The Dragon's Christmas Wish

by Georgette St. Clair

  They were as tall as the Balthazar Clan Drakken, and they had reddish scales on their foreheads. They wore fur boots, leggings and fur capes, and to Liza’s horror, she saw that they had skulls and bones as adornments.

  They also were carrying spears, and stalking through the crowd, giving haughty, threatening looks to the humans.

  Oddly enough, Liza saw one of them exchange a glance with Roger. Roger nodded slightly, and his thin lips twitched into a smirk.

  What was that all about?

  Jaspar and his clan hurried over and surrounded the Harbingers. Their leader, Liza knew, was called Deathbringer Fabian.

  “Let us pass,” Fabian snarled at Jaspar. “Or it will not go well with you.”

  Deputy Mayor Kristoff, a portly man with a white beard and curled-up mustache, had been singing with the carolers, but now he hurried over.

  “There are no weapons allowed here in town!” he said indignantly. “You are frightening the families with your spears and your…” He gestured at the skulls sewn onto Fabian’s cape. “Those things. You must leave at once.”

  “We will own your world soon,” Deathbringer Fabian sneered, his lips curling.

  Jaspar walked right up to Fabian, shoving his face close to his. “Leave now, or we take to the skies.” His eyes glowed. “And we know that you won’t do that, because you are the weaker Drakken. You are all weaker than us, or you would have formally declared war long ago.”

  Fabian’s eyes glowed bright red, and smoke curled up from his nostrils. Several children in the crowd started crying, and their families grabbed them and hurried away.

  “Perhaps that is about to change,” Fabian boasted, and then turned and stalked off, followed by his clan members.

  Chapter Ten

  The next morning, Jaspar woke with an uneasy premonition. His premonitions were never wrong.

  Something bad was about to happen.

  He dressed quickly, glancing with regret at his bed. He wanted Liza there with him, by his side, every night. He hoped that she would soon agree to marry him and he could begin planning the wedding party.

  He hurried out to meet with his brothers. They were in the kitchen eating breakfast.

  “Have the Harbingers tried anything else?” Jaspar demanded of them.

  They all shook their heads.

  “Our surveillance drones have been watching their hotel all night,” Korl said. “They did not leave the grounds.”

  Jaspar walked outside to find Liza, and saw that she was standing by one of her family’s booths, talking to a man he did not recognize. She was scowling, and looked very unhappy.

  He did not know what was wrong, but he felt an instant rage roar through him. Someone was upsetting his heart-mate.

  He hurried over to her, and to his surprise, she spun around and glared at him, angrier than he had ever seen her before. “You son of a bitch.”

  He stood there and considered this. He knew what a bitch was. There was only one person she could be referring to. “Has my mother said something to you? You are angry at my mother, am I correct?”

  “Oh no, your mother has nothing to do with this.” She practically spat the words at him. “And to think that I was falling for you. Drakken can’t lie? Riiight. Just goes to show that you can’t believe everything you read in the Encyclopedia Galactica.”

  He stared at her as she stomped away.

  What had just happened?

  Korl walked up to him. “Is this a bad time?” he asked.

  “What could possibly give you that impression?” Jaspar grated between his teeth.

  “You’ve gone scaly and there is smoke pouring from your nostrils.”

  Jaspar answered with one frustrated jerk of his head. “Yes, this is a bad time.”

  “Sorry,” Korl said. “We need to head to the conference center right away. The humans filed a complaint with their local Galactic Representative, and the Arbitrator has summoned both clans.” He smiled eagerly. “I hope it turns into a death battle!”

  “I could use a good slaughter right now,” Jaspar growled in agreement.

  He and his clan gathered and flew to the meeting place, arriving two hours later, as they had been ordered.

  Deathbringer Fabian was there, along with most of his men and several females. Jaspar recognized Valeria the Bloody.

  Clever. Since the females were genetically able to lie, they could do some of the negotiating.

  They gathered before the stage in the big, empty meeting room, and a hologram of the Arbitrator, a human named Orion, appeared.

  “Greetings, oh wise one! The Balthazar clan threatened us and attempted to challenge me,” Fabian said quickly.

  Orion gazed at him and raised an eyebrow. “I am told that you went into town carrying weapons, which is against the laws of this colony. Until ownership of the colony is decided, you will still follow their rules. As for the individual challenge, the Balthazar Regis was within his legal rights.”

  Fabian scowled. “The Balthazar Clan has been spying on us and on this meeting place.”

  “But so have you, haven’t you?” Jaspar said.

  “We most certainly have not,” Valeria said indignantly. “We have been completely aboveboard in all our dealings here.”

  “Is this true?” Jaspar demanded of Fabian.

  “You heard what my princess said,” the leader said.

  It was a classic example of Harbinger manipulation.

  He was telling the truth, after all; Jaspar had indeed heard what the female had said.

  “You must answer his question,” the hologram said to Fabian.

  “Which question must I answer?” Fabian wheedled.

  “Did your people also station spies to watch our hotel and this place?” Jaspar repeated.

  The leader glared at him.

  “Yes, we did,” he snarled, his eyes briefly going reptilian, bright red with an angry vertical black slit.

  “Then both of you may station guards here until the actual meeting takes place, to ensure that there is no sabotage.” The Arbitrator looked annoyed. “You are meeting in a week; please stay away from each other until then. Since the Harbingers have broken the laws of the human world, I forbid them from entering the town again.” And he faded out.

  Jaspar flashed a scornful look of triumph at the leader of the Harbinger Clan, and then he and his clan headed back to the bed and breakfast.

  He needed to find out why his heart-mate was angry with him. He would not rest until he knew and figured out how to make it right

  That was no easy task, however. Liza avoided him all day, barely speaking to him. At the end of the day, she hurried to her room at the bed and breakfast and locked the door. She did not answer when Jaspar knocked.

  A couple of days went by like this, with Liza working all day and ignoring Jaspar at night. Jaspar knew that he could have insisted that Liza honor her agreement and go on a date with him, but he did not want to force her to be with him. He wanted her to want to be with him. He wanted her to look at him the way she had before she’d become angry with him…with that light shining in her eyes and the smile playing on her rosy lips.

  On the third morning, Jaspar saw her get up and hurry over to her grandmother’s house at six a.m. He followed her over there and knocked.

  Liza’s grandmother pulled the door open.

  Jaspar bowed to her. “Greetings, baker of goods and ancestor of my heart-mate.”

  Her grandmother just looked at him and shook her head from side to side, disappointment in her eyes.

  Liza stomped up, glowering at him. Marjan followed her, accompanied by La La. Even La La looked angry, Jaspar was shocked to see.

  He pulled a piece of candy from his leather belt-pouch and offered it to La La. She slapped it out of his hand and stomped on it with her little booted paw. “Sriii, sriii, la, la,” she spat.

  Marjan looked amused. “Shall I tell you into which orifice she suggests you shove your gift?”

  “Ah, no, I p
refer that to remain a mystery.”

  “Why are you here?” Liza demanded.

  “You know why. I am here to find out why you’re angry.”

  “Really. That’s how you’re going to play it.” Liza met his stare challengingly.

  Jaspar shook his head in confusion. “We are playing? What are we playing? I do not like this game at all.”

  “Fine,” Liza snapped. “Apparently, an investigation at the Weather Control Station revealed a couple of Drakken scales next to a machine that had been sabotaged. Silver, tinged with black.” She glared at him. “Now, if it were just a matter of you trying to make sure that we were stuck there for our date, I could look past it and chalk it up to you wanting to spend more time with me. But the fact is, you swore to me that you didn’t sabotage the weather station. And you also claimed that your species is incapable of lying.”

  “We are,” Jaspar said.

  “Yeah, so it said in the Encyclopedia Galactica, but you lied about sabotaging the weather station, which means that you are capable of lying in general. The only reason I believed you when you said you weren’t spreading the fungus was because you said you couldn’t lie. But you can. And if you can lie about one thing, then you could be lying about everything.”

  “That logic cannot be denied,” Jaspar said.

  “You admit it?” Her eyes widened in astonishment.

  “Good heavens,” Mawmaw said. “I never thought I’d say this, but I don’t believe I can wish you a Merry Christmas anymore. You…you deserve coal in your stocking.”

  Was that bad? From the look on her face, Jaspar suspected it was bad.

  “We do not lie, and I did not sabotage the weather machine or your planet. I am a warrior, not a saboteur. I am simply agreeing that you are correct – if I could lie at all, then I would be able to lie about everything. Now I must go do some investigating.”

  “Take your time,” Liza said, glaring. “A century or two would be fine with me.”

  “And to think that I invited him to decorate a tree with us,” her grandmother said as he turned and left their house. “Why, he’s a regular…Scrooge!” There were tears in her eyes. “There. I said it.”

  Jaspar had a feeling that the woman had just said the worst curse that could possibly pass her lips. He actually felt terrible, even though he had not done anything wrong. The fact that Liza and her grandmother believed it had him deeply rattled.

  Chapter Eleven

  The investigation did not take too long. Jaspar had one main suspect, and as soon as he ascertained the truth, he gathered that suspect, and his brothers and his clan mates, and they headed over to the guest cottage.

  His brothers and clan mates stood there expectantly, as Marjan and Liza and her family walked into the kitchen. Everyone was there but Loren. Liza was holding La La in her arms, and La La was watching them all with bared, needle-like teeth.

  “Mother, do you have something you would like to say to everybody here?” Jaspar said, glaring ferociously at her.

  “Many things,” Karmelite said. “For instance, I would like to thank them for their hospitality and their sharing of their most quaint and delightful holiday customs. Also, I would be most happy to tell them about our home world, which they have not yet visited and—”

  “Is there anything you would like to confess to them?” Jaspar said, and scales covered his body in a silvery sheet. Smoke began drifting from his mouth and nostrils.

  “Nothing at all, actually,” his mother said to him, batting her enormous eyes. “Why would I want to confess something? If I did something wrong, then obviously I would wish to conceal it.”

  “You try my patience, Mother. Tell them now. I am your Regis, and I command it,” Jaspar snarled.

  His mother rolled her eyes like a chastised child. “Oh, very well,” she said. “My son was not the one who sabotaged the weather machine. It was me.”

  “Did you have help?” Jaspar said, glowering at her.

  “Well, of course. I had Loren actually do it for me. But it is entirely my fault. I told him what to do, and threatened him with revealing his most embarrassing dragonling secrets if he didn’t help me.”

  “And what else did you have him sabotage?” Jaspar continued relentlessly.

  “Well, the translator, of course,” his mother said. “Although he didn’t do the best job there. It was supposed to stop working the moment you landed at the restaurant.”

  “I don’t understand,” Liza protested. “Why would you conspire to force Jaspar and me to spend the night together if you’re opposed to this match?”

  His mother shrugged gracefully. “I believed that you two would have a terrible date, especially without the translator working, and forcing you to spend an entire night together would definitely make you see that you are not suited for each other.”

  “Well, you failed miserably, because we actually had the most wonderful date of all time.” Jaspar flashed his mother a triumphant look.

  “It was?” Liza said.

  “It most certainly was,” Jaspar said.

  Liza found herself warming to him a little bit again.

  Okay, a lot.

  Marjan wasn’t so easy to convince. “I still don’t trust you,” she said to Korl. “And if your Regis hurts my friend in any way – and that includes her feelings, then he will answer to me.”

  “But if you hurt my Regis, then you answer to me,” Korl said.

  “Your threats bear all the weight of a Larcoosian skimron,” Marjan scoffed.

  Everybody stared at her.

  “They’re not very frightening,” she explained.

  “Yeah, I figured that, from the context,” Liza said.

  “My goodness, I’m so happy that we resolved all this!” Mawmaw said, beaming at them. “I do hate to be angry at Christmas time.”

  She grabbed a plate of cookies from the counter and held one out to Karmelite. Karmelite took it and regarded it with suspicion.

  “What type of poison do these sugar circles contain?” she asked suspiciously. “My system can metabolize many types of poison, but not all.”

  “They don’t contain any poison,” Liza said, grabbing one and stuffing it in her mouth. She chewed and swallowed. “These are my grandmother’s famous sugar cookies. She would never sully the ancient family recipe with poison.”

  “But this makes no sense,” Karmelite protested. “The appropriate thing for your family to do at this point would be to try to punish me.”

  “No, not at all. You did the right thing by telling the truth, so the appropriate thing to do is reward you.” Mawmaw was beaming now. Her faith in basic decency had been restored.

  “I side with Scaly Satan’s mother on this one,” Marjan said. “The appropriate thing to do would be to pun— awk!” she finished as Mawmaw shoved a cookie into her mouth. “Nopf fair. Ypf knpf I cpnt refift these,” she complained, mouth full.

  Jaspar’s mother stood there, shaking her head, with a frown on her face.

  “What was that you said, dear?” Mawmaw said.

  “I didn’t say— urpf!” Karmelite said as Mawmaw shoved two cookies in her mouth.

  “Should have seen that coming,” Liza said smugly.

  Karmelite chewed the cookies.

  She grabbed several more. Everybody stared at her.

  “What?” she said defensively. “I am not entirely convinced that there is no poison in these sugar circles. My constitution is extremely strong. Therefore, the more of these sugar circles I consume, the less likely it is that anyone else will perish from the human’s treachery.”

  And with that, she grabbed the plate of cookies and walked out of the house.

  “I’ll make you a copy of my recipe,” Mawmaw called after her, “but I’ll leave out the poison!”

  La La had retracted her teeth. She walked over to Jaspar, tugged on his legging, and held out both her paws.

  “I accept your apology,” Jaspar said to her, and gave her two pieces of candy from his ba
g. She stuffed them both in her mouth right away and did three back flips.

  “I believe that you owe me a date that should start, say, at lunch time,” Jaspar said triumphantly to Liza.

  Liza glanced at her grandmother. She needed time to think. Her emotions were in a whirl. The last several days had been terrible. When she’d believed that Jaspar had been lying to her, the sense of betrayal had cut her to the bone. She’d craved his presence all the time, and had to fight to resist it. She’d tossed and turned all night, yearning for his warmth, his kiss, his touch… She’d forced herself to wall him out. If she let him back in, could she ever escape? What if he betrayed her for real? She didn’t know if her heart could survive that.

  He won’t, a little voice deep inside her whispered. He would never betray you, and you know it.

  She rubbed her face with her hands. Stall. She needed to stall. “I need to help my grandmother. We’re still getting a lot of customers.”

  Mawmaw shook her head. “Oh, don’t worry, your grandfather and I can handle it, and I brought in a couple of people from town to help out.”

  “Seriously?” Liza glared at her, eyes narrowed. “Why is everyone conspiring against me to force me to date this highly questionable alien?”

  Her grandmother shrugged. “He kind of grows on you, actually,” she said.

  Liza snorted. He had indeed grown on her, but not in a way that she was going to discuss with her grandmother.

  “You’re just a sucker for romance stories that start at Christmas,” Liza said. She glanced at Jaspar. “All right, you win,” she said. “What kind of date are we going on?”

  “I will show you my ship,” he said.

  * * * * *

  That afternoon, as Jaspar and Liza were headed to the hovercraft, Korl hurried over, waving at them.

  “We spotted some unusual Harbinger activity,” Korl said to Jaspar. “We’ve seen a group of them wandering around in an area several miles outside town. They’ve been there several times. There’s nothing there – no buildings, no houses, just dead apple trees. We just saw a new group head out there today, about half a dozen of them.”