by Kim M Watt
Beaufort huffed yellow smoke. “I would suggest, Mortimer, that rather than offering platitudes, you come up with some ideas yourself.”
“Oh. I mean, yes. Sorry.” Mortimer attempted a smile, but it came out goofy and lopsided. Beaufort never snapped. Beaufort was positive and upbeat to the point of it being infuriating, and he never, ever snapped. Which meant that the High Lord was more worried than he let on.
Beaufort sighed slightly, shook his head, then turned back to Wendy and said, “I’m sorry. That blanket is truly charming.” He waved a paw. “Plus the beanie is very fetching. Brings out your scales.”
“It is fetching,” she said sharply. “And I’ll tell you again, I got it from one of those W.I. ladies. You can ask Amelia. She arranged the whole thing in exchange for a few scales.”
“Amelia traded scales?” Mortimer asked.
“Yes, she can get most anything for a couple of scales.” Wendy folded her blanket carefully and clutched it to her chest, as if worried they might try to snatch it off her. “Now, Beaufort, are we quite finished here? Only it’s well past morning tea time.”
Beaufort scratched his chin. “Yes. I think we may as well be. I do believe a different approach is called for.”
Wendy huffed and turned her back on them, and Mortimer followed the High Lord back to his seat. The old dragon was moving slowly, and Mortimer’s belly twisted with a stab of panic. “Umm – Beaufort, sir?”
“Yes, Mortimer.” Beaufort looked up at his Weber as if it was going to take an awful effort to climb onto it.
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry, lad, you were right. This was a silly idea.” The old dragon sighed. “It’s so hard to believe that a Cloverly could have done this. Yet here we are, and with no more idea who’s behind it than before.”
“It might not be a Cloverly,” Mortimer said, worrying at his tail. “And this could still work. Maybe if we had fewer dragons …?”
Beaufort gave him a look that was far more his usual self. “When I said come up with ideas, Mortimer, I meant new ideas.” He scrambled up onto his barbecue. “Now, quiet. I need to settle this lot down.”
“What do you mean, ‘a sideline’?” Mortimer asked. He was trying to stay calm, but, honestly. Trading scales for blankets? And beanies? Trailed by Gilbert, who was slowly recovering his russet colours, he’d dragged Amelia into a quiet corner as the Grand Cavern emptied. Beaufort had apologised for the inconvenience but not the accusation, and Lord Margery had been muttering mutinously. She wasn’t the only one. There had been shouting, and arguing, and even a few snapping teeth and stray fireballs. Mortimer was fairly sure that Rockford and his silly lot had been behind most of that, but Lord Margery had been particularly angry because Amelia had called her a cruel old lizard for upsetting Gilbert. But even she had finally left, and now the cavern was almost empty again, everyone wandering off to their own caves and grumbling about being held up for the morning. Beaufort had refrained from telling everyone not to leave town, although it had taken a mid-speech interruption and all of Mortimer’s best diplomacy to convince him not to.
“Mortimer, have you seen how many baubles and boats we’ve been making?” Amelia asked. “We honestly can’t keep up with demand when we only use our own scales, or what we can find.”
“But I don’t understand. We use the proceeds to benefit the whole clan. Why isn’t everyone just giving us their scales, like we asked them to?”
Amelia rolled her eyes and looked at Gilbert, who shrugged. “Look,” she said, “it’s all very well, the whole clan pulling together idea, but we’re dragons. We like having our own treasure, and sometimes we need a little incentive to do the all for one and one for all thing.”
“Well. Well, I think that’s very shortsighted.”
“You’ve been spending too much time with Beaufort,” Gilbert said. “You’re getting all into lofty ideals and forgetting the fact that we’re all individuals who just aren’t very good at that sort of thing.”
“I never forget that you’re an individual, lad,” Beaufort said from a ledge above them, making Gilbert yelp. “In fact, I can’t.” Gilbert had recently added a second piercing to his tail, and today his claws were purple with yellow spots. Mortimer wasn’t sure if that meant something or was just a style choice. And he was wondering for the first time where the young dragon got his paint.
“Sorry,” Gilbert mumbled. “I didn’t mean anything by it.”
“It’s quite alright,” Beaufort said.
“It’s not,” Mortimer said. “This whole project was about ensuring we all had access to barbecues and gas bottles, so everyone could be comfortable through the winter, and keep the eggs warm, and not be constantly hunting for fuel. Don’t you remember? Five years ago, it was such a bad winter that we spent all our time trying to find enough fuel to keep from freezing. And that was before the time we spent hunting for animals that weren’t even around, it was so cold. Some weeks it was eat or be warm, we didn’t have time for both. We lost three eggs, and they’re rare enough as it is. I’m trying to fix that. I’m trying to make our lives better, and dragons are more interested in, in blankets? And beanies?”
It was quiet for a moment, and now Mortimer couldn’t decide if he was more furious or hungry or just plain tired. He’d been working twenty hours a day in the lead-up to the market, trying to make enough baubles to ensure they’d be able to afford all the gas they needed to see them through winter. Stealing gas bottles had proved risky, given the number of garages with CCTV or that were open 24 hours, and there had been that explosion when a few of the younger dragons got careless and decided to play catch with the bottles on the way home. Not to mention that Cedric, who was maybe not the brightest dragon, kept coming back with bottles of cream, for some inexplicable reason, and no one could convince him he couldn’t run his barbecue on it. All in all, it was best to get Miriam to refill the ones that they had, and he’d organised a way to make that work. For everyone. And now this. A black market in scales, going on right under his snout, for cat blankets and purple beanies. He snorted anxious orange smoke.
“Mortimer,” Beaufort said, his voice deep and serious. “You’re a wonderful young dragon. And all of these things you’ve done have been terribly clever, and I appreciate it enormously. You’re making all our lives better.”
Mortimer didn’t say anything, but he could feel his scales flushing an embarrassed lilac.
“However,” Beaufort continued, “dragons will be dragons. We all crave our own treasure.”
“But aren’t the barbecues enough? And the gas bottles?”
“No,” Amelia said quietly. “Everyone wants something that’s just theirs. Like in the old days, how everyone used to want a crown, or a sword that no one else had. A dragon’s hoard is always their own.”
“Old days,” Beaufort grumbled. “It wasn’t that long ago.”
“So, how does it work, then?” Mortimer demanded. “How’ve you been getting these things?”
“Gert,” Amelia said. “She gets whatever we need, and in return I’ve made her a few dragon-scale toys, and even turned some old rings into a necklace for her. The rest of the scales go straight to the workshop.”
“Very enterprising,” Beaufort said approvingly, shooting Mortimer a cautious glance.
“Yes,” Mortimer said. “I’m sure it is.” He dusted his paws off. “I better go do some work. Especially as it seems we have no shortage of scales.”
He marched out of the cavern and into the rain without looking back.
Mortimer stared around his workshop bleakly. It had taken him months to get it set up just the way he liked, with solid stone benches lit by prisms that collected the light from outside, and the new addition of bright gas lamps. There were chimeneas in the corners, and specially adapted metal clamps and tweezers and hammers and other tools that he’d commissioned from the local dwarfs, and hooks on the walls where they lived when they weren’t in use. There was a deep basket full of gl
ittering scales by one bench, and more baskets of completed baubles and water-activated boats waiting to be taken down to Miriam and boxed up for orders. But what was the point now? No one needed it. No one wanted it. They all thought they could just do this stuff themselves, although doubtless no one was thinking about practical things like gas bottles. No, everyone just wanted beanies.
He hunkered down next to the scale bin and tucked his paws under his belly. Dragons will be dragons. Pah. Well, he’d show them. He wouldn’t get anyone any gas bottles. He’d stop making baubles. He’d just be a selfish old dragon like the rest of them. He’d go to Miriam’s and eat mince pies and be warm, and bollocks to everyone else. He’d watch TV, and drink tea, and make baubles just for her, and sleep on the floor in front of her AGA. He’d – he lowered his chin to the ground and tucked his tail around him, closing his eyes. He’d carry on just as before, because he didn’t want to see even grumpy old Lord Walter shivering in the drafts of the Grand Cavern. He didn’t want to see another dragon crying tears that steamed in the cold embers of their empty nest. He didn’t want to see hatchlings sleeping through the day rather than making nuisances of themselves, because they were too cold and hungry to play. But he was going to sulk for a while first.
“Mortimer?”
Mortimer shook himself, startled to find that he’d fallen asleep. He was more tired than he’d thought. And with the chimeneas out it was cold in here. His tail had gone numb, and his breath hung in the air.
“Lad? Are you in there?” Beaufort’s bulk shut out the weak daylight in the entry tunnel, and Mortimer could hear the old dragon’s claws scratching on the hard stone as he padded in. He wrinkled his nose and held his breath. He couldn’t stand the High Lord’s endless optimism now any more than he’d been able to stand his disappointment earlier.
“Mortimer?”
The younger dragon still didn’t reply, tucking his paws in a little tighter and dropping his snout toward his chest as if that would make him invisible. He was already the anxious grey of the stone. He seemed to spend a lot of time that colour, he thought gloomily.
“I brought you some mince pies. I still had a couple left from the other night.”
Mortimer twitched, but didn’t look up.
“You have wonderful ideas, lad. Wonderful talents. You just have to learn a little about dragon nature. Nature in general, really.”
There was the scraping of scaled skin on the floor, then a clatter as Beaufort bumped into one of the baskets. Half a dozen baubles rolled across the workshop, and Mortimer swallowed a sigh.
“Dragons are individuals. We always have been. Do you know what happens when you try to stop dragons being individuals?” Beaufort paused, giving Mortimer a chance to reply. He didn’t. “They rebel. And the more you try to stop individuality, the more it comes out. So, no matter that you were doing all this for the greater good, once everyone had time again, once they’d stopped having to spend every moment searching for fuel or food, once they didn’t have to spend all their time just surviving, they were always going to go back to finding the things that matter to them, whether it was allowed or not. And because there’s not exactly a whole lot of jewels and swords out there for the taking, it’s going to be blankets and beanies and cushions and – well, I’m not sure, but I’ve heard that Lord Pamela has a whole collection of sheepskins, all dyed a different colour.”
“But how can they not care?” Mortimer blurted, finally lifting his head. “How can they not care if everyone’s okay, not just them?”
“They do. If it was watch the other Cloverlies starve or give up their beanies, they’d hand them over in an instant. But it’s not. You’ve given them freedom to have both.”
“But it’s sneaky!”
“We are dragons, lad.”
“But,” Mortimer sat up properly and glared at the old dragon. “But why didn’t they just say? We could have handled it all, done it through Miriam, not risked other human/dragon contact.”
“Dragons, remember. There’s a proper way, and the dragon way.”
“You knew. You knew this was going on. Am I the only one who didn’t know?” His chest was hot. How could be so stupid? He was meant to be smart. Everyone said he was smart!
"I didn’t know exactly, but I do know dragons. I've been one for an awfully long time."
"Why didn't you tell me? Warn me to look out for it, at least?"
"Because these things need to happen. Anything I stopped would have started up again differently, and maybe more riskily. Sometimes it’s best to let things happen and see where it goes. As it turns out, Amelia did rather wonderfully. She’s a clever one. She saw the demand, and rather than letting dragons run off trying to trade scales any old place, she channelled it to make sure you had all the scales you could ever need, and that there weren’t half a dozen dragons trawling around the village peeking in shop windows on a Monday morning.”
Mortimer sighed. He still felt foolish for not realising, and was trying to decide if he felt more admiration for Amelia, or resentment that he hadn’t been included. “You still could have told me that you suspected something was going on,” he said, knowing he sounded peevish but not really caring. He had a right to feel peevish. He’d started the whole trade agreement, and now everyone was just jumping on board like it was a, a, well – one of those sale things he’d seen on Miriam’s TV.
“I could have. But I didn’t like to get involved when it seemed that whatever was happening was working rather well.”
Mortimer spluttered, his scales starting to take on their usual purples and blues. “You didn’t like to get involved?”
Beaufort grinned. He’d turned a gas lamp on, flooding the little cavern with light, and it shone off his teeth rather dramatically. “I choose what I involve myself in, Mortimer. Young dragons figuring out how the economics of the clan are going to work is not something I want to be in the middle of.”
Mortimer thought of about half a dozen possible retorts, then gave up. “Fine. I guess I get it. It doesn’t mean I like it, though.”
“We don’t get to like everything, but if it works and doesn’t hurt anyone, we need to accept it.”
Mortimer made a face. “Do you have those mince pies?”
Beaufort handed the box over, and Mortimer took it, then reluctantly gave the second tart back. “How do you know?”
“Know what?”
“What to get involved in. What to turn a blind eye to.”
“That, lad, is centuries of practise. You’ll get the hang of it.”
Beaufort ate his mince pie with evident enjoyment, and Mortimer nibbled at his own, thinking that the High Lord’s words had sounded a little ominous. He wasn’t at all sure he wanted to get the hang of those sort of things. It all seemed very … Lord-ish.
5
Alice
Alice knew she wasn’t the most patient person in the world, but Miriam was being impossible today. It was all very well having a few drinks to get through a stressful situation. She had even been known to do it herself at times, such as back in those rather unpleasant days when her unsatisfactory husband was still recently missing and the police were asking all their questions. But if you were going to drink, you really had best be able to handle yourself.
“For goodness’ sake, Miriam, what are you doing?” Alice asked, as the younger woman tripped over the kerb for the third time. She seemed to be spending more time looking over her shoulder than at where she was going as they trudged through the damp, empty streets. They really should have taken the car, but it hadn’t been raining this heavily when they’d set off.
“I’m looking for that cat,” Miriam said. She finally had some colour back in her cheeks, but her eyes were anxious.
“I rather doubt, even if it was one of those Watch cats, that it’d be following us in this weather.”
“But it did come out after us. What if it overheard us?”
“Then it did. We can’t be paralysed by the fear a cat’s watching
us. That’s just ridiculous.”
“It’s not. Beaufort said this Watch might be looking into the attack on the postman.”
Alice sighed. Miriam was right, of course, but there wasn’t much they could do if the cat had overheard them. Sneaky things. And what a peculiar world it had become since meeting Mortimer and Beaufort. On the whole, she rather liked it, but this worrying about cats was no good.
“Is there a name for it?” Miriam was saying.
“A name for what, dear?”
“For the fear that a cat’s watching you. There’s one for ducks. Ana-something. Anatiddly? Anantiduck?”
Alice stopped. “What on earth are you talking about?”
“Anatidaephobia. That’s it.”
“Miriam, do you want to go home?” Alice regarded her with some concern. There was rain dripping off Miriam’s nose, and her hair was even frizzier than normal.
“Hmm? Oh, um, no. I’m okay. But that’s a real thing, you know. The duck thing.”
“I rather doubt it. Look, I can do this on my own. If you’re going to spend the whole time worried about cats, there’s really no point.”
“No, I want to help.” Miriam sounded offended, and wiped rain out of her eyes. “I’m just not feeling a hundred percent.”
“Yes. That we’ve gathered.” Alice headed off again, the rain slicking off her wax jacket and running down her arms. She was glad she’d invested in some new Hunter wellies this year. They really were most comfortable. She looked sideways at Miriam’s paisley print boots. They had a hole in the toe, which wouldn’t be helping matters.
Jasmine’s house was a new and rather pretty semi-detached close to the Skipton edge of town, with big front windows that showed off a Christmas tree tilting somewhat dangerously over the living room sofa. They trooped up to the door and Alice rang the bell with cold, rain-wrinkled fingers, setting off hysterical barking inside. She made a face.