The Last Dragon

by J.A. Clement

head.

  “I promise. You have my word as a Dragon.” It was a bit like swearing an oath to a sheep, but he was very lonely and he did want the human to come back. “You’re sure your mother doesn’t have an axe, though?”

  “Of course she doesn’t!” And waving back at him, the youngling skipped away.

  Jorr did not wander far from the forest that afternoon, but his little friend did not come back. The day stretched on and on and it was only as evening fell that Jorr heard a shout. He trotted back to the edge of the forest and sat patiently until the youngling burst out of the forest, followed by an adult human who stopped in her tracks.

  “Hey Dragon.” The youngling ran up to Jorr. “My mother didn’t believe I was talking to a real live dragon so I brought her to see you.”

  “Madam.” Jorr bowed his head courteously to her. “I am honoured to make your acquaintance.”

  The woman’s knees gave out beneath her, and she sat suddenly. Shifting himself back a bit so as not to get too close, Jorr laid down so that his head was more on her level, but she did not reply and just stared at him. Jorr glanced at the youngling. “Are you sure she speaks?”

  “Mother!” The youngling elbowed her in the ribs.

  “Certainly I speak,” the woman quavered. “I am just not used to speaking to dragons. What are you doing here?”

  Jorr looked away, a little ashamed of himself. “Well... I am running away, if the truth be told. Not very impressive, is it?”

  “Running away? You expect me to believe that, a great armoured beast like you? What would you have to run away from?” Her voice squeaked with fear.

  “Well, humans, actually.” Jorr turned his head so she could see the smashed scales and the dried blood on his neck. “Humans with ropes and axes.”

  “What did you do? Flamed them to a cinder I suppose.”

  “Something is wrong with me. I think my Elders put a spell on me so that I can’t flame any more. Look.” He turned his head away politely, and phutted smoke into the forest. “No flames. I was really good at them too. I hate having no flames. The humans tied me into a net and tried to chop my head off, and all I could do was to wriggle free and fly away, and I hurt my wing so I can’t even do that now.” He turned his head away to hide the big steaming tear which rolled down his face. “My Mother was right. The first thing I did was to get into trouble, and now I can’t hunt or defend myself and the man with the axe might come after me again.”

  The woman looked at him narrowly. “How old are you, Dragon?”

  “Very old!” the youngling announced. “He’s three hundred and seventy years old!”

  “And how old is that for a Dragon?”

  Jorr considered how to explain this to a creature that did not have eggs or hatchlings. “Not an adult, but not fresh out of the egg. Wyverns like myself are about two thirds of the way towards adulthood, maybe a bit more.”

  “Quite young, then?”

  “I suppose...” Jorr was a bit prickly about this. “But nearly an adult.”

  “And you are hurt?”

  Jorr suddenly saw where this was going. “Madam, I have given your youngling my word as a Dragon that I will not eat it. I’ve never eaten human and now I know they speak, I really don’t think I’ll ever want to. You and your family are safe from me.” His tummy rumbled at this inopportune moment.

  “What is the word of a Dragon worth?” she asked softly.

  “The word of a Dragon is magical, Madam. We sang the words that made the world. The word of a Dragon is as binding as rock.” How odd it was to have to explain all this.

  “I will trust you. But you must also promise not to eat our animals,” she continued. “We are poor and we barely scrape a living. If you eat our cow and our goat, we will starve.”

  Jorr was at first downcast, and then a thought struck him. “Do you think that that is why all those other people attacked me? Because I ate the sheep by the river?”

  “That’s very probable.”

  Jorr was very hungry, but he was also very lonely, and it seemed to him that he should be able to find some food elsewhere. Besides, it was nice to be talking to someone who didn’t dislike him.

  “I promise.” He sighed, and all the dust rose up in a great huff.

  “Thank you. My name is Rosalia.”

  Jorr leapt to his feet and bowed deeply. “I am honoured by your trust, Rosalia. My name is Jorr.”

  “By my trust?”

  “To give me your name is a deep magic indeed, especially when you thought I was going to eat you. I am honoured that you have decided to trust me.”

  Rosalia looked astonished, but the youngling bounced up again. “Jorr, my name is Edred. I’m eleven, you know. If I was a dragon, would I be one of those wiv- why – those things that you said you were?”

  Jorr considered this. “Hmmm... How old do humans live to?”

  “Sixty or so.”

  “Sixty! How quickly you learn. At sixty I could barely walk in a straight line without tripping over my tail! Let’s see now... Yes. I think you’d be a bit old for a hatchling. You would be a young wyvern, but a wyvern nonetheless.”

  “Hurrah! But I don’t know how to be a wyvern. What do wyverns do?”

  Rosalia sat on a nearby rock, and watched as Jorr told her son great tales of the tricks and naughtinesses that the others had got up to. At first she watched very closely, but soon she was laughing along with them. At the end of the day she agreed that they would come and talk to him again tomorrow.

  The next day and the next, Jorr talked to Edred. For a youngling the boy was fearless, with an insatiable curiosity that Jorr really enjoyed. Edred had such different ways of thinking to the ones Jorr was used to, and the dragon marvelled that for a puny little creature with no flames, no wings, no scales and no teeth or talons worth speaking of, humans spent very little of their time hiding or afraid. As he learned, they were more hunters than prey. The days and months went much faster now that he had friends to talk to and he told them all about the places he had flown over, the plants and animals that he had seen (and in some cases, eaten) and the cities and countries of which the other dragons had talked when he was little enough to still be interested.

  In return they told him about themselves. Rosalia’s husband had died of a fever, and now there was just the two of them trying to scratch a living. Jorr felt sorry for them, and set himself to think of a way to help, but nothing really occurred to him.

  “You must be hungry, Jorr. What are you eating?”

  Jorr tried not to salivate. “I haven’t really caught much of late.”

  “There is a farmer at the next town whose apple trees are being stripped of their bark by a herd of deer. If you promise not to eat his cattle, he will show you where the deer live.”

  Jorr’s stomach rumbled. “Does he have an axe?”

  “He does not. Shall I bring him here to talk to you?”

  “If you think that is wise.” Jorr was dubious.

  “You need to eat, Jorr. I worry about you, you know.”

  Jorr stared as Rosalia walked back to the house where her friend was waiting. He was touched that this human should care about him. He felt ashamed about his ignorance, having thought that humans were basically upright sheep. There was much more to this world than he had thought. Jorr decided that if he could, he would try to earn Rosalia’s respect and that of her family.

  Soon she returned with her farmer friend. Though initially everyone was a bit wary, eventually it was agreed that Jorr should hunt the deer, but that the farmer would allow them to stay on his land so that Jorr had a source of food.

  Jorr’s wing was still not right, but he could fly on it and soon found the herd. At first he ate deer after deer, revelling in the chase and glorying in the food, but there were not that many deer, and he stopped while there were still some left. He did not want to be hungry again though his hunger was barely sated. The farmer watched him closely as he flew back to the forest, but as Jorr mad
e no attempt on any of his cattle, it all went well and everyone was pleased with the agreement.

  Jorr looked closely at the farmer’s land as he flew and saw how it was crisscrossed with little channels of water.

  “It is to water the trees that grow the apples,” Edred told him. “That is how they grow so big and sweet.”

  “But you don’t have them in your pasture.”

  “We bring buckets of water from the river for the animals. It’s quite hard work.”

  Jorr thought about this. “When is your mother next out at the market? I have an idea.”

  Rosalia came back from the market the following week to find the house in uproar. The goat and cow had been shut in the stable, and the pasture was full of a very muddy dragon, a channel leading to a deep muddy pool, and a muddy son dancing about shouting “Look what we made! Look what we made!”

  “What on earth...?” She dropped her basket of vegetables and went to look, laughing out loud to see the delight on the dragon’s face as well as Edred’s. “How wonderful! What is it Jorr?”

  The dragon had a mouthful of pebbles. He concentrated – there was a grinding sound as he chewed carefully – and then mumbling “’Scuse me,” he spat something out into the grass and stared at it.

  “Eugghhhh, that’s disgusting, spitting like that!” Edred shouted with glee.

  “Thought so. These any good to you?” Amongst the shards of stone were green crystals. “Once polished up it’ll be the sort of shiny trinket you humans are fond of, I think.”

  Rosalia thanked him politely and picked the