The Dragon Guard - Writing Prompt

Hey everyone, so you read Semantics response to this writing prompt, hopefully. This is my response and I hope you enjoy the differences in our writing styles and how we chose to approach the prompt. 

-A

 Writing Prompt: You are on the run from a dragon. Not because it wants to kill you, quite the opposite in fact. This dragon hoards powerful adventurers and unfortunately your skills caught its eye. Now it will stop at nothing until you are part of its guild.

As I burst through the open sewer drain I couldn’t help but smile. That actually worked! I mean my first time as an adventurer and I robbed a dragon, no way anyone believes me. I pulled my bag in front of me and opened it up to check on my prize, still full to the brim with gold. Unfortunately, it didn’t take long for the paranoia to set in. Megara ran this city, her claws sunk into every separate piece of the local government. I might have gotten out of the castle, but getting away with the money was going to be a separate issue entirely.

First things first, I needed to get home and hide the money. I wouldn’t be able to spend any of it here, they’d trace the gold back to me I’m sure. I’d have to lay low until the heat blew over. Then if I could escape I’d be home free. Not too bad, I don’t think anyone saw me in the castle so they shouldn’t know where to look.

I walked home as casually as I could so I wouldn’t bring attention to myself. I could feel myself sweating though. The guards were also out and about, they must have noticed the gold was missing already because they were rounding up known thieves. Luckily, none of them knew me as a thief so they couldn’t give me up. 

As I got home I really started to panic, the dragon guard were notoriously ruthless and smart, no one had ever stolen from Megara and made it out of the treasury let alone the castle. I started pacing around the house, looting through things trying to find a good place to stash the gold. I was so fucked. If the dragon guard decided to search my apartment they’d kill me. My fingers would not stop twitching so I picked up a deck of cards to fiddle with. Shuffling a deck always relaxed my hands and let me think, I had a healthy childhood magic obsession to thank for that. With cards spinning in my hand it finally came to me, my family was broke growing up so for my birthday my dad made me a chest with a false bottom for my tricks.

The chest was storing blankets in a closet in my room for now, but I knew I wanted to hide the gold in plain sight. So instead of using that chest to hold my blankets I brought it into the kitchen and filled it with potatoes instead, with the gold in the fake bottom. Potatoes were pretty much the only thing I could reliably keep to eat so a chest of potatoes wouldn’t look out of place in a poor man’s kitchen.

As I was cleaning up my apartment after I heard the knock at the door. “DRAGON GUARD OPEN UP” 

I took a deep breath, I had to relax and act like I had nothing to hide. “Coming sir, just a second,” I ran over to the door and opened up to 2 men in full armor with a large ruby dragon across their chest. The officers didn’t waste any time; they just pushed past me and one of them started searching through my apartment.

“You are suspected of robbing the royal treasury, you will submit to a search of your place and belongings and come into the castle for questioning,” The Dragon Guard said as he searched through my pantry. The second Guard had stopped after he entered and was guarding the door.

“Officer, there must have been a misunderstanding. I could never have done anything of the sort.”

“Save your excuses for Megara. She deals with thieves herself.” I started to sweat as he got into the kitchen, when he came across the potato chest he knocked it over to let the potatoes fall off. Somehow, the false bottom was staying in place and the guard just kept on moving. He left the kitchen and went into my room to search there after. I realized I’d have to make my move here. They were going to take me to the dragon either way and I was as good as dead then.

Just then I could hear the false bottom give on the chest and the clatter of gold coins spilling onto the floor. I could see the guard by the door out of the corner of my eye and the noise caught his attention. Without hesitation I pulled the blade from my sleeve and cut the guard's throat before he could make any noise. I caught the body and laid it on the floor, grabbed the gold out of the kitchen and snuck out the window. I was worried that I would panic and freeze but this time the adrenaline kicked in, I hit the ground and just started running.

As I was sprinting through the streets I realized I needed to decide where I was running, seemed like a stupid idea to try and outrun the dragon guard on foot. There was a stable not too far out of the way to a relatively unused gate out of the city. I figured it was my best shot even though it was a long shot at best. I kept running until I got to the stable, I didn’t bother talking to the owner or anything. I just threw him some gold coins and took a horse, I paid him way more than the horse was worth, if he was smart he’d hide some and maybe they wouldn’t confiscate it all.

It was only when I was on my horse galloping away that I decided to look behind me, to my surprise no one was chasing me. I decided not to push my luck and didn’t slow down. It didn’t take me long to reach the gate out of town and I was in luck; there was no one manning the gate. I rode out of the gate feeling like I had made it home free, it was just farmland from here until the villages.

Just when I began to relax a shadow came over my head, before I even had time to look up I felt my body being lifted off the horse. It took me a second to process what was even happening but when I opened my eyes and saw myself flying straight back to the castle I knew what happened. Megara had come for me herself. Most people would kill for a ride like this, too bad I was about to die from one.

Instead Megara let me down right at the highest peak of the castle. I had to scramble just to keep my footing on the steep slope. Then Megara flew to meet me at eye level and I could hear her speak in my mind.

“You’re a clever one aren’t you. You’ve managed to get this far and that’s much farther than anyone else has.”

“TH- THANK YOU YOUR MAJESTY” my voice was shaky and the wind was threatening to push me off the roof. Megara seemed to hear me just fine though. 

“However, you killed one of my dragon guards. As impressive as that is, there are only two options for you now. You may take his place in the dragon guard and swear your fealty to me for the rest of your life, or you can pay with your life.” At the time I’ll be honest it was a no brainer, I didn’t want to die and the dragon guards seemed like they lived made lives.

I didn’t know it’d be like this...