Far Horizons: Tales of Sci-Fi, Fantasy and Horror. Issue #15 June 2015 | Page 23

Quest
By Jackie Pitchford
Three brothers set out one day on a quest to kill a
dragon. John and Edward were well versed in the arts
of war. They had been training since their seventh
birthdays and showed much promise. John, recently
knighted, had just returned from a tourney in Brittany
where he had successfully won a prize on the joust
circuit and captured three knights in the melee event.
Their ransoms had bought the beautiful chestnut war
horse he was riding, Thunder. Kevin was only twelve
and acting as squire to his older brothers for the first
time.
The quest had come about as a result of increasingly
hysterical reports from the local peasants to the king’s
justice that a dragon had become active once more
after many years of silence. There had been a spate of
cattle thefts and the carcasses were found with the telltale scorch and tear marks left by a dragons teeth. The
king had been sceptical, having never seen a dragon
himself, but decided it was a good option to get his
sons away from the plague raging through the city.
By dressing the whole thing up as a romantic quest
the king was able to persuade the three young princes,

John, Edward and Kevin, to set off in search of the
monster, ridding the land of a terrible monster and
earning Kevin’s spurs in a singularly spectacular way.
John, was a bit dubious but he was a game lad, brave
and skilled in the arms of war, eager to defend the
realm, and having a nice camping trip with his brothers along the way was just the icing on the cake.

The dragon they sought lived in a desolate spot of wild
land at the edge of the kingdom. It took several days
riding to get there, the weather didn’t help, wet and
humid, making everything smell musty and dank, the
ever present, grey low clouds looming menacingly
over everything. It seemed that the bare sides of the
mountain were glowering at them as they approached
over the blasted land.
They could make out scorch marks above the entrance
to the dragon’s lair, alongside deep runnels from giant
claws torn into the bare rock. The boys found it more
daunting than they had anticipated, even from a fair
distance away. There was no doubt about it, this task
was going to be tougher than it had seemed back at the
castle.

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