Kristin - Chapter 4 - Dragon

“WHAT?” was all she could manage. Dragon-keeper??  Dragons aren’t real!

“Yes, dragon-keeper.” Cook droned in a rather bored voice. “Your duties will include feeding, grooming, and humoring Her Majesty Kimbers dragon. Every day at this time you will take a cow, pig, sheep, or chicken, depending on Her Majesty’s wishes, down to his room...”

“His?” Kristin squeaked.

“Well what did you expect? Its?” Cook continued. “You will take it down to his room and present it to him. When he has finished eating, you will groom him par his direction…”

Again, Kristin interrupted. “His direction? It can TALK?”

“HE can talk. You had better learn some respect girlie, or you might end up like the last dragon-keeper. Now…”

Kristin’s face had turned a pale and sickly shade of white. “Wha-what happened to the last dragon keeper?”

Cook ignored her question. “…after you have groomed him, if he has taken a liking to you, there is a chance he will tell you to stay and converse with him. I suggest you comply with everything he says.”

“What if he doesn’t take a liking to me?”

“Then I suggest you get yourself out of there before he decides that he’s still hungry. Now, follow me.”

Cook led her around to an iron door on the side of the castle. Taking a ring of keys out of her pocket, Cook unlocked the door and led Kristin down into a wide passageway, sufficient for the cow, and maybe a few cows, to pass through. Kristin was still leading the docile animal along by her rope.

After about five minutes they came to another iron door. Cook unlocked this one and they stepped through it. Kristin gasped.

It was the hallway of iron doors! She almost screamed, but then caught herself. This was not her dream. There was not going to be a flood of red or a man with an eye-patch. Or the scream of a small helpless girl. Just a hall lined with iron doors.

And a dragon behind one of them.

She silently debated which was worse, dream or reality.  Neither, it seemed.

After about ten minutes, they reached the end of the hall. Before them stood the last and largest iron door. It was big enough to allow a 100-foot giant to pass comfortably through. Kristin quaked at the thought of the monster that lay behind it.

“Well, here’s where I leave you.” Cook said brusquely.

“You…Your LEAVING?” Kristin’s panic level shot up.

“Yes. This isn’t my job. The door should open in a few minutes. If you want to open it from the inside just say, ‘I serve an almighty sorceress.’ ” She quickly turned on her heel and left, leaving Kristin alone with the cow.

She stood there uncertainly. The door remained solidly shut. Just as she was beginning to think that it was all some sort of sick joke, and she could go back up to the kitchens, the door flew open, inwards. It led into a tunnel so big that, even with the torches lining the walls, she couldn’t see the roof. She, slowly and fearfully, led the cow down the tunnel. It seemed to stretch on and on. Any second, she expected to see a dragon come roaring out of the shadows, fire blazing, teeth and claws bared.

Nothing happened. She continued to plod down the foreboding tunnel, the only sound the echo of her and the cow’s footsteps ricocheting around the cavern. Up ahead was a sharp bend. Gathering her courage, Kristin turned the corner and found herself standing on the edge of an enormous cave, staring into the glowing golden eyes of the most magnificent and terrifying animal she had ever seen or heard of.

The dragon’s black, scaly hide shone with a subtle inner light. Every one of his razor- sharp, serrated claws was nearly twice long as she was. He towered above her, nostrils glowing ember-red, leathery wings folded at his sides, snake-like tail thrashing about the floor in front of her, then beside her, then behind and in front of her again, and then she was being lifted off the floor and held in front of his face. With fright, she stared into his eyes. They were each bigger than her head, golden with flecks of green. Ebony horns, six feet long and wickedly sharp, framed his intimidating face.

“Welcome, little human.” His voice was whisper-quiet, and soothing. It calmed her, and for some unfathomable reason she felt like falling asleep in the coils of the great beasts tail.

Then he gently set her down next to him and looked to the cow, which, unexplainably, had not bolted but was standing in front of the dragon as docile as ever. He leaned down, whispered a few words in its ear, and watched as it trotted off down the tunnel, as if on some urgent mission.

As soon as his tail had lost contact with her, Kristin’s calm had evaporated and she was again paralyzed with a cold, dreading fear of this animal (or could you call it an animal?) that was crouching before her. He turned to her and, again in a calming, whispering voice, asked, “What is your name, little one?”

“Kristin.” Her name came out as a squeak.

“I am Alejandro Rodríguez Quintana the Sixth.”

 “Oh.”

Then she nervously asked, “Wer-weren’t you going to eat the cow?”

The dragon’s laugh was more of a rumble, like rocks falling down a mountainside, but far away.  “I do not need to eat meat like many other creatures. The fact that the foolish conjurer who lives here thinks that I need meat to live reveals her ignorance of my kind.”

“Then what did you do with it? Th-the cow?”

“I told it how to leave the palace undetected and where to find others of its kind.”

“Leave the palace undetected?” Kristin grew exited. “Could I do that?”

Alejandro’s eyes dimmed, though only for a second. “It is an easier thing for a cow to leave this place than a human girl. Besides, out in the world it is very dangerous for humans. You are safer here at the house of Kimber, on the very doorstep of the devil, than anywhere else you could possibly be.”

Kristin silently doubted this, but it does not bode well to argue with a dragon, even one who doesn’t seem interested in eating you. “If you don’t eat cows, what do you live off of?”

Again the dragon laughed. “You have many questions for such a little human. I will tell you, and then you will answer a few of my questions. I live off of the undercurrent of energy that radiates from the earth. It is called Domhan-Saol, and comes from the rivers of magma that flow near the earth’s core. Dragons absorb it naturally, and it gives us not only the ability to live almost forever, but our magical talents and fire-breath as well.”

“Really?” Kristin had never heard anything so interesting in her life. Her head was filled with questions. “Why…”

Alejandro interrupted her, this time in a voice slightly louder and more firm. “No more. I have a few questions for you. What is your surname?”

“Basolc.”

“WHAT?” He roared, his voice piercing every fiber of her being, overpowering her until she crumpled to the ground and knew nothing but fear at the rage of a dragon.

Kristin, Chapter 3 - Kitchens

They remained in the throne room for a few more minutes, silent and unmoving. Then Finabard commanded, “Let her go.” The guards stepped away from her. Kristin collapsed onto her side. The woman, or, really, the sorceress Kimber, was gone.

“Can you stand up?” Finabard inquired. If Kristin had not been in the present circumstances, she might have called his tone kind and his face handsome. But she was here, in the throne room of the Sorceress Kimber, crumpled on the ground in front of the newly appointed Captain of the Guard. This was not a place to grasp at kindness or handsomeness.

In response to his question, she carefully picked herself up off the ground and struggled shakily to her feet. He nodded briskly, and then turned to the guards. “You are dismissed. Return to the barracks and await further orders.” In unison, they chanted “Yes Sir,” turned, and marched out the golden door.

“Follow me,” he told her, and made his way towards another great door, this one silver. Kristin struggled to keep up, even though Finabard adjusted his pace to compensate for her condition. Halfway across the throne room, she collapsed. She just couldn’t do it. She wasn’t useful for anything. She could barely walk across the room. He would kill her, and she would be with Clara again. That was all she wanted. Tears started streaming down her face.

Without a word, Finabard came over and looked down at her. Without a word, he lifted her gently off the floor and carried her through the silver door. This led into a bright dining room, all made of white marble. From here he turned, and carried her through a small wooden door into what she could only describe as heaven.

Food. The room was filled with food. Food being chopped, food being baked, food being tossed into salads. Food cooking, food cooling, food hanging from the ceiling. An old, chubby woman was overseeing it all, and her assistants scuttled back and forth, stirring, adding, popping things into ovens, taking things out of ovens, putting more wood on the fire, peeling, mincing, trying, adding a pinch of salt, trying again, and doing all the things generally associated with food and its preparation.

Finabard crossed to a cot in the far corner of the room and laid Kristen gingerly down on it. He covered her with a warm blanket, crossed to the chubby woman, said something to her, and left.

Kristin just laid there. She didn’t try to move, or think, or even sleep. She just let the room take her in and surround her in its warmth and comfort. After a while, the chubby woman came and set a tray of something down by her bed. Kristin slowly summoned her strength a got up to look at it.

Mushroom stew, a warm, fresh, quarter-loaf of bread, and a blue-colored fizzing drink. Kristin wolfed it down eagerly. The drink was sweet, yet sour as well. When she finished, she felt content to lay down and sleep.

Shadows haunted her dreams. Laughing sadistically, men with eye-patches chased her down never-ending passageways lined with giant iron doors. Every time she tried to open a door, it was locked. Finally, a door opened, and out rushed a red, sticky liquid. It seeped into her mouth, nose, eyes and ears, and as she drowned in it, she heard a little girl screaming her name.

Kristin awoke tangled in her blanket and thrashing around on the floor. Most of the kitchen staff was staring down at her with wide, frightened eyes. The chubby woman looked up form kneading bread dough.

“Good, you’re up. All of you, back to work. She’s not going to explode.” The staff scattered back to their business. Kristin stood up. She still felt weak, but it wasn’t nearly as bad as it had been. That blue fizzy drink must’ve been some type of tonic.  She made her little cot, then sat on it, at a loss as to what she should do.

The chubby woman noticed her dilemma. “My name is Gretel. Call me Cook. You’ll have something to do soon enough. Right now, eat.” Gretel gestured toward a bubbling pot of porridge hanging over the fire. Kristin found a bowl and liberally spooned hot porridge into it. She slurped it down quickly. It was bland and tasteless, but warm in her stomach and quietly bracing.

She took her bowl to the washbasin and started to wash dishes. Every so often, she thought she felt Cook’s eyes drift over to her, yet whenever Kristin turned, Cook quickly looked down at her bread or her soup or whatever she was working on at the moment. Once Kristin thought she saw her shake her head, almost in pity.

The morning passed this way, rather uneventfully. Lunch came and went, and the afternoon wore on. Kristin spent her time helping out any way she could, though cooking had never been her strong suit. Around three o’clock, Cook came up to her.

“Now it is time to do what you were brought here for. Come with me.” Kristin followed her out the side kitchen door and into the area where the livestock where kept. Cook went straight to the cattle and picked out a rather fat, sleepy-looking cow. She led it out of the pen and handed the rope to Kristin.

“You,” she stated matter-of-factly, as if it was nothing out of the ordinary, “Are going to be the new dragon-keeper.”

Essay

I wrote this as a school assignment. It's a half-joke. I admit, I'm rather proud of this little piece of work...

 Sometime soon, someone will be saved from a definitely devastating death by that mighty man-made marvel, the internet. This amazingly astounding invention is indubitably one of our outstanding accomplishments achieved in this apex of human history.  Many misinformed men think that the internet is an illusion, something shamefully scummy. Actually, anybody accusing the internet is ignoring its innumerable intrinsic values. The internet is incredibly informative, hugely helpful, and amazingly accessible.

The internet is indispensable. Without it, we would wallow wearily in timeworn tomes, sadly searching for some finicky fact. Now, instead of overusing outdated octavos, we can quickly quest for questions using useful websites such as Google and Wikipedia.  Anything you ingest from the internet is incontestable, so don’t doubt decency. This timeless treasure, astoundingly accurate, helps herald hundreds of halleluiahs, primarily from poor people perusing perfection. Yet being infinitely informative is not everything the internet insures.

Communication creates countless comforts. We seek solace sacrilegiously sometimes, so solitude seems torturous. The internet incurs an influx of interesting friends, so we need never have neurosis of being neglected. Some men find matches using match.com, many marry on the internet. Facebook feels fabulous, sharing our shining, sterile souls with other perfect people. Identity is irrelevant on the internet, you can create yourself completely!  Flaws fade away into fakeness, perfection presides, and since the internet is so amazingly accessible, self-annihilation is entirely easy.

The internet enables everyone to easily encounter everything. Everything on the internet is extraordinarily easy to do, even if it’s illegal. This tugs us toward it, because we want to save our energy. Accessibility accounts for all of the awesome influx of information on the internet. Amazingly, all of us access the internet nearly daily. Computers create comfortable centers to enjoy it. Without this wonderful way of easily entering the internet, we would not wear it so often.

Though, sorrowfully, some say the internet is immoral, it’s really a beautiful benefit to our bountiful society. Its innate values are indisputable, and the numerous needs it fulfills would find no filler without the web. Whatever way you look at it, the internet is astoundingly amazingly awesome!