Page 56 of The Dungeon Book

What was to be done about the dragon? Another agenda item entirely. Sufficient unto the day the evil thereof, and so on. Indeed, it probably wasn’t his problem to deal with at all. He knew his place, and dragons were well above that. Someone else – some legendary hero, some battle-tested veteran, maybe a great army bristling with spears – would be sent down from the capital to deal with this peril.

Sir Rudyard’s duty was the wise husbandry of resources. Eggs and bacon and bread and rules and order and hold the line until help arrived.

By the time he reached the keep, he already had his urgent letter to the king drafted in his head.

The messenger left, hooves churning up autumn mud.

The messenger returned, shivering, forcing his way through winter snow.

He was not accompanied by a legendary hero or battle-tested veteran. There was no room in his saddlebags for a great army bristling with anything at all. Instead, he brought a letter. Although it bore the king’s seal, it was not from the king. It had been written by the Chancellor. It was brief; indeed, once you skipped over the salutations (perfunctory) and the list of titles and honours held by the Chancellor (extensive), its contents could be summarised thusly:

You’re on your own.

P.S. You still owe us the usual taxes.

In truth, heroes are in short supply at the best of times, but they were especially scarce then. Sir Peledon was the only real example of the breed left.

As for battle-tested veterans, the Great Northern War had produced whole hosts of them, but they were all otherwise engaged in the Westerlund. King Arus was dying, the rumours said, and several of his barons had taken advantage of his weakness by joining together in a rebellion against the Chancellor (who they despised as an upstart interloper) and the Princess Aldebara (who they admired for her gentility and poise, and all thought would make an excellent consort in a few years for whichever of them won the throne). So, any battle-tested veterans were busy putting down the rebels, so for a time both the Royal Antiquarian Survey and any prospective dragon-slaying was on hold.

The rebellion had already lasted two years. A suspiciously convenient thunderstorm wrecked the rebel fleet at Vellisport, safeguarding the capital from attack. After that came months of gruelling siege warfare as the king’s armies eliminated the rebel barons, castle by castle. A well-designed castle, by the by, has an escape tunnel, so often a given baron was able to flee the fall of their own fortress and seek refuge with a neighbour. By month fourteen, there was a pack of about thirty barons scurrying from one castle to the next like frightened mice.

They ended up in the last fortress at the very end of the Westerlund peninsula, a miserable lump of rock caked in seagull droppings, which describes both fortress and peninsula. They all crowded into a damp keep, all screeching blame at one another over the failure of their rebellion, all waiting for the king’s armies to slaughter them. The Chancellor ordered his troops to blockade the tip of the peninsula with the intent of starving the rebels into submission. Knowing the man, I suspect he threw a few daggers over the battlements to quicken things along – though some of the rebel barons were beefy, and their deaths would have staved off starvation.

Another counterproductive effort on his part.

In any event, before the rebels ate each other or surrendered, there came a white horse clip-clopping daintily over the shore, and riding it was a herald sent by the Princess Aldebara. In sight of both the rebels and the Chancellor’s forces, the herald unrolled a scroll and read the princess’s message: if the barons surrendered personally to her father the king, and commanded their remaining followers to lay down their weapons, then they would all be spared and no punishment would fall upon them. She decreed this very loudly, and very publicly. Not even the Chancellor could gainsay her. After, it was known as Aldebara’s Mercy – but you know all this better than I.

Anyway, it did not end. The barons promised they would go straight to the palace to surrender. Instead, they slipped away into the hills and gathered new strength.

The Chancellor rushed back to the king’s side to ensure that there were no more troublesome letters, but the damage was done, or, rather, not done. Within a year, the war was on again.

Anyway, I mention all that to explain why Sir Rudyard’s pleas for aid went unanswered.

Almost unanswered.

“Begging your pardon, sir,” said the serving boy, “it’s only that . . .”

Sir Rudyard frowned at the lad, trying to recall his name. Awful. Offcut. Offal. Something like that. “Only that what?”

“I’ve heard things . . .”

“As have I,” snapped Rudyard. “Right now, for example, I am hearing a boy who is not getting to the point.”

“I’ve heard that there are ways into . . . into down there. The Underhalls.”

“The foresters report that there was a landslide shortly before the dragon’s first assault. The door’s blocked.”

“There’s other ways in. Other doors.” Offa dropped a handful of treasures on the table. Ancient gold coins, the broken hilt of a dagger, monstrous teeth. “A village boy I know went in. Just in the first chamber, mind, but he brought back these. I took them off him. The door’s there. The Dungeon . . .” Offa’s eyes were wide as breakfast plates. “Someone could sneak in and take the dragon unawares. Catch it by surprise and kill it—”

“Slay it. One slays dragons.” Sir Rudyard blinked, as if waking from a dream. “This is arrant nonsense. You saw what became of those gentlemen” (they were not gentle) “from the Survey. They were professionally trained soldiers, experts in the field of, of . . . well, experts. I don’t see any such experts around here, do you?”

“No, sir.”

“Well then.” Sir Rudyard felt as if he had won the skirmish.

“Isn’t that the problem, sir?”

Bacon hung from fork paused between plate and mouth.