A Slayer's Debt

Beginnings

The lake had frozen over. Snow was falling softly on the twilight landscape around Alger, the tiny spikes of grass almost fully submerged by the silver carpet. The trees were still and dead and no birds could be heard, let alone dragons. This was a dismal time for him.

A flock of a dozen Silver Tails flew high above the tree line near Alger. No bigger than geese but, in numbers, they could roast a man in seconds. They took no notice as they passed. Some dragons migrated south like the Silver Tails. Some would dig holes in the ground and hibernate with common beasts. But the big ones with names like 'Bjarke the Colossal' or 'Colborn the Torch', the legendary beasts that live for thousands of years, just back away into their mountain caves and wait. 'Alger the Swift' was a Dragon slayer. He belonged to a collection of legendary warriors, funded by the crown. They protected villages and purged treacherous roads of the savage beasts that roamed the skies. Alger had received his name for being extremely agile in combat because of his light armour and skills with a bow.

Alger hated the winter; there were never any forts to guard or maidens to rescue. He would spend three full months hunting deer and drinking ale in the Wolf's Head, a tavern where Dragon Slayers and other knights of the realm congregated and told tales of daring deeds and drank nights away. This year was unlikely to be an exception.

Turning from the lake to face the windy path through the forest, Alger pictured a warm steak and flagon of ale and decided to take a short detour on his way home. In his new found anticipation he mounted his horse, Erica, and began to make his way up the path. 

The sky darkening with every tree he passed. His tunic had begun to dampen from the falling snow and his long, torn cloak over his back, thrashed and swirled as Erica galloped. He had fashioned a single spaulder for his left shoulder from the skull of a dragon the size of a dog. He had a sword at his side and a long bow slung over his back made from the rib bone of an enormous dragon that took ten men to subdue. It had been passed down each generation from his great, great, grandfather. To this day the bow felt warm to the touch.

Around his neck hung an old dragons tooth given to him by his father before he died, he was told to keep it safe until the time came and he would know what to do with it when it did. It was not a very big tooth, only two inches long and thin with a serrated  back edge but it was covered in markings like runes and seemed to glow slightly in the deepest caves. 

Alger often reminisced about when he was training with his father. They would go to a clearing in the forest and fight for hours on end.He always remembered the amazing feeling of the wind in his face as he rode between the trees or caught a bigger fish than his father from the lake.

No two lessons were ever the same. But now he only learned from deep gashes and burns.