The Season of Dragons

The red dragons in the sky cast no shadows below them. The 11-year-old boy in the grass followed them with his eyes, squinting as their translucent, serpentine bodies shimmered and twisted about. The air wavered with the heat of the day, like ripples in water. The dragons swam through it, leaving trails of smoke from their mouths and noses. Ronan swallowed away the itch of thirst in his throat.

"If I didn't see another summer again, I'd be happy the rest of my life."

Ronan sat up from the grass. Helena brushed a hand over her forehead and made a face when it came back sweaty. She groaned and let her hand fall. The grass crunched. "The grass isn't even grass anymore. It's like I'm lying on a hay bale."

"You're pricklier than a hay bale, Helena," Ronan said.

She stuck out her tongue. "Remind me why we're under the baking sun again."

Standing up, Ronan grabbed her wrist. He coaxed her up, which she answered with a grumble. Bits of grass stuck to her summer dress. He pointed up the hill toward the trees. "Today's the day. I'm going to ride a dragon."

Helena raised both eyebrows. Ronan had seen that reaction from everyone, every time. But at least she didn't tease him to his face. She glanced behind her, toward the house.

"Don't worry. The grownups are busy talking about the crops again," he said. "They won't even notice we're gone." Using both hands, Helena smoothed away the hair that was sticking to her face. "And I'll take the blame," Ronan added, "and maybe you'll get to ride with me. So it's a win-win for you."

When Helena's gaze dropped to his bruised lip, he tongued it. It still throbbed. "But it's a lose-lose for you, Ronan. You're gonna get hurt like you always do. You fell nearly 15 feet from a tree last time. And you're gonna get punished like you always do."

Ronan shrugged and headed toward the hill, shoes tramping down the dead grass. Sweat beaded up along his brow and neck, and the breeze pressed against him like a thick blanket. Helena followed, grumbles increasing in tempo with her march. She was always the first to complain but the last to ever consider leaving him.

The trees bowed from the humidity, and the shade they offered didn't turn down the heat. But at least the cicadas were still singing. Ronan watched the tops of the trees as they walked further in.

"Don't you think they're flying faster than they normally do?" he said.

Helena pulled a twig from her boot. "Yeah, I think so. Maybe that means summer's gonna finally end."

"But I haven't seen the autumn dragons yet."

"They don't always show up at the same time every year. Remember a couple years ago when the winter dragons stayed almost till June? And spring was barely a month long."

"But it's nearly December," he said.

Helena jumped over a fallen tree, nimble as a cat. "So, you want to ride an autumn dragon?"

"Well, it wouldn't burn me, for one."

"No one in history has ever touched one of the dragons, right? They're like clouds or wind." There it was. The biggest hurdle to his plans. Ronan kept his mouth shut and plowed ahead. Helena's voice softened as she followed behind. "They can't help you run away."

Ronan hated his best friend sometimes. She was only a year older and a few inches taller, but she was smarter than any adult Ronan had to deal with. And so much kinder. The boy huffed and went along faster, ignoring the extra heat on his cheeks. Helena kept pace.

The smell of leaves washed over them with the next breeze. Ronan snapped around to her, a smile spreading across his face. "I knew it!" Then he dashed through the trees and up the incline. Helena called out to him to wait up, but the scent of autumn only grew stronger. When Ronan crested the hill, he stopped. His heart leapt to his throat. Helena reached him, and he grabbed her arm to stop her. She let out a gasp.

It was one of the autumn dragons. But it was just levitating there, maybe six feet off the ground. Never had Ronan seen a dragon so still and so close. The lowest he'd ever seen them fly was right over the trees. Now that it was there, Ronan felt fear climb through his limbs. Gone was the ethereal quality all the dragons had. Leaves and twigs freed from the wind skipped over the dragon's massive head and stuck to its hazel-colored beard.

Its orange eyes were large and beady, but it didn't look like it was staring at anything. For a moment, Ronan thought it had turned into a statue, just stuck there in open space. But then it let out a breath from its parted jaws. The smell of it reminded him of worms and heavy rain and burning leaves. Then the dragon fell.

When it landed on the forest floor, it scattered apart in a gust of leaves. It blew over them, and Ronan shielded his face from the barrage and overwhelming smell. Then he peered past his arms. The dragon was gone, nothing left but a trail of wet earth travelling away where its long body used to be.

"What was that?" Helena whispered.

Ronan didn't have a clue. He brushed off the leaves, shivering at the wetness they left behind. Then another smell hit him. The two exchanged frowns, and Ronan didn't let go of Helena's hand as they reached the edge of the hill. Then they looked over the entire valley.

In the autumn, the dragons breathed color into the rolling hills of trees, a canvas of reds, browns, oranges, and yellows. In the winter, a fresh landscape of sparkling white coated even the mountains, and the winter dragons exhaled frosty snow. In the spring, the dragons burst from the ground, drawing flowers and green with them until the valley was lush and sweet. And in the summer, the fiery dragons raged heat and thunderstorms until the hills were thriving with vegetation and creatures big and small.

When the children reached the edge, Ronan covered his nose. The air burned, and the summer dragons gathered like storm clouds. The smell of smoke soaked into his skin, and Helena pointed toward the sprawling city in the distance.

"What are they doing?"

Ronan had never seen the dragons circle one area, but they did just that. Like a pit of horned and bearded snakes, the red dragons blew out smoke as they passed over the city Ronan had been born in but never raised. Then they angled their heads and loosened their jaws.

     Streams of fire shot down, catching the sky scrapers and lighting them up like torches. Black plumes of smoke mixed in with the emissions of the city. More dragons trailed along, spying pockets of civilization and razing them with liquid fire. Factories exploded and nuclear plants melted.

A flicker of shadow made Ronan look up. Dragons flew overhead, and then a red glow erupted behind them down the hill. Where the foster house was. The roar of the fire thundered in his ears, and Helena slipped out of his grasp back down the hill. The heat stopped her after a few hundred yards. She coughed and collapsed to her knees. She looked up at him.

"They're burning everything."

Ronan stepped forward until he could see past the trees, wincing as his skin started to blister. The dead grass that led them to the forest was black, and everything else was in flames. Ronan watched, in awe, as one of the dragons took a dive toward the earth. When it collided, it blew apart in a rush of ash. Then all the dragons started falling.

As the sky cleared of the summer bringers, so did the sweltering heat. Ronan stood in the clearing. A pang of loss filled him as he looked to where the house and farm used to be. It had been his prison since he could remember, a place he wanted to fly away from. But it had been his only home, and now he was afraid.

Helena stood close to him, her arm bumping his shoulder. "It's all gone. And we could've gone with them."

Ronan glanced up at her. Tears were trailing down her face, but he didn't know if she was happy or sad. "I'm glad we didn’t," he said.

She took his hand. "All because you wanted to ride a dragon. You and your stupid, impossible dream. Your reckless hope."

Ronan squeezed her hand. Something cold landed on his cheek. He blinked and flinched when it happened again. They craned their necks up. The sky clouded over and streaks of white split it open. Ronan put his hands out.

The six months of summer ended, and snow started to fall.

It dampened the roar and smothered the fires until dunes covered the ash mounds. The myriad of flakes created a film over the lake across the field. Crops long scorched by the long summer were buried and finally put to rest. Acrid smoke turned to the smell of cold in winter. The trees of the forest bowed with white caps.

Ronan and Helena stood under a tree, and the snow pressed up against them until it was at their knees. The girl started shivering. Ronan stomped down on the fluffy white. "I think we might get buried," he said, and he offered her a smirk. It was stiff, and he didn't know if it was from the freezing wind or his worry.

"Did I say I didn't want to see summer again? I take that back," Helena said. She had her arms wrapped around her ribs, back pressed against the oak.

Ronan leaned against her, shying away from the snow that started to cling to his shorts. He rubbed at a bruise on his arm, and then trailed his fingers down a spattering of scars. They stood out against his sun tan and goosebumps. "And I still didn't get to ride a dragon."

The snow before them shifted like waves of the sea. Then a form surfaced. It was silvery white with blue eyes. The winter dragon slithered along the snowy hills and then plunged its head back under, disappearing from view.

"Did you see it?" Ronan said, cheeks coloring. He stepped out into the field.

"Yeah, and it was just as scary as that brown dragon in the forest," Helena said. She trailed after him, skinny legs wading through the snow. In the distance, Ronan saw one of them falling from the sky. But it wasn't a dive like the other dragons, who died in a plume of ash and leaves. The white dragon loped and then dipped into the soft hills. It reminded Ronan of a fox he'd seen one winter, prancing about and playing in the snow.

Ronan felt a tremor, and then the snow in front of him collapsed. In its place lifted a winter dragon's giant head. Its crystalline horns were close enough for Ronan to touch, and its eye was nearly as big as he was. It didn't seem aware of him, its pupil as unfocused as one of Helena's dolls. It shook and started carving a path through the snow. The boy followed.

"Come on, Helena," he shouted back.

She called after him as he ran alongside the serpent, and then he reached out and grabbed a branch of its horn. It felt like glass. Ronan lifted himself up and into its thick fur, and a shiver of warmth spread through him. His best friend sprinted the best she could, face wild with fear. He held out his hand.

"Let's see how far it takes us," he called.

Helena leapt up behind him and wrapped her arms around his waist. "This is impossible," he thought he heard her say.

As the dragon took to the sky, Ronan dared to look down. The earth was coated in quiet. The trees and mountains were nothing but texture along the surface. And then the sky broke, and Ronan closed his eyes to the sun. The smell of spring filled his senses.