The Red Pearls - Part 4/4

Ibn Rajab stood in the night alone, holding a cloth bag containing twenty-five glowing pearls and gloating at his success. The pearls were his. And rightfully so, for he had bought them, hadn’t he? That baron, even if his story was true, had no right to these comely pearls.

Ibn Rajab looked towards the stygian firmament and was surprised to descry a strange green bird flying towards him. It came closer and closer. It was, now he came to think of it, too ponderous for a bird and it had no beak and was covered in scales and spikes.

With a horrible realization he understood that this was the fabled dragon. Now he stood, paralyzed with terror as it came closer and closer. Then he sighed with relief as it flew past. It was not without purpose that the dragon had descended, however. Looking after it, he saw a bulging bag dangling from a long black talon.

Suddenly he felt angry. He had bought those pearls and now the dragon had embezzled them. He looked around; a man was closing a stable door. Without hesitation, he ran towards the man, shoved him aside, and rushed into the stable. Therein was a glossy, black horse. Ibn Rajab did not have any knowledge of riding, but he thought he did so he leapt on the horse, pulled its mane, and kicked its front legs. The horse reared up and Ibn Rajab slid off landing on the hard floor. Then the man entered holding a stick in preparation to beat him. Ibn Rajab picked himself up, pushed past the man and rushed out the door.

He could still see the dragon in the distance, so he began to give chase. The dragon was awfully slow due to its tremendous bulk. In addition to that, it looked fatigued. Ibn Rajab passed houses, shops, inns and finally reached the gates of the town. Two hapless guards were heaving at them, endeavouring to shut them. They were having extraordinarily little success.

“Hail friend,” called one of them, “would you mind…”

“Out of the way!” snapped Ibn Rajab and he sped past.

Now he began running in earnest. Ahead, an alp loomed. The dragon was flying towards it. Then it vanished into a cave. Ibn Rajab, after many hours, many stops, and many wishes for water finally reached the foot. Then began the long, arduous travail up the steep incline.

He investigated the first cave he reached and found it was empty. The next cave contained some invisible atoms. The next five were the same. He observed a phosphorescent golden light emerging from the eighth cave. He approached with caution and peeked around the side of the cave. The cave was tall and very wide. There was a large white ball of celestial light in the centre of the ceiling (he later discovered it was made from something called “majick”). There were piles of golden trappings: doubloons, armour, helms, shields, swords, coins, daggers, crowns, sceptres, rings, model animals and people, statues, spears, lances, helmets, cups, goblets, chalices, vessels, breastplates, and rolls and rolls of golden cloth. There was a clearing in all that glittering, shimmering, glimmering gold and in it was the green thief and an old man. On the floor near entrance was the brown cloth bag containing the pearls.

Ibn Rajab crept forward very stealthily and slowly picked the bag up; then started to back quickly out of the cave. Then the pearls clinked together. The dragon looked up. Then the old man looked up as well.

“Ah,” said the old man, “I see you’ve got my pearls. Please return them.”

Ibn Rajab was about to say no, but the dragon growled so he thought better of it. He dropped the bag and hurried out of the cave. Then was the descent and the walk back to the town and then the lengthy vigil at the gates until morning and finally the long wait for the two guards to open them. Then back to his house and then to bed.