The Beast of the Sky

There weren't always dragons in the Valley. They came later, along with the plagues, the floods and all the nasty things that almost killed us. Still, we survived. We'll always survive.

I think that we were cursed to live through the fire and hunger and walk out the other side more hateful than we've ever been. When the dragons showed up, so did the Monks, who swore they would protect us. I don't believe them, because nobody in the world would ever volunteer to protect us. The Monks stand by the side and watch as the dragons come crashing down to tear down our city and rain fire on our fields. They stay up in their monastery and come down once a year in the winter, to set dragon traps and take our food.

I live in the Valley between the two tallest mountains in the world. The one on the left of us was called Mount Pestilence, and the one to the right was named Mount Hope. Mount Pestilence was crawling with dragons, their nest made deep within the rocky caverns and crevices of the mountain. It was named Mount Pestilence long before the dragons came, the journey itself so rough that it would kill you before any dragon could. Mount Hope wasn't really any nicer. It was named from an old legend that said if you could climb to the top of Mount Hope and yell your heart's greatest wish, it would come true. I didn't believe that, either.

My best friend, Naomi, believed every myth and legend she heard. She says she's even seen a dragon. She says it stood in front of her, and watched her run back and forth from the apple tree in her back yard with her little brother. She had such a vivid description of it. She said it was like a piece of the sky had come loose and was watching her with its beady black eyes. She said there were wisps of clouds that flew from its mouth instead of flame. She always got so excited at the last part of the story. She would exclaim 'Oh how it flew Laura, you should have seen it, the way it twisted and twirled through the sky like a kite, it was majestic'. I told her that she must have eaten something funny, because a dragon would have eaten her and her brother whole.

Naomi and I worked at a tavern where everybody was always complaining about something. The manager complained nobody wanted to come here anymore because of the winged beasts who would swoop down and steal anyone who dared. The patrons complained that everything was overpriced because the goods from the city couldn't reach us unless we hired mercenaries to protect the transport. The food was bad and the drinks were worse, but the manager paid us well and let us stay, so we really had nothing to complain about.

"I hear they're going to dig a tunnel. Right through Mount Hope. The Flyers can't get us if we're underground," one of the men says, the one who drinks half his body weight every night.

"That's a pipe dream," I told him, pouring him another drink.

"You're a-" he slammed his head down on the counter before finishing his sentence.

"When the Monks come down this winter, we'll be fine," says the young boy who tips us because he thinks we're pretty. He doesn't drink, he eats the soup, a nasty sludge, really, and gossips with the other men who like rambling.

"You know what they call us on the other side, right?" a voice from table four says. He likes red pepper flakes in his soup. There were people murmuring and whispering to each other. The Valley of Bones, the Valley of Death, the Valley of Fools. That's what they call us.

"Who cares what they call us," Naomi says, "and besides, those fools wouldn't last a day over here,"

Oh Naomi, you ray of sunshine. Naomi was taller than me, by a bit. She had pitch black hair and skin the color of cinnamon and eyes like chocolate from the city. She was a dreamer. I was a realist. We had an apartment above the tavern, and tonight, when we were getting ready for bed, Naomi, the dreamer, said something that made me think she wasn't a dreamer, but a crazy person.

"Laura, we should catch a dragon," she was laying down on her bed, pulling the covers over her chest. It was the end of fall, and the chill was setting in. Our apartment above the tavern was drafty, the breeze slipping by my legs. I looked at Naomi, who has a solemn face, no humorous expression to be found. I laughed slightly, and decided to play into her dragon fighting fantasy.

"And how do you plan on pulling that off?" I asked her, climbing into my own bed to escape the breeze.

"When the Monks come down. They bring their traps, we bring our knowledge. We could catch one," She said. I want to tell her that her dragon catching idea was a crazier pipe dream than drilling through the mountain.

"That's just-"

"I know what you're going to say, but it's not crazy. It's really not,"

I gave her a look that said 'How?', and she shrugged.

"We survived a flood, the sweating sickness, the crops all failing, and dragons falling out of the bloody sky. We can catch one. Survival is in our blood Laura," Naomi told me, sitting up in her bed. I wanted to inform her that survival was in her blood, not mine. My father died a month before I was born, and my mother, Mina, climbed Mount Hope. I had no idea if she made it to the top, because I never saw her again. I go to tell her that it's a horrible idea, and I'm not helping her, but then I look at her warm smile and pleading eyes, and I sigh, because I know I'm making a mistake.

"I guess so. We have four weeks before the Monks arrive, better get ready," I told her. Naomi smiled.

She's a jinx, Naomi, because as soon as we wanted a dragon, they dropped off the face of the planet. No more sightings, no more disappearances. They simply vanished. And when the Monks came down, they threw a party, to the eradication of the dragons. That was the busiest night of the year. They drank and laughed and cheered until the sun came up, but by then, Naomi and I were already gone.

Naomi and I stole some weapons from the Monks cart. The Monks were odd. They wore emerald green robes, the Queens color, and black bracelets forged from dragon scales, impervious to fire. They say they pray to the highest power, and that was what gave them their protection, but they carried around deadly weapons wherever they went. I don’t know what they would use the weapons for, as we’ve never actually seen the Monks kill a dragon, but we were thankful for them. Naomi took a spear, long and thin, made from a dark metal with intricate carvings from the base of the spear all the way to the sharp tip.

I took a longsword. I couldn't use it, as I'd ever been trained in any such form, but I needed a weapon. When I took the sword out of its casing, I saw detailed engravings on the blade, along with a word. "Mina '' it said. My mother's name. Maybe it was her sword, or my fathers. Maybe it belonged to an unrelated Mina who I didn't even know.

"What's your plan for finding a dragon it they're all gone?" I asked Naomi, who was a few steps ahead of me on the rocky road that led to Mount Hope. She kicked a pebble out of her way.

“They’ll come to us. Two tasty snacks walking all alone and defenseless? We’re irresistible,”

“If you say so,” I had my good boots on, lace-up ones that had been worn just enough so that they were comfortable, but still, the uneven terrain was making my feet hurt. The midday sun was glaring over the mountain and into my eyes, causing me to squint and trip. After another hour of walking, my hair was starting to stick to my forehead with sweat, and I was more thirsty than I had ever been in my life. I rolled the legs of my pants all the way up and pinned them in place just so I wouldn’t pass out. The chill nipped at my cheeks, but still, not even that cooled me off.

“Wanna rest up a bit?” Naomi said. I nodded and collapsed on the ground, guzzling my water like it was the only thing between me and death. “You won’t have to worry about being too hot soon. It’s going to get cold on the mountain,”

“Thank the Queen,” I laughed, wiping away a drop of water from my face.

“When we catch the dragon, you’ll see what I was talking about. They’re majestic,”

“Oh yes, how it was a piece of the sky,”

“Exactly,” Naomi laughed and laid back on the cold frozen ground. After our break, we walked until it got dark. And then we walked more. At the base of the mountain, a little ways up, we decided to spend the night on a small ledge that jutted out from the mountain side, with a thin, almost invisible, layer of snow coating it. I went from burning up to shivering in less than an hour.

“Still too hot, Laura?”

“No, too cold now,”

“Will the temperature ever be perfect?”

“I will complain about the heat. I will complain about the cold. I will complain about everything there is to complain about. That’s just what makes me charming,” I said smugly. Naomi laughed. Despite the cold, I managed to fall asleep. As I was drifting off, Naomi muttered something in her sleep. She said ‘Sky King, where are you?’. It was weird. Not the weirdest thing she’s said, but still, odd.

The orange morning light laid over us like a blanket, warming up the sky and waking up the world. There were pink fluffy clouds and a gorgeous sunrise in the distance. The sunrise on Mount Hope was one of the most beautiful things I’d ever seen. As the warm light filtered through the air and to my eyes, I sat up on the rocky ledge, and turned to face the trail we had come from. This was so stupid. So unbelievably stupid. Why am I here? And then I look at Naomi's sleeping face and I remember why.

I turn back to the trail, and there it is. A dragon. Naomi was right. It looked like a piece of the sky had fallen down to earth. It towered over me, sitting proudly and majestically, like a cat, its enormous tail sweeping over his front feet. Its scales were blue and white, splotched, like clouds in the sky. Its teeth were glistening and perfect, sticking out of his mouth in a vicious snarl. On the top of its head were thin clouds, surrounding it, like he was the very peak of a mountain. It glowed with the morning light to its back, a radiant orange, fading into yellow or pink, clear as day.

“Naomi,” I tried to yell, but no words came out. The dragon looked down at me, then raised its clawed leg. With a single claw, jagged and rough like rocks, it touched my forehead. I was too frightened to move. In a voice like rumbling thunder, I heard it speak.

“We are not the enemy,” It rumbled. I blinked once, and it was gone, vanished into the haze of the morning. Naomi woke up, rubbing her eyes.

“Huh?” she groaned.

“The sky, it spoke,” I told her, staring into the space the dragon occupied.