In which our little dragon friend tells his story.

Find earlier parts HERE

“Mama,” Peter called from the kitchen’s back door. A light snow had just started falling, dusting his hair and shoulders. “Me and Jules and Royal got the evergreens you wanted.”

Though only ten, Peter was still the spit and image of his father. Tall and strapping, with the makings of broad shoulders and a powerful jaw. He even sounded like Thomas. Encouraging and heartbreaking in equal measure.

“Where do you want them, Mama?” Jules peeked in under Peter’s arm. Two years younger and a head shorter, Jules was Millicent’s child through and through. He looked like her, thought like her, and when he argued with Peter, he even sounded like her.

“Can’t Emily and Helen help?” Royal pushed in on Peter’s other side. His button nose and chubby cheeks were bright red, and his hand-me-down coat was covered with mud. Probably had played around as much as helped while out with his brothers. At six, he needed to be more responsible with such things. Millicent had been getting lax since Thomas’s illness. She needed to work on that.

“No, dear, they have gone home for the evening, it is just us. Bring it all into the kitchen and we’ll sort out what to do with it.” She closed her business journal and cleared the worktable.

The boys brought in several armfuls of evergreen boughs, which filled the warm kitchen with their lovely fresh scent. Even if Royal had been playing around, they had done a good job of it.

“Pull up the stools and sit down. I have a bit of warm chocolate left that you can have.” She pulled the boy’s tin cups from the shelf and filled them with the chocolate.

Peter held the cup to his nose and breathed deep. “This is just the way we like it, without those strange spices your customers always ask for. This wasn’t left over. You made this just for us.”

“What if I did, little mister? What if I did?”

Peter jumped down from his stool and hugged her hard. Jules and Royal followed suit.

There now, they had gone and done it. Tears trickled down her cheeks. At least this had happened often enough that it no longer frightened the boys. Such good lads. “Now have your chocolate and biscuits and we’ll work out what to do with all these lovelies you have brought me.”

“But isn’t it early to put out the decorations? I thought that was for Christmas eve, until Twelfth night.” Peter perched on his stool near the worktable, both hands clasped around his cup.

“That is what people do in their homes, true enough. But it is only a week until Christmas and I want our customers to be thinking about the Chocolate Dragon as they are planning their Christmastime parties. I want to be very busy come the end of the month, and reminding the of the holiday seems to be sound idea.”

“What do you want us to do?” Jules asked.

“We will sort out the boughs and tie them with red ribbon to hang in the window and along the walls. If there are some small bits, we might add them to the displays and maybe the tables as well.”

“If there is extra, may be put some in the house, too?” Royal turned pleading blue eyes on her.

“If there is extra, we may, and if there is not, I suppose you lot might go out and bring in some more for the house. So finish up with your treats, and we can get started.” It wasn’t indulging them if they had to do the work for it, was it?

The boys cheered—trudging out in the woods was hardly a chore for them.

Millicent poured a little cup of chocolate for herself. The boys were right. It was better without the expensive spices and wines. Just simple chocolate and milk, maybe a bit of cinnamon, and a moment to savor life—just the small things. The warmth of the kitchen, the crackling fire, her children, the—

“May I help?” a small voice from the floor asked.

Oh no!

“Mama, what’s that?” Jules pointed toward the hearth.

“Just a small dog to catch the rats. I am just a small dog.”

“Why is it saying it’s a dog?” Royal jumped down from his stool and scurried toward the Criollo, laying flat on the warm stone.

Millicent clapped her hand to her forehead. Why hadn’t she told him to stay away from the children? “Don’t bother trying to persuade them you’re anything but what you are. They can hear dragons.”

“Can you now?” Criollo sat back on his haunches and cocked his head.

“We have a dragon now?” Peter joined his brothers in a loose ring around the green-brown dragon.

“One does not have a dragon.” She joined the boys. “A dragon is not a pet like a dog. He is his own creature, you see.”

“So, his is our Friend, then?” Peter crouched, nearly eye to eye with Criollo. “Are you our Friend?”

“I hardly know what to say?” Criollo looked up at her. “I have only just arrived here.”

“How did you get here? I have never seen your kind around here.” Jules sat tailor-style beside Criollo, inching as close as he dared.

Criollo dropped his head and scrubbed his face with his paws. “It is not a very nice story. I got stuck in a bag of cacao pods and shipped here from my home in the islands.”

“Shipped in a cacao bag? That is quite the adventure.” Peter sat beside Jules. “May I scratch your chin?”

Criollo lifted his head and reached it toward Peter, who scratched it gently. “I always thought an adventure would be something nice. But this has not been nice.”

“How did you get stuck in the bag?” Royal edged between his brothers, elbows on his knees and chin in his hands. He loved a good story.

“The plantation men treated us like farm animals, who belonged to them. It wasn’t nice.”

“Not all farmers are bad to their animals.” Royal bit his lip.

“I suppose it doesn’t have to be that way. But it was there. And they wouldn’t brook no complaining.”

“You complained?” Peter stroked Criollo’s cheek.

“Someone had to try to make things better? We were treated like animals—it wasn’t good.” He glanced up at her as though promising not to offer details the children did not need to know.

“So they put you in the bag to make you go away?” Jules stroked Criollo’s spinal ridge between his wings.

Criollo spread his little wings and leaned into the touch. “No, I think the plantation men had other things in mind. It were my friends I think, who didn’t want me to come to harm. They gave me a tea to make me sleep and sewed me into the bag to send me away.  I think they were trying to be kind.”

“But if they could escape that way, why didn’t they try?” That was Jules, always seeing the unique possibilities.

“It was a … difficult … trip. I had to hibernate to survive. We tropical dragons do not naturally hibernate. I only learned it from a passing bird-type dragon who was blown off course in a storm. She told me about dragons in far away places, like here, and how some hibernate to get through the cold.”

“So your Friends trapped you in the bag, knowing you could die?” Peter’s big brown eyes grew very large.

Criollo shrugged his wings. “It was the best chance they could give me. They were good friends to me.”

“Well, I think it is terrible that you should be away from all your friends and everything you knew. Stuck here all alone.” Royal huffed.

“I am not all alone, not now. I am here. With a warm hearth, and a roof, and plenty of rats to eat. I am very fortunate.”

“Rats to eat?” Royal shuddered. “That does not sound very good.”

“You are not alone.” Peter glanced over his shoulder at her. “Can we be your Friends? Mama, can he be our Friend?”

And this was why she should have made sure he did not talk to the children. She dragged her hand down her face.

“Please, Mama. You and Papa never let no one go cold or hungry. You can’t start now.” Bless it all, Jules would be the one to bring that up.

“Perhaps, we might have a trial of it?” Criollo blinked up at her, his lips pressed hard. “See how we all get on before declaring a Friendship?”

That did leave both of them a way out. And it felt heartless to turn the creature out now after she had told him he could stay.

“Yes, that sounds like a very good idea. Don’t it?” Peter coaxed Criollo into his lap.

How soon before she’d find the little dragon sleeping at the foot of his bed?

“If I say yes, it doesn’t change anything about what we talked about before, your responsibilities and mine.” She planted her hands on her hips so the boys would know she was firm on that point.

“We all have responsibilities, Ma, of course he should have them, too.” Jules jumped to his feet and threw his arms around her waist.

“That is only fair.” Criollo’s thick scaly tail beat softly on the hearth.

Millicent sighed. “Fine then, we will try for … until Twelfth Night and see how it goes.”

“Thank you, Mama!” Suddenly she was enveloped in boy-hugs and a little dragon leaning against her legs.

Do you think Millicent is going to regret her choice? Tell me in the comments!

Catch up on parts you missed here.