A Dragon Story

A man paced outside of large door. An extremely large door, with gold painted around the frame, although it was not the door he was afraid of. He was afraid of the man on the other side, the man who would give him no mercy, the man known as king.
‘Bloody well that this happened!” he thought to himself. He gave a passerby an extremely unfriendly look along with a quite rude gesture and felt guilty.
Beads of sweat ran down his face as he adjusted his armor to his liking. He had been right in the middle of counting how many pebbles he could spot with the same shape when he finally decided that it was now or never. He grunted loudly as he pushed open the door, all the while wondering why it had to be so heavy. He had gotten it a quarter of the way open when a voice from the other side greeted him.
“Good news I hope Thomas.” The booming voice was all but welcoming.
“well your majesty, about that!” Thomas grunted some more as he managed to get the door open enough to slip on through, “you see, its good in the sense that no one was very badly injured, although for you it is probably something that you do not really want to hear.” He stared down a narrow walkway lined with red silk. At the end of the walkway was a robust man with an air of authority around him. He was tall when not sitting and had a thick gray beard covering most of his face. His beard had bits of food from a past dinner hanging around, and Thomas could swear he had seen a piece of chicken making its way to the mans scalp with a compass.
“How might it be bad news for me Thomas? Did you not do everything you could?” The king asked, his eyebrow raising, his suspicion aroused.
“Well,” Thomas chuckled nervously, “its a lot more complicated than that. You see when the dragon came he-“
“Yes?”
“You must realize that it is very difficult to commit suicide by bursting into flames. It is quite painful you know.” He said tugging on the back of his armor pulling out a wedgie.
“Go on then.”
“Yes, well when the dragon came. Well he ran off with your,” He inched back towards to door looking for a daring escape, “Daughter.” He said meekly.
The king’s eyes glazed over suddenly, Thomas turned pale white, and the sound of violins played in the background all in one instance.
“What?” the king asked, his glare cutting through Thomas and serving him up on the new china.
“Yes, well. That was all it. But the good news is that none of the men were hurt.”
“my daughter has been taken by a big fire breathing dragon and all you can say is that none of your men were hurt?!” Spit seemed to wash over the room and all over the fresh tile and stone. The sound of a door slamming was heard and both men stopped to look at the source. A young woman was standing in the entrance to the room, apparently having had no problem in opening the door. Her face was pink and wet showing she had been crying recently. Her dark brown hair covered the right side of her face under her crystal crown.
She ran across the ivory and ebony floor to the side of the throne and sat her self in a side throne right next to it and stared closely at Thomas. He winced under the glare. The king looked warmly at the thin girl and put a pudgy hand on her hand. Just as quickly his eyes turned to ice and went back to Thomas.
“You, Thomas you are going to go get my daughter back.”
“I’m sorry, excuse me?” Thomas tried to clean out his ears.
“You will find the dragon, find my daughter, and save her!” The king spat a little more adding to the puddle forming on the floor.
“I don’t think that is altogether probable” Thomas was staring dumbly at the king.
The kings face turned a bright red to the point Thomas thought it would explode. If it hadn’t been for the young girl piping up right then his head might have exploded.
“Father, I want to go too” she said, her voice sounded weak.
“No, Abigail.’
“Please father I-“
“No Abigail! It is to dangerous,” she turned her head away from him, and stared at the opposite wall. Her silent sobs were all but visible.
Thomas had been nervously twitching his fingers when the king turned back him, “ You will find my daughter or you will die trying. End of story.”

“Jesus, what have I gotten myself into?” Thomas thought as he strapped on the harness to his horse. “What have I gotten us into crystal girl?”
He fondly patted his horse on it’s nose. He hooked up the cart to the back of the Crystal and put food and his sword inside. “Bloody time to be a knight!” he yelled and threw his helmet in the back. He got on crystal and started her off towards the forest. He had said goodbye to everyone he had meant to, it had only taken a few seconds seeing as he was single for life, and he had not been a particularly social person. It wasn’t his fault really it was possibly just the fact that everywhere he went people seemed to die. Just one of the perks of being a knight he guessed.
He trotted along the road with a strap in one hand and a bottle of scotch in the other. He had been on the road for 20 minutes when he heard a thump from the back. He did a double tack almost dislocating his head in the process. ‘Crap.’ He said grabbing a dagger and moving towards the back of the cart. His hand was shaking as he saw the sheets from the cart move.
He help but think how pathetic it would be if he died before he ever got to start the mission
He slowly grabbed the sheets and pulled them off. There lying in the protection of the cart was the young princess Abigail staring straight back at him.
He was stunned for a few moments, and it appeared as though she was too. It took a long while before either of them could regain any senses they may have previously owned.
“What are you doing here?!” Asked Thomas with his hands on his head, though he had thick brown hair, he was quickly going bald.
“I’m here to save my sister, what do you think I’m doing here? Do you think I’m going to leave this in the hands of an incapable knight?”
Thomas was trying to figure out what was going on and at the same time was trying to let her go with the fact that she had just called him incompetent.
“I’m taking you back!” he said.
“right, and tell my dad that you kidnapped me and decided you didn’t want me? I can see it now, yes sir here’s your daughter back. I’m sorry I took her but at least I gave her back!” Abigail grinned mischievously.
“But I never took you in the first place!” he shouted.
“That’s not what my daddy will believe.”
Thomas sighed deeply. Who’d have thought that a princess thought that way?
“fine, you can come with me, but you are staying in the back.”
He climbed back into front and got behind crystal and absentmindedly began driving the horse again, driving over every bump in the road, and savoring the princesses yelps of discomfort.

“are we there yet?” Abigail whined.
“Shut up!” Tomas screamed. He looked back for a moment and added, “princess.”
“Christ man, I’ve been down here for 5 hours, can I at least stretch my legs?”
“You probably don’t want to do that here.” Said Thomas stopping the horse.
“Why not!” She got up out of the cart and brushed off her blue gown. Drew her head up over the side to see.
“Well, I guess first of all is that we are here, and second is that I really don’t feel like getting flamed into a chicken nugget.”
“what’s a chicken nugget?”
“Never mind that, here.” He threw back a sheathed sword at her narrowly missing her leg.
“Watch where you’re throwing that! What am I supposed to do with this?”
Thomas looked back with a stupid look on his face. He was looking at her from head to toe and then smiled a little as if enjoying what he was about to say.
“Well you’ll be using it of course. Didn’t think you could go about chasing a dragon with me without fighting a little. That is what I do, that it what you wanted to do.”
She glanced nervously at the sword and reluctantly picked them up. Her face was a mixture of emotions but he could tell that she was as determined as he was scared out of his mind.
The climb to the top of the mountain was the longest he had ever had. The cave at the top loomed in front of him and only seemed to tell him that dying seemed to be his only option at the moment. He looked back at Abigail who was trailing along sluggishly.
“You can always leave you know!” he yelled back, he wished he could. She frowned at him but said nothing.
They finally reached the top only to be confronted with the cave itself. The stone was charred and burned. Ashes where strewn everywhere and Sir Thomas grimaced as he tried to avoid stepping in a large pile of something he really did not want to think about at the moment. He dropped his canteen into one of them, and cursed the day he’d ever thought of buying a cowhide one instead of the water and dung proof.
He took a step inside the cave slowly, the air was hot and grimy and smoke rose from the rocks inside. Abigail inched forward, her sword at her side. She couldn’t afford to be a coward right now. Not like that stupid knight she thought to herself. She took a look at him, and laughed silently, wondering how he had ever become a knight.
They reached a large opening somewhere after 15 minutes of walking. Sir Thomas took a look inside, and came back just as quickly. His face was milk white. This was how Abigail knew the dragon was in there.
“So?” she whispered softly, “What’s the matter?”
Sir Thomas gulped an extremely large gulp, “Well, the dragon is definitely in there. There is no doubt about that. Your sister is in there as well of course.”
Abigail brushed past his and proceeded to the entrance. Sir Thomas franticly grabbed her arm and pulled her back roughly. “what are you crazy!?” he asked. Abigail noticed a slight bit of drool running down the side of his cheek, “We can’t go in there!”
“Why not? I thought we are going to get my sister!” she inquired hastily.
Sir Thomas paced around in a circle clutching his forehead, and stringing his hair through his hands, “ because!” he said like a little child, “ there’s a dragon In there! A great big bloody fire breathing dragon! Complete with full set of teeth, and a lovely little pair of claws on the side. by the way, did I mention that we’ll die?”
“Isn’t that a risk that we are supposed to be willing to take?” Abigail glared at him.
“well yes technically. There are some situations that you don’t mess with though. I mean when having a choice between getting chewed on like a rawhide bone, or living in the back of my horses cart, I’d say only hay for me from now on.”
“Christ what kind of knight are you?! You’d probably be afraid of your own shadow if you knew that it was stuck to the ground! I mean honestly, do you really expect my sister to stay there for a little while until the dragon just lets her out and wishes her a good day? I honestly don’t care about what you do right now but I am definitely going in. By the way if you haven’t noticed I have a sword.
Thomas felt a slight twinge of guilt in his chest and stared into the eyes of the determined girl. He also stared at the sword she was clumsily hanging on to unable to keep it in the air.
“Fine, we’ll go, but we need a plan.”
Abigail smiled, and Thomas was taken aback. It was the first time he had ever seen her smile, unfortunately it had to also be the first time he died.
“Great! A plan to save my sister, and to kill the dragon of course.” She said, dropping the sword lightly to the ground and leaning against a pointy rock.
“Alright, so the your sister is in a cage right?” Abigail nodded, “ so our first priority is to get her out of course. There is a hole for a key so we have to find the key, so maybe you could just hit the lock with a big rock or something.”
“A rock?” she looked at him dumbly, “ that’s the best you could come up with is a rock?”
“This is a very stressing time ok, so I’d appreciate a bit of flexibility here!”
“Fine.” she sighed.
Thomas edged nervously towards to entrance looked inside. The dragon slept in the middle of the stone room surrounded by rocks. It was bright red, had jagged claws jutting out of both hands, and it’s tail was covered with pointy spikes of bone. He hated those kinds of dragons. Next to the dragon was a small looking girl sprawled on the bottom of a golden cage.
Thomas had been making his way into the room on his own accord when Abigail brushed past him and headed straight for the cage. He winced slightly as if expecting the dragon to wake up any moment. She ran over to the cage her sister was in an looked at the young girl.
“Penelope,” she whispered, “are you awake?”
The girls head turned up from the bottom of the cage. Her eyes were puffy and swollen, and her hair was unkempt. “Abigail?” she asked frailly.
“Of course it’s me did you think I would leave you here? Christ you look terrible. Well lets get you out of there.” the young girl smiled weakly as if she weren’t used to it.
Abigail looked around the cavern for the key. She had been scanning the walls when she noticed a small glint from the dragons neck. She looked closely and noticed, to her dismay, that the dragon was wearing the key around his neck.
“Of course.” she said to herself, and with that picked up a rock and began to beat the cage.
Thomas had been only inches away from the dragon when he heard Abigail begin to beat the cage. He stood as still as possible, wondering why she couldn’t wait until after he had stabbed the dragon before whacking at the cage like a maniac. He stared intently at the dragon, and inched a little closer. He turned his eyes towards Abigail for a moment to see how far along she was getting along, and found that she really was getting no where. He turned his eyes forward and moved another inch towards the dragon and stopped dead in his tracks.
He found himself staring into the giant green eye, of an entirely awake dragon and felt the small trickle of liquid run down his, to young to die, leg.
“Crud.” he said quickly, “ Abigail!”
“What do you want, and why are you yelling?” she asked impatiently.
“Stop hitting the stupid cage and pay attention.”
She turned away from her project just in time to see the dragon lumber to his mammoth feet, and cock his head slightly to one side, “Oh no…”
She picked up the rock again, and tried again on her futile attempts on the cage. Frustrated the threw the rock at the lock, and amazingly broke it off. She stood for a moment wondering how she could have broken it just by throwing it, but decided not to question any further. She gathered Penelope in one arm and ducked behind a boulder as a large and seemingly dangerous fireball hurled past them, singeing Abigail’s dress slightly.
Thomas was just fine. Actually he was more than fine. He was quite happy. He heard that right before you die, you become at peace with yourself. At least that was one troth he was told in his life. He held his sword ready at his chest, and stared at the dragon staring back at him. It took a step forward, and he nervously took a step back. The Dragon shook slightly, but the ground shook violently. It took him a moment to realize that the dragon was actually laughing at his. Thomas’s eyes glazed over, and his eye brows furrowed. A dragon laughing at him was just a little more than he could take, and seeing as he was still alive, he could take a lot. The dragon began to run, tumbling towards him. Thomas put one foot on a small rock behind him and pushed off thrusting with everything he had. He felt a searing pain across his shoulder as it was torn below the joint by a sharp claw. He landed perfectly balanced on both feet, only to fall forward to his stomach trying to stand up straight. ‘great’ he thought,’ ‘ here’s where it rips me apart.’ He braced himself for five minutes before noticing that he failed to be ripped apart, an wondered why. He lifted his head and looked behind he to the dragon. It was standing upright but its head was slumped over in an odd position.
Then he noticed a small pool of blood being emitted from its chest. He also noticed that his sword was apparently lodged in the dragons chest. Abigail looked up from behind the boulder slightly, staring at the dead dragon. She told Penelope so stay where she was as she began to advance towards it. She kept her hand on the hilt of her sword the entire time, her heart beating fast. She walked to the front of it, and saw the bubbling blood spurt from the creatures chest. It’s eyes were open in shock, and it’s mouth was slightly open, all it’s teeth showing. She managed to muster enough courage to pick up her sword and cutting off a single claw from the dragons foot.
The dragons body shivered slightly, and fell to the ground causing the ground to crack beneath it. She walked over towards the pathetic looking Thomas and put an arm on his hurt shoulder.
“Your hurt.” she said smugly. “Nice job by the way.”
“Only a nice job?” he grinned at her, showing a few of his teeth, “I thought I did alright out there.”
“Yeah, you did alright. We got what we came for.” she looked at her sister who was timidly staring at the deceased dragon on the ground, “ this is for you.”
She handed Thomas the piece of claw, and he grunted as he took It in his hand. He examined it for a little, feeling oddly proud of himself. He killed this dragon, him, not any one else. He smiled at the claw, then to Abigail, who was fondly smiling back. He took her hand in his and helped himself up. He looked over at Penelope and beckoned her over to come to the both of them. She hesitated for a moment before the twelve year old decided to obey.
“Are you okay?” He asked. She nodded meekly.
“And are you going to stay okay?” she nodded once more
“Excellent, well that solves these dragons escapades for me.”
“What are you talking about?” Abigail asked, “ Now your going to get more missions than before. Now that you’ve proven yourself that is.”
Thomas looked crestfallen, “I don’t suppose we could just say that you sister found her own way to us.”
Abigail laughed, “ Not a chance.”
Thomas picked up Penelope and set her on his back, and set off with Abigail to the wagon at the bottom of the mountain.