The Dragon's Greed

Snaffle gore the Dragon lived in a cave high in the mountains beyond Palin. He had lived on his own for most of his life, except, that is, when he hatched from his mother’s egg. But she soon pushed him out of the nest, as soon as he was able to catch his own food in fact.

Snafflegore was a young male dragon around forty foot long from the tip of his tail to the tip of his nose. His scales were green and blue and his bat-like wings were of  similar hue.

He had never seen a female dragon, except his mother, and had no dragon friends, so all in all he had led a very solitary existence. This is, however, quite normal for dragons, they seem to have no friends but, being intelligent, they do like to talk to humans sometimes.

The reason dragons do not hang around in gangs is that if two male dragons ever meet they always fight. Being fiercely territorial creatures this fight is usually to the death, or until the loser escapes.

Even then the victor of a dragon fight will pursue him relentlessly. Males are always concerned that the other dragon will come back later to steal their food supply (mainly goats and sheep), their treasure or be there to compete for any female that might come along. The female dragons are extremely rare (as are all dragons) which may account for this strange behavior. It may also explain why dragons are so aggressive and grumpy. Generally they attack first and eat afterwards, questions not even being on the menu.

Male dragons set themselves up in a nice cave high in the mountains, hopefully inaccessible to any other creatures. The Dragon then consolidates his territory, which may be hundreds of miles across, where he settles down to live his carnivorous lifestyle and wait for a passing female.

Females live differently, they migrate from the North to the South and back again according to some cycle understood only by dragons. They breed in the north and then fly south, not to be seen again for tens or even hundreds of years. Presumably the females bask on sunny beaches on tropical islands, which makes sense since they are cold-blooded members of the lizard family and only fly to the cold north to breed.

Dragons are, in fact, very intelligent creatures, quite capable of understanding human speech and talking back. One of the things dragons do to attract females is to collect a great hoard of treasure which they use as a bed and (hopefully) a nest for any eggs, should a suitable female be attracted by the size and glitteryness of the hoard. They are a little like magpies in this respect and although they are very possesive and protective of their pile of gold and jewels and other sparkling objects, have no real need for their value in human terms.

Snafflegore ate mostly mountain goats. He would fly in on them from above, thus suprising them, and snap them up. Once back in his den he would grill the carcus with the flames from his nostrils and munch it up. Snafflegore had not seen another dragon for fifty years (since his mother weaned him) and knew of no other existance than the simple one he now led.

It was late one Autumn when Snafflegore’s life changed dramatically. As was his habit he had just slept for two days after eating a particularily plump goat and awoke hungry and ready to go hunting again. He crawled out of his cave, belched a puff of smelly smoke on the cliff ledge outside and flapped his wings ready for taking off to look for the next meal. Then he saw something move in the canyon below. It was a small group of men, labouriously making their way up the steep and rocky stream bed far below. Never had Snafflegore seen men here before, he had spied them from afar on the plains but none had ventured into the rugged mountains that made up his territory.

Snafflegore’s first reaction was anger:  ‘How dare those little two-legged goats invade my valley?’ He thought, and then, more cunningly:

‘Perhaps they have some treasure.’ For Snafflegore’s hoard was virtually non-existant, consisting as it did of a rusty iron pot, two bronze rings and a tatty tapestry he had found abandoned by a travelling merchant.

For some time Snafflegore watched the men, it became clear to him that they were not heading his way but further up into the mountains. So he just let them continue on their way up the steep and narrow valley. There were five of them and they had roped themselves together to aid their ascent of the treacherous path. This somehow tickled Snafflegore’s sense of humour and he chuckled to himself which sounded like a deep rumbling in his large belly.

‘Maybe they are good to eat?’ He thought, and tied up like that they would be pretty helpless in a fight. The men must have heard Snafflegore’s chuckle for they looked around worriedly but they did not spot him high up in his eyrie.

Soon the little string of men passed around a bend in the valley and Snafflegore decided to follow on the wing. He leapt from the ledge, very gracefully for his enormous size, and glided down towards them. He banked smoothly and flapped his great wings a few times to maintain altitude. Within a minute or two he had caught up and was above them. Not wanting to be seen Snafflegore turned away and flew upwards. He was enjoying flying very much, as he always did after a long sleep. So he flew up and up until the group of men became tiny little dots barely discernable in the rocky landscape below.

From this height it was clear that the men could only take one route into the mountains since there were no ways out of the narrow valley. Going further up or turning back to go down being the only options. Thus reassured Snafflegore flew off in search of something to eat, a little mountain goat or perhaps a deer should take the edge off of his hunger. Before long he found a small herd of deer and easily snapped up one that lagged behind the others. But the deer did not really satisfy him, his curiosity had been engaged by the unheard of invasion of his territory by the men. So he quickly finished his meal and then flew back to they valley to see how their trek was progressing.

The day was now proceeding towards evening and when he found the men again they had gone quite some way further into the mountains. As he spied on them from far above Snafflegore saw they had reached a small pool from which the stream poured in a pleasant little waterfall. This pool was well known to the dragon for he often caught goats who went there for a drink and he had eaten many a meal on it’s moss covered banks.

The climbers were obviously going to camp there for the night, as Snafflegore circled far above he watched them light a fire and, presumably, cook their supper. He resolved to come back after nightfall and creep up close to their camp.

Snafflegore flew around some of his territory to pass the time, he often did this to keep an eye out for passing females. In his whole life so far he had not seen one but he kept hoping and searching as he was bound by instinct to do. He looked to the North and to the East where the mountains stretched as far as the eye could see, marching into the distance like the spikes on the backs of an endless crowd of enormous dragons. He glanced to the South over the great forest and to the East over the plains. As usual there was no sign of any other dragon. He saw a few eagles far below and the goblin castle perched on its little mountain at the edge of the forest. But that was all.

The sun set gloriously in the West and Snafflegore enjoyed the colourful display before heading back to the pool where the men were camped. He timed his arrival well so that it was just about dusk as he swooped up the valley. With his keen eyesight he could make out the steep valley sides and the waterfall but hopefully the men would not spot him in the half-light. He soon saw their little fire up ahead and landed silently on the rocky stream bed about twenty yards from their camp.

He could hear them talking above the rushing sound of the little waterfall.

“I tell you there is something out there watching us.” One of them said.

“Probably just a mountain goat or an eagle. We have nothing to fear from the likes of them.” His companion replied.

“No it’s something big and evil, I know it. I can feel it in my bones and the hair on the back of my neck keeps standing up.” Stated the first voice, clearly not willing to be reassured.

“Maybe it’s a deer or a bear?” A third voice chirped in, not very helpfully. And then a fourth man said:

“No, I reckon it’s some great monster come to hunt us. You remember that story the old shepherd used to tell? About a giant scaly lizard he came across sleeping in a valley somewhere to the South of here. Fifty or a hundred feet long he said it was.”

“Nah! You’re just trying to make it worse and frighten me. That’s a fairy story for kids.” The original voice said.

“All the same, I think we had best set a watch tonight. If there is something out there we don’t want to get caught napping!” A strong and powerful voice said; obviously the leader of the group.

Snafflegore sat and thought about this exchange. Clearly the men knew he was about, even though he had been careful to keep out of sight. He licked his lips, he had never tasted human flesh, but found the prospect of eating the lot of them somehow quite appealing. Now that they suspected he was near, any chance of sneaking up and helping himself to any treasure they might have would be reduced. Perhaps he should just snap up the men one by one.

In the end Snafflegore did nothing for some time, he sat patiently waiting for the humans to fall asleep, this they did, after a lot of chatter about monsters. Most of it was foolish nonsense but some of the stories sounded like very good descriptions of him. He had no idea that the human people had seen so much of him over the years. Luckily these encounters had always been at a distance or whilst Snafflegore was asleep. All that was going to change now!

By the time the moon had risen all five men appeared to be asleep. Slowly, ever so slowly, Snafflegore crept forward. Easing his huge body over the rocks and moss. Each step he took with one of his four enormous clawed feet he did with great care so as not to make any noise. Unfortunately his long tail dragged a little on some small rocks which clattered into the stream. He froze. No noise came from the men so he continued.

It seemed to take a long time to get close to the travellers but Snafflegore was used to stalking prey and thought nothing of it. At last he was in amongst them, he swept his great snout back and forth, sniffing quietly. Having identified by smell where each man lay (the moonlight was poor because of heavy clouds that night) Snafflegore closed in on what he thought might be their treasure. It was a large pack near the embers of the fire. Unfortunately a man lay completely in the way. Snafflegore tried to reach over the sleeper and hook the pack with his long and pointed front teeth.

Not suprisingly, given the heat and stench of the Dragon’s breath, the man awoke and shouted:

“Ahhhrrr!”

He was almost completely covered by the dragon’s head, his feet were under it’s neck and his head was under it’s snout, so large was the monster’s head.

Luckily for the man Snafflegore’s enormous Jaws were occupied with the pack. Otherwise they would have snapped the poor chap in half as quick as a wink. Also, because of the sack hanging from his ten inch long front fangs, Snafflegore could not breath fire upon the fortunate man.

Once these things became clear to Snafflegore he decided that flying off would be the best option. Regrettably, taking off from the ground, rather than off from a clifftop or ledge, is rather difficult for a full-grown dragon, given that they weigh over twenty tons! He began to flap his huge bat-like wings but the men were all awake and alarmed now. They were not defenceless goats to be snapped up by a flying monster, they had swords and spears and were not frightened to use them.

The man under Snafflegore’s head had rolled to one side and grabbed his sword whilst still lying down. He tried poking the dragon in the neck from that position. One of his mates had grabbed a spear and was thrusting it at Snafflegore’s head as he it waved back and forth. The others seemed to be mainly either waking up or shouting.

Luckily for the Dragon, his armoured skin was so tough and thick that these attacks could do him no real harm. They did hurt however, like sticking a needle in your finger, and he roared angrily at the men, swung his head violently to one side and knocked two of them flying.

All this time he had been beating his wings and at last began to majestically lift off of the ground. He still had the pack in his jaws and kept them closed upon it so as not to drop his hard-won trophy. He slashed his front claws about at the men as he rose above their heads and they stopped trying to poke him and just ducked to avoid his dangerous but ineffectual blows.

Once he was airborne it was relatively easy for Snafflegore to gain height and fly away. He had not realised how much hard work these two-legged people could be! He resolved to be more careful next time.

Meanwhile the men watched the great shadow of the dragon disappear into the night. It had been a lucky escape for them and they knew it. They packed up their gear straight away and began slowly making their way back the way they had come. They were so scared they travelled at night, passing Snafflegore’s lair before dawn. They did not see his malovent eyes looking down upon them from high above as they went!

After the men had gone the Dragon slept in his cave for the rest of the night. He had, after all, had a small meal earlier. But he awoke a few hours later when dawn spread through the mountains, tinting their grey sides with hues of red and gold.

Snafflegore was eager to see what booty he had obtained from the unfortunate travellers so he retrieved the pack. Essentially is was a sack tied with rope into an oblong shape so as to be carried on one of the men’s backs. This rope proved very tricky for Snafflegore to undo. His huge claws were not really suited to dealing with knots!

In the end he managed it, mainly by gently chewing at a corner until the pack came apart. He was rewarded for his persistance by the contents spilling onto his cave floor. These consisted of:

One nice fresh cabbage (thrown over the cliff edge in disgust), a side of smoked bacon (whoofed down in one gulp), a loaf of bread (over the side), a dagger with a jewel in the pommel (kept!), a pewter tankard (kept), and some rather smelly clothes (over the side).

Not exactly a major haul of treasure and hardly likely to please the ladies. But Snafflegore was quite happy to have a fairly good knife and a metal tankard to add to his motley hoard.  Still, he could not help but be disappointed and having had this rather paltry taste of treasure he determined to get some more. Clearly the group of men he had seen off were not likely to be rich pickings and not worth pursuing. Where could he find plenty of gold and silver and jewels?

For a long time Snafflegore pondered upon this problem. The trouble was, being a relatively young dragon of fifty or so summers, he had little experience of these things. No father had taught him the niceties of acquiring large amounts of cash and booty so he did not really know where to begin.

Then finally, it hit him! Dwarves! Everybody, even inexperienced dragons like Snafflegore, knew that dwarves love gold and silver and all forms of treasure. They spent their whole lives amassing it, digging under the ground for it and love to count it on long winter nights.

He must find some dwarves and steal their gold!