Chapter Text
Over the past year, rumors had spread through the realm.
Farmers told tales of a massive beast swooping down and snatching cows out of the fields. Townsfolk reported sightings of a huge creature with scales the color of the night. One traveling merchant had even drawn a sketch of a massive flying monster, its dark form framed against bright midday clouds. Though the stories and descriptions varied, all arrived at the same conclusion:
Dragon.
…of course, it wasn’t a real dragon, Ashe reminded himself. No one had seen a real dragon on this continent in ages. These days, ‘dragons’ tended to be nothing more than unusually large and aggressive wyverns, seen in low lighting by people with fanciful imaginations. (When questioned, the merchant had admitted it was actually raining at the time. But artistic liberties aside, he was adamant he’d gotten the shape right. That was impossible, though; wyverns were bipedal, and the creature in his drawing clearly had four legs...)
Of course, the exact species of the monster didn’t make any real difference to the farmers and townsfolk living nearby; after all, something was killing the livestock. And as a knight - well, okay, as a knight-in-training - of the Kingdom, Ashe had been sent to deal with the problem.
At the beginning, he had honestly been excited about this quest. All the heroic knights in the stories he read had faced off against dragons, after all. Even if it wasn’t a real dragon, getting to fight one felt like… a rite of passage, in a way. A way to prove what a great knight he could be. Sir Ubert the Dragonslayer, protector of the people!
But now, as he carefully rode up the mountain where the dragon was said to roost, he began to grow more and more anxious. It had taken him the better part of a month to travel here from the capitol, and he’d caught a few glimpses of the creature on his way. Though he hadn’t gotten a good enough look to properly identify the thing, he was certain it was larger than any wyvern he’d seen. And that wasn’t even taking into account the stories from the farmers about the beast outsmarting their many attempts to keep it away from their cattle; size and intelligence were a deadly combination.
The safest thing to do, Ashe knew, would be to find some backup, maybe even ask some of his fellow knights for aid. But… the knight captain had promised that if he slew the beast by himself, he would be knighted upon his return. Being a full knight had been his long time dream; he couldn’t just throw this chance away. (Cynically, he wondered if his status as a commoner was the reason the captain had refused to recommend him so far. There were some high-born knights who’d started their training even later than he had, and to his knowledge they’d never needed to complete dangerous quests to earn their promotions.)
It was late afternoon by the time he approached the mountain’s peak. The foliage was sparse in this area, and the terrain was getting steeper. His horse was starting to struggle with the rocky slopes, so he decided to leave her and go the rest of the way on foot. He stopped at the next tree he found - well, more of a tallish bush really - and looped her reins around it.
He gave the mare a reassuring pat on the nose. “Don’t worry, girl. I’ll be fine. …probably.” He reconsidered for a moment, then untied her with a sigh. “Here. If I don’t come back by nightfall, just head to the village, okay?”
The mare stared blankly back at him. Hopefully she understood, more or less. She was a good horse, but she wasn’t really trained for combat. And this was his fight, in the end; it wouldn’t be right to get her hurt for it.
After a short hike, he found what he was looking for: a large stony platform close to the mountain’s peak, utterly devoid of any plant life. The sort of place where a wyvern would roost. The cliffs leading up to it were rather sheer, and he spent the better part of an hour finding a safe route up. As he clambered up the rocks to the summit, he tried to keep an eye out for the wyvern. If it discovered him now, all it would have to do was knock him off the cliff…
Thankfully, there was no sign of the wyvern, even once he’d reached the top. Its lair, however, was quite easy to find: carved into the mountainside was a huge opening that presumably led into the tunnels that the beast called home. Ashe couldn’t see more than a few meters into it, unfortunately.
He spent a few minutes surveying the area, trying to get a feel for the terrain. It wouldn’t do to successfully sidestep an attack just to immediately fall down the mountain, after all. (Briefly, he entertained the idea of fighting within the cave so that the creature wouldn't be able to fly. This was ruled out rather quickly; he didn’t much like his chances of winning if he couldn’t even see.)
Worryingly, the rocks below his feet were covered in what appeared to be scorch marks. Wyverns couldn’t produce fire, and no one would’ve been setting a campfire up here, not since the beast had moved in. …what if it really was-?
No, no, he was just freaking himself out. There was a good chance the stone just looked like that normally; this was pretty far up the mountain, it stood to reason there’d be different minerals here. Maybe, he reasoned, this was how the rumors of the creature breathing fire had started. That made sense. See? Nothing to worry about.
The sun was nearly to the horizon now, casting the mountaintop in an orange glow. It was quite the breathtaking view, looking down over the forests and farmland. Unfortunately, he didn’t have time to admire it. If he didn’t want to fight in the dark, he couldn’t afford to stall any longer.
Alright. He could do this. With one last check of his shield and weapons, Ashe took a deep breath and summoned all his courage.
“Great dragon of the mountain!”
The words echoed through the cavern; if the wyvern was home, it would hear him. Sure, it wouldn’t understand him, but the real goal was just to get its attention. Besides, this was how the heroes talked in all the stories he’d read, when they went to do battle with monsters; emulating them always made him feel just a bit braver.
“Your reign of terror here has ended!”
In the dark depths of the cave, he could see faint signs of movement as a creature began to emerge. Right, this was it. He raised his sword.
“Come forth and do…” He faltered as the creature stepped out into the light. “...battle…”
Oh, holy shit.
That was not an overgrown wyvern. That… that was a dragon.
His first thought - well, his first coherent thought that wasn’t some kind of swear word - was how??? How the fuck was there a real dragon here? There hadn’t been any dragons in this region for the better part of a century. Yet there was one standing right in front of him, covered in dark blue scales which appeared almost black in the rapidly dimming light.
His second thought was that he’d badly underestimated the dragon’s size. This was understandable; he’d only seen it in flight, after all, where there was nothing near it to provide a frame of reference. Now that it was in front of him, though, he could see that it was huge. Even with its slightly crouched stance, Ashe didn’t even come up to its shoulder. He had to crane his neck upwards just to be able to meet its gaze.
This led neatly into his third thought, which was: holy fuck, I’m going to die here.
No, no, it was too early to give up. He hastily shook himself from his thoughts and leveled his sword at the dragon. Not that it would do him much good; if those scales were even half as tough as they appeared, even a direct hit would only scuff them a little. Maybe he could hit it in the eye, if it lowered its head? Really, he’d have better luck with his bow - but to draw it he’d have to put his shield down, and the dragon was much too close already, he’d never have enough time-
Ashe readied his shield and braced himself, but thus far the dragon had made no move to attack. It was just staring at him. Like it was waiting for him to finish talking. That should’ve been a relief, really - he was in no hurry to fight this thing - but somehow he found it… unsettling.
Gathering up his courage, he tried again. His voice only shook a little.
“I- I am Ashe Ubert, loyal squire of the Kingdom of Faerghus, here to-”
“Slay Me?”
He let out a startled yelp and stumbled backwards a few steps, nearly tripping over the stones. “Y-you can talk?!”
The dragon tilted its head slightly, then spoke again in that booming voice. “No.”
“...right,” Ashe replied, weakly. The dragons never talked in the old stories. They were just… monsters, really. He wasn’t sure how he felt about slaying something with human intelligence. …though, to be fair, he probably wouldn’t need to worry about that. After all, that would require him to win.
“Are You Done?” The dragon took another step forwards-
“No! No, um-! W-why are you tormenting the people of this kingdom, foul beast?” Really, he shouldn’t keep delaying this fight, but… it hadn’t attacked him yet, so he wasn’t really sure what else to do. Now that he knew the dragon was intelligent, it felt unchivalrous to attack unprovoked. On the other hand, if he didn’t attack first, he had the feeling he’d never get the chance to.
The creature blinked, a translucent third eyelid swiping sideways across its eye. “How Am I Tormenting Them?”
Ashe faltered for a moment. It didn’t know? “Um, t-the farmers say you’ve been stealing cattle-”
“I Do Have To Eat Something. ”
“W-well, yes, but…”
“Cows Are Hardly The Worst Option.”
“N-no, I suppose not…” He tried not to consider what the worst option would be. He failed.
“If They Were Truly Bothered,” the dragon intoned, “They Would Send More Than Just A Squire.”
“I’m basically a knight,” Ashe protested, pride outweighing fear for a moment. “I’ve been qualified for a while now. And the captain said he’ll knight me as soon as I get back, that I just have to…” He trailed off as the situation sunk in.
“Slay The Dragon?”
At a loss for words, Ashe nodded. The dragon stared back at him with an unnerving intensity.
“Your Captain Sent You To Die.”
Was- Was that a threat?! The dragon’s tone was flat and unreadable, but… Oh, fuck it all. Chivalry be damned, he’d really rather stay alive.
In one quick motion Ashe dropped his sword and shield, leapt to the side, and grabbed his bow. He lined up a shot on the dragon’s eye in less than a second, mind running on adrenaline alone, and was about to fire-
-when his conscience kicked back in. Dammit. He shifted his aim a little; a hit to the face wouldn’t blind it, but maybe the pain would distract it long enough for him to run? Well, hopefully it would, because he really didn’t have time to make a better plan.
He fired the arrow. The dragon flinched as the projectile shattered against its face just inches away from its eye. Even at this close range the arrowhead didn’t pierce the scales; in fact, it didn’t seem to have done any damage at all.
For a moment, the dragon remained frozen in place, appearing almost surprised. Then, its dark blue eyes narrowed, and its mouth opened in a snarl. The very mountain seemed to shake as a growl rumbled through its massive chest.
…belatedly, Ashe realized that even if he knew he’d missed the eye on purpose, there was no way for the dragon to know that. “W-wait, I-!”
But the dragon, it seemed, was done with talking. With an enraged roar it lunged forwards, slashing at him with a foreleg. The beast’s claws grazed Ashe’s shoulder as he dodged sideways, hurriedly trying to load another arrow. He ran towards the dragon’s back, in an attempt to stay away from its teeth and claws.
He raised his bow-
Suddenly, the breath was knocked out of him as the dragon’s long tail slammed into his side, sending him flying. The bow flew from his hands as he skidded across the stones and landed heavily on his back. It took a few precious seconds for him to get his bearings again. His bow lay in pieces on the ground, and the dragon was getting closer-
-his shield, where was his shield-?
There! He spotted it in the dirt just a few meters away and made a desperate lunge, reaching out to-
A pillar of fire shot out of the dragon’s mouth towards the shield, and he pulled back just a second too late. White-hot flames seared his arm as the heat buffeted his face, forcing him to close his eyes and blindly roll away.
He stopped just before the edge of the platform. Luckily, his maneuver put out the fire that had caught on his arm. Ashe glanced back, and watched with a mixture of terror and awe as the shield deformed and melted. After a few seconds, the flames died down, leaving a glowing orange puddle of molten metal on the stones.
No shield. No weapons. Nowhere left to run… Well, nowhere except…
He briefly glanced behind him, where the platform dropped off. This was the side he’d climbed up on; while still sheer, it was still noticeably less so than the others. All the same, this slope was tall. It was steep. It had, from what he could tell, a lot of large stones at the bottom.
But for all its faults, it didn’t have huge teeth and flaming breath. So before he could overthink it, Ashe tucked his head in and rolled sideways.
Time itself seemed to slow as he tumbled down the hill, too disoriented to track his progress, only aware of his steadily increasing momentum. Even the periodic hits from rocks and outcroppings seemed to fade into the background.
His descent had probably only taken a few seconds, but it felt like an eternity before the slope shallowed out and he landed painfully on his back.
He lay there for a while, just staring up at the sky. Even with his armor taking the brunt of the damage, he still felt like… well, like he’d rolled off a cliff. The rough trip also hadn’t done any favors to the burns on his left arm, where he had been hit by the dragon’s fire.
The dragon…
He glanced back up, and immediately froze.
It saw him. There was no chance it didn’t; it was looking directly at him. Ashe stayed perfectly still, crippled by indecision. Should he run? Play dead? He didn’t think he could run right now, to be honest.
The dragon started climbing down the cliff face, and Ashe was fairly certain his heart stopped. He shot to his feet, shaking from the adrenaline, and tried desperately to remember where he’d left his horse.
Surprisingly, the dragon paused. It stared at him for a moment, then began backing itself back up to the top of the cliff. Upon reaching the platform, it turned back towards the cave and vanished from sight.
Ashe collapsed to the ground and finally- finally- got a chance to rest.
=========================
It was long past sunset by the time Ashe managed to limp back to his horse. She was still patiently waiting where he’d left her, chewing idly on the bush.
“I thought I told you to leave at nightfall,” he mumbled, giving her a grateful pat. The adrenaline had all but worn off at this point. Everything hurt, and he was absolutely exhausted. He was getting aches in muscles he didn’t know he even had. His left arm was in the worst shape, though; it still felt a bit like it was on fire.
Through nothing less than a feat of strength he managed to get himself into the saddle. The mare began to trot in what was hopefully the right direction, and it was all Ashe could do to just stay awake as they began the long journey back to the village.