Once there was a boy who had three mothers.

The boy's name was Hardy. The mothers also had names, of course. They had many names, but the people who came to call with one problem or another usually just referred to them as the Ladies. For this story we'll keep it simple and call them Mother-one, Mother-two, and Mother-three. For you see, this is a tale about the boy Hardy, not the mothers. Their stories have already become legend.

On this particular day young Hardy rejoiced, because he knew tomorrow was his Special Day, his birthday when his mothers would grant him one wish. Last year he'd wished for a pony ride. He'd seen drawings of ponies in his books but there weren't any in the village, and the visitors to his home rode huge, scary beasts and ignored the little boy hanging around. On Hardy's Special Day, a beautiful snow-white pony had come trotting out of the forest to play with him, and it even included a long spiral horn growing out of its head, something the books had failed to mention.

Hardy had thought long and hard about this year's Special Day and knew exactly what to wish for. So, when the three mothers asked for his wish, he was ready...

# # #

"I want an adventure."

Mother-one looked surprised, unusual for her. Normally there was nothing Hardy could say to surprise any of them. "An adventure? But Hardy dear--"

"That's a wise choice of wishes," Mother-two interrupted. "But, my boy, that's something we can't give you--"

"But we'll give you something else, just as good," Mother-three concluded. They were always talking that way. Sometimes it appeared to Hardy that he didn't have three mothers; he had one mother living in three bodies.

Hardy didn't want something "just as good", although he knew better than to throw a tantrum this close to his Special Day. Later he sat on his bed, kicking his feet and doing some secret sulking. He looked at the shelf full of books he loved to read, each page filled with boys and girls having one great adventure after another. Why not him?

Hardy had an idea. He'd give himself an adventure! But how could he do that?

“Let's see,” he said to himself, “what do all the adventures have in common?”

In books, no parents stood around and got in the way of the fun. His own mothers got upset whenever Hardy did anything exciting, like when he tried to see if the images in their scrying pool looked backwards from under the water. But in the books, once the parents were out of the way, adventures came calling. He decided to start out with that.

The next morning Hardy went to Mother-one and asked permission to go on a hike. She smiled and handed him a lunch she'd already packed. Mother-two met him at the door and held out a raincoat. He looked at the blue, cloudless sky, but stuffed it in his pack anyway. Mother-three met him at the path where it entered the forest, where she hugged and kissed him.

"Remember to be careful with the stream," was all she said, as he marched down the well-traveled path into the trees.

Hardy had gone into the forest before, but always in the company of his mothers. Being alone made it exciting, and he imagined he was on a great quest or exploring a strange unknown land. After a while, Hardy arrived at the point where a bridge crossed a stream, the one he supposed his mother had cautioned him about. He splashed around for a while, but the troll under the bridge was grumpy and refused to play, and the frogs he caught acted like frogs, not enchanted people. He'd once seen his mothers turn a local bully into a frog. Hardy giggled, remembering how the poor frog couldn’t find anyone willing to kiss it in order to break the spell. He briefly considered kissing one to see what would happen but decided it would taste nasty. He did find a neat rock to add to his collection, a sparkly white stone with a shiny yellow streak running through it, and stuffed the rock in his pocket.

He also ate his lunch, even though it was still morning. Then instead of dragging the pack with him, Hardy hid it under the bridge, making a deal with the troll not to steal it in exchange for sharing a piece of pie. He'd retrieve it on the way back.

But before Hardy started out again, he looked around once more. Where was the adventure? So far, he was just taking a walk. He'd been down the path with his mothers before, and knew that eventually it ended where a retired old wizard lived in a haunted castle. There was nothing new or exciting about that. Having no mothers around wasn't bringing him an adventure, after all. What else was missing?

In every adventure he’d read about the boy or girl went somewhere new. He looked into the trees on either side. His thoughts made him nervous, since it would break one of the rules. The mothers were big on rules. "Brush your teeth every morning, Hardy." "Don't eat too much cake, Hardy." And in this case, "Hardy, you stay on the path." He'd broken his share of rules before and submitted to the motherly punishment, but knew this one was important. Hardy had no wish to get lost. The trouble he'd be in when his mothers came to get him was not the sort of adventure he was seeking.

Hardy considered the stream. It meandered down from the mountains surrounding his village and was mostly sand and rocks, with just a little water trickling through it. If he went that way, he'd be going somewhere new and he could just follow it back when it was time to go home. Hardy started upstream, hopping from sandbar to sandbar and climbing over the occasional fallen tree that blocked his way. He'd find his adventure yet!

For a while, Hardy relaxed and explored as he worked his way up the hill. He found a few more rocks for his collection, but none as nice as the first stone. He met a group of fairies drinking from the stream, but they were shy folk and hid in the bushes when they caught sight of him. He ignored them, since fairies were common enough and the ones that did want to talk always rambled on about which flowers provided the best nectar.

In this manner, Hardy climbed for a good part of the day, and came to a place where the stream was born. A meadow surrounded a small pool at the foot of a mountain; a little waterfall fed the pool from the rock above. He looked up at the cliff and the mountain that stood in his way. It seemed this would be the end of his hike. Hardly an adventure at all.

He sat on the grass and looked around, wishing he'd saved some of his lunch to eat while he enjoyed the cool breeze. The breeze became a wind, and Hardy was surprised to find the sun hidden by gathering clouds. It looked like it might rain, and he thought of the raincoat he had left in the pack.

A rumble came from the sky as the clouds converged overhead. Hardy became certain a storm was on its way. He started back, but stopped when he thought of the words Mother-three had spoken. Something about being careful with the stream. Hardy looked at the little trickle of water and remembered seeing it after a hard rain – then it wasn't a dry sandy path; it was a gushing river. Maybe he shouldn't return that way with the storm approaching.

Hardy was trying to decide what to do when lightning struck a nearby tree with a flash, a boom of thunder, and a crackle of broken branches. It made him jump, almost causing him to fall into the water. He needed someplace to get out of the weather. He looked around, and spied an overhang where a cliff might provide shelter. The overhang hid a small cave, perfect for staying dry. He knelt and peeked into the hole, but it was too dark to see very far inside. He knew that wild animals liked to make their homes in such places and didn't want to surprise any of them.

"Is anything in here?" he called into the dark.

"Go away!" was the immediate response.

Hardy ran, but stopped at the other side of the clearing, and turned to see if something was chasing him. There was only the empty meadow.

“Go away? Wild animals don't tell you to go away.” He stomped back to the opening and glared inside. "I won't go away! You come out of there or I'll...I'll poke you with a stick!"

This time he heard a sniffle, and a quivering voice said, "You're not a knight, are you? Mama said to keep away from knights, they'd eat me."

Hardy frowned. "A knight? I'm a boy, and I won't eat you if you don't eat me."

Something shuffled in the dark and Hardy was amazed when the head appeared. It had big, liquid eyes, a long snout, pointed ears, and shiny golden scales. "You're a dragon!" he exclaimed, at the same time the creature said, "You're a princess!"

"A princess?" Hardy was sure he hadn't heard that right. "No, I told you, I'm a boy. Are you a dragon? You seem awful small for a dragon. My books say you should be big as a house."

The creature came the rest of the way out of the cave and Hardy saw it was indeed a dragon in miniature. It had a stocky body and long tail, big leathery wings folded along its sides, and a short row of spikes running up the back. It sat back on its rump and their heads came to the same height while they examined each other.

"No, you're a people, I can tell," it replied. "Mama told me all about people. There are knight people, they're covered in hard shells and have a long pointed claw, they shout and stick you with it, and I'm to stay away from knights. There are princess people, they have fur on their heads and soft hide and shriek and run away when you try to talk to them. You're a princess people. And I am not small, I'm big for my age, Mama told me. Why aren't you shrieking and running away?"

A sprinkling of rain reminded Hardy that standing in the open and arguing with a dragon wasn't going to protect him from the storm. "Um, can I share your home? I don't want to get all wet."

"This hole? It's not my home; I'm just trying to get out of the rain, too. Sure, there's room."

The boy and dragon settled down on the sand inside the snug opening. The storm finally hit. The wind, rain, lightning, and thunder shook the trees, but none of it entered the cave. Soon enough Hardy had the dragon educated on the types of people and the differences between a knight and a princess and a boy. And he learned his companion was a young boy like himself. Well, a young boy dragon anyway. They passed the time learning about each other.

"No, I don't have a name yet," the dragon was explaining. "Mama says I don't get a name until I find my fire, and then that will be my Special Day when I get to pick my name. It's something I have to find all by myself. That's why I'm here. Mama says this is where she found her fire, but the people have taken it all since then. She says they have bunches of it in big castles, and the knights live there and keep everyone away and get real mad if you eat any of it."

This led to further discussion where Hardy learned that dragons needed something they dug out of the ground in order to get the furnace in their stomachs started. They only had to eat it once, and from then on, they could belch flames when needed. Hardy guessed it must be some kind of magic plant or root but couldn't understand the rest of the story. The idea of picking your own name fascinated him, though, and they spent some time talking about that.

"Could you say that again?" Hardy asked. "It sounds like you're clearing your throat."

The dragon made the sound again, slower this time. "Feurghnadaugn. It's in the old language," he added. "It's the name of a hero, a Dragon King who brought us to these mountains a long time ago. It means Scales-like-Fire. It's what I'm going to name myself."

Hardy tried to repeat the sound several times, then shrugged and gave up. "I think I'd need a neck like yours to say it right. How about I just call you Ferdy, short for Ferdanan. It sort of sounds the same, and it's the name of a hero in one of my books."

"Sure, it's close enough. But you still haven't told me what Hardy means. Names have to mean something."

"But it doesn't mean anything," Hardy insisted. "It's just a...well, a name. It's what my mothers tack onto it that means something. If they say 'Hardy-I-Swear', it means I'm only in a little trouble. If they say 'Hardy-You-Come-Here-This-Instant', it means I'm in lots of trouble. Hey, it stopped raining!"

The storm ended as quickly as it began. They stood outside in the freshly scrubbed air and Hardy looked at the pond. The little waterfall had grown into a thundering cascade, and water, heading downhill as fast as it could go, filled the streambed. Hardy sighed as he saw the brush on either side that he'd have to push through to get back. Then he had another idea.

"Hey Ferdy, could I get you to carry me back down to the village? You could stay for dinner."

The dragon was wandering around, picking up rocks and dropping them after a close inspection. He looked skeptically at Hardy. "Carry you? You look almost half my size. I might drop you. Mama could, but it will be dark before I could bring her back here. Why don't you just use your legs?"

When Hardy explained about the stream, the dragon pointed to the other side of the clearing. "But when I came here I saw the people just a short flight in that direction. A couple of hills over, just grass between here and there. Look, you can see the smoke that comes from those little castles you live in."

He could indeed see the smoke from the chimneys where everyone would be getting their stoves ready to cook supper. It seemed the stream had curved around and he was closer to home than he expected.

Thinking of fire caused something to click in his mind, and he looked again at the dragon scratching in the dirt. He knelt and emptied his pockets, finding the stone with the yellow streak. He held it up, comparing it to the dragon's golden scales, and realized they were the same color. Scales like Fire? It was worth a try.

"Is this what you're looking for?"

The dragon stopped what he was doing and stared at the stone. When Hardy handed it over, the dragon licked it with his long tongue, then with a yelp tossed it into his mouth, crunched and swallowed.

"Wow, you've got hard teeth! You call it fire, but we call it gold. People in the books spend a lot of time fighting over it. Are you all right? You gonna be sick?"

The dragon was acting peculiar, burping repeatedly. Finally, a long, loud belch came out, along with a tiny puff of white smoke.

"I've got my fire! This is my Special Day, after all! Thank you, thank you. Just wait until I show Mama. Now I get to pick my name. I'm going to be Ferdanan, the Fire-Scaled!"

Hardy didn't think a puff of smoke was all that great, although the belching was impressive. He guessed the dragon would get better at the fire part with practice. "I gotta go now. I'm glad I could help. You, um...you wouldn't want to come visit me sometime, would you? And can you teach me to burp like that?

# # #

The three mothers stood around their scrying pool, holding hands and watching as the reflecting surface showed Hardy and Ferdanan forge a life-long friendship. The scene was interrupted by an image of another dragon -- a very large, very old, very black dragon this time.

This dragon looked back at the women through the pool. "Well, Three-Who-Are-One," it said, "it seems both our boys have had their Special Day. You have my gratitude."

"Our thanks also, Fiona--" Mother-one began.

"We think you were overdoing it with the lightning, though--" Mother-two continued.

"You almost hit our boy!" Mother-three concluded.

The dragon snorted and a blast of thick smoke briefly hid her. "Look who's talking. That cloudburst of yours could have washed my boy right off the mountain. You stick to your element, and I'll handle mine."

And with that, the Queen of Dragons was gone, but the mothers delayed breaking contact, continuing to watch the reflective surface. Eventually they coaxed one last vision out of the pool. It was an image of a grown man riding a magnificent golden dragon that belched fire as it flew through a swarm of giant bat-like creatures. The man held a glowing sword in his hand, slicing through anything that attacked from above. Sitting behind the man and holding onto his waist was a young woman in a green robe, a witch who struck down with spells any attackers sneaking up from behind.

The trio seemed hard pressed, but Mother-one broke the circle before the outcome could be shown. "It is best not to know," she remarked. "The future is Hardy's alone, to handle as best he can. We can only prepare our boy for the trials ahead."

The mothers went home to fix a Special Day feast. Hardy would be home before long, hungry and with quite a story to tell.

"Give him an adventure, indeed," Mother-two muttered as she looked to see how the cake was doing in the oven.