Cindy put on her best schoolteacher voice. “Lionel, it’s not nice to make kebabs of your friends. Today you are going to have some lovely processed meat items, if you can be good and refrain from destroying the rest of the city.”

Lionel huffed. A spire of blue smoke rose up from his nostril. “You’re stifling me, Cindy. You just don’t understand me. No one does. Everyone just wants me to become what they expect. I’m moving out as soon as I’m old enough.” Cindy looked closer at Lionel. There was a hint…just a hint, mind you…of black eyeliner around the dragon’s eye.

Sir Ronald stepped forward. “Sir Dragon, we must humor our lady. Womanly types need humoring. I promise you, as soon as this adventure is over, I will invite you to my estate and we can hunt wild boar, roast them whole, all manner of manly activities.”

Lionel was mollified.

Then something horrible arrived: an irate vegetarian on a bike, blasting the worst tunes from the solo career of Sir Paul McCartney on her portable stereo.