Fool's Gold

“Aww man that is a ridiculous amount of gold,” as their eyes adjusted to the gloom, they realized they were in a cave, which was indeed glittering with it, and a smattering of colorful jewels, “I mean there’s gotta be like 20 grand worth.”

“God, Jason, that is somehow so specific and yet so wrong,” said Liv.

They weren’t exactly sure how they’d gotten there, one minute they’d been hopelessly lost on a hike, and the next they’d followed a goat down a hole hoping for some food or shelter.

The cave was about the size of a basketball court and filled to the brim with piles of gold coins and diamonds, which rose almost to the stalactites reaching down from the ceiling like greedy fingers.

Jason and Liv seemed to forget they were hungry and afraid, and with a quick glance at each other, they jumped, giggling, into the nearest pile. Sure the landing was a bit rough, and it caused a small avalanche that brought coins and colorful stones toppling and tinkling over their heads, but it was a GIGANTIC pile of shiny stuff, who wouldn’t be ecstatic?

Liv threw coins in the air, while Jason made gold angels on the ground --like snow angels, but less comfortable--, they whooped and huzzahed and Liv stuffed her pockets with whatever she could grab.

A sharp bleat broke their triumphant hoots, and they looked at each other with unease. The sound pierced the air once more. Live and Jason gingerly picked their way around the piles, heading towards the back of the cave.

They were nearing a small alcove when Jason stopped abruptly causing Liv to crash into him. She tried to push him forward, but he wasn’t budging, so a defeated Liv peaked around him, a “what the hell, Jase” catching in her throat. Only a few yards away, curled up like a cat, lay a sleeping dragon --or at least it looked like it was sleeping, eyes closed, breath slow and regular, its thorny wings wrapped around itself like a blanket. It wasn’t very big, maybe the size of a van, but still, it was a freaking dragon. And next to it, quite close, stood a grungy-looking longhorn goat, crossed eyes looking simultaneously at them and at the dragon through slit pupils. As they watched, the goat turned its head towards the dragon’s head, and let out another massively loud BAAAAA. The dragon’s eyes snapped open, like an alarm clock had just gone off, similarly slit pupils taking in the goat. The dragon unfurled its large wings, stretching, and yawning with its big red maw.

Liv began to move slowly but determinedly towards the other side of the cave, pulling a still stubbornly frozen Jason with her. Ahead of them, the dragon rubbed its head against that of the goat and purred softly, still unaware of the two people. Somehow, Jason and Liv made it behind a rock column, collapsing into the shadows.

“Shit, shit, shit,” Liv whispered violently. “Oh my god, we’re gonna die, and there won’t even be anything left for them to find.” Liv suddenly realized that Jason was no longer with her. She groped her way blindly in the dark until she bumped into a shoe. Jason was lying flat on the ground, looking out from behind the rock. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

Jason pointed towards the dragon, “shh, look. There, underneath its paw.”

Liv scooched forward a bit on her stomach and looked at where Jason was pointing. “I saw it when it got up and stretched.” Something was indeed peeking out from underneath the calloused, clawed foot. “What is it?” asked Liv. “Don’t know, but if it’s guarding it so carefully it must be infinitely more valuable than anything out here.”

The goat was climbing over the dragon and then pushing off in fancy flips. The dragon seemed to be chuckling, big huffs of smoke escaped its nostrils and a low growl emanated from its throat. Even as they seemingly played, the dragon kept his foot firmly caged over the object.

“All right, here’s the plan,” said Jason turning towards Liv. “We are going to wait until it falls back asleep and then we’re gonna steal whatever it is.”

“What? Why? What!?” Liv was shaking violently.

Jason shook her hard “Liv, snap out of it, we haven’t come this far to turn back now.”

“We don’t know what this is! We didn’t come here on purpose but we are definitely leaving that way. Let’s go.” She started to crawl out but Jason pulled her back.

Seeming to reconsider, Jason whispered, “fine, fine. We have to wait until it falls asleep again but then we’ll sneak out.”

They had crawled back into the shadows again and were pressed against the cold stone of the cave. “Why don’t you try to rest, I’ll keep an eye out,” he said to Liv. Her adrenaline high was rapidly falling and she nodded her head before curling up into a ball and closing her eyes - there would be time later to consider just how bat-shit crazy this was she thought, right now she should really rest.

-------

She awoke with a start, something was wrong, but she couldn’t immediately place what it was. She looked around for Jason but couldn’t find him anywhere, when it hit her, it was light inside the cave. “God, Jason, what did you do?”

She crawled out from behind the rock but had to snap her head back quickly as a ball of fire flew past her and exploded on the nearest pile of gold. Everywhere she looked there were small blazes burning. “I’m gonna kill him if he doesn’t die first,” she said.

She looked out again to see the dragon storming about the cave, roaring and shooting out a fireball once in a while. The goat was nowhere to be seen. Jason, on the other hand, she spotted right away, he had buried himself in a pile of coins and only his face and one hand were visible, he spotted her at the same time. “What did you do?” she mouthed angrily at him, “I got it!” he mouthed back excitedly, waving a small black notebook at her. The dragon stalked off to the other corner of the cave and Liv ran over and pulled Jason out from under the coins. “What is that?”, she said. “You’re not gonna believe this, but this is what it was hiding, a notebook...”, replied Jason. Liv clapped a hand over his mouth, “we decided we weren’t going to do this, remember?”

Jason licked her hand and she recoiled, disgusted. “Don’t you want to see what’s in it?”

“No, I want to get out of here”, she shouted back. The crashing noises behind them came suddenly to a halt.

“Well, now you’ve done it,” said Jason. The dragon roared and started pounding towards them, they took off running. “I’ve done it? I’ve done it?!”

A ball of fire flew inches over their heads, “let’s get out first, talk later,” said Jason.

Somehow, they made it back to where they had entered, dove in headfirst, and started frantically shimmying their way up.

The dragon caught up but couldn’t seem to fit inside the tight tunnel, nor to position its head in such a way to shoot fire at them. Its roar shook the walls.

“See, we’re totally fine,” said Jason, “it can’t get us now.”

“It probably has another way out,” hissed Liv. In fact, they could hear the dragon stomping away from them.

They were almost to the entrance; they could see daylight ahead of them. They were side by side now, doing a sort of crouched run when a shadow darkened the entrance. They stopped short as the goat bent down to crawl in and bleated menacingly at them. “C’mon, we can’t let it trap us in here”, shouted Jason as he screamed at the top of his lungs and ran full tilt at the goat. It seemed to work as the goat faltered momentarily, and they managed to shove past it. The goat quickly recovered and snapped at Liv’s coat. “Jason, help me!” She shouted to Jason who had sprinted away, unaware she was stuck. He turned around as if to come back for her, but stopped in his tracks.

Liv felt a whoosh behind her and, shaking, turned around slowly. She whimpered as the dragon snapped its teeth at her.

In a low, smoky voice the dragon bellowed, “GIVE ME BACK MY TREASURE!” Liv started emptying her pockets of the coins she had taken, “NOOO, THE BOOK. GIVE ME THE BOOK.”

Jason raised a hand over his head, in it was the slim notebook. “You want this?”

“IT’S A TREASURE TO MEEEE.” The dragon’s words shook the landscape and a flock of birds erupted out of a nearby tree.

“Let us go and I’ll give it back,” said a shaking Jason.

The dragon exhaled slowly considering the proposition, Liv’s eyes stinging with the smoke.

Jason opened the notebook and made as if to break it in half. “NO!” Screamed the dragon.

“FINE, YOU HAVE A DEAL.”

“How do I know I can trust you?” Shouted Jason.

“A DRAGON CANNOT LIE, BOY. BUT KNOW THIS, IF YOU RETURN, I WILL DESTROY YOU.”

Jason nodded as if that was enough, what else could he do? He slowly put the notebook on the ground and backed away. “GO,” said the dragon to Liv. Accompanied by the goat, she carefully walked towards Jason and the notebook. The goat gingerly picked up the notebook between his teeth while Liv ran the rest of the way to Jason, grabbing him and pulling him along as they made their getaway. They tried to put as much space between themselves and the beasts, running until their legs and lungs were burning, and they collapsed in a heap. As soon she got her breath back she said, “I promised I would kill you if you didn’t die and I mean to keep my word,” as she punched Jason as hard as she could, which wasn’t very hard at all. She lay back down next to him, exhausted and thrilled to just be alive. “That was crazy,” mumbled Jason, “we have to tell someone.”

“Are you insane? No one is going to believe us, we have literally no evidence, and the dragon would kill us, so no, we are not telling anyone, we are just putting this behind us.”

“How are we going to explain the treasure?”

“There is nothing left! I gave it all back,” shouted Liv. Punching him again.

“Not everything,” said Jason, pulling a small green diamond from his pocket.

-------

3 weeks later. Somehow back in civilization.

“You are not going to believe this Jase,” said Liv, coming out of the pawnshop and handing him a bulky envelope, “I sold it for about 20,000.” I am literally shaking from the thought that you can somehow predict the future.”

They walked down the street together, “See, I told you everything would be ok.”

“I’m still kind of bummed we never looked inside the notebook, can you even imagine what fantastic shit was in there?”

“I like to think it was its little book of poems, and the dragon is an amateur author,” said Liv.

“Or maybe it was its diary, and it was hiding all its deepest darkest secrets!”

As they walked off into the sunset, exchanging theories, and planning their next adventure funded by their previous one, they failed to notice a shadow darkening the sky.

High above, the goat was riding on the back of the dragon, locked into a clever basket-like device. “DRAGON’S AREN’T BOUND BY THEIR PROMISES, FOOLS,” it roared as it dove towards the ground.