Dragon Skin by G. L. Snodgrass

 
     
    Dragon Skin
    Stephan
    You’d think a dragon skin would impress a girl. At least earn you a raised eyebrow of interest. Something that says, “Hey, wow, that’s impressive.” But no, not a twinkle. I’m talking a full blown, armored dragon skin; eighteen feet long, with two black ridges down its back. Properly cured and preserved, everything you’d want in a dragon skin.
    No reaction, nothing, not even a yawn.
    I mean, it was the first true dragon’s skin in two hundred years. Not some wizard’s pathetic attempt to fool the masses. Nor some molted snake skin passed off as authentic. This was the real deal and she could care less. What was it about high born ladies and their disdain for the important things in life?
    Dragons, being rare and pretty much indestructible are hard enough to find, let alone kill. If he was lucky a man could spend his whole life and never see one. Others, less than lucky, spent their entire lives living under their threat of immediate and permanent incineration. That’s the thing, you just never know with a dragon.
    Everyone else in the hall got it. Their eyes bugged out and a quiet murmur passed through the crowd.
    “Is that really a dragon skin?”
    “Where’s its wings?”
    “Isn’t he the Blacksmith’s son?”
    “A dragon skin. It’s worth a king’s ransom.”
    “How’d he get it? Who’d he steal it from?”
    All of the whispered questions passed up and down the rank of onlookers. I let them talk, ignoring them as I studied the young woman sitting at the head table next to her uncle.
    Brianna could make a rose wilt with envy. She’d make the sun second guess its brilliance. Never, in all of the kingdom’s history had a woman been so beautiful.  Long golden hair fell to her trim waist. Emerald green eyes twinkled with intelligence and an understanding of the world. This was a woman to birth a race of warriors and capture a people’s heart.
    And she would be mine. Or I’d die trying.
    .o0o.
    Brianna
    He was back.
    Five years and he walks into my Uncles hall as if he owns the place.
    He’d grown, a lot. Massive shoulders carried a rolled carpet as if it were a child’s pillow. Legs like tree trunks and heavily muscled arms spoke of his strength and power. I didn’t know if it was sword play or the smith’s hammer that had created such a chiseled specimen and didn’t care. He was here.
    A long sword swung from his left hip and a sharp battle axe rested in a scabbard across his back. Two dirks, the throwing kind, peaked from the top of each boot and another was positioned in his belt. This was a man ready for war.
    It was the eyes that let me know that it was him, he’d changed that much. Their deep blue shot through my soul as soon as he saw me. I’d held my breath while he marched down the aisle to the head table. Every eye followed him, every head turned as he passed. Most would not remember the boy. But none would forget the man.
    Unfazed, unbothered, he threw his burden to the ground and kicked it open. Unrolling it for all to see.
    I knew what it was without looking. He’d said he’d do it. Promised me on that moonlit night behind his father’s forge. I’d thought him a fool for trying, and a bastard for leaving.  He’d been my only friend. My only trusted friend. Instead of staying, he’d left on some silly quest to retrieve a dragon’s skin. Now he was back and my heart raced with joy. Not because of the prize, but because he was well. Grown into a man a woman could be proud of.
    He stood before the onlookers, feet apart and arm crossed at his chest. Looking for all the world like a lost hero. The dark green scales of the skin at his feet overlapped each other. The hard scales growing progressively smaller and turning yellow towards the edges. Two circular patches indicated where the beast’s wings had been. A dragon’s skin. Who would believe it?
    I’d always thought them myth. My Stephan had proved the world wrong. I couldn’t imagine what