Dragonfield: And Other Stories

by Jane Yolen

  He had always considered the river bank his own. No one else in the family ever went there. He liked to set his feet in the damp ground and make patterns. It was like a picture, and the artist in him appreciated the primitive beauty.

  Heat lightning jetted across the sky. He sat down on a fallen log and picked at the bark as he would a scab. He could feel the log imprint itself on his backside through the thin cotton pajamas. He wished—not for the first time—that he could be allowed to sleep without his clothes.

  The silence and heat enveloped him. He closed his eyes and dreamed of sleep, but his head still throbbed. He had never been out at night by himself before. The slight touch of fear was both pleasure and pain.

  He thought about that fear, probing it like a loose tooth, now to feel the ache and now to feel the sweetness, when the faint came upon him and he tumbled slowly from the log. There was nothing but river bank before him, nothing to slow his descent, and he rolled down the slight hill and into the river, not waking till the shock of the water hit him.

  It was cold and unpleasantly muddy. He thrashed about. The sour water got in his mouth and made him gag.

  Suddenly someone took his arm and pulled him up onto the bank, dragged him up the slight incline.

  He opened his eyes and shook his head to get the lank, wet hair from his face. He was surprised to find that his rescuer was a girl, about his size, in a white cotton shift. She was not muddied at all from her efforts. His one thought before she heaved him over the top of the bank and helped him back onto the log was that she must be quite marvelously strong.

  “Thank you,” he said, when he was seated again, and then did not know where to go from there.

  “You are welcome.” Her voice was low, her speech precise, almost old-fashioned in its carefulness. He realized that she was not a girl but a small woman.

  “You fell in,” she said.

  “Yes.”

  She sat down beside him and looked into his eyes, smiling. He wondered how he could see so well when the moon was behind her. She seemed to light up from within like some kind of lamp. Her outline was a golden glow and her blond hair fell in straight lengths to her shoulder.

  “You may call me Angelica,” she said.

  “Is that your name?”

  She laughed. “No. No, it is not. And how perceptive of you to guess.”

  “Is it an alias?” He knew about such things. His father was a customs official and told the family stories at the table about his work.

  “It is the name I …” she hesitated for a moment and looked behind her. Then she turned and laughed again. “It is the name I travel under.”

  “Oh.”

  “You could not pronounce my real name,” she said.

  “Could I try?”

  “Pistias Sophia!” said the woman and she stood as she named her self. She seemed to shimmer and grow at her own words, but the boy thought that might be the fever in his head, though he hadn’t a headache anymore.

  “Pissta …” he could not stumble around the name. There seemed to be something blocking his tongue. “I guess I better call you Angelica for now,” he said.

  “For now,” she agreed.

  He smiled shyly at her. “My name is Addie,” he said.

  “I know.”

  “How do you know? Do I look like an Addie? It means…”

  “Noble hero,” she finished for him.

  “How do you know that?”

  “I am very wise,” she said. “And names are important to me. To all of us. Destiny is in names.” She smiled, but her smile was not so pleasant any longer. She started to reach for his hand, but he drew back.

  “You shouldn’t boast,” he said. “About being wise. It’s not nice.”

  “I am not boasting.” She found his hand and held it in hers. Her touch was cool and infinitely soothing. She reached over with the other hand and put it first palm, then back to his forehead. She made a “tch” against her teeth and scowled. “Your guardian should be Flung Over. I shall have to speak to Uriel about this. Letting you out with such a fever.”

  “Nobody let me out,” said the boy. “I let myself out. No one knows I am here—except you.”

  “Well, there is one who should know where you are. And he shall certainly hear from me about this.” She stood up and was suddenly much taller than the boy. “Come. Back to the house with you. You should be in bed.” She reached down the front of her white shift and brought up a silver bottle on a chain. “You must take a sip of this now. It will help you sleep.”

  “Will you come back with me?” the boy asked after taking a drink.

  “Just a little way.” She held his hand as they went.

  He looked behind once to see his footprints in the rain-soft earth. They marched in an orderly line behind him. He could not see hers at all.

  “Do you believe, little Addie?” Her voice seemed to come from a long way off, farther even than the hills.

  “Believe in what?”

  “In God. Do you believe that he directs all our movements?”

  “I sing in the church choir,” he said, hoping it was the proof she wanted.

  “That will do for now,” she said.

  There was a fierceness in her voice that made him turn in the muddy furrow and look at her. She towered above him, all white and gold and glowing. The moon haloed her head, and behind her, close to her shoulders, he saw something like wings, feathery and waving. He was suddenly desperately afraid.

  “What are you?” he whispered.

  “What do you think I am?” she asked, and her face looked carved in stone, so white her skin and black the features.

  “Are you … the angel of death?” he asked and then looked down before she answered. He could not bear to watch her talk.

  “For you, I am an angel of life,” she said. “Did I not save you?”

  “What kind of angel are you?” he whispered, falling to his knees before her.

  She lifted him up and cradled him in her arms. She sang him a lullaby in a language he did not know. “I told you in the beginning who I am,” she murmured to the sleeping boy. “I am Pistias Sophia, angel of wisdom and faith. The one who put the serpent into the garden little Adolf. But I was only following orders.”

  Her wings unfurled behind her. She pumped them once, twice, and then the great wind they commanded lifted her into the air. She flew without a sound to the Hitler house and left the boy sleeping, feverless, in his bed.

  The Wild Child

  In 1799, in France, a wild boy

  Was seen running,

  Running like a beast

  On all fours,

  Running like a beast

  Through gullies and streams,

  Running like a beast

  And free.

  He could not talk,

  He could not think

  Beyond instinct,

  He could not reason

  Beyond his last meal,

  Or count to ten,

  But he was free.

  He bayed at the sky,

  He ate roots, He howled at the moon,

  He ate acorns,

  He snuffled and snorted

  And did not use a fork,

  He wore nothing but his tangled hair

  And he was free.

  But late at night

  When he was packless

  And without a mate

  Or a mother to kiss him,

  Without the comfort

  Of language or art,

  He was trapped forever

  In his animal heart.

  Happy Dens or A Day in the Old Wolves Home

  NURSE LAMB STOOD IN front of the big white house with the black shutters. She shivered. She was a brand-new nurse and this was her very first job.

  From inside the house came loud and angry growls. Nurse Lamb looked at the name carved over the door: HAPPY DENS. But it didn’t sound like a happy place, she thought, as she listened to the howls from inside.

  Shuddering
, she knocked on the door.

  The only answer was another howl.

  Lifting the latch, Nurse Lamb went in.

  No sooner had she stepped across the doorstep than a bowl sped by her head. It splattered against the wall. Nurse Lamb ducked, but she was too late. Her fresh white uniform was spotted and dotted with whatever had been in the bowl.

  “Mush!” shouted an old wolf, shaking his cane at her. “Great howls and thorny paws. I can’t stand another day of it. The end of life is nothing but a big bowl of mush.”

  Nurse Lamb gave a frightened little bleat and turned to go back out the door, but a great big wolf with two black ears and one black paw barred her way. “Mush for breakfast, mush for dinner, and more mush in between,” he growled. “That’s all they serve us here at Happy Dens, Home for Aging Wolves.”

  The wolf with the cane added: “When we were young and full of teeth it was never like this.” He howled.

  Nurse Lamb gave another bleat and ran into the next room. To her surprise it was a kitchen. A large, comfortable-looking pig wearing a white hat was leaning over the stove and stirring an enormous pot. Since the wolves had not followed her in, Nurse Lamb sat down on a kitchen stool and began to cry.

  The cook put her spoon down, wiped her trotters with a stained towel, and patted Nurse Lamb on the head, right behind the ears.

  “There, there, lambkin,” said the cook. “Don’t start a new job in tears. We say that in the barnyard all the time.”

  Nurse Lamb looked up and snuffled. “I … I don’t think I’m right for this place. I feel as if I have been thrown to the wolves.”

  The cook nodded wisely. “And, in a manner of speaking, you have been. But these poor old dears are all bark and no bite. Toothless, don’t you know. All they can manage is mush.”

  “But no one told me this was an old wolves home,” complained Nurse Lamb. “They just said ‘How would you like to work at Happy Dens?’ And it sounded like the nicest place in the world to work.”

  “And so it is. And so it is,” said the cook. “It just takes getting used to.”

  Nurse Lamb wiped her nose and looked around. “But how could someone like you work here. I mean …” She dropped her voice to a whisper. “I heard all about it at school. The three little pigs and all. Did you know them?”

  The cook sniffed. “And a bad lot they were, too. As we say in the barnyard, ‘There’s more than one side to every sty.’”

  “But I was told that the big bad wolf tried to eat the three little pigs. And he huffed and he puffed and …” Nurse Lamb looked confused.

  Cook just smiled and began to stir the pot again, lifting up a spoonful to taste.

  “And then there was that poor little child in the woods with the red riding hood,” said Nurse Lamb. “Bringing the basket of goodies to her sick grandmother.”

  Cook shook her head and added pepper to the pot. “In the barnyard we say, ‘Don’t take slop from a kid in a cloak.’” She ladled out a bowlful of mush.

  Nurse Lamb stood up. She walked up to the cook and put her hooves on her hips. “But what about that boy Peter? The one who caught the wolf by the tail after he ate the duck. And the hunters came and—”

  “Bad press,” said a voice from the doorway. It was the wolf with the two black ears. “Much of what you know about wolves is bad press.”

  Nurse Lamb turned and looked at him. “I don’t even know what bad press means,” she said.

  “It means that only one side of the story has been told. There is another way of telling those very same tales. From the wolf’s point of view.” He grinned at her. “My name is Wolfgang and if you will bring a bowl of that thoroughly awful stuff to the table”—he pointed to the pot—“I will tell you my side of a familiar tale.”

  Sheepishly, Nurse Lamb picked up the bowl and followed the wolf into the living room. She put the bowl on the table in front of Wolfgang and sat down. There were half a dozen wolves sitting there.

  Nurse Lamb smiled at them timidly.

  They smiled back. The cook was right. Only Wolfgang had any teeth.

  Wolfgang’s Tale

  Once upon a time (began the black-eared wolf) there was a thoroughly nice young wolf. He had two black ears and one black paw. He was a poet and a dreamer.

  This thoroughly nice wolf loved to lay about in the woods staring at the lacy curlings of fiddlehead ferns and smelling the wild roses.

  He was a vegetarian—except for lizards and an occasional snake, which don’t count. He loved carrot cake and was partial to peanut-butter pie.

  One day as he lay by the side of a babbling brook, writing a poem that began

  Twinkle, twinkle, lambkin’s eye,

  How I wish you were close by …

  he heard the sound of a child weeping. He knew it was a human child because only they cry with that snuffling gasp. So the thoroughly nice wolf leaped to his feet and ran over, his hind end waggling, eager to help.

  The child looked up from her crying. She was quite young and dressed in a long red riding hood, a lacy dress, white stockings, and black patent-leather Mary Jane shoes. Hardly what you would call your usual hiking-in-the-woods outfit.

  “Oh, hello, wolfie,” she said. In those days, of course, humans often talked to wolves. “I am quite lost.”

  The thoroughly nice wolf sat down by her side and held her hand. “There, there,” he said. “Tell me where you live.”

  The child grabbed her hand back. “If I knew that, you silly growler, I wouldn’t be lost, would I?”

  The thoroughly nice wolf bit back his own sharp answer and asked her in rhyme:

  Where are you going

  My pretty young maid?

  Answer me this

  And I’ll make you a trade.

  The path through the forest

  Is dark and it’s long,

  So I will go with you

  And sing you a song.

  The little girl was charmed. “I’m going to my grandmother’s house,” she said. “With this.” She held up a basket that was covered with a red-checked cloth. The wolf could smell carrot cake. He grinned.

  “Oh, poet, what big teeth you have,” said the child.

  “The better to eat carrot cake with,” said the thoroughly nice wolf.

  “My granny hates carrot cake,” said the child. “In fact, she hates anything but mush.”

  “What bad taste,” said the wolf. “I made up a poem about that one:

  If I found someone

  Who liked to eat mush

  I’d sit them in front of it.

  Then give a …”

  “Push!” shouted the child.

  “Why, you’re a poet, too,” said the wolf.

  “I’m really more of a storyteller,” said the child, blushing prettily. “But I do love carrot cake.”

  “All poets do,” said the wolf. “So you must be a poet as well.”

  “Well, my granny is no poet. Every week when I bring the carrot cake over, she dumps it into her mush and mushes it all up together and then makes me eat it with her. She says that I have to learn that life ends with a bowl of mush.”

  “Great howls!” said the wolf shuddering. “What a terribly wicked thing to say and do.”

  “I guess so,” said the child.

  “Then we must save this wonderful carrot cake from your grandmother,” the wolf said, scratching his head below his ears.

  The child clapped her hands. “I know,” she said. “Let’s pretend.”

  “Pretend?” asked the wolf.

  “Let’s pretend that you are Granny and I am bringing the cake to you. Here, you wear my red riding hood and we’ll pretend it’s Granny’s nightcap and nightgown.”

  The wolf took her little cape and slung it over his head. He grinned again. He was a poet and he loved pretending.

  The child skipped up to him and knocked upon an imaginary door.

  The wolf opened it. “Come in. Come in.”

  “Oh, no,” said the child. “My grandm
other never gets out of bed.”

  “Never?” asked the wolf.

  “Never,” said the child.

  “All right,” said the thoroughly nice wolf, shaking his head. He lay down on the cool green grass, clasped his paws over his stomach, and made a very loud pretend snore.

  The child walked over to his feet and knocked again.

  “Who is it?” called out the wolf in a high, weak, scratchy voice.

  “It is your granddaughter, Little Red Riding Hood,” the child said, giggling.

  “Come in, come in. Just lift the latch. I’m in bed with aches and pains and a bad case of the rheumaticks,” said the wolf in the high, funny voice.

  The child walked in through the pretend door.

  “I have brought you a basket of goodies,” said the child, putting the basket by the wolf’s side. She placed her hands on her hips. “But you know, Grandmother, you look very different today.”

  “How so?” asked the wolf, opening both his yellow eyes wide.

  “Well, Grandmother, what big eyes you have,” said the child.

  The wolf closed his eyes and opened them again quickly. “The better to see you with, my dear,” he said.

  “Oh, you silly wolf. She never calls me dear. She calls me Sweetface. Or Punkins. Or her Airy Fairy Dee.”

  “How awful,” said the wolf.”

  “I know,” said the child. “But that’s what she calls me.

  “Well, I can’t,” said the wolf, turning over on his side. “I’m a poet, after all, and no self-respecting poet could possibly use those words. If I have to call you that, there’s no more pretending.”

  “I guess you can call me dear,” said the child in a very small voice. “But I didn’t know that poets were so particular.”

  “About words we are,” said the wolf.

  “And you have an awfully big nose,” said the child.

  The wolf put his paw over his nose. “Now that is uncalled-for,” he said. “My nose isn’t all that big—for a wolf.”

  “It’s part of the game,” said the child.

  “Oh, yes, the game. I had forgotten. The better to smell the basket of goodies, my dear,” said the wolf.

  “And Grandmother, what big teeth you have.”