Drake the Dragonboy

      Rebecca Schultz

      First Published 2014 by JoJo Publishing

      This edition published 2018 by Woodslane Press

      © Rebecca Schultz

      All rights reserved. No part of this printed or video publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electrical, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publisher and copyright owner.

      Designer / typesetter: Chameleon Print Design

      Editor: Ormé Harris

      Digital Distribution: Ebook Alchemy

      Conversion by Winking Billy

      National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry

      Rebecca Schultz has a love of writing. She has worked as an Information Technology journalist and as an on-line writing specialist. Rebecca is secondary-teaching trained; her passion is working with people who have difficulties learning to read and write. She currently teaches English as a Second Language to adults at Wodonga TAFE, Victoria.

      Drake the Dragonboy is Rebecca’s first children’s book.

      Rebecca lives in East Albury with her four-year-old son, dog and cat.

      Drake Dramco was sitting in class concentrating hard and tapping his dragon claws on his forehead. He was finding today’s science class very interesting. Miss Tess, the only teacher he actually liked, was talking about dragon evolution and how dragonfolk had developed from animal dragons. Drake liked Miss Tess because, unlike most teachers, she didn’t mind him asking questions.

      Miss Tess explained how dragonfolk had begun on all four legs, covered from head to toe in scales to keep them safe and warm. Over time they had risen onto two legs, so they could use their front legs to do things, like make tools and eventually light fires. She handed out a picture of the process.

      The first dragon in the picture was enormous and green with hard scales, flared nostrils, and giant claws on the end of its four legs. Its huge wings sprouted from its armoured back like giant shields. Gradually the dragon changed to become upright. The scales slowly dropped off, leaving soft pink fleshy arms, legs and belly.

      The final picture showed dragonfolk as they were today — little pink bodies, heads with fluffy hair, skinny backs with small wings that were cut short and folded neatly, and long pink legs with small feet. They stood on these feet and used their arms and hands to manipulate, leaving behind the four-legged dragons of the past. The only other signs of dragon were the scales left on their backs where their wings joined and their claw-like nails on the end of their fingers, so strong and sharp that it took a lot of trouble to keep them trimmed.

      “Miss Tess, it doesn’t look as if we’ve improved. We looked so tough in the beginning, as if we’d win any battle, and now we’re … kind of … small and wimpy looking,” said Drake. The whole class laughed, partly because Drake was particularly small and wimpy, and waited expectantly. Miss Tess smiled, placed her hand on her pointy chin, and thought for a moment.

      “Drake, instead of survival of the fittest, it’s become about survival of the smartest. By going up onto two legs, we’ve freed our hands so that we can make tools. These tools have become modern technology. We couldn’t have done that if we were big tough dumb animals.”

      Drake nodded and smiled. That made a lot of sense to him. He loved technology and wanted to work in technology when he got older, like his dad. His dad was the head of Thermodynamics, the largest and most successful technology company in all of Dragonland. Thermodynamics specialised in climate control — amongst other things they made clothes that kept you at exactly the right temperature. Drake was wearing one of these climate-controlled suits. His dad was an inventor and created the sort of things a super hero would use. Drake knew it wasn’t fashionable but he was so in awe of his father — in fact, he pretty much thought his father was a superhero — and so happy that his father had thought to send him the suit that he just didn’t care. It was a full body suit that clung to his skinny little body and set him apart from the other boys in their jeans and colourful t-shirts.

      Drake was short and still waiting for the growth spurt his mother had promised. He had recently turned thirteen and was nearly at the end of his first year at Dragon High School. He had spiky dark hair that wouldn’t sit in place whatever he did and a sweet baby face that was popular amongst parents but not peers. He had his cheeks pinched by adults all the time and he was far too old for that sort of thing. Drake’s parents were divorced and Drake hardly ever saw his father. Even before the divorce Drake hardly saw his father. He was always working. You had to work hard to get to be the manager of a company like Thermodynamics. Drake understood this but he didn’t think his mother did.

      “Drake, if we didn’t have technology we’d still be spending our lives running away from the Quintas,” explained Miss Tess. “We’d be so busy running away from them and foraging for food that we’d have no time for anything else.”

      The Quintas were enormous meat-eating creatures, ten metres long, with teeth like blades and wings like sheet metal. They flew through the sky at incredible speeds and as if that wasn’t enough, the Quintas breathed fire — great balls of fire that projected ten metres ahead of them. Their strangely small arms and hands dropped from their chests, limp and evil-looking, occasionally rising to bat an insect away from their small beady eyes. Just the mention of the name Quinta sent cold chills down the spines of any dragonfolk.

      “Instead, Thermodynamics has built a huge shield over the city. Instead of hiding behind rocks, watching our backs all the time, we enjoy our lives out in the glorious sunshine. We can even go out and bathe in the light of the moon at night, if we want to. In fact, Drake’s dad here was the one who designed the force field that protects us.”

      The entire city of Dragonland was sheltered under a shield. This force field kept everything out, from Quintas to mosquitoes and even the harsh UV rays from the sun. It was a well-planned city with all the community amenities based in the centre and neat small houses with cozy court-yards circling around this. Commuter trains headed into the city from six different directions and circled around connecting the suburbs at three different points. It was a well organised city that comfortably housed the 15,000 or so dragonfolk who lived there. It almost seemed too well planned to be a city that had grown over the last few thousand years.

      Beyond the city was a giant wasteland, which surrounded it from all sides. The wasteland was a desert full of sandstorms and scary animals like white lizards with blue forks for tongues and brown snakes with yellow bellies and little bells that grew out of their long scaly bodies. Not to mention the Quintas.

      “I’d like to bathe in the moonlight with you, Miss