The Princess and the Dragon

The beating of her horse’s hooves thundered down the road as they sped faster than the wind towards the distant mountain, her fine silver armour clinking faintly.

Her long, golden hair streamed out behind her, her helmet forgotten in her bag. Upon her hip jangled an arming sword, a tear-shaped ruby glinting on its pommel. Her family’s sword, entrusted to the eldest child, whether boy or girl. Her father, the King, had given it to her for this very mission, for the sword was a slayer of dragons.

Dragons had once ravaged the land until the brave knights and her ancestors nearly annihilated them. Then they made a treaty with the few that remained. Leave the Kingdom or be destroyed.

The dragons left.

For decades, the Kingdom had been at peace – from dragons at least.

Until now.

A green dragon had been stealing maidens, usually noble ones or ones of great beauty. None of them had returned, nor had the knights that had set out to rescue them.

For a year now, she had studied everything she could of dragons: their strengths, their weaknesses, their habits. She had trained hard and fast and her armour could resist a dragon’s fire. She did not know how the court wizards had achieved it. They had said not a word when they handed the armour to the King.

Soon it would be put to the test.

She galloped on, trying to plan how best she could slay the monster like her ancestors of old.

It took a full day and night until she reached the base of the mountain. The golden sunlight beamed down and highlighted the entrance to a massive cave carved into the mountainside.

The Princess Heir frowned.

It was very unusual for a dragon to have its lair at ground level. Usually they had it high in the peaks, claiming the skies that were their domain. It also made it harder for would-be attackers to reach them and slay them in their sleep.

She hid her noble steed in the shadows of the forest near the mountain and began her cautious approach.

With the sunlight streaming into the cave, hopefully it would blind the creature. Her silver armour would no doubt give her away regardless, for dragon senses were sharp as a nail.

She rounded the last boulder before the entrance and tried to pierce the gloom of the cave. The wind suddenly blew and she wrinkled her nose as the smell of mildew and burning and death came from within. Then she frowned again. Mixed in with those awful scents she could smell…flowers?

Shaking off that strangeness, she donned her helmet, drew her sword and slowly began her descent into the bowels of the beast.

*****

The cave, to her surprise, wasn’t as dark within. Crevices high in the rock let the light through in patches. The awful smells still lingered, mixed with the definite scent of flowers. Why, or how, would one grow flowers under a mountain?

Eventually, the light became stronger and as she passed a wall of rock, she gasped.

Before her was a cavern that was open to the sky, high above, on the backward slope of the mountain. The morning sunlight could not reach it, but she guessed that in the afternoons, the warm sunlight would bathe the floor below which was indeed covered in a small field of flowers. They danced happily in the air that flowed through the cavern, filling it more with their sweet smells than that of the mildew and the death.

She could see a large pile of glinting gold and jewels on the far side of the cavern, and she knew she had found the dragon’s hoard and the heart of its lair.

But where was the dragon ?

She still kept to the shadows, not wanting to reveal herself until she had a better idea of where the dragon was, if it was even here.

Every sense was on alert, taut as a bowstring.

“Who are you to come into my home? I have nothing for you. Leave!” came a deep, sonorous voice echoing throughout the cavern.

The Princess Heir gripped her sword tightly and swung around, eyes wide and wild, trying to find the source of the voice.

“I come to slay you for the slaughter of the peoples of this Kingdom!” she shouted back, her voice sounding small against the strength of the dragon’s.

“Slaughter!” the dragon roared. “How dare you accuse me of wantonly and happily killing people like some savage beast!”

There came a thud and the cavern shook.

“Do you deny that any who set foot in your cavern never left?” she challenged, still looking vainly for the source of the voice.

“That was not my doing! You humans are so fragile!”

The Princess Heir suddenly spotted a puff of dark smoke from the pillar behind the hoard of gold. There! She began slowly making her way towards it.

“That’s not our fault,” she said, trying to throw her voice to distract it and sound like she hadn’t moved. A dim part of her mind wondered why the dragon hadn’t tried finding her yet.

“Well, it’s not mine either!” the dragon countered.

There was a series of loud thumps and the gold and jewels from the pile scattered to the ground as the dragon moved its massive bulk out from behind the pillar and into the light from the skylight.

The Princess Heir froze in equal mixes of awe and fear.

The dragon was, for lack of a better word, beautiful. After its beauty came the realization of its sheer size.

Its scales glittered incandescently with all the shades of green imaginable: the hidden shades of emeralds; the light, fresh green of spring grass; the dark green of a fairy circle. It had two spikes like horns stretching back from its head and more spines, sparkling white, all down its back. Its wings were tucked away but she could tell they were massive with a pale green colour for their membrane. It had talons the length of swords and she knew they would be sharper than anything imaginable. Dragon talons, and teeth, were the sharpest know material in the Kingdoms. Its eyes danced with every colour green along with its scales, and then seemed to settle on a darker, angrier green.

“Could you please reveal yourself so we may talk face to face? It is so uncivilized to be speaking at shadows and empty air,” the dragon said, puffing more smoke into the air.

“Uncivilized?” she thought in confusion. “The dragon wanted to…talk?”

In all her studies, she had not come across dragons acknowledging anything as civilized or uncivilized. They were intelligent creatures yes, for they could communicate with humans, but they had a base intelligence that was not as refined as that of humans. They tended to be blunt and brutal, and reinforced their will with brute strength instead of cunning and discussion.

A part of her almost wanted to stop and speak with the dragon. But then another part of her screamed that it was all a ruse and it would douse her in flame the moment she appeared.

“I swear I shall not hurt you,” said the dragon again.

It made no threatening movements, just stood in the centre of the light and seemed to be waiting.

She kept inching around, trying to get into a position behind the dragon so she could strike.

“I know exactly where you are, ser. If I wanted to harm you, I would have done so already,” it said, and to her horror pointed at the exact pillar she was hiding behind. “I swear upon my heart stone, my very life-giver, that I shall not harm you,” the dragon said, a hint of amusement in its voice now.

After a long, long moment, she decided to oblige the dragon. She had her armour on to withstands its fire and fast enough reflexes to dodge its talons and teeth. So, she took a deep breath and stepped into the light.

“Ah, greetings brave knight!” boomed the dragon, opening its clawed paws wide in a gesture of welcome. “What brings you here this fine day?”

Still struggling with her confusion, she answered, “I come here to slay you, oh mighty dragon, to avenge all who you have slain!”

The dragon huffed and thicker, darker clouds of smoke appeared, momentarily obscuring the dragon.

“Again, that was not my fault!” it complained.

Now that she was closer to the dragon’s hoard and where it obviously was a lot of the time, she could see the charred corpses and skeletons littered in amongst the gold and jewels.

“Then how do you explain this?” she shouted, gesturing to the vestiges of death.

The dragon look at where she pointed and she could have sworn that it looked crestfallen.

“Well, as I said, humans are fragile, especially the maidens.”

Its head suddenly snapped towards the Princess Heir and it flared its nostrils.

“You come in armour, yet you smell of maiden. Are you a knight like the others who came to rescue the fair maidens?” the dragon asked suspiciously.

Quick as a flash, he strode towards her on his four paws, crushing all under his feet. Including, to her further horror, the charred skeletons that still had bits of armour on them. It moved so fast that she unconsciously stumbled backwards and fell, sending a ringing noise throughout the cavern as her armour hit the hard floor.

The dragon instantly halted in his stride and stood up on its hind legs, its clawed wingtips nearly touching the lower part of the roof.

“See what I mean? So clumsy,” it huffed.

The fear as well the confusion and the tinge of humiliation stoked the Princess Heir’s anger.

“Fight me, giant wyrm!” she shouted defiantly, sword raised.

She knew from her studies that wyrm was an insult to most dragons, as wyrms were considered lesser beings.

Instead of stoking it to anger though, the dragon looked hurt.

“You think I am one of the lesser creatures? That is disappointing. But perhaps that is my fault for displaying no manners. Allow me to introduce myself.”

In what could only be described as a monstrous bow with its forepaws and wings sweeping across its body, it bowed deeply to her.

“My name is Bartholemew Barten, Great Dragon of the Earthen Clan, here to learn more about this great Kingdom, and to befriend all of its subjects.”

The Princess Heir wondered if she had already been killed and eaten and this was all some dream or delusion bin her last moments before death.

“What is your name?” Bartholemew asked, folding his paws over his large belly expectantly.

Despite herself, she replied.

“My name is Princess Alexandria Dondarros, Heir to the Kingom’s Throne,” and she returned a regal bow in return.

For a moment, she panicked as she lost sight of Bartholemew, thinking she had made a terrible mistake in looking away.

But Bartholemew made no move towards her. In fact, when she looked up, his eyes were sparkling.

“A maiden knight! How delightful! And royal too. You will be able to tell me much of the Kingdom! Please, take off your helmet and relax. I think I can find some sort of refreshment or food.”

Alexandria cringed and couldn’t help but look at the corpses. Is that what he meant by food?

Bartholemew again saw where her gaze had landed, sighed heavily then turned to face her.

“I suppose I should explain myself. I never meant for any harm to come to anyone. Here, I have some fresh water I can gather for you and perhaps some flower or fruit. I believe you humans can eat those, yes?” he asked, then went to behind his hoard and started rummaging through.

Slowly, carefully, Alexandria took off her helmet and approached the hoard.

“I’ll admit that I kidnapped maidens, and I felt very bad for it. But I was told by other dragonkind that if you kidnap maidens, the knights soon follow. I have always wanted to talk to knights. Their kind have slayed dragons for centuries, so they must be quite knowledgeable and brave humans. I felt like they could teach me a lot about their kind, and I could teach them about mine,” he said, his voice slightly muffled as he stuck his head into a crevice and started throwing things in her direction.

She dodged mostly rotten vegetables, fruit and bits of earth.

“We already know all about your kind,” she said, then perched upon a large wooden chest with a flat lid. “You are monsters that must be slain.”

She kept her hand ever close to her sword as she spoke.

“You wound me!” he said, although his voice was muffled.

Eventually he found what looked like a fresh red apple and offered it to Alexandria, then offered her a rough bowl of clear water.

After sniffing both, she took a bite and found the apple delicious and the water cool and fresh.

Bartholemew grinned at her delightedly, if not a little bit slyly.

“Is it true that in your customs, once you offer food and drink to your guest and they accept, you can no longer harm them?” he asked.

Alexandria paused for a moment.

“Yes, it is. They are now under your protection and you are honor bound to do them no harm, unless they harm you or yours first. But violence against a guest is a very serious issue, yes.”

“Then fear not, fair Princess Maiden,” he eyed her golden hair with a dragon’s love of gold. "You are now my guest so I cannot harm you.”

For the first time since she had stepped foot into the cave, Alexandria felt herself relax just very slightly.

“That does make me feel somewhat better, but I would feel much better if you would please explain to me why so many of your ‘guests’ have wound up dead.”

Bartholemew moved closer to her and she instinctively gripped her sword. He pretended not to notice as he lay on his belly in front of her, claws tucked underneath looking for all the world like a giant, green cat. Now he was eye level with her and she could see his eyes had cooled to a light green.

“I did not know enough about humans to either keep them alive, or keep them from harm. The maidens were most infuriating. The first one would not stop screaming! I tried to speak soothingly to her, tried to give her water and gifts and food but nothing could be heard above the echoing screams. So I tried to silence her by covering her mouth so I could tell her she was safe and, well…” He turned to look at a corpse near the top of the pile, scraps of pink silk still visible. Its skull was crushed in.

“Human heads are not as strong as dragon heads, or paws."

Alexandria cringed.

“When I realized that perhaps the knights would not take kindly to that when they saw it, I moved closer to the entrance of the cave to greet them. The first one came in and when I rushed to go meet him, I tripped.”

“You tripped?” Alexandria asked a little incredulously.

“I am better at flying than walking, and some parts of my cave are so narrow! So yes, I tripped and accidentally landed on him. Squashed him flat. He now makes a rather nice silver doormat, I suppose,” the dragon mused.

Alexandria couldn’t decide whether to be horrified or to laugh.

“I grew flowers here, in hopes that it would soothe the maidens, for I heard they liked flowers. I offered one maiden some beautiful yellow ones, the same golden-yellow as her dress. Unfortunately, those particular flowers make me sneeze.”

He gestured to a very charred corpse with a few scraps of yellow silk on its bones.

“So…every single one of the maidens and knights that have come here you have only…accidentally killed?” she asked, almost believing it.

Bartholemew nodded emphatically.

“It’s been the rottenest luck and I am deeply aggrieved! I know that some of the accidents were because I lacked human knowledge. So I can only get better by learning more and by having, perhaps, that wonderful thing I’ve heard about called…a friend?”

He looked so hopefully at her that she wondered.

“Do dragons not have friendships?”

“Oh no! We have ‘alliances’ but not friendship like I have seen from humans. It seems a very grand thing to have, something as worthy as gold and jewels.”

Alexandria thought long and hard before she spoke.

“If…if I teach you about humankind, will you promise to do no more kidnapping, nor cause anymore harm? If you do, humans will still come to try to slay you and more will die, perhaps even you.”

“Yes! Yes I promise!” he crowed, and lashed his spiked tail enthusiastically.

She yelped at the shower of rocks.

“Small movements! Fragile human!” she yelled.

He immediately stilled.

“Oops, sorry,” he said sheepishly.

“However, as future Queen of this Kingdom, you must swear on your heart stone that you will not use this knowledge to harm any human in our land. Otherwise, I will hunt you and slay you to protect my people,” she proposed.

Bartholemew thought for a long moment too.

“If you also swear on your Kingdom’s throne that anything I teach you, or anything you glean of dragon kind, you will not use against me or mine.”

Bartholemew reached out a large paw in a very human gesture.

“Are we agreed?” he asked, smiling as unmenacingly as he could.

Alexandria smiled back, took his paw in her hand, which dwarfed it, and delicately shook.

“Deal.”