Dragon Tamer: 21. Momma's Home (Patreon)

Once we got our breath back, I decided to come out with a confession.

"So," I said, "I kind of just completed a quest..."

"From the system?" Jane asked in shock. "Another one? Those are supposed to be rare."

I grimaced. "Don't tell my system that. It's been handing them out like they were candy." Not that I was complaining. Free stuff was free stuff.

Jane and Sienna looked at me warily. I had the feeling I was capping out on their personal weirdness quota. Oh well.

Extending my hand, I showed off the three gold coins. "What do you say we split the rewards?"

I was not above bribing my friends.

Jane perked up and even Sienna looked brighter than usual.

Then Jane shook her head. "I shouldn't get one. You, Ferdinand, and Tiberius did all the work."

"No way," I said. "You made a great distraction."

Sienna nudged Jane's shoulder as she stepped forward. "Take the gold, Jane. You’re making this awkward."

Jane hesitated.

Time to drive the point home.

I held up the coins higher, temptingly. "We're a team, right?"

That got her to smile. "Yes, we are."

She reached out and plucked one golden coin from my palm. Sienna did too, quickly sticking hers deep in her pocket. I got the impression that money meant a lot more to her than to Jane.

"The fun's not over with yet." I limped over to the red egg-sucker that Tiberius had killed and bent down.

Wow. Tiberius had really done a number on the dragon. The chest was completely caved in almost to the backbone and the sides were split and... leaking. Gross.

I brushed my fingers over the head, just over the sightless eyes.

Ding!

Do you want to loot this egg-sucking dragon?

"Yes, I do."

Ding!

You have received:

(1) Egg-Sucker Steak

(1) Egg-Sucker hide

The items appeared in my hands, and I quickly set them aside. Huh. Same ones as last time.

I moved to the blue and repeated the process, receiving the same result though with a sapphire blue hide instead of ruby red.

The last dragon, the green... I wasn't touching that body with a ten-foot pole. The narcosis had completely engulfed the body. I doubted I could get a viable hide and I definitely wasn't eating any of it.

Two hides and two steaks. Damn it, I was hoping for a rare drop, but I couldn't win them all.

Jane came over to watch what I was doing. Her gaze fell on the bloody pieces of meat. "Is that--"

"An egg-sucker steak," I said, picking one T-bone up by the end and dangling it in slight distaste. "Which is good because I've never butchered an animal in my life."

"You haven't? Do your people not eat meat?"

I shrugged, not sure how to explain supermarkets. "We have machines and... processes in place for that. It's kind of weird to go out and hunt and cook up your own food. Like, salt of the earth people do it as a hobby or... if they're trying to prove a point against society, you now?"

And... cue the 'you're and oddball' look.

Oh well. I wiggled the steak. "So, is it a cultural no-no for the dragons to... um, eat other dragons?"

"Egg-suckers are barely dragons," Jane said with a sniff. "And no. Egg-sucker meat is a bit of a delicacy. It will help revive our dragon's stamina and magical potential. They ought to have it."

I bit down on the cannibalism questions because that was a moral quandary I was not up to unknotting at the moment.

Jane bit her bottom lip. "It seems we will be here for a while, and forgive me but you know nothing about the domestic arts..."

I shrugged. "That's fair."

"Then I will build a fire and do the cooking if you gather the wood." She hesitated. "Do you need to be shown what kind of wood to gather?"

"Uh..."

"Dry," Sienna said, joining us. "Let's go together in case other lesser monsters are hiding in the bushes."

Sienna was kind of a dour girl, but she was straight to the point and a good teacher. Apparently, there was more to building a fire than having your dragon light a stick and hope that it caught fire. Sienna showed me which grasses to pull to kindle a growing flame. There were different kinds of wood, too. Some which caught fire quickly and threw sparks, some which burned more slowly but hotter. Perfect for cooking with.

I guess people back on Earth knew this, but I never lived in a house that had a real fireplace. Mostly just group homes with a thermostat.

Once we'd gathered a truly large amount of wood, Jane set to work. She was a much better cook than I was, though I was amused to see she used my method of frying steaks on a flattish rock. Though she didn't put them on the flames. Apparently, it was better to use the coals.

Sienna had a bit of Girl Scout herbalism going for her because she was able to find and dig up tubers lickety-split which also went into the coals to cook.

As the sun went down an hour later, we had steaks and potatoes for dinner.

By mutual agreement, we split the larger of the steaks between Tiberius and Ferdinand with an extra portion saved for Commodore when he returned.

Jane, Sienna, and I shared the second steak and we all got two smallish, fluffy tubers. They were the size of red potato’s on earth, but with a baked-in buttery oily taste inside. Great for seasoning.

As the last of the sun's light faded from the sky, Commodore returned. He flapped around in circles, chittering angrily at the carcasses of the egg-sucker dragons as if he was annoyed he'd lost out on a good fight.

I glanced back towards the carcasses as well. The two non-rotted ones were missing the majority of the skin and were a little deflated, but there seemed to be a lot left. "Think I can sell anymore... parts of the egg-sucker at the market?" I asked.

Sienna nodded, swallowed the last of her steak, and said, "Yes you should be able to scavenge a lot more meat. The teeth might be valuable, too."

"Nice."

That's when we heard the flap of wings overhead. The mimic touched down in Winter dragon form with a dead animal hanging out of her jaws.

It looked a little like an alpaca, complete with a cute, smiling face. The long neck was broken and hung off to the side.

Oh, and it was lime green the color of mountain dew. And had six legs. Extra weird.

The mimic set down her prize then looked around, visibly hesitating when she saw the carcasses of the egg-sucker dragons. Turning, she immediately went to her eggs to examine them for damage. I held my breath, but of course, she didn't find any dings or scratches.

Arcee rumbled in what I assumed was approval.

That test passed, I walked to join her. "What do you have here?" I asked, gesturing to the weird alpaca thing.

"That's a mountain greeny," Jane said. "Their wool is really valuable if you can loot it."

I opened my mouth to say that I probably couldn't because I hadn't killed the thing... but then again, I hadn't killed the egg-suckers either.

"Let's see." I bent and pressed my hand to the greeny.

Ding!

Would you like to loot this Mountain Greeny?

"Sweet," I said then I stopped. "Yo, Arcee. Mind if I loot this?"

The mimic snorted which I took to either mean 'I don't care' or "Why do you think I brought this for you?"

I selected yes immediately.

Ding!

You have received:

Greeny Fur

Greeny venom stack.

Sure enough, a few moments later my arms were filled with a blanket of super-soft green fur. On top lay a disgusting green fleshy sack.

I yelped. "These things are poisonous?"

"Venomous," Sienna corrected, coming up. Very carefully, she peeled back the little smiling lips to reveal sharp canines that would have put a vampire to shame. "They’re okay to eat, but people die all the time from getting bitten."

"Oookay." I cautiously placed the venom sacks next to the gas death orbs.

This world was full of delights

Arcee grunted again. Seeing my looting was done, she carefully nudged me to step away and then started stripping the greeny of meat.

As she swallowed it down, the other three dragons lined up to one side to watch her greedily.

"You just ate," I told Tiberius.

Tiberius 'yarped' in agreement at me. His hopeful eyes never left Arcee.

Arcee snorted again and threw her next strip of meat to the three littler dragons who all pounced to rip into it raw.

Jane sighed, hands on her hips. "Commodore will stuff himself so full he won't be able to fly."

"He worked hard today," I said.

Jane softened.

After the littler dragons were done, Sienna rose from her seat on a log. "I have to go home."

"So do I," Jane admitted.

I considered asking to crash at one of their houses -- a bed sounded great -- but I knew my place was here.

"I'll meet you guys at the market tomorrow?" I asked.

The two agreed. We said our goodbyes and to my surprise, I was sad to see them go.

Well, today had been one hell of a day. I'd found two friends and tamed a brand new dragon.

Who knew what tomorrow would hold?