Nazli the Dragon

A long time ago, when the world was full of princes and princesses, there lived dragons.

One of these, Nazli, was the most beautiful and terrifying dragon of all. With her purple, crimson and gold scales and enormous wingspan, she was a truly magnificent sight. Her home was a huge cave high up in the craggy mountains. Here she kept her vast treasures and looked after her baby dragons until they were big enough to take care of themselves.

The kingdom over which Nazli flew was ruled by a brave and kindly prince, Prince Ahau, and over the course of many years it had been settled by farmers and artisans who led very happy and contented lives.

However, as dragons do, Nazli protected her territory and treasure fiercely. She would often fly through the air scaring off any other dragon that came near her lair. This also scared the people of this peaceful and rustic kingdom. And a good thing too. Because dragons get VERY hungry. Nazli would often swoop down over the fields and pick up a sheep or a cow for her supper. This upset the people even more than her flying scared them. For how were they to survive if the dragon ate all of their animals?

Prince Ahau decided that something had to be done about the dragon. He gathered thirty of his finest hunters and soldiers and led an expedition up into the mountains to find the dragon’s home and kill her.

Off the dragon hunting party went, led by their seemingly fearless leader. They had donkeys to carry their equipment and food, some sheep and pigs to eat and a few cows to supply them with milk.

Far and wide the men searched for Nazli. They looked in every cave, grotto and crevice they saw as they trekked up the steep and precarious mountain path.

After a while they came to a rocky chamber, which they decided was big and clean enough for them to live in while they continued to hunt the dragon. They needed to make a camp because the path was becoming far too steep and narrow for them to continue safely with the donkeys, sheep, cows and pigs that made up their entourage.

They kept the animals outside and one day, when they went off to track Nazli, she swooped down and ate one of their sheep. Imagine how mystified they were when they arrived back at their cave and thought that one of their sheep had escaped!

As well as trying to hide from the men that were hunting her, and playing games with them by eating their animals, our dragon, Nazli, had another problem. As I mentioned earlier, dragons are fiercely protective of their homes and the land that surrounds it. Nazli not only had men hunting her, but there were other dragons trying to take over her hunting grounds and home. Almost daily there would be a noisy and terrifying duel in the air between our beautiful dragon and one of her cousins. And some days the battles were not with her, but over her.

She was so beautiful that many of the male dragons were in love with her and wanted her for their wife. But first they had to fight and win. They then had to impress her with gifts. Nazli’s treasures were vast. Mounds of gold, jewels tumbling from all corners of her cave. These too she guarded jealously, for any dragon that defeated her in battle could claim them.
Eventually Nazli grew weary of all of this fighting; and she flew to her refuge, sealed it up so that no person or dragon could get in and fell asleep for a long, long time.

Unaware that Nazli had wearied of her life, the hunting party continued to search. Soon they noticed that the skies were peaceful and that the dragon’s shadow did not pass over them any more. It was not long after this that they came to some huge boulders sealing a cave. The rocks were so large that no matter how they tried, they could not move them, however they could hear and smell the snoring dragon within her den, so they posted guards outside the cave, replaced every 20 days by volunteers.

The prince himself stood on the first watch, and every 260 days thereafter he took his turn until his sons were old enough to take over. However it did not take many generations before the fear of the dragon had waned and believing that she had died in her lair, after failing to move the boulders and gain her treasures, they stopped guarding the cave, and the secret of its location was lost.

When Nazli woke up many years had passed. In fact, it was not so very long ago from today that she awoke. She stretched, yawned and realised that she was VERY hungry. She didn’t know how long she had been asleep – it had been several centuries since she last flew - and woke up in our time.

Nazli decided to stretch her wings and find herself a nice fat juicy cow to eat for breakfast. With a thundering clatter that sounded like a landslide, she moved aside the boulders and rubble with which she had sealed her cave and flew out into a beautiful spring morning.

As Nazli flew, she heard a roaring sound. Recognising it as being similar to the call of a dragon who was challenging her to a fight, she turned. In mid-air she stopped for a moment and blinked. Coming towards her was a shining silver dragon like no other dragon she had ever seen! The sun was glinting off its shiny back. It flew towards her faster than any dragon she had ever seen before. She let out a huge roar and flew towards it, ready to fight. She breathed fire at it, but still it came careening towards her.

She decided to trick it. Flew towards it, darted beneath it and came up behind it. Imagine her surprise when she saw flames coming from behind its wings rather than from where she assumed its mouth was! Imagine the surprise of the people on the airplane flying over a remote mountain range when they saw a dragon fly past; and imagine their terror when they realised the dragon was attacking their plane!

The air traffic controllers thought the pilot had gone mad when he screamed out for help because a dragon was attacking his plane. They thought he was talking in code, so they called the air force, which sent their top pilots out in fast jet planes When they reached the airplane, they too started babbling about dragons.

When Nazli saw the two smaller planes (which she thought were also strange dragons), she decided to return to the safety of her cave. The pilots followed at a safe distance and found the location of her lair.

Several of the passengers had taken photos of the encounter between the dragon and the air force/planes. Soon people all over the world were talking about her, because until now, most people had never believed that dragons were real. Scientists and politicians from all over the world met to decide what to do about what they saw as a new enemy.

Eventually they decided it was best to just leave her alone and hope that she would leave them alone. The only thing that disturbed Nazli now was the silvery dragon (that would not fight her), which brought her some sheep and cows to eat, so that she would leave the people and their farms alone.

The area where Nazli’s cave was had long been popular with walkers and picnickers and so it remained for the more adventurous who hoped to catch a glimpse of her flying high up, glorious against the bright blue sky. One family had been visiting since before their children were born. This family had lived in the area for a long time, and had they bothered to trace their family history, would have discovered that it led all the way back to Prince Ahau, although they had long since ceased to be rulers as the kingdom was now just one small part of a much larger country.

On this day, Janine was chasing her brother, Toby, running ahead of their parents – further perhaps than they should - when, ahead of them, they saw the open mouth of a cave, with a pile of boulders and rubble heaved to one side. They stopped suddenly, silently, too scared to move.

Staring at each other, on the edge of their vision they saw a movement from inside the cave and emerging slowly, was the dragon! Too scared even too scream, they stood, as still as rocks, as Nazli’s head moved closer and closer to them. Lowering it, she sniffed at them, and rubbed her head against their fragile bodies, recognising their innocence. As she touched them, inside their heads the children heard a mellow and beautiful voice telling them not to be scared, she meant them no harm and would they like to go for a ride on her back.

By now the children were so scared they could not even think. So they just nodded and as she stretched out a huge clawed leg for them, they obediently climbed up and on to her back, clinging to each other.

The dragon stretched out her crimson and purple wings and with two strong beats, they were in the air! The children forgot their fear in the exhilaration of the flight and the wonder of hearing the dragon’s voice inside their heads.

When they eventually landed, the children’s parents ran over and scooped them up with joy, for when they had seen the children on the dragon’s back they feared they had lost their children forever. But Janine and Toby could not stop talking about how amazing it was, to have flown on the back of a dragon. Our dragon was happy too, for although she did not know any other dragons, she had made her first contact with people and had made friends that she would keep for a long, long time.