The Menagerie #2

by Tui T. Sutherland

  “We need to figure out what happened to her,” Mr. Kahn said to Clawdius.

  “Asleep was Clawdius,” said the dragon. “Also not caring is Clawdius.” A small puff of smoke snorted from his nose. “Now asleep is Clawdius.” The dragon turned, majestically presenting his back to the SNAPA agents, and lay down in the sun again.

  “Let’s go talk to Scratch,” Mr. Kahn suggested.

  “We need to inspect all the dragons’ chains first,” said Agent Dantes, putting her hands on her hips.

  Mr. Kahn winced. “We don’t call them chains,” he said. “We call them ‘assisted restraints.’”

  Her look was not amused.

  Logan crouched, feeling the sweat roll down his back, and watched Zoe’s dad lead the agents to Clawdius’s back legs. One of the dragon’s ankles had an iron clamp around it, connected to a large, solid-looking chain that led back into the darkness of the cave.

  Clawdius shifted and Agent Dantes took a quick step back. Agent Runcible crouched and poked at the clamp, then carefully inspected each link in the chain. He went into the cave for a while, then emerged shaking his head.

  “Looks fine,” he said to Dantes. “Let’s check the next one.”

  “You checked their restraints last Sunday,” Mr. Kahn pointed out. “Is it really necessary to check them again?”

  “I think you know the answer to that,” Runcible said witheringly.

  Clawdius turned his head to peer at them as the three adults approached the second cave. “Asleep is Firebella,” the silver dragon warned. “Extremely displeased to be woken shall be Firebella.”

  Dantes hesitated, and Runcible strode forward with a snort. “I’ll do it,” he said, vanishing into the cave.

  “Uh-oh,” Zoe muttered.

  A moment later, a blast of flames shot out of the cave entrance. Logan jumped up and stumbled back from the searing heat.

  “She was just startled,” Zoe said quickly. “She doesn’t normally breathe fire at people. Not unless you wake her up.”

  “Or talk too loud,” Blue offered. “Or bring her the wrong food. Or ask her to do something. Or criticize her singing. Or—”

  “Okay, but she’s a dragon!” Zoe protested. “That’s how they’re supposed to be!”

  “Exactly.” Blue leaned against one of the twisted boulders.

  Logan decided he agreed with Zoe. Of course dragons breathed fire and got a little grumpy when humans tried to boss them around. They wouldn’t be nearly as cool if they had the personalities of sheep.

  Runcible stormed out of the cave with smoke trailing from his suit. Without speaking to the others, he headed for the path up to the third cave.

  Zoe let out a quiet sigh of relief. “I guess Firebella’s restraints were fine, too.” She chased after the adults, and Logan and Blue hurried along behind.

  “So the dragons each have just the one chain?” Logan asked as they climbed. “Dragons don’t require something . . . more than that?”

  “It’s a special kind of dragonfire-resistant metal,” Zoe said. “And of course there’s the fence.”

  “What fence?” Logan glanced around, but there wasn’t a fence in sight.

  “The invisible fence.” Blue waved a hand at the air above them. “The dragons are chipped so a shock knocks them out when they try to go too far from their caves.”

  “So it couldn’t have been a dragon in the Aviary,” Zoe said. “They can’t go that far.”

  Logan wondered why it sounded like she was trying to convince herself.

  They reached the top of the path, opposite the last cave.

  Flopped across the entrance was a sleeping dragon about a third smaller than Clawdius. Its reddish-orange-yellow skin morphed into a rusty brown along its belly, and when it exhaled, its scales clanked together like steel against armor. Two wings protruded from its back, and barbs ran along the length of its tail.

  “Scratch,” Mr. Kahn said soothingly, edging toward him. “Don’t be alarmed. I’m here with the two SNAPA agents you met last week—”

  The dragon’s eyes flew open. He surged upright, let out a panicked roar . . . and disappeared into thin air.

  FOUR

  Zoe’s heart sank. She’d really hoped Scratch would keep his new trick hidden. The SNAPA agents hadn’t found out about it during their inspection the previous week. But there was no hiding it now.

  “Where did he go?” shouted Agent Runcible. Agent Dantes pressed her back against a boulder and glanced around wildly.

  “It’s all right,” said her dad, jumping in front of the agents. “He’s still here. It’s just a glamour. Look.” He stepped over to where Scratch had been and knocked on the air. Clang clang. A small burst of fire popped into the sky above his head.

  “Wow,” Logan breathed. “Dragons can be invisible?”

  “Not all of them,” Zoe said. “Some of them can cast, like, illusions, or what we call ‘glamours.’ Most of them try to make themselves look bigger or scarier. I have no idea why Scratch decided to go for invisible instead.”

  “Childhood trauma,” Logan guessed, and Blue snorted a half laugh.

  “Yeah,” he said. “Maybe he was bullied at dragon school.”

  Logan’s eyes nearly popped out of his head. “There’s dragon sch—”

  “No,” said Zoe, rolling her eyes.

  “Oh,” Logan said, sounding disappointed. “You have to admit that would be cool. But seriously, maybe something happened to him that made him want to hide.”

  “You’re thinking as if dragons are anything like people,” Blue said. “It’s more likely that he’s planning something sinister and being invisible is how he’ll get away with it.”

  Zoe winced, remembering why they were there. Had Scratch learned to make himself invisible just so he could sneak in and eat Pelly? That was . . . crazy, wasn’t it?

  Besides, there were the restraints and the fence. Invisibility wouldn’t get him past those.

  Her dad had been murmuring at Scratch for a while, and now the dragon’s red-brown-gold scales were shimmering back into view. Scratch still looked very uncomfortable. Zoe didn’t like the way he kept glancing guiltily at the SNAPA agents.

  Should she have told them about Scratch’s feud with Pelly?

  No. It wasn’t serious. They’re suspicious enough.

  “All right, Scratch,” said her dad. “Everything is okay. We just need to ask you about the intruder watch last night.”

  “Watching was Scratch,” said the dragon. His voice was as deep as Clawdius’s, but with a waver to it that always made him sound a bit anxious. “Most dark was time of darkness. Most quiet under the star-time.” He avoided Mr. Kahn’s eyes, scratching his claws along the rock below him.

  Zoe thought of her to-do list and how “check on Scratch” had been on there because he’d been refusing his food lately. She’d been worried he was sick—but he looked healthier than ever. Too healthy. Too well fed.

  She didn’t want to think about what he might just have eaten.

  “Really?” said Zoe’s dad. “There were no intruders at all?”

  “Intruders none,” said Scratch. He rolled his eyes up and squinted at the sky. “Full zero of intruders were there.”

  He’s lying, Zoe thought. She could see the shimmer of the invisibility glamour starting around his tail, as if he desperately wanted to disappear. But why?

  “Think carefully, Scratch,” said her dad. “It’s very important.”

  Scratch hunched his shoulders and muttered, “None intruders none.”

  Mr. Kahn reached toward his helmet as if he wanted to rub his temples, then sighed and lowered his hands again. “Then what happened in the Aviary, Scratch? While you were on duty, something got in and killed Pelly.”

  The dragon blinked several times, and Zoe felt a glimmer of hope. He looks genuinely surprised, she thought. At least, I think he does. I don’t think he’s that good an actor.

  Scratch closed his eyes, evidently using his sixth sense
to feel the presences in the Menagerie. A startled, pleased expression flickered over his face. “Gone the fat selfish mean herself-full honk-bird!” he cried, opening them again. “Magnificent the day!”

  “Oh, dear,” said Zoe.

  “I’m guessing that’s not going to help his cause,” said Logan.

  “Scratch,” said Mr. Kahn with a hint of impatience. “If you were on duty, how could you not know that?”

  Scratch looked canny and guilty and miserable all at once.

  Oh, Zoe thought. Maybe he fell asleep. Maybe he wasn’t paying attention. Maybe that’s all he’s lying about . . . in which case, that’s not the end of the world. He’d get in a little trouble, but not too much, and they wouldn’t shut us down just for having a lazy dragon. I don’t think.

  Agent Runcible growled something under his breath and stalked over to Scratch’s restraints. He crouched beside the anklet, picked up a stick, and poked at the metal band.

  With a horrible, ominous clank, the anklet fell right off Scratch’s leg.

  Scratch and Runcible both stared down at the anklet for a long, awful moment. Zoe wondered if this was what having a heart attack felt like.

  “Uh-oh,” said Blue.

  SNAPA is going to kill him, Zoe thought, starting to panic. Literally. And then they’re going to shut us down.

  Faster than Zoe could blink, Agent Runcible reached into his suit jacket and whipped out a fat silver weapon that looked like a short, futuristic crossbow. He pointed it at Scratch and yelled, “Stay exactly where you are!”

  Scratch roared with dismay and promptly vanished again.

  “He’s not being disrespectful!” Zoe yelled. “He’s just scared! He does that when he’s nervous!”

  “Don’t hurt him!” Logan shouted.

  But the agents weren’t paying any attention to them. Dantes had thrown herself behind the nearest boulder with her arms over her head. Runcible hit a button on the crossbow and fired at the empty space where Scratch had been.

  Another panicked roar filled the air, and a moment later, Scratch thudded to the ground, visible once more. His head flopped onto the rocks and he let out a little wheeze, closing his eyes.

  “Oh, no,” Logan said, starting forward.

  Blue and Zoe jumped to grab him and pull him back.

  “It’s just a tranq dart,” Zoe said. “I think. I mean, I’m sure.” She studied the dragon anxiously until she saw his side going up and down. Unconscious, not dead. At least for now.

  With the dragon out of commission, the SNAPA agents removed their helmets. Dantes looked red and flustered as she crept out from behind the boulder. Runcible strode up to Scratch’s head and whipped out a camera the size of a playing card. He snapped a few pictures of Scratch’s snout and then prodded open his lips to examine his teeth.

  “Aha,” he said. “Blood. And it’s fresh.”

  Zoe had to sit down. Her heart was pounding. Scratch hadn’t eaten his food in days. How did he get blood on his snout?

  “Blood?” Agent Dantes cried. “Are you sure?” She whirled to face Mr. Kahn. “Haven’t you been brushing his teeth like we told you to?”

  “I—we—” Mr. Kahn stammered, clearly as shocked as Zoe was. “Sometimes?”

  “Delia, is that really the most important question right now?” Runcible asked Dantes sternly.

  “Only because they might have noticed blood sooner if they were using the toothbrushes,” she said. “What if he’s killed someone else this week?” She pulled out her phone. “I’m calling the Exterminators.”

  Icicles froze and snapped throughout Zoe’s veins. She’d grown up thinking that Exterminators were a myth. And even now that she knew they were as real as unicorns, she’d hoped never to meet one.

  “Wait,” said Mr. Kahn. “There must be an explanation.”

  “Indeed,” said Runcible. “Here’s one: you were careless about containing your dragons, and one escaped to kill another priceless mythical creature, whom you failed to protect. Not only should this dragon be terminated but this whole Menagerie should be shut down. I might even recommend kraken ink for all employees and associates.”

  That was worse than Zoe could ever have imagined. Shutting down the Menagerie, taking away her memories of her whole life, killing Scratch—even her most terrifying nightmares were never this awful.

  “You don’t know for sure that he ate Pelly,” Logan blurted. “Maybe it was someone else. Maybe it wasn’t the Menagerie’s fault at all.”

  “I’m sorry, kid,” Agent Dantes said. “That looks like pretty compelling evidence to me.” She pointed at the broken anklet.

  “But you can’t just kill him!” Logan said.

  “We have to,” she said. “This is how we deal with creatures who are that dangerous, for the safety of humans.”

  “And the protection of all other supernatural animals,” said Zoe’s dad, looking stricken.

  “No, it isn’t,” Zoe said, suddenly remembering something. She’d read about a case like this in a SNAPA history guide—well, not exactly like this, but close enough.

  “I beg your pardon?” said Dantes.

  “Dragons are higher-order, sentient beings,” said Zoe. “Not like basilisks or kelpies—more like griffins or phoenixes. That means when they’re accused of something, especially something with a death penalty, they’re entitled to a fair trial. It’s a SNAPA rule.”

  Agent Dantes snapped her phone shut and pushed her hair behind her ears, frowning. With a snort, Runcible pulled out his tablet again and started tapping. After a moment, he sighed.

  “She’s right,” he said. “We’ll need a SNAPA authority to be the judge. And lawyers. And—” He paused as if it pained him to say the next bit. “And a jury of his peers.”

  “What?” Dantes and Mr. Kahn said simultaneously.

  “Like, twelve other dragons?” Logan asked. Zoe couldn’t imagine where they would put twelve dragons in the Menagerie, let alone how they would feed them, even for a day.

  “No, no,” said Runcible. “No more than six mythical creatures, and they don’t all have to be dragons—even Mostly Humans can serve as jurors. And we’ll need a caladrius or a qilin.”

  “A caladrius is a truth bird,” Zoe whispered, seeing Logan’s puzzled expression. “A qilin is kind of like a Chinese unicorn.”

  “That doesn’t really clear things up,” he whispered back.

  “Camp Underpaw lost their qilin this summer,” said Dantes. “And even if we could get the caladrius from the Oregon menagerie, who would want to represent this miserable creature?” She waved her hand at Scratch.

  “We will,” Mr. Kahn said, and the agents both turned to frown at him. “Give us two weeks to investigate internally. Please.”

  “You have until Thursday,” said Runcible, shoving his tablet back into his bag. “And we will be staying to oversee this ‘investigation.’ Meanwhile, I will be writing my report on all the reasons this place should be shut down, which will go straight to my superiors once the dragon is found guilty.”

  “I understand,” said Mr. Kahn.

  “But if he’s not guilty—” Logan interjected. “I mean, if we prove that Scratch is innocent, then you’ll reconsider. Right?”

  The agents exchanged glances. “We’ll see,” said Agent Dantes.

  “Don’t worry,” Logan said to Zoe. “I’m sure Scratch had nothing to do with what happened to Pelly.”

  I hope you’re right, Logan, Zoe thought. But she could see the looks on the SNAPA agents’ faces, and it was hard to disagree with their skepticism. There was the broken anklet right there. There was Scratch’s shifty, strange behavior and the blood on his teeth. And there was his history with Pelly, which the agents didn’t even know about.

  All signs point to guilty. And if this was all our fault and we lose the trial, that means the end of Scratch . . . and the end of this Menagerie.

  FIVE

  “So what do we do first?” Logan asked, pulling off his fireproof helmet as
he caught up with Zoe at the base of the cliff. He would have been happy to stay and watch the dragons all day, but the SNAPA agents had declared Scratch a Potential Class X Threat, whatever that meant, and sent everyone away.

  “You should go home,” Zoe said. She tugged off her gloves and dug a small notebook out of an inside pocket of the suit. Logan recognized it as the one where she wrote her to-do list in code. “You haven’t been home in forever.”

  That was true. Friday night, Logan had stayed in Blue’s room so the Kahns could keep an eye on him. That was before they decided to trust him and promised not to use kraken ink to erase his memories of the mythical creatures. And Saturday night he’d been stuck in a secret staircase in Jasmin’s house with Zoe and the last missing griffin cub, hiding until it was safe to sneak out.

  Now it was Sunday morning, and his dad would definitely think it was weird if Logan didn’t get home soon, no matter how pleased he was that Logan had finally found a friend. (Meaning Blue. Logan hadn’t said anything about Zoe to his dad. Being friends with a girl was too complicated for parents to understand.)

  “I don’t have to rush home,” Logan said, checking his phone. There weren’t any messages from his dad yet. “We should make a list of suspects, witnesses, and possible alibis for Scratch. Hey, maybe the other dragons could testify that he was in his cave all night.”

  “Not if they were sleeping,” Blue said. He’d already pulled off the whole suit and had it bundled under one arm, except for the giant boots, which looked pretty silly with his jeans. Logan started to do the same, unzipping his own fireproof jacket as Blue continued. “Dragons sleep pretty soundly. And they’re unreliable witnesses because they’ll lie just for fun. Most courts won’t hear their testimony.”

  “Oh, no!” Zoe yelped with dismay, dropping her helmet. She took off running down the path toward the lake, stuffing her notebook back inside her suit.

  “What?” Logan called after her. “What is it?”

  “It was my turn today!” Zoe called back. “According to the chore chart! I bet nobody else thought to do it!”

  Logan gave Blue a quizzical look as he bent to pick up Zoe’s helmet. “Really suddenly urgent chores?” Blue shrugged and they both hurried after her, although in the boots it was less like running and more like stomping on the moon.