The Dragon Isn't Slain in This One

You turn girls into monsters, just so you have dragons to slay.

She whose golden flesh is littered with jagged scars from all the times she dragged her claws across her chest and held that beating organ out to you, dripping and pulsing, in her own hand.

She whose scales you tore from her body so many times that they have stopped growing back, leaving her bald.

She who has been de-fanged after biting one time too many.

She who has been hunted, struck down and mounted by a knight who serves no king but himself.

Another notch in your sword and another story for you to tell your princess when you finally find her.

But before you set off on your quest, I have a message. A message from my fellow monsters—From my fellow dragons and chimaeras and jabberwockies: That damsel you think you’re going to find?

You’ve got her all wrong. She’s no princess. There won’t be any sonnets sung or favours given when you climb her tower.

Stupid boy.

You’ll find only empty rooms, shattered glass slippers, rotting apples and splintered spinning wheels.

There are no princesses there.

But there are plenty of monsters. And I can’t wait to see how many you can conquer when you are finally outnumbered.