ISSUE 2 - December 2006
Dragon's Flare by Tala Bar
“I don’t believe in dragons!” cried a young man of the audience, after the minstrel had finished his tale.
Finbar laughed, wryly, “Neither do I, really. It’s just a tale, my young friend, you should enjoy hearing it, not necessarily believe in it.”
A few minutes later he followed his hostess to her house, where he would spend the night before continuing on his way. The morning lighted on a pleasant autumn day, and he was all set to travel the short, day trip to the next village. Finbar was in a good mood, and nothing was going to disturb it for him!
In his youth, Finbar was a handsome figure, whom the girls had no qualms spending a night with. He was tall and slim, with a shock of dark hair, clear blue-green eyes, long nose and a laughing mouth. His cheeks were rather hollow from never eating enough, but his limbs long and flexible and his gait light and quick. During the years his tall figure bent slightly from carrying the bag on his back for such a long time; and his legs grew slightly heavier with the time that had come to lie on his shoulders: the troubles of all the people he had met, and sometimes his own sorrows to which he had no solution.
Finbar’s profession as a minstrel was an expressive cover for a nature that very few people he had met on the road would get to know. Behind the continuous exchange between jolly and sad folk songs and tales of horror and romance, lay a sensitive but also an inquisitive soul; his curiosity about people and about the world drove him to acquire much knowledge; but, the more he knew the more he felt both the tragedy and the comedy of life. He absorbed everything, expressed it in his lore, but he had to fight continually to continue his own life without being crushed under that load of knowledge.
The minstrel was never a hero. He did not rush into a battle that occurred on his way, thought nothing of running away if there was a good chance for it. But he also was not a coward, and if forced, he would stand his ground and tried to make the best of every situation. In short, Finbar was as a complex being as any other human being, and perhaps a little more, because of his varied way of living.
As relations between the two villages were cordial, there was a clear path to walk on. The area was hilly and slightly rocky, with a few trees growing sparsely here and there. They were mostly standing in a fall, their leaves getting colorful brown, reddish and yellow before falling, and the grass underfoot was yellowing as well, after a relatively dry summer. The minstrel was still whistling to himself as he walked, his sack on his back and his coat on top of it, his long staff in his hand, being sometimes used to lean on, but now he waved in the air in rhythm to the tune he was whistling. He was gaily and curiously looking around him, when he suddenly stopped.
Up above, at the top of one hill higher than others, a strange rock reared its oddly shaped form. It was quite uneven, serrated with protrusions here and there, giving the overall impression of the head of a dragon... Dragon! Finbar inhaled, close his eyes then opened them and looked again. It really looked like a dragon, though he was sure he had never seen dragons in his life. Nor, as he assured that young man in the village, did he really believe in their existence. But here Finbar felt the need to be a little careful. Indeed, he had encountered some sights and some creatures on his traveling that he hardly believed existed outside his own tales and songs; sometimes, he even thought he actually dreamed all these fantastic meetings. That dragon, surely...
The shape changed, it moved. It grew taller as if the dragon was standing up. Then a pair of huge wings appeared on both sides of the strange head. They moved as well, flapping with a loud sound. The rocky creature then took off, flew up in circles, then it started to go down – down – getting really big as it came closer and closer to Finbar...
The minstrel was standing, nailed the ground, unable to move. The dragon hovered for a few minutes above him, as if it studied, then, slowly and gradually, it folded its wings and landed, right beside Finbar. The minstrel, who had held his breath until then, emitted a long breath and breathed in again, deeply.
“So, you are Finbar,” he heard a rumbling voice emitted from the direction of the dragon. He was now forced to look at the monster, just to be polite. It was, of course, enormous. Well, let’s just say, quite big. Certainly bigger than the largest horse Finbar had ever seen, perhaps twice as high, much wider and certainly very long between the tips of its head and tail; the latter was moving restlessly to and fro, giving the minstrel the feeling of immediate danger and he tried to move away from it. In these few moments he had also a chance of looking at the appearance of the dragon, and it amazed him more than he could ever think. It was scaly, of course, according to the best stories. But the sacles did not lie flat. They were standing on edge, making the monster look like bristling, the low rays of the rising sun reflecting in each of these coppery bristles, and Finbar was not sure if it made the dragon more or less frightening. It certainly gave it a look of unexpected, bizarre beauty, and to add to it, from among the spiky scales on its head shone a pair of the clearest green eyes he had ever seen. They reminded him a woman he had met some time ago, in very different circumstances, which he could not recall at that moment.
Again, he felt the need to be polite, just to try and avert danger. “Did you speak?” he asked.
“I was just making our acquaintance,” the rumbling voice resumed, and the minstrel noticed an orange light flaring out of the monster’s mouth together with the sound. ‘It is breathing fire,’ Finbar thought, fleetingly, his heart even more racing than before.
“Yes, I am Finbar,” he answered in a trembling voice, “and you?”
“We’ll leave that for later. Right now, I have come to help you in your coming trouble.”
“What trouble?” The argument made Finbar less aware of the danger emanating to him from the dragon itself.
“Here it comes. You step behind me and you’ll be all right.”
“How can I step behind you when I see nothing in front of us?” he insisted. But then, he saw it too. Right in front of them, from behind a hilly fold in the ground, a row of flickering spear points appeared. Behind them helmets shone in the sun, and soon whole bodies of marching soldiers were seen, advancing right on Finbar and the dragon. The beast spread its wings and rose in the air, a mass of shining copper points.
“Don’t worry, I’m here with you!” the rumbling voice sounded like drums in the minstrel’s ears as the body diminished in its size. Finbar turned his eyes from it toward the approaching soldiers who, in quite a short time, stood before him.
“Hey, man, what are you doing here, all on your own? Aren’t you afraid? There is a war going on, and you are right in the middle it!” A big mass of a man addressed him, heavy and strong, a head taller than Finbar. This must have been the commander who, instead of a spear was carrying a large club, with a short sword hanging from his belt. Finbar had met military men before, but as individuals, and never in such threatening circumstances.
“I never heard of any war,” Finbar answered. As a wandering minstrel, he knew his way around people and had never been afraid even of the strongest and most violent of them. But he had never met them in such a mass that made them look like an enormous monster, no less intimidating than the dragon. For a second he lifted his eyes to see where that creature was.
“Some baron is going to war, and you should join one side or the other to keep safe, and not find yourself between two warring armies.”
“But I am a minstrel!” he protested. “I wander about and do not belong to any baron, nor am I interested in fighting.”
The commander laughed, with his men joining him in a roar. “Interested? Who is asking you? You’re coming with us, to become one of us and fight for our baron, and if you do not come willingly, you’ll come by force.” He signed to the men, and two of them stepped forward. “Take him!”
They just stretched their arms at the minstrel, and a great roar sounded from above, and a mass of coppery spikes fell on the men. Finbar could not say there were frightened away, because a shower of spears flew at the dragon. But the dragon shook them off and started spewing flame from its mouth, scorching the soldiers. They were lucky they were wearing helmets, Finbar thought, before he felt arms seizing him just the same, using his body as protection against the monster. But the dragon waved his enormous wings, his spiky scales hit at the men, forcing them to drop the minstrel and scatter away. The dragon roared and rumbled again, throwing flames after the escaping soldiers, until none of them was left around. Then the monster lifted and was gone, and for a few moments Finbar was alone among the rocky hills.
He shut his eyes for a moment, falling to the ground, catching his breath. “Did you get a good fright, then?” he heard a laughing, clear voice that did not belong to the scene he had just experienced. He opened his eyes and immediately rose to his feet.
“Where did you sprung from?” He asked the lovely woman standing before him. She was dressed in a copper armor made of spiky scales, and under her copper helmet, from among some curls of coppery hair, shone the loveliest pair of green eyes he had ever seen...
“But you must know me, after I had just saved you from fate worse than death,” she laughed.
“Worse than death... Well, I wouldn’t argue, but thank you all the same. Still – what about the dragon?”
“Well, it’s useful, don’t you think? I could not scare them away in this form, could I?”
© Copyright Tala Bar 2006