A Texas Dragon for Christmas

Ever since I met Tolkien’s Smaug in The Hobbit in the 1960’s, I’ve enjoyed books in which sentient dragons are characters. There was Ann McCaffrey’s Dragons of Pern series. More recently, while George R Martin’s Game of Thrones dragons don’t speak, they are impressive. I’m also a fan of Brit Naomi Novik’s dragons in her Temerarie series set during early 1800’s. I wish I’d thought of adding dragon air forces to the Napoleonic wars. And not to forget John Ringo’s military dragons in his The Council Wars series. All to say, after writing four Civil War novels and one Texas Ranger adventure, I’ve decided to write a novel with a dragon character.

But I don’t want to copy the dragons of others.  Surely, I could think of some way to make a McBride dragon stand out. So I’ve asked myself, “What’s the blueprint for a Texas-centric dragon? How can I create a dragon that is uniquely Texan?” I thought back to my childhood before Tolkien and remembered the little flat lizards we called horny toads.

From Wikipedia:  “Although its coloration generally serves as camouflage against predation, when threatened by a predator, a horned lizard puffs up and appears very fat, which causes its body scales to protrude, making it difficult to swallow. The Texas horned lizard, also has the ability to squirt an aimed stream of blood from the corners of the eyes and sometimes from its mouth for a distance up to 5 ft. This not only confuses would-be predators, but also the blood is mixed with a chemical that is foul-tasting to canine predators such as wolves, coyotes, and domestic dogs. This novel behavior is observed to be very effective in defense."

Whoa, hoss. What’s this? A Texas horny toad can squirt blood from its eyes to ward off hungry coyotes? Really? And puff up. And blend in to its surroundings?

So, what if a Texas horny toad grew to house-size and could fly by virtue of bat-type wings. What if it shot its eye blood stream a hundred yards instead of five feet? What if the blood stream was laced with a deadly acidic chemical instead of a smelly chemical? Let other writers’ dragons breathe fire. That’s old school, outdated. Instead, mine will stream really nasty acid-blood from its eyes. What would that horny toad be?

Answer: A Texas Dragon, A Different Dragon Entirely.  I’m calling it historical fantasy dragon lit—Texas style.  

I’m starting with just one horny toad dragon, a female named Leine—which is Gaelic for torch bearer. I’ll feed in more details later, but for now, I’ll say that Leine doesn’t talk. Rather, she projects her thoughts in Latin to a teenager named Mally Gunn—daughter of Jesse Gunn, a main character of my last book, and his beloved wife Caroline, she who was kidnapped by the Apaches in the opening pages of A Different Country Entirely.

I’m having a great time with this one because the writing makes me feel young and rebellious. When one of your main characters is a giant flying horny toad, the strict rules of historical fiction don’t much matter. I keep thinking of MLK’s great words, “Free at last, free at last. Hallelujah, I’m free at last.” At least for one book.

I still have one or two more Texas Confederate tales to write. I’ve not written anything about how back in real life Texas soldiers stopped two Yankee invasions of our home state, once at Sabine Pass and once in Louisiana at a place called Mansfield. But for now, it’s all about a Texas dragon named Leine.

Merry Christmas to all y’all from Little Lockhart, Texas.