Considering the series is called Senta and the Steel Dragon, the steel dragon, especially in the early part of the series is a more minor character than some others.  As he grows, so does his importance to the story.  Bessemer, the Steel Dragon, plays a bigger part in The Two Dragons than he does the other books.  He is involved in quite a bit of action both at the beginning and the end of the story.  This scene is one that I had in my mind for months before I got to write it.

The deinonychus jumped up to its feet and whirled around, circling and hissing.  Zeah threw his hands up to make himself appear larger and made growling sounds.  The creature took two steps back and cocked its head to one side, listening to the man-thing’s unusual call.  After a moment it let out its own squawk.  There was an answering cry from the edge of the woods.  Zeah’s stomach sank and his loins tightened when he saw six more deinonychus rush out of the trees and run toward him.

Now it was Zeah’s turn to back up.  As he did so, he reached down and picked up Terra in one hand by the back of her dress.  He felt Augie and Iolana grab hold of the back of his jacket.  The foremost bird stood its ground and was joined by its fellows in scant seconds.  Zeah was about to yell for the children to run, and he intended to sell his life as dearly as possible to earn them their escape, when a giant shape dropped out of the air, landing directly atop the creatures.

The force of the impact knocked Zeah and Iolana from their feet and he dropped Terra into the sand.  Only Augie managed to stay upright.  They all found themselves in the massive shadow created by the wings of the steel dragon.  Zeah’s mind flashed back to eight years previous when an even larger dragon had saved him in a very similar way from a group of even larger predators.  The dragon’s two hind feet had crushed four of the deinonychus.  Two more were smashed beneath its right front hand.  A single unharmed bird made a run for the forest.  A flick of the long, supple, steel-colored tail mashed it into the beach.

Zeah picked himself back up, though his legs felt like they were made of rubber.  He reached down and pulled Iolana and Terra back to their feet as well.  All three children were sobbing, frightened by the attacking birds, though perhaps unaware of the real peril that had faced them. 

“Bessemer!” shouted Iolana, switching from one emotion to another as only an eight-year-old could.

She and the other children had known the steel dragon all their lives and took delight every time they encountered him.  Zeah had known Bessemer more than eight years, having first seen him when he was not much larger than a good-sized housecat.   He still felt about him the way he felt about the sorceress with whom the dragon lived—generally on good terms, but always wary.

“Hello children,” said the dragon.  His voice was deep and cultured, like a good Zaeri Imam or a guest lecturer at the university.  He picked up one of the squashed, bloody bodies of the deinonychus and tossed it whole into his large mouth.  Zeah speculated that the tyrranosaurus that had once chased him had a much larger mouth than the dragon did, though their overall body sizes were about the same.

“Do you have to do that in front of the children?” he asked sharply, as the dragon tossed a second deinonychus into his mouth.

“Oh, sorry.”  Bessemer raised his left wing to obscure his face as he ate a third and then a fourth bird.  “I’ve been flying.  You can’t imagine how hungry I get.”

“There’s sand stuck to those birds,” said Augie, wiping his face.  “You’re not eating sand, are you?”

“I imagine there is a bit of sand on them.  It used to bother me when I was your size.  I would wash and wash my food if it got on the sand.  It just doesn’t bother me anymore though.”

The dragon folded his wing back and lowered its face to get a better look at the children.  His face looked like the helmet of some primitive armor suit—smooth and shiny and for the most part expressionless.  He had four horns sticking back from the top of his head and a very small stub of horn on his nose.  They too added to the warlike visage.  Only his eyes and the thick whiskers on either side of his mouth hinted at the lively personality within.

“Let’s see.  I know you.”  The five and a half foot long head stopped in front of each of them in turn.  “Miss Iolana, how lovely to see you.  Young Augustus, you look well.  And who do we have here?  Terror?  Terrible?  Tyrranosaurus?”

“It’s –sob—Terra.”

“What’s the matter, Terra?  Did those ugly yet oddly scrumptious birds frighten you?”

“No, my –sob—hair got pulled!”

Zeah felt something squeezing his heart.

“I bet it didn’t hurt.  I bet it just tickled, like this.”

A long forked tongue shot out of the dragon’s mouth and flicked around the girl’s chin.  The unpleasant thought that Bessemer was tasting his granddaughter popped into Zeah’s head, but the little girl squealed with delight and ran foreward to grab a handfull of whiskers.

“Terra, get back,” said Zeah.

“She’s fine,” said Bessemer.

“I uh… I wouldn’t want her to get under your feet.”

The dragon made a dismissive gesture with his hand that was an exact copy of the one that Zeah had so often seen Zurfina and her apprentice Senta make. 

“The birds seem to have injured you, Mayor.”  Bessemer tilted his head sideways as Terra tugged in earnest at the whiskers.

Zeah looked down at himself.  There was a clean rip right through the breast of his jacket and his shirt.  He felt his chest and looked at his hand to find a thin smear of blood.

“It’s just a scratch.”

“You’re going to need a tailor though.”

“Yes.”

“You seemed to have dropped your shoes too.”

The shoes, Zeah’s and the children’s were strewn here and there on the sand.  Zeah picked up all eight.  While he did, he listened to the children and the dragon.

“Are you going to eat the rest of those birds?” wondered Augie.  “Only my mother says you shouldn’t waste food because there are starving children in Enclep.”

“That’s what I hear,” said Bessemer, gobbling down the rest of his prey.

“Hey, put your wing down.  I can’t see you eat them.”

“Are they good?” asked Terra, in a squeaky voice.

“Not bad.”

“Can I eat one?”

“I think your mouth is way too small.”

“I don’t believe I thanked you for saving us,” said Zeah, his arms now full of shoes.

“Not to worry.  Perfectly understandable.”

“But still, thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Bessemer flicked out his tongue.  “Nothing else frightening in the area—if you wanted to finish your walk.”

“No, we’ve walked enough.”

“Well then, toodle-pip everyone.”  One second the steel dragon was standing on the sand and the next it was hundreds of feet in the air.  It made a quick circle around them and then sailed off to the west.

“I want to be a dragon when I grow up,” said Terra.