Wanderin’ Willy: Part 4 One Adventure Ends

We come today to Part 4 of Wanderin’ Willy. It’s been a fun ride for me, seeing this little idea take off and lead to places and things unanticipated. Now, Willy’s adventure comes to fruition as all adventures must.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this small sojourn into my world of giant lizards, prospectors, the occasional Harriet maneuver. Feel free to leave me a comment. Let me know if you liked this story. Enjoy.

Wanderin’ Willy: Part 4

The creature’s brightly scaled head tipped to one side, as if considering its answer.

Having lived a moment longer, Willy said, “I don’t know why you are held here. You don’t belong here, do you?”

Again the creature tipped its head, now to the other side.

Willy was smart enough not to press his luck too far and didn’t advance. He took a good look at the animal’s head with its several horns, more like a cow’s sweeping backward. The muzzle was almost pointed near the nose but looked soft to the touch, scaled or not. In fact, the more he looked at it, the more its skin moved like that of a small rock lizard; more like supple skin than scales.

The eyes held intelligence, he decided, when he looked into them again. He hadn’t expected that. He wasn’t sure what he expected, but intelligence wasn’t it.

Visions of seeing the creature’s wing outstretched and moving in the air flashed through his mind. How such a large body would get into the air wasn’t something he could understand, he knew. He still had trouble accepting that a vulture could stay in the air.

He wondered though. Had this creature been brought here and chained? Had it been stranded here as a young animal and been trapped and then chained? And why chain it up, especially with gold?

Willy shook his head. The puzzle made no sense to him. He’d searched for gold all his life. He knew how soft it was for this kind of use. The creature should have been able to break its bonds without difficulty. It looked far stronger than soft gold links.

“They hold magic within them,” came a reverberating bass voice inside Willy’s mind.

He flung his head up, nearly cracking it on the rock behind him. The lizard’s head had extended on its long slender neck toward him. “I cannot break these chains. Only man can do that.”

For an instant, Willy was certain he’d gone insane. For that instant, he gloried in such insanity. When the instant passed, he recognized that the insanity was real and that the lizard could talk to him in his head.

He looked straight into the creature’s eyes. “You want me to free you.”

The statement was followed by a sigh of breath from a mouth full of razor-edged teeth. No “smile” followed. No thought. Only sighing breath.

The old prospector thought of Harriet, free to find her way back to civilization if he died on this adventure. He considered this poor creature, chained here for countless years, waiting for someone to come along and free it that it might return to its home. It had made no move to harm him in any way. It had talked to him in his mind. That was crazy but he could accept it. All sorts of crazy things happened in these mountains.

Decision made, Willy told the prisoner, “I will do my best to free you. I ask only that you allow me to keep my life if I succeed.”

Another sigh emerged and a mental “So be it.”

He took his pick from his belt and moved with slow, deliberate steps to one side so as to approach the chain on the right. “I will use my tool on the chain. You are safe from it.”

Another breath of air flowed over his body as that great golden head swiveled to watch his movements.

Willy set to with his pick after examining the chain for its flimsiest link. Four strikes of his pick weakened the link enough that his own weathered hands, lean though they were, could finished the job of pulling it apart. He dislodged the cuff that held the leg and tossed it to one side, out of his way. He put gentle fingers against the leg’s skin and massaged the scarred area to bring as much feeling back into it at possible. A lame lizard might be a nasty lizard, he figured.

When he finished with that, he patted the leg and moved around to the other side. The bulk of the creature’s body separated the two as it sat, balanced as it was on haunches and thick, long tail. He began working on the chain as quickly as possible, repeating the actions taken on the other leg.

At last he was satisfied that he’d done all he could to free the animal from its prison. He stood away from it and looked into its eyes again. “The chains are gone from your legs. Can you climb up and leave from the opening above us?”

The creature tipped its head to look above, shuffled its feet, and looked back at Willy. Soft murmurs flowed into his head. “In two risings of your sky light, I will have strength to leave. You will stay until I fly.”

The animal’s thoughts came as reassurance, though the last statement was more command than request. Willy thought he understood. The poor thing had been alone for a long time.

He spent the remaining time sleeping, talking to the giant lizard, and sharing his food and water, little though it was. The hours had taught him something about himself. He couldn’t leave an animal to suffer.

His soul could not rest until he knew this one was flying. And, he’d lost his desire for gold.

Willy looked at the discarded chains and cuffs and scowled. A precious ore had been tainted by evil. He would always see it that way now. He’d searched out his last treasure. His world was gone, had disappeared inside a cave with a creature that shouldn’t exist.

“What do I do now?” he asked the lizard.

A long, supple tail swept him closer. Eyes aflame caught his gaze. “You come with me to the distant home.”

The creature’s thought showed him a blurred blue range of mountains. He that this place was nowhere near the Superstitions.

“What’s your name?” Willy asked.

“Dragon.”

End of Wanderin’ Willy