Robin McKinley - Fire - Tales of Elemental Spirits

She climbed out of the driver’s side and paused. Flame was sitting up in the passenger seat, so her family could see that there was, indeed, a dog.

ʺWell, come on,ʺ said Jane. ʺI have a class to teach in two minutes. Let’s see him. Her.ʺ

ʺHim,ʺ said Miri. She opened the passenger door slowly, and clipped Flame’s leash on. Then she led him round the back of the truck to where her family was waiting. The two cats ran away. Flame paid them no attention.

ʺGood god,ʺ said her father.

ʺOh, poor thing, but what’s wrong with him? It’s not contagious, is it?ʺ said Jane.

ʺYuck,ʺ said Mal. ʺI thought you wanted a dog. ʺ

ʺHe’s a hellhound,ʺ said Miri. ʺThat’s all. There’s nothing wrong with him and it’s not contagious. Ronnie gave me the letter from the vet that says so.ʺ In fact the letter didn’t say anything of the kind: it hedged. That the writer was puzzled and confused was apparent; but the letter did say that the vet hadn’t been able to find anything wrong with Flame.

There was a little silence.

ʺI hope you bought a large bag of dog food,ʺ Jane said finally.

ʺYes,ʺ said Miri, but her heart sank. Her family liked animals; Flame wasn’t that awful, was he? Didn’t anyone even want to say hello to him? Give him a pat? She hooked the leash over her wrist and dropped her own hand on his head; the hair on the top of his head was very silky, as if it had been specially organized there to be good for stroking.

ʺSorry,ʺ said Jane, who could read her daughter very easily. ʺHe’s just—I wasn’t expecting a hellhound.ʺ She stepped forward and then dropped down on one knee. The huge scarlet eyes looked at her gravely. She reached out and stroked her hand down his bristly throat and chest. ʺAnd a dog brush with the dog food. No mud and no burrs past the mudroom, okay?ʺ

ʺOkay,ʺ said Miri, smiling with relief. At least Jane wasn’t going to try to banish him from the house.

A long pink tongue unrolled from Flame’s mouth, and he just touched the back of Jane’s hand with it. It was barely a lick; it was more like an acknowledgement.

ʺI think he’s trying to charm me,ʺ said Jane.

ʺIs he succeeding?ʺ said Miri.

Jane and Flame stared at each other a little more.

ʺYes,ʺ said Jane. ʺI rather think he is. You’ve got a lesson yourself in half an hour, you know, and I’m not at all sure how Lynn is going to react to your hellhound.ʺ Lynn was one of Miri’s timid ones. A good lesson with Lynn was getting her off the longe line for a turn or two around the arena by herself. ʺWhat are you going to do with him while you’re teaching? I don’t want him loose till we know he’ll behave and—er—ʺ

ʺYou don’t want mass panic if the kindergarteners all catch sight of him at once,ʺ said Miri calmly. She was feeling much better now that her mother was (more or less) won over. One or two of the kindergarteners at a time were fine, but in aggregate they were unfortunately prone to shrieking. They enjoyed shrieking. Flame might bring on quite a bad attack of this.

The kindergarteners were, in fact, the nine- to eleven-year-old group, but Mal had started calling them that three or four years ago when he wasn’t much older than they were, and despite Jane’s having forbidden him to do so. Possibly because most of them had had a crush on him, they’d decided en masse that they liked the name, and the Kindergarten Quadrille was now an established part of the barn’s annual horse show, and places in it were much sought after. (Miri had said sourly, about a year ago, that having a crush on Mal was still a requirement for entry. Mal had knocked her down and sat on her—they were in the hayloft at the time—and Jane had said that if they wanted to behave like eight-year-olds, then bedtime was eight o’clock and Saturday night curfew nine.) The class Jane was about to teach was kindergarteners, and so was Lynn.

ʺI’ll introduce him to Lynn,ʺ she went on, trying to sound more confident than she felt. ʺShe’ll like being first. And if fraidy-cat Lynn is okay with him the other kids won’t want to be anything else.ʺ She looked at Mal.

He too could read her easily. ʺIt’ll cost you,ʺ he said.

ʺOkay,ʺ said Miri.

ʺ What? ʺ said Jane. ʺWhat’s going to cost? What are you two up to, under my nose?ʺ

ʺMal’s going to help the kindergarteners adjust to my hellhound.ʺ

ʺ I haven’t adjusted to your hellhound yet.ʺ

ʺ I haven’t adjusted to Dorothy. And I bet Flame’s table manners are better than Dorothy’s!ʺ

ʺ Flame? ʺ said Mal. ʺYou didn’t tell me his name was Flame. The price has just gone up.ʺ

ʺChildren, children,ʺ said Ned.

ʺThere’s Lynn’s mom’s car,ʺ said Jane. ʺYou’d better figure out what you’re doing fast.ʺ

There were a few rather hairy moments in the first few weeks of Flame’s tenancy, but Jane said, ʺWe haven’t lost any customers, and that’s all that matters. The rest will sort itself out.ʺ Lynn had, in fact, given a little gulp and sob—almost a shriek—but Mal had sauntered in with Miri and Flame, and Lynn (who was nine) wasn’t going to look like a real kindergartener in front of Miri’s gorgeous brother. Miri, not knowing what else to do, tied Flame to a tree outside the small arena they used for private lessons, where he had the shade and the shadows disguised him. Lynn glanced his way nervously a couple of times, but Flame didn’t do anything but lie quietly, and she soon forgot him.

By the time Lynn was leading her horse back into the stable Mal was working his wiles on Jane’s class. They couldn’t believe their luck that Mal was actually hanging around to talk to them. Miri thought, watching them, he could tell them to go jump off a cliff, and they’d all say, where? What cliff? But there weren’t any cliffs nearby and all he said was, ʺHey, Miri’s got a new dog. He’s really cool. He’s got these scary red eyes. He’s a hellhound. His name is Flame. Want to meet him?ʺ

They all giggled at hellhound but with Mal there watching there was no shrieking. And one or two of them were even brave enough to pat him.

She collected the new name tag that said FLAME with the stable phone number on it the next day, and began letting him cautiously off the leash when she was cleaning tack or mucking out or anything she didn’t have to concentrate on. By the following week he was accompanying her when she took horses in and out to the paddocks. He never showed the least inclination to chase anything—despite several of the cats’ best efforts—and the horses didn’t react to his red eyes. Balthazar liked him: he’d reach his nose down over the half door of his stall to say hello. She still tied him up when she was giving lessons, but Ned rigged up a running line between two trees outside the two outdoor arenas so he had room to move around, although all he ever seemed to do was shift to whichever end was nearer where Miri was and lie down.

The price of Mal’s cooperation had been that she pick him up after all the parties he went to, for the rest of the summer—and he was invited to a lot of parties. Fortunately he didn’t go to very many of them—Dorothy wouldn’t let him. But he still managed one or two a week. Since his job got out at eleven, this meant that she was picking him up at four or five o’clock in the morning—occasionally she was lucky, and they went on till after six, when the buses started running again. She’d pointed out that even extortion has its limits, and by six o’clock she was out feeding horses, with a cup of strong coffee steaming on the windowsill in the feedroom. He’d promised that if it was after six, he’d catch the bus to the end of Highland Road, and walk the rest of the way home.