Everything is silent, and I remind myself that I have not eaten properly at a table since I was a child. I don’t know Dragon culture either. I have many questions I want to ask.
What food are we eating?
How do we eat?
What are your – our – people’s customs?
All questions I want answers to, but I get the idea – especially from his magic spiking – that he is angry. I cannot be sure if the anger is directed at me or the anger stems from something else. I cannot believe his magic. I have never seen magic do such a thing.
I can feel him gazing at me in silence, his stare deep. It might be only a feeling, but I am not usually wrong about someone’s eyes on me, watching me.
I touch the table before hesitantly touching my plate. I have no difficulty finding a large dish. I smooth out the tablecloth and graze my hand over the surface until I locate the base of a glass cup. The glass is cold and somewhat bumpy, perhaps it is the design.
I touch my plate, feeling the same bumpy ridges as the cup, only on the perimeter. The plate and glass must be from a matching set.
I hear the King pick up his silverware and start to cut into something noisily. The knife and fork scrape across the plate, a horrible screech emits each time. His stare still lingers as I can feel it, never once has his eyes wavered from me.
I’m surprised he hasn’t spoken thus far to me – maybe he hopes to annoy me with his poor etiquette. As I think that, he begins to chew loudly, grinding his teeth over gristle just like the guards in the tower.
I wonder what it is we are eating, and my fingers skim over the food. I know there is meat from shape and texture – tough and tender and thick with a roundish shape. Then, to the right of the meat, I feel a warm stringy food somewhat slimy to touch. To the left, a piece of bread, hot and soft, and it is the only thing I know I will like just by touch alone.
I pick up the bread and split it in half. I bring one half to my face and inhale the smell and let the warm steam roll over my flesh. The bread smells wonderful, even the warmth in my hands delights me.
I am okay with food being my only comfort here.
I part my lips to taste this divinity, but the King interrupts me, his question is snotty. “Do you always have such odd habits while eating, Mage?”
Mage?
I am getting sick of everyone calling me everything but my name, whether they call me Ice Mage, Mage, Ice Princess, My Lady, or other names, some of them vile and tasteless. All of them bothered me.
“My name is Vrai,” I announce, unsure if he knows my rightful name. He may have forgotten, so I hope this serves as a friendly reminder.
“Are you… telling me to use your name?” he asks.
“Preferably,” I reply.
“I can use whatever name I see fit, Mage, and Mage is a very suiting name for you,” he growls.
“Do you have a preference of what you want to be called?” I question before taking a small bite of the bread, very much tempted to stuff the rest in my mouth like a truffle trigg. I can moan from the mere flavor alone.
While some may call bread bland, to someone such as I, who ate cold and stale food for the last ten years, I say differently. The bread is rich and full of flavor.
He seems to take to silence, and I give him a list of options. “King of Dragons? Dragon King? Maybe just King? Your Majesty? My Lord? Your name? Something else?”
“Just call me My Lord… like the maids,” he grumbles.
“Alright... My Lord,” I chew and swallow my food as quietly as I can. I was locked in a tower for my entire life, and my manners are better than his.
“And I want to be clear, Mage… You are never to call me by my name,” he says. “You will never receive the pleasure of my name rolling off your tongue or hear me speak your name, Mage.”
I hear him stand as he pours himself a drink, the liquid splashes into his empty glass. It has such a sweet smell and its aroma fills my nostrils.
Listening to him pour his drink reminds me of my bath and the maid trying to drown me and how scared I felt. Shivers run up my spine, and I smash the bread in my hand. A sound so simple is able to trigger terrible memories of recent events.
I hear him place the metal canister on the table, and the sweet-smelling liquid swishes around inside. The sound is soft but enough to draw me back to reality and stop tormenting the food in my hand.
I slowly finish off the bread, wishing for more, but I dare not ask, so I move on to the next item on my plate. I pick up my silverware, having to feel the tips to know what the fork and knife are. The utensils feel odd in my hands as it has been a few years since I have eaten with cutlery.
Though I haven’t eaten meat for a much longer time, once I cut a small piece of meat the best I can, I carefully bring the tip of my fork to my open mouth – which is watering from the smell alone.
The meat is salty, smoky, succulent, and so tender that it melts in my mouth. The bread is good, but if I dare to say, the meat is far better.
Despite almost melting in my mouth, I must chew, if only a little. I feel disheartened as my teeth are sore and sensitive from not having much food over the years.
“What food is this, that I eat?” I ask after swallowing.
“Meat,” he replies in between taking giant gulps of the liquid from his glass.
“I know I eat meat… But what kind of meat is it?” I ask, beginning to cut another piece.
“Do you need to know?” He puts his glass on the table before asking.
“Yes.” I take a second bite.
“It’s Dragon flesh,” the King replies and by the time, he answers, I have swallowed the second bite. He can’t be serious, can he?
He continues, “Of course, the flesh comes from a prisoner. One who committed treason, no one innocent by far or could ever be presumed innocent. I thought why not let him honor us at least once by giving us the gift of flesh,” he chuckles. “He accepted although he didn’t have many choices. All in all, he wanted to be accepted by the Sky Gods and be eaten by his King… and in a turn of events, his Queen.”
I drop my utensils, and the Dragon King laughs, “Why so pale, Mage? Didn’t your ancestors once eat the flesh of Kari? Isn’t eating the great Dragon Kari’s flesh the only reason why you peasants received such divine powers given to us by the Sky Gods?”
My stomach turns and rolls with disgust. I stand up, placing my hand over my mouth, the thought of eating Dragon flesh, or the flesh of any being, is horrifying and disgusting. I try to keep the food down, the food that I have barely taken two bites of.
“You are sick,” I mutter. “How can you eat your own?”
“I’m sick?” he questions. “What of your people, Ice Mage? Don’t they use us Dragons as decoration? Use our scales as armor against us in battle? Kill our children and women? And much more. All the things you know about.”
“I know nothing of what you speak!” I snap, this being the first time I have raised my voice against a man… A King, no less.
“Oh, I see. Because you are blind, you are blind to the actions of your people.” The King gets up from his chair, and I hear his footsteps approaching me.
His boots clump against the hard floor, click, and tap… Click, tap… A slow approach, he wants me to know he is stalking toward me with heavy and powerful steps. Click, tap…. Click, tap...
He stops behind me. His leather jacket squeaks with the movement of his arms. I only know this noise because one of my guards always boasted that the jacket he wore was from a Dragon he killed.
I see his magic growing brighter as he closes the distance between us.
I remove my hand from my mouth, waiting for his next move. I must be prepared for anything; the Dragon King is unpredictable. I have no idea what he is going to do next.
His shoes have become silent, his aura gone. He is circling me like a predator. I have made a mistake. I am going to die. I am foolish for aggravating him.
He grabs my face with his hands and yanks so we are face to face. Only then do I feel his hard and sharp nails scraping against my cheeks.
“Now tell me this. Are you just a sheltered Princess or simply an ignorant fool? Or perhaps both?” I feel the tips of his fingers grow hotter than the rest of him, maybe he is threatening to burn me if I don’t answer him this time around.
“I am neither,” I reply.
“Neither?” he questions, his grip around my cheeks loosening. “Then perhaps I am a poor judge of character? Well, my good Lady, give me another jab at guessing.... Were you perhaps locked in a tower most of your life like some fairytale Princess, waiting to be saved by a kind and handsome Prince?” He strokes my cheek with the back of his hand, but this act of his is not comforting to me.
He is right… I was locked in a tower most of my life, the second part about wishing for a Prince to rescue me is not.
Mages have often told tales of what he spoke of, about a Knight or Prince in shining armor saving a Princess who has been locked away in a tower by an evil, menacing Dragon who burns those who draw near the beautiful maiden.
The Knight or Prince is described as wholly handsome and saves the beautiful maiden after slaying the hideous Dragon in a vicious and long drawn-out battle. The tale ends usually with the last sentence, ‘And so after being saved from the tower and the Dragon slain, the two wed and are granted very beautiful children, living happily ever after.’
Real-life is all but tragic, and there are no happy endings. There is truly never a happily ever after. Those stories spin false hopes in the hearts of the children who hear them.
The world is sad and unhappy, and this is the reason why storytellers write such tales because they crave happy endings, and they also want those hearing their stories to be happy too. If I was a storyteller, I would try and make everything happy, maybe even the Dragon.
I think I lived too close to that story, but instead of being locked away by some evil Dragon, I was locked in a tower by my father. Then instead of being saved, my father gifted me to a Dragon.
I guess you can say the Dragon I am to wed breathes fire and is just as menacing and evil. I will never have a Prince or Knight braving the Dragon’s castle to rescue me. I will be marrying the Dragon, he himself being the Prince or well… the King.
I don’t answer him, and he laughs as his nails drag across my skin. “I’m interested in your story, Princess. Maybe you won’t bore me like some common whore. I even wish to hear the story from your very lips. You may not know much about us Dragons besides terrible tales, but we do enjoy a good story.”
“And finish your breakfast, you are skin and bone. All you are good for is using your bones to pick my teeth of leftovers, Mage,” he chuckles.
I stand still before I decide to sit back down slowly, still disturbed about the origin of the meat on my plate, meat I must finish, or I risk offending the King. Dragons are not my people, but regardless, a person is a person whether they are Mage, Dragon, or some other being.
But then again what differs between feasting on this man and dining on a trigg? It is disturbing how quickly my thoughts turn dark. It is disgusting and worrying.
I have no words left for the King, and we eat the rest of the breakfast in silence. On occasion, a breeze blows in from the balcony; the doors must have been left open.
I still can’t believe I will be marrying this man by the end of the night. The wedding is fast approaching and also creeping up on both of us. Also, neither of us seem to be prepared for the event.
I do not want to marry him. I do not want to be Queen. I do not want anything to do with Dragons. The food in my stomach sours. I feel sick.
I’m also scared of what tonight will bring. Suddenly, I remember the words of my maids.
‘Death is everywhere.’
Comments (2)
See all