Son of the Dragon

They crossed the great river Danube
to take what they thought was owed:
our wealth and our lives,
souls to fight for an unloved lord.

The invaders were taken up,
a tribute paid in blood,
as a message to the Conqueror:
You have woken the spirit of the Dragon.
He sends me, his son and heir,
across another Rubicon to burn
your lands to ash, and
your people to embers.

Forewarned of deception,
a trap was sprung, a fortress sacked
and across his lands my words were heard,
a Dragon's voice of overwhelming flames.
And when those of the Conqueror's faith were
consumed, sympathizers and heretics all undone,
only then did the Dragon's tongue retreat
back into its maw of bristling swords.

And now as the Conqueror rides to me
I sit at my table before my keep, waiting
beneath a sullen sky of grey, watching
as they ride forth, the Conqueror and his legions vast.
A thirst for vengeance drives them on like
herded cattle that look up with angry hollow eyes
only to find themselves in the slaughterhouse.

I hear the screams, I taste their terror on the wind
as they enter my great forest, their resolve
flies faster than their horses can turn and run.

I find myself smiling as I break my bread
and dip it in the sweet nectar of my victory,
a warm red sap in a glowing bowl of life.
I gathered it myself from the limbs
of twenty-thousand trees
--the forest the Conqueror now flees.

At last, I think, he understands the
message from the Dragon, for he saw
all that remains of his lost invaders
--the Conqueror's mighty janissaries--
now only a thick foliage of meat and bone
skin pierced by shafts of wood
hardened by the Dragon's breath.

I taste my bread, a tribute
dipped in blood
now paid in full.