Henry Cobble and the Prison of Gold

Something woke Henry up; he turned to the window, which was dimly lit by the far off street lights. By the light from the window he could see that Scarfee was also awake. His head was raised up from the bed, and he was alert. A gust of wind flew past the window and the old glass trembled. The old house creaked and the branches from the huge elm tree alongside the house scraped the house with an eerie sound. A shadow swooped past the window. Henry ducked down and pulled the covers over him and Scarfee. He didn’t want to hear or see anything more.

After a minute Scarfee began a low growl and began to struggle to get out from under the covers. Henry slowly pulled the cover off their heads. Was the room brighter? There was a light in the room—it was coming from around the closet door. Henry’s hair stood on end and he gave a croak and ducked his head under the covers again. Scarfee would have none of that and began to whine and bark and pull the covers off. As Henry grabbed the little dog the closet door began to open. Bright light flooded the room as the door swung open. Henry stared in horror as a little figure appeared in the doorway with one hand on the doorknob.

The bright light outlined the figure and made it hard to see. The figure stepped out of the doorway and turned sideways. The light hit him then and Henry could see the figure. It was a little man. As Henry’s eyes adjusted he could see the man was about three feet tall. He was dressed in green. It looked to Henry like he had short pants with soft leather buskins up to his knees and a long-sleeve jacket. On his head he had a pointed hat with the sides rolled up and a feather stuck in it. He had long pointed ears and a huge drooping nose.

The little man put his finger to his lips in a keep quiet gesture. He looked at Henry with a twinkle in his eye. He made a sweeping gesture with his hand. Flakes of shining stuff flew off of it. As he did so the little man spoke in a high-pitched voice, "Do not be afraid boy, your father said it is time for you to have some of your magic."

He then gave Henry a big wink and closed the door. The light went out. The shiny stuff in the air glowed and then went out. It was dark again. Through all this Scarfee was growling and barking.

As the dog settled down Henry heard a commotion downstairs, "Uh-oh," he said. He grabbed Scarfee’s mouth, too late.

His Aunt Abigail shouted up the stairwell, "Henry have you got that dog in your bed again? How many times do I have to tell you? Get him down here!"

He flipped the covers back and pointed towards the stairway. "You better get down there, Scarfee."

Scarfee was a little black and white longhaired dog of a mixed variety. He gave Henry a sad look and then jumped off the bed and bounded down the stairs.

"There you are, you little devil you," his aunt exclaimed in a loud voice.

The front door slammed as poor Scarfee was ejected into the cold outdoors. "You get back to sleep now, Henry," his aunt ordered. The downstairs light went off and the house became quiet again.

Henry carefully got out of bed and tiptoed to the closet. He carefully opened the door and fearfully peeked in. It was dark. He pulled the string to pull on the light and the light came on. Nothing—just his clothes and junk that he kept in the closet. There was no sign of the little man. Shaking his head Henry went back to bed.

With that the dragon roared in anger. Henry spoke more, "I will give you one chance. Give up now and forfeit all your hostages and loot. Behave yourself for the rest of your life and I will let you live."

The dragon roared, fear forgotten, "Give up—never again!" He raised his head and then lowered it and shot a tremendous jet of flame at Henry. The flames hit Henry’s magic bubble and deflected off of it. It was so hot that he could feel the rock heating up through his shoes. Blet and Cummodos were ignored by the dragon and huddled under their own little magic bubble.

Henry shot a super powerful bolt of magic energy at the dragon and it was absorbed by the amulet. The amulet glowed red hot and the dragon screamed in pain. It did not stop him, though. He flew off the rock and hovered over them with powerful beats of his wings. All the time he kept firing his flames.

Henry calmly walked over to his bike and picked up the Stinger. He acted calm but his feet were really hot and the rock surface was starting to smoke. Henry set the launcher on his shoulder and lined up the sights on the dragon’s head. He noticed that the dragon raised and lowered his head every time he fired the flame. There was a slight window when the dragon’s mouth was open just before he ejected the flame.

Henry paused and fired. The rocket blasted from the launcher and flew straight down the dragon’s throat and exploded right beside the dragon’s methane gas reservoir. The methane gas went up with the rocket. There was another flash of fear in the dragon’s eyes when the missile went down his throat. And then he blew up.

Once more Henry went hurtling through the air inside his magic bubble. This time he was ready and put down a magic cushion inside the bubble. As he flew through the air he noticed the bubble was covered with dragon blood and gore. It seemed like he flew forever but it was only mere seconds until he landed with a thump.

He put a cleaning spell on the bubble and all the gore fell off. Then he released the bubble and looked around. He was about one hundred yards from the site of the explosion. When the dragon blew the noise of the explosion echoed through the mountains. People and animals were startled. The seagulls flew into the air and flew in wild circles trying to find the dragon.

Henry walked over to ground zero. The ground for hundreds of yards around was littered with chunks of dragon flesh. He had only gone a few steps and Wender and Rufus were there. Even their fur had splatters of gore on it. "You did it, didn’t you, Master? I knew you would do it!"

Wender was so excited he was walking on his back legs and patting Henry on the back. Rufus was running in circles on all fours and sniffing everything like a dog would. Then he ran to Henry. "Where do you suppose the dragon’s treasure is?"

Henry laughed and shook his head. "Well, it would be in his lair, of course. Don’t you know any dragon lore?

"But forget that for now. Listen up, you two." He described the Crondite amulet to them. "I want you to look around and try to find it." And he wagged a finger in their faces. "I want you to bring it to me."

"Okay!"

"Sure, sure, Master," they both promised.

Before they left the crows fluttered down and landed. They were both happy. "You did it again, didn’t you, Boss," said Craw.