The Dragon Who Went Trick-or-Treating

Once, in a valley, there was a small kingdom with a castle at the bottom and a hill at the top. On the hill lived a dragon called Pepper.

Pepper was about the size of a pony. He was green all over, except for his belly, which was pink. He couldn’t talk, but he was very clever, and he had the best manners in the whole valley. He bowed to the sun in the morning. He bowed to the moon at night, in case it was feeling left out.

Every year, on the last night of October, Pepper sat on his hill and watched costume night.

On costume night, every child in the valley old enough to hold a lantern dressed up as something frightening, a witch or a ghost or a goblin. They carried candle lanterns from door to door. The King went too. From the top of the hill it looked like a string of little lights going knock, knock, knock all through the dark. Pepper watched it every year and wished for one thing.

He wanted to knock on a door, and have it open, and have somebody say “Trick or treat!” and put a sweet in his bag.

That sounds easy. It is not easy if you are a dragon. Pepper had tried knocking on ordinary days, very politely. The miller had hidden in a flour sack. The baker had climbed out of his own back window and gone to stay at his sister’s for a week. Doors did not open for dragons.

So this year Pepper made a plan. On costume night, everybody dresses up as a monster. So on costume night, nobody will look twice at a real one.

Now, I want you to hold on to this: Pepper was a real dragon. Nobody else in this story is going to believe it. Well, almost nobody. You must.

He had a bag ready. It was a pillowcase that had blown up the hill off somebody’s washing line one windy day. He had kept it folded under a rock ever since. It had a small hole in one corner. Pepper didn’t know about the hole. Hold on to that too.

When the first lanterns came out, Pepper walked down the hill to the first cottage. He knocked with one claw, very gently. A grandma opened the door. Pepper bowed.

“What a wonderful costume!” said the grandma. “But it’s too scary for the little ones.”

She pointed up. Two very small grandchildren were peeping over the windowsill upstairs, and they did look worried.

The grandma went inside and came back with a gold paper crown, left over from a birthday. She put it on Pepper’s head, between his horns.

“There,” she said. “Nobody is frightened of anybody in a crown.”

And it was true. The two little faces at the window stopped looking worried and started waving.

Then the grandma said “Trick or treat!” because Pepper hadn’t, and somebody had to. And she put a toffee in his pillowcase.

Pepper bowed three times. One door, and one toffee! He could have gone home happy right then. But the valley was full of doors.

At the second house, the door was opened by a boy dressed as a ghost. He had come home early with a full bag, and his mom was letting him hand out the sweets, which he was doing very importantly.

“What a wonderful costume!” said the boy. “But it’s a bit plain. At the back.”

He fetched a red ribbon from his mom’s sewing box and tied it in a bow on the end of Pepper’s tail. It was a very good bow.

“Better,” he said. “Trick or treat!” And he put a sugar mouse in the pillowcase.

At the third house, an old man in slippers opened the door.

“What a wonderful costume!” said the old man. “But you’re late! The parade’s starting at the castle, and the King is judging!”

He dropped a peppermint in the pillowcase, said “Trick or treat!” very fast, and pointed down the lane.

So off Pepper hurried, a dragon in a crown with a bow on his tail. People kept popping sweets into his pillowcase as he went by. Every so often one dropped out of the hole. Pepper didn’t notice. He was in a rush.

At the castle, forty children stood in a line outside the great doors with forty candle lanterns, waiting to march into the courtyard. At the front stood the King, dressed as a wolf. His costume was a white bath mat with two ears pinned on. It looked exactly like a sheep, but nobody had ever told him, because he was the King.

At the very end of the line stood Princess Rosie. She was seven, and dressed as a dragon, in cardboard, with green paint on her nose. Pepper stood next to her. Rosie looked at his crown, and his bow, and his claws, for a long time.

“Open the great doors!” said the King.

The great doors swung open. And the October wind came rushing down the hill and through the doors in one big gust. Every single lantern went out at once.

The courtyard was pitch dark. Somebody small began to cry. Somebody bigger said, “I’m not scared,” in a scared sort of voice. “Everybody stay where you are,” said the King, in a voice that was trying very hard.

Pepper took a deep breath.

Now, a dragon’s breath is a big thing, and this could have gone very badly. But Pepper had the best manners in the valley, and that included his fire. He let out one long, slow, careful breath, a thin ribbon of flame no wider than a pencil. He walked along the line and touched each lantern, like somebody blowing out birthday candles, only backwards. All forty, one breath. Not one witch’s hat so much as smoked.

The courtyard was bright again. Everybody gasped.

Then Princess Rosie said, “I knew it. Nobody’s costume is that good.”

She was more delighted than anybody has ever been. She had wanted to meet a dragon her whole life, which was seven years, and here was one, at her own parade, in a crown.

The King came down the line in his bath mat and looked at Pepper very seriously, because he judged costumes very seriously.

“What a wonderful costume,” said the King.

“Dad,” said Rosie. “It isn’t a costume.”

The King thought about this. “What a wonderful dragon,” he said.

And nobody said “but.”

The King said that a dragon who comes to costume night dressed as a dragon is in costume, strictly speaking. He said it was the best one he had ever judged, and the crown and the bow were a very nice touch. And he gave Pepper first prize, which was a whole plum cake.

Then he made a rule in front of everybody. On costume night, forever, the castle door would be open to the dragon on the hill.

Everyone cheered. The small one who had cried now wanted to pat Pepper’s pink belly, and did. Pepper bowed to the King. The King bowed back, which is hard to do in a bath mat. Then Rosie bowed, and all forty children bowed, and Pepper had to bow to every one of them, which took a while.

Late that night, Pepper walked home up the hill with his plum cake, and his pillowcase full, and the paper crown still on his head. All the way up, sweets dropped out of the hole, one after another. Pepper didn’t notice. He was much too happy.

The next morning, the children of the valley found a trail of toffees and sugar mice and peppermints going all the way up the hill. They picked up every sweet on the way to the top. Pepper didn’t have a door, so they knocked on a rock. When he came out and bowed, they said “Trick or treat!” and filled his pillowcase all over again. And Rosie had brought a needle and thread for the hole.

And every year after that, on the last night of October, Pepper put on his crown and his bow and walked down the hill. The castle door was always open for him. And nobody ever said “but” to Pepper again.