Wicked Worm Chapter 01

A/N
In the Broadway musical "Wicked," we learned that the Wicked Witch of the West (from "The Wizard of Oz") wasn't really wicked, just misunderstood and persecuted. In this story, I will do something similar for another famous villain. This is based on the book "The Hobbit," not on the movies. Rated K-plus; the language is all K.

o

"Well, thief! I smell you and I feel your air. I hear your breath. Come along! Help yourself again, there is plenty and to spare!"

Bilbo was not the world's greatest expert in dragon lore, but he knew a trap when he saw one. "No, thank you, O Smaug the Tremendous," he answered politely. "I did not come for presents. I only wished to have a look at you and see if you were truly as great as tales say. I did not believe them."

"That is clever of you," the dragon replied. "I am sure I am portrayed either as the most vicious killer in Middle Earth, or as an insignificant son of a sand lizard, depending on who is telling the history. The story is determined as much by the storyteller as by the subject of the tale. Tell me: which of the two extremes were you expecting?"

"Oh, definitely the 'vicious killer,' although I mean no offense in saying so," Bilbo said. "They told me that you were a most specially greedy, strong, and wicked dragon."

"And do I disappoint you?" Smaug asked.

"Far from it! The songs and tales fall utterly short of the reality, O Smaug, the Chiefest and Greatest of Calamities," the hobbit replied.

"Flatterer," the dragon rumbled. "I have heard fairer words from fouler tongues, so I pay little heed to the words of dwarves, elves, and men. But you speak of calamities. I very much doubt that you know the meaning of the word."

"Oh, I've heard tales of your exploits at the expense of dwarves, elves, and men," Bilbo said airily. "As I said, I doubted those tales, but I shall never doubt them again."

"You have heard tales?" the dragon replied icily. "I mean no disrespect toward a guest in my home, even an uninvited guest who has already proven that he means to take things that do not belong to him, but it would be truer to say that you know nothing of calamities!"

"I will not argue the point," Bilbo replied. "I admit, I am a stranger to many of the affairs of this world, and there is much that I have not learned. What is it that you think I ought to know?" He hoped, from this line of conversation, that the dragon might say too much and reveal something that Bilbo and his friends might use against him. This, of course, was a foolish hope. Dragons, especially the old ones, are much too careful with their words to reveal anything more than they wish to reveal. It is far more likely that a person, in talking with a dragon, will say too much, either out of nervous fear or out of overconfidence; and Bilbo, remarkably enough, was feeling some of both.

The dragon shifted his bulk to face toward the general area where Bilbo stood unseen. "I suppose they told you," he began in a quieter voice, "that I appeared at this mountain like a whirlwind, falling on a peaceful people without warning and slaughtering them without mercy, and then greedily gathering all their treasure for my bed."

"Well, yes, that was the gist of what they said," Bilbo admitted.

"Of course they did," the dragon nodded. "As I said, the story is determined as much by the teller as by the subject. May I tell you what really happened on that awful night?"

"It would be impolite of me to refuse," the hobbit said. "As you say, I am a guest in your home, so I should remember my manners. But if the story is determined as much by the teller as by the subject, then how can I know that your version of the facts is better than the version that my friends told me?"

"You're a perceptive one," Smaug said. "That is unusual. Most thieves simply creep in, sieze the first thing that falls within their reach... and then die screaming as my fires reduce them to a pile of blackened ashes. I take little pleasure in that, but I am sworn to guard this pile of gold against any and all who would try to steal it."

"Against any and all?" Bilbo definitely did not like the sound of that.

"Yes, my hard-to-see companion, you have placed yourself under my vengeance as well. Normally, I would incinerate you where you stand, but because you seem more sociable than the average thief, because you returned to my cave without taking more treasure, and because you pique my curiosity by somehow remaining unseen, I will offer you one slim chance at life. Give back what you took, and you will live. But if I do not see my golden cup returned before the rising of the sun this morning, then you may be assured, I will hunt you down and burn you to a very small cinder. No thief has ever succeeded in taking away so much as a single silver coin of this hoard without paying for it with his life. It is nothing personal; you seem to be a pleasant soul, and you are better at conversation than anyone else I have met in these past hundred and fifty years. It pleases me to share pleasant words with someone who appreciates them, even though you have condemned yourself to a horrible death in the morning. So rest easy in the time that I have given you, and learn the true meaning of 'calamity' that your so-called friends will never tell you." The dragon curled up and made himself comfortable on his pile of gold.

"For uncounted years, dragonkind has lived and thrived in the northern wastes. The heat that you feel radiating from my body helps us stay alive there; it is our natural habitat. But because we are very few in number, and because the northern wastes are mostly flat ice, devoid of fixed landmarks, it becomes difficult for two dragons to locate each other on the rare occasions when we wish to do so. But when it is time for us to breed, then we must find each other, and we cannot waste time in doing it. So, in time long past, one of our ancestors flew south and found a mountain rising out of a plain, with no other mountains nearby. He found this mountain! It was a perfect landmark, easy to find and impossible to mistake for any other place. It became our trysting place and our nest. A dragon who was coming into season would fly there and wait for another dragon of the opposite sex. They would mate and remain there, waiting for the female to lay her egg. Then the male would provide food for her while she guarded their egg in the great cave in the middle of the mountain. When the egg hatched, they would take turns feeding the young dragon until it was old enough to climb to the peak of the mountain, jump into the sky, and follow its parents back to the northlands. This dance was repeated countless times through the years, usually spaced one or two centuries apart, all without incident."

"Do you mean to say that this mountain is claimed by the dragons?" Bilbo wondered. He knew that the beasts could be greedy for treasure, but to claim an entire mountain...?

"Yes, that is precisely what I mean to say," Smaug went on. "It was ours and no one else's, for no one else wanted it. Some one hundred and fifty years ago, I felt my own season beginning. So, like any other dragon, I flew south to our mountain. I made no secret of my arrival. Why should I? No one should be here, except, possibly, a female dragon awaiting a male like me. So I approached our mountain with confidence and hope... and then saw, with shock, that since the last dragon left here, it had become infested by dwarves!" The dragon lashed his tail with displeasure at the memory, sending a wave of golden coins rippling across the pile of treasure.

"Now, please understand – I am a reasonable dragon. I realized that the dwarves probably meant no harm in being here, and that they simply did not know that they were trespassing. There was no need for an overreaction on my part. But at the same time, I knew that I had to resolve this problem quickly. If a fertile female dragon arrived and found her future nest full of hundreds of aggressive bipeds, she would turn tail and leave, and I might never see her again. So I set a few trees afire to get the dwarves' attention, then landed near the entrance to the main cave so I could reason with them.

"Instead, they came boiling out of the cave, armed and armored for battle! I had never seen such an unprovoked attack. And they sang songs of death and dragon-slaying! There was one chant that they particularly liked to call to each other. How did it go? Oh, yes, I remember now:

Kill the dragon!
Smite him thus!
Keep the treasure
Just for us!

Smaug chuckled bitterly. " 'Smite him thus?' You must admit, that is a very elvish-sounding phrase coming from the mouths of dwarves! My mistake was in pointing this out to their king. I thought he would enjoy the irony, and this would help to defuse a volatile situation. I did not realize how strongly they would take offense at being compared to elves. Looking back, I realize that they expected nothing but evil and violence from me, and my attempt at humor did nothing except to supply the spark for an explosion. And I got my explosion a moment later. They hurled their spears at me in a volley! They just rattled and bounced off my scales, of course, and they did me no harm. But then..."

The dragon paused for the space of several breaths. When he spoke again, his voice was low and quiet. "You have certainly heard tales of how dragons are implacable, bloodthirsty killers? There is truth in those tales. With some of us, the blood-lust lies close to the surface and shows itself at the slightest opportunity. With others, like myself, the rage lies deep, and arises only at a strong provocation. But, deep or shallow, when it rises, it becomes unstoppable. We are incapable of containing our destructive urges until all of our enemies lie dead before us. And so it was on that accursed night.

"The dwarves had barely drawn their axes and their war-hammers when my temper welled up, and then overflowed. I quickly breathed my fires onto the river, boiling the water into a thick fog that hid me from my new enemies. Then I fanned the fog with my wings, moving it toward the dwarven host as I followed behind it, until I was close enough to strike. And then I struck, and struck again! Fire, claws, teeth, my lashing tail, the sheer mass of my body... they felt every ounce of rage that I could fling at them. Nearly all of them fell; most of them fought bravely, but, brave or coward, they died that night. But my temper had not run its course. Below the mountain lay the town that the humans called Dale. Some of the dwarves fled there for safety. They found no safety there; the human town fell almost as quickly as the dwarven army did. When there wasn't much left to burn there, I returned to the mountain. But was I done? No, may my eyes be forever cursed, no! I had to search the tunnels, hunting down every dwarf who remained underground, and killing them in the most painful ways you can imagine, until there were no more dwarves! Male, female, old, young... it made no difference to me. The rage was upon me and I could not stop." He looked away and hid his head behind a leathery wing. "I could... not... stop!"

Bilbo remained silent. This was not at all like the story he had been told by Thorin and his friends. He realized that the dragon might be spinning an elaborate lie, just like the spiders of Mirkwood had spun their webs in the trees, and for a very similar purpose. But what if the dragon was telling the truth?

At last, Smaug continued. "At last, the rage faded and I realized what I had done. I had slaughtered nearly every member of two entire communities, some of whom did nothing to provoke or resist me, and it was all due to a terrible misunderstanding. For days, I lay motionless, stunned and shocked at what I had done. If one lone dwarf had approached me at that time, he probably could have killed me with ease. At one point, I even wept. But can tears bring back the dead? At last, I pulled myself together, and I made a solemn vow.

"I gathered up all the gold and the other treasures that the dwarves and humans had made, and I piled them in the main cavern, the place where I had hoped to meet a fertile female in the near future. I vowed to guard those golden things with my life, until the day came when I could return them to their rightful owners, or if necessary, the owners' surviving descendants. If a female did come, then she would have to consent to joining me in my vow, or else I would refuse her. Returning the gold would not undo the mistakes of the past, but there were no other amends that I could make.

"In the meantime, I have lived in this cave, sleeping on the gold so as to guard it better, leaving only to hunt my necessary food. As the years went by, I became less and less active, and so I had to hunt less and less often. But whenever a thief tried to take the dwarves' gold, I had to stir myself to action, and then feed afterward. The dwarves never returned. The men did not rebuild Dale, but relocated to a new town by the shores of the lake. Perhaps they feel safer there; perhaps they think that a few more miles between them and my mountain will make a difference if I mean to fly there for some reason. If they leave me alone, then I leave them alone, although their livestock makes a convenient snack if I cannot find food in the wild lands. I understand that the horses and cows belong to them, but as long as my debt to the dwarves remains unpaid, I will do whatever I have to do in order to remain here, healthy and alert to attempts at thievery. I wait for the dwarves, and I wait for a female dragon... and, so far, neither of them has come. I have had no visitors except for birds, bats, and thieves. I tolerate the first two. And still I wait.

"So, thief, now you know what a 'calamity' really is. What do you think of my story?"

"I... I am speechless," Bilbo stammered, trying to gather his wits. "It was not at all what I expected to hear."

The dragon puffed out a puff of smoke from his nostrils. "You expected to hear tales of sneak attacks, and thievery, and greed without equal, did you not? Those are the tales that the dwarves and the men and the elves tell about me. Which of the three races filled your ears with their stories, I wonder?"

"Oh... I would rather not say," the hobbit said. The dragon seemed to be stirring slightly, and Bilbo thought that perhaps it was almost time for him to make a discreet exit.

"There is no need for you to answer," the dragon said casually. "There is a slight smell of dwarf about you, not as though you were one or had been sharing a cave with one, but enough to tell me that you have been near one quite recently. We will discuss that soon. But for now, I have entertained you with my history; now it is your turn. I still know nothing about you. Be a polite guest and enlighten me. Who and what are you?"

"What am I?" Bilbo exclaimed, surprised that the conversation had taken this turn. But he had not totally lost his wits; he knew that being forthright with a dragon seldom paid good dividends. "I am a clue-finder, a web-cutter, a stinging fly. I was chosen for the lucky number. I am a friend of bears and a guest of eagles. I am Ring-winner, and Luck-wearer, and Barrel-rider."

"How interesting," Smaug nodded and smiled, but it was not a pleasant smile. "You smell of dwarf, and you were chosen for the lucky number, so I think that you are the companion of thirteen dwarves. 'Web-cutter' makes me think that you fell in with the giant spiders of Mirkwood Forest on your way here, which means that you traveled here from the west. 'Barrel-rider' makes me think that you passed through Lake Town to get here. I assume that, when you leave here with my cup, you will return to Lake Town and a hero's welcome, which will last from the moment you arrive until the moment I set the first buildings afire. Are there any other secrets that you wish to keep from me?"

At this, Bilbo clapped his hand over his mouth, determined to say nothing else. He had thought he was being clever, but instead, he had done exactly what he had hoped the dragon would do – he had said too much and given his adversary useful information about himself.

"What? No more clever words? You disappoint me, Barrel-rider. Very well, then. I cannot force you to talk. Just be aware that the sun will rise in a few hours, and if you have not returned my golden cup by then, it will be too late to appease me. That cup was not yours, and while it might rightfully belong to your dwarven companions, I will not concede a single ounce of treasure until they present themselves to me so I can properly honor my vow. Otherwise, that vow will be your death warrant."

Bilbo silently made his way back up the secret passageway. When he had come down the passageway earlier, he had thought his course of action was clear. Now, it was hopelessly muddled. Should he steal the cup back from the dwarves to whom it belonged, in the hope that the dragon was telling the truth about sparing his life in return? Should he tell his friends what the dragon had told him, knowing that their version of events wasn't even close to the dragon's version? He might have to deal with their anger about the things that Smaug had said, but even his magic ring might not be enough to save him from the wrath of Smaug.