Read The Fire Within (The Last Dragon Chro) for Free Online Page A

clearly saw Lucy. It was almost as if she’d dissolved inside it.
    The second dragon, by contrast, was a real monster. Its wings were raised, its jaws were open, and its claws were spread in readiness for battle. David peered intoits dark green eyes. They had a strangely disconcerting depth. The sort of eyes that could follow you anywhere. He was pleased Gadzooks didn’t look like that.
    “Who are they?” he asked.
    “Gawain and Gwendolen,” Lucy muttered.
    “What do you think?” asked Liz. She leaned back against the counter, drying pots.
    David pointed at the scary one. “Wouldn’t like to meet him down a long, dark alley.”
    “That’s Gawain,” said Lucy. “He’s very
fierce
and he doesn’t like
jokes.
”
    “Don’t be grumpy,” said Liz. “What about the other one, David?”
    The tenant sat down in his usual place and turned Gwendolen around to face him. “At the risk of getting burnt to a crisp, she really reminds me of Lucy —”
    Lucy dropped her modeling stick.
    “— give or take the odd green scale, of course.”
    For a moment there was silence. David gave an innocuous smile, hoping he hadn’t said anything outof place. You never really knew in the Pennykettle household; dragons were always a ticklish subject. He looked at Lucy. She was gaping at her mom.
    Liz dried a plate with a slow, circular motion of the dish towel. “That’s very observant,” she said. “Not many people can see the resemblance.”
    “Lucky guess,” said David with a nervous shrug. Why did he suddenly get the feeling he’d found the key to some deep, dark secret? He glanced at Gawain and couldn’t help but ask, “So if Gwendolen is Lucy, then who’s …?”
    Lucy’s eyes opened to the size of saucers. “He’s —”
    “Going upstairs,” said Liz, just as the timer on the microwave pinged.
    “But—?”
    “No buts, it’s dinnertime. Clear that table.”
    Lucy’s shoulders sagged. She looked once at her half-built dragon, blew it a kiss, then squashed it mercilessly into a ball.
    Liz pulled on a pair of oven gloves and took three potatoes out of the microwave. She put them on abaking tray and popped them into the oven to crisp. “Five minutes,” she said, and whisked outside with a bag of trash.
    As the door drifted shut, David tapped Lucy gently on the arm. “Who is he, then?” he whispered, nodding at Gawain.
    Lucy bit her lip and glanced outside. “The last dragon in the world,” she hissed.
    “No. I meant, who’s he modeled on?”
    Lucy looked at him as if he were an idiot. “He’s the last real dragon in the
world,”
she repeated.
    David, none the wiser, changed the subject. “Fine. Let’s talk about Conker. I want to ask you something important. Have you ever seen him climb — since he hurt his eye?”
    Lucy looked faintly puzzled.
    “Up a tree? Fence? Anything? Think hard.”
    Lucy thought for a moment, then shook her head. “Why do you want to know?”
    “Know what?” said Liz, coming in again. She snatched up a box of cat chow and rattled some intoBonnington’s dish. Bonnington materialized in the kitchen as if he’d beamed down from outer space.
    “I was asking Lucy about Conker,” said David.
    “Quelle surprise,”
said Liz, making Lucy frown.
    David knocked on the table to get her attention. “I saw two squirrels in the library gardens.”
    Lucy’s eyes lit up.
    “Lucy, I can still see a mess,” said her mom.
    Lucy hurried to the sink with her jelly jar and sticks. “What did they look like?” she asked.
    “Gray and squirrelly,” David said unhelpfully. “One of them was big and fat.”
    The jelly jar clattered around the sink. “Was it Birchwood?!”
    “Birchwood?” David spluttered with laughter. “Not unless he caught the bus to Scrubbley. It’s quite a trek to the library gardens.”
    “Not if you go across the fields,” said Lucy. She banged her hands down on the counter. “That’s where they went, Mom, the library gardens!”
    “Very nice,”