The Dragon's Tail

Purgon looked at himself in the calm lake. He sighed. All of his dragon friends had already grown their tail spikes or ridges. His tail was as smooth as a baby dragon's butt.  

“Baby butt tail, baby butt tail, baby butt tail" the other dragons sang at him every day and then they would laugh. Sometimes even his best friend would join in on the teasing.

Hadex was the one that led the name-calling. He was a little older than the other dragons in class. Hadex not only had spikes that came out of his head and twisted around, but he also had ridges coming down his back starting at right between his ears all the way to the very tip of his tail. 

It was not only Hadex that gave Purgon trouble. Even his dragon teacher would make little hints that it was time for him to grow up and get some spikes.

Hadex was not only better at growing spikes and ridges, but he was also better at almost everything. At recess, he once blew fire so hot that he started a forest fire and they had to move the class to another cave.

Hadex could also roar better than anyone in the class. His roars were so loud that he blew over all of the tables and chairs in the classroom and they would go rolling down the hill and the teacher had to fly down and get them and bring them back.

 Purgon knew that he could never compete with Hadex in anything. Hadex was not only good at blowing fire and roaring he could also catch and eat a crunchy knight in ten seconds flat!

When Purgon tried to catch a knight he would always get away on his white horse. And all the other dragons laughed at pointed at him when a knight got a good poke at Purgon’s tummy with his sharp spear.

"Any day now, don’t worry!" His mommy dragon would say to him when she saw how sad he looked after preschool.

“You will start growing your spikes soon”, she would tell him every day. 

He tried to smile so she wouldn't feel sad for him but then he would go into his cave room and lay on his pile of gold and cry.

One day he had an idea. He thought it would be a good idea to eat some pointy things. He thought if he ate pointy things that maybe he would grow some spikes. He ate rose bushes by the dozens. Cactus's hurt his throat but he ate them anyway. And there was not a thistle for miles around because he had eaten them all. He had even taken to eating hedgehogs and porcupines whenever he could find them. But it was no help. His spikes just didn't seem to want to grow.

One day Purgon was walking along trying to find a porcupine or two when he heard roaring. He right away recognized the roar of Hadex. But it didn’t sound the way it normally did. Purgon could tell from the roar that he was in trouble. So he went to see what was the matter.

He flew towards the noise and saw some of the other dragons in his class standing at the top of a mountain looking down. He looked around but couldn’t see Hadex anywhere.   

Purgon landed there next to the other dragons looking down. Then he saw why Hadex was making such a terrible noise. At the top of the mountain was a hole. He could see that it was a volcano and Hadex had fallen down the hole and the lava was starting to rise towards his toes! The other dragons had each tried to put their tail down the hole so that Hadex could climb up. But since all the other dragons had large spikes or ridges Hadex couldn't get a good grip to be pulled up.

"Purgon!!!" They all shouted. Please you must help! The lava is rising and Hadex is going to be cooked meat if you don’t help him.”

Purgon looked down and saw that Hadex's wings were burnt around the edges so he couldn't flap them to fly out.

For just a second Purgon thought that this would be a good chance to get rid of the dragon that teased him so badly. But then he changed his mind. He knew that he was a good dragon and he couldn't let Hadex get hurt. So he backed up, putting his tail down the volcano. Sweat started to pour out of Purgon’s tail it was so hot down there! It was getting really bad so he knew he had to hurry.

Hadex grabbed ahold of Purgon's tail while the other dragons took ahold of Purgon’s front claws to make sure he didn’t fall into the volcano too. 

Poor Purgon strained and pulled as he tried to take one step forward. Oh it hurt so bad! Hadex was so heavy and the heat was getting worse by the second. Purgon clapped his feet tight onto the side of the mountain and pulled as hard as he could. Once or twice Purgon could feel Hadex's claws starting to slip but he pulled his tail up so Hadex could sit on it like a knight sits on a horse.

Finally after pulling and tugging and sweating Purgon pulled Hadex out of the volcano.

All of a sudden Purgon heard loud cheering and clapping around him! Every single one of the dragons from his class had shown up to see what was happening. And they were cheering for him!

His purple scales turned red as he blushed. Hadex himself thanked Purgon and even gave him a hug for saving his life!

That night as he slept something wonderful happened. When he woke up in the morning he saw that his spikes had all grown. And they were spikier than any of the dragons in his class! Even spikier than Hadex’s!

 He knew that he was finally growing up on the outside and that felt really good. But what he knew most was that he had done something to help a fellow dragon. He learned that growing up on the inside felt even better.