Dragons are a Girls Best Friend

Chapter 3

The next morning at about 8am

I pushed my hair behind my ears and strode up to the stable doors. Jeez this is going to be embarrassing. Summoning up every bit of courage I could, I knocked. The young stable boy from last night opened the door. His eyes widened at the sight of me and, was that a slight blush? Oh here we go. Just what I need. Some boy having a crush on me from the first time he sees me. I groan inwardly. If Asta gets wind of this, she'll never let me hear the end of it. "Are you here for the opening or...?". The stable boy's words brought me back to the present. "Ah yes. Yes that is exactly what I'm here for. The new job opening. And not because I want to rescue the dragons at all" I mumbled the last part through my teeth. "What was that?" He turned back to look at me, eyebrows raised. "Nothing!" I said rather too quickly. "So how does this work, do I need to sign anything, do anything or...?"

"You're hired" He said plainly. What! Just like that? Ok this is weird. Where's the catch? The Stable boy grabbed all his stuff and walked past me out the door. "Just do whatever he tells you to do. Bye. See ya, wouldn't want to be ya. Literally". And with that he slammed the door behind him and left. Leaving me standing awkwardly alone. A burly haired man stuck his head around the corner to see what all that loud banging was about. Seeing me he smiled. And when he did, I noticed he had no teeth. And as such, when he spoke, it came out as a lisp. "Wells wells. He finally flews se coop. I guess yous the replacement now eh?" He inched forwards to get a better look at me. I inched backwards to get away from him. You can't blame me though. He smelt like he had rolled in Yak dung. Disgusting! "Right lassie. What's ye name?" I gulped and tried not to gag as he spoke. His foul stenching breath smacking me in the face. "My name's Eydis sir"

"Eydis. What a lovely name that be. Ways better than that young lad Tori". So that's what the stable boy's name was. Tori. Well regardless of what this big chump says, I kinda like his name. Tori. I felt my cheeks burn. I shook my head angrily. No, no! I do not like him. He ditched me. Stop it you! "Well I'ms sure yes be wanting to know my name. It be Harold. Fine names I know. Please keep yes breath in. I knows it be se best name in se Archipelago". Ah no. Definitely not. Like; Harold, he's got to be kidding! I rolled my eyes. What have I gotten into? Asta is definitely in for it now! Harold, much to my disgust, grabbed my hands and led me on a tour of the stable. Most of it was boring stuff like, "Here se tools are kept" and, "That's where we keep se saddles". But once we moved onto the actual part where all the dragons were kept, things got a lot more interesting and worse. The interesting part was seeing all the different dragons with some I recognised like a Hobblegrunt, the Deadly Nadder from last night, a Windgnasher and some others I didn't recognise. The worse part of all this was quite simple. It was obvious that these magnificent creatures were being mistreated and not fed enough. Most looked broken and helpless. Even if I could set them free, I'm not sure they'll even listen to me and leave this horrid place. My eyes looked over every pen with every dragon in it until I saw this one pen away from the others with a young adolescent Hobblegrunt lying down inside. As if sensing me staring at it, the dragon raised its head and its eyes stared directly into my soul. I was curious and in awe at the same time. This dragon. There's something about it that- "Alright then lassie. I'll leave ye to yous work. Just look after all the dragons here and ye's can have a bed and a nice hot meal in return". Harold turned and left. Leaving me alone in the stable full of dragons.