Burn(27)

“There are always surprises, officer,” Kazimir said. “That is the nature of the word.”

“He always talks like this,” Sarah’s dad said to the sheriff, then to Kazimir: “The sheriff wants to ask you some questions about the disappearance of Deputy Kelby. You remember him, don’t you?”

“You met the deputy on the road out there, I gather,” the sheriff added.

At this, Kazimir looked at Sarah, though she kept having to remind herself she was the only one who knew the dragon’s name. “I didn’t tell them,” she found herself saying, then was deeply embarrassed by the skeptical glance the sheriff gave her.

“Indeed she didn’t,” he said. “It was the deputy himself. Said you’d been insubordinate.”

“As I am not his subordinate,” said the dragon, “how would it be possible to act in any other fashion?”

“Enough of this,” Sarah’s father grumbled. “Did you kill the deputy?”

“Mr. Dewhurst,” the sheriff warned.

“I did not,” Kazimir said, almost casually. “Who is saying that I did?”

“No one, Mr. . . . ?” The sheriff left a blank for Kazimir to provide his name. A cue the dragon either didn’t understand or pretended not to.

The sheriff was not obviously unkind. He’d driven Sarah down to her farm and had been respectful in his questions to her about the dragon: if she had ever known it to leave their farm, if she had in particular known its whereabouts the night Deputy Kelby was thought to have vanished. She’d offered no information that would have incriminated anyone. If the Sheriff had thought she was being evasive, he didn’t show it, just mentioned that he’d known her mother slightly. “A smart lady. I was sorry to hear of her passing.”

“So was I,” was all Sarah was able to say in return.

“We found a dragon footprint,” the sheriff said now. “Well, half a footprint. In the dirt by the alley behind Al’s diner, not too far from where Deputy Kelby’s patrol car was parked. As there are no other dragons working in this county right now to my knowledge, and as that footprint is too small to be a red—”

“It is interesting, this word ‘small,’” Kazimir said, opening his wings some. “It is accurate to say that I am smaller than my red brethren.” He stepped forward, like he did that night at the gas station, making himself look enormous, terrifying. “It is inaccurate to say that I am small.”

Sheriff Lopez held his ground with a smile. “I mean no offense. I merely want to confirm that it’s yours and to hear your explanation for making it.”

“I cannot confirm, not having seen it, but I have, yes, walked through your town in your sleeping hours. You know little of my kind, but where I come from, we are famous for our curiosity.”

“And where do you come from?”

“To the point at last,” Kazimir said. “You would like me to say that I am Russian, as if the nations of men have any meaning to a dragon. You would like to think that I am a spy, if not a murderer. I am neither, Officer, and do you know why?”

“Tell me.”

“Because I will outlive you,” Kazimir said, simply. “If I took a human life, my own would end, but why would I bother when my life is so much longer than yours? I win by simply outlasting you. For the same reason, why would I ever care about the fate of your nations, except when they would limit the freedom of mine? Why would you ever be so significant to me?”

“You work for us,” Sarah’s father said, and she could hear the anger. “You want our gold.”

“You work your hogs,” Kazimir said. “Yet you want their meat.”

Sarah winced. This did not feel at all like the right thing to say.

“And do you want our meat, Mr. Dragon?” the sheriff said.

Kazimir lowered his head on that long neck, careening it down to their level. “It does not suit the stomach,” he said. “Too much grit.”

“Did you kill Deputy Kelby?” the sheriff asked. “Are you a spy?”

“No,” Kazimir said.

“No to which?”

Kazimir only smiled.

There had been little more after that. The sheriff had no real evidence or, it seemed, any real belief of a connection between the dragon and the death of Deputy Kelby.

“But that might not matter to some people,” the sheriff told Kazimir. “I’d be careful, if I were you.”

“I am always careful around men,” the dragon had answered. “You are dangerous animals.”

After that, Sarah and her father walked the sheriff to his car.

“Do you really think it was the claw, Sheriff?” her father asked.

“Not especially. We found a human tooth in the alley and signs of a scuffle. The deputy no doubt finally said the wrong thing to the wrong person.”

He tipped his hat at them and left. They watched him drive away. She and her father were alone. Like they always were. Like they had been since her mother had passed.

“A tooth,” her father said. “Isn’t that interesting?”

“Dad—”

“Whatever it is you’re too afraid to tell me,” her father said, still watching the sheriff’s car head off into what was now falling snow. “I’m braver than you think.”