Dragon's Hunt

*Sniff, Sniff* I can smell her. She thinks she’s safe—thinks I won’t be able to, over all the other myriad odors flooding my nostrils in the deep wood, smell the lilacs she likes to wear in her hair or the powder that’s used on her linens. She won’t understand how wrong she is until it’s far too late. By then, she’ll already be in my clutches.

I’ve smelled these trees, their leaves and sap for centuries. I know when one is sick and needs culled. When flowers bloom according to their season, my nose tells me first. There isn’t an animal in this forest I haven’t at one time by smell alone hunted for food or sport. A small human girl, a toddler, using the vernacular of her people, has no chance of eluding me in my home. I’m Mortimer of the Long Reach, one of the last remaining dragons in this part of the world, and this entire forest is my domain.

If I choose, I can be almost imperceptible to human senses. My body blends naturally into my surroundings in the wild and my musculoskeletal system is almost as flexible as a snake’s. So, I can get very low to the ground and maneuver easily around obstacles all while blending in with everything I pass. These abilities have evolved over the years to near perfection to survive being hunted by humans and occasionally other dragons. That I’ve lived this long among beings that want to wipe out my entire species is testament to their effectiveness. This is one little human that won’t grow up to be like her barbarian kin.

She had a head start of half an hour or more. I could’ve caught up with her easily if I’d taken to the sky but then I would’ve exposed my location to enemies and one little girl is too small a meal to risk that. The smell of lilacs is getting stronger. My nose leads me to a fallen log. She must be on the other side, or inside, it matters not. I can rend the log apart as though it was made of straw. I get into a ready crouch and leap on top of the log. Nothing. I look inside and again see nothing. I search the log from one end to the other and find no trace of the girl except a pile of lilac petals. She tricked me. I know she poses no danger but still I sit up and look around furtively. I cannot tell which way she went. I won’t be able to track her using the lilacs anymore. She’s smart for her age. I’ll have to track her by the powder scent instead.

I follow that scent, less indigenous to the wood and thus easier to single out, until I reach a small creek. She must have entered it to keep from brushing up against the bushes and leaving a trail to follow. Once I figure out where she left the creek though, I can pick up the scent easily enough. There are no footprints on the rocks or in the sand under the water so I can’t tell which direction she went. Perhaps she’s too light to make any or she didn’t enter the creek and instead doubled back through her original trail. I don’t find either of those possibilities likely so I must be missing something. Bending my head as close to the water as possible, I see scrape marks which could’ve been made by someone using a stick to try and cover their tracks. I stretch my long neck and find tiny little footprints a few feet from the scrape marks. She must have thought I wouldn’t keep looking for them if I didn’t see them where the trail ended. It’s a reasonable assumption but I am no reasonable dragon, and I will not be fooled a second time.

Following the footprints, I slow to a crawl to savor what is surely the final leg of the hunt. She cannot be far now. I lick my lips in anticipation of my victory. I’m moving faster now but still quietly enough to not be heard over the trinkling of the creek. After a hundred yards or so the sight of a blonde hair blowing out from behind a persimmon tree causes me to slow my pace once more. If she knows I’m here she will run again and I’m getting too tired for a chase. I’m an old dragon after all. Almost glacially slow, I creep to the foot of the tree. I bring my long fingers up to grasp her on the other side of the tree so that she cannot escape. Like a snake, I sit coiled waiting for just the right moment to strike. Then I lash out faster than the human eye can see and grab the girl and tree trunk together. I look around the tree and for the second time, after thinking victory is mine, come up empty handed.

As slowly as possible, I stand up for a better view of my surroundings. Then, in the middle of thinking she has to be close, I hear someone say “BOO!” and I nearly jump out of my skin.

“I found you,” an adorably tiny voice called.

“You did, and nearly scared the scales off of me,” I reply, “but I was supposed to find you.”

“You were taking so long I was afraid I’d be lost again,” she said.

Considering how I’d found her, lost and afraid in the woods after her party had been attacked by a pack of road bandits, it's a reasonable fear. Her mother had stowed her away inside the opening of a large tree to prevent her being found by the fiends. I was looking for the bandits myself when I came across her. It must have been the scariest thing that’s ever happened to her.

“I took so long because you are very smart and very good at this game,” I said. Then, bending down to get closer to her, I said, “Here, I kept these for you. Using them to throw me off your trail was clever.”

“My lilacs!” she cried excitedly. She took them and gave my leg a hug. Her arms didn’t even go halfway around.

I picked her up and put her on my shoulder. She started putting the flowers back in her hair as we made our way back to the cave I call home. A cave that is not nearly as damp and dreary as it was before I found her. I know this will all have to come to an end someday. Eventually, I’ll have to help her find her way back to her own people but for now, she’s as safe as she’s ever been and doesn’t seem to be in any hurry to get back to people who remind her of what she’s lost.

“Are you hungry?” I ask.

“Apple slices and honey, papa dragon” she says gleefully.

“Apple slices and honey,” I say in agreement. “We have plenty of that.”

I look over at her just as we reach an opening in the canopy of the forest. The sunlight sets upon her blonde hair like a halo. When she sees me watching her, she smiles. I smile back. She taught me how.