The Great Worm
by Dave Gauer, April 8, 2010 (started by Stephanie G., March 28th)
All around me was still, but in the distance I could feel it getting closer. It was like a chill breeze, but felt in my gut, somewhere between the squishy intersections of my pancreas, kidney, and stomach. I adjusted my chainmail over my dress. I'd had no time to change into something appropriate before leaving the manse. Even the smell of Lord Foster's pipe smoke still clung to my braided hair and skin.
The messenger had burst into the parlor in a breathless tumble. His news was disturbing enough to send three of my fellow ladies into a carefully-practiced faint. Their men, seasoned faint-catchers all, had swept them up and carried them to various guest quarters to recuperate.
The rest of us stayed to hear out the full tale and its denouement: apparently a dragon was loose upon the banks of the Thames and was, at the time of the news, setting the Newgate prison afire. According to our exhausted messenger, the dragon was heading roughly Southwest by South, which put us directly in its path. The messenger had been riding by the same course, ahead of the beast, and warning all who would be in its path.
I had endured a few looks in Baron Morris's armory as I joined the men in selecting arms. I even heard the Baron himself mutter something to the effect of, "tits should keep to the cellar when dragons are about." But of the twenty-three men I joined in the defense, most seemed merely pleasantly surprised to have me make the number twenty-four. Portly, red-bearded Sir Murray even helped me into the hefty chainmail with surprising sobriety and minimum of groping.
It was evening, but the late summer sun had not yet set. Golden light still played through the tall trees and across the carefully manicured lawn of the estate. Despite the remaining warmth of the fading day, and despite the layers of my clothing, I shivered. Nervously, I pulled my thin rapier from its scabbard and examined it. I polished the pommel with a fold of my dress, and then looked in horror at the gray smear of grease I had left on the fine cloth. I would be reprimanded by my maidservant when I returned home. That of course, was assuming I lived to make it home at all.
I shivered involuntarily. Though I could not see the horizon, which was hidden by trees, I could see some small, white clouds. They reflected a brief and faint flicker of light, as if they had been lit from below by a powerful flame. Like thunder following lightning, there was a barely-perceptible rumble in the distance.
I looked around. The only other person in sight was Lord Foster. He stood by a tall, square topiary of yew. He looked over at me, touched his sword hilt, and nodded. He had heard the rumble as well.
After that, came the waiting. For a while, I itched all over. My earlier perspirations cooled and evaporated, leaving the salt, which itched. Then the sun went low in the sky, below the branch which had blocked it before, and it became blindingly bright to look towards the ever-increasing sounds of destruction. So I looked down at the lawn while I waited. The leaves of the trees made blurry flickering shadows on the grass. There were small insects crawling in the grass. I itched again.
Finally, the sun went below the bulk of the trees, and I could look to the North again. The sounds were discernable now, great crashing, thunderous beating, and the whooshing of displaced air like ocean waves pounding into a sea-side cave.
I heard trees crashing in front of me. There were some human screams, and the sky lit up with fire. I could actually feel the heat of the terrible flames. I heard the hooves of a horse beating at a gallop and a knight in full plate armor burst through the brush and across the grass between Lord Foster and me. I saw him spur the horse, and they picked up speed, navigating around the hedges and stone planters like obstacles in a riding course. I felt a shadow pass over me and looked up at a vast, dark scaled thing soaring overhead. There was a single beat of great wings and I could feel the air press down on me with great weight, parting my braided hair. I was nearly forced to the ground from the pressure.
An enormous claw grasped the horse and rider in mid-stride. The horse was nearly cut in two by the great black talons. The knight and saddle were torn from its back and crushed as neatly as a silver thimble under a blacksmith's hammer. The dead horse crashed into a fountain and bled out, staining the water red. The knight, now a bloody crumpled ball of flesh and metal, was dropped somewhere behind a row of cedars.
The noise all around was deafening, but I heard almost nothing. The dragon blotted out the sky overhead as it rose and wheeled about for a second pass. Its shadow darkened the manor-house, the lawn, and even the trees ringing the stately grounds. As it turned in the sky, I could only understand part of its shape, bulky in places, sharp in others, and covered in dark scales that reflected light like obsidian. It put the manor-house to fire with a single breath. The heat was so intense that I had to shield my face with my hand. A moment later, I could smell my singed hair.
Despite the heat, the presence of the beast filled me with the same chill I had felt before it arrived, only now it rose like a tide of ice to cover my lungs and my heart, causing me to reel with shock. I heard Lord Foster yell something to my left, but could not make out any words.
Could even the Baron's huge ballista harm this creature? I pictured him then, feverishly positioning the machine to take aim upon the dragon before it spied him and turned him to ash. There came a loud crack of wood and a huge spear-tipped bolt flew up from the ground and pierced the dragon's hide right at the center of its chest. A jet of brown, almost black blood shot out in the opposite direction. The dragon faltered in the sky. Its limbs shook uncontrollably, and it began its fall, slowly at first, as all huge things do, from the sky. I gasped, realizing that it was falling in my direction.
There was no time to run; the dragon was down in a moment. It slammed into the ground with such force that I stumbled and fell backwards. I became tangled in a shrub. I thrashed against it, feeling completely disoriented as the ground continued to buck under me. With the greatest of effort, I pulled myself upright against the weight of the chain mail and came face-to-face with the dragon. It had landed and slid to a stop with its head just a pace from where I kneeled. It had a shiny black carapace as big as a barn on its head. It had two slick, towering brown horns and two eyes, each twice as tall as I was, that were yellow like the yolk of an egg. The closest one was staring straight at me.
The dragon took in a breath. The force of the intake actually lifted me and brought me to my feet. I knew the breath would come back out as a wall of fire. I used the forward momentum to stumble the short distance towards the eye. I tugged at the rapier at my side. The blade caught in the sheath for a moment. Then I pulled it free. With one hand around the hilt and my other hand around the wrist of the first, I plunged the sword into the eye with all my might. The eye was tough, like leather, but I pierced it just the same. Warm, clear liquid gushed out onto my arms. I lost sight of the sword but I gripped it tightly. The dragon jerked backward and I held on for my life.
I could hear the fire building inside the monster. In a moment, I would be cooked. I slashed down with the sword, putting my weight into it and nearly lifting myself from the ground. The blade cut several feet through the eye and then stopped. I was blinded by the wall of vitreous humor that poured forth. I filled my frozen lungs with air and forced my way inside.
It was pleasantly warm in the eye. Then, though my own eyes were closed, I saw intense light through my eyelids. There came a gentle heat that followed. I had just escaped the dragon's fire.
Unable to see, to breath, and movement difficult in the gelatinous vitreous, I felt terribly claustrophobic in the eye. I knew I had not long to live. Though I yearned for escape, I pushed my way, like a swimmer, away from the light. I fought through the fluid with my sword in front of me, slashing slowly through fibrous tendrils until I reached the darkness. Ramming the sword like a spear before me, I pierced through the back wall of the eye until I had plunged my arms up to my elbows.
The dragon shook violently. I lost hold of the sword. For a moment, I floated free in the eye. Then, with lungs begging for air, I struggled back to the light. I burst from the eye and fell, wasted, to the ground. I was surrounded by charred ash. The dragon had incinerated every green thing before me. The ground was hot beneath me. I wiped the fluid from my eyes with my hands as best I could and propped myself up. The dragon was dead before me. Its ruined eye looked deflated in its black and boney socket.
Lord Foster was running towards me. There was a look of shocked amazement on his face and when he reached me, he fell to his knees. He grasped my hand and said something I could not hear. I smiled weakly at him.
"My lady," he stammered.
Then I allowed myself to faint in a very lady-like fashion.