Mount Verund cast a wide shadow over the valley of her namesake. No one who ventured there ever returned. They’d been eaten by Hiro the Wise. But the dragon’s treasure hoard was too tempting for many.
“Wait for me!” Sophie called dragging her sword behind her. Her father had finally given her a real sword of metal.
“There’s no way you can keep up with us. You’re just a girl!” Sebastian sneered. He elbowed her as he ran by, his sword elegantly strapped to his back.
“Ugh!” Sophie nearly toppled over. Catching herself, she sighed and regained her balance.
The knights in training were nothing more than a cloud of dust when she looked down the road.
Grumbling to herself, Sophie plopped down on the ground. For as long as she could remember, she’d wanted to be a knight.
Sophie hadn’t had any problems keeping up with the boys until Sebastian decided he didn’t want a girl in the club. Since then, they’d all taken to teasing her and pushing her around. If there was a way to earn back their respect, she hadn’t found it yet.
With another heavy sigh, Sophie stood up and retrieved her new sword. Her father had an adult man’s sword made for her, which was too heavy and off-balanced for her height and skill level. There was a part of her that wondered if he’d done that to see her fail.
As she headed home, she gingerly rested her sword in the crook of her elbow. Sun illuminated the steel and the freshly polished metal caught a reflection.
Gasping, Sophie stopped dead and studied the reflection.
Mount Verund shone in her blade, a perfect replica of the snow-tipped peak behind her.
A frightful idea piqued Sophie’s mind. Grinning, she slid her sword into its scabbard and headed for the mountain.
“I’ll show them… I’ll show all of them… ugh…”
She muttered to herself, grunting and panting as she climbed the barren, desolate mountain paths. Nothing had grown there in years. The villagers blamed the dragon.
“Once I have the treasure, they’ll all beg me to come back…”
The old mining entrance wasn’t at too high of an altitude. Sophie reached it before midday. She made her way into the darkened shaft, the floor angling down the deeper she went.
Sophie reached her arms out and touched the walls on either side of her, her only guide in the dark hallway.
“Grrr. Rrmmm.”
She froze and strained her ears.
It could have been shifting rocks or… no, it was Hiro the Wise. She quickened her pace, the mine shaft opening ahead.
Sweat broke out on her brow and the back of her neck. She fanned herself with her hand. There was no doubt she was getting close, dragons gave off heat.
At the end of the shaft, Sophie entered the large cavern. She stared mouth ajar, at the mound of gold and treasure piled almost to the ceiling. Craning her neck back the top of the hoard was beyond her range of sight.
“Who goes there!?”
The voice rasped and thundered, shaking the whole mountain.
Sophie clutched the sides of her head, her skeleton trembling, her brain rattling around.
“A knight that wishes to challenge you for your hoard,” she replied when the strange sensation subsided.
“Challenge me?”
The mountain of gold trembled and small treasure pieces skittered down the sides. Hiro the Wise came into view, her red scales reflecting the mound of gold.
“Yes. Hiro the Wise, I Sophie am here to take your treasure.” She pulled out her sword.
The dragon puffed a gray smoke ring from her left nostril. She batted wide, brown, doe eyes with thick lashes at Sophie.
“What if I don’t want to fight?” Hiro asked.
Sophie frowned.
“But I’m challenging you. You have to fight.”
“Hmph.”
Hiro turned up her nose.
Shrugging, Sophie lowered her sword.
“Umm… is there a problem?”
“I’m a little offended that just because I’m a dragon you assume I want to fight to the death,” Hiro said.
“Oh. Well, what do you want?” Sophie bit her lip, standing perfectly still. She shifted her eyes from side to side.
This wasn’t what she expected.
Hiro’s lips spread in what might have been a smile, but all Sophie saw were rows of razor-sharp, white teeth in a set of jaws that could swallow her whole.
She swallowed, tightening her hand on the hilt of her sword.
“Wow, no one who has come here has ever asked me what I want. They always just tell me they are going to fight me for my treasure,” the dragon said.
“But you fought them,” Sophie pointed out.
The dragon rolled her eyes. “Because they didn’t announce themselves. They just attacked.”
“Okay… so, what do you want?”
“I want to stop guarding this hoard. It has been over five hundred years!”
Sophie blinked. Then, she smiled. “That’s perfect! I could take the hoard off your hands. I wouldn’t even fight you for it.”
The dragon smirked her toothy grin again. Her head swung slowly on her long neck as she leaned down. Sophie saw her own reflection, from head to toe, in the dragon’s big, brown, scrutinizing eye.
“Are you sure that’s what you want?”
“Yes!”
“Very well. The hoard is yours. Take care of it.”
With a powerful down sweep of her wings, Hiro knocked Sophie back.
Quickly, Sophie jumped to her feet and straightened herself. The dragon was gone.
Laughing, Sophie ran at the gold. She knelt down and dug her fists into it, feeling the coins and gems
“It’s mine. I did it!” she gushed.
Looking down the hoard seemed smaller. Sophie grunted, hot smoke stinging her nostrils.
Pulling her hands out of the hoard she gasped. Instead of pink flesh, her hands and arms were covered in red scales and had more than tripled in size.
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