Hazel Boonton's Arc

Chapter 3 of 3

By afternoon the buns were fed and sleeping in the deepest chamber. Hazel meant to spend the day thinking of what to say to the cabin folk. Then a door banged shut across the clearing. Wheels crunched on frozen ground. Through the round window she saw the pink cabin's porch. A figure climbed the steps, arms full of bundles. The owner had come home early. Hazel had no plan and no time to make one. She looked back at the warren floor. Root peelings lay scattered near the entrance. Grain husks dusted the packed dirt. Small pawprints crossed the threshold and pointed straight to the sleeping chamber. Any glance inside would tell the whole story. Seven buns had moved into someone's ground, and the mess proved it. Hazel worked fast. She swept the peelings into a pile with her forepaws. She pushed the husks under a loose root by the wall. But the pawprints stayed pressed in the dirt, and the door hung broken, unable to close. Outside, the shaggy pink dog trotted from the trees. It sniffed the warren door, then swung its head toward the cabin and barked. Once. Twice. The figure on the porch stopped and turned. Hazel's heart slammed. The dog was calling its owner straight to the door. She did the only thing left. She stepped out into the cold and stood in plain sight. If the owner was coming, Hazel would meet them on her own feet, not be dragged out of hiding. The dragon lay in the clearing where it always lay, its rainbow scales catching the low sun. The ginger cat sat curled against its side. The figure came down the porch steps. Hazel could not make out a face, only a shape crossing the frozen yard. The dragon lifted its head. Then it did something that stopped the figure short. It rose, spread one great wing, and lowered it like a curtain between the cabin and the warren door. It shielded Hazel from view. The figure called out a word to the dragon. A name, maybe. The dragon did not move. It held the wing steady over the warren, over Hazel, over the sleeping buns inside. The dog stopped barking and sat. Hazel understood. The dragon was not hiding her out of cruelty or trick. It was buying her time, the way it had cleared the path to the cellar. But a shield was not a welcome. The owner now knew something crouched behind that wing. Hazel had lost her secret. She had not lost her life or the buns. The figure stood still in the yard, waiting. The dragon would not hold its wing forever. Hazel drew a breath of freezing air. The choice was gone. She would have to walk out from behind the wing and speak. Whether this cabin became a home for a whole colony, or the end of one, depended on the next words she found.