Into the Heart of a Killer: Memoirs of an Assassin

Chapter Six

"The first dragon," he said. "was a magical beast. She – because it was a girl – was gold and beautiful. Everyone looked up to her. She protected the towns nearby and she loved them, as any good mother would. One day, she found a tiny human. It was a baby. She didn't know anything about human babies because she was a dragon. But she took the tiny baby and brought it back to the nearby village. The villagers told the dragon that the baby's mother had died and no one could afford to take care of him. The dragon took the baby to her cave and cared for him instead of the humans.

"The dragon had trouble taking care of the baby. She was too big to change the baby's diapers and she didn't know what to feed it. She tried giving the baby meat, but the baby wouldn't eat it. Eventually, she was afraid the baby was going to die, so she took it back to the village and pleaded with the humans to help her. She found a group of girls that were willing to help her take care of the baby. The dragon took the baby home with her every night and brought him back during the day to be fed and changed by the humans. These girls named the dragon 'Emese,' which means mother."

"You can be named 'mother'?" I asked.

"Shh, don't interrupt."

"Sorry," I said, and he continued where he left off.

"Emese took very good care of the baby. She made sure the human girls took care of him very well, too. Emese and the girls became very good friends. Emese stopped bringing the baby to the girls as the child started to grow up. When the child could walk on his own, Emese stopped visiting the village, but she sent the boy down to get food and clothes. She gave him a scale as money, and the villagers loved to see the shiny gold scales that he brought down. The boy was named Akakios – which means innocence. Akakios was the nicest of all the boys in the village and the boys got jealous of him. They didn't like how popular Akakios was, and they made fun of him for not having real parents.

"Akakios didn't understand what they meant when he was little. He just wanted to play with Emese. Emese loved Akakios with all her heart, and that's a lot, because dragon hearts are very big. Akakios spent a lot of time playing with Emse. He went into the village to buy food and clothes but otherwise, he stayed with his mother. He loved his mother very much, even though she was a dragon. Emese calmed his fears every night he had nightmares and scared off the village boys if they came up to tease Akakios. The boys quickly learned to leave him alone. But the village boys weren't happy with Akakios. They were jealous that everyone liked him best.

"And so the boys came up with a plan. It wasn't very nice. The boys wanted to scare Akakios so much that he would never come back to the village. So, one day, they stole Akakios's best friend's dress. They killed a sheep and covered the dress in the sheep's blood. Then they waited for him at the entrance of the village. When they saw him, they threw the dress on the ground and pointed. 'This is what happens,' one of the boys said, 'when we don't like you. Go away, or we'll kill your other friends.'

"The boys didn't expect Akakios's reaction. He got so angry that he attacked one of them. The two fell onto the ground. In the fall, Akakios broke the boy's arm on accident. The boys got so mad at Akakios that they attacked him in return. No one came to help Akakios and the boys didn't stop kicking him until he stopped moving. They didn't mean to kill him. The boy with the broken arm stopped them. They were all scared when they realized what they had done, and they ran away.

"Emese got worried for her child when he didn't return in the evening, so she went to the village. The village was in a commotion, and Emese was confused. She found the girls who had helped take care of Akakios, who were all mothers now, and asked where her son was. One of the girls was taking care of her son, who had a broken arm. Emese asked how it got broken. The boy didn't say anything and neither did the moms. Finally, one of the mothers stood and took the dragon to the entrance of the town. There sat a white blanket covering Akakios's body.

"The boy with the broken arm had followed them to the entrance told Emese what happened. The dragon stared at the boy before letting out a shriek so grave that it broke the hearts of everyone who heard it. Emese grabbed Akakios's body gingerly in her claws and opened her wings. She flew away from the village, her cries echoing all the way.

"When she got back to the cave, she cried over her baby. She breathed life into the boy, but he would not stir. Her sadness ate at her until it swallowed her whole. In the dead of night, Emese took Akakios's body and laid it in the center of the village. With a terrifying roar, she began to destroy it. Fire caught every building until everything was consumed in flames. All that could be heard were Emese's devastated roars and the screams of the villagers. Even as the flames grew higher, Emese landed in the middle of the village, curling herself around the body of her dead child, and made no sound as the flames enveloped her."

I stared. His mother had told him that? As a bedtime story?

"That's very sad," I said. "How were there any more dragons after Emese?"

"I don't know," Tane said. "Mother said there was a lesson to the story, but I haven't figured it out yet."

"I think it's to be nice to people," I offered. "Emese was sad because Akakios died. She loved him very much. I think the lesson is not to hurt people, 'cause even if you think you're only hurting oen person, you hurt the people that love them, too."

Tane thought about it for a moment before nodding his head. "Maybe. I'll ask Mother. She promised to tell me if I was right." His eyes lit up. "Better idea! You can tell her!"

"What?" I asked, looking at him in disbelief. "I can't tell her. I've never met her before."

"So come meet her now!"

I looked at him hesitantly. "I'm not sure..."

"It'll be fun, I promise. She lives right on the edge of the forest, so she isn't too far away. Pleaseeeee, Jae?"

I sighed. Ceseth wouldn't want me going. He didn't want me to see Tane in the first place. I hated how everything always boiled down to what he wanted. I didn't want to put Tane in danger by being friends with him, but at the same time, he wanted me to go with him so badly. She sounded like a nice woman... it would be nice to witness what a real mother was like.

"Okay," I said, finally giving in. "I guess I can go."