Short Story

Diary of a Jester

Day 1:
Well, ok, let’s start with the basics: My name is Calvin. I’m a jester and I’m that sort of guy who entertains the court with jokes or artistic things, like juggling. I think I have been doing a very good job so far. They laugh and have fun watching my skills, especially the beautiful princess, who seems to be very elated. And that’s why I can’t understand why they’ve given me a new assignment: I’m supposed to fight a dragon! Do you know why I chose the job of a jester? Because I’m a coward! I don’t want to be squeezed into the uncomfortable armor and ride on horse all day to get my butt all bruised. I’m not cut out for those manly jobs. I seriously need to talk to the king again. Maybe the princess can help me and convince him that I’m not in dragon-fighting shape.

Day 2:
It was no use; I’ll have to go and fight the dragon. And the king made clear that I shouldn’t come back until the dragon is dead. He also explained that I’m the only one left that is young and strong enough to go on this quest. He mentioned something about all of his soldiers being gone to fight some kind of very important war, probably about some religious crap.

Day 3:
That was my first day on the road. Have I mentioned that I’ve never learned how to ride on a horse? I guess I’ll have to be a fast learner now because if I continue in walking, it’ll take a week until I get to the cave where the dragon lives. And I surely don’t want to be sitting in that saddle for a week; my privates already feel squashed. I’m sure I won’t sleep at all tonight; the ground is hard and damp. I can’t wait to get back to my comfortable, soft, warm bed in the palace!

Day 7:
Yes, I managed to get the horse into gallop and advanced quite a lot in the last few days. I am now in front of that alleged cave. I peaked in for a short second, but couldn’t see any dragon. I even called it names and insulted him, but it wouldn’t come out. How do you lure a dragon out of its cave? Does it even understand English?

Day 8:
Well, the dragon is dead. It was much easier than expected. Ok, here’s the whole story: This morning when I woke up, all my beer was gone. I had taken about 3 litres with me and wanted to keep it as my victory drink. I was very incensed that someone would steal beer from a poor jester on such a hard mission. However, I couldn’t do anything about it. So, I went into the cave to do my business: kill the big bad dragon. The cave was huge, probably about 25 m high and it had burn marks all over. When I was right before a curve, I heard loud, heavy footsteps echoing in the cave. And then I saw a 20 m high shadow while the dragon came at me. The shadow showed huge teeth and huge puffs of fire came out of its mouth. And suddenly it stood in front of me. I was…er…surprised: it was only 2 m tall, its color was more baby pink than fire red, and it had big blue eyes. Seriously, it looked kind of cute. And that was supposed to be the dangerous dragon that ate 20 villagers? But something seemed to be wrong with the dragon: it couldn’t stand still and when I walked backwards and lured it after me it was tumbling. Its eyes were rolling and weren’t able to focus. And when it breathed its little puffs of fire, I knew who had stolen my beer! So, I was to fight a little drunk dragon. Well, I know that this was going to be an easy fight. I drew my sword and ran towards the exit of the cave because although it was a tiny dragon, I didn’t feel like fighting in a closed space. When I exited the cave, I turned to my right to not fall of the cliff. But the dragon was so drunk that it stumbled over a fallen tree and fell off the cliff. I always thought that dragons could fly, but this one couldn’t. Or maybe the drunkenness impaired its flying abilities. However, it was lying in the canyon looking very dead. But to get proof that I killed the dragon I climbed down and pulled one of its biggest teeth. And then I went back on my horse and started on my way back to the castle.

Day 12:
I’m on my way back to the cave. “Why?”, you might ask. Well, when I was at the palace and proudly presented the dragon’s tooth, the king started to laugh hysterically and asked me where I had gotten the tiny tooth from. I told him about the small dragon I encountered and how bravely I killed it. After ten minutes of hilarious laughter the king was finally able to speak again and explained that this must have been the baby of the dragon because the dragon I was supposed to kill is 20 m tall and has reddish-black skin. So, I guess I have to prove my braveness once more. And this time I took 3 litres of strong liqueur: Let’s hope that mama dragon likes alcohol as much as her baby! Wish me luck!