Sir Reginald

Chapter1: One Night, Two Knights

The stale air permeated the tavern as Sir Reginald Macehammer of Lythgowen sat at his table. A hard stare to him, leering at the inn's residents. There were all sorts of decadents who tossed and meandered about like drunken elk. Most were young, would-be knights who were off to slay dragons.

Dragons, Reginald thought to himself. What did these petty, brazen, piss-drunk kids know of dragons? Sir Reginald had fought some dragons in his younger days—more than his fair share—and he felt he was fairly entitled to a large amount of them to begin with. First off, you don't go and get pissed before you approach one. They'll snap you up in their jaws, probably before you get off your horse. Secondly, you don't go rescuing damsels in distress with the smell of another damsel on you. That'll get you an unpleasant, one-way ride straight to the guillotine from her rich family. Finally, and this is the most important, you show respect when approaching a dragon. Chat him up a bit, maybe share a story or two of good memories. Sir Reginald always liked to share his stories of victorious fights with them. His thoughts wavered off to one young dragon he had faced down. The blue youngling had just wanted to talk about his parents and cookies. This made Reginald a bit frustrated, but he honored the blue princely dragon, and let him go on with his tales. It was a pity the maiden had to keep screaming, nearly ruining the whole experience. "Save me!" "Help me, he's a monster!" "Kill it already!" It took everything in Reginald not to kill her afterwards.

Taking a swig of ale, Reginald choked back the memory, returning his attention to the knights. They stumbled and boasted, filling the tavern with unpleasant noise. He smiled to himself, shaking his head at the knights' absurdity in their thick, steel-plated armor. They sounded like a cacophony of metal beasts. The only thing all that metal would be good for was getting flambéed in your underwear. Reginald knew what to wear when facing down a dragon. You wear mostly furs on your exposed bits of flesh; wolf hide or bear skin did the trick. A dragon's saliva was highly acidic and would melt right through armor in seconds. Fur hides, on the other hand, negated the reaction quite well. Only a skilled veteran knew any of this. It had something to do with dragons not being able to hurt innocent flora and fauna of the woods. That was why Sir Reginald wore mostly wolf skin in between some of his armor and some deer hide for chausses. The most he had on were his gauntlets made of chainmail and his steel chest plate. His back was mostly exposed, but he didn't mind; a dragon who gets behind you has you dead-to-rights anyhow, no matter what is covering your back. Even a magic sigil wouldn't keep your spine from getting ripped out of your body by the nefarious teeth of a dragon.

Slowly gazing at one really boisterous knight, Sir Reginald took another swig of ale and wiped his mouth, seeing the young, haughty knight coming his way. Letting out a sigh, Reginald knew what would come next. He had been approached by these prideful bucks on so many occasions, his twilight years shown on his face to would-be heroes. Reginald's hair was the color of purest snow, his cheeks littered with scars and abrasions from past fights, and his handlebar mustache curled near his cheeks, a clear sign of his youthful era long since past. He gallivanted it proudly, but that only encouraged brutish whelps, like the one approaching him, to tear down his hopes of killing a dragon. Little did they realize it took more than a big mouth and fancy armor to slay a dragon—or Sir Reginald Macehammer of Lythgowen.

The knight sat down across from Reginald, flipping his chair around to sit on it like some kind of female bear on estrus. Reginald casually looked away from the young knight, not wanting to give such a show of disrespect any attention. Reginald was surprised at how fast this tosser had infuriated him: hardly five seconds. It had to be some kind of a record.

This knight was small, raven-headed, and seem to not know the use for boiled-down crème because he had quite a collection of acne all along his face. An overbite accentuated his dumb look, accompanied by clumsiness in a heavy armor he had no idea how to wear. His eyes were full of inexperience. Not just manners and etiquette, but with dragons, battles, monsters, other knights, maidens—just about everything Reginald had faced down before.