Rescue
The knight dared not pause to catch his breath, even though his horse had long since collapsed beneath him. It mattered not: leaving the tired beast behind in a small yet lush pasture, the tall knight continued on, his armor glinting in the thin air of the mountains. His sword, great and broad and long, hung in the scabbard slung across his waist, the hilt intricately carved with strange runes from another time, from another age. They served to protect the user, and they had served the knight's grandfather well, as they would serve him.
The armored knight was indeed the epitome of a stalwart and strong fellow: a deep chest, knotted arms and broad shoulders, resting atop a lean yet sturdy set of legs and feet that moved with a quick, steady purpose. His armor covered every square inch of his body, yet the slit through which his eyes peered out seemed to blaze with an unnatural fire. The tattered-looking traveling cloak hung from his waist, the originally rich scarlet color having mostly faded to an almost brownish hue. It had been a gift from his squire, and although the younger man was still traveling with him, the knight had left him in the dust: the lad truly needed to learn how to run in armor.
He was almost there; he had almost reached the top...
The stories of the dragons of these mountains had been told to him since he was but a child, the images of gnashing teeth, tearing claws and scalding fire filling his nightmares as a lad. He had heard of plenty of stories of countless armed men going up into these hills, only to come down maimed or to not return at all. Even those that did return, he had been told, were often driven mad by the terrors they had seen, or had died from their wounds within days of reaching safety. All his young life, under his father’s watchful eye, he had trained to become a knight of land, destined for greatness, glory and all things prestigious. At the end of his adventuring career, he would become a landed man, a man who served only the king, and in time would have a household of his own. From there, whether it would continue to be on the battlefields of war or politics, he would make his mark, and one day, hopefully, pass on a legacy to children of his own.
Rounding a corner, he spied what he was looking for: scrapings in the stone, from where the dragon had scrambled up the rock, undoubtedly with its quarry in tow. Dragons had been known for ages to abduct fair maidens and chain them high in these mountains, where the moist air from the eastern seas kept the climate fairly warm. Dragons didn’t like cold, and as such, their prisoners rarely perished from the elements. More often than not, they would grow bored of waiting for dashing knights, like himself, to come save the maidens, and would either eat them or take them deep into their mountain strongholds, where rumors abounded of them committing the most terrible of deeds upon the poor things.
This knight would not let that happen; he would save the fair Lady Bromilden from the dreaded creature, or die in the attempt. Working his way up the winding slope, the dragon stopped, hearing voices in the distance. It would seem he was indeed near his quarry, as he could just barely make out the exact conversation.
“How dare you chain me up here! I will have you know there are likely dozens of knights on their way here, right now, coming to slay you and rescue me from your terrible claws!”
“Please, I told you once, I’ve told you a thousand times; I didn’t chain you up, I’m only here on guard duty.”
“Please! I know you dragons are all alike, just waiting to prey on us weak humans for your own sport! I have heard all of the tales about your taste for our flesh.”
“I’m a vegetarian.”
Ah! So the princess was indeed annoying the dragon, making them lose focus on their surroundings. Perfect! With a loud roar, the knight drew his sword in one hand, the blade glinting in the light, and charged up and over the last bit of rocks between him and the pair. He rushed over, raising his sword to strike, and... stopped. Confused at the sight before him, he lowered his sword.
There, indeed, was the Lady Bromilden, chained up to a large boulder. It would seem some of the tales of her beauty the knight had heard had been... truthful, for once. Just the other week, he had had to rescue a merchant’s daughter from a pack of trolls, and he had barely been able to distinguish just which one was her out of the bunch. In the end, the beard gave it away: trolls don’t have facial hair. Lady Bromilden had the fairest of golden hair, and a body that kept heroes awake at night.
Lying across from her, its hands holding its head in a somewhat defensive gesture, sat the dragon. Only, there was something different about this creature from the stories the knight had heard. Namely, this thing was small: barely a foot taller than him, he had to guess, when standing upright, and that was only if he included the two large horns poking out of its head. It was nothing like the twenty-foot giants he had heard tales of in his youth. Also, the creature’s figure... it reminded him of not of a lizard's, but of Lady Bromilden’s: slender, yet shaped like that of a woman who was budding into the prime of her life. Plus, this creature wore some semblance of clothes across its chest, something the knight had never seen before.
“Well? Are you going to kill it, or are you going to just stand there?” Lady Bromilden asked, her voice sounding rather scratchy; must have been yelling at this thing for some time now. The knight started to raise his sword again, only to stop when he saw the creature flinch again, its eyes peeking out from behind its fingers.
“Please don’t kill me, I’m only supposed to guard her until the wizard gets back,” the dragon mumbled, and in a burst of realization, the knight knew why this creature sounded so odd. It was a female dragon: a dragoness, if you will. He had heard stories from some of the seedier villages of dragonesses, on how they could bewitch men (and even women) into doing their bidding just from their smell. The knight didn’t know if that was true or not, nor did he know how such a thing would work, but he kept his sword in his hand as he approached the creature, just in case.
“What wizard?” he asked, cocking his head to the side as the dragoness shivered in his shadow.
“The wizard who kidnapped loudmouth Lady Bromilden here,” the dragoness said, pointing one trembling finger at the chained beauty. "He's the reason why she's here, not me."
“That is not true! I knew knights were daft, but I never suspected one would be too interested in conversation with a dragon to slay it and free a fair maiden!” Bromilden screeched, her teeth bared and her eyes wild. “Just kill that thing and get me out of here!”
The knight looked back at the dragoness. “Why would a wizard kidnap Lady Bromilden?”
“Because her father refused to pay him for his services,” the dragoness said softly, lowering her hands. Maybe this knight wouldn’t kill her...
“What services?” the knight asked as the maiden kicked against the boulder she was chained to, hissing and spitting in anger at her being ignored.
“He undid a curse that plagued the southern fields of the lord's realm since before the lady was born,” the dragoness replied. “When he wasn’t paid, he kidnapped her and set me on watch. I... I work for him, you see, under a debt I need to pay off. I’m almost done, and when I am, I just... I just want to leave this place, okay?” There were several old scars across the dragoness's back, a testament to a fate the wizard had likely saved her from. Then again, those could have been inflicted by the wizard himself long ago; the knight did not know which was the true cause of such injuries.
His armor glinting in the light, the knight looked from the dragoness to the maiden, hefting his sword in his hand. “Does she speak the truth?” he asked the lady.
“It is regrettable to say that “it” is correct,” Bromilden said. “My father did employ a so-called “wizard” to lift the curse, but even though the curse is apparently gone, we know it was nothing more than a scam. Any curse can be lifted with time, and that foolish old conjurer’s arrival and “cleansing” just happened to coincide with the curse’s expiration! So what if my father did not pay him! It wasn’t as though he actually did anything useful!”
“Wait, if you knew the wizard kidnapped you, why was it you were saying before the dragon had?” The knight was growing tired of the maiden’s constant jabbering and outright unpleasantness. Her "kindness" he had heard of was likely a fabrication by her father, since without such a description, what hero in his right mind would want to rescue her?
“Because I know she is the brains behind this whole operation! There is no way that old geezer could have possibly come up with so stupid an idea on his own!” the lady screeched, flecks of spit spewing from her mouth. “Now kill that monster and release me!”
The knight stared at the maiden, and then back to the dragoness, his sword still clenched in one hand. He had come to save the lady, but... he really didn’t want to linger, in case that wizard came back. What to do, what to do...
Several minutes later, a young man in poorly-polished armor made his way up the mountain path, having finally managed to secure both of the horses down in the small pasture. There was no chance of them running off now, but he had to get to his master. Who knew what terrible danger he could be in, facing off against that mighty dragon all by himself?
Rounding a corner, the squire was almost knocked off his feet by a twitching tail. Grabbing for his short sword, he saw the tail was attached to a small dragon, which itself was... being carried by his master? “Sire? What is going on? Where is Lady Bromilden?” he asked.
“Back where she is still chained up,” the knight said simply. “You can free her and bring her back to her father: I free you from my service. I must warn you though, she's rather loud.”
“But... but if I bring her back, who will claim the reward? The prestige and honor?” The squire was still unsure why his master was carrying the dragon on his shoulder like that. Was he planning on keeping it alive, like some pet? The younger man had to admit, it didn’t exactly look threatening...
“Those will be yours, my friend,” the knight said, the dragon on his shoulder watching the two talk with rapt interest.
“Then what do I say of you? What do I tell everyone about your battle with the dragon?” the squire asked.
“Tell them I was injured and told you to go on, to save the maiden. My reputation will not be stained from it: injuries are common in this line of work, after all.” That last part was true, at any rate: beginning knights and heroes were more often than not beaten up on a fairly regular basis by those they fought, though deaths were less common than the gentry might have thought.
Walking past the confused squire, the knight glanced out of his helmet to the dragoness on his shoulder. He had to admit, for a supposedly deadly and voracious creature, she wasn’t all that hideous: nothing like the fair maidens of the castles he frequented in terms of beauty, but... she did have a quality about her he wasn’t repulsed by. Maybe it was her eyes.
“You know, there will likely be questions as to why I’m traveling with you,” the dragoness said softly. "Humans don't take kindly to my kind, even when we're minding our own business."
“Of course, of course: if anyone asks, you’re just a servant of mine I won in a game of chance with a wizard,” the knight said.
“You didn’t have to threaten to gut him like a fish if he didn’t forgive my debt,” she replied. The knight hadn't taken two steps with her on his shoulder before the wizard had shown up, back from his potty break in some bushes a ways up the path. He had indeed known powerful magic, but it is hard to try and use it after you've just spent the last thirty minutes going to the bathroom. Old age, you see.
“Any service to a man like that is worthless to one’s self,” the knight said. “Even for a dragon, a life spent guarding ladies like Bromilden is a waste. Tell me, what do you think of spending the rest of your life on the grounds of a small castle, with decent accommodations in which to live? My father's lands are not the most extensive, but there are several spare cottages that are available on the grounds.” The only reason he was doing this was because he pitied the poor creature; he wasn't slightly attracted to her or anything, no sir...
“That would sound nice, though I doubt a servant such as myself would get much attention from your lords as anything other than a plaything,” she said as he gently placed her atop his horse. "Won't you get in trouble, anyway, for letting me live?"
“We’ll see about that,” the knight said with a smile as he led the pair of them away. Off in the distance, he could hear his poor former squire yelling at Lady Bromilden for digging her knees into his back. Her response was too terrible for him to try and think about: the poor squire's mother was not a massive troll.
“And that is how my grandparents on my father’s side met,” Discord said, finishing up his story for the small group of ponies gathered in the classroom. He had to be honest, he always loved story time with some of the younger citizens of Ponyville: they were always so attentive. Except for that bratty little pink Earth pony in the front row, but he'd magically left her a few frogs in her backpack for her to discover when she got home.
“Hold on, hold on, hold on,” Sweetie Belle said, raising her hoof in the air. “You mean to tell me that the human knight and the dragoness get married?” She sounded so happy, yet so surprised, that it was impossible to not find her astonishment downright adorable. That, and she squeaked when she said the word "married".
“Indeed, my astute little unicorn,” Discord replied. “It wasn’t for a few more years, but yes, they did indeed end up married.” He didn’t want to tell them about the courtship, as that was likely best suited for an older audience. Female dragons tended to do the craziest things when they were in season...
“So... yer descended from a human and a dragoness on yer pa’s side?” Applebloom asked. “I thought humans were long gone from these parts.”
“Oh, they are, my little filly, but remember, I’m much, much older than I appear,” the God of Chaos said, magically creating a mirror and looking at his reflection. “I must say, I look good for my age, don’t you think?”
“Just how old are ya?” the yellow filly asked.
“Oh, come now Applebloom, you must never ask a lady her age,” Discord said with a smile.
The little filly looked confused. “But... yer not a la-,”
“Discord? Sir?” a small orange filly asked, cutting off what surely would have been an awkward conversation between her friend and their guest. “You said those were your grandparents on your father’s side. What about your mother’s side?”
“Hmm, now you see, my mother was what you might call a-,”
BRING BRING BRING
“Okay class, I’m afraid that’s all the time we have for today’s guest speaker,” Miss Cheerliee said, earning several moans of disappointment from her class. “Let’s give Mr. Discord a round of applause for his wonderful story!”
The clapping of hooves echoed through the room, but softly, as these foals weren’t exactly thrilled to see the God of Chaos leave.
“Don’t fret my little ponies, I’ll be back next week to tell you all about how my mother’s parents met,” Discord said, earning a few hoorays from the crowd as they packed up to leave school. As soon as they were all gone, he turned to the mare at the front of the room. “I must say, Miss Cheerilee, you have a most attentive class.”
“Why thank you, Mr. Discord,” the teacher said, walking up to the draconequus as her class filed out o the room. “They like good stories, especially when we have such a... distinguished guest such as yourself. So... what were your mother’s parents, by the way?”
“Oh, come now Miss Cheerilee, telling you would spoil the fun,” Discord said with a laugh, earning a small sigh of disappointment from the pink pony. “You’ll just have to wait until next week like the rest of your class.”
Leaving the teacher behind, he walked out of the room where his supervisor, Twilight Sparkle, was waiting for him. “That was good, Discord, that was very good,” she said, holding up a clipboard and writing down the time. “That still leaves... seventy-two hours of community service left for this year.”
“Oh, posh, I’ll have that done within the month,” he said. "Tomorrow I'm helping out ponies at the old folk's home, remember?"
As the two walked off, Twilight leaned in closer and whispered, “By the way, that story was true, right? I'd have to report you if you went around telling lies to impressionable colts and fillies.”
“Of course it was true: why would I lie about something that outrageous? Just wait until the week after next, when I tell about how my parents met. I'll give you a hint: a volcano and a hydra are involved.”
Twilight could hardly wait.
Author's Note
This little thought just came to me as I was browsing the internet. Not meant to be taken seriously, but hey, I liked writing this.
