Bring Me the Head of Prince Charming

The final decision at the conference was to bow to neces­sity, give up some of the more aggressive tactics, which had given dragons bad repute, and maintain a low profile. Dragons voted universally to give up their time-old pursuits of Hoarding and Guarding in favor of the new disciplines of Ducking and Dodging. Don't just stand around guarding treasure, they an­nounced to each other. Fade into the landscape, live at the bottoms of rivers - for many dragons were able to live under­water- gilled dragons, they were called, that fed on sharks and killer whales and mahimahi. The land dragons had to adopt a different strategy. Land-based dragons learned to conceal them­selves as small mountains, hills, even as clumps of trees. They gave up their old habits of ferocity, contenting themselves with an occasional hunter who strayed into their territory. Once in a while a dragon went back to the old practices, and eventually got hunted down and killed. That dragon's name would go down in the Dragon Hall of Heroes, and the rest would be advised not to act like him.

Skander was old even by dragon standards. He was there­fore super wily and stayed out of trouble. He lived in central Asia, somewhere near Samarkand, but he had been around since before the city was founded. You could have searched for ages and not found Skander if he didn't want to be found. But if you did find him he was often a helpful dragon, and he had a vast store of lore. He was also quirky, however, and given to mood swings.

Ylith knew this, but she had to make the attempt. She picked up a bundle of powerbrooms, the sort you can fly on. These were the witches' greatest accomplishment. They ran on spells, which the Witches' Sisterhood put together at their head­quarters in Byzantium. The power of spells ran in cycles, some years good, others not so good. Spells were subject to natural forces, but these were not clearly understood, and there were occasional recalls.

The logical starting place, it seemed to her, was the place she had met Skander last time: Dragon Rock. Dragons are clever enough to know that men will never search for a dragon at a place called Dragon Rock.

Many heroes had ridden through the area, most of them bearing only the light curved sword of the region, which would do no good against a dragon anyway. Not that Skander cared to try issues even with these lightweights. Skander's hide with its overlapping scales was able to withstand the blow of an avalanche, and he thought nothing of swords unless they were backed up with really powerful spells. But humans were sneaky; they'd seem to be aiming at a shoulder, and then, pow, you'd get an arrow in the eye. Somehow dragons, despite their ex­treme intelligence and centuries of experience, were prone to getting arrows in the eye. They never fully caught on to the trick that men used, of pretending to shoot in one direction and then actually shooting in another. It wasn't according to dragon practice, and went against their idea of a warrior's ethics.

For whatever reason, Ylith had met Skander at Dragon Rock, where she had been visiting relatives who had recently moved to the area from Scythia. Skander at that time had been taking advantage of a rare shape-changing spell that had come his way. Dragons are always in search of shape-changing spells because, being intelligent, they aspire to appear in human so­ciety. Although humans don't know it, dragons in altered shapes have been present in many of the courts of the world, where they love to argue with philosophers. More often, though, drag­ons simply get tired of all the years alone, all the more alone since dragons of either sex are suspicious of dragons of the opposite sex. It is for this reason, not for lack of opportunity or lustiness, that dragons rarely mate, and it is even more rare that they have young. Among the dragons who do have young, there's no agreed-upon rule as to which parent is to bring up the children. There's not even consensus on who bears them. The dragons did away with most of that instinctual stuff ages ago. Creatures of reason now, they fought over these matters among themselves. It is said that in the settling of these argu­ments, much of the race of dragons was wiped out.

And heroes had a field day against dragons in their con­fusion. It amazed dragons to think that knights-beefy guys in metal suits-could kill them, since the humans were so ob­viously unintelligent and had only their court rituals going for them. But the humans were wi

Ylith flew to the Samarkand region and made inquiry in the town of Yar Digi, the nearest village to Dragon Rock. It was a low, miserable place, and there was nothing on its one street but souvenir shops. These were filled with dragon lore, but there were no customers. When Ylith asked about this, a bookstore owner named Achmed told her, "It is because the long-awaited boom in dragon lore has not yet come to pass. Other places are getting all the attention. In Britain, for ex­ample, where no dragons have stirred for centuries, they run guided tours of where they used to be, and outsell us a hundred to one. Where is the dragon? Somewhere up the trail over in his cave at Dragon Rock. But no one ever seems able to find it unless the dragon wants visitors. And you never know about that. He's quirky."

Ylith went in the direction indicated and, after paying her entrance fee, was allowed onto the path. Moving along it, she rounded a number of turns, passed a small refreshment stand, passed Dragon Rock itself. Nothing resembling a cave was apparent at either hand.

It was not until she heard a deep, resonant chuckle that she halted.

"Skander?" she called.

The sound came again.

"It's me, Ylith."

Suddenly she became aware of a shadowy place between two boulders which might be more than shadow. Moving to it, she saw that it continued back into a greater darkness. She entered there.

At what point she passed within the greater darkness of the hillside she could not be certain. Yet, after a time, the echoing of her footfalls convinced her that she was entirely indoors.

"Skander?" she repeated.

There was still no reply, but she became aware of a faint illumination ahead and to the right. Following it around a bend, she entered an area where the stone itself seemed to glow- overhead and at either hand. With this visibility, she increased her pace. The passage branched several times, and in each instance she followed the path of greater brightness.

At length, she came to a chamber where the dark, scaled form she sought reclined, staring at her. Save for the eyes, she might have missed him in the stillness. She halted upon the threshold, uneasy.

"Skander. It's me. Ylith," she said.

He cocked his head and lowered his eyelids slightly.

"Yes. It is, isn't it?" he observed. "How long has it been?"

"Long. What are you doing?"

"I was dreaming of the Renaissance."

"What is a Renaissance?"

"I'm sorry, I'm getting my centuries mixed up," he replied. "The Renaissance comes later. That's the trouble with being prescient. You can never tell then from now."

"Skander," Ylith said, "I need help."

"Just as I thought," the dragon said. "What else would bring you out to this remote place? What is it you want, my dear? The old flames are still plenty hot. Want me to burn someone up for you?"

"I need eyes," Ylith said, and explained about Azzie and Prince Charming and Princess Scarlet.

"Eyes," Skander murmured, and his hide, normally a red­dish brown, turned pasty white. There was a prophecy she had suddenly brought to mind.

"Why do you stay in this place?" Ylith asked.

"It's the quest for fame, you see," Skander said. "The people here are going to publicize me. I promised to put this place on the map. It hasn't happened yet but it's bound to come."