Tavrin the Little Dragon

More about Tavrin the Little Dragon

The house at the end of Whispering Lane was silent as a stopped clock, yet it smelled of time: of page dust, of wax, of the breath of stories yet to be told. In its heart, a room more like a nest of shelves, lived Tavrin—a small dragon with slate-colored skin and eyes in which the candlelight became tiny suns. He was no bigger than an old suitcase that the house's owner—a lady who rarely, and then only like a memory, flitted through the rooms herself—once shoved under the windowsill and forgot about. Tavrin was never forgotten. The books knew his name, they crackled as he crept past, and the candles nodded to him with their little flames, as if they knew that warmth was not only given but also guarded. That evening, there was snow in the garden, but the windows breathed a milky gold. Tavrin sat on a thick dictionary, reading an open book. It contained little arts: how to comfort a teacup's fear before its first crack, or how to capture the rustle of a page to release it later. How to ask the flickering candle to leave a piece of its light in the air to create the scent of the journey home. Tavrin loved such things and sometimes ran the tip of his clawed finger along the edges, as if he could caress the sentences. In the circle of candles stood one with a bowl of melted wax. "Careful," she whispered. "The shadows are thin today." "Thin?" Tavrin had never thought about shadow thickness. "When the cold breathes outside, they become fine like hair. They slip easily." Tavrin nodded seriously—because being serious was one of the secret arts. Then he came across a recipe: A light to go. It required a bowl, a drop of courage, three kind words, and the breath of a dragon that never burns when it loves. Tavrin smiled. He knew its breath—warm like a hug, not hot like an argument. He fetched a small bowl, placed it in the circle of candles, and breathed until the air above glowed gently. "Come with me," he said, and the light did so, as if it were a shy bird. With the bowl, Tavrin went to the window. Outside, night hung in white threads on the trees, and the snow made the world not colder, but quieter. He tapped the bowl against the pane, and a piece of the silence entered like a polite visitor. "For you," Tavrin said to the house, for houses are faces with rooms instead of cheeks.