His page seems slightly less flustered at the appearance of a dragon in the courtyard this time, but the guards are still on watch. One of them’s watching me, and I am convinced – beyond a shadow of a doubt – that one of them’s sharpening a pike for me somewhere.
“Well?” says King Roland as we approach.
I pause.
Partly because I know that once I’ve spoken the words I came to deliver, they can’t be unspoken.
Partly because they’re mine.
“King Morner says,” I begin, “that if you want to talk, meet me in the Field of our Fathers’ in two days’ time.”
The hall falls silent at the sound of the name.
This one, it seems, holds greater meaning than the sum of its parts might suggest.
But then, slowly but surely, a grin appears on the king’s face.
“Alright,” he says, “I will.”
And, in doing so, confirms the whole damn lot.
Act VI
Chaos is a ladder (that doesn’t go anywhere)
Dear reader – if you’ve stuck with me this far, I am certain your distinguished senses have picked up on an important truth.
I’m not a bad person.
…am I?
Sure, I may take things that aren’t mine from time to time, but I’m honest about it. I only ever steal from those who have enough already, and every last coin goes to the poor, even if that’s always me.
And so, I am sure you can imagine that when she asks me that evening if I think they’ll keep her on as a ‘message dragon’ once they’ve become friends again, it almost physically hurts when I say ‘yes’.
* * *
“I could carry all sorts of things,” she continues, the excitement in her voice unmistakable.
I hastily throw the remains of my cowl into my bag.
It’s been days since I’ve worn it, and the old piece of cloth seems a shadow of what it once was.
“Horses, cows, maybe even carts,” she continues.
I don’t reply.
“Hey!” she says.
I stop.
“What are you doing?”
“Packing,” I say without turning around.
“Why?”
“We need to get as far away from this place as we can before morning,” I say. “The farmer already knows where we are and it won’t take long for them to track him down and come after us.”
I stuff my broken ladle in beside my main gear, hear a snap as something breaks a little further.
“But what about the meeting?” she says.
I stop a moment, then sigh.
“There isn’t going to be a meeting,” I say at last, unable to contain my silence anymore.
“But they said so,” she says.
I run a hand through my hair as I search for the words that will save me. But… after what seems like a small eternity, I realise I’m left with the truth.
“They lied…” I say.
She doesn’t say anything at that.
I turn around, finally working up the courage to face her as I deliver the message that’s been on my mind since we left the castle.
“There isn’t going to be a meeting,” I say again. “There aren’t going to be friends, there aren’t going to be any messages, and there certainly aren’t going to be any horses after what they’re going to do to each other.”
“I don’t understand,” says the dragon. “Aren’t they both people? Why are they being so mean to each other?”
I don’t answer.
I can’t.
She blinks in what appears to be the dragon equivalent of some kind of uncertainty, then starts pacing.
“Was it something I said?” she says as she turns about the cliffs. “Maybe I was too much, maybe I was too little. Was I too menacing when I was trying to smile?”
“It’s not your fault,” I say.
She passes around again, her tail knocking errant stones over the cliffs into the ocean below.
“Maybe it’s because of the way I fell that first time?” she says. “I’ve never landed in a castle before and it was a little tighter than expected.”
“It’s not your fault,” I say again, but she doesn’t listen.
“And I didn’t mean to knock over that brazier. It’s just it was sitting so close to the edge of the wall and -”
“It’s got nothing to do with you!” I cry, my own emotions finally coming to the fore. “Don’t you understand? It doesn’t matter if you’ve got scales or skin or feathers every colour of the sun! These people have hated each other for hundreds of years, and their children’s children will hate each other long after those who are too stupid to die tomorrow make it back and keep the whole farce going.”
I run my hands through my hair.
“And for what?” I say. “All because the other one’s got a slightly bigger castle, or a slightly bigger horse. Sometimes it’s not even about that,” I say. “Some people are just downright bastards, and there’s not a thing you can do about it.”
I stop.
“That’s just the way we are,” I say. “And that’s why you should never, ever trust anyone. They’ll always betray you in the end.”
As my tirade ends, the air falls silent, nothing but the sound of the gentle ocean spray until it’s the dragon who breaks the silence.
“But you haven’t…” she says.
And I have nothing to say to that.
* * *
Early morning.
The sea is terribly gentle right now, and I curse it for that. A rough spray, splashing swells against the rock face… anything would have been preferable to the terrible calm that sits over the air as the sun’s first rays climb over the horizon. Something to match the storm of emotions rising inside me.
I’m angry.
What at, I can’t say, but the feeling’s sharp, pointed, and it won’t go away.
C’mon… comes Samuel’s voice, help a guy out, won’t you…
Visions of the past few weeks cloud my thoughts. The same that prevented me from getting any sleep. Of towns, arrows. The faces of people as they run in fear…
It’s not your fault!
And where did that come from?
I’ve always prided myself on remaining cool under pressure. It’s one of the reasons I always find a way out of every situation I’ve ever been in.
And yet, something about this one defies all expectations.
A rustling sound passes across the rocks as the dragon awakens. A small motion at first, always the same. A flick of the tail before she rises, one eye opening, then the other, as they focus on the objects around her and come to rest on me.
“You’re going, are you?” I say.
“I have to see what happens,” she says.
“Alright,” I say a moment later. “I’ll come with you.”
Who knows what’ll happen if I’m not around to tell her, I tell myself as I fit the harness around her shoulders.
But even I now know that’s not true anymore.
* * *
Strong winds buffet us as we make our approach to Castle Morner in the early morning sun. The calm of the ocean is pitched against the fury of the rising mountain winds as they whip their way up the ridges, creating funnels of air we need to navigate carefully as we climb.
Neither of us speak, our attention focused on the tiny speck of rock in the distance, growing closer as we approach.
* * *
“No one’s here,” says the dragon as we arrive.
And she’s right.
Guards, townspeople, horses, chickens, soldiers…
The entire castle’s devoid of any movement as we stand upon the walls. The usual complement of archers and horns that greets our arrival is nowhere to be seen. And, apart from the occasional dog running through the streets, there’s no sign of the townspeople here at all.
“Maybe they’ve already gone?” she posits, but I know the truth.
“Follow me,” I say, and away we go again.
* * *
The light breezes that rose against us as we climbed have turned into the fury of the fates themselves as we change directions now. Not for the open grassy patches the kings identified as the Field of our Fathers, but a space far more innocuous.
A small collection of buildings marking a crossroads partway between the two castles. The exact same place an army could pass through if they thought the other was absent.
Which, apparently, both thought the other would be.
A small ocean of glittering metal fills the pass on either side as the forces converge. The occupants of the nearby buildings scatter into the hills as the armies approach, the voices of their leaders carrying to us on the winds even before we set down to placate the growing conflict.
“My lords!” I cry as we come in for a landing, “hold your weapons!”
The dragon rests on the nearby rocks, her wings rising out to the side briefly as she catches her balance.
And this, it seems, is the sign.
“Now!” shouts King Morner, apparently believing the cavalry has arrived.
But, oh… how mistaken he is.
* * *
“Left!” I cry as a wooden shaft tears through the air, inches from my shoulder. The dragon, however, has different ideas.
Wind rushes past my ears as she turns right and into a twist, the clack of arrows bouncing off her scaly hide like pebbles off a cliff as she pulls away from the ground. My stomach rises in a churning lurch as her weight shifts beneath me and she comes upright, the slightest bump in the air lifting me up into nothingness for a moment before she readjusts.
I grab onto the harness around her upper arms as the world spins for a moment from dizziness.
Then the rope arrives…
Big and powerful, a bolas wooshes up from seemingly nowhere, wrapping about the dragon’s shoulder, and all I see is earth.
The ground rises up to greet us, the forced landing casting me aside as the dragon hits the ground and comes sliding to a halt.
I push up on my elbows and stare.
Silvered knights rush in from all sides as the forces collide, footsoldiers and pikemen exchanging blows on the field. The dragon squirms on the ground, caught up in the snare, but none of the surrounding forces even seem to notice.
I stand on uneasy legs, drawing a knife from my boot to cut the ropes when I hear a voice.
“Shoot the beast!” it calls.
Even now, I can’t tell which side the cry came from.
King Roland’s… King Morner’s… the distinction doesn’t seem to matter as something deeper inside me calls me to action.
And, without thinking, I leap in front of a heavily armored leg.
A volley of arrows flies at us out of nowhere, the majority bouncing off the dragon’s scales. One, however, finds a softer target.
A sharp stabbing pain runs through my thighs, and I feel a shiver run through the dragon’s scales as I collapse against them. A momentary pause as though the whole world gasps at once, then a primordial fear runs through my body as, for the first time, I see her completely and utterly enraged.
I hold on to a rope as she rears into the air, a sudden warmth floods through the scales beneath me, and all I can see is fire.
Epilogue
But first, marshmallows
Dear reader, things got pretty grim for a moment there, didn’t they. But don’t forget – you already know how this story ends.
Well, part of it, at least…
* * *
My hand comes up against something solid as it rummages through the package in search of the second set of marshmallows. My leg’s still sore from where the arrow entered, but something I learned about dragon fire is that it’s awfully good at cauterising things.
I push aside the objects in the package until I catch a glimpse of what lies beneath. A red scale, slightly larger than a dinner plate, but tougher again than the strongest mail I’ve ever seen.
I pull it out and look it over in the silence of the clearing.
There’s a dent near the middle where the ballista struck. Enough to dislodge it from the dragon’s scaly hide, but not to puncture all the way through.
I look over to where she sits.
There’s a patch of skin where the scale once sat, still red and sore. But, I ponder, enough leverage for me to tie it back on neatly with the right tools.
I smile as I return it to its place in the pack.
It’s been… about a month, by my reckoning, since we took up together. A decent run considering I hadn’t planned on being much of anything to a dragon at first, other than maybe breakfast.
“Found some!” I call.
I grab the pack of marshmallows, close the lip of the bag and make my way back over.
I promised I’d find her a friend.
“Next town over?” she says as I return to the fire.
“Next town over,” I say as I unwrap the package of sticky treats. “But first, marshmallows.”
And maybe… I already have.
Author’s note:
Originally created as a submission for a flash fiction competition in 2022.
‘But, wait -‘ I hear you say ‘isn’t flash fiction meant to be, well, short?’
Ah-h, indeed – you have correctly identified the problem.
The original version of this story (originally titled ‘If at first you don’t succeed’) consisted of the campfire scene, cave scene, then the ending, with a short montage in between. A decent enough flow on its own, but even at the time, I knew it deserved something more.
Fast forward a few years, I dusted it off, added a few scenes, and discovered a story begging for more detail than I’d planned even then.
In the end, it ran more than three times my originally planned length, but the journey’s been a good one. Lollipop and our narrator had a lot to say, it seems – too much for one story – and who knows, maybe they’ll make an appearance again in the future.
I wonder what they’ll get up to by then.
A.J.Dahms 