A Fable in the Manner of La Fontaine
I. The Dragon
In a wide valley bordered by forests and stone towers, there lived a sheep with only three legs. He had lost the fourth long ago — no one remembered how — but he had learned to walk anyway, slowly, carefully, with patience.
He grazed quietly. He bothered no one. He harmed nothing.
His only crime was being visible.
What few knew was that beneath his land — beneath the very grass where he limped and rested — slept gold. Veins of it, quiet and ancient, deep in the earth.
The Sheep did not boast. He had never even dug. He believed land was first for living, not for conquering.
But the Wolves knew.
They always know.
High above the valley, on the tallest rocks, sat the Wolves. They wore fine coats and spoke with calm, authoritative voices. From their height, they addressed the other animals daily.
One day, they came down from their rocks wearing smiles polished like mirrors.
“Dear Sheep,” they said sweetly. “We admire your land. It is… underutilized.”
The Sheep listened.
“We propose a partnership,” continued the Wolves. “We will extract the gold for you. Efficiently. Professionally.”
They paused, then added, generously: “You will receive 1%.”
The Sheep blinked.
“And the other 99%?” he asked.
The Wolves chuckled. “Ah, details. Risk. Expertise. Infrastructure.”
They leaned closer.
“You should be grateful,” one whispered. “Most sheep get nothing.”
The Sheep thought for a long moment.
Then he said, calmly: “I intend to extract the gold myself. Slowly. Carefully. And I will use it for the other sheep — for healing, shelter, and fields where lambs may play.”
Silence.
The Wolves’ smiles cracked.
They had assumed the Sheep was weak. They had mistaken injury for ignorance.
What the Sheep did not know — what the Wolves never said — was that they had never intended to give him even 1%.
The offer was not generosity. It was control.
Had he accepted, they would have kept him obedient, quiet, dependent — alive just enough to sign papers.
But refusal?
Refusal was unforgivable.
The Wolves left, their tails stiff with rage.
“It is our gold,” they snarled among themselves. “He is squatting on it.”
“But how do we take it?” asked a younger Wolf.
The eldest smiled.
“We do not take land from a dragon,” he said. “We protect the valley from it.”
II. The Legend
Soon, the story began to spread.
“Beware,” said the Wolves to the valley. “There is a dragon among you.”
The animals gasped.
“A dragon?” asked the Rabbits, trembling.
“Yes,” replied the Wolves. “It breathes fire. It is dangerous. It threatens our peace.”
“But… where is it?” asked a Deer.
The Wolves pointed — not to fire, nor to scales, nor to wings — but to the three-legged Sheep, limping across the field.
“Do you see how strangely it walks?” said one Wolf.
“Do you see how it does not look like you?” said another.
“Only a dragon would move like that.”
The Wolves added:
“It is hoarding wealth beneath the ground.”
“It threatens our stability.”
“Why would it refuse such a generous offer? What is it hiding?”
They showed pictures. They repeated words. They stirred fear.
The animals looked again. And again. And again.
Soon, they no longer saw wool. They saw smoke.
They no longer heard silence. They heard roaring.
The Sheep continued grazing, unaware he had become a legend.
Each day, the Wolves repeated the story. Louder. More urgently. With drawings, speeches, and songs.
Some animals hesitated.
“I’ve never seen it burn anything,” whispered a Goat.
“I’ve never been harmed by it,” said a Bird.
The Wolves sighed patiently.
“That is how clever dragons are.”
Eventually, fear did what truth could not undo.
The animals armed themselves — not because they had been attacked, but because they had been told they would be.
III. The Silence
One morning, as the Sheep rested beneath an olive tree, exhausted from walking on three legs, the animals surrounded him.
He looked up, confused.
“I am just trying to live,” he said.
But no one heard him.
They were too busy listening to the Wolves.
When the Sheep was gone, the valley was quiet.
Too quiet.
The Wolves moved onto the land.
The gold was extracted — “for the greater good,” they said.
The valley changed. The grass thinned.
And the other sheep received… nothing.
The Wolves smiled.
“Peace,” they declared.
And then they looked around… and asked:
“Now… who is the next dragon?”
✦ ✦ ✦
Moral
When wolves offer you a share of what is already yours, they are not proposing partnership — they are asking permission to steal quietly.
And when a sheep says no, the fastest way to take his land is to convince the world he is a dragon.
For when those who profit from fear are trusted to name the monster, even a wounded sheep can be turned into a dragon — and the wolves will never go hungry.
Salima
Just me thinking out loud over here