“Good,” said Zoey. “It’s actually her that I wanted to see. When did you get the new addition to your family?”
Bryony stared for a moment. “Oh, you mean Spot? Kieran got him for me after my run in with the velociraptors. I was a bit wary at first, but he’s actually quite affectionate. He loves Kerry and he keeps those vicious birds away.”
Zoey followed her through the parlor and into the dining room. Bryony waved her toward a seat at the table, which she took. Bryony returned from the kitchen a moment later with the teapot and took her own seat.
“This just came off the stove,” she said, pouring a cup and handing it over. “I know you like yours scalding hot.”
“Thank you.”
Bryony poured her own cup and set it aside to cool.
“I haven’t seen much of you lately, Zoantheria.”
“Oh, I’ve been very busy.”
“Yes, I see in the Gazette that you have become Lord Dechantagne’s regular companion.”
“We’re in love.”
“I hope that works out for you,” said Bryony.
“But your tone implies that you don’t think it will.”
“He is a young man and you are a young dragon.”
“I hear enough of that from Senta,” said Zoey.
“As surprised as I am to find myself in agreement with her… well.”
“She’s very fond of you, you know.”
“You must be daft!” Bryony guffawed.
“Why exactly did you think you were still alive? Why do you think she lets you raise her daughter?”
Whatever response Bryony might have uttered never came. She was interrupted when Sen came in the side door directly into the dining room. She was wearing a white dress and had her blond hair styled with ringlets falling on either side of her face and in back. She smiled when she saw Zoantheria, and stepped quickly over and gave her a kiss on the cheek, before giving another to Bryony.
“Zoey, I haven’t seen you in a dragon’s age,” said the girl.
“I have to wake up Kerry,” said Bryony, getting up from the table and heading toward the parlor, “and then we’ll all have a lovely tea.”
“I’ve come to talk to you, Sen,” said Zoey. “You need to go see your mother.”
The girl crossed her arms and curled her lips into a sneer.
“She really does love you, you know.”
“No, I don’t know that. In fact, I would wager on the exact opposite.”
“She doesn’t hate you.”
“The opposite of love isn’t hate. It’s indifference. And that is precisely what she has shown me for years now.”
“I won’t argue that it doesn’t seem that way to you,” said Zoey. “I imagine that she keeps a closer eye on you than you think she does.”
“Maybe she’s scrying me right now,” said the girl. “If you are, Mother, appear!”
She waited a moment, but nothing happened.
“In any case,” continued the dragon in human form. “Don’t go see her for her. Do it for yourself. You are a sorceress and the only thing that will happen if you don’t learn your craft is that when they come for you, you won’t be prepared. And they will come for you.”
“Who? Who will come for me?”
“I don’t know, but someone will. It’s happened to your mother numerous times.”
The girl took her seat. Her expression clearly spelled out her skepticism.
“Do you know what happened to your mother? Do you know why she was gone from the time you were four until you were eight?”
“She left,” said Sen.
Bryony brought in a still sleepy Kerry and sat him in his chair, his bottom raised up by several mail order catalogs.
“You never told her?” Zoey asked Bryony.
“We don’t really talk about Senta at all.”
“I thought better of you.”
The lady of the house looked like she had been slapped. Mouth clamped tight, she stepped quickly into the kitchen. Zoey looked back to Sen.
“Your mother has tangled with various groups of evil wizards in the past—men who wanted her power for themselves. Some seven years ago, a group of such men from Brechalon captured her. They did unspeakable things to her. They tried to remove the magic from her. It took her years, but she finally managed to escape.”
“Nobody could capture her.”
“They did. Look for the scar on her head. They tried to cut out her brain.”
Sen gasped. Then she looked thoughtful. “What about the years since she got back?”
“You’ll have to ask her. But I brought you this.” She pulled out Mr. Wissinger’s book: A Portrait of Zurfina the Magnificent. “Read this. It will give you a better understanding of how she became who she is. Besides, you should know about your grandmother. You can read, can’t you?”
“I’m up to date in all my studies,” Sen curtly replied. “Who taught you to read? Surely not my mother.”
“I taught myself. And you are up to date in all your studies, except for magic.”
Bryony returned with a large tray and began setting out plates of little cheese sandwiches, sliced sausages, fruit pastries, and a nettle salad. She set the tray aside and then sat down.
“I have read parts of this before,” said Sen, taking the book.
“I think you should read it all.”
“What do you think, Bryony?” the girl asked
“I confess that I find your mother as inscrutable as the sphynx. I do think she cares for you though. And perhaps I have not given her enough credit.”
“I will read this,” said Sen. “I’ll read it and I’ll think about everything.”
“I can ask nothing more. Now let us enjoy this splendid repast.”
* * * * *
About an hour later, Zoey left the little cottage and skipped out to her car. As she had expected, the fire had gone very low. She reached inside and raked the still hot coals with her hand, before adding more. When she pulled her hand out again, she saw that she had burned the sleeve of her dress.
“Bother,” she said, and then, with “uuthanum,” she magically repaired the garment. She wiped her hands on a cloth rag and climbed in.
It was slow going at first. The steam had to build up. Soon though, she was shooting north up Redwood. She had to slow down because of traffic at University Avenue, but soon was accelerating again toward the vehicle’s top speed. She was going fast enough that it went up on two wheels as she rounded the corner at First. Though she slowed down considerably, she still clipped the corner of the gate driving onto the Dechantagne Staff Estate. After skidding to a stop in front of the house, she threw the brake, and then jumped out and ran around to look at the front of her car. There was a big scratch on left front wing.
“A pox upon my luck!”
“I don’t think your luck is the problem.”
Zoey turned to find Augie’s mother sitting in a rattan chair in the shade of the portico.
“Perhaps you should be cursing your skill as a steam carriage driver. I imagine that there is some damage to our expensive gate too.”
“I’ll send a lizzie over to repair it,” said Zoey, looking toward the gate. “I’m sure its nothing serious.”
“Why do you have a car?” asked Mrs. Dechantagne. “You can fly and teleport too, I’m told.”
“It’s very exhilarating,” said Zoey climbing the steps. “Have you tried it?”
“It’s not my cup of tea.”
“I’m here to see Augie. Is he home?”
“He’s at the office. I expect him for dinner. You may wait for him.”
“That’s very nice,” observed Zoey. “You’re not going to run me off with a shotgun?”
“I doubt a shotgun would have much effect,” said Mrs. Dechantagne. “Besides, it has been explained to me that I have very little voice in deciding who my son sees or doesn’t see.”
Zoey sauntered across the portico to stand next to her.
“I
would prefer we were friends.”
“I have all the friends I need.”
“Are you sure? Think of the things a dragon could do for you.”
“I don’t need anyone eaten or burned, thank you very much,” she replied, standing up and walking to the door.
She had to open the front door herself because Kaden, the lizzie major-domo, was not at this station.
“Coming in?”
“I think I’ll walk around your gardens, if it’s all the same to you.”
Once Mrs. Dechantagne entered the house, Zoey descended the stairs and strolled around to the west side of the mansion, admiring the carefully curated gardens and the reflecting pool. She stopped at the gazebo and sat down in the swing.
“I was told that I would find you here.”
A man in a trench coat and brown bowler approached from the south side of the garden. He had a large beard and a long pointed nose. Though he squinted, Zoey could tell that his were eyes not just metaphorically steely. Both the iris and the whites of the eyes were the same color as a new plow blade.
“You need to work on your transformation spell,” she said.
“Hello Zoantheria.”
“I mean really. No one would mistake you for a real human.”
“I don’t have as much opportunity to practice as you do,” he said. “There are more important things to do than sneak around disguised as a human.”
“Sneak? Do I look like I’m sneaking, Bessemer?”
“I was speaking only of myself. I wanted to speak to you, Zoantheria.”
“Well, you’re speaking. Did you have something important to say, or are you just going to waffle?”
“I want to invite you to Yessonarah.”
Zoey sighed. “I see enough lizzies here. Why would I want to see a whole city of them?”
“They are your people.”
“Not my people.”
“Your worshippers then. They’ve built you a temple in Yessonarah.”
“A whole temple devoted to me?”
“To both of us.”
“So we would sit there together, out tails entwined, while the lizzies dropped to the ground in genuflection? It sounds just oh so special.”
“I grew up among humans too,” he said. “I know what sarcasm sounds like.”
“How lovely for you. It doesn’t change the fact that I have no interest in you or your lizzies.”
“You have to have an interest eventually, Zoantheria. Who else is there for you?”
“There are others.”
“Weaklings and has-beens,” he said.
“And which is Lord Voindrazius?”
“Voindrazius is the latter. He’s a monster, a big one, and dangerous, when he’s awake. How often is that? He has his cult of followers and his city. I’m worshipped in a dozen lizzie cities, all of them bigger than Xiatooq, and hundreds of villages. I am the God of the Sky.”
“And I suppose you’ll tell him so?”
“I will… when I’m ready.”
“I will think about your invitation,” said Zoey. “Will you be going by to see Senta while you’re in town.”
“Of course I will. She’s my sister.”
He let go of his enchantment and suddenly transformed into his real self. He was almost four times as large as Zoey was in her dragon form, the color of shining steel. His face looked like it was made of immobile armor, surrounded by horns, but with long whiskers near his mouth. With a curt nod, he shot, seemingly without effort, into the sky. Zoey had to admit that he was the most handsome dragon she had ever seen, excepting of course, the one in the mirror.
“Imagine my pleasure at finding a such a lovely visitor,” said Augie, stepping around the corner from the front of the house.
Zoey skipped down the gazebo steps and ran into his arms. He caught her and planted a deep kiss on her lips.
“Wow,” he said.
She grinned.
“You’ll be joining us for dinner, I hope.”
“If you ask me very nicely.”
“Please, please join me for dinner. If I have to spend one more evening with only Auntie and Mother, the three of us staring at each other like fish, I shall gouge my own eyes out.”
“Then I shall have to rescue you, My Lord.”
“Come and sit with me,” he said, leading her back to the gazebo, where they took their places in the swing. “When I was a boy, we had a full table almost every night. “Iolana and Terra, and of course Uncle Radley, and we had guests all the time.”
“You are the man of the house now,” she said. “It’s up to you to invite guests for dinner.”
“You’re right. Mother would just a soon eat alone in her bed, and I don’t think Auntie cares one way or the other. I’ll have to invite the Stephensons and some others.”
“You should invite the Baxters,” said Zoey.
“Really? I don’t want to run afoul of our sorceress friend.”
“Oh, she won’t mind. You should invite her too.”
“Well, all right,” he said. “But you must agree to be my hostess.”
“People might make assumptions about us.”
“Let them.” He smiled. “I plan on a long association between us.”
She kissed him, their arms snaking around one another.
“You are so hot,” he said.
“Too hot?”
“No. Not too.”
“So what have you been doing today, my very important March Lord of Birmisia?”
“I’m expanding The Office of Lizzie Affairs.”
Zoey clucked her tongue. “Everyone is so concerned with those cold-blooded reptiles.”
“Well they do live here too, and we have to interact with them. I don’t want any soft-skins taking advantage of them, and I don’t want them causing any trouble for us, either.”
She laughed musically. “Soft-skins.” She poked her finger into his belly.
“Don’t poke me!” he said in mock anger. “I’m a very important man!”
He made to poke her stomach, but she shifted and he poked her right bosom instead. She slapped his face, hard enough to leave a crimson image of her hand.
“I’m, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean…”
She put her left hand behind his neck, pulling him into a fiery kiss, while with her right, she pulled his hand back to her breast. For several minutes, they were glued together as their tongues darted back and forth and their hands explored each other over their clothes. At last, he put his hands on her shoulders and pushed himself away.
“I have to admit,” he said. “I think I’m getting mixed signals.”
“Good. A lady is supposed to keep her man guessing. Shall we go in?”
“You go ahead. I need to sit here for a few minutes.”
With a smile, Zoey got up and walked down the steps and around the house. She cast one quick glance back at him as she turned the corner, satisfied that he was watching her. She had to open the front door for herself. In the foyer, she stopped to examine her image in a wall mirror. Then she smoothed down her dress, and entered the parlor. Mrs. Dechantagne was sitting at one end of the sofa reading a copy of Brysin’s Weekly Ladies’ Journal.
“I take it that my son is home?”
“He’s in the garden. He’ll be in soon. He’s invited me for dinner.”
“I don’t think we have an entire dinosaur in the pantry at present.”
“Oh, I very much doubt that I shall be disappointed by the Dechantagne table,” smiled Zoey.
“Hmph,” Mrs. Dechantagne grunted.
Zoey sat down in a stuffed chair. Mrs. D offered no other comments. A minute later, Augie walked in, hatless, having doffed his bowler in the foyer.
“You need a haircut,” said his mother, without looking up.
“I think you’re right,” he said, running his hands through his chestnut hair.
“Let me do that,” said Zoey, jumping up and hurrying to his side, where her fingers replaced his.
“Would you mind not acting like a wanton in my parlor?” said his mother.
At that moment Iolanthe Dechantagne Staff walked in. Her crimson and blue walking dress made her look a little like a soldier, an image that the bag she was carrying did nothing to discourage.
“I think we could all stand to show a little more affection,” she said.
“Really?” cried Mrs. Dechantagne, throwing her magazine to the floor. “You! You think we should show more affection! Now I know I’ve fallen into a coma and I’m living in some kind of perverse dream version of reality.”
Governor Staff rolled her eyes and turning, left the room.
“This is my life,” said Augie to Zoantheria. “This is everyday existence in my house.”
His mother got up and stomped out of the room. A minute later, one of the lizzies poked its head in. “Tonahass dak.”
“Well, let’s go eat,” said Augie, leading Zoey to the dining room.
Neither Augie’s mother nor his aunt showed up at the table, which was filled to overflowing with food, despite there only being two diners. Zoantheria had four helpings of pork roast. And they had peach ice cream for dessert. Back in the parlor, Augie poured them both a glass of fortified wine, and he took a seat on the sofa.
“Wait right here,” said Zoey. “I have a present for you.”
“Well that’s very nice.”
After hurrying to the car, she returned with the boxed shoes. Augie pulled out his pocketknife and cut through the twine, and then opened the boxes.
“These are some fine shoes,” he said, after examining them.
“Let me try one on and make sure it fits,” said Zoey, grabbing his foot and pulling it up so that she could remove his old shoe. Augie rolled back, almost spilling his wine. She grabbed his ankle and forced his foot into the new shoe. “Voila! It fits!”
“Very nice,” said Augie, still reclining, and then he drained his glass.
Pulling the shoe off again, she untied and removed his spat and then pulled off his sock. From heel to toe, she licked the bottom of his foot.
“Mmm. Salty.”
Chapter Ten: Rings
Yuah didn’t eat at the family dining table on any of the following four days either. It wasn’t because the dragon was there. In fact she wasn’t. Neither was Augie, and Yuah didn’t know if Iolanthe was or not. In any case, she certainly had no desire to eat alone or to eat alone with her sister-in-law. She took her meals in her room. She hadn’t gone anywhere during the day either, spending the mornings in the garden and the afternoons in the parlor or the library. She wasn’t brooding, she told herself. At last though, she could take the solitude no more.
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