How to Train Your Dragon
Sherra the Brave wanted to give up. She'd slain wyverns, felled demons, and bested the fiercest foes the wildlands could provide. Yet staring at the pantry, flour in every nook and stray berries in every cranny, she felt only that she'd met her match. In a toddler.
Marta, sweet baby Marta, flipped the bread basket over with the ferocity of an ogre. Her unfiltered glee filled the room with giggles.
Sherra the “brave” made the fatal error of falling asleep on the job. It was inexcusable to have lost track of her charge. To have let such disaster occur. Where flames of redemption should have filled her belly, she found only icy dread. Her shoulders, once held high with pride, sank low under the weight of shame. Perhaps the tavern gossips were right, and the weight of motherhood was too much for her to bear.
The creak of the door was less noticeable than Tyris' sunlit shadow as she entered, home from errands and in time to see Sherra the Shameful.
Sherra could do naught but stare into her wife's face as she beheld the sight. Her eyes scanned from open cabinet to crushed food, from the dirtied hands of a culprit who didn't know to feel guilty to Sherra's face that bore it all. And then she laughed.
“Sherra, my love, what is it that brings tears to your eyes?”
“What is— Can you not see the evidence of my most grievous of sins? That I dozed when I should have guarded?”
“This mess is what troubles you so? Are you not Sherra the Brave, vanquisher of evil and tamer of dragons? Surely the dragon made more of a mess than this.”
“That was a dragon, this is a child.”
“What are children if not tiny dragons?”
Marta tottered over and pulled at the laces of Tyris' boots. Tiny dragon, indeed. Neither Sherra nor Tyris knew how to raise a child, but what parent did their first time? Sherra hadn't known how to train a dragon when she was hired her to do so, but it was the job she had and thus it was the job she did. Even if several countryside sheep were mysteriously lost along the way.
Sherra lifted her daughter into her arms as she addressed her wife. “Tyris the Mighty, your words alone could turn the tides of war. You've just returned, rest yourself while I help the little one clean up her mess.”
“No, I must take some blame for not realizing how tired you were. We will clean together, and you can regale us with dragon training tales.” With a kiss to both, Tyris left to remove coat and shoes.
Fire had returned to Sherra's soul. There was no retribution to be had and no villain to lay low. Only a tiny dragon to train, with all the love and patience in her heart.
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