The Dragon Keepers

“There weren’t always dragons in the valley.” I dropped my pencil onto my unfinished letter and looked to my ma in surprise. She carefully layered oats, raspberry puree, and whipped cream for Cranachans as if she hadn’t uttered a word, while the sweet fragrance wafted to my nose, and my mouth watered. So preoccupied was I in hunger that I must have misunderstood what she said.

“I’m sorry. What did you say?” I managed around the saliva gathering in my mouth. I had heard whispered stories and read brief paragraphs in school history books of the good ol’ days before the dragons arrived but never from my ma, who rarely spoke to me and never spoke to anyone else. It was a theme with the older generation: the more loss they experienced from the dragons’ arrival, the less they spoke. For my generation, however, dragons were just a way of life – they were a rather large inconvenience, but they have always been here.

She set the dessert jars onto an antique tray and deftly moved them to the chiller to set completely. Rather than picking up my pencil to continue my letter, I simply watched her work and hoped for leftovers. She was in her element at the stainless-steel counter at the back of our small shop, magically combining simple ingredients into beautiful pastries and desserts with little more than a rolling pin, a whisk, and an old beat-up caldron – I mean stockpot.

“It’s time you know the truth ‘afore some fool tells you otherwise.” Her light Scottish lilt was always surprising to hear since she hadn’t been to Scotland in over 25 years. Perhaps her voice was just rusty with disuse, and she hadn’t allowed it to adjust to her new surroundings.

I wasn’t sure what qualified as the “truth” since no one seemed to know where the dragons came from or how they avoided detection for the last, oh, 800 years or so. It wasn’t every day an extinct species came back from the literal dead. I didn’t interrupt, though, except for the growling of my stomach.

My ma raised an eyebrow before continuing. “In Scotland, when the ol’ Gods ruled and man wasn’t the top of the food chain, great wyrms roamed both earth and sea.” I knew she didn’t mean the earth-burrowing kind from the family religion books that survived the trip from Scotland. “Everyone from Beowulf to Erik Leif were credited with slaying the monsters, but rumors survived each generation that some of the dragons – and their eggs – escaped the centuries-long slaughter.”

I hadn’t heard that part before, but it sure seems plausible since we were dealing with a bit of a dragon issue ourselves hundreds of years later. Could the stories be more than just myths?

She seemed to read my thoughts as she replied, “That, my girl, is where our family comes in. You see, your family – my family – are those who sought to save the great beasts from the hunters and glory-seekers.” She sneered at the descriptions of some of the heroes I had grown up not just learning about but idolizing. Part of me feared she had finally lost her mind, but she seemed perfectly sane except for all the dragon talk – fervent, absolutely, but still sane.

“These great wyrms weren’t necessarily evil, contrary to most beliefs at the time, any more than our current dragons are. More…misunderstood and a bit hot-headed.” It may have been a bit of an understatement since our valley was filled with scorched earth and leveled buildings, but I wanted to hear more about how our family history played into this story. “Our ancestors knew the dragons were not the devils they were believed to be, so sought to save the entire species.”

I quietly made my way to the other side of her workspace and grabbed both the bowl used to whip cream and a spoon, settling in for the long haul. This was the most my ma had spoken in years, and I didn’t want to pass out in the middle of the story from hunger. Ma grabbed two scones from the cooling rack to dunk into the whipping cream and sat back down across from me.

“Each sworn to secrecy, and at great personal risk, your great, great, great…something grandma and her sisters began formulating a plan to collect as many dragon eggs as they could and safeguard them for when the species could eventually be safely reborn. They called themselves the Dragon Keepers, and we’ve been protecting dragon eggs ever since.”

My mouth dropped open so widely the partially-eaten scone fell from my mouth and rolled across the floor.