In this land, of old, there lived a dragon, she scrawled in her little book. A foul creature was he, given to foul tempers and even fouler odours. And as she wrote, the world around her seemed to fade away, to darken. It began to change in a way that almost defied description. First it changed in the little things; the pavement changed to dirt, the garbage changed to food and refuse over cardboard and glass. The wall she leaned against changed from stone to wood.
A dragon poked its scaly head out of the wall to her side, wriggling out of nothing and revealing its long, slender, serpentine body. From its gullet it belched a blast of fire, which warmed Alice’s face. It clutched the ground with its long arms, dragging itself out of the wall until it became wholly visible. And all the while, Alice wrote…
In this land, of old, there lived a dragon. A foul creature was he, given to foul tempers and even fouler odours. Some called him Gorelin, which meant “destroyer”, while others called him Orenesh, which meant “he who lights the fire” in the tongue of the Men of the South. Others just called him demon. He could be called anything, really. He was evil all the same.
He lived alone in what was once a grand city, full of light and life. Where once there had been statues and fountains and gardens, there was now a burnt desolation. Where once there had been tall buildings, mansions and castles all, there were now hollow, ashen shells. Where once there had been people aplenty and festivals to boot, there was now no one. Nothing but silence graced that ancient city, silence and a dragon.
Gorelin lived alone there, in one of the old, now deserted castles. It had once housed the King of Ticaria, a man who had reigned supreme over all of the Southern Continent. Now he was dead, however, and Gorelin took his place. He had been the one to burn the city, to destroy all of the grandeur of the men. He'd taken their gold and their coins, their goblets and their swords, all the riches that they had in the world. He'd taken their lives and their families and everything that they held dear. Now it was his to hold dear, and he did exactly that.
Deep in the darkest cavern of that great castle, in what might have been a dungeon once, Gorelin had made his horde. Piled high, reaching almost to the cavernous ceilings, were riches of every kind: coins, cups, weapons, armour, everything imaginable. And it was solely Gorelin's.
Now Aron had heard the story of the Dragon of Ticaria, of that fabled demon that men called Gorelin. He discounted it. It had been more than five hundred years since the sacking of that Southern City, and it had more likely been by barbarian pillagers than by a dragon. No, there was no dragon lurking in the ruins of Ticaria, he was sure. And to prove his confidence in this, Aron had decided that he would go there himself, to show his friends that there was nothing inside those walls worthy of fear. He was a fool, indeed.
A fool though he was, he was the first man to set foot in legendary Ticaria since the city had burned so long ago. He found ruins, ruins, and ruins to spare, but he found no other life. No bugs to scuttle along the ground, no predators to stalk the alleys. Not even the birds flew overhead. How could there be a dragon in such a lifeless place? No, it made little sense to him. Alone he walked down the dusty cobblestone streets, past crumbled buildings and dry fountains. Once he passed a statue of what might have been an ancient king, though he had not a head on him, no crown to prove his royalty.
Eventually he stumbled onto the castle, a greater building than any other. Towers stretched up from it to scrape the sky; a barren moat surrounded the ancient stronghold, a splintered drawbridge spanning its width. Its sheer immensity seemed to highlight its emptiness, and it seemed even more desolate than the rest of the city. Barren or not, though, Aron barged in all the same.
There, in the darkness of the entryway, he found nothing but dust and ruin. Two great heads looked down on him from either side of the doorway, heads that had once been regal but now held nothing but terror. Their eyes, though made of stone, seemed able to peer into his very self. He shuddered, but pressed on. There was a vast series of hallways from there, one that led into the throne room itself. He went there first, but found it empty like the rest, with nothing to hold his attention. He left.
The Dragon and the King
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