It was once told, in many lands, there was a dragon who took maidens for his slaves. It was told, he worked them till they shriveled and starved them with half-rotten food. It was also said he ate them as soon as they entered his cave, while they were still juicy and plump. But as with oft-told tales, the truth was much more complex.
It is not so often told, in small, scattered villages, there once was a dragon who took in maidens. Be they the victims of grotesque marriages, or the battered daughters of cruel men, or whimpering girls cast out half-naked under the accusation of wizardry, he helped them. He gave them space to recover from the ravages done to their bodies by those who thought others were owned, not loved. He hid the shivering and speechless ones, counseled the confused and enraged. He had a great hoard of treasure, passed down to him by his grandsire, a boon given by the dwarves of the Ironside mountains. At least that was the rumor. Some versions of the little-told tale say he made gold from his shed scales. Either way, he gave gold to the ones who needed it, so they could have and find new homes, gentler lovers, kinder fathers, and less envious townswoman. Some of them returned to him more than once, having thrust themselves into more tangled relationships than before.
It is rarely told, only whispered among girls at night to each other, that the dragon loved a maiden. So much so he gave her all the scales from his body, even the newly grown ones, ripped by his teeth, leaving raw and bloody patches of his hide exposed.
It is often told, from the altars of many grand churches, there was a woman who seduced dragons. She came to them as an innocent maid, frail but enchanting. She wheedled and manipulated her way into their sacred caves. She told them lies of her evil, abusive father and her desperation to find safety. They gave her shelter and gold. She enchanted the holy dragons and pried their scales from their emaciated bodies, after starving them. She ate their flesh and ground their bones for magic. She stayed forever young by this abomination. But as with most holy tales, the truth was much less straightforward.
There is a story less told, in quiet groups of heathens, of a girl who fled her harsh mother. Or perhaps ran from her village after being raped by the town priest. Either way, she became lost in the wastelands. Half-dead, her bones jutting out of her sallow skin, the dragon had saved her, and had nourished her back to health. He had blessed her with some of his own scales, seven, to be precise, for that was a perfect number. She had left him, renewed and repentant, returning to her family with the dragon’s bounty.
There is a story seldom spoken, only whispered by girls silently, that a maiden loved a dragon so much she gave him her heart, still beating, so he would not die. But as with any story, what really happened is usually lost in the telling.
As usually is told, there lived a lonely girl in a lonely village. Her father was not a cruel man. It was not his fault the twelve-eyed god had cursed him with a single daughter. If she had been born a twin at least, his fortune would have been better. But, no, the God-who-stares-at-all had cursed him with a single, ugly daughter, who tore into this world with ferocity and screaming and too much blood. So much blood, the priest had said the wife must be drowned the next day. The balance of blood had to be kept; so much blood with a birth only meant one thing, the death of the mother as payment to the merciless god.
Her father had not adored his wife; he had only treasured the status she brought, the potential sons she would bear. He had been considered fortunate before his wife's death. He had come from prosperous parents, who prayed at the twelve-hour mark daily, who gave twelve coins each month, and had even sacrificed twelve owls to the god every year. After his marriage, he had given twelve days of thanks and spent twelve days in solitude after his wife revealed her pregnancy. He had been pious for the sake of fortune.
The twelve-eyed god cared little for motivation, as long as his dictates were followed. All were evil and all were cursed to die without hope or love. But the god gave those who served money to soften their lives. At least, that was how her father had interpreted the words. All his fortune had come crumbling down with the birth of his daughter. She was the cause of her mother's death. She was the cause of his loss of money. She was the reason his parents died penniless and unwashed in the gutter, unable to even pay for a death prayer.
He was not a cruel man, simply a cursed one. So he bent his rage and loathing into a barb he could use against his curse. The twelve-eyed god forbade hitting children; parents were routinely hung if the abuse was severe enough. There had even been a spat of false accusations made against parents by disgruntled children, leading to several wrong convictions. The Order had been dispatched to burn the entire village, to burrow out the evil, by order of His Most Holy, the All-Seeing Claw of God.
So he never struck his daughter, though he often fantasized about it. No, he took her apart daily, nitpicking all she did, making her redo chores till her hands and feet bled. He bought her used and dirty clothes, sometimes pulling rags off the unburied criminals. He never gave her clear water to bathe or let her use her mother's combs to pin up her frazzled and bulky hair. He treated her with the disgust she deserved, and so then did the rest of the village. She had brought an entire holy family to ruin, simply by existing. Her father had only taught her to read so she could tremble nightly over the scriptures.
The girl had one comfort, her magic. Magic in the land was forbidden, even though it often leapt into people's outstretched hands, so eager was it to be used. But it was evil for unholy men to touch the magic, for that belonged only to god and his dragons. But the girl felt the magic in everything and almost instinctively used it. She mostly did it unconsciously, like weaving a heavier blanket for herself on the cold, mountain nights. She had been granted one blanket, as her father could not neglect her by the law. But it did not specify how many blankets he had to give her. So he heaped most on top of himself at night and squirreled the rest away under his bed for the mice to curl up in.
She also made heavy water buckets lighter with a flex of her wrist as she carried them. She had to go to the far well, across the valley. Her father commanded it, so she would have time to contemplate her sins and weep before the twelve-eyed god. She didn’t do much crying, though, mostly using the time to pick roots and edible mushrooms to supplement her rations. She also hummed to herself off tune, and casually changed the colors of wildflowers. Sometimes, she accidentally zapped butterflies with stray magic, sending them careening off course, with brightly be-speckled wings. The first time she noticed herself doing this, she tried to catch the butterfly and apologize, desperately trying to figure out how to change it back. She never caught the butterfly and they seemed mostly unfazed by their course or color change. She used magic, too, to heal animals. They were the only breathing things she could talk to.
The villagers either scorned her with silence or lectured her about her vile birth. Her father only scolded or ordered, though he was mostly too drunk to lecture or notice her. As long as dinner was served and his laundry done, he let her be most days. His sober days, which were slowly becoming less, she hated. Those days, he made her read from the scriptures and scrub her hands till they were bloody.
Her constant companion, even on the sober days, was a large, striped cat she had healed years ago. He had had maimed himself by jumping down from a roof and broken his front feet with the impact. Or at least, that is how the girl surmised it. She had found him when she was only six, crumpled and mewling under the eaves of the wheelwright house. It was raining and they were both soaked. Her father had sent her to get another barrel of ale from the tavern, his third that fortnight. He always somehow had coins for alcohol. Occasionally, he would sober up to do some labor for the wheelwright, and stash his coins under the floorboards for his next bout of drinking. He was a cruel sober; she preferred him drunk and docile, so she did not mind the late-night errand, nor lugging the barrel home in the mud. The barrel was up to her waist but lighter than carrying two buckets of water across the valley every day.
She heard the faint, pitiful cries of the cat and peeked over the wheelwright's hedge. The cat was so drenched and bedraggled she couldn't tell its color. But the way its legs lay twisted left then sharply backwards, she knew it couldn’t stand. She crept towards it but didn’t touch, she only gave a small sob and felt her eyes sting. She blinked hard, the cat gave a surprised yelp and sprang up. It stared at its now straight legs in puzzlement and slashed its tale. Then it dashed away.
The girl, who her father called Olichaster, but the village called Chastercasten, but she called herself Alibasten after her mother, sighed happily and slogged on to the tavern. The next day, Alibasten had a companion who followed her to the well, across the whole length of the valley and back. That night, she felt something she had never even guessed existed, a warm, firm back pressed up against her curled legs, softly vibrating.