Xalares, The

The steel grew heavier and heavier in his hand as his breath turned to heaving, and with every heave the dragon’s swipe, the dragon’s bite seemed to grow more ferocious – faster, too close for comfort. But with the lives of the thousands waiting in prayer – the thousands who should be prepared for death the moment his blood spilled over the cold, wet cavern floor – on his shoulders, he mustered the strength for one last strike…

With a great leap, he soared over the dragon’s gaping maw, legs barely missing the pointed end of a giant, elongated canine. And then, holding the hilt of his glistening elven sword with both of his marred, callused hands, he brought down the mighty blade right through—

           “Please?”

“No.”

           “Pleassseeeeee.”

           “No.”

           “Oh, would you just kill me already?!”

If this was any other place, such a statement would surely turn some heads, especially considering the identity of the creature saying it and the volume in which it had been said. Instead, as usual, the roar of the dragon slipped harmlessly into the gaps in the cacophony of clinking glasses, the piercing shrills of five lutes trying to be heard over the other, and the hollow, buffoonish laughter of creatures with throats three times as long and three times as sonorous. Only the in-house signal of tapping the bottom of your pint three times in a one-two rhythm would get you some attention in the chaos – the “right” kind of attention from the barmaster, who silently took the mug that the warrior slid across all the way from the other end of the wooden table in a practiced motion before turning around to fill it for the fifth time that night.

Now stuck with having to wait the fifteen or so seconds until the barmaster could fill the extra-large pint to the brim and slide it back over, the warrior finally turned her full attention to the dragon sitting next to her, her only decorative accessory in the form of a still shiny golden ring glinting like brand new loot under the flickering lantern as she dumped her head into her open hand.

“If you aren’t such an annoying drunk, I would’ve suggested you drown yourself in alcohol – then maybe your wish would come true without me needing to be involved.”

A guttural sigh spat out of the dragon’s perpetually open mouth, his teeth too elongated and inconsistent in shape for the two jaws to clamp together and ward off the threadbare curtains of spit now swinging around precariously due to the sudden burst of dragon breath. His claws, which until then had been clasped together almost in prayer, threw themselves into the air just short of the counter area’s low ceiling beams before landing with an echoing thud on the table. The sound, again, dissipated quickly into the surrounding raucousness as easily as a single dragon breath in a cavern of bigger and badder dragons with bigger and badder breaths.

“Oh, come onnnnnn.” A whining tone only managed to make his low voice even more resonant in the natural echo chamber of the cavern, making the surface of the ale sitting on the countertop froth and tremble even after the warrior took a long, long swig of her refilled pint. “I’ve done my job! Isn’t this supposed to be yours, Mrs. Hero?”

He yelped instinctively as she shoved the already half-empty mug into the rounded apex of his scaly stomach, another thick strand of glistening saliva shooting out through the gap between two crooked canines as he did so.

“That’s it – right there. Mrs. Hero… this isn’t supposed to be my job. I was content with just sitting around, occasionally filling mugs then drinking the tavern dry with the other customers before my darn father decided to sell me off to that “promised warrior.”” She scoffed, taking another big swig of her mug before sliding it back over to the barmaster, who couldn’t care less about his sister’s usual whining as he hummed silently to himself over the bards’ improvised dissonance.

““Promised warrior” … there was nothing promising about a life with, or after him. Heck, I’m better with a sword than he ever was for saints’ sake!”

“Exactly! And that’s why only you can play this part exactly how I imagined it.”

He shifted in his seat on the stalagmite stump, freeing the tail which had grown to be as thick as an oak tree over the last three years or so, and which had been tucked like a blanket underneath his flat bottom (even after three years or so). It thumped against the cavern floor, sending even bigger shock waves that helped spill unwanted froth from the freshly refilled pints onto the already slick countertop.

“I am Xalares the Great, Xalares the Magnificient – Xalares the Black Omen! When I was “Xalares the Pest,” any common farmer could’ve said they killed me with a pitchfork, and anyone would’ve believed it – though it is still quite a stretch. Now, it’ll only make sense that only someone who’s the most powerful and the most well-versed in sword magic throughout the entire Continent would be able to kill the Millennium Black Dragon!”

A chorus of scoffs could be heard from the center of the room. Xalares gave the three Elder Dragons his usual toothy grin as he looked over his shoulder, his grin looking especially sheepish compared to their tightly clamped smirks, full of thinner yet razor sharp, jagged needles for teeth. When he turned back, he dipped his bulbous head as low as it could possibly go. His voice was just a smidge smaller despite this attempt at whispering to the warrior, with him only succeeding in finally untangling the curtains of spit hanging from the roof of his mouth and letting them veil over the section of the countertop where the warrior’s pint would’ve been just two seconds later.

“See? You have to kill me now! And then when people see that I’ve somehow resurrected myself – because, surprise, I’m not actually dead! – I could finally join those cool guys over there, and I won’t need to bother you ever again! Come on, isn’t this such a sweet deal for the both of us?”

“...Too much work. Too many theatrics means too much effort.”

“Oh, come on! Can you believe her?” The black dragon's head snapped up suddenly – that one could almost imagine it snapping off and toppling down across a quarter of the width of the room to crush the puny humans, elves, and goblins unwittingly littered in its wake – and turned in my direction. “Help me out here – no way this is only a good idea in my head, right? Won't you take this deal if you were her?”

I tilted my head to get a better look at the warrior. Despite the perpetual lazy droop of her sharply honed eyes, one would only need the one glance to believe her a skilled swordswoman. The lack of scars seemed to point to an unmatched lightness of her feet, so that she would never be on the receiving end of a tapered fang, claw, nor sword (which would probably be true if she neither ran away from what would be an annoyingly prolonged and thereby troublesome fight, or didn’t immediately knock out the opponents that she couldn’t avoid because they so happened to be in her way with a single hit of her blade). The closely cropped hair and lack of luxuriousness to her full-body armor suggested a loyalty to the job, an understanding of the need for absolute practicality and utmost efficiency for whatever quest could be thrown at her during her many travels (except she only travelled outside the village if someone was willing to pay for all her expenses, and she was more than willing to do miscellaneous tasks over grand adventures as long as the pay rate was relatively higher).  

But, feeling bad for Xalares whose claws were once again clasped together in prayer and whose eyes had filled with hot dragon tears in an attempt at the faddish, puppy-eyed look, I decided to try my hand at convincing the (regent) Promised Warrior of Light. “Yes, yes, I would. Imagine, you do this one big job, and you might not even need to go on any more quests for the rest of your life. You’ll get all the riches you want to live comfortably in the countryside, spend it all on ale every single night without a care in the world. I mean, that does sound like bliss to me.”

I knew I failed to hit the mark when she finally looked at me after a moment, that same lazy glint glaring right at me underneath layers and layers of thick, heavy eyelashes.

“No wonder you’re a bard. Shouldn’t you be spitting out that flowery crap alongside your fellow sappy musicians?”

“Ah, well...” I flinch instinctively as I picked up an off-tune twang in the distance – a result of one of my fellow sappy musicians purposefully kicking the shin of another sappy musician who’d probably stolen a tune from the former. “Not tonight... It’s too much for me sometimes. The role of a bard – is it so bad to relax and just be another villager for once?”

“Exactly.” Mrs. Hero rolled her eyes before tapping the bottom of her pint on the table three times. Was it seven already now? “I’m done with this hard work crap. Just because people think I’m good at it doesn’t mean I want to do it.”

“Oh!”

           “Oh?” Xalares looked at me with hope in his eyes, his grin stretching even wider even before the words could come out of my mouth.

“Why doesn’t he kill you instead?”

“Whaaaatttt?” They both sang in unison – and a little too loudly for that matter, which wouldn’t have mattered if the entire tavern hadn’t just dropped everything they were doing to look back at the three of us.

Heavy silence followed for a moment or two, only disturbed by the sound of white froth, dotted here and there with fist-sized drops of golden ale, spilling out of the gaping maw of one of the three Elder Dragons like an ambrosia waterfall.

“I mean, think about it: heroes never really retire even after they kill the most powerful Elder Dragon, the evilest demon lord, or the most corrupted tyrant known by the Continent in a thousand years. No, people keep pestering them to do more quests, or attend those political costume parties between kingdoms to remind the opposing side of the strength of the Continent and whatnot, but if they think you’re dead... That’s the perfect retirement.”

“Even I know that that’s wayyy off-script.” But her hand had let go of the pint.

Crossing her arms, she had turned her entire body in the direction of Xalares and me, and even he knew what that meant: she was listening. 

So, sharing a look, we both leaned in for the kill. “But you want to get out of the script, don’t you? Throw it away – just sleep it off, not read the same thing over and over again?”

“Hmm... and this oversized buffoon would be hailed as the most powerful Elder Dragon because he’ll be the only one who’s able to kill a Promised Warrior of Light.” She shrugged, the clacking of her shoulder guards filling in for some much overdue laughter on her part. “Well, so far, anyway.”

Xalares chortled aloud, slamming the palms of his outstretched palms together and sending mini earthquakes through the newly stale air waves. “Yes, yes – this is perfect! Maybe not as good as my plan – frankly, it sounds way more complicated – but it’ll definitely get us what we both truly want, right?”

The warrior nodded. “And I won’t have to deal with your crap ever again.”

“Yes, exactly!... Though I gotta admit, it actually hurts to hear you say that yourself.”

“WAIT!!!”  

A deafening roar echoed through the cavern space, enough to rattle everyone’s hearts in their ribcages as one of the Elder Dragons – Endia the Crimson Terror – stood up from her seat, the tips of her scarred, jagged horns barely grazing the stump of a stalactite that she herself had beheaded on her way to the table. Golden-orange fire boiled at the center of her black corneas and came out as long trails of steam from her dilated nostrils like effervescent white pillars.

“Are you crazy?” She raised one oversized claw in the air, cutting through it so quickly and with such force that a squall blew past the three of us in turn before she actually started pointing fingers. “I expected this from the saints-forsaken bard, but even our Promised Warrior of Light is seemingly going to pull her own weight for once to fail out of all things – and failing at the claws of the biggest buffoon to ever grace our kind’s ranks at that!”

Xalares started to stand up as well, a half-roar, half-sheepish moan about ready to burst out of his throat before another one of the Elder Dragons – Korigan the Terrible – beat him to it with an unexpectedly high-pitched, ear-shattering cry (no matter how many times one heard it before). “Yeah, something like this hasn’t been done before—"

“And should never be for a reason!” Finished Argo the Colossus.

“And did you really think we’ll all shut up about it when we literally heard your entire plan?” Endia snorted, another two pillars of caustic white smoke shooting out of her nostrils and leaving ember-tinged smoke rings in their wake.

The three of us shared one last, final look with one another. Letting out a drawn-out sigh, the warrior tapped the bottom of her pint three times in a two-one rhythm before wearily sliding out of her seat for the first time since she’d sluggishly slumped down half an hour ago. Picking up my lute from the countertop, I decided to whistle my favorite tune from the selection of about twenty offered up by my fellow bards that night as I backed away through the hidden trapdoor reserved for the barmaster, whilst the warrior – right on cue – drew her glistening silver, elven-forged sword from its relatively plain scabbard.

“No... which is why your biggest buffoon and our Promised Warrior of Light will be setting up actual victims for the story to fully check out.”

The warrior clicked her tongue. “This is probably the most troublesome job I’ve ever taken – but there’ll be no more work to be done for the rest of my life, so heck, I’ll do it.”

“Wait, wait, wait – I just didn’t like the way how she called me a buffoon. I’m not ready for—”  

“It’s now or never, you oversized pest.”

—and so, she brought down the sword to meet with the claw

The claw and fang forged by the ashes of forsaken brothers

Brothers and sisters who were slain by the same glistening steel

So, heart burning, the black dragon let his claw soar through the sky

Breaking the promised blade in pieces

Ripping the promised warrior's heart to bits and pieces

So, that, alas the reign of the great dragon,

Xalares the Millenium Black Dragon,

Xalares the Evilest Black Demon,

would continue on for a thousand more years.