«Get the court astrologer to study them and translate them if he can.»
«I’ll translate them for you,» Dandy volunteered, and jumped into the casket.
«It says here! The dragon will not leave…»
«Get away, dwarf!» Winona hissed.
Dandy put a claw to her forehead, and she shut up, looking at the empty whites of her eyes in the void.
«It says: until you return my wife to me, I will destroy your body, beautiful woman who bears her name from the root of the rose flower.»
«What’s next?» Rosamunda nervously crumpled her lace handkerchief in her hands. «Read it! I want to know everything.»
But Winona’s body burst into flames, as did the paper letters. Sparks rained down on the terrified crowd of courtiers. Some were burned, some swallowed sparks and burned their tongues. Some of the ladies were disfigured by burns. The dead Winona didn’t care whether she burned or not. She was acting as a message. Apparently, parchment or letters on skin and bodies from a dragon burn just like paper.
The remains of the maid of honor were being shunned by everyone. The chest full of ashes was taken to the cemetery. That’s where it belongs.
«The sacrifice was in vain,» sighed the counselors and looked unkindly at the queen.
«So, what shall we do?» Rosamunda roused Dandy, who for some reason none of the ministers called an exotic animal and did not try to put him in a cage.
«Marry you to a dragon!» He muttered sullenly.
«What do you mean?» Rosamunda clenched her fists in anger. «You’re mocking me!»
«I am not! It’s what the dragon wants.»
«To burn me or eat me for dinner!»
«Suddenly he doesn’t want an appetizer, he wants a wife.»
Rosamunda swung her scepter at Dandy.
«Calm down! Where’s your sense of humor?» He squeaked, hiding behind the throne. «I’ll tell you a secret: monsters are really very attracted to beauties, and not at all to eat them.»
«That’s comforting!» Rosamunda said skeptically.
«Don’t you want to fool the dragon by promising him a marriage for the future?»
«That’s clever! But how do you negotiate with a dragon? Who dares approach him when he’s so vicious? Did you see what he did to Lady Winona? He dismembered her with his claws! What if he breathes fire on me as soon as I go to negotiate with him? Should I just send you? You’re agile! If there’s a risk, run away or hide in one of the pits in the Underworld.»
Dandy doesn’t like that idea.
«He won’t listen to me. He needs a lady.»
«He’s already been given one, and he hasn’t expressed much admiration.»
«He needs a lady of his own choosing. It is the chosen one!»
«It’s a shame he chose me! There are so many brides to be given away, and the dragon wants me! It’s the law of meanness!»
Fire raged through the kingdom here and there. The angry dragon was flying over the country and breathing on villages and cities. How could he be tamed? Not with love! Should we call the militia? But what could the militia do against the dragon? He’ll crush them all with one paw. The size difference gives him an advantage. And his fire breath makes him all-powerful.
«He’d enslave us all like that,» Rosamunda complained. «We’d have to get a strong wizard to fight him.»
«I’ve heard that the singing of fair maidens can put dragons to sleep. Sing to him!»
There’s nothing to lose. Rosamunda leaned out the window and sang a frivolous love song she’d heard from the seamstresses. Strangely enough, the dragon reacted. The fire that was about to fall on the castle towers was stopped.
Rosamunda continued to sing as the dragon flew over the castle. Only when it flew away did she close her mouth. Her tongue ached as if it were about to fall off. To contain the fire of the entire country, she had to sing for the dragon for over an hour.
«Love is a hard thing!» Dandy muttered. «It is especially dragon love!»
What’s love got to do with it? It was an enemy raid. She had a sore throat. She wished Dandy had brought wine instead of muttering about dragon love.
The dragon didn’t return for 24 hours. Is this a victory? Or is it the calm before another firestorm?
«I wish I had a strong wizard to deal with it,» Rosamunda continued to lament.
And as if by magic, a message arrived about the visit of ambassadors from the State of Wizards.
An elf in the ambassador’s entourage
Flames ran between the lines.
«I love you! I hate you! I wait for you! I am your dragon.»
It was no longer a letter, but a short note by fire. It did not burst into flames, but lay on the carpet, only the lines burning. Then they were extinguished. The note became ashes.
Rosamunda thought the note a mockery. The dragon didn’t belong to her.
It was said that Queen Seraphina of the northern state had her own dragon, but Queen Rosamunda had no dragon of her own. It is except for the dragon in the letters. Maybe someone got wind of her desire to have her own dragon and is playing a joke on her? But who would want to do that and why?
«You should have a dragon of your own,» said Dandy, sensing the threat of war. «Or tame one that already flies over the towers and shines like the dawn.»
Instead, Rosamunda wrote poems about the dragon, but the lines were in ink, not fire. Only once did something out of the ordinary happen: Rosamunda was summoned by the voice of a fairy from the bookshelves, the queen dripped blood on a line, and several fiery lines appeared, as if a dragon had breathed on the paper.
«I am here! I am near! In your palace! At your back! I am yours! And so is the fire.»
The lines of fire, alas, burned too quickly. There’s no way to prove the existence of letters of fire. They could never be reassembled from the ashes.
Rosamunda was nervous. She even felt a dragon’s claw touch her shoulder. It felt like the dragon was at court, but the heralds only trumpeted some afterthought from a magical state.
«Come quickly! Otherwise we’ll all be in big trouble,» Dandy is all shaken up. He’s about to faint.
Rosamunda hurried into the throne room. The courtiers had gathered in a crowd. They were all expecting special ambassadors.
«Was it true that their empire was populated only by wizards?» Rosamunda sat on the throne in a ceremonial gown of silver brocade trimmed with sable. Dandy sat on the back of the throne and whispered his advice to her.
«It is also called the Magic Empire, or in the lingo, simply the Empire of Magic,» he said. «The emperor is very powerful. You’d have to seduce him, and you’d be in business.»
«Does he specialize in taming dragons?» Rosamunda was keenly interested.
«It is something like that…» Dandy was embarrassed for some reason.
«But the ambassadors have come to see me, not the Emperor.»
«Arrange