The Episode of the Hallucinations of a Dragon

Her death wasn't in vain.

It wasn't. It wasn't. He grumbled, fiery smoke leaving his voice as he mumbles inanely. Her death wasn't...

His scaled body freezes as voices echo in the brush beside his cave. His breaths quicken as the rustling shushes. As the light fades into that dark, cold tunnel, he takes heavy steps with his tail dragging the dirt in the ground. It wasn't. It wasn't.

The light faded, deep and dark, until a glimmer of gold covered the walls in a heavenly light. Gemstones within the pile created kaleidoscopes on the walls. He chuckles softly as he crashes into the bed of wealth.

Sighing with a smile and closed eyes, "It wasn't in vain."

A sharp sound of falling metal whips his head to the cave entrance. There, in the light of the cave entrance: her scales fill the room like tidal waves. The luminous gold attempts to fill the cave, yet the darkness consumes all but the shadows of her golden eyes and wings. Sailors should have sung sea shanties of her splendid.

"But, why did you do it?" She asks in a peculiar monotone, voice thick as if she was drowning.

"What are you doing here?" His eyes shake at her sudden appearance. "You shouldn't be–"

"Why..." She shouts with sharp hiss as her voice echoes in the chasm. "Why did you do it?"

"I've done nothing." He hisses back like a snake. "You can leave me in my slumber; I have no ghosts to haunt me. It wasn't in vain."

"Cry that all you want." She scowls now stalking around him, coins clinking as she does. "You know the truth, cowardly dragon! Many will come for your gold, and they'll find a lowly snake speaking to himself, insanely, fending for his gold. They will call you a weasel for the rest of time."

"No!" He cries with cat slit eyes tearing with silver. "It wasn't my fault! It was yours! I had done everything right, I earned our wealth, yet you refused to accept it!"

Clink, clink, clink... A river of coins falls.

"Did you hear that?" He whispers, eyes darting away from her to search frantically through the golden mountains.

His friend scoffs, circling behind him. "And here you go running off again! Looking for excuses, distractions! Claiming anyone's fault but your own! Aren't you miserable? Aren't you angry with yourself?"

"You had to!" He growls, breath hot with fire. "You had to die! There was no choice!"

She only scowls before glancing to the side of the cave. Tears of gold stream down her face. "There were always other choices." Her wings begin to drip into the golden ground, sinking with the coins. She thrashes into the earth, crying with gold splashing his face, burning his scales.

"It wasn't in vain!" He wails, running to claw at his friend. "Please don't leave me again. It was for us!"

She stares at him helplessly with the liquid gold rushing to her head. Her eyes look at him sorrowfully as she sinks further and further into his talons.

"It wasn't–"

Sling!

His head topples into the gold, sliding across the floor where a little farmer girl stands, golden sword and book in hand. The girl wipes the dirt off her face, admiring the mountain of coins now laced with dragon's blood.

She completely shuts the book as the golden dragon finally melts into the earth, leaving the world with a gentle smile on her face.

"But it was."