by S. W. Clarke
You see, there isn’t much literature out there on raising a dragon. Trust me—I’ve searched. Most of what’s out there still talks about dragons in stereotypes: they love hoarding treasure (false), they’re recluses (false), and they’re wildly intelligent (true).
At least, that’d been my experience with this one dragon.
I’d wondered before if there were other dragons out there. Surely there were. If I’d found Percy’s egg at a circus, someone had to have birthed him. But I hadn’t met her. And I had searched for her, too. Frankly, I’d just wanted to meet any dragon.
Not just for me, but for Percy. So he wouldn’t have to feel so strange when pedestrians gawked at him on the street. So he could feel normal. So he didn’t have to wonder why his protector was a five-foot-two blond while he was blue-scaled and yellow-eyed with a tail.
And trying to juggle raising him with chasing the Scarred was a real seam down the center of my life.
I was Tara the protector.
I was Tara the avenger.
The two parts couldn’t be knitted together. They were opposing, always splitting the seam wider. Protecting Percy was mutually exclusive to the bloodlust I felt over their deaths.
My mom, my dad, my little sister.
“Tara?” Percy said.
I jolted, focused on him. “Yeah?”
“You didn’t tell the story. And you stopped brushing.”
I cleared my throat, found my brush-hand just resting stationary on his tail. “I got lost in my thoughts again.” I went on brushing. “So you know how a dog chases a ball when you throw it?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, that game’s no good for little dragons. Because no matter how fast you can throw a ball, it’ll be too slow.”
“So what do the little dragons do?”
I pointed up. “They wait until they see a shooting star in the night sky. Do you know how fast a shooting star flies?”
He paused. “I can’t remember.”
“Up to a hundred and sixty thousand miles per hour. But once it breaks through the atmosphere, it speeds up as gravity pulls it toward the earth.”
“Uh-huh.”
“And as soon as the little dragons see that shooting star, they take off after it. They can chase it anywhere in the world, and they do.”
“What do they find when they get the shooting star?”
I stopped brushing. “A space rock so hot it could even burn you. It’s the biggest tennis ball you’ll ever see.”
“I want a space rock,” he said with a soft sigh. He looked back at me. “How much more do you have to do?”
I took a survey of the scales I’d scrubbed. Not a GoneGodDamn difference. “Box of frogs, Perce. This steel wool isn’t cutting it.”
“But the gnome…”
“Yeah, I believe him.” I dropped the brush into the hay. “But I don’t think this is the way.”
He sighed, turning fully toward me. “So what are we supposed to do?”
I tilted my head at him, a reckless flashbulb of an idea coming to mind. “Well, you are immune to fire…”
Chapter 6
Ever gaslit someone you love?
And I don’t mean in the emotionally abusive way. In this case, I was literally gaslighting my dragon.
That night we flew to a local gas station, where I purchased two gallons of gasoline and a pack of matches. When the attendant leaned out to look for my car and found the parking lot empty except for a blue dragon, his elbows dropped to the counter. “That your ride?”
I glanced out the doors as though to confirm. “Yep.”
“GoneGodDamn,” he said.
“Never seen a dragon?”
His eyebrows lifted as he met my eyes. “Should I have?”
“We’re doing a show in the French Quarter.” I reached into my jacket pocket with a half-smile; flirtation was the name of the street performer’s game. I tapped the card as I set it in his hand. “Believe you me, it isn’t a show to miss.”
“Tara and her Dragon,” he read off, surveying me overtop the card. “May I ask you a question, Tara?”
“Of course.”
He indicated the two gallons of gasoline sitting beside Percy. “If that dragon’s your ride, what do you need those containers for?”
“Why, gaslighting him, of course.” I started out the door, glanced over my shoulder as the bell chimed. “See you at the show.”
He’d be there; men who eyed me that way always were. I wouldn’t start anything with that attendant, but Tara Drake slid on and off me like a familiar jacket. She was my bravado. She was my armor.
Sometimes she came over me so easy, I wondered if she and I were converging.
Percy and I flew back with the two containers tied over his back, sloshing the whole way. When we arrived at the barn, a certain frenetic excitement had overtaken him.
He really was the dragon equivalent of a twelve-year-old boy.
“Now Perce,” I said as he trotted inside, “you don’t think I’m going to light you up overtop a bed of hay, do you?”
He paused, turned back around. Gave a nervous chuckle. “Oh, right.”
We stood in the nearby paddock, which was trodden and barren enough I didn’t have to worry about burning the barn down. That wouldn’t do for either of us—not with the amount I was already spending just to keep a dragon fed.
Feeding him was the equivalent of providing for a household of six kids. And Percy wasn’t even much bigger than a lion yet.
If we had a house, he would have already eaten me out of it.
“Why just the tail?” he groused as I sprinkled the gasoline on the tip of his long, clubbed tail. “Slosh it all over me!”
“I wouldn’t be much of a protector if I lit you up just like that.” I set the container down. “We need a test run. Or two.”
“I can take it. I’m a dragon.”
I pulled out the matches. “Sure, but you’re my dragon. And nothing bad will happen to Percival on my watch.”
He sniffed. “That stuff smells funny.”
“Long as it doesn’t smell good.” I flicked the match, set it to his tail. The flame rushed over a patch of his scales. “How’s that?”
“Fine.”
As the fire died away, I squinted in the floodlights off the barn. When I touched his scales, they weren’t so slippery. “Well I’ll be. Seems that gnome was right about taking the shine off.”
“It’s gone?”
“It’s gone.”
Percy’s scales shifted like a bird’s feathers. He was excited. “All right, Tara—douse me.”
I did another test run on his tail. He complained, of course, but I needed to be surer than sure. Here stood the closest creature I had to family in the world, and I wasn’t about to let him rush me in this.
Of course, the second test run was the same as the first. I’d expected no less: dragon scales were immune to fire.
Finally, finally, I decided to go for it. When I raised the canister over his head, I paused. “Close your eyes, Perce. Don’t want to get any in there.”
He squeezed them shut like a child would.
I doused him like a scorned lover at her ex-husband’s house. I mean, I really got him good—if we were going to do this, I wanted to get it all done in one go.
At the end, I retreated back to the barn to wash myself off. I was unequivocally burnable—a fact which I had a testament to on my wrist. A scar from Percy.
When I came back out, I pulled the pack out of my jacket. Held up another match. “All right, Perce. This is it.”
His eyes remained shut. “I’m ready.”
With a held breath, I lit and tossed the match at him. The tiny flame sailed through the night, landed on him in a burst of fire.
“Empty Hell,” I breathed, resisting rushing to him. He was already encased in flames. “Percy, are you all right?”
He didn’t answer.
I cursed. “I’ll put you out!”
Just as I took a step towa
rd the barn, a cooing came to me. I paused, turned back.
It was Percy.
He only made that noise when he was deeply happy. It was like a cat’s purr, and he most often cooed when we were napping together or I was telling him a bedtime story.
“Perce?”
He laughed. “This is the best feeling I’ve ever had. This is what you humans must mean when you say you’re having an org—”
No. No, no, no. “Perce, don’t say it! Do not say it. How do you know that word, anyway?”
His flaming tail swung back and forth. “Remember that farmhouse out in Kansas? Well, they had HBO, and I turned it on one night while you were out. There were three guys and one woman …”
I raised a hand. GoneGods, I was the worst protector in the universe. “I get it.”
“All three guys were—”
I cleared my throat. “Looks like the fire’s dying out.”
“Aww.” Percy huffed, the flames now burning only a foot high in the warm Louisiana night. “Can we do it again?”
↔
Two days later, I fell into the hay with a curse. That was the tenth time this afternoon, and while we’d gotten much better at the loop-the-loop, I still couldn’t stay on Percy’s back for the whole trick.
Above me, Percy sighed, wings flapping.
I pressed myself up to standing with a groan. “Seems the afterbirth wasn’t the problem, Perce.”
“But I’m way less slippery now.”
“That you are.” I pulled hay out of my braid. “So I suppose we’ve got to dig deeper.”
We’d failed at the trick yesterday, too, but I hadn’t been willing to admit gaslighting Percy wasn’t the solution. Not until today’s practice, when it became unequivocally obvious.
We weren’t working together like we ought to.
Throughout, I couldn’t stop thinking about what Ferris had said about a dragon’s mother being of consummate importance to a fledgling dragon. More important than a human child’s mother.
I’d seen him born. Seen him crack his way right out of his egg, and been with him every day of his life. When he first unfurled his wings, I’d been there to keep him steady. When he first breathed fire, I’d been the one clapping.
But I wasn’t Percy’s mother. He hadn’t imprinted on me.
And I didn’t rightly expect him to. I was just a teenage girl, and he was a dragon. We were different species entirely, and I had my own issues to deal with. I wasn’t cut from a mother’s cloth—not after what happened to my family. My blood sloshed with lust for revenge, with their faces floating in my mind—Dad, Mom, Thelma—every day.
I did my best, but my best often wasn’t enough for a young dragon.
I still cared for Percy. I wanted us to be together always. He was the closest person to me in the world. But as I gazed up at him, I didn’t know how to say any of that. I didn’t know how to tell him how I felt, or whether that might have any effect on our ability to fly together.
There was a wedge between us, and as he got older and more curious, it felt like it only got bigger. Wider.
Sometimes he asked me about other dragons. Sometimes he asked me why he and I looked so different from each other. Sometimes he asked me about his mother.
My answers were never great. Occasionally—as when he asked about his mom—I didn’t have an answer at all. He’d been an egg at a circus, on display for years. Who knew where the circus-runners had gotten him?
In all my life, I didn’t know if we would ever see another dragon. Which frustrated Percy.
So the wedge between us grew. I didn’t know how to remove it.
“Dig deeper?” he said. “How?”
I put on a smile. “You know what I always say about practicing, little egg.”
He sighed. “‘The more you’ve failed, the closer you are.’”
“And don’t you forget it.” Maybe I could show Percy how I felt. Maybe I didn’t have to say it. Yeah right. Because that’s worked to now. “Let’s break for now. We have to get into costume—we’ve got a party to attend.”
I had called Ferris the other day, passing along Mr. Trafficker’s intel about the upcoming party. After some investigative work, the ninjas had determined the gnomelings would be at the party. After a halting conversation on the phone with Ferris the previous day, we’d agreed it was in our best interest for the ninjas and us to sneak into the swanky New Orleans party together.
The gnomes had their reason: to rescue the gnomelings.
And I had my reason: to take down another ex-vamp who’d participated in my family’s murder.
It only made sense for us to infiltrate together.
Of course, Ferris hadn’t been thrilled by my idea for how to infiltrate. I’d told the gnomes to come dressed in glittery outfits, the brighter the better. “Trust me,” I’d said on the phone. “Go loud.”
Percy and I were still getting dolled up when the seven ninjas appeared in the barn. And when they came into the barn, I saw they’d complied.
I applied a streak of shimmer paint right below Percy’s eye. “About time.” I glanced at them. “You guys look cute. Love the color.”
Before me stood seven fabulous gnomes. At some point they must have sprinkled a tub of glitter over themselves, because they were absolutely crystalline under the light. And their robes weren’t black, but varying shades of technicolor: firecracker red, emerald, fuchsia, lemon yellow.
Six of them had folded arms, and Ferris stood with hands on hips. “We’ve done as you asked. Explain.”
I stood, pressing my tinsel-woven braid over my shoulder. “You said it’s like Cirque de Soleil, right? Except we’re Cirque du Dragon … We’re the entertainment.”
One of the ninja’s eyes narrowed. “We haven’t been hired.”
I grabbed a blue tassel from the pile, attached it to one of Percy’s legs. “Do you know how these swanky parties work? We literally just rock up and tell them we’re the entertainment.” I stood. “Trust me, it’ll work.”
Chapter 7
It didn’t work.
As night deepened, the lot of us arrived at the side door to the ornate old building in the French Quarter, and Percy stood behind me, he himself flanked by the seven ninjas like they were his miniature posse.
I stepped up to the security guard. When I smiled at him, he only stared back. Waited for me to speak first. “Hi there,” I offered.
He only said, “What’re you here for?”
I gestured to the swath of colors behind me. “We’re the entertainment, of course.”
He glanced over my shoulder, eyes narrowed as they swept over the whole group of us. Then he pointed past us. “No, you’re not. They are.”
When we turned, four mimes in Edinburgh deathbringer masks stood behind us, waving. One of them patted the air as though stuck behind a wall. The others took the cue, and all four were soon patting as though stuck behind an invisible barrier and couldn’t come any closer.
I turned slowly back to the security guard, and we met eyes. He looked like he’d sniffed a piece of moldy fruit.
I flashed him my most appealing grin.
He sucked in air through his teeth, eyes on the mimes again. “You’d think when the gods left they’d have done us a favor by getting rid of mimes.” He pointed past me. “You four, you’re out.” Then his finger swiveled to us. “You guys, you’re in. Here’s the pay structure …”
Ferris cleared his throat, jingled his way onto the first step to get the guard’s attention. “Are you not even curious as to how we knew about this party, if we weren’t the hired entertainment?”
GoneGods, for a ninja he was distinctly oblivious to interpersonal subterfuge.
He got the hint when the toe of my boot made unsubtle contact with his shin.
The security guard either didn’t notice, or had chosen to ignore it. “I know you entertainer types—I was a carnie once, believe it or not.”
“Oh, I’d believe it,” I said in that impressed
, appraising way you did with men whose egos needed propping.
The first hint of pleasure touched his lips. “You want a gig? Well, here’s your gig.”
Behind us, the mimes all started inaudibly crying as they beat against their invisible prison.
“Sorry, fellas.” I set a hand on Percy’s neck. “Next time you’re in New Orleans, I’d say ixnay on the masks.”
Twenty minutes later, we were set up on the private back lawn. We hadn’t actually entered the building, but the enormous French doors had been left wide open into the night. Inside, I spotted people in gowns and tuxedos milling about, their long-necked champagne glasses glinting in the soft-hued light.
A waiter carrying a platter of half-full glasses swept from one room to another, deftly swinging the platter down to waist-level to offer drinks to the first couple he encountered. A second waiter followed, his platter full of hors d’oeuvre.
Outside, past a statue garden, the lot of us came to the main attraction. And I knew Ferris had been right:
This was Cirque de Soleil for people who liked caviar.
A white walkway had been constructed down the center of the lawn, leading to a stage adorned in gold and silver rings spinning in the faint breeze, like low-hanging chandeliers backdropping whatever would take place up on that pretty white stage.
Meanwhile, tall, circular tables dotted the lawn, each of them gowned in bone-white tablecloths.
“This is where they’ll be auctioned,” Ferris whispered to me.
I leaned down as we walked. “Who?”
“The gnomelings.”
I shot him an appalled glance. “Auctioned?”
His glittering face was grim as he met my eyes. “In the GoneGod World, the last gnomes are invaluable to the wealthy. We have become collectibles.”
Indignant fire shot through my chest. It was the first time the ninjas’ mission had become real to me—real in the sense of my own life, of my desires, my vendetta.
I imagined Percy being auctioned off. Being led down that walkway. Pulled onto that stage.
It was unbearable.
I set a hand on Ferris’s shoulder. “Tell me what I can do.”