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All Stories © Sue Coulson 2016 All rights reserved.
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Baby Koilin
Koilin was the youngest member of the dragon nest nearest to the shroom village. He had not yet left the confines of the valley and surrounding areas. He had yet to take his first flight as the wings of young dragons were not fully formed until they reached their second year. When first born, dragon young were a little like tadpoles in that their arms and legs developed as they grew and appeared at around six months of age. Koilin was just a year and a half old and although dragon young matured much faster than human children he was still considered to be far too young to be allowed too far from the nest alone. He had made a friend of one of the local children, Hemke, and they were often to be seen playing together in the sunshine or in the puddles getting wet and muddy after rain showers. They had yet to form that final bond to become familiar and dragon but it was hoped that this connection would soon become apparent.
Hemke and Koilin were very adventurous and were often being brought back after some calamity or another. Their most recent misadventure had taken them close to the place where the monstrous shroom known as the magic mushroom grew. For some while they had been daring each other to approach this monstrosity and finally Hemke taunted Koilin that he was cowardly for not getting too close. Koilin took offence at this slur on dragon kind and drawing himself up to his full height – which at his young age was not as impressive as it would have been had he been full grown – announced that he would walk to the shroom and touch it. Hemke duly impressed sat down, crossed his arms across his small chest and asked what he was waiting for. Koilin having made the boast now felt that he had to do as he had said; he started off across the clearing walking confidently at first but slowing as he grew nearer. When he was within a few feet of the twisted shroom he stopped and studied it. The eyes and the mouths were closed and the nostrils were only thin slits. It was quiet in the clearing, no birds sang, no wind blew the leaves, it was as if the whole clearing held its breath waiting to see what transpired. Koilin feeling more confident as the shroom did not appear to be awake crept forward carefully. He reached out his hand and as his fingers brushed against the strange bark like exterior a sound broke the silence, a loud sniff as the shroom caught the scent of the young dragon. With lightning speed the eyes and mouth flew open and a long tongue shot out wrapping itself tightly around the middle of Koilin’s tail as he turned to run away. Both Hemke and Koilin yelled and Koilin tried to pull back but the tongue held him fast, the more he wriggled and pulled away the tighter the tongues grip became; slowly pulling him nearer and nearer to its gaping maw. Hemke ran forward to help his friend but Koilin told him to stay back he didn’t want him to be trapped as well and he told him to run for help. However Hemke worried that if he left without helping, Koilin would be eaten or worse in his absence. He looked around for something to help free his friend but nothing he could see would help; no large branch he could use to hit the shroom with, nothing he could find to wedge to mouths open to prevent them from biting. Hemke started to feel very tearful and large tears collected and ran down his cheeks as he ran to and fro looking for a weapon of any kind to use. He was about to take Koilin’s advice and run to the nest and hope he was in time when he spotted a large lilac bush not far away, just inside the ring of trees surrounding the clearing. He ran as fast as he could and tugged and heaved at the branches full of long purple flowers. Finally he managed to snap one long branch from the bush and running full tilt back across the clearing he thrust the branch at the nostrils of the shroom; shaking the long stems as he did so causing a thick haze of pollen to cloud the air. The shroom who was taking a deep breath each time he heaved Koilin closer, breathed in a huge lungful of the powdery substance. The shroom twitched its nostrils and blinked took another deep breath and then gave a huge sneeze. Huge gobs of thick mucus shot across the clearing and Koilin was blown away from the shroom by the force of the sneeze. He rolled over and over finally coming to rest halfway across the clearing. As he sat up Hemke started to laugh, holding his side with one hand and pointing at Koilin with the other. Koilin shook his head and couldn’t see what was amusing Hemke so much, he was about to ask what he found so funny when a large blob of mucus slid from the end of his nose; he was covered in the nasty, sticky fluid and it was dripping from ears, nose, tail and was forming a thick puddle around him, he could now see what Hemke was laughing at and he started to laugh too, he looked ridiculous. Leaves and grass stuck to his skin making him look like a small, green hummock. Their laughter cut off abruptly as the shroom growled behind them and the pair took off, running back to the nest as fast as they could.
When they arrived back in the valley, Koilin’s mother was waiting for them; she had begun to worry as they had been away for some time. She asked where they had been and what was that awful stuff Koilin and Hemke were coated in – they were both now covered as Koilin had flicked a handful at Hemke and a slime throwing competition had begun on the way back to the nest. Neither had a suitable answer for Koilin’s mother without revealing where they had been so they hung their heads and said nothing. However when she noticed the red welt around his tail she knew instantly where they had been; she had seen this sort of injury before. The two were now in serious trouble as they were not supposed to go anywhere near the clearing and Koilin’s mother was torn between beating him soundly or hugging him to make sure he was alright. She managed a compromise and spoke sternly with the miscreants telling them to get inside and wait she would deal with them once she had spoken to the dragon elder. The two crept inside and sat with heads bowed awaiting their punishment. Not long after this incident, and another where a man from the village had almost lost his life, the dragon and village elders decided that the shroom had to be destroyed and it was burnt to the ground. Even though the shroom was no longer there, Hemke and Koilin never again dared to go to the clearing, however they still managed to get into mischief on a regular basis finding places to go and pranks to enact.
Baby Koilin
