Just as I did with Senta in The Dark and Forbidding Land, I had to figure out what Bessemer was like, having already written him in book 3.  In The Drache Girl, he was as big as a pony and quite loquacious.  In The Voyage of the Minotaur, he was cat-sized and barely spoke.  So he fell right in the middle for this book.

This is a scene in which Bessemer seeks some vengeance on a man who has been causing grief to his favorite human.

Cissy left the parlor, passed through the foyer, and picked up the bag of rock salt by the door before going outside.  Once in the garden, she began walking up and down, spreading the salt on the cobblestone paths and the stepping stones.  She looked up at the dark clouds moving in from the north.  If Toss had been there, he would have been able to tell her if this was going to be the last storm of the cold season.  He wasn’t there, and it was unlikely that Cissy would ever see him again.

Just then Mr. Streck walked through the front gate.  Cissy was about to turn around so that she could go inside and inform Mr. Dechantagne of the Freedonain’s arrival, when she saw a bright glint shoot across the otherwise gloomy sky.  The object, which it took no great intellect to recognize as the steel dragon, swooped downward.  Streck had taken four steps into the yard, when the beast shot by his face so fast that he could not have seen what it was.  Cissy was watching it as it sped by, and could tell not only what it was, but could see that it was carrying something wrapped in white paper, clutched tightly to its chest.  The dragon was already out of sight when the Freedonian let out a blood-curdling scream.  Looking back at the man, the lizzie could see cuts across his nose and both cheeks that suddenly began to bleed profusely.

She hesitated as red blood oozed from between the fingers held to his face.  Saba Colbshallow suddenly appeared at the gate and rushed to the man’s assistance.  He took him by the shoulder and rushed him toward the house.  Cissy quickly took Streck’s other shoulder.  Before they reached the steps, Streck’s legs gave out beneath him and he crumpled into half consciousness.  Tisson rushed down the steps and took his legs while Saba and Cissy carried him by the arms.

Once inside, Streck was rushed to the dining room, where amid much shouting and hissing, he was laid out on the great table.  Mrs. Colbshallow arrived from the kitchen and immediately ordered that clean linens and tincture of iodine be brought.  Just as Clegg was arriving with the requested items, Mrs. Dechantagne-Calliere stepped into the room carrying a brown bottle of healing draught.  Streck’s face, upon examination was seen to have five razor thin slices, quite deep, across its width.

“Yadira, send someone to fetch Dr. Kelloran,” said the governor as she leaned over the wounded man and carefully poured the potion onto the cuts.

“I don’t need a doctor,” said Streck.

“Be quiet.  This is your face.  We need to make sure that it isn’t scarred.”

Clegg was sent as directed and by the time he returned with the doctor, Streck, no longer bleeding, had been moved to the parlor.

Cissy had seen Dr. Kelloran before.  She was easily recognized for her more pronounced female characteristics.  She usually also, as she now did, carried her small black bag.  Sitting down on the sofa next to Streck, she carefully examined his face.

“The healing draught seems to be knitting the skin together nicely, but I still want to put a stitch or two on this nose.”

“Ouch!” cried Streck, as the stitches were sewn.  “Damn Birmisian birds.  It flew by so fast I didn’t even see it.”

“Birmisian birds don’t fly, at least none that I’ve heard of,” said Mr. Dechantagne from the doorway.  His wife was standing with him.  “We have a few large flying reptiles, but I’ve never heard of one attacking a person.”

“Saba?” asked the governor.

“Sorry, I didn’t see it.  I heard someone cry out and came running, but whatever it was, was gone before I got there.  But your lizzie was in the yard.  Maybe she saw something.”

“Cissy?” asked Mrs. Colbshallow.  Cissy took a step back as all of the human eyes in the room focused on her.  “Cissy, what did you see?”

“It was the little god,” she replied quietly.

“Little god?”

“She means the dragon,” said Mrs. Dechantagne.  “Zurfina’s little dragon.”

“It seems, Mr. Steck,” said Governor Dechantagne-Calliere, “that you have made a powerful enemy.  Just what have you done to Zurfina to raise her ire?”

“I have not even seen the woman.”

“He didn’t do anything to Zurfina,” said Saba, frowning.  “I’ll wager he didn’t do anything to the dragon either.  But he has had at least one well-known row with Senta.”

“That child belongs in an institution,” said Streck.

As I mentioned the other day– and have talked about on more than one occasion, I had already written book 3 of Senta and the Steel Dragon before writing book 2.  Knowing what was going to happen with the characters, I extrapolated a year and a half back and fit them into the new book’s plot.  In some ways this worked well, and in others it didn’t.  There are some spots in which I think Senta acts a little more immature in book 3 than in book 2.  On the other hand, that happens to all of us now and then.

I also had to extrapolate how the town of Port Dechantagne was going to look.  In book 3 there was a thriving town square, so in book 2 it had to be under construction.  Here is the scene from The Dark and Forbidding Land when Senta first visits town square.

It was a walk of only about three hundred yards from the new home Zurfina the sorceress and her ward to the large gate in the protective wall that divided the now completely subdued peninsula from the large and still untamed forest.  When Senta reached the gate she found a great deal of activity.  A town square had been built just outside the gate some months before, and it would eventually be the center point of the colony.  A new flagpole had been delivered on the last ship and two men, while a small crowd of men and women watched, were erecting it.  That was not all that was going on though.  No less than three good-sized buildings were under construction around the square despite the frigid and damp weather.  The two new buildings on the east side of the square already had walls, doors, and windows and now men walked around upon their roofs hammering down shingles.  The building on the southwest corner was still being framed in when Senta had last seen it—little more than a wooden and iron skeleton of a building.  Now its walls were done and it too was getting a roof.  The three were joining the two buildings that had sat along the east side of the square since its construction—the dress shop and Mr. Parnorsham’s Pfennig Store.  Senta saw a face she knew and walked over to its owner.

“Hello Mr. Darwin.”

“Oh hello, Senta,” said the bespectacled older man, who was only slightly taller than the ten year old girl.  “How are you this cold morning?”

“I’m okay.  Which of these buildings is going to be yours?”

“This one right here,” he replied, pointing to the left most of the two having their roofs put on.  “I’m right next to Mr. Parnorsham’s Pfennig Store.  I think that’s the best spot in the square.  Don’t you?”

“I kind of thought you would have moved in there when Mrs. Wachtel died,” said Senta, indicating the shop just to the left of the Pfennig Store.

“Yes, well… to be honest, when Mrs. Wachtel… a…  passed away,” Mr. Darwin crossed himself.  “I had already signed the paperwork.”

“So what are they going to do with her place?”

“It’s my understanding that Mrs. Bratihn is going to take over the business.”

“I guess that will be good since her husband can’t work on account of being blind.”

“Mmm,” nodded Mr. Darwin, noncommittally while he took off his glasses to wipe them with a clean handkerchief.

“I didn’t expect Mrs. Government to let us go too long without a dress shop.”

Mr. Darwin bit his lower lip.  “Senta, you are irrepressible.  You are going to have to learn to watch what you say.”

“I think Senta will always say what she means,” said a voice from behind them.

They turned around to see Egeria Lusk in a beautiful dress that was only slightly less white than the surrounding snow and a bright colored coat that was only slightly more red than her fiery hair, which just now was pulled up into a bun and tucked behind the straw boater she wore.  Miss Lusk was a very small woman with very large green eyes, and though strikingly beautiful, she was known more for her keen mind.

“Good day to you, sir,” she said, curtseying to Mr. Darwin, who bowed at the waist in return.  “Where are you off to, Senta?”

Senta shrugged.

“I’m going to the Pfennig Store for some lace.  Why don’t you come along with me?”

“Okay.  Good day Mr. Darwin.”

“Good day beautiful ladies,” said Mr. Darwin, once again bowing at the waist.