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Ser Girdwood came before the king's own court
Under threat of executioner's axe
To answer why, in his past battles fought
He had deemed the starved peasantry his snacks
“Highness!” he laughed, his belly squirmed
With the panicked struggles of melting men
“Surely thy spies have now clearly confirmed
That I have emptied out the vile beast’s den?”
“T’is true”, said the royal, fists held in rage
“That thou have slain the dragons in the hills,
But thine murder-gut is a killer’s cage,
and a dozen lost taxpayers its kills.”
"Indeed, my lord, but consider their worth
as additions to your loyal knight's girth."
The king was silent as ten heartbeats passed,
Knowing that the issue had to be pressed.
"You ate men, women of a lower caste,
And feel no guilt in letting them digest?
Does thou value a life so little that
Thy stomach should be gorged and fed and plump
By turning your countrymen into fat
And flab that beneath your armour will slump?”
The knight was quiet for a moment more
then he raised from his knee, stomach groaning.
“These poors shall bother you no more with their
Incessant whining and pleas and moaning.”
Girdwood seemed proud of what he had just said.
And with a crunch, another peasant dead.
The king thought for a moment, rage pushed deep.
A knight of his house, a horrible act.
If public support he wanted to keep.
He had to punish that digestive tract.
“Very well, Ser Girdwood.” His Highness said.
“I will not deny this vile appetite.
But in penance for the innocents dead
You will be served a meal with much more fight.”
The cruel knight seemed smug about the deal.
His squirming guts groaned in gluttonous greed.
“I will take on any and every meal.”
There it was, the promise the king did need.
“Good. From the mountains my fine men did fetch
one final dragon. Your stomach must stretch.”
Girdwood paused. His prey offered final cries.
He had just made room for another course.
“...surely, your highness, these are just mere lies.
I culled every last beast with thorough force.”
“Except the largest.” The king did reveal,
As his knights marched the beast out, hogtied.
“You said you would take any penance meal.
For those who, in your intestines, have died.”
The creature was live, but bound with steel chain,
As wide as a village, and just as tall.
“I give a choice. In a cell you remain,
Or otherwise you shall swallow this all.”
The knight’s eager guts decided his choice.
As a burble cut short his last prey’s voice.
On the date of his penance, Girdwood ate.
His throat bulging wide, his stomach the same.
Inch by inch, to horrendous fate
He forced the immense piece of beastly game.
The onlookers were struck with deep disgust
As the hamlet-sized dragon disappeared
Into a stomach that would surely bust
With the pressure they could audibly hear.
As the tail was slurped into his helm,
Girdwood let out a deep satisfied sigh.
Lightly spicy, with a hilt of raw elm,
And the sadistic arousal that it would soon die.
His ten-foot-stretched stomach groaned deep and loud
as he greedily eyed the noble crowd.
The guards went first. The advisors then too.
The jury and judges and servants for last.
All added to his belly’s boiling stew,
From deep in which belch did forcefully blast.
The thrashing and writhing and muffled screams
Were mulched by groans of digestive hell.
And when Girdwood turned his eyes on the king
He knew he wanted the royal as well.
“This cannot be true! You cannot have room!”
His Highness locked up in horrified grief.
“I think.” Said the knight. “This will be your tomb.
But I doubt your cruel death will be brief.”
With a lunge, a gulp, the royal went down.
His last legacy a belched-up crown.
For ten years since, the knight, now the new king,
held his position with terrible ease.
Those who speak out about a single thing
Join the slurry of fine ale, meat and cheese.
It pumps through his guts, so calorie-dense
That he has fattened to spill from his throne.
And although Girdwood may now be immense
His stomach retains that deep greedy groan.
The dragon-eater, some may call him now.
He has driven to extinction that beast.
And when stocks run low on fish, pork or cow,
On his own population he will feast.
A bottomless pit, some might indeed say,
But to tell him that name spell your last day.
But one simple Sunday, trial begins
For a knight with an appetite cruel.
Like Girdwood, he too has many a sin
Of gulping down innocents like gruel.
King Girdwood huffs between tired, panted breaths
As his stomach works off his ninth dinner.
“Can you explain why you thought all these deaths
Could occur without making a sinner?”
The knight, Ser Archibald, a royal guard
Chuckles thrice as his stomach clenches down
On the melting remains of a whole logging yard,
that held half the peasantry of its town.
"Indeed, my lord, but consider their worth
as additions to your loyal knight's girth."