Adam lived in a small village in the South of Poland near to the big city of Krakow. Adam’s favorite part of the day was dinnertime. Not because his mother made the best food in the whole world, but because, at dinner time, the whole family would sit around the television and watch the news. No school lesson could compare to the stories Adam watched on the news: exotic looking people from different cultures, natural disasters in countries he had never visited, and insights into the coolest celebrities
and their extraordinary lives. It was one such story that changed Adam’s life forever…
One evening, just before harvest, the family was sitting round enjoying steaming bowls of chicken soup with homemade macaroni when the news began. The top story was about a mysterious robbery from Wawel Castle in the nearby city of Krakow. During the night thieves had snuck in and taken the treasure from Smok’s lair!
Everybody in Poland knows the story of Smok the Dragon who lived in Wawel Castle many hundreds of years ago. Smok lived in the caves beneath the castle and used to eat the King’s cattle. The King offered his daughter’s hand in marriage to the man who could slay the mighty dragon. Many brave knights and noblemen tried and failed, but in the end it was a simple cobbler who had slain the mighty dragon.
As every school girl and boy knows, dragons sleep on a bed of gold treasure.
Smok’s lair had such a bed of gold, and when the dragon was slain, the King did not move the gold because he wanted other dragons to think that Smok still lived in Wawel Castle. ‘That way,’ the King had exclaimed, ‘I will never be bothered by dragons again!’
And so the gold coins stayed in the dragon’s lair for hundreds of years, each new King believing that the gold brought good luck to his people.
The gold coins had stayed in the lair for all of that time until they were stolen, and it was while eating his dinner in front of the television that Adam first learned of the robbery.
The reporter was at Waywel Castle. She was interviewing a tall policeman. The policeman said: ‘We believe that the thieves came into the castle during the day pretending to be tourists. They must have hidden in a dark corner of Smok’s lair and waited until the castle closed for the day. They then filled two large suitcases with as much gold as they could. This,’ he said, while pointing to a spot on the castle floor, ‘is all that remains of the precious gold coins.’
The camera zoomed in on a few gold coins that were scattered on the floor.
Standing next to the policeman was a very forlorn castle curator. He was shaking his head and murmuring something about it being very unlucky for the castle and for the city of Krakow.
Adam’s father gasped: ‘All that treasure gone!’
‘What if another dragon comes along and sees that all the gold is missing?’ asked Adam. ‘Will they know that Smok isn’t there anymore? The castle might be attacked and we would have a new dragon after all these years!’
Basia, Adam’s older sister, chuckled to herself and said: ‘Well then, the King had better go to the bank and get some more gold coins out before it is too late.’
The family laughed and returned to eating their delicious chicken soup. It seemed to Adam that nobody believed in dragons anymore so maybe there was nothing to worry about after all.
The next day, Adam woke up very early with the rest of his family. His parents and older brothers and sister were all going out to the fields to bring in the harvest. They would be gone for the whole day. The fields were far away from the farmhouse so they had to leave very early. It would be hard work for everybody.
Every harvest, different members of the family would take it in turn to stay at home and look after the farm animals and prepare the barn to store the crops. It was also their job to prepare a feast for the hungry family to eat when they returned home. This year it was Adam’s turn.
As his family left in the tractor, Adam gathered food scrap