Dragon Friend (The Complete 3 Book Arthurian Fantasy Adventure Series), page 1
DRAGON FRIEND
The Complete Arthurian Fantasy Adventure Series
This 3 book collection contains the following Leonard the Great novels:
Dragon Friend
Giant Killer
Elven King
Roger Eschbacher
Copyright © 2023 by Roger Eschbacher
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, without prior written permission.
www.rogereschbacher.com
Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.
Book Cover by Keith Robinson
Book Layout © 2017 Book Design Templates
Dragon Friend: The Complete 3 Book Arthurian Fantasy Adventure Series / Roger Eschbacher – 1st ed.
ASIN B0CFGYVDS3
ISBN 9798857182291
This 3 book collection contains the following novels:
Dragon Friend
ASIN B00642JZYA
ISBN-10 1453628487
ISBN-13 978-1453628485
Giant Killer
ASIN: B00MX87DY8
ISBN-10: 1499125631
ISBN-13: 978-1499125634
Elven King
ASIN B08MZ7253J
ISBN 9798561246494
To Pat and Roger, the best mom and dad ever!
DRAGON FRIEND
Leonard the Great, Book 1
Roger Eschbacher
Copyright © 2011 by Roger Eschbacher
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, without prior written permission.
www.rogereschbacher.com
Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.
Book Cover Design by Keith Robinson
Book Layout © 2017 Book Design Templates
Dragonfriend: Leonard the Great, Book 1 / Roger Eschbacher – 2nd ed. (2020)
ASIN B00642JZYA
ISBN-10 1453628487
ISBN-13 978-1453628485
BISAC Juvenile Fiction / Fantasy Magic
To my readers
DRAGON FRIEND CONTENTS
Watch Out for the Dragon
That Big Thing Under the Bridge
Sir Gareth the Pain
The Arrow
The Brilliant Plan
Glennys the Beauty
Wherein the Brilliant Plan Becomes
The Old Peddler
Stable Employment
Along for the Ride
A Giant Problem
The Red Herring
Here We Go Again
The Pit
Eater of the Dead
Lost and Found
Battle Royale
Send in the Best, Send in the Beast
Hounded
The Upper Hand
My Name is Murck
Return of the Red Herring
The Reunion
Too Late?
We Thought You Were Dead!
Darkness Before Light
Leonard the Great
Chapter One
Watch Out for the Dragon
S ir Ronald rubbed the faint scars on the back of his neck and winced at the memory of how he’d gotten them. “Be careful, Leonard! Those claws are sharp and will draw blood!” he shouted. “I speak from experience!”
The tall, thin knight with a kind face and graying beard nervously glanced at the skies. Fortunately, the only winged beasts in the vicinity of Widow Toe’s garden were the original five attackers he and his young page battled moments earlier. That’s good, he thought. Sometimes the cries of these beasts drew in more of their kind, and one could find himself engulfed by a cloud of black fury before he knew what hit him. But the skies were clear, and the surrounding countryside was calm and peaceful.
This was Sir Ronald’s land, and he loved it. Known as the Green Valley, it had been given to a distant ancestor by one of the old pagan kings and handed down to him when his father died some fifteen winters ago. Not large, especially when compared with the holdings of some of the more prosperous nobility, the Green Valley was lush and, not surprisingly, green. It was dotted with the tiny homesteads of poor tenant farmers and surviving patches of the old forest. No, not particularly large; not especially prosperous; but it was his, and he took the care and protection of the valley and its people seriously. Right now, it was under attack by a cunning menace. One that had plagued simple farm folk since the dawn of time.
Sir Ronald watched as his page, a wiry boy of fifteen with dark brown hair and pale blue eyes, crawled out of a weedy irrigation ditch. The boy had lost his balance and fallen backward into the murky water while dodging a frenzied attack just moments before.
“Yes, sir,” said Leonard, wiping the mud from his face. “I’ll be careful.”
Leonard was ready. He stood up, pitchfork in hand, and waited as the winged attackers banked for another strike.
Sir Ronald permitted himself a quick smile. It was not in Leonard’s nature to back down. He was a bright and honest lad with a brave heart and could always be counted on to do the right thing. Little did he know when he found the boy, barely a toddler and crying in the middle of a smoldering hut, that he’d grow up to be such a fine young man.
Sir Ronald was proud of the boy.
“Here they come. Mind those beaks, too.”
Leonard took a deep breath and widened his stance. He’d faced foes like this a few times already in his young life and felt confident he could handle anything these ill-tempered creatures could throw at him.
As they dove toward his head, he waited until the last moment to thrust the wooden pitchfork into the air. Predictably, the leader crashed into it and fell to the ground, tumbling head over tail through the rows of radishes and into a tangle of gourd vines. Dazed but not injured, it sat still for a moment before it jumped into the air and flew off, summoning its companions with a loud “caw!”
Leonard nodded to himself. Crows always turned tail and fled at the first sign of any serious opposition.
“Well done, Leonard!” said Sir Ronald, looking for a mud-free space to pat him on the back. “You’ll make a fine knight someday.”
Sir Ronald was always quick to praise Leonard with a kind word, and Leonard thought of him more like a favorite relative than his Master. In the almost sixteen years he had spent with the knight, he’d never been beaten or even had a cross word spoken to him. Leonard felt lucky he was not in the service of a cruel man. He’d heard of other servant boys who weren’t so lucky. So, while Leonard wasn’t quite sure how chasing crows out of Widow Toe’s garden would help him gain the skills necessary to become a knight, he took Sir Ronald’s compliment in the spirit it was given.
“Thank you, milord,” said Leonard. “But I’d need my own land before that ever happened. The King doesn’t usually grant property to a page, does he?”
Sir Ronald chuckled and tousled Leonard’s hair, temporarily revealing the boy’s malformed left ear. His right ear was normal, but his left ear came to a slight point and had been that way since birth. “Yes, well, we’ll have to see about that, won’t we?”
“Here’s some bread, Sir Ronald,” said Widow Toe, leaning out of her cottage window. She was bent and plump and grinned at them with a largely toothless mouth. “It’s not much, just my way of saying thanks.”
Both Leonard and Sir Ronald stared at the loaf for a moment. Then Leonard’s stomach rumbled.
“Thank you for your kindness,” said Sir Ronald, shooting Leonard a pointed glance before accepting the loaf of bread.
The bread was fresh, and Leonard’s stomach rumbled again as he inhaled. Thanks to an involuntary lack of calories, both he and Sir Ronald were too thin. As landlord, his Master could have demanded those living on his land pay him a large percentage of their crops and livestock; it was his right to do so, but Sir Ronald was too kind to take food out of the mouths of his barely surviving peasants. Instead, he grew his own scrawny vegetables, raised his own scrawny geese, and every now and then, humbly accepted a warm loaf of bread.
Sir Ronald bowed to Widow Toe then he and Leonard started on their way toward the knight’s partially built castle.
“Leonard, as soon as we get home, I want you to take a dinner invitation to Sir Francis,” said Sir Ronald, kicking at a stone and missing it. “Tomorrow night we feast!”
Sir Francis was another poor knight who lived on the other side of Medwishire, the Green Valley’s only village. Medwishire was located on the banks of the Stenc River, a foul-smelling stream that would make a person’s eyes water if they breathed in too deeply near its banks. Medwishire boasted a stone bridge, a small church with actual stained-glass windows, and a population of just fewer than two hundred souls.
Sir Francis was Sir Ronald’s best friend, and the two liked to invite each other over for feasts. Since Sir Ronald was poor, his feasts were simple dinners involving stale bread, cheap wine, and a scrawny goose—definitely not the kind of feasts shared by the well-fed Knights of the Round Table. Sir Francis kept a nice vegetable garden so his dinners, although a little bit on the green side, were more “filling.”
Leonard and Sir Ronald walked through the Green Valley for the rest of the morning and, slightly after midday, crested a small hill and paused. Just ahead stood Sir Ronald’s half-castle. It was not much to look at, basically a half-built gate in the middle of a half-built wall surrounding a half-built hall and half-built tower. Large piles of stone and aging cut timbers lay scattered about, giving the place the overall appearance it had been half-destroyed by some half-crazy barbarian horde. It hadn’t, but that’s what it looked like due to Sir Ronald’s lack of anything resembling a steady income.
Sir Ronald often vowed he would one day finish the structure, but since he’d been saying that for a while Leonard didn’t get the feeling it would happen anytime soon.
Despite all its half-built imperfections, Leonard couldn’t help but smile when he first caught sight of the half-castle. None of the mess mattered. This was the place where he felt safe, where he took care of Sir Ronald, and where his heart was. Leonard loved the half-castle.
“We’re home, Sir,” said Leonard.
“Indeed we are, Leonard. Indeed we are.”
A few moments later, they reached the castle gate where Sir Ronald said something that almost made Leonard’s heart stop. “Oh, watch out for the dragon.”
“Dragon?” said Leonard, wheeling around. “Are you joking, Sir?”
“No, I’m not. A morose dragon has taken up residence under the bridge in Medwishire. Didn’t I tell you this already?”
“No, Sir, you did not.”
“Oh. There’s a dragon, and the Round Table knights haven’t had a chance to clear it out yet,” said Sir Ronald. “So, be careful on your way to Sir Francis’s estate.”
Recently, the Knights of the Round Table had issued an order declaring only they could do the bravest of deeds. This meant all the rest of the knights could only do unchallenging brave things that wouldn’t get them into trouble. Things like chasing crows out of gardens.
Truth be told, this new rule had probably saved Sir Ronald’s life by keeping him out of dangerous situations. As kind and good as he was, Sir Ronald was also a clumsy knight and not a good fighter. Sir Ronald would thrust when he should parry (terms having something to do with sword fighting), back up when he should charge (terms having something to do with horsemanship), and poke when he should pinch (terms having something to do with fighting hand to hand). His jousting was awful and his helmet so big it would sometimes get completely twisted around on his head. Most of the other knights in the kingdom laughed at him behind his back and called him “Sir Ronald the Mediocre.” But an order from the Knights of the Round Table was as good as law, so, these days, Sir Ronald rescued cats from trees and fought with crows.
“The Miller’s wife said the great beast just lies there and sighs all day, but she and the rest of the villagers run across the bridge as fast as they can anyway, just to be on the safe side,” said Sir Ronald. “You’ll be fine as long as you remember to be careful and don’t go doing something thick-headed like talking to it. Now be brave and run along.”
Leonard shuffled away from the castle gate toward Medwishire and got more worried with every step. He worried past the blacksmith’s shop where the blacksmith was talking about the dragon under the bridge. He worried past the butcher who was talking about the dragon under the bridge. He worried past the baker, and the candlestick maker. They were talking about the dragon under the bridge, but at this point Leonard didn’t care. A dragon waited up ahead, and he was walking toward it—on purpose! Leonard worried all the way up to the Medwishire Bridge. Amazingly, once he got there, he found he wasn’t worried anymore.
He was terrified.
Chapter Two
That Big Thing Under
the Bridge
A s Leonard walked through Medwishire, he was surprised to discover it was still standing. You’d think with a dragon in the neighborhood, this town would be in ruins, he thought.
But everything was as it should be. Clusters of little white houses with thatched roofs still lined the main street, neither crushed nor burned. The central marketplace, with noisy peasants selling their wares, was untouched. A dappled mare grazed on the village green while her colt bucked and kicked just for the fun of it. The presence of uneaten livestock alone made Leonard start to doubt there was a dragon around. Maybe Sir Ronald had gotten the story wrong. Maybe the dragon was in a different town. Maybe he should go ahead and do something stupid just to see if there really was a dragon down there.
“Hullo?” said Leonard, approaching Medwishire’s large stone bridge. All Leonard heard in reply was the smelly water of the Stenc River gurgling below him. “Hullo?”
“Hullo yourself,” said a big, deep voice from under the bridge.
Leonard jumped back, his eyes wide with fear. Sir Ronald was right, there was a dragon down there. He stood frozen for a moment, unsure of what to do. “Well, I guess I’ll start running across the bridge now.”
“Go ahead. See if I care,” said the big deep voice.
Again, Leonard didn’t quite know how to react, so he stood in place and fidgeted. Something was wrong.
“Well? I don’t hear the clop-clop-clop of a terrified human running across,” said the big deep voice. “What are you waiting for?”
Leonard edged a little closer to the bridge and tried to peek underneath. “Are you the dragon everyone’s talking about?” said Leonard, immediately feeling stupid for asking such a silly question because, after all, who else would it be?
“Yes, who else would it be?”
“Well, then, is this some sort of trick? Will you try to catch and eat me when I start running across the bridge?” asked Leonard.
“Ordinarily, yes, I would swoop up and gobble you down before you had a chance to figure out what was going on. But I will not do that today. Go ahead and cross,” said the dragon.
Leonard wasn’t buying this. After all, it was just the sort of thing a crafty dragon would come up with to trick people. “Why not today?”
“Because today, I am tired of being a dragon and, as a matter of fact, I plan on being tired of being a dragon tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow, and all the days after tomorrow until the Knights of the Round Table come to kill me. So, run back and forth in a panic as often as you wish. I just don’t care.”
Once again, Leonard didn’t quite know what to do. Any other person would’ve just shrugged his shoulders and run across the bridge, but there was something about this that just wasn’t adding up. Leonard hated it when things didn’t add up.
“You’re waiting for them to come and kill you?” asked Leonard. “But that doesn’t make any sense.”
“I don’t care if it doesn’t make any sense to you. It makes sense to me, and that’s what matters. Now go on and leave me alone.”
The “too curious for his own good” part of Leonard’s brain couldn’t let that one go by. “Excuse me, Master Dragon,” said Leonard. “Well, sir, and I don’t mean to pry, but would you mind telling me why you want them to kill you?”
After a long pause, the dragon spoke again. “Come closer, young man, so I might look at you.”
Despite being so nervous his legs felt weak, Leonard edged a few feet closer to the bridge.
“Closer, now. I won’t bite. You have my promise, and a dragon never breaks his promise.”
Leonard looked over the bridge wall. What he saw amazed him, even though he already knew he was going to see it. Looking back up at him was a pair of large, red, and incredibly sad dragon eyes. They were attached to an exceptionally large dragon head with large smoky nostrils attached to a large dragon body covered with large and thick scales. Finally, the dragon had a large tail wiggling in the river like a large snake.
