It took the Templar several long moments to assess what was happening. It appeared that the great beast was helping him. He might live! Aleon stood unable to decide what he should do next. Then depression returned. Hope was foolish, he told himself. The monster was just playing with him. It wanted the kill for himself. When it tired of the game, he'd die. It hardly mattered whether he was killed in this lonely place by a dragon or a Tartar chief.
The knight stood, unsure which enemy represented the most immediate danger. Whichever he faced meant turning his back to the other. Even sitting passively, the hulking mass of the dragon intimidated Aleon. The chief answered his query by shrieking his anger and charging at him. Reluctantly he turned his back on the monster and faced the nomad.
After the initial crossing of swords, Aleon was relieved to see that fighting on foot he held an advantage.
"No smile now?" he taunted the old Tartar as they exchanged blows and thrusts.
The man responded by uttering a wild shriek and attacking without concern for protecting himself. Twice the old nomad's wild swings nearly tore past Aleon's guard. The young knight wasn't wearing any armor and any blow that got through would have felled or maimed him. The few times he managed to land a blow of his own they had been stopped by the nomad's chain mail or cuirass. Then, at the end of another series of frenzied attacks, the chieftain's blade pulled the small man off balance and the Templar saw an opening. Almost before he realized what he had done, Aleon drove his own blade into the Tartar's throat.
The chieftain fell without a sound.
With a wailing cry the three remaining Tartars abandoned the top of the hill and disappeared. Quickly gathering up the nomad's weapon, Aleon turned to face the dragon with a sword in either hand.
"Haven't you fought enough for one day?" it asked. The voice was deep and rumbling with a softness to it Aleon had not expected. But then he had not expected it to talk at all.
"Have you?" the knight asked as he approached the dragon. He found it hard to sound menacing being dwarfed by the dragon's massive bulk.
"I think I'd had enough a long time ago," Aleon was surprised to hear from the red monster.
"Why?" the knight finally asked, gesturing at the fallen nomad and his fleeing followers.
"You were a valiant opponent," the dragon rumbled back. "And you fought to defend your land, not to rob my hoard."
Aleon could only stare, not really ready to understand what was happening. The dragon continued.
"After you dropped that boulder on me, I was quite upset." The dragon spoke calmly, though loudly, as if dealing with some theoretical situation. Aleon found himself almost unable to accept that he was having a conversation with a beast whose very existence he had doubted less than a week before. The dragon, however seemed to find nothing unusual in having a chat with a human while squatting on a hillside next to a dead body.
"Then I found your rope and the scrape marks on the plateau above. I realized you must have been there for days."
"Three," Aleon managed to confirm.
"Yes, three," the dragon agreed, "and you never tried to pillage my lair."
Aleon nodded. The Templar had simply never thought of it. Though perhaps he should have. The legend, but then he was talking to that legend, was that dragons slept on gigantic piles of gold. The booty he might have taken could have outfitted mercenaries to assist him. It also would have returned him to Normandy in style. Choosing discretion, he said nothing.
"I searched you out then, wishing to see what land of knight can resist the call of a dragon's treasure trove." It paused and waved a clawed hand toward the sky. Aleon suspected he had seen the dragon equivalent of a shrug.
"When I thought I'd found you it was your trap," it continued glancing at the wound in its shoulder. "I wondered if I'd judged you wrong. Then I saw you lead those horsemen off to save the others."
Again Aleon decided this was not the time to explain why they were after him alone.
"I watched the chase." It shrugged again. "You have courage. And I have no further desire to do battle with you. We need a truce, you and I. I have a need for a human that I can deal with honorably."
The Templar hesitated as he began to realize the incredulity of his situation. He was standing on a hillside two months hard riding from his relatives in Normandy, having a blood feud with the Tartars and in a conversation with a dragon. When he returned they would never believe any of this happened. Aleon discovered that he was thinking again about living and just how much he wanted to continue to do so. His earlier acceptance of death gone, the knight's heart began to race as he looked up at the gigantic creature standing a few paces away. Why was he talking to a dragon? Was cowardice inspiring his words or prudence? Aleon thought for a long moment and then spit out his challenge before he was unable to say it.
"I cannot make a bargain with a minion of the devil."
"The devil?" the dragon wondered aloud. The knight would have sworn that it was amused at the thought. "Maybe you and your spreading hordes are my devils, but I assure you I have no pact with your evil gods."
"Will you agree to leave this land?" Aleon demanded. He wasn't sure where he was finding the courage.
"Certainly not," the great beast protested mildly. "My kind lived here before yours learned farming. When I heard the land had been abandoned after the plague emptied it, I decided to return."
"Then we must fight," Aleon concluded reluctantly. He looked up at the mountain of muscle sitting a few paces in front of him and realized that he had unconsciously moved to place himself in the shade of the monster's great shadow. The Templar's legs began to weaken as he regarded the beast he had just challenged. The dragon was so large he probably couldn't even reach high enough to strike a vital organ. Certainly not before it simply squashed him like a bug. Then again it had only to breathe its fire and nothing would remain of him at all. There were no caves or cuts in the rock he could hide in this time.
"You can't win," the dragon's words echoed his thoughts. "And you're likely to be busy for some time in any case. The old fellow you just killed is likely to have more sons and dozens of cousins."
Sudden Aleon felt very tired. Nothing was over. It had just begun.
"I didn't move to those isolated mountains to fight," the dragon explained.
The knight raised his eyes again. He was getting tired of facing imminent death and then finding things had changed. Though that was, he immediately reminded himself, better than the alternative outcome. The dragon continued.
"I am old and have fought my battles. Now I wish to study the mystic arts and philosophies. When you live so long as I have, you begin to wonder about things that shorter-lived creatures rarely consider."
"What does a dragon need to wonder about?" Aleon asked, confused. This wasn't like any confrontation with a dragon he had ever heard about.
"To learn enough to ask the right questions," the dragon replied in an even more distant voice. "I've lost interest in wealth and glory. That was a fantasy of my youth. Though many of my kin still value gold and gems above all else. Maybe I just have enough."
Again Aleon regretted that he had not raided the lair and fled with sacks of treasure.
"Perhaps there is a way we can leave each other in peace," the dragon offered in the silence. "Considering that at the moment I am in less danger than you, the offer seems reasonable."
"I can make no contract with a minion of the devil," Aleon objected.
"The devil, again? Hardly! Then a truce perhaps? I have no desire to kill you. I'd prefer to have men of honor, or at least limited greed, around my lair. Once you're gone the nomads will ride freely and eventually find my home. Then I'll have to fight or move again and that's very disruptive."
"You're letting me live because I'm convenient?" the Templar wondered aloud. He was too tired to feel outrage, but was sure he'd just been insulted.
"And because you are rather heroic for one of the little ones. That interests me."
Aleon could only stand and stare. He didn't feel heroic. He felt sore, tired, and the cut on his back stung horribly. He didn't feel he had any real leverage, but if he was to even consider the dragon's offer it had to be something that was tolerable by those he was sworn to protect.
"The farmers cannot afford your raiding their herds. Even if I were to agree they could compel me, or another like me, to seek you out," the knight explained. He wasn't sure why he spoke. If the dragon wanted to let him live he was a fool to argue against that.
"I'll not apologize for needing to eat," the dragon insisted. "Along with the game, I'll need perhaps one or two of your farm beasts in cycle of the moon. How many cattle has your valley lost to those Tartars?"
"Dozens," Aleon admitted sullenly. It was an admission of failure.
"So if those raids stopped, your valley could easily have enough extra cattle and sheep to satisfy my needs," the dragon argued.
"True, but we can reach no agreement," the Templar maintained and wondered why. He wanted to make peace with this dragon. It had just saved his life and he wanted to live.
"Let us say that since I fly every day, should I see any intruders, I might make them unwelcome. How long before they choose to raid somewhere else rather than fight against the two of us?" the dragon offered.
"One farmer's stead burnt or herd scattered and I'll have to come after you," Aleon threatened, raising both swords. But there was no menace in his voice and Aleon found himself smiling. He was looking forward to the look on the Patriarch's face when he told the old cleric that he finally had the much more experienced and powerful protector his station deserved. It just wasn't human.
"Never," the dragon agreed pulling back in mock fright. The motion made the great beast's shoulder hurt where the bolt had torn into the flying muscles and it added "of course" more thoughtfully. Then the dragon rocked back against its closed wings as if frightened off its feet by the man standing before it. The ground shook as tons of dragon shifted. Dust rose and then the dragon feebly kicked its legs, mimicing panic.
Finally, Aleon had an ally; he had to laugh. So did the dragon.
THE POWER WITHIN
by Mickey Zucker Reichert
Joshua leaned against an olive tree, its intermittent branches supplying scant shade from the broiling sun and its reflection from the desert sand. Sweat rolled down his face, plastering black hair to his forehead, stinging his dark eyes, and drenching his loose-fitting shirt. He ignored the discomfort for a greater one that bore no relation to the weather. As general of the Chosen Ones' army, the burdens of a nation lay, aching, on his shoulders; and braving the midday heat seemed the only way to steal a moment alone. Though months old, the Lord's words still echoed in his head: "The lands of the Children of Israel will stretch to the banks of the sea. And you shall lead them." The advance and its myriad wars had already begun. So many dead, enemy and friend alike. So many dead at my command.
Remorse twisted through Joshua, twining uncertainty through the stalwart faith he needed to appease the God he loved and served, usually without question. Now belief seemed as much a burden as the formidable task that lay mostly before and partially behind him. He imagined his obligations as a weight, a seamless casting of the scarce steel that only their Hittite enemy managed to gather in bulk, an impenetrable shielding that even his problems could not breach. But the responsibilities remained, trapped inside the armor with him. Frustration and doubt fostered rage. Who is Joshua to doubt the word or intention of the Lord God? No answer came, no guidance from the One above.
Still clinging to the image of his armor, Joshua sought escape elsewhere. He was a soldier first and foremost. He would find his solace in killing and destruction, in defeating a goliath enemy whose strength and power seemed indomitable. Though only a daydream, the satisfaction of that one perfect soldier's act would displace the negative ideas and thoughts he wished to escape. Having decided his course, he sought a form and figure for the bitterness and uncertainty that plagued him with this restless need to slay. An ancient memory surfaced. As a toddler, he had feared the yellow streaks of lightning that ruptured trees and set cottages to flame. The thunder's boom had sent him skittering and quivering beneath his blanket. Then, his imagination had created a sentience to the storms that terrified him. The jagged flashes became a monster that streaked across the sky, the thunder its roar, so mighty it threatened to tear the world asunder. Over the years, he had tamed the beast he called Ohr, meaning light, then befriended it, riding through the gale-chopped night sky, a warrior on missions of God.
Now, Joshua decided, he would borrow the look of the imaginary friend that had once seemed so real in his infantile ignorance. He could conjure nothing more terrible in adulthood than the figure crafted from a child's terror. He could think of no monster that could better personify the inseparable mixture of frustration, anger, and misery that tore at him now. Closing his eyes, he lost himself in the illusion. He imagined that the evil creature had kidnapped a fair, young maiden named Faith from the Children of Israel; and the great warrior Joshua must slay it and all it represented, restoring Faith to her proper place in his heart and among the people.
A presence awakened the dragon in his cave, even before the faint clink of mail diffused through birdsong to his ears. He sighed, breath hot against his foreleg, not bothering to rise. Massive, red eyes glided open to the familiar darkness of his cave and the distant glow of treasure long owned and no longer appreciated. Once, those trinkets had reminded him of the days of glory, when he and his human friend had rescued them from the clutches of enemies, swooping down on the unworthy like a golden revenant. Now, the storm world of Eshem lay emptily placid, glazed to a quiet, grey calm that matched the tedium of an eternal life grown dull. Despair hounded him. Hope had died years ago. Only a mindless, routine charade goaded him to clamber to his feet. He stretched each leg until the claws splayed, slithering his tail across the stones to work the kinks from every joint, then lumbered toward the mouth of the cave.
As the intruder drew nearer, the dragon analyzed it from habit rather than interest. Though it had not yet come near enough for his keen vision to carve its figure from relentless gloom, he read its nature from its thoughts. Human, it seemed, at least nearer that than anything else with which he had ever had contact. The creature worried the concept of time the way only a mortal could. It also bore the tragedy of understanding death, clutching to concerns about its own and others. It seemed burdened to the point of breaking with responsibilities the dragon could not sift into context. Over all, uncertainty pervaded every thought, and it seemed most focused on the need to destroy a beast of fantasy to place its life back on the even keel it sought. The dragon suspected he was the newcomer's target. And he did not care.
Human. The oddity spurred a long-buried spark of interest. The dragon glided forward, awaiting the approaching figure at the mouth. Within moments, it came around a bend in the pathway. It stood erect, obviously human, though nearly twice the height and three times the weight of his one-time companion. It far more resembled the many foes they had defeated together, dressed from head to toe in metal. A helmet covered all but the eyes that peeped through slits. Iron encased him, jointed to allow for movement that seemed ponderous compared to the natural armored grace of a dragon. He wore a cloth tabard with a blue, six-pointed star on its front, and a sword lay slung at his hip. Any other clothing was buried beneath the protections. From helmet point to boots, he stood barely as long as the dragon's neck.
The dragon remained still, a breeze stirring beneath his scales and the triangular plates drooping along his back. As the man approached, the dragon could taste the bitterness that fueled a murderous rage and the man's intention to quell feelings of helplessness and uncertainty with killing. The dragon wondered who or what had taught him to respond to circumstance in such a violent manner. The enemies of his human friend had seemed little more than parchment cutouts, caricatures of greed who tumbled like flotsam beneath the dragon's roar. The
dragon's friend had been an innocent, incapable of the thoughts that plagued the man who faced him now. He had waved his wooden sword without malice, believing in triumph through faith and friendship, without understanding war's link to blood or destruction.
The man marched directly to the cave and drew his sword, shield strapped to the other arm. "Beast! Come out and fight."
The dragon sucked in a deep breath, then blew it out in a sad sigh, steam twining from his nostrils. From experience, he knew men's vision could not compete with his own. To the stranger, he looked like a shapeless blur in surrounding shadow. "No," he said at length.
The response seemed to baffle the man. The command left his tone, replaced by confusion. "No?"
"No."
The man partially lowered his sword, clearly unprepared for such an answer. More of the anger funneled into perplexity. "Why not?"
"Why?"
"Does it matter?"
"Of course it matters."
The man considered, obviously irritated by the need to think about instead of simply enacting the mindless violence he had sought to uplift his spirits. The dragon understood that the man simply assumed a creation of his own imagination would behave precisely as he decided it would and with no more provocation than himself, so opposite the expectations of the child who had befriended the dragon years ago. "Because . . ." the man cried. "Because you've captured a beautiful woman, and I've come to rescue her."
The dragon smiled for the first time in longer than two decades, managing to find a hint of lost enjoyment in the man's discomfort and the game. "No, I haven't."
"You haven't?"
The dragon shook his head. His jagged, iridescent horns rattled against stone. "What would I do with a human woman?"
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