Steven George & The Dragon
The Miser’s Gift
HEAVY WITH THE FEAST the trader had ordered spread before them, Steven had difficulty focusing on what was being said. There had been considerably more ale served than Steven was used to. Ibin once again convinced Steven that in order to establish their position in the inn, they should arrive as a gentleman and his page. Since Ibin knew more about the conduct of civil affairs than Steven, he would be the gentleman, and Steven would be his page and confidante. As the gentleman’s page, it was up to Steven to pay the innkeeper for the feast and lodging while the trader continually invited others to join at their table. Steven calculated the cost of the meal and lodging in his head and resolved to withhold two gold pieces worth of information from the man he now considered little more than a thief.
As Steven cut his food, the thief noticed the knife with the dragon pattern engraved on its blade.
“Steven George,” said the thief at last. “The company is in need of a story. As you owe me a story debt, I call upon you to tell us the story of that knife you use at table.” At once, all eyes fell upon the knife that Steven held in his hand and there were exclamations over the beauty of the knife. Steven had prepared a story about his hat for the company and was surprised at the request.
“Wouldn’t you rather hear about my hat?” he asked. Those gathered at the table laughed.
“My poor page is recently from the country where stories are often told about the fantastic adventures of articles of clothing,” laughed the thief. “No, fair page. No peasant hat stories for this company. Tell us instead of this beautiful knife, and how a simple page comes to have it.”
Steven looked around the company and in his state of disorientation brought on by too much food and ale they reminded him of nothing less than gathered predators descending on their prey. Forgetting the advice of the Tinker, he took another sip of his ale and rose uncertainly to stand by the table.
ONCE UPON A TIME, when grandfathers were young and paths had not yet wound away from the Castle of Minor Ordam, there lived a miserly despot named Grouse who ruled over all the land with a tight fist and a sharp tongue. Grouse was hated by all his subjects and by his overlords as well. It was said he had many treasures in his castle and guarded them with fervor. The miser’s treasure room, it was rumored, would be a sight to behold if only one could get to it. But the room was located in the center of the castle dungeons. It was locked by a huge padlock and chains held the bar in place. This room, in turn, was reached by a staircase that had a locked door at both the bottom and the top. The staircase was in a private locked chamber that could only be reached through a door hidden in the master’s bedchamber. No one had ever been in the mysterious vault except the master, but tales of its glory were told throughout the land.
The miser’s touch was hard on the people of his land. He taxed what little they had and let nothing issue from his palace that would help them. The peasants of Minor Ordam were so pressed, that, after their pleas to the miser had failed to win succor, they sent a delegation to the miser’s overlord, who in turn summoned a council of the lords around. They listened to the peasants’ complaint—how they were unable to feed their families because of the heavy taxes the miser imposed and how their children were unclothed in the winter because the miser took their wool.
First the lords thought they would tax the miser for his injustice, but the miser just threatened more stringent duties on his people. Then the lords thought they would make war on the miser, but the cost of war is high and if the miser closed his gates, they would have to besiege the castle for months, or possibly years, before they could breach the walls. Finally, the lords came up with the idea to infiltrate the castle with their own man who would gain access to the miser’s treasury and distribute it back to the people with, of course, a fair share going back to the overlords. They searched far and wide for the right person when they thought of a thief named Bárcenas.
Now Bárcenas had been known to the lords for many years, but had gone unpunished for his deeds because he could never be caught with the stolen property. He continued to prosper amidst them as he continued steal from them. So, they reasoned together that they could rid themselves of miser and thief together by getting the thief to break into the miser’s treasury, then convicting the thief at last for his crimes.
Bárcenas had not survived for so long through idiocy. He was clever and saw through the lords’ plan immediately. But how could he avoid their clever trap? If he failed to breach the miser’s treasury, the Lords would surely banish him. Yet if he did breach the treasury, they would convict him of theft and he would lose both his hands.
Bárcenas approached the Castle of Minor Ordam with caution late one night. He silently scaled the walls of the castle and peeked over the parapet. All was dark and silent. He raced across the rooftops looking for guards and trying to find the master’s bedchamber. But looking from the outside was in vain, and as dawn began to clear the eastern skies, Bárcenas slipped out of the castle and away. This happened for two more nights with the same results. The thief was discouraged as he had found no way into the inner fortification. This would require a different approach.
The next day the thief went to the market in the city. He looked long and hard for something special. At last, in the back chamber of a metalsmith, the thief saw his salvation. It was a golden goblet. Runes were engraved around the lip of the beautiful goblet and the stem was fashioned in the shape of a dragon with unfurled wings. The golden flames that shot from the dragon’s mouth were so cunningly crafted that they looked as though they would burn the unwary. This was the pride of the smith’s workshop and he was cautious showing it to Bárcenas.
But the thief had no intention of stealing such a fine piece, for surely this would be known anywhere that he might try to sell it, and in his line of work collecting lovely pieces of art was impractical. Instead, Bárcenas paid for the goblet. The price nearly beggared the thief, but he knew where he could get more coins. There was only one dragon goblet.
The next day, Bárcenas arrived at the Castle of Minor Ordam when the first peasants were entering with their goods for sale in the market and paying their taxes to the guards on duty. He took with him a simple young man who knew no better than to act as his page. As they approached the guards, the page stepped boldly forth and declared, “Make way for my master, the honorable Duke of Skulhelitan, heir to the Kingdom of the Underlands and ambassador to the fabled Castle of Minor Ordam. We seek audience with His Glorious Lordship Grouse to pay him honor and bring him gifts.”
The guards nearly fell over one another in attempting to usher the thief and his page into the presence of Lord Grouse. They were offered wine and food, given a fine room and were encouraged to bathe before they met with the master. The thief briefly considered slaying the lord and claiming the castle for himself, but the power of the overlords made him cautious. They would not willingly suffer a man of his reputation as an underlord. At last, they were summoned to the hastily cleaned throne room of Lord Grouse.
The master was seated on an elevated chair that the thief saw was not so much a throne as it was thrown together. A chair sat on wooden boxes to give it more height. It had been covered by what appeared to be nothing less than a feather blanket retrieved from a bedchamber.
The thief politely knelt before the throne as the page announced his presence. Then he rose to address the master.
“Oh, most elevated master of this most glorious house, your humble servant is honored by your gracious hospitality. I bring greetings from Glendal, King of all Skulhelitan and your faithful servant. The King has long sought to have audience with the honored Lord Grouse, but has been ill for many years and cannot travel. Therefore, he bade me as, his heir apparent, to seek the wisdom and counsel of the famed Lord Grouse in his stead.” The thief was most eloquent in his address, quite overwhelming Lord Grouse who had not in his memory received an ambassador from any other lord, duke, or king of any land. The flattery worked well.
“My Lord Duke,” said Grouse, “I am pleased to welcome your visit and ask that you bring what matter you will to my judgment and I will advise you with the experience of my years.”
Then Grouse stood from the throne, which nearly toppled with him as his foot caught in the blanket and it slipped between the crates. His dignity was barely rescued by the guards who caught him and set him on his feet. He joined the thief and asked him, “What counsel would you seek from me, good sir Duke? Let us walk in the garden and talk as friends.”
And so, they left the banquet hall and walked in what Grouse called his garden. It was so overgrown with weeds and briars from lack of attention that the two soon gave up trying to fight their way through the brambles and sat together on a rickety bench, out of earshot of the guards who were still picking stick-tights out of the joints of their armor.
“Soon—indeed, I am afraid all too soon—I shall ascend to the throne of my esteemed ancestor, King Glendal,” said the thief. “He is old and ill and the time will come that he will pass over the river as a free soul. But my ascension to the throne is not uncontested, for there is a widespread belief that we have not the ability to establish alliances with kingdoms of the Overland. We fear that we will come to blows with nations who suspect, unwisely, that we are weak. Therefore, I have journeyed to you to find some means of establishing an alliance that will dissuade them from aggression for we are a peaceful, though fearsome, people. In turn, the forces of my realm will be at your command should your overlords continue their meddling in your affairs.” Bárcenas nodded wisely and Grouse remembered the overlords’ demands that he share his wealth with the populace.
“And you seek that alliance from me?” asked Grouse, incredulously. “I am not powerful. I do not have an army that can assist you. How can I be of use?”
“Ah,” said the thief. “We have force of arms to withstand attack, but would rather not be challenged. What you have and are so modest about is fabled wealth. We do not seek an alliance of strength, but of treasure. In this we believe we can make a grand alliance.”
Now the miserly Grouse was cautious at the mention of his wealth, but the flattery of the thief was such that he let his caution slip.
“How would my wealth be of help to you?” he asked.
“Well,” said Bárcenas, “our vaults in Skulhelitan are the strongest in the world. Our army is strong and able to withstand assault because they are wraiths and spirits that are not easily slain in battle. We need to show our enemies that our army is trusted by our allies so they will be discouraged from attacking us. I would propose that we store your wealth in our vaults. Thus, our enemies can see that you have created a strong alliance with us and will know that they cannot possibly breach our defenses. Your enemies will know that you have compacted with the Underlands and will not dare attack you. And we will pay interest.”
“But my vault is secure,” said the miser. “It has a bar and chains on the door and I have the only key.”
“Our vault,” said the thief, “has a door carved out of solid rock that takes four strong men to move when six golden locks have been released by the six gatekeepers of the underworld.” The miser was impressed. “And we will pay interest,” the thief added.
“My vault is reached by a staircase of two hundred steps with a locked door at each end,” said the miser.
“My vault,” countered the thief, “is in a sheer mountain cliff one hundred feet above a raging ocean.” The miser was again impressed, but unwilling to give up.
“My vault can only be reached through a secret passage in my own bedchamber,” said the miser.
“My vault,” boldly lied the thief, “is guarded by a fiery dragon that must be passed in order to gain access.”
“How do you do that?” asked the miser, astounded.
“I thought you might ask that,” said the thief, “and so I have brought with me the secret that will allow a man to pass the dragon. You shall hold this in safety until such time as we agree to transfer the wealth once again.”
“You have this with you?” exclaimed the miser in unbelief. “Show me. Show me!”
His excitement was so great that the guards took notice and began to approach. He frantically waved them away, but the thief feigned sudden caution as he glanced toward the guards.
“Let us not expose ourselves in this public forum,” he said.
“I have it,” said the miser. “After dinner this evening, you will come to my chamber. I will take you with me to my vault. There you will show me the key, and if it is true, we will transfer my wealth to your vault where it will surely be impregnable, and I will keep the key here in my vault as security. And you will pay interest.”
That night, the clever thief and the miser dined on an impressive array of dishes that were served by somber looking peasants in ragged clothes. After they had eaten and drunk their fill, the thief and the miser retired to their bedchambers. When the bell in the great watchtower tolled the middle of the night, the thief knocked softly on the miser’s door and was admitted. The miser pulled a drapery aside behind his bed and opened the first door with a key from a great ring of keys at his belt. Then they descended two hundred steps into the darkness until the miser stopped to open a second door with another key. Then they entered a chamber lit by only a single torch. In front of them was the barred and chained door. This required the miser to use three different keys before the bars were released and the door creaked open.
As fortunes might be measured, the miser’s hoard was pitiful. At first the thief thought they had descended to the castle dump. It seemed nothing the miser had ever touched had been discarded. Old royal proclamations of taxes lay stacked in piles beside theatrical playbills and napkins from some long-forgotten feast. True, he had gold coins and silver cups scattered amidst the rubble. A few precious stones decorated plates or circlets, but the thief’s heart sank at the thought that he had taken such a risk for so little.
But there was only one way he could save his hands from the overlords, so he continued to play his game. He reached into his coat and withdrew the marvelous golden dragon goblet. The truth be known, it was much finer than the miser’s wealth. When the miser’s eyes lit upon it, they brightened, for he had never seen a treasure that matched it.
“This is the key to the dragon vault?” cried the miser. “It is beautiful. But how does it work?”
“Yes, well,” said Bárcenas, “if you will proceed with this trade, you will keep the dragon key in this vault while we take your vast hoard for safe-keeping. Thereby we will cement our alliance and show our enemies how powerful we truly are. Tonight, we will proceed to our treasury and I will show you how to use the key.” The miser readily agreed. Then, remembering his manners, he rushed to a corner of the vault.
“I must send a token to King Glendal,” said the miser, overwhelmed by the beauty of the goblet. He shifted papers and raised a cloud of dust. Then he turned to Bárcenas and revealed a sword and dagger, covered in dust and tarnish and cased in a moldy leather sheath. Emblazoned on the blade of each was an engraving that seemed to glow from the tarnished steel as the thief looked at it.
“This sword and dagger,” said the miser, “were all that were left to me by my father. All this treasure has been earned by my own hand, but this. These will I send to your king as my pledge of alliance and will exchange them with him again for the dragon goblet when I retrieve my treasures from your vault.”
This having been said, the two conspirators exchanged their tokens and set to bundling the miser’s treasure up into bags and hauling it out of the vault. All this time, the miser thought, “You will never see the goblet again, for with it in my power, I can go into your vault at will and take not only what is mine, but what is yours together.” At the same time, the thief thought, “You will never see the sword and dagger again, for the overlords will retrieve your hoard, but I will keep these weapons. So, deceiving each other they proceeded to a cliff that the thief knew to store the treasures.
When they approached the cliff and saw the raging water beneath it, the thief instructed the miser to fill the goblet with water and when he saw the fire of the dragon, he was to cast the water at it which would allow them to pass. Soon as they wound their way up the cliff by a narrow path, fire burst from the rocks ahead of them.
“Now,” said the thief, and the frightened miser threw the water at the flames. They were extinguished immediately and the two continued up the cliff. They entered the cave and were met by six men the thief had picked as his confederates. These six unlocked six locks and four of them pushed the stone door aside.
In fact, this was the secret treasury of the thief and his confederates, and it appeared much richer than that of the poor miser. The miser’s eyes went wide as he thought of the wealth that he could now command. They stacked the miser’s miserable pile next to that of the thief, then ritually locked the door and descended the cliff. Bárcenas set Grouse on the road back to the Castle of Minor Ordam and then returned up the path to the cliff. The thief and his confederates carefully removed the miser’s treasure and loaded it on a donkey, then sealed the entrance of the cave so it could not be seen from the path. The thief then went into the city and to the overlords.
Immediately they seized the hoard, exclaiming over its pittance and accused the thief of stealing from the miser. But the thief protested that he had been given the entire treasure by the miser and could prove this. He instructed the overlords to ride to the Castle of Minor Ordam and ask the miser where his treasure was.
So, the overlords rode to the castle and at the gates demanded that the miser address them. He stood atop a wall and called down to them.
“What will you have of me, a poor man barely able to pay his taxes to the lords and whose people are scarcely able to feed themselves?” asked the miser.
“Where is your treasure, Grouse,” called the king of the overlords, “for we believe it has been stolen.”
“It is not possible,” returned the miser. “This night past I have transferred my wealth into the safekeeping of King Glendal of the Underland by way of his faithful Duke of Skulhelitan. In token of our exchange, the Duke has entrusted me with this goblet and has pledged the wraiths and ghouls of the Underland to my defense should your meddling persist. There is no other treasure at this castle, so go and bother me no more.”
With that the miser returned to his rooms to admire the incredible dragon goblet and the overlords returned to face the thief.
“You see,” said the thief, “I have taken nothing from the Lord Grouse that he has not freely given me. Here is his treasure.” The overlords took the treasures of the miser. These they divided among themselves and with the people of Ordam, thinking nothing of being thieves themselves.
The thief polished the sword and dagger and discovered the blue steel and blazing engraving of the dragon—a sword so sharp it might pierce a man and not leave a mark—and thought that he had not made such a bad trade after all.
You might think that trading his hoarded treasure for a single goblet was foolish beyond belief, but it was the story of the goblet as told to him by the thief that captured the heart of the miser. For many years, he was so enamored of the beautiful dragon goblet that he did not think again of the hoard. He was so pleased with this treasure, in fact, that he ceased to collect heavy taxes from his people and the fiefdom prospered. He had so completely forgotten about his previous treasure that on his deathbed he clutched the dragon goblet to his chest whispering, “Mine, all mine.”
As for the Bárcenas, he could not be other than he was. He continued to steal from people and ultimately was caught. The executioner used the thief’s own sword, emblazoned with a dragon, to cut off his hand, but the thief clutched the hand to his wrist and the wound was so clean that the parts knitted together and he was healed.
The knife I bear with the dragon emblazoned on its blade is the very knife of that thief, passed down through generations so that even I, the poorest of his kin, carry it with pride.
THE CROWDED COMMONS of the Inn of the Lost Soul was stunned by the story Steven told. Steven, for his part, felt dizzy from the exertion of telling the story and from the food and ale that he had consumed. He reached for his mug and drank off another round.
“Storyteller,” said one of those gathered, “this is a most amazing tale. But where, pray tell, is the sharp sword that matches this glorious blade?”
“Ah that,” said Steven, nearly tripping over himself as he stumbled to his pack. “The sword is here in the pack of my glorious master, The Honorable Ibin Arriaga, Thief of faraway Baghalonia.” With that, Steven drew the sword and lay it on the table next to the knife. The room was hushed in awe and Ibin asked help in getting his faithful servant to bed. Steven was led stumbling blindly up the stairs and was tucked into the bed.
The sword and knife were left beside him and he heard as the last of the guests was leaving the room, “I should like to have heard about his hat.”
When they were all gone, Ibin sat beside the groggy Steven and said, “Now, Dragonslayer, you owe me twelve gold coins worth of information. Where is the young idiot who delivered me into the hands of authorities in Baghalonia? I would repay his loyalty with a dose of my own.”
Now Steven was certain the thief meant harm to Jasper. He was certain, as well, that he had uncovered the truth about the trader cum thief. In his ale-induced haze, he could not do more than mutter, “A wagon-ride to Zannopolis,” said Steven, “and 427,252 steps, across a lake and next to a river.” The thief left and Steven thought of the two gold pieces’ worth of information he had retained. Always keep to the left.
Then he passed out.
Comments
Please feel free to send comments to the author at nathan@nathaneverett.com.
