Arise Sir George

It wasn’t the fall that had rendered the aging knight senseless, more the tumultuous crash of landing on his head, the impact breaking his nose and causing him to bite through his lower lip as consciousness fleeted, but at least he was alive. Lying on his side, injured where the dragon had seized him, head partially submerged, he came awake, flopping over supine. “Boy!” he called out before rocking to and fro like a turtle on its back. “Boy!” he hollered again, heaving mightily and rolling to his uninjured side with considerable effort. Getting up on a knee, water draining from his armor, he pushed his visor up and looked around, a coppery taste in his mouth from the split in his lip.

“Daffyd!” he called out, pushing himself up to his unsteady feet, flesh puckered and cold. Turning slowly on the spot, he espied his sword lying not far off in the water. Walking over to the blade he knelt down gingerly and gathered the weapon in his right hand. It was fairly easy to see the significant depression in the sand in the stream bed from where it appeared the beast pounced on the lad. He guessed it looked like the boy had used the sword to try and fend the beast off, but obviously the effort was unsuccessful. But where was the boy? There was no evidence of the lad’s carcass nor shredded clothes and there was definitely no way the young dragon could have swallowed the lad whole. Would it have carried him off?

Sloshing through the water, he collected his shield and walked toward the clearing where he and Daffyd had originally encountered the monster. Taking off his right gauntlet, he brought his hand up to delicately feel for the damage to his face before slipping two fingers into his mouth and whistling sharply.

There was whinny from amongst some nearby trees and the sound of Beauregard, his horse, making an effort to heed the summons.

While he waited, Sir George took a moment to examine the condition of his armor and aside from a couple of dents sustained from the fall and the rent in the side from the dragon’s claws, it was in functional shape.

Parking his rear on a boulder, he removed his helm, setting on the rock beside him, looking up when Beauregard emerged from the bramble upstream followed by Daffyd’s mount and their pack donkey.

Without the lad’s assistance and all alone, it required a fair degree of effort for him to divest himself of the metal armor and wet underclothes, but once off, he was able to thoroughly examine the ugly gash torn in his side.

Retrieving the stitch kit from the donkey, and after a couple of attempts, he threaded a needle, before cleaning the wound with fresh stream water and sewing it up. He smiled wryly at his crude handiwork, satisfied that though not pretty, it would hold, adding another battle scar to his already impressive collection.

Getting dressed in fresh dry clothes, he immediately dismissed the notion of returning to Carrington, choosing instead to try and see if he couldn’t locate the young dragon’s lair thinking if it carried him off, it probably wasn’t hungry at the moment and that might be enough time to find and rescue the boy.

Gathering his gear and stowing it securely on the donkey, he climbed atop Beauregard, setting out with the mindset that if food were plentiful enough in the area for the dragon, it probably didn’t need to travel to far from where it denned which then should theoretically place it close to where they initially encountered it.

Moving up into the rockier terrain above the stream, he began trying to identify possible locations for a nesting site or places a dragon might use. The uneven and treacherous ground, complicated by the dense vegetation made travel difficult and agonizingly slow. The wily knight understood the necessity for haste, aware every possible second could mean the difference between life and death for his young squire. As the sun submerged below the western horizon and the shroud of night closed in, and as much as Sir George wanted to continue his search, he decided to hole up for the night rather than risk injuring himself or one of the horses.

When the first fingers of dawn were crawling through the sky the following morning, he was up, horses watered and fed and ready to resume his search.

“If you’re stilling breathing boy, I’ll find ye,” he vocalized in a determined tone, digging his heels into Beauregard’s flanks and spurring the horse onward.

By midday, he believed he had found exactly what he was looking for, a cave with some obvious dragon sign around the entrance including some vitrification from scorching, an assortment of bleached animal bones, and some deeply furrowed territorial markings carved directly into the stone surrounding the gloomy opening.

Dismounting, he crept closer to the entrance, pausing to hold his hand up and examine the breadth of the scores in the rock. He frowned and shook his head. Given the size, depth, and scope of the talon marks, it was readily apparent there was no possible way they were made by the dragon he had fought the day previous, these ones belonged to a much larger creature, significantly larger.

Pursing his lips, brow furled, he thought it odd the little dragon would be bold enough to be hunting in a much more established and older dragon’s territory, it was counter to everything he read about the creatures in Medlaw’s Bestiary, though there might be some plausible explanations. The little one may have assumed residence in a vacated den, not common, but possible, or the smaller dragon might still be denning with its mother, though the information in the bestiary indicated most dragonets were usually driven off when they are usually much smaller.

In the inky darkness within the cave, he heard something move, something very big.