The Dragon's Tale

“There weren't always dragons in the Valley, were there, Highness?” asked the Duke.

The Queen sat back slightly in her chair, preparing herself for the same well-rehearsed performance she had seen so many times before, when the wine had been drunk, and the fire grew low. She folded her hands in her lap and looked down at them, waiting for the King to respond.

“Why, no indeed,” he said, leaning in toward his enraptured audience. The lords smiled, knowing the story well, while the ladies prepared to listen, eyes wide. “It has been…a year, now?”

“Almost two, Sire,” corrected the Duke.

“Two! My word. Two years since…the Battle of Firewyrm Tower.” The King paused for effect, soaking in the recognition of the court. The Queen closed her eyes, swallowing the ridiculousness of the name he had invented for a run-down, two-story rockpile in the middle of nowhere, a name for the balladeers to sing, to immortalize his ‘victory.’ The foolishness of man would never cease to amaze her.

“Go on, Sire,” urged a lord. “Tell us of your daring rescue.” The King chuckled, flattered. The Queen sank her long nails into the fabric of her dress. Rescue. If only they knew.

“Well,” the King began. “I had long heard tell of a beautiful maiden, the fairest in all the land.”

The Queen felt the eyes of the court upon her. She forced herself to return their glances with her own, golden-green. The men stared back with that hungry, hunting look; the women looked away, unsettled.

“But legend said,” the King went on, “that she was guarded by a fearsome beast, with talons as long as your forearm, teeth as sharp as knives, and fiery breath hotter than the Sun.”

“Were you not afraid, My Lord?” asked one blushing maiden. The King smiled smugly, causing the girl to blush further. The Queen looked away, not in jealousy, but pity for her naivete. She would learn what it was she blushed for, soon enough.

“Why, of course I was afraid,” said the King. “But how could I leave the lady in the hands of such a monster? Someone had to save her.”

“So how did you do it, My Liege?” another lord chimed in. “How did you slay the dragon?”

The Queen was staring coolly at the King now, not that anyone would have noticed. All heads and hearts were turned to him, the great hero of lore. How she loathed him.

“I had done my research,” the King went on. “Read all the ancient tomes. Spoken to the elders. I knew the dragon’s weakness: its wings. The stories said that to ground the dragon would rob it of its power, and, this done, it would be nothing to defeat it. So I crept up on the tower silently, like the night–”

The court was hanging on his every word. The blushing maiden rested her chin in her hand, watching as the King pantomimed along with his words. “I drew my bow,” he said, pulling two fingers back toward his eyeline. The listeners leaned in toward him.

“And then–just before I was about to release my arrow–the dragon looked at me.”

A few ladies gasped.

“It knew you were there, My Lord?” said the Duke.

“It was as though the beast sensed me as I approached–”

“Sensed its impending doom!” interjected a lord, to a few guttural laughs from the other gentlemen present. The ladies shushed them, craving more.

The Queen held her breath, hearing the lies before they were spoken.

“And then,” said the King, looking around the room pointedly at each avid listener, “The dragon soared into the air, roaring as it did, a roar to shake the Earth!”

He was standing now, towering over them with arms spread, to demonstrate the great hulking mass of the dragon.

“It sprayed fire in my direction. I leapt behind the ramparts, and drew my bow back to position. As the dragon spun, rounding on me once more, I took aim at the flesh of its huge, scaly wing. It glided over me, blocking out the light of the moon, and I was sure it would swoop down and catch me up in its great fangs. As it descended, I steadied my bow, knowing that this shot might be my last.”

The room was silent. Anticipation furrowed every brow; ladies clutched their breathless breasts.

“I shot,” said the King, letting go of his imaginary arrow, eyes pointed to the gilded ceiling as if it were the starry Valley sky. “The dragon reeled, careening down toward the earth, wailing as it went. The arrow had found its intended home. The dragon was made powerless, and thereafter I brought its life to a merciful end.”

He sat down, satisfied that his narration had been brought to a thrilling finale. The ladies fanned themselves, aflame with excitement. “And what of the maiden?” smiled the Duke, prompting the required happy ending.

All eyes again turned to the Queen, who sat, still as a statue, unmoved by the King’s theatrics. The King smiled at her tightly. “Why, there she sits,” he said. “Safe and well.”

“Thanks to you,” said the Duke. The court broke into bravos and applause, and the Queen curled her lips carefully into the expected expression of gratitude. The King turned away from her gaze, back to his fawning admirers, and the Queen breathed a hot breath, releasing her rage into the cool damp of the banquet hall.

Would they admire him so if they knew the real story? She, asleep on her perch, too far strayed from home. A footfall in the night, a glint of steel in the dark, a shaky, coward’s arrow, and it had all been over in an instant. She ran her hand along her right arm, feeling the scar beneath her brocade sleeve. The enchantments of old had done their work. A wounded wing had forced her into human form, stolen her ability to shift back. There had been no battle. There had only been her, naked, frightened, and at his mercy.

No one seemed to question the hasty marriage, nor its lack of fanfare. That it had been conducted at the point of a sword was knowledge privy only to the King, the Queen, and of course the Duke, who had been the one holding it. Once the legends had begun to circulate, she was simply the fair maiden, rescued from the evil beast, and nothing she said could have changed anyone’s mind. She had no opportunity, in any case, locked as she was in her chamber, but for the nights like tonight, when she was paraded in front of castle guests. Too weak, at first, to try to fight, her attempts to speak were met with further cruelty.

So she stayed silent. And waited. And grew stronger.

The acclamation died down, silence once more descending on the King’s entourage. He had taken on a pensive countenance, looking past them all, through a darkened window into the unseen Valley below.

“And now dragons have returned, you say,” he said mostly to himself.

“Yes, Your Majesty,” said the Duke. “One has been spotted to the east, flying low above the treeline.”

The Queen looked up from her reverie. Was it too soon?

No–she could feel it in her blood. She was ready.

“Well then,” said the King, standing decisively. “Perhaps it is time for another adventure.”

The court cheered. The men patted him on the back. The blushing maiden looked on adoringly.

The Queen smiled.

Perhaps, she thought, he imagined himself destined for further greatness. Perhaps he dreamed that another fair damsel awaited him, one who would not refuse him so obstinately, or look upon him with coldness or contempt. One more amenable to being conquered.

She watched him from across the room, her green-gold eyes almost flickering.

She had been practicing, in the Valley to the east. Shifting. Flying again, after all this time. For all his pompousness, he was not clever enough to understand that what he had done could be undone, with time. Locks on all the doors, but not one on the windows--foolishness indeed. Since the day she arrived, she had been readying herself to flee her captors. To return to her kind. And when she did, there would be nowhere he could hide that they would not find him. Legend would tell of the battles that would be fought in the days to come–but this time, she was determined, he would not survive to alter the telling of it. She watched him and his men, lifting their goblets, celebrating their future victory, and knew that these celebrations would be their last.

The Great Dragon War was about to begin.