“There is a new dragon in the north, I have heard.”
The Village Elder plopped a thick spoonful of sour cream into Mikhail's bowl of borscht and gazed with pride at the grown knight he had raised these many years. As everyone knows, even a knight with a beautiful stallion and finely polished armor is only as noble as his quest. What a man is willing to work for, to fight for, shows the kind of man he chooses to be. And in three years of hunting dragons, rescuing damsels, and saving villages, Mikhail had always chosen noble quests.
“Oh?” Mikhail swallowed a spoonful of the steaming soup. “Dragons rarely come to our northern lands this time of year.” He knew a great deal about dragons, after all.
“Yet this one has,” the Elder replied. “Many have failed to track it. It has moved from village to village these past three weeks, hunting perhaps. Always hunting and never finding...always burning but never satisfied.”
“When was it last seen?” Mikhail asked.
“In the village of Novoselo, two days travel to the northwest.
“Then I must leave at once!” Mikhail declared. And so he did, that very evening. For all noble knights know that there is no better time to do good than the present.
Far, far into the deep forests of the north, Mikhail and Spirit galloped after the dragon's trail of charred towns and ruined orchards...on past frozen waterfalls, frost-bitten deserts, and snow-peaked volcanoes. At each village, Mikhail was greeted with tales of a great and terrible fire-breathing beast, black as smoke, as threatening as a storm cloud, that would sweep down in the darkest night to burn and destroy. But the noble knight and his white stallion had arrived too late! Always too late...
Oh, but Mikhail did plenty of good along the way, as good knights do. If we had the time, I could tell you of the many adventures which he had fighting bridge trolls, outwitting mountain giants, and defeating river witches. And whenever his heart grew heavy during his many adventures, Mikhail drew from his precious supply of ashrooms, the better to ward off the discouragement that often follows a determined doer of good.
And so it was, as he journeyed ever further north, now spurring Spirit through heavy snow drifts the color of the stallion's mane, that Mikhail neared the broad mountain valley of the Altai village.
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