by Jack Heckel
Elle swallowed. “You swear that you will not harm him?”
The dragon nodded and placed a taloned claw to its chest. “I promise that if you come with me before he breaches this chamber, he will live to see the dawn. I cannot swear that I will be able to stay my wrath if we come face-to-face this night. I also cannot vouch for him in the coming days. It seems unlikely that he will let your capture go unavenged. If I mark his character correctly, he will hunt me, and only one of us shall survive the meeting if he should find me.”
It was as much as she could ask.
“Very well,” she said softly. “Let us go.”
Another blow came against the door. This time a distinct crack and pop issued from the oaken timbers. Elle knew that time was short, but the knowledge that Will was inches from her and that she was leaving him and that this might be the last time that she was ever this close to him was too much for her courage to bear. She reached back and touched the wood of the door. She waited and felt the door jerk against her hand as, once again, Will’s body impacted against it, because she knew without a doubt that he was the one battering against it. This time, the latch flexed and bent inward against the force of his assault.
“Lady?” the dragon said somberly. “If we are to away, it must be now.”
Elle nodded silently, and whispered, “Goodbye, Will.” She turned and walked away, letting her hand on the door trail behind her.
As she marched across the room toward the dragon, her eyes fell on her wedding dress, and despite herself, she began to cry. Still, she kept moving, knowing that to stop now was to stop forever and sentence Will to death. The tears running down her face stung where the salt met the scratches from the glass. She pulled a lace handkerchief from the sleeve of her dressing gown and wiped her eyes.
She reached the balcony as another blow came from behind her. She did not turn to look, but heard the audible groan as the door began to give way. Will shouted, “Elle, I am coming, Elle! If you touch her, dragon—” but the threat was never completed as he prepared for his final assault.
Standing beside the dragon she was more aware than ever of the creature’s sheer bulk. Arrows from the castle’s archers bristled here and there on the beast’s body, lodged between its armored plates and ridges, but they seemed like pins in a cushion—insignificant and laughable. The dragon balanced on one of his hind legs and turned the other over to make a sort of platform.
“If you will be so kind,” the dragon said, indicating with his head the upturned claw.
Carefully, she sat in his scaled palm, holding on to one of the talons for balance like an infant grasping her mother’s finger. The dragon carefully closed his claw, encircling and cradling her. Instantly, the heat from the dragon’s body warmed her so that she did not even notice the bite of the night air through her thin dressing gown.
“Be ready, Lady,” the dragon said earnestly. “If you are afraid of heights, this will not be pleasant, but know that I will keep you safe.”
She felt the creature’s muscles tense, and, like a stone from a sling, he launched his body into the air. Despite the dragon’s warning, Elle shrieked involuntarily as they began to drop from the sky. And then the dragon extended his wings above them and caught the air. Roaring and spurting flame, the dragon flexed his shoulders and began rhythmically beating his wings against the sky. At every stroke, they climbed higher. With a speed that made Elle gasp, the castle fell away beneath them.
In the rush of wind that followed their passage, Elle’s handkerchief was torn from her grasp. She turned and watched it flutter back down toward the ruined balcony. For an instant, she saw Will, far below, silhouetted against the red light of the doorway. He was standing at the edge of the balcony, sword in hand, pointing up at the sky, then the dragon banked, and the sight vanished.
She was alone with the dragon in the arms of the night.
Standing on the balcony of Elle’s chamber in the Royal Tower of Castle White, Will watched impotently as the dragon disappeared into the night sky. Rage and disbelief warred within him. He heard himself giving orders for the archers to fire and for the huntsmen to be summoned and the soldiers assembled for pursuit, but everything that was him was elsewhere in a roaring place of terrible despair.
Something small and white fluttered to the ground at his feet. It was one of Elle’s delicate handkerchiefs, identical to the one she’d given to him all those months before at the crossroads where he had fallen in love with her, but unlike that one, this was stained with her blood.
“No!” he said with a choking sob. Will fell to his knees, his sword clattering to the stones at his feet and his hands clutching for the bit of cloth.
The captain of the guards, Sir Alain, whispered in his ear. “Don’t worry, Your Majesty, we already have our fastest horsemen following. The dragon won’t stay hidden. We will find her. I swear on my life, we will find her.”
Will nodded. Bracing himself against Alain, he rose and picked up his sword. “Tell the men to assemble in the courtyard. We march within the hour.”
Alain saluted, and, with a few shouted orders, the men departed. Alone, Will looked about at the ruins of the room, his mind recreating the moments of terror Elle must have felt. At his feet, carved into the hard stone of the floor, was a message from the dragon.
You deprived me of my love, Dragonslayer. Now, I deprive you of yours. –The Dragon of the North.
The old lie had come back to haunt him. The fault truly was his. His eyes fell on her wedding gown. The dress she hadn’t wanted him to see. The dress that now he wasn’t sure she would ever wear.
“No, that will not happen,” Will said in a voice that sounded brittle even to him. He felt an indescribable pain, which he could only imagine was the shattering of his soul.
Whatever it cost, he swore to himself that he would find the dragon, save Elle, then slay the beast and send its vile spirit screaming to Hell. He didn’t care about the kingdom, or his crown, or his life. His life and his rule no longer mattered. They were forfeit. He had failed in his most important charge—to protect his beloved. He would go north and face this dragon, but he knew that he would need help. There was only one man in the entire kingdom who had spent his entire life training to kill a dragon.
“I need Charming.”
*One other less dignified, but infinitely more toastable, point in his favor was his now nearly legendary night of drinking at the Cooked Goose. In Royaume, a good night out with the lads is commonly referred to as pulling a King Willy.
CHAPTER 2
OLLY, OLLY OXEN FREE
Panic is like fire: It only takes a spark to light it, and it spreads quickly when fed by the right fuel—rumor, fear, and ignorance. In the Kingdom of Royaume, all the conditions were perfect for a panic following the kidnapping of Lady Rapunzel. King William had ridden from the castle in pursuit of the dragon only an hour after the attack. His advisor, Lord Rupert, tried to calm the people, but given his terrible history with dragons, sensible folk ignored him. Less sensible folk made up their own accounts of what happened, and as a result, the event known as the Great Dragon Panic spread like wildfire through the land.
During those early days of the Great Dragon Panic, it seemed that no amount of absurdity was beyond the people’s belief. Dragons were seen everywhere, and they all seemed to be bent on ridding Royaume of its young maidens. If the tales traded by the merchants in the village markets were to be believed, the skies above Prosper teemed with whole flocks of dragons, and with every claim of a dragon sighting from Prosper, the town of Two Trees responded with two claims of its own. Several families in both towns actually claimed that their daughters had been kidnapped, even while voices that sounded like the young women in question were heard from behind a pantry door or an upstairs window. Old stories and superstitions about dragons were also revisited, including tales of wizards and fairies and witches who could defeat
such creatures. These stories soon began to lead people in search of the author of The Dragon’s Tale, a man known as the Dracomancer.
However, any references to The Dragon’s Tale also led to people talking about another man—Prince Charming. Although he had lost his title and vanished from public view since Princess Gwendolyn’s usurpation of the throne, the reappearance of dragons had meant a resurrection of his legend. The prophecy that Prince Charming would slay the dragon and free the Princess had ingrained itself so solidly in the minds of the populace that many saw the kidnapping of Rapunzel as a sign that it was still valid. Indeed, many began to say that the first dragon had not been the dragon of prophecy at all and that this was why the Prince had never gone to slay it. After being ignored by nearly everyone in the kingdom for over a year, the people of Royaume were suddenly begging for Prince Charming’s return. The only problem was that nobody seemed to know where he might be found.
As for Charming himself, he had retired to a quiet cottage in the woods with his wife—the King’s sister, Elizabeth Charming—and life was going well . . . perhaps too well.
Increasingly, a sense of restlessness had crept over Charming. While he had unsurpassed skills as a hunter, the animals in the enchanted forest surrounding the cottage had no fear of humans. In fact, they seemed to have an unnatural attraction to people. They would simply walk up to Charming, nearly begging to become dinner. It took all the challenge out of the hunt and, quite frankly, was a little creepy.
He had suggested at times to his wife that they should return to Castle White so Elizabeth could advise the soon-to-be-queen, Lady Rapunzel, and he could advise King William, but Elizabeth had little desire to go to court and thought that her brother and Elle were doing quite well on their own. Although Charming thought his wife’s view of court was tainted by her previous experiences, he couldn’t argue with her. All things considered, Charming and Liz had all they needed and more at their little cottage, which perhaps explained the ox.
Edward Michael Charming sat down heavily on a stump at the edge of his newly plowed field and cast a critical eye across his handiwork. He had done everything himself. Well, he and the ox had done everything themselves. Of course, Liz had protested that her little vegetable garden was sufficient for the two of them, but Charming knew that once she saw how he had tamed the very land to his command she would come to appreciate his efforts—and also to appreciate Goliath, the ox, to whom she had not exactly warmed yet.
The buying of the ox had been a real test of their relationship. When he had first pledged to her a field so bountiful it would make other farmers weep with envy, she had told him that she thought it was a bad idea, but that if he was determined to “try his hand at farming,” she would make sure he at least had a proper draft horse and plow to prepare the earth. This idea of “plowing” had intrigued Charming, and, not wishing to appear ignorant, he had quickly written to King William, the only other farmer he knew, so that he might explain what exactly was required to “farm.” The answer, or rather answers, as Will’s response had been quite lengthy and filled with many details that Charming did not follow, gave him to understand that there was more to farming than simply dropping seeds onto the ground.
Who knew?
But the one thing that the letter had confirmed was the need for a plow animal—the bigger the better. Liz, of course, had wanted to get involved, but he had informed her that he was quite capable of handling everything. He was renowned throughout the land as having a fine eye for horseflesh—flanks and withers were no mystery to him. So, he had gone to market and found a merchant who had not only sold him a fine plow but the largest animal to pull it possible—an ox—whom Charming had immediately named Goliath as the creature was magnificently huge.
Charming’s luck hadn’t ended there, for, after Charming had confessed that he knew little of farming and that perhaps purchasing such a large creature was premature, the merchant had assured him that Goliath was magical and not only had the ability to understand Charming’s words, but that he also knew all there was to know about farming. All Charming had to do, so the merchant explained, was to point Goliath at a field, and the beast would plow it himself. Such good fortune had its price, of course, but Charming had gladly given the man a bag of gold for such a renowned beast.
The proof of this claim lay before him, a fully plowed field. Charming studied the rows, which zigged and zagged this way and that and bent in odd loops and curves. It didn’t look exactly like the fields he’d ridden past on his jaunts through the kingdom. Those always seemed to have perfectly straight lines of crops, but then he reflected that those farmers hadn’t had to contend with so many obstacles. His field was littered with stumps and rocks and all sorts of things that Goliath had needed to plow around.
The point was, there had been much churning of the earth, which from Will’s letter Charming understood was necessary for the sowing of the ground, or was it the reaping of the ground? Farm terminology was a bit stupefying. Still, he was beginning to wonder how much Goliath really knew about farming. He had specifically asked the creature whether or not they should remove all those things from their path before starting, but Goliath clearly shook his head no.
Charming regarded Goliath, who stood quietly beside him munching on grass. Such a noble beast.
“I’m glad you know what you’re doing.”
The ox lifted his gaze and stared back at Charming with those big brown eyes, his jaw moving in a slow circular motion as he chewed. Such intelligent eyes.
“You do know what you’re doing, don’t you?”
Goliath shook his head, flapping his ears and sending a cloud of flies that had been buzzing around him scattering to the winds.
“You don’t?”
The ox dipped its head in an ambiguous motion that Charming couldn’t interpret and ripped more grass from the ground. The flies returned, settling again on the creature’s head.
“It is all well and good for you to understand me, but we really need to work on me understanding you. Perhaps if you could moo, or whatever you do, once for yes and twice for no?”
Goliath shook his ears again, and the flies took flight once more.
Charming kicked at a dirt clod and mumbled, “Next time, I should probably ask how much an ox usually costs before buying one.”
Goliath snorted.
“Yes, you are quite right. It wouldn’t have mattered. You are certainly worth a mere bag of gold.”
Goliath’s ears twitched, and the animal lifted its head ponderously to glance at the cottage. Charming followed the ox’s gaze and saw Liz heading down the hill toward them.
“It is an amazing field, isn’t it, Goliath?”
The animal made no response to this except a deep belch.
“I mean, who would have thought that I, Prince Charming, could have plowed a field? Of course, I’m not a prince anymore, so perhaps I should be called Farmer Charming.”
The ox stared at him with a look that Charming thought might be incredulity.
“You’re right, it just doesn’t sound believable. Even with my hands roughed and sweat on my brow”—he wiped his forehead dramatically with a silk handkerchief—“I’m too dashing to pull off being a farmer. I’m not even sure what tights a farmer should wear, or if they even wear tights. Perhaps I should try the Farmer-formerly-known-as-Prince-Charming?”
The ox shook his head and looked away.
Charming was about to suggest to Goliath that matching outfits in greens and browns could work when he noticed Elizabeth was now standing at the other end of the field, hands on her hips, staring across at him.
She must be impressed, he thought. I don’t think she every really believed that Goliath and I could finish the work—and so quickly!
She began making her way through the maze of crisscrossing furrows Goliath had carved into the ground,
and he watched her red hair catch the light as she came closer. His heart pounded with the joy he always felt upon seeing her, but this time it was multiplied by the pride he felt at having accomplished something. He could scarcely believe he had plowed a field.
“Edward! What have you done?”
He smiled and swept his arms across the expanse of broken earth. “Behold! The magnificent, unsurpassed, amazing fields of the Charming’s! Am I not now the great and humble farmer I promised you I would become?”
“This is . . .” She searched for a word.
“Stupendous?” he supplied.
“Terrible,” she replied darkly. She made a half-shrugging gesture that reminded Charming of her brother, Will. “I mean, I didn’t think you could do too much damage, but really, look at these furrows. It looks like they were plowed by a drunk, blind man. What were you thinking?”
“Well, I trusted the arrangement of the rows and things of that sort to Goliath, naturally.”
The ox bowed his head modestly and chomped down on more grass.
Liz’s eyes flashed. “You trusted the ox? Is that what you said? Wait, where is the other half of the plow?”
Charming felt that, for some reason he didn’t quite understand, things weren’t going well. “Of course I put my trust in the ox, he is magical after all. And, if anyone is to blame for the broken plow, it’s him.”
“But, Charming,” she said gesturing about at the field. “It is no wonder that the plow broke. You have to clear the land first. I mean, there’s a rock over there, and there, and there, and there, and more stumps than—” Liz stopped her lecture suddenly, her face flowing from disgust to disbelief. “Wait, did you say a magical ox?”
Charming nodded. “You see, I was going to clear the field, but Goliath didn’t seem interested in pulling out the stumps or in moving the rocks, and he is the expert.” Charming dropped his voice, so Goliath would not overhear them, “Between you and me, I think he’s a bit lazy.”