The Sword of St. George

By Jim Cunningham

Fred watched the creature as it lumbered towards him. A green, monstrous two tons of fire-breathing, fanged destruction descended upon him. He did not move. His eyes never left the dragon. He waited. He watched. He gripped the handle of his sword more tightly in his right hand. He needed to time his stroke. He must be sure the dragons vulnerable unarmoured belly was exposed to his blade. He waited for the monster to take off. He counted the seconds in his head; one, two, three. The giant claws pushed the razor sharp talons into the air and raging and thrashing, the beast hurtled towards the solitary figure of the boy.
Fred acted instinctively. There was no time to do otherwise. He dropped onto his knees, drawing the monster towards him, almost inviting attack. The dragon raised its head and, as it did so, its wings spread open in a gesture of triumph. The giant jaws opened and the blazing sheet of flame shot forth towards the small figure.
As the deadly stream left the dragons jaws, Fred rolled onto his left side, feeling the searing heat as it almost singed his hair. In one movement, he regained his feet, stood up straight and thrust upwards with the weapon in his right hand. Now, dragons are impervious to simple steel blades. A normal sword will not penetrate a dragons hide, even its unarmoured skin will not be pierced by a mere mortals sword. But the sword that was in Freds hand was no ordinary blade. It was a magic sword which he had earned as a result of many trials and tests.
He felt the magic metal push upwards through the creatures hide, felt it as it pushed through the tough flesh and into the dragons evil heart. The monster screamed, a high pitched wail which made the boy wince. Yet, he knew he must hold onto the sword, to keep on thrusting it into the dragons innards.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris UK
• Release date: Mar 14, 2013
• ISBN: 9781483605289

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Copyright © 2013 by Jim Cunningham.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Rev. date: 03/12/2013

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Contents

Prologue

PART ONE

George

Chapter 1   George

Chapter 2   The Wizard

Chapter 3   Three Dragons

Chaper 4    Enter Old Sage

Chapter 5   The Plains Of Death

Chapter 6   The Dwarf

Chapter 7   The Cave Of Shadows

Chapter 8   The Castle Of Darkness

Chapter 9   Return

Middle-Ogue

PART TWO

The Wizard’s Watch

Back To School

Old Sage Again

Night Visitor

The Sea

Camp Of Rebels

Imprisoned

The Horsemen

In The Giant’s Den

Attack

The End Of An Adventure

Home Again

Old Sage Alone

Epilogue

PROLOGUE

Fred watched the creature as it lumbered towards him. A green, monstrous two tons of fire-breathing, fanged destruction descended upon him. He did not move. His eyes never left the dragon. He waited. He watched. He gripped the handle of his sword more tightly in his right hand. He needed to time his stroke. He must be sure the dragon’s vulnerable unarmoured belly was exposed to his blade. He waited for the monster to take off. He counted the seconds in his head; one, two, three. The giant claws pushed the razor sharp talons into the air and raging and thrashing, the beast hurtled towards the solitary figure of the boy.

Fred acted instinctively. There was no time to do otherwise. He dropped onto his knees, drawing the monster towards him, almost inviting attack. The dragon raised its head and, as it did so, its wings spread open in a gesture of triumph. The giant jaws opened and the blazing sheet of flame shot forth towards the small figure.

As the deadly stream left the dragon’s jaws, Fred rolled onto his left side, feeling the searing heat as it almost singed his hair. In one movement, he regained his feet, stood up straight and thrust upwards with the weapon in his right hand. Now, dragons are impervious to simple steel blades. A normal sword will not penetrate a dragon’s hide, even its unarmoured skin will not be pierced by a mere mortal’s sword. But the sword that was in Fred’s hand was no ordinary blade. It was a magic sword which he had earned as a result of many trials and tests.

He felt the magic metal push upwards through the creature’s hide, felt it as it pushed through the tough flesh and into the dragon’s evil heart. The monster screamed, a high pitched wail which made the boy wince. Yet, he knew he must hold onto the sword, to keep on thrusting it into the dragon’s innards.

Suddenly, the creature broke free from the boy’s sword. It tried to fly, but failed. It tried to stand up but merely shuddered into a green smouldering heap. Fred approached the dead dragon carefully, sword poised in case his foe was not yet crushed. Warily, he poked the smoking form with his magic sword.

‘I did it,’ he said excitedly. ‘I did it. Granddad! I killed the dragon.’

Granddad George was engrossed in his crossword. 3 across was proving difficult while 5 down, M-X-M-T-R, was virtually impossible.

I don’t know, he thought, are clues getting more difficult or is it me getting too old?

‘Granddad,’ Fred raised his voice slightly. ‘Are you okay?’ The boy sounded concerned. George was stirred from his daydream.

‘What! Oh, sorry, Fred. I’m sorry. I got lost in my crossword. What were you saying?’

‘A dragon. I got a dragon!’ Fred said proudly.

‘That’s good, Fred. Very good. How many points do you get for a dragon?’

‘No, no, Granddad, you don’t understand. To kill a dragon is the best you can do. It’s, like, the top. If you’ve killed a dragon, you’ve, like, won the Game. You’ve beaten it.’

The man smiled. The boy’s enthusiasm and zest for living reminded him of something he had mislaid somewhere along the path of life. For, despite the technological changes and the opulence of the present compared to his own childhood, twelve year olds today were basically the same mix of hopes and fears as they had been fifty years earlier. They didn’t know more, they knew different.

‘Do you fancy trying it?’ the boy said, offering the control unit to his ageing relative.

‘No thanks. Do you remember last time I tried to master it? The car racing game?’

‘Car Auto Smash Super 10,’ Fred reminded him. ‘I remember. You crashed the car fifteen times.’

‘At least,’ his grandfather said. ‘. . . and that was just in the first hundred yards… before I gave up.’

‘But this is different,’ the boy said. ‘This is about fighting evil things—dragons and trolls and suchlike. You’d love it.’

His grandfather shook his bald head. ‘No thanks, Fred. Some other time, eh?’

There was a ring at the house door. ‘I’ll get it,’ Fred said, jumping up and leaving the room. He came back in seconds later with another boy. This one had blonde hair and was wearing a T shirt which read ‘Keep Cool and Don’t Panic.’

‘Granddad George. This is my friend Jerry. Can I go and play football over at the green?’

‘What does your mother say?’ Granddads soon learn that when dealing with grandkids that it is better, where possible, to invoke the doctrine of the parental imperative.

‘Mum says it’s okay. Besides we’ll only be half an hour.’ The boy’s eyes radiated sincerity. At that moment, he could have laid claim to the world high jump record and George would have accepted it as Gospel.

‘What does your mum say?’ He transferred his attention to the blonde boy.

‘‘S fine, Fred’s granddad.’ He smiled. ‘Honest. Cross my heart.’ This lad was not quite as serious as his grandson but, even so, George had no doubt he was being truthful.

‘Okay. Fine. Off you go. But, mind, half an hour. 45 minutes max.’

‘See you, Granddad,’ his grandson said as the boys left the room. He heard the front door close and walked over to the window to watch the pair as they walked off in the direction of the field.

He looked up at the blue sky with the fluffy cotton wool balls floating idly across it. It was a day just like this, all those years ago, he thought, halfway through the summer holidays.

He shook his head and returned to the couch and the crossword, particularly 5 down, M-X-M-T-R. He paused, put his pen in his mouth and looked up at the ceiling. It can’t be, he thought.

PART ONE

George

CHAPTER 1

George

George was bored, very bored. The summer holidays were two weeks old and already he was sick of the sight of his mates; sick of the park and football; sick of the local pool with its blue water that tasted awful and stung your eyes; sick of watching rubbish TV for hours on end; in fact sick of everything. He was indeed very bored.

That year there was no family holiday to look forward to either. He’d never imagined that he would miss Mam’s bad temper as she tried to cram the cases as full as possible with loads of clothes which they ended up never wearing, or that he’d miss Dad sweating and swearing away as he fiddled inside the bonnet, getting the car ready for the trip to the seaside. But he did miss them, he even missed his sister Annie saying, ‘Oh, I’m so excited: I can’t wait for next weekend’ three hundred times a day until his head ached—because now there was nothing to break up the six week holiday from school. Dad said it was because of inflation, but George always thought inflation was about balloons and rubber dinghies which he quite liked, so he didn’t understand. Still, there was no point in asking Dad, he’d only say, ‘Ask your mother,’ or ‘not now son,’ and if you did as your mother she’d say, ‘Ask your dad,’ and if you went back to Dad, he’d be too busy. Dad was always willing to tell you but never seemed to have the time. So there was nothing for it but to hang around the town for another four weeks and hope for a miracle-like an invasion from outer space or finding a crocodile in the bath, to liven things up.

The town where George lived was pretty ordinary, there were houses and tall blocks of flats where the people lived, factories, offices and shops where they worked. Then there were schools—George went to Park Green Comprehensive which the kids called ‘The Prison’ because it felt like being released when the bell rang at 3.30 every day.

As well as these, there was a hospital—where George’s mother said he had been born, every time they walked past it. There was also a fire station, town hall and all sorts of places like these which towns have. Then there were Bingo Halls and pubs and clubs where George’s mam and dad went when they could get Auntie Maureen to babysit. Auntie Maureen was all right but she kept bringing these blokes around with her. They’d be all right too until mam and dad went out, then they’d say, ‘Well kids, eight o’clock, time for bed,’ and you’d have to go. But for the kids there was practically nothing—except the cinema which was known locally as the ‘flea pit’ and which showed X films most of the time and films you’d seen on the telly the rest; the park which was fine for little ones like Annie, who could go on the swings and such, but where you were liable to get chased by the Parkie if he caught you playing football. There was a youth club where you had to go to Sunday School to join. It was run by the Vicar and his wife, and you’d play ‘jolly’ games and all be ‘frightfully’ lucky to have a ‘great’ club like this one. George thought it was ‘jolly’ too—jolly boring.

In many ways George was a very ordinary boy. He wasn’t all that tall for his twelve years although he was taller than quite a few boys in his class. He wasn’t all that strong either, but he wasn’t scared to have a go if anybody tried to bully him. He wasn’t top of the class or great at sport. (Mr. Cropp, the Games Master, had written ‘George always does his best and has achieved an average level of performance’ on his last report). The only thing really different about George was that he dreamed different dreams. Not dreams like being a footballer becoming a hero by scoring the winning goal in the Cup Final, or being the first Englishman to land on Pluto like the other lads did. No, George dreamed about being a knight on a white horse with a sword and shield and riding off across the land in search of evil. In his dreams he’d fight dragons and evil knights with black moustaches and black horses. He’d chop the heads off the fire-breathing monsters and he’d make the black knights beg for mercy and make them promise never to be bad again. Then he’d ride back through the grateful countryside and the peasants in their smocks would touch their hats and cheer him as he rode by. The King and his beautiful daughter would welcome him to the Palace and he’d sit at the King’s right hand and be served the finest meals from a silver plate until the time came for him to ride forth once more to seek out evil. Sometimes he would think it was all real then his mam or dad or sometimes his teacher would say, ‘Stop dreaming George!’ and he’d be back in the ordinary world again—back in front of the telly or in the classroom. His mam worried about him, she said she told Mrs. Wilkins next door and Mrs. Wilkins said it was ‘just a phase, nothing to worry about, it’s just his age,’ like when her Jack (who was now seventeen and had a big noisy motorbike which woke everybody up at all hours of the night so they all said, ‘that Jack Wilkins’ and other much worse things) used to pick his nose and Mrs. Wilkins couldn’t stop him. She tried everything, even taking him to the doctors, but nothing worked. Then one day he just stopped. ‘You’ll see dear, it’s just a phase.’ George wanted to tell them sometimes that it wasn’t, that his dreams were very important, but he knew they wouldn’t understand and they’d shake their heads and laugh or something like that, so he just kept his secrets safe in his head and never told anybody his dreams, not even Jeremy Bragg, his best friend.

It had all started when he was in the little school. When he was in Miss Peabody’s class he won an attendance prize. Attendance was the one thing he was really good at. They’d given him this book with lots of coloured pictures in and big printing. He wasn’t much interested in books then, so he’d just put it in the cupboard by his bed. Then one night when it was pouring with rain outside and George couldn’t sleep, he’d put the light on and reached in the cupboard for the book. It was called ‘Saint George and the Dragon.’

As George read the story with