Cash, Knights, and Dragons

     “So, you want to know how I got so filthy rich?” the old man asked.  He sat by the fire in his great room, sipping brandy.  Seated in the chair beside him was a newly minted squire, pledged to serve Sir David of the house Trelayne.  The young man brushed his red hair out of his eyes and leaned forward.

     “It’s not a tale I tell to just anyone,” said the old man, whose name was Joffrey.  He took another drink before continuing.  “But you seem like a clever young man.  It’s cliche to say, but you do remind me of myself when I was your age.

     “My story begins with a dragon and a princess.  Princess Amelia was the only child of King Horus of Cinska, a small yet influential country on the shore of the Forgotten Sea.  She was mildly attractive, extremely well-spoken, and well-educated.  Her charm lay in her conversation.  It was said that suitors came from across the land simply to speak to her.

     “One day, just after Midwinter, a dragon did bear off with her, flying to its lair in the Vale of Flowers, a good fortnight’s ride from Cinska.  King Horus issued a call to all knights to slay the dragon and return his daughter.  Many tried and many failed.  And then my master, Sir Neville of The Lands, decided to rescue Amelia, though he was loath to do so.

     “We rode to the Vale of Flowers and paused at the top of a foothill that overlooked the vale.  Sir Neville looked down into the vale and saw the dragon’s lair.  He then turned to me and said…”

   “I don’t want to kill the dragon,” Sir Neville exclaimed.  He cut a dashing figure, sitting astride his chestnut warhorse like a god of war.  He raised his visor and looked down into the Vale of Flowers, where the dragon had taken Princess Amelia.  

     Not cutting anything near a dashing figure upon his gray mare was Joffrey, Sir Neville's squire.  Where Sir Neville was well-fleshed and muscular, Joffrey was gangly and awkward.  With a thin hand, he brushed greasy black hair from his brown eyes and stared into the Vale.

     "You have to slay the dragon," Joffrey said, speaking to his master as if he were a toddler who didn't want to go to bed.  "And then you have to rescue the princess and return her to the king."

     "Why should I save her," Neville whined.  "You saw how she treated me at the winter ball.  She practically threw herself at Sir Reginald, that fat, balding git.  She treated me like I was lower than dirt."

     "I think we went to different parties Sir Neville," Joffrey replied, turning his horse to look at Neville.  "You only asked her to dance once and went off and sulked when she said she had promised the Solstice Dance to Sir Reginald."

     "That's not how it went," Neville sulked, knowing deep down that his squire was right.

     "Yes, it was and you know it.  She even asked about you."

     Neville perked up like a puppy finally getting his dinner.  "She did?"

     "Indeed.  She feared that she had upset you by refusing the dance and wanted to convey her apologies."

     "Did she really," Neville asked, smiling like a giddy schoolboy.  After a moment, the smile faded and the petulant face returned.  "I still don't want to kill the dragon."

     Joffrey sighed.  He hated it when Neville got into one of his lovesick moods.  "Look, one mustn't let these things interfere with business.  The king has offered a very handsome reward to the knight who saves his daughter."

     Neville shifted in his saddle.  "Always thinking with your purse Joffrey.  There's more to life than just money."

    "That may be so, but I find that having money makes it easier to enjoy those things."

     Unbeknownst to the knight and his squire, the dragon had been eavesdropping on their conversation (dragons have excellent hearing).  He came out of his lair and looked up at the pair.  He cleared his throat, sending plumes of smoke into the air.  "Excuse me gentlemen, but is there any chance of getting this show on the road?  Princess Amelia won't stop complaining about the delay."

     Joffrey walked his horse to the edge of the hill and looked down at the dragon.  Golden sunlight glinted off his metallic blue scales and his dark eyes twinkled.  "I'm afraid that Sir Neville doesn't want to kill you today."

     The dragon reeled back as if Neville had scored a mighty blow with his lance.  "What?  He doesn't want to kill me?  Isn't that his bloody job?"

     Joffrey sighed.  "That's what I've been trying to tell him for the past twenty minutes good dragon.  Alas, my master is besotted with the princess and feels that she slighted him at the Winter Ball the other night, and he's not sure he wants to rescue her."

     The dragon scratched his chin with a scaly claw.  "That's not what I heard.  The princess says that your master here slinked off like a spoiled child when she wouldn't dance the Solstice Dance with him."

     Neville threw his sword into the ground.  "Dammit, I'm right here you know," he shouted.  "And that's not how things went."

     "Just what a lovestruck idiot would say," the dragon countered. He softened his tone.  "But that's neither here nor there, the point is that there is a job that needs to be done."

     Neville crossed his arms in front of his chest and pouted.  "Still don't want to do it."

     "Look, you need to be down here murdering me to death and rescuing the princess.  How's it gonna look if the knight doesn't kill the dragon?"

     Neville managed to cross his arms tighter across his chest.  "Not gonna."

     Joffrey frowned.  Dragons were supposed to be bellicose beasts, not reasonable like this one.  "Why are you saying these things?  Are you trying to get yourself slaughtered?"

     The dragon blinked.  "Why don't you come down here kid?  I've got something I'd like to tell you, something not meant for everyone's ears," he said, nodding towards Neville.

     Joffrey hesitated, wondering if this was some new way to lure unsuspecting souls to their deaths.  He tossed that notion aside quickly as everyone knew that dragons only killed knights.

     "Are you really going to go down there and talk to that scaly beast," Neville asked, moving his horse to block his squire's.

     "Look," said the dragon.  "If I wanted to kill you, I'd have done it while you were whining about not wanting to kill me.  Your squire is perfectly safe, I assure you."

     "Very well," Neville said grudgingly, moving aside so Joffrey could descend into the vale.  He rode up to the dragon, stopping a few feet away from the reptile.  The dragon lowered his head so it was level with Joffrey's, staring at the lad for a moment before speaking.

     "The reality is that the knights can't really kill us."

     Joffrey's eyes went wide in disbelief.  "But all the stories!"

     "Hogwash," the dragon replied.  "Oh, they can hurt us, but after we take a certain amount of damage, we go into a deep sleep that looks like death to anyone except another dragon.

     "So, a knight fights a dragon, it takes enough damage to go into torpor, and the knight thinks he's vanquished the vile beast and pisses off home in triumph.  The dragon wakes up after a few days, realizes that the area isn't safe, and flies off to another land."

     "And no one's caught on to this," Joffrey asked, scratching his chin.

     "You may have noticed that most knights aren't exactly quick on the uptake," the dragon said, scratching his ear.  "Must be all the blows to the head they take in those jousts they love so much."

     "That's not a very nice thing to say," Neville said, causing Joffrey to nearly fall off his horse in surprise.

     "How long have you been there," asked the dragon.  Joffrey and the dragon had been so engrossed in their conversation that they didn't hear the fully armored knight ride down to them.

     "Long enough I think.  What's this about dragons not dying?"

     The dragon sighed.  "You heard that then."

     "Verily.  I have an idea that could make us very rich."

     The dragon looked at Neville appraisingly. "Go on."

     "So, we have dragons that cannot die and no one has noticed.  Seems to my not-so-quick mind that this could be exploited to our mutual benefit."

     "How so," asked Joffrey and the dragon simultaneously.

     "Simple.  We pick a town, village, or hamlet, something small and fairly remote.  The dragon goes in and wreaks some havoc by destroying buildings or kidnapping someone, the usual dragon fare.

     "My squire and I show up a day or two later.  The townspeople clamor for us to aid them.  We accept and go out to do battle.  We 'kill' the dragon, collect the money, and do our best to keep the townsfolk away from the dragon until he wakes up and flies off.  We wait a few days to a few weeks, pick another target, and do it all over again."

     The dragon looked at Neville with new eyes.  "Interesting idea."

     Joffrey frowned.  "But what about the knightly code?  It doesn't seem very chivalrous to let a dragon kill people or destroy their livelihoods."

     "The dragon," Neville started.  He turned to the dragon.  "Hey, what's your name?  Seems a bit rude to keep referring to you as 'the dragon'."

     "Croyden," offered the dragon.

     "Croyden will just agree to not kill anyone or destroy anything important.  We could even send Joffrey to look things over before we do our thing.  Croyden, how's that sound to you?"

     Croyden mulled it over for a few moments before answering.  "I'm in."

     "When shall we begin," Neville asked.

     Croyden pointed back at his lair.  "How about now?  You can take this princess off my claws."

     Neville closed his visor and drew his sword.  "Sure, why not?  Let's give the princess a show she'll talk about for months.  Have at you!"

     The old man smiled at his visitor.  "And give a show they did.  It was the talk of the kingdom for months.  Bards wrote moving ballads, women threw themselves at Sir Neville, and even I got some attention.  We stayed in Cinska for a fortnight before moving on.  We went all over this land and even visited the Storm Islands, the Far Continent, and other exotic places. Croyden would do damage to a town that looked worse than it really was, Neville would offer his services, he and Croyden would have a mighty 'battle', and we would collect the reward.

     "The years went on and Sir Neville got too old to continue.  He retired and became a landowner in Cinska.  I moved here and set up this tidy little shop.  Keeps me busy.  And now for the reason I called upon you to visit.

     "I hear that Sir David is badly in need of funds.  Croyden tells me that he's quite tired of sitting on that pile of gold all day and wants to get back in action.  Would you be interested in an arrangement?"