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  BLOOD OF THE DRAGON

  BOOK 1 OF THE DRAGON OF FAERY

  BY JAY D. PEARSON

  Copyright © 2018 by Jay D. Pearson. All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of very brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  For Mom, whose love and support are unconditional and unwavering

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  My most profound thanks to my editors Kathy Pearson, Amelia Ferrel, and Michael Scott, who gave freely of their time. Thanks also to my mentor, Abbott Smith, without whose encouragement, I might never have finished Chapter 1. My most special thanks to my dear wife, Shelly Pearson, who has not only supported and edited, but has listened to me read every chapter more than once.

  Many thanks also to Alyce Wolf, whose gorgeous watercolor graces the cover. If you’d like to see more of Alyce’s work, please visit her at alycewolf.com.

  Follow me at deepheepblog.wordpress.com to keep up with news and read The Misadventures of Sir Roger.

  Chapter 1

  The Boy

  Miguel Martinez slammed the bathroom door. Everything solid from his childhood now seemed to have a squishy center. What was left sucked at his feet like sand washing out with the tide.

  “14 sucks!”

  He glared at the mirror. His hair stood straight, mocking him. A staple gun would work better than this dumb brush. Why couldn’t his parents let him dye it black and get a cool cut?

  “Stupid red hair!”

  He spat the words. “Stupid dark skin! Stupid slanted eyes! Why can’t I just be Hispanic or Irish or Chinese and not all three?”

  He whacked the brush right into the toothpaste tube. Green and white gel squirted over the tiles and he groaned. He’d have to scrub his sink once again. He snarled, glancing at his brother Carlos’ side of the counter. Little Mr. Perfect’s clean, neat toothbrush laughed at him.

  Looking back up, his mother’s strange green Chinese eyes stared back. Why were so many weird things happening to him these days?

  It hadn’t been so bad at first, he realized as he tried wiping the toothpaste off his brush. He’d still looked forward to Mass each Sunday then. At least, his parents never had to drag him along like they did with Carlos. As they’d entered the narthex a couple weeks ago, however, a votive candle had winked at him, or so he’d thought. He’d stopped, bending over to tie his shoe while his family continued to their pew. Standing back up with a glance to make sure no one was watching, he’d given it a tiny wave and it had flickered, the tip bowing twice directly towards him. Even the glass holder glowed.

  This can’t be real, he’d thought, deciding to wave one more time. The flames of the candles on either side of the little votive seemed to turn towards it and their holders glowed with a hint of red. He’d wondered if they were displeased. The votive waved back at him, the flame distinctly swaying three times before settling down, a warm glow emanating from its holder.

  He’d shaken his head as he’d stepped into the nave before his family missed him, wanting to dismiss what he’d just seen. It had been like something out of a fairy tale. As Mass began, the priest’s words of the liturgy had been a blur and his own speech mumbled. Did that candle really wave at me?

  He studied his reflection in the mirror. If that had been the only instance, he would have dismissed it. But strange things had been happening ever since: objects thrown at him (particularly orange peels and spit wads in the cafeteria) suddenly hit those around him instead; his trumpet landed upright with its mouthpiece in place after he’d been tripped; and five perfect scores on consecutive algebra tests. That had been how he’d learned there is nothing worse for a middle school student than notoriety, and why he now leaned against the sink, staring at himself in the mirror, hating the freak who stared back at him.

  Nothing that day in front of the mirror, and none of the strangeness that had happened at Mass or school, prepared him for the Day of the Dead parade, however. That’s when things really got weird.

  The following Saturday was the first time in several days his mom had not yanked his warm covers off to get him out of bed. He and his best friend, Javier Gutierrez, would be allowed by their parents to walk in the All Souls Procession in downtown Tucson without supervision. Javier’s mom helped them paint their own sugar skulls, and that evening the two thirteen-year-olds joined the march down 4th Avenue. As they awaited their parents at the parade’s end, they jabbered eagerly about the costumes, the fire dancers, and the pyrotechnics they’d seen.

  A rock skittered along the sidewalk, bouncing past as if kicked. The boys whirled. Four characters strutted towards them, their store-bought skull masks and black robes hiding their features. Miguel groaned, knowing from the way the leader sauntered that it was Burton Peña, the one boy he hated. He wasn’t certain who the other three were, but it really didn’t matter; Burton’s followers were all bully wannabes.

  His nemesis was bigger than all the other boys at Miguel’s middle school, with a protruding brow and wide nose that made him as intimidating as an NFL lineman. He’d had a mustache in sixth grade and was now shaving in eighth. It was as if he existed simply to torment Miguel and his small circle of friends.

  P.E. was the worst. Miguel’s locker was next to Burton’s, who would open his wide enough so Miguel had only an inch to reach into his own. It used to be two inches until Miguel had complained to Mr. Matthews, who had told him to grow a pair. After that, an inch was all Burton would give him, smirking every time.

  “Well, if it isn’t the sci-fi geeks,” Burton announced, pulling his mask off as he swaggered, laughing harshly. “Nice paint job, girls. Did your mommies do that for you?” The other boys imitated his chortle.

  “How come you’re not home playing Mario Kart?” taunted one of the other boys.

  That’s all it took. Miguel had endured so many taunts from Burton and his sycophants that anger rose up unbidden within him. That was not unusual, but this time, the sensation almost burned his belly, surging up through his chest like a firehose filled with hot flame.

  “No daddy or teacher to protect you this time, you dweebs,” said Burton with a sneer and a threatening pound of one fist into the other palm. “It’s time for a lesson—Peña style.”

  At that moment, the hot sensation exploded. He’d half expected a burst of fire, but nothing had been visible beyond a faint haze. Nonetheless, the bullies suddenly flew backwards through the air, bouncing on the sidewalk several feet away with painful grunts.

  While Miguel and Javier gazed open-mouthed, Burton and his friends rose stiffly, rubbing their heads, robes askew and slightly torn, and limped away with dark glances over their shoulders.

  “What was that?” Javier whispered, looking behind them as if there might be some logical explanation.

  “That was bizarre,” Miguel muttered honestly, even though he knew the answer. The boys made no mention of the incident when their parents found them shortly after, focusing on the parade instead.

  Weird as the encounter with Burton had been, the following few days marked his first enjoyable week in middle school. It was especially nice that, save for dirty looks, Burton and his cronies completely ignored him, walking on the far side of the hallways in school. He even found himself with four or five inches to access his P.E. locker.

  Strange things continued to happen, though nothing as extreme as the parade. Javier never mentioned the event, and Miguel tried to not think too much about it (other th
an revel in the looks on Burton’s face) until P.E. the following Wednesday. Once again, his pudgy teacher with the bad comb over, Mr. Matthews, was too lazy to teach any skills, or come up with a game more original than dodgeball. It wasn’t so much a game as a diversion for Mr. Matthews, who would lean against a wall chuckling while jocks pelted the nerds with rubber balls. Miguel hated Mr. Matthews almost as much as he hated dodgeball.

  When his teacher announced what they’d be playing, several of the students groaned, but only Miguel was foolish enough to make an audible remark.

  “That must’ve taken a decade to plan,” he muttered to Javier a little too loudly.

  Mr. Matthews glared at him, red patches emerging on his pasty face like zombies crawling up out of the ground in one of his video games.

  “I think Martinez wants to be smack in the center…and teamless.” Miguel glared back, but Mr. Matthews smiled cruelly. This was his favorite punishment for any non-jock who dared criticize him.

  Miguel reluctantly scuffled to the center of the basketball court while his teacher divided the class into two teams and handed out red rubber balls just big enough to hurl at a very high speed. There was, of course, no ball for him.

  Anger at the injustice of this lousy, vindictive teacher built to a rage that burned in his stomach…just like it had at the All Souls Procession. As Mr. Matthews raised the whistle to his mouth, Miguel glared at his hated teacher, eyebrows furrowed and lips tight as he focused his rage at the man. Then the whistle blew, and all the jocks hurled their balls with full force at Miguel. (The nerds just lightly lofted their balls, as they’d all at one time or another been in his place.) As the balls flew from each student’s hand, they zipped not towards Miguel, but at Mr. Matthews. It didn’t matter which way a student aimed; every ball flew full force towards the teacher’s face.

  Mr. Matthews had just enough time for his eyes to widen and his mouth to gape before the balls pelted him. In his shock, he did not raise his hands or duck. Most of the balls missed, but only because the first few had already knocked him on his back. He lay motionless for several moments before staggering to his feet. Blood streamed from his nose and welts covered his face.

  “Class dismissed,” he stammered hoarsely as he stumbled towards his office in the boys’ locker room. Then he turned, pointed a finger at Miguel, and shouted, “Martinez, I’ll…you… grrrrggh…” His voice trailed off and he disappeared through the doors, but the effect was not lost. All the students turned to stare at him. By the end of the day, the story had spread throughout the school and, somehow, so had the event at the All Souls Procession.

  After school, he found himself sitting alone at the back of the bus; Javier lived close enough to walk to school while Miguel and his family had a home in Oro Valley near one of the country clubs. His younger brother rarely sat with him; not out of any enmity, but because Carlos was always surrounded by his little sixth grade buddies. They crouched on their knees in a huddle in the front two seats with his brother in the middle, and the bus driver yelled again for them to plant their butts on the seat, although he could see her smile in the rear-view mirror. They obeyed, then burst out laughing. Even the driver chuckled at whatever joke Carlos had told.

  Miguel scowled, watching his brother with envy. Carlos’s skin might be lighter than most Hispanics or Native Americans, but that was the only sign he was of mixed race. His hair was black and it lay flat. His eyes were dark with no hint of Asian ancestry. Weird things didn’t happen to him.

  The bus driver had long ago made Carlos and his cadre sit up front, but it had little effect on their loud, incessant chattering; it just limited their pranks. As always, Carlos was the center of attention. He didn’t have to work at it; it came to him as naturally as baseball or learning a new instrument. Or pretty much anything else. It was as if…as if someone had waved a magic wand so everything came easily to Carlos while the same spell made all sorts of strange things happen to Miguel.

  They were nearing his stop when the weirdness struck a third time. Miguel had sunk down in his seat, trying to shut himself off from all the strange looks he was getting by immersing himself in his iPhone (his collection of video game soundtracks was the one thing bigger than anything his brother had put together), and trying to ignore the whispers that crept over his shoulders and down his back like a line of spiders.

  He’d also tried ignoring Burton Peña, who lived a couple of stops farther. Since the parade, his nemesis had been wary of Miguel, but Burton’s ball had flown sideways out of his hand this morning and smacked into Mr. Matthews’ nose. Most of the ride home, Peña had glared over his shoulder at Miguel, who just tried to focus on scrolling through the album artwork. He knew Mr. Matthews was Burton’s favorite teacher and he figured the jerk had taken the incident personally.

  As he glanced up to see how close they were to his stop, his eyes met Burton’s. He looked away immediately, but not before seeing the determined malice. He should have known it was only a matter of time before Peña would try something, that this peace couldn’t last.

  The bus started slowing and, as he reached for his backpack, something smacked his face. A squashed ball of what he assumed was Burton’s leftover mac ‘n cheese lunch splattered next to his hand, where it stuck to the seat like a giant yellow spit wad. His cheek stung where cheese still clung.

  Ignore him, just ignore him, he thought, but then something squishy and wet hit his neck. Fury churned in his belly, a warm rage growing hotter just like before. Then, as the bus stopped and he stood, a piece of candy smacked his nose. He glared at Burton, whose proud smirk begged for retaliation.

  He growled, heat escaping from his eyes and nose in a barely visible haze. Suddenly, Burton’s pack spilled open, even though the pack sat upright, and books and pens fountained up and out.

  A collective gasp followed by shouts of anger and confusion caused Miguel to glance forward. Every other backpack and bag was doing the same thing. Even the bus driver’s purse. Except for two, he realized. His own and his brother’s. He just hoped in the confusion that no one would notice that his pack had remained closed.

  What was happening to him?

  Chapter 2

  The Boy

  “T

  hat was wicked!” Carlos shouted as he raced into their house, a white stucco rambler as perfect as Carlos’s side of the bathroom. Miguel plodded behind on the wide stone slab walkway, dreading the moment his brother blabbed about the bus incident to their mom.

  Their home was broad and elegant with a spacious great room in the middle designed for entertaining large groups. Wide windows provided a spectacular view of Tucson below and the hazy blue Santa Rita Mountains beyond. The boys’ rooms were to the right and their parents’ room and den was to the left while the kitchen was to the back.

  Eduardo, his father and one of Tucson’s top architects, loved to experiment with both his yard and house. The house and garage, a separate building that included a pair of guests’ rooms and frequently housed Miguel’s grandparents or many cousins, were surrounded by a beautifully manicured and landscaped yard, his father’s pride and joy.

  The front had several acacia and mesquite trees with tall cacti along the drive and resplendent rock garden Miguel had often been roped into helping maintain on Saturday mornings when he’d planned to go to the park with Javier. Behind the house, however, was his dad’s crown jewel, the pool he’d built for his wife, Maeve. Shaped and designed like a natural pond, it had a rocky outcrop at one end that provided a small waterfall while tall palm trees afforded privacy. Beneath the waterfall, the pool was very deep, being fed by an underwater spring. No one mentioned it outside the family, because springs like that aren’t natural, not in Oro Valley. Whatever its source, however, Eduardo wasn’t one to let the opportunity slip by and Miguel wasn’t about to point out anything that might make him appear weirder.

  “Mom! Mom!” Carlos shouted, tearing through the cool, air-conditioned house towards the pool after tossing his backpac
k atop the wide, plush chocolate sofa. Miguel followed, reluctantly slinking behind. There would be no way to hide what had just happened on the bus, and his brother would probably blab about the incident in P.E., so he figured he might as well go defend himself before his dad got home. Maybe that way he wouldn’t get grounded.

  By the time he stepped onto the patio, his brother was already animatedly demonstrating the bus ride to their mother. She was a very tall woman, a few inches taller than their father, and slender. Not thin, but strong like a figure skater. She held their one-year-old sister, Isabel who, like Carlos, had black hair and dark eyes.

  Maeve was Irish, the only non-Hispanic or non-Native American in all of Eduardo’s very large extended family. Her green Chinese eyes never failed to brighten any event, whether a family gathering or a chance meeting in the supermarket. Her long hair, usually tied loosely atop her head, was bright red with only a hint of orange. Few other mothers believed her when she said she didn’t dye it.

  Perhaps her most striking feature was her skin. It wasn’t the fair white of most Irish, but slightly golden. She claimed to have some Chinese in her ancestry and, if you glanced out of the corner of your eye when the light was just right, you’d swear there was a nimbus or aura around her.

  Maeve never tried to stand out; if anything, Miguel thought she dimmed herself in public, always seeking to advance attention towards his dad. Still, he couldn’t help but notice how many eyes were drawn to her. Every so often some guy in a restaurant would make a rude, suggestive comment, but her sharp look of disdain always sent them slinking away, thoroughly embarrassed.

  His father, Eduardo, was the greatest man in the world as far as Miguel was concerned, even though he knew his father wasn’t handsome. Sure, he was strong, but he had a paunch around his waist, receding hair, small dark eyes, and a thin mustache. His enormous smile, however, was ever present, as was the friendliness of his deep, jocular voice.