The Lazy Dragon and Bumblespells Wizard (2 page)

Only something that would get Cl'rnce in big trouble would drive Hazel to venture past what she so elegantly referred to as Wiz-Tech's “smelly old stables, which are stuck behind the knights' section of the academy for a good reason.” That she hadn't used her usual flunky to fetch him meant this was going to be a dr'gon's flight past bad. Had something happened after his practical joke?

Hazel kicked his branch until, eyes still closed, he turned his head in her direction.

“You need to stop loafing and pay attention. We have one grand mess,” she snapped.

An instant too late, he heard the scratch of her razor-sharp talon along the trunk end of his branch. The limb cracked, and Cl'rnce plummeted. He snapped open his almost-never-used wings to slow himself.

But he didn't open them all the way, and he wasn't quick enough; butt first, he landed in the muddy riverbank. Cl'rnce stared up to where his sister hovered. He
started to plan. That was his motto: Always have a plan.

With a snort and a quick extension of her perfect jade wings, Hazel flapped down in front of him. Tidily on dry ground, she stood a pace beyond his muddy landing spot. “Cl'rnce, you big lummox! You are not worthy, but it's time for you to step up as the heir, as the next River D'rgon.” A burst of angry flame slipped between Hazel's fangs.

Cl'rnce's paws were stuck under the mud. With a muddy squish that sounded a lot like hot air escaping his bottom, Cl'rnce rocked backward to get up. But the mud sucked him forward. He lost his balance and landed muzzle first in the muck. He slit an eye open to peer up at Hazel. “Huh?”

Cl'rnce worked hard not to flinch as he stared into the angry purple edges of the world's meanest sister's snout. Hazel was older by a measly seven minutes and seven seconds, but she acted like she knew everything and treated him like a too-dumb-to-be-out-alone troll. He struggled to get up, but his legs were stuck in the slippery mud, wrapped together in the tangled strings of crushed rushes.

Hazel flicked open her razor claws; with one swipe the weeds snicked apart.

“Hey, be careful. You might slice me instead.” Cl'rnce stood and slogged through the sludge.

He kicked the shredded plants. The severed cattails
flew at his sister, missing her by an inch. She squinted at him. Cl'rnce pretended not to notice she was even angrier now. He said, “Do you know how long it took me to steal the maps to find this place?”

“Aren't we proud? Now we can add thieving to your many talents.” Hazel leaned close. “Are you paying attention to me?”

Rubbing his eyes, Cl'rnce turned away from her breath. Hazel'd been eating gardenias again. Not only were they his least favorite flower, but they made such a smelly combination with her normal rotted-eggs-and-sulphur breath.

Cl'rnce said, “Depends. Why are you stalking me? I thought after assembly you were scheduled to make the First Year Dr'gons' lives miserable. You'll be late if you don't hurry back to their caverns.”

“As if I don't know what you did. No matter. Right now I'm making your life miserable,” Hazel said, leaning even closer, pouring out scalding gardenia-sulphur breath.

Cl'rnce had an uncomfortably close view of her front fangs, which were sharp and even. Not like Cl'rnce's, with his right fang longer than the left. Hazel could bite really hard with her perfect fangs. She'd made a point of biting him almost every day when they were young dr'gonelles.

“I know. I know everything,” she said, raising her
eye ridges.

Cl'rnce shivered but managed not to run.

Hazel continued, “You're the worst. For months Wizard Professor Gralph and Mother have been asking me to talk to you, about how you make trouble and ….” She took a deep breath, rolling her eyes up. “No. You're not getting me off topic. What's happened is too important.” She pointed a claw at him. “You can't go on like this.” Hazel stared at him, slowly nodding her horned head. “Are you listening?”

“I can't go on like what?” Cl'rnce stretched to his full, twelve-foot height. Around Hazel there were three rules to survival. Rule Number One: always be taller than Hazel. Rule Number Two: always be ready to dodge and run. Number Three was the same as Number Two. “I was just napping. It's not like I was busy setting any knights on fire.”

“No, not today. Today it was shrinking robes, and that's not the point. Did you know Mother got The Letter? The school's Board decreed you have until the end of this term to make up the last fifty credits you failed toward your Dr'gon Arts degree; if you don't, you're out. This is a disgrace. No Merlin Clan River Dr'gon has ever been expelled from Dr'gon and Wizard Technological School and Knights Academy. You're an embarrassment to our family, the Merlin Clan, and all River Dr'gons.”

Hazel's snout was now an impressive red and
purple. Not too far from explosion point, Cl'rnce thought. It wouldn't take much to get a world-class tantrum out of her, maybe distract her from the whole assembly fiasco. He smiled at his sister. “Hazel, you're the only one who ever rolls out the school's whole, long name. Why do you do that? Personally I go with Wiz-Tech. But I guess being so
you
is how you got to be valedictorian of your class, huh? Is that the way all your friends say the school name? Oops. My bad. You don't have any friends.”

“Stop it! I know what you're doing. And
my
class is supposed to be
our
class, except you've flunked Wizard Training three times.” Hazel snorted three tight streams of flame at Cl'rnce.

He ducked the first two, but the last burst hit Cl'rnce's left hind paw. “Ow! What'd you do that for?” He hopped away.

“Pay attention!” Hazel's paws were clenched so tightly they were almost white through her purple scales.

“Okay. Go ahead, Viper Breath.” Cl'rnce bent over his burned paw. “Will you look at this? I'm singed all around my claw.” He glared at his sister. “And it stings a lot!”

“I'm going to ignore your whining,” Hazel snarled, “but only this once. Listen up. This is the important part. As mad at you as I am for your failures here at Dr'gon and Wizard Technological School and Knights Academy, there is something far more significant. Are
you listening this time?
The River Dr'gon is superannuated
.” She stared at him.

Cl'rnce couldn't believe it. She either didn't suspect about his Borrow spell or for once wasn't interested in punishing him and letting everyone know what a dope he was. Nope. She wouldn't miss that opportunity. She didn't know. He was safe, at least until he made sense of why she was really after him.

She'd said something about a superannuated dr'gon. He didn't know what that meant, but the way she was glaring, he had a feeling it meant something awful—like dead. Cl'rnce patted his chest and felt his heart. It was okay—he wasn't the one dead.

He couldn't resist poking her again, so he shrugged. “Which dr'gon?” He patted his chest. “You and I are both River Dr'gons. And we're both here. I'm not dead or super-whatsit … well, it's true I am super.” Cl'rnce opened his eyes wide, giving her his most doubtful look. “Are you super?”

Hazel breathed in so deeply her chest expanded to twice its usual size, and her muzzle glowed an even angrier red. “Listen, waste-of-dr'gon-scales—” She poked Cl'rnce's chest with a knife-like talon. “—not
a
River Dr'gon.
The
River Dr'gon. The Primus! The First Dr'gon among all River Dr'gons and Dr'gon Nations, the Dr'gon Council leader,
the
River Dr'gon.”

“So what?” Cl'rnce felt a tickle of alarm but decided
to ignore it.

“You know so what. By our royal birth you are it, the next Primus,
the
River Dr'gon. Why you and not me is just plain stupid. Why should a lazy, selfish trickster like you be First among Dr'gons? Just because you are the last male Merlin Clan River Dr'gon? Every other dr'gon clan allows royal females to be considered, but not ours. And our clan rules.” Hazel spit a flame ball into the puddle beside Cl'rnce. “Phooey!”

When hot mud splashed him, Cl'rnce flinched. “Don't hold back, sis. How do you really feel?”

Hazel glared, clacking her glistening teeth. “Letter or no letter from the school, you're out, leaving at once. The point is even though you will never graduate like all the Dr'gon Nations rulers before you, you must find a Wizard Partner and undertake the Journey immediately. You and your partner must return the Whisper Stone to the Dr'gon Council Chamber as every potential Primus before you has.”

She closed her eyes and droned out the next words. “You must overcome the perils of the Journey and prove yourself worthy of being Primus.” Hazel took a deep breath and held it long enough for her red muzzle to pale to its normal light-purple edges. “I've always feared this day would come. The decision is made. You have no choice.”

Cl'rnce pulled up an Essence of Life flower. The
flowers protected against disease, which he thought he'd need if he was stepping in where this super-what-sit diseased River Dr'gon had been. But the flowers also gave visions. As he snorted its fragrance, a vision of the dream-wizard unfolded. This time he watched her throw back her hood. She was a freckle-faced short person engulfed in a too-long blue robe. She didn't look like any wizard he knew, but she was saying how he was special. He let the dream image melt. If he couldn't stay at Wiz-Tech, it was sort of possible getting a Wizard Partner who adored him as Primus could be good. Also being Hazel's boss could be good. And fun was his middle name. Cl'rnce shrugged. “Okay. Anything else?”

Hazel took a deep breath and blew out slightly less scalding air. “Yes. Repeat after me: I have to get a Wizard Partner. I have five days to complete the Primus Journey and deliver the Whisper Stone to the Uamha.”

“Where?” interrupted Cl'rnce.

“The Dr'gon Council Chamber.” Hazel snorted three hot puffs of angry steam in his face. Cl'rnce felt the runnow-or-get-flamed heat rising in his sister. Her muzzle started to glow scarlet again. “I said to repeat after me.” Flame-edged steam slipped through her fangs. “I have to get a Wizard Partner.”

Just one more poke at his angry sister and Cl'rnce would get going. “Hazel has to …”

Hazel let loose, and Cl'rnce leaped up and over her
long flaming shot. “Good one, Hazel. You almost got me in the—”

She fired again, but he was too slow, and she nipped his muddy rear.

Cl'rnce swatted out the flames, checking to make sure his perfect scales were not damaged. Only a foot away from him, standing as still as a statue, with that look that said Cl'rnce had gone too far, Hazel hissed, “Focus, little brother. Five days.” His sister's voice softened to her scariest tone. “Wizard Professor Gralph says there are five wizardry students who haven't yet paired up with a dr'gon. Any of them would be honored to have the next Primus as their Dr'gon Partner.” Hazel choked on the last words.

She clicked her claws together once; a small parchment appeared in her outstretched palm. Hazel read from the paper. “‘Bosberous.' He's from the very old and distinguished Pendr'gon wizard clan.” She glared at Cl'rnce as if she could force him to say yes to stupid old Bosberous.

He shook his head. “Don't think so. I made Bosberous's wand fire backward.”

“So? That's nothing next to some of the tricks you've
pulled on other wizardry students.” Hazel shrugged.

Cl'rnce flicked a fluff of dandelion off his chest. “Yeah. That's how I saw it. Too bad you weren't there to defend me at the Disciplinary Court. It's been over a year, and Bosberous still won't speak to me.” Cl'rnce smiled. “Not that his speech is all that clear, what with that chin-length lip hair.” Cl'rnce circled his talons outside his ears. “I'm not sure if he hears all that well through the stylish orange and blue ear tufts. Funny what a backward-firing wand can do.” He laughed.

Hazel drew a claw through the first name. “Well, there's Norman. As a Slipstream he has a real gift for transportation spells. You'll need those to get to the Council Chamber with the Whisper Stone in time.”

Cl'rnce shook his head.

Hazel sighed. “Fire again?”

He gulped. She knew about the stables. He nodded and shrugged. Hazel scratched at her paper. “There seems to be a theme here. You need to stay away from fire spells. You're not that good at them, you beady-eyed cretin.”

“Are not beady. My eyes are large and lustrous. Mother said so.” Cl'rnce rolled his eyes away from Hazel. He kept it his own secret, but he was pretty good at non-fire magic and could have gotten highest marks in
Magick 101,
if he'd shown up for the final practical test. But it interfered with nap time, so ….

He walked to the river edge and bent to admire himself in a pool as still as glass behind a fallen log. Cl'rnce waved at his reflection, enjoying the graceful motions of his digits.

Hazel read the next name. “Jeremiah. No, never mind. I remember him. He has a brutish temper.” She eliminated number three.

Cl'rnce choked. “Yeah, let's stay away from the cranky ones.” He eyed his crabby sister.

Hazel didn't look up as she read, “Halbert.”

“Fire.” Cl'rnce scraped a bit of mulberry leaf out of his fangs and smiled at his reflection. “Don't you think I'm uncommonly handsome?”

Hazel snorted and zipped her claw through
Halbert
. “That leaves Wilhelmina Wanderlust. An excellent choice. She was one of the most promising First Years ….”

Cl'rnce jerked away from his watery image. “She's like you!”

Hazel growled, “So what?”

Bossed and tortured by Hazel for four hundred and twenty years, Cl'rnce shivered at the thought of a partner picked out by, and resembling more than a little, his own sister. He grabbed for an excuse. “Uh, Willy is afraid of caves. Don't I have to take the Whisper Stone to the Council Chamber inside Ghost Mountain? The Council Chamber is nothing but a big cave. What good
is a wizard who won't go in a cave?”