Georgina and The Dragon (Written for St George’s Day)

Once, there was a little girl called Georgina who absolutely loved Dragons.

She loved everything about them; their green scaly-ness and their long spiky tails and their big, flapping wings; their loud, ferocious roars and their fiery breath.

She had lots of books about dragons but, by far, her favourite one was the story of St George and The Dragon that had a big picture of a green, scaly, ferocious, fire breathing dragon on the cover.

And, one day, she was lying on her bed looking at the cover of that book and wishing to herself,

“Oh I wish…I wish…I wish I could see a real dragon”.

And, just then, to Georgina’s complete amazement, there was a loud bang and a bright flash and a puff of thick purple smoke and, when the smoke had cleared away, standing in the middle of her bedroom and bumping its green scaly head against the lampshade hanging from her bedroom ceiling, was a ginormous, ferocious green dragon.

“It looks just like the Dragon from my book”, thought Georgina excitedly, reaching out to touch the spikes on its tail just to make sure that she wasn’t dreaming.

“Well?”, asked the Dragon, in a loud, bellowing, rumbling sort of voice, “Are you happy now? You got what you wished for. You wanted to see a dragon and here I am”.

“Oh yes, I’m very happy”, said Georgina, amazed to hear the dragon speak, “But where on Earth did you come from?”.

“From the book of course”, replied the dragon, “You made a wish and you made it three times and three is a very magical number”.

“Wow!”, thought Georgina, her head filling up with all sorts of other wishes she could make like sailing round the world in a hot air balloon made of bubble gum.

But then the dragon, as if it had read her thoughts like words in a book, said, “If you want to fly round the world; why don’t you just climb on my back?”.

Georgina thought this was a splendid idea and, eagerly, she climbed over the Dragons long spiky tail and onto its scaly back.

“Hold on tight now”, said the Dragon, “I wouldn’t want you to fall off”.

And, the next thing Georgina knew, she was no longer in her bedroom but flying through the cloudy, blue April skies on the back of the gigantic green dragon and, looking down, she could see hundreds of tiny houses that looked just like dolls houses as well as fields and hills that looked like an enormous, green patchwork blanket and motorways with tiny cars and busses and lorries zooming around on them.

And then, the dragon zooming through the air at the speed of a jet aeroplane, his big, leathery green wings becoming a blur and Georgina’s hair being blown all about by the wind, they flew all round the world and, looking down, Georgina saw Big Ben and the Eiffel Tower and the Sydney Opera House in Australia and the Pyramids in Egypt; the Taj Mahal in India and the Great Wall of China.

“I like that place”, remarked the Dragon as they flew low over Chinese Pagoda’s and paddy fields, “They like Dragons there”.

But then Georgina looked at her watch and noticed it was starting to get late and so the dragon flew her back home and, suddenly, magically, they were both back in Georgina’s bedroom again.

“Oh, I’ve had a wonderful time”, said Georgina, sitting on her bed and giggling, bouncing up and down excitedly.

“My pleasure”, said the Dragon.

But then, all of a sudden, Georgina noticed the Dragon begin to get a funny sort of look in his big green, dragon eyes and then the dragon said,

“My! All that flying has made me feel awfully hungry”.

“Oh?”, asked Georgina, forgetting all that she knew about dragons from the books she had read, “Well, what do Dragons eat?”.

“Why, little girls of course”, said the Dragon, starting to cackle, a wicked grin spreading across his long scaly jaws as he looked down at Georgina hungrily.

“Oh dear!”, said Georgina, starting to tremble with fright as she looked up at the ginormous dragon who was now reaching out to grab hold of her with both its big, green scaly claws, “Oh, I wish… I wish…I wish that there was a knight in shining armour who could save me!”.

Suddenly, just as before, there was a loud bang; a bright flash and a big puff of purple smoke and, when the smoke cleared; standing in the middle of Georgina’s bedroom was a medieval knight dressed from head to foot in shining, silver armour and carrying a sword and shield with the red and white cross of St George upon it.

“By George!”, exclaimed Georgina, “You’re Saint George”.

“Indeed, m’lady”, said St George, bowing to Georgina, “And you need fear not, fair damsel, for I have come to save you from this foul, ferocious, fire breathing fiend”.

And then, suddenly, raising his sword and shield, St George charged towards the dragon, thrusting the point of his sword into the dragons scaly chest.

And, the moment that he did so, just like a bubble or a balloon bursting with a pop when its pricked by a needle, the gigantic, green dragon disappeared and, looking down at her story book, Georgina saw it reappear on the cover.

“Phew!”, said Georgina, sighing with relief and shaking St Georges steel gauntleted left hand, “Thank you, so much, St George. I don’t know what I would have done without you to help me”.

The knight took another bow.

“T’was an honour and a privilege, Lady Georgina”, he said and then, just like the Dragon, he too disappeared back into the story book.

Getting up off her bed, Georgina picked up her story book from the floor and put it back on her bookshelf.

“I don’t think I like Dragons so much anymore”, she said to herself, smiling, “At least, not ones that eat little girls”.