Hilde was young enough to remember playing Dragonslayer when she was little. She had pretended to fight off the drakes who ruled the kingdom with wooden swords and cardboard armor like the knights of old. 

She was old enough to remember when the inventors made the first bolt-rifles to defend their villages and the Kaiser declared that they were free from draconic rule.

She was wise enough to keep Maxmilian out of the Young Guard when the factories churned out machine guns and everyone was enlisting to drive the dragons back to their roosts.

She was desperate enough to walk into one of them when the engineers ordered artillery big enough to shake the mountains to their roots and Prince Heldan led armies to retake the godforsaken north of the Fatherland.

The wind bit into Hilde’s shredded coat as she stared into the yawning cave mouth. She just stood there for a few moments, scared to take the next step. But Hilde had learned that sometimes, you just have to choose and never look back. And she had already chosen.

Three years a nurse on the front lines of hell, starving, freezing, and sawing in equal measure had made the choice for her, really. When Aldorf had taken her aside and asked if she would help him to stop the platoon, damn the superiors, she had actually hugged him. Maximilian had been shipped out here two weeks ago. Her son wouldn’t die charging up a worthless stretch of cratered ground.

All up and down the line, people had gotten fed up with pushing forwards and threw down their guns. But now they were hungry and pinned down and reinforcements were coming to hang the ringleaders. And she had drawn the short straw for who would ask for a truce.

So far Hilde had made the climb up no-man’s-land undetected, but she still clutched her white flag in case Old Silberzunge bothered to look before flaming. Most of a bottle of whisky had utterly failed to make her warm. Her slush-soaked boots left a trail of wet across the truly ancient flagstones of the drake-roost.

On either side, cyclopean walls gradually gave way to regular alcoves. Shadowy statues and gilt-framed canvases perched within. The floor flowed from primeval carving to polished black marble without her noticing. The light dwindled behind her and a cavern opened up in front.

A jarring draft of humid air slammed into her from within and she realized she had no idea what to say. For some reason, she could only think of when she realized how hard it would be to raise Max and William holding her hands and saying, “Parents make sacrifices so their children don’t have to.”

“He…llo?”

Something huge shifted and suddenly Hilde was a little cardboard knight all over again. Old Silberzunge uncurled behind her, pale golden eye glittering in the gloaming. “Yes? I’m listening.” The ancient beast’s voice was as smooth as quicksilver, unaccented save a slight rolling at the end of her ‘s’s.

“I…” Hilde swallowed. “Am the representative of Commissar Aldorf. He wants a cease-fire.”

“And since when does a Commissar have the authority to negotiate that, hmmm?” Silberzunge coiled around her without so much as a click of claw on stone.

“Since…” She had to focus! Max was counting on her. Everyone was. “Since he decided his platoon wasn’t fighting anymore. Since we decided to stop the madness.”

“We did? So it’s a mutiny, then.” The dragon had fully slid past her into the dark. Hilde shifted uncomfortably. No one was saying that, back in the trenches. “Do you agree? To the truce?”

“I need my time, representative.” Silberzunge hissed in and out of the room beyond. Her huge head brushed against Hilde’s side. “And I need to know who I’m dealing with. How many divisions are part of this little scheme? Where are you?”

“Representatives don’t have to share information with the enemy.” Hilde grunted. “And you’re still the enemy.”

“Am I?” That dull gold eye was staring out from the dark. “Because I asked for a pittance when we ruled? Back then I claimed a single maiden on every third night of the new moon. Now, the Kaiser gives me hundreds of young men every day.”

Hilde tried not to wonder if that was right. “Doesn’t matter. Do you agree?”

“No. I can’t negotiate like this. Not unless I know who you speak for.”

“Three platoons.” She had to say something. Men were dying while she wasted time.

“Spread all down the Wiesenran. Almost the whole front line.”

“Well that was easy, wasn’t it? If Commissar Aldorf speaks for the whole front line, then he must be worth some respect. I agree.”

“Then… we’re finished?” Hilde tried to back up, but there was tail there.

“If you want. But it must be hungry down there. And cold. Muddy, too, most likely.”

It was. Every day she tried to hold onto the memory of William waving to the train. To the feeling of their last kiss. Tried to remind herself he would be here if he didn’t have that job. But it was hard. Harder every day. “Don’t pretend you don’t know. You’ve fought us here every day we fought you.” It came out as a half-strangled growl.

“We. Us. You. You never seem to understand we cooperated for so long. That we could still cooperate. Us drakes die to your shells same as you die to our flames. I don’t want this going longer than needed any more than you do.”

The tail was gone now. Hilde could run away with her truce. But Silberzunge was leading up to something. She had already come here to negotiate. And the whisky was finally starting to work. Sometimes you just have to choose and never look back. She put some steel in her spine, stood up straight and tried to catch that milky golden eye. “What are you offering?”

“Help. Blankets. Food. Your friends don’t have to starve. We can have peace, representative, not just a truce.”

She thought of going home, of watching William and Max play their ball-games while she laughed at them and everything was okay again. But that couldn’t happen. She had to think. “What do you want in exchange? And why?”

“Nothing at all. Only the land we have been reduced to and the silence of your guns.” The huge beast flowed over to a wall, titanic claws delicately readjusting a fragile painting. “And my kin are dying. My art is in danger. My age is over.”

Maybe it could happen? “So that’s it? No… hoarding?” After all the disappointment, Hilde couldn’t stop herself questioning.

“I collect. Art. Culture. Beauty. I preserve it because it is worth savoring. I keep it safe from your fires. Any connoisseur knows when to give and when to keep.” Old Silberzunge vanished back into the blackness. “Oh. Your wagon of supplies will be waiting outside.”

“Already? You… knew I would come?”

“I was there when you made fire from sticks. Of course I knew you would come. Someone always will.” And then Hilde remembered why she had stopped playing Dragonslayer. The soaring drake. The huge shadow that made her helpless to do anything except stare and stare. The terrifying impossibility of a wooden sword doing anything.

The whisky’s warmth was already gone.

“Of course,” she managed, then turned and almost ran to the exit, leaving little pools of water at every footfall. Perhaps the age of the dragon wasn’t quite past.

Somehow, there was the wagon, two old donkeys harnessed to a transport piled high with a jumble of random boxes, rolled blankets, pots and some wrapping paper already wilting under the ashy snow. The sight of it alone was enough to make her stop and gape. It was so much. If even half those crates contained half a day’s food, the whole platoon would be eating for weeks.

She waded up to it and slapped one on the rump. “Hey-YA!” Wheels turned through slop and the donkeys started to meander downhill. Hilde thought heard the rattle of bullets. She avoided thinking about where those had to have come from.

“But.” Hilde stiffened. Silberzunge’s ruddy bulk was flowing out of the cave now, towering over the wagon, the donkeys, even the mountain. Her huge wings cast Hilde into shadow. “I wouldn’t want all these good things to go to waste on a lost cause. You surely agree?”

“Of… course.”

“So does the rest of the army have thoughts about your little treason? Do you have a plan for when they come? Mmmm?”

“We have a deal. I don’t need to tell you.” Hilde didn’t want to admit that she had been wondering the same thing on the walk here.

“But I’m asking. Are you sure that all your friends are going to be brave enough to stand up against the Kaiser’s real soldiers?” The dragon snaked in front of her, head on the same level, eye meeting eye. “It’d be a shame if all this negotiating came to nothing.”

“The reserves are just like us.” Except that they were led by Prince Heldan. “We can convince everyone that our demands are reasonable.” Except herself, apparently.

Silberzunge let out a little snort that smelled of sulfur. “Well, then. It seems you have it under control. You’ll just convince them. If you need my help, just come back and tell me what’s wrong.” And then she was gone and Hilde almost stumbled forwards.

Hilde took a shuddering breath and puffed out her cheeks, watching the steam pool in front of her face. She thought about Aldorf desperately trying to hold everyone together. She thought about William, waving goodbye to the train with tears in his eyes. She thought about Max, childhood eaten by the war. About to hang for treason. Parents sacrifice so their children don’t have to. “Heldan is coming. He’s leading the reserves to retake the front.”

“Ah, Prince Heldan. The Liberator. Our emperor’s only son. Here to lay the hand of freedom down on slaves and cowards alike.” Hot breath ruffled Hidle’s coat. It felt good.

“He should be crossing the fords right now. Behind the Wiesenran. Unprepared for something to go wrong. And we’re out of shells.” Hilde found herself turning around to meet that watery golden eye. “That’s what’s wrong.”

She thought it got wider, ever so slightly. “Ah.”

Hilde pulled her coat tight and started down the slope. “This one’s for you, Max.” Her voice was tiny in the vast silence.

Hilde could only hear the sound of her boots when Old Silberzunge took to the air. She was a sweeping shadow that left quiet dread in its wake. Just the sight of it was enough to scare a girl out of playing Dragonslayers.

But everyone has to grow up eventually. Hilde had lived the dream, been a Dragonslayer, fought for freedom. And all it had done was make her a slave to hunger and cold.

She thought of the prince’s division for a moment. She pitied them, even. But in the end they were other people’s sons. Sometimes you just have to choose and never look back.