"In Need of a Dragon"

 

Not two minutes after Ms. Wright had finished speaking with the owner of the appliance store and hung up her phone did her doorbell ring. It was not the delivery person ringing but instead a dragon, ten feet tall and shimmering in its blue scales, its neck bent low under the porch roof and its wings folded like fans. It wore a grey fedora.

"Hello," it said. "Pardon me for intruding, but I got wind of your neighbors' chatter and heard your furnace is on its way out. Might you be in need of a dragon?"

Ms. Wright, of 142 Oak Terrance #3, merely stood there.

"My card," said the dragon. It pinched a thin card between two knife-sharp claws and passed it toward Ms. Wright, who opened her screen door just wide enough for her hand to fit. The dragon, in addition to being a home heating specialist, was also a supply logistics manager. Its name was an illegible scroll.

"I just ordered a new furnace yesterday," Ms. Wright whispered, barely able to meet her visitor's gaze.

The dragon clicked its tongue. A curl of smoke escaped from between its jagged mountainpeak teeth. "I'm always just a little too late on these house calls," it said with a sigh. "I was on my way over much earlier in the week, but I caught the scent of the earth turning over far below the grass, because, as you know, spring starts next week, and the smell was just so...."

The dragon sighed again and shook its head. 

"Forgive me. I'm easily distracted in my old age," it said. "If I may ask, the warranty on your purchase...?"

"Ten years," said Ms. Wright.

"Well, that's good, that's quite standard. I'd like to point out, however, that dragons are rather long-lived, and incredibly efficient to boot, the source of our flames being nothing more than a slight twist in our anatomy."

"Of course, of course." Ms. Wright's eyes had not grown any less saucer-shaped since she answered the door.

"And," the dragon added, removing his fedora, "we've also been known to make excellent companions on rare occasions, particularly for those among your kind who--and please consider this a term of respect, as you'll imagine it must be for my ilk--who are more advanced in years." Here Ms. Wright touched her grey curls and finally looked straight at the dragon, who seemed to understand her in a way no other salesperson ever had. "While I understand you have a commitment with another seller and have no wish to pressure you out of it," the dragon said, "I do hope that, once your warranty's over, you'll keep me in mind. For as I suspect you may know, there are some chills that come with age that won't go away no matter how high you set your heater."

The dragon cleared its throat and blinked, and then smiled before placing its fedora on its head. "Ms. Wright, thank you so much for your time," it said. "I hope you have a wonderful day."

The dragon lifted itself into the air on its mighty wings, stirring the scent of springtime with each beat. Ms. Wright remained at her door, her eyes swimming in tears, her mouth ajar, and her fingers fumbling for her phone as she tried to recall the appliance store's cancellation policy.

"Safe from Dragons"

This is our dragon, a.k.a. our furnace. Lately it hasn't been behaving the way we'd expect a furnace to behave.

Oh, how the villagers hated that fire-breathing dragon. Loud it was, and smelly--its stink seeped from deep within its mountaintop cave and flowed all the way to the valley below like a river of vaporous sulfur. The villagers gathered in the inn to discuss the dragon and often were joined by foreign mercenaries and quest-bound knights, all of whom asked the same question: "What should be done?" The mountain was the tallest in the land, and the mouth of the cave poured forth dragonfire almost constantly, great geyser plumes of flame that could be seen in the village day and night. Danger lay in wait on the mountaintop. Surely that danger was waiting to invade the village.

The people assumed their time had come the day the dragon left its cave and flew over the valley. They ran inside their homes, not knowing what else to do, except for one small boy who stayed outside while the dragon, so close to them all, neither roared nor breathed fire but simply glided overhead on its thin wings like a parchment kite. The boy was confused, amazed, and humbled. He was also, however, deeply human. "Go away, dragon!" he screamed. "We don't want you here!" He never told anyone that the dragon looked at him.

Not once in all the days after did any of the villagers catch the torturous odor of dragon flesh on the wind or hear a wild, clawing bellow tumble out from the high-up cave, and it was for the better, they said. Who knew what that dragon had been up to? And now they were safe. The inn began to close early. The mercenaries and knights who still passed that way left town with a quick nod, there being nothing else for them to do. And the villagers, instead of gathering to talk, went to bed every night not long after supper. They slept in a place that was dark all around, as any place without a dragon is bound to be.