Carrie Vaughn: Voices of Dragons

“This is the most important dance of our lives. Shopping for a dress—you have to take it seriously.”

“Sorry,” Kay said, as Tam slid into the passenger seat of the car. “So what happens when junior prom comes along? Then senior prom? Isn’t that supposed to be the most important dance of our lives?”

That got a smile out of Tam. “What have you been doing all day?”

Kay shrugged. “It wasn’t all day. Just a couple of hours. I was just out hiking.”

“You’re always hiking.”

“I like hiking.”

“If I didn’t know better, I’d say you had a secret boyfriend stashed somewhere.”

Kay stiffened and couldn’t think of what to say, so she glared at Tam as if to say, Don’t be ridiculous . But maybe Tam kept thinking it, and maybe that was okay, if it meant Kay didn’t have to explain what was really going on.

The closest mall was fifty miles away and wasn’t much of a mall. Only one department store, which made shopping for a dress either really easy or really hard, depending on your perspective.

“Maybe we should have stayed home and looked for dresses online,” Kay said.

Tam gave her a look. “That’s not as fun.”

Easy for her to say. All the dresses Tam tried on looked great on her. Kay could barely bring herself to try on any. They looked so glamorous, shimmering with beads and glitter, tight and clingy. She didn’t feel very glamorous.

She was glad Tam was there. Tam made her try on dresses she never would have thought of wearing herself.

“Don’t slouch,” Tam said, tugging at Kay’s shoulders as they stood before a three-way mirror.

It was hard not to. The black, form-fitted dress had spaghetti straps, leaving Kay’s shoulders and a big part of her chest bare. The tan on her arms ended where her T-shirt sleeves did. She felt self-conscious, and she slouched. Turning one way and the other, she studied the dress and herself. The minute she leaned over or tilted the wrong way, the front hung open, revealing way too much for all the world to see.

“I’m not big enough for this dress,” she said, grimacing at her small chest and the excess fabric. Tam, however, would fill it out nicely.

Tam grimaced right along with her, which meant she couldn’t try to deny it. “Okay. We’ll try something else then.”

Tam was still wearing the dress she’d tried on and was in the process of falling in love with. Royal purple, shot through with silver, it was a skintight sheath that showed off every inch of her curvy body. It had off-the-shoulder straps and a rhinestone broach between her breasts. Nobody else at school would have the guts to wear a dress like that; Tam looked amazing.

Shuffling through the hangers of the dozen or so gowns they’d picked, Tam pulled out the next one: spaghetti straps, snow white and silver, sparkling with beads, with a gather in front that would make Kay look like she had more rather than less.

“That’s too fancy,” Kay said, shaking her head.

“It won’t hurt anything to try it on.”

Kay peeled out of one dress and squirmed into the other.

It was beautiful. It made Kay beautiful. Experimenting, she scrunched up her hair and held it on top of her head, letting a few strands fall loose around her face.

“Wow,” Tam said.

“I look like I’m getting married,” Kay pouted. This was too much. She didn’t want a dress like this.

“No, you don’t. You look like you’re going to the Oscars.”

Tam may have been right, but Kay didn’t recognize the svelte young woman in the mirror. Wearing a dress like this was…crazy. Like free-climbing a rock face or crossing the creek into Dragon. She wasn’t hot enough for it, and she’d look like an idiot walking into the dance. Then again—maybe Tam was right. Maybe she really could be glamorous—and maybe she ought to try. An acceptable risk, as Artegal had said.

Kay didn’t dare look at the price tag. She’d pulled a hundred dollars out of her savings from her summer job working for a river rafting company. Her mother had been adamant: “It’s just a dance. It’s not even prom. Don’t break the bank on a dress.” Try explaining that to Tam.

“So what’s the damage?” Kay asked, turning so she could reach the mess of tags hanging out the back. She braced. It was going to be too much. She couldn’t afford it.

In the mirror, she could see Tam smile. “Eighty-nine ninety-nine.”

Kay didn’t know why she should be so nervous. She was going to the dance with a friend. That was all.

When Jon came to pick her up, her parents insisted on making them pose for pictures. Like that wasn’t embarrassing. She couldn’t complain—most of the time, they let her alone, didn’t pry too much, didn’t harass her. She could sneak out without drawing too much attention. Not this time.

But she had to admit, Jon looked good. She’d never seen him in a suit and tie before. He looked slick. Very Hollywood, Tam would say. Or Secret Service. Kay thought it was mostly because he managed not to slouch. She still had to think about it.

“Why don’t you two stand over here, under the tree?” Dad said, camera in one hand, gesturing them over with the other.

“It’s getting too dark out,” Mom argued. “I think we should do this inside. Or at least on the porch, where there’s more light.”

Dad smirked. “We can do both. You two mind?”

Kay mostly wanted to hurry up and leave. But she wasn’t going to ruin her parents’ fun by arguing. They seemed happy. They beamed at her, eyes shining. Tearing up? Her tough cop parents tearing up? All she’d done was put on a nice dress.

Jon was smiling; he didn’t seem to mind. Finally, Kay realized she’d have to put her foot down or her parents would take pictures all night.

“We really need to get going. We’re supposed to be meeting Tam and Carson,” she said hopefully.

“Oh, gosh, I didn’t realize how late it is,” Mom said, glancing at her watch. “Of course you should get going. Have fun.” Kay hugged her mother, then her father.

He said, “Kay, back by midnight, right?”

“Right.”

Then she and Jon piled into his car. Jon was chuckling.

“What?” she asked.

“When your dad’s the sheriff and he says be home by midnight, you don’t have a choice, do you? He could send the cops after you.” His expression turned thoughtful. “Do you think he’d really do that?”

Kay’s father had pulled her over for speeding once. That was all it had taken.

She said, “I think we’d better plan on being back by midnight.”

If you wanted to go to a dance with a friend, there had to be an easier way.

The gym had been done up with a ton of streamers and balloons. A disco ball had been temporarily suspended from the ceiling. It still looked—and smelled—like the gym. The football team had won the game earlier that day and were acting rowdy, screaming at one another, mostly incomprehensible phrases, except for an occasional “Saints!” Now that Kay thought about it, calling the closest high school to Dragon the Saint Georges struck her as being kind of rude. The football players’ girlfriends stood to the side, pouting and looking embarrassed at the team’s rowdiness, a few people danced to recorded music, and lots of others stood to the sides, sipping fruit punch from paper cups and nibbling on cookies. Like any other school dance. While lots of people managed to look nice in their new dresses and suits, many others looked exactly what they were: uncomfortable.

On the other hand, this was about as fancy as Silver River ever got.

Kay and Jon leaned against a wall and watched the drama.

Jon pointed to where Principal Reid, who always wore pressed dress suits in dark, respectable colors, even while chaperoning a dance, was tapping Carson on the shoulder. Carson and Tam stopped making out on the dance floor. It was the third time Reid had split them up. They returned to dancing in the acceptable manner: her arms across his shoulders, his hands on her hips, six inches between them. Reid had been known to measure with a ruler.