A Dragon's Guide to the Care and Feeding of Humans Read online

  “I just got in a new shipment,” Clipper said. “And as thanks for helping me, I’ll throw in some of those seaweed cakes you like so much.” She arched an eyebrow. “Or perhaps you’d prefer a tiara for the Spelling Bee.”

  Winnie immediately piped up. “You get a crown for spelling words?”

  I held a claw up to my muzzle. “You’re not supposed to interrupt grown-ups when they’re holding a conversation.”

  Clipper leaned forward and said in a conspiratorial voice to Winnie, “She’s always cranky before she’s had her afternoon tea.”

  Winnie tilted forward so she could whisper loudly, “Do you have anything else that will make a dragon less grumpy?”

  Clipper folded her arms in amusement. “Short of a personality transplant, no. But I do have a nice selection of wooden clubs. Perhaps one of them would do the trick.”

  I tapped Winnie’s snout. “I didn’t bring you here just so you could insult me.”

  She looked right past my claw and at Clipper. “I’ll take the biggest club you have.”

  “I’m afraid you don’t look strong enough to lift it.” Resting her arms on the counter, Clipper smiled. “But I can tell you what the Spelling Bee is, since the old grump won’t.” As an old friend enjoying this new game, Clipper ignored my frantic signals to keep quiet.

  Winnie listened with growing excitement as Clipper told her about tomorrow’s Enchanters’ Fair. “All the magical creatures get together and hold all sorts of competitions. And at the end, there’s a contest of wits and spells that we call the Spelling Bee, and the winner becomes the monarch of the festival.” Clipper motioned to me. “Miss Drake has won every year since it started.”

  “I’m going to let someone else be Queen Bee this year,” I said impatiently. Lowering my head, I slid my purse off my neck and emptied the pearls into a nearby tray. “Please deduct my purchases from this and transfer the remaining money to the usual account.” That was the trust fund that Whitlock, Hound and Spurge administered. They would draw from the fund to pay Winnie’s tuition to the Spriggs Academy. It offered its students a range of unique educational opportunities, but none of them came cheap.

  “Certainly,” Clipper said, beginning to count the shining pearls. “You’ve been very busy, Miss Drake.” Her delicate eyebrows immediately rose. “Ah, of course, you’ve been grieving for Miss Amelia.” She nodded sympathetically as she finally understood why I had so many pearls and why I didn’t feel like participating in the Spelling Bee.

  Winnie, though, couldn’t get the Fair out of her head. “I think you ought to enter the contest this year.”

  “You have no say in this,” I said firmly, and added to Clipper, “Winnie needs something lightweight but warm when we fly.”

  “I have just the thing.” Clipper drifted up into the misty heights and then descended with a silvery scarf. “This is woven from the wool of ice sheep.”

  “Ice sheep?” Winnie asked.

  Clipper wound the scarf around Winnie’s neck until the lower half of her face was hidden by woolen folds. “There. You’ll be nice and toasty-roasty in a moment.”

  I thought of Winnie’s painting. She had promise as an artist, but of course, it would never do to praise a pet unduly. Their heads can swell up with the tiniest crumb of flattery. “And something to keep Winnie from becoming idle before school starts. Perhaps a sketchbook to draw in?”

  From under the counter, Clipper drew a sketchbook covered in crimson shantung silk. “I’ve got something every other artist will envy. I found this in an old trunk that I bought at an auction. The pages are all empty, and I’ll sell it half price for my new friend.”

  Winnie caressed the silk cover and mumbled something about its smoothness.

  Suddenly she yanked the scarf away from her mouth. “Hey, it tingles.”

  “That’s probably static electricity from the silk on the cover,” I said.

  “Or residual magic from my shop.” Clipper began to wrap my purchases in blue paper and tie up the bundle neatly with red twine.

  If my friend had only known what the sketchbook really was, she would never have parted with it for a roomful of dragon pearls but kept it for herself. And if I had known how much trouble it was going to cause, I would never have let Winnie touch it—let alone use it.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Encourage your pet to pursue his or her talents or your pet will be bored and bore you as well.

  The scarf kept Winnie comfortable on the flight back, just as Clipper had promised. But I should have tied it around her mouth like a gag. All the way home, she kept pestering me about the Fair, especially the Spelling Bee.

  I landed on the hospital rooftop and transformed to my human form, and we walked back to my rooms, where I was looking forward to curling up with a well-earned cup of tea. Winnie, though, began to poke and pry around my living room. “Where’s all your tiaras from the other Fairs?”

  Some humans become greedy monsters when they see gold and jewels, so I didn’t want to expose her to them until I knew her better.

  “There are no tiaras,” I fibbed. “Nor medals nor trophies nor plaques. The winner just gets some applause, and then everyone goes home.”

  “But Clipper said—” she began to protest.

  I cut her off. “That was just more bad sprite humor.”

  “I think you ought to at least get a blue ribbon,” Winnie said, exasperated.

  “Like a prize cow? No thank you,” I said. “The real prize is the satisfaction of being the best in San Francisco.”

  “And beating everyone else,” Winnie grunted.

  I thought of my rival, Silana, grinding her teeth year after year when I won, and I simply smiled. But when Winnie kicked off her shoes and flopped down on my sofa as if she were trying to put a permanent dent in it, I tried to hint that she should leave. “Don’t you have to go and check on your mother?”

  “Nope.” Winnie showed me her smartphone. “Mom texted me that the therapist said she’s doing really well and that she’s meeting Ms. Dylis for tea.”

  Dylis Whitlock was the lawyer who handled the trust. She came from a fine old dwarf family and had her ear to the stone, as the dwarves liked to say when they thought someone was sensible. I was glad that she and Winnie’s mother had hit it off—just not this afternoon.

  Winnie pillowed her head on her hands. “You know, I wouldn’t mind having some tea myself.”

  I pretended to yawn. “Actually, I was thinking of taking a nap.”

  The second hint sailed over her head just like the first one had. “Go ahead. I’ll make my own tea.” She swung her legs off the sofa.

  I could have retreated into my bedroom for some privacy and a rest, but leaving Winnie unsupervised in my living room was like asking a cat to babysit a nest of chicks. Nothing would be the same when I returned.

  “Perhaps I’m feeling a little parched after all,” I said, and changed to my proper form. “Ah, much more comfortable.” I stretched luxuriously.

  She knew enough now not to interrupt me in mid-spell. “What’s kloot … kloot …?” she asked.

  So she’d been watching and listening. “Kluttänk,” I corrected her. “It means ‘change’ in a language long dead.” And just in case she had any ideas of trying to change her own shape, I added, “But you’ll get frustrated if you try to copy me. You have to put a bit of your soul into a spell before it’ll work. It’s like putting fuel into the gas tank of a car.”

  “Teach me,” she said eagerly.

  “It’s not my place to do that,” I told her, “and very few can work magic, so don’t be disappointed if you can’t.”

  Fluffy was not magically inclined, but managed, with a little help, to pass her introductory classes at Spriggs. She learned about magic in them yet never was able to pursue it further. She didn’t need to. She had me to protect her. And so would Winnie.

  “Will you please open the parcel and get the tea?” I asked.

  As she tore off the paper excited
ly, I thought her face must look as happy as this when she opened a birthday present—whether it had been bought in a store or was a homemade one like her checkers. She never took her eyes off the silk sketchbook as she handed me the tea.

  When I brought the tray of tea things from the kitchen, Winnie was lying on her stomach, drawing in her new sketchbook. She was focused on her work, filling page after page.

  As I set the seaweed cakes on a platter and prepared the tea, I glanced at her every now and then. If Winnie had been a cat, I think she would have been purring contentedly.

  Sitting down in my favorite chair, I found myself enjoying the scene after all. I was glad that Winnie had insisted on staying.

  I leaned my head back and began to see the possibilities the future might hold for us, my new pet and me. I couldn’t imagine a cozier picture than Winnie drawing on the sofa while I sipped my tea. And I wondered if Fluffy had known how much Winnie would need a friend—and that I would need one too.

  Maybe she expected our lives together to be like this … full of happy flights and quiet, pleasant moments.

  If so, how very wrong she was.

  Later that evening, as Winnie slumbered in her bedroom and I fell asleep in my apartment, our dreams were sweet and forgettable. But in the cool, foggy summer night, something was stirring—something unpredictable and unforgettable.

  I did not know what was happening then, but I can imagine it now.

  The sketchbook sitting by Winnie’s open window began to glow, a pale shimmer first dancing along the edges and then spreading across the covers and down the spine. Then the pages inside began to gleam from one to the next until all were shining with a golden light.

  The pages fluttered, gently, then wilder and wilder, until the book was flung open, the dancing pages flickering and fanning in a half circle of light. Quickly, small, frightened shapes skittered into the darkness: some leaping to the floor below, some fleeing and fluttering out the window, down the ivy vines, and into the misty garden.

  Magic seen can be thrilling or horrifying. But too often unseen magic simply changes the way things are in bewildering ways.

  Before dawn, the book snapped shut, dark and still again, and all our troubles began.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Be firm with your pet and make it clear what is acceptable behavior. Both you and your pet will be happier for it.

  Early Saturday morning, I had resolved to curl up with a good book and stay in my apartment all day.

  I made a pot of Rangoon tea, but as the flowery scent filled the living room, I heard the rapping at the door.

  Winnie’s voice sounded muffled from beyond. “Miss Drake, you gotta see this.”

  “Civilized conversation begins only after my first cup of tea,” I answered loudly. “So go away.”

  I heard Winnie’s key click in the lock.

  Be firm, I told myself, no matter how much she cries or begs to stay.

  “Look, I have something to show you.” Winnie sailed triumphantly into the room, balancing her sketchbook on her palms as if she were presenting a huge diamond. She twirled around and around and laid it on the coffee table. “Come see. Come see,” she called merrily.

  What I could see was one silly little flibbertigibbet who was not going to be satisfied until I did what she asked.

  “I spent all evening working on it,” she said, flopping on the couch. “I used all the colored pencils I could find to make everything look right.” Picking up the book, she spread it open wide so I couldn’t miss the display.

  “Well,” I said, folding my forelegs, “I’ve heard of invisible ink before, but not invisible pencils.”

  The sketchbook’s pages were blank—as blank as they were when Clipper sold it to us.

  Winnie’s head dipped down to look.

  “They’re gone,” she said in dismay, and began to flip through page after page. “Every single one is gone.”

  I was just about to say something witty and perhaps a bit sharp, but when I saw how upset she was, I bit my tongue.

  “What is gone?” I asked her as softly as I could. As she stared at a blank page, she was growing more distressed by the moment. So I slipped the book from her grasp and shut it with a thud.

  “My pictures.” Winnie’s voice was trembling. “My wonderful, wonderful pictures of the rare and magical creatures. But now they’re all gone. What happened?”

  As my paws held the book, I felt a thin but lingering tingle run across my claws. Dread slid like a small, swift lizard down my shoulders, settling between my wings.

  I shivered. Oh, Clipper. There was magic in this book. Why didn’t you sense it? Why didn’t I? Or did something awaken the magic just now? It felt like a restless kind of magic, too, one that wanted to be noticed.

  With her tiny snout, Winnie would have missed the many clues that a dragon could detect. Lifting the book, I sniffed it cautiously and smelled the graphite, wax, and pigments of her modern pencils. They almost masked the scent of papyrus reeds harvested from a marsh under a full moon … the dampness of silkworms weaving their cocoons upon a golden skeleton … and the … yes—it was unmistakable—the bark from the dancing trees of Serendip, which dance only in a solar eclipse.

  Paper is made partly with linen or other plant fibers, but only a strange and magical paper would be made with such exotic and costly ingredients.

  I was the one who needed calming now, so I took several deep breaths before I picked up my tablet. As she began to thumb through her sketchbook again, looking for her missing pictures, I searched the magical databases. I didn’t like what I found.

  “Winnie, did you remove the book’s seal?” I asked.

  She drew her eyebrows together in puzzlement. “You mean like the kind with flippers that eats fish?”

  “No, the seal could have been some symbol drawn inside the book, or perhaps a piece of wax with a design stamped on it—or even something like a sticker,” I explained.

  “Well, there was something,” Winnie said. “A bunch of squiggly lines that suddenly showed up inside the back cover. I thought some kid had scribbled them there, but they came right off when I rubbed them.” She held up her thumb.

  “That would have been the seal,” I said, feeling the wing muscles tense tightly along my shoulders. So much for my leisurely day of reading. “And it probably only appeared to the book’s owner at a certain hour each night. Removing the seal let your sketchlings come to life. They’re currently wandering around the neighborhood and perhaps all around San Francisco.”

  “Cool,” Winnie said.

  It was not quite the reaction I had been expecting. Fear or remorse or confusion, yes, but not such … enthusiasm.

  “No, it is not cool,” I corrected her. “Remember what I told you about the Agreement?”

  “Sure, but I haven’t told anyone about you or the other magicals,” she said.

  “According to the Agreement,” I explained, “we magicals cannot use our powers or work magic openly where too many humans can find out.”

  Winnie asked, “Like if some of the neighbors saw my sketchlings …?”

  “It would be bad,” I said. “So let’s not let things come to that.” I got another cup from the kitchen and poured tea into it. Then I placed it in front of Winnie. “While you drink this, I want you to try to remember how many pictures you drew.”

  Winnie took a sip. “Umpteen.”

  I told myself to be patient. “Umpteen is not as precise a figure as I would like.”

  Winnie stared into her cup a moment. “I drew something different across each page. I think I filled at least a quarter of the sketchbook.”

  I flicked open the book and fanned the pages. “I count eighty pages, and if you were right about a quarter full, we should have twenty to find.”

  “How did you count the pages so fast?” Winnie asked.

  “Training,” I told her. “Some skills are no longer taught or valued. A shame. But back to the sketchbook. Did you draw a kobold or dro
ught demon?”

  She seemed offended. “Why would I want to draw those wicked and mean things? I like interesting things and pretty ones—like that pemburu. I got to use so many colored pencils when I drew it. I added a few new colors for fun.”

  The pemburu had been so small that I didn’t worry about it. “What else?”

  She sipped her tea and thought for a bit. “There was that mini-pteranodon.”

  “Not pretty, but interesting.” Picking up my tablet, I carefully tapped the buttons on the reinforced screen.

  “Yup,” said Winnie. “I saw a big one at the natural history museum. My dad took me there whenever he could. We both loved the dinosaur rooms the most.”

  To her credit and my dismay, Winnie had a remarkable memory of many of the magical creatures she had seen in Clipper’s shop. Some she had drawn just one sketch of, and others she drew several times. So there were two dragonets and a couple of neon lizards to track down. Delightful!

  I counted the list. “That makes nineteen. What about number twenty?”

  Winnie shifted uneasily and looked away. “Maybe that was all.”

  Pandora and her box, I muttered to myself, had nothing on you and your sketchbook, my pet. But I could see she was feeling bad about the runaway sketches, so I memorized the list. When I finished, I set the tablet on the coffee table. “Well, our day is planned. We’re going on a Beast Hunt before too many people see your sketchlings and we violate the Agreement. Once we’ve returned all the creatures to the book, we’ll reseal it if I can’t think of something better to do with them.”

  “Where do we start?” Winnie asked.

  “Perhaps you should check your room first,” I advised her. “There might be a straggler or two. And if we’re very lucky, we’ll be done by lunchtime.”

  I was mentally crossing my claws on that promise when I heard a noise from outside. Had Winnie’s mother followed her down here? Hurrying to the door, I opened it and poked my head outside. I thought I glimpsed a long shadow disappearing behind a stack of shipping crates.