Hazel - pets (Patreon)

The morning was unseasonably cold.  There was something about this year that had produced far more chilly mornings than I had been used to.  Getting out of bed had been a chore that neither Hazel nor I were a fan of. Especially when most mornings, we woke up together, curled against each other's naked bodies. It was hit or miss which one of us would push the other out of bed first. Some mornings she would be far more responsible and toss the quilts from us to force us downstairs. Other mornings, I would cool my feet outside of the blankets and then press them to her thighs until she shrieked and ran from the bed.

This morning, however, she was not even in bed. I woke to the chill, the wisps all huddled together on the ceiling for warmth.  But no Hazel.

Wrapping a blanket around myself, I rose from bed, shuffling out of the bedroom.  There was a strange sound coming from the fireplace. A soft snuffling and scratching motion combined.  Walking a little further in, I peered over the sofa.  A small black and green chicken was pacing inside the hearth where the wood should have been. It looked disgruntled, a few of its feathers falling from its tail.

“Hazel?” I asked. Because it wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility for her to have accidentally transformed into a chicken, would it?  I hurried towards the fireplace, kneeling down in front of it. The chicken stopped, looking at me with familiar hazel eyes. The same eyes that looked back at me each morning and each evening before going to bed.

“We’ll fix this,” I assured her, trying to not let panic enter my voice. “I will not let you stay a chicken. I promise that–”

“Um, hi?”

I turned around so hard that I fell on my butt.  Hazel was standing in the doorway, her arms full of wood.  “I thought you were a chicken.”

“I can see that,” she grinned a little. “I can see the likeness. Also, that’s not a chicken.” Walking over to the wall, she placed the wood down in the crate.

“What is it?”

“A dragon who wants to be a chicken. Or maybe a phoenix.”

The chicken not chicken clucked, pecking at the stone floor.  “Okay, what is it doing in the fireplace?”  Given what Hazel had occasionally done with animals, it was cause for concern.

“It was something my mother used to do,” she said. “When we were cold during the winters, she’d bring in a dragon for the fireplace.  We had a family pet named Kipper. She would sit inside the hearth and breathe on the logs. Her tails would fan the flames and every time it got even the least bit cold, she would breathe more heat into the room.”

Hazel pulled a small pouch from her apron, walking over to the hearth and spreading a little grain on the floor.

“Malcolm and I had a game when we were young. We used to see how far Kipper could shoot fireballs without lighting the house on fire.  After about two rounds, though, I would get scared and hide behind Mal and close my eyes really tight. Then Mal would narrate everything Kipper was doing, including flying around the living room and dropping fireballs onto the carpet.”

I looked around for scorch marks.

“It actually sounds like a nice memory from childhood.” Hazel claimed she had many but from what I had heard, I wouldn’t consider most of them on the side of joyful.

“It is,” she smiled.  

“Do I dare ask what happened to Kipper?”

Her face looked a little crestfallen at that. “Probably not.”

Standing, she brushed the ash from her skirts beginning to stack the wood.  The chicken began pecking at her, getting irritated at her little environment getting disturbed.

“So why the chicken?”

“Dragon chick,” Hazel said.  “It’s going to do the same thing as Kipper.”

“How?”

“You’ll see,” she sang. 

When she had the wood stacked, she sat back.  The chicken looked completely happy just pecking away at their food now. But little by little, I noticed it.  The tips of the chicken's wings began to glow. They started at a cold black and slowly began to edge out into orange and then red. I could feel a strange amount of heat emanating from the fireplace then and as I looked down at the food that the chicken was eating, I realized that with each peck, it gave a small spark. Popping as it went down the chickens throat.

“Uh, Hazel…?”

The chicken suddenly exploded. Bursting into a lick of flames and igniting the wood. I stumbled back in horror as the last “bacaw” sounded through the room.  With wide eyes I looked at Hazel who was simply humming to herself and tossing more wood onto the fire.

When things calmed down, I was left with nothing but a pile of wood, food, and ember colored feathers.

“Hazel, you cannot just kill an animal like that!”

Hazel looked confused for a moment before she began laughing. “Oh, no. No no no. That’s not… just watching.”

I turned back to the flames hesitantly, seeing nothing but logs and orange heat.  But then, something began to shift.  Deep within the embers, I saw dripping magma begin to form.  Then a peep sounded as a small black chicken jumped from the fire. Hazel scooped it up in her hands and cuddled it close.

“Kipper didn't do this but that’s because mother had her in a spell and was enslaving her. I thought this little chickee would be happy to be reborn, though. When they’re stuck in their form for too long, they get achy.”

“So it’s okay?”

“Of course.” She handed the chicken to me. It was small and soft and peeped in my palms.  “See?” she whispered, curling closer.  “The chicken gives its life to keep us warm and in return, we take the baby it's reborn into and give it love.”

“And if we don’t do this?”

“They die,” she said.  “It’s within their nature for a rebirth. We just were helping it along.”

The chicken nuzzled close. “Can we keep it?”

“Yes,” Hazel grinned. “I want an entire coup of them in fact. We’ll call it the dragons den.”

As the chicken cuddled close, I felt the heat from the strong flames of the fire. The air smelled a bit like fried chicken but it wasn’t entirely a bad smell.  Leaning back against the couch, I wrapped an arm around Hazel and let the chicken begin hopping around.

“I’m glad I’m here for this,” I told her honestly. To be a part of her eccentricities.

Hazel looked up at me with love in her eyes. “I’m glad you’re here too.”