"That's a bit of a relief." I told him before looking a the one on the table. It had finished cleaning up the slime and was looking at me. I leaned back from it and eyed it warily.

     "So why is this one considered special?" I asked him.

     "It is a Storm Cloud variant that likes eating gremlins. It is a very smart girl and I was think of saving her for you to have as pet. If you did not want her, I would sell her at a later date to someone who wanted an intelligent familiar."

     "I see. And now?"

     "She wants you... or perhaps the Wraith to be her master/owner now." He told me.

      I sighed unhappily. First the Wraith and now this. I did not want or need another supernatural critter running around the house. Especially when it had taken me nearly a year to get used to Bear after he was first accepted into the house. I stared at the juvenile dragon and it look back up at me with wide blues eyes as if to beg me to keep it. I sighed again from being torn between taking responsibility of it after it had bonded with me or the wraith and my deeply rooted fear of all things supernatural. I eventually gave in though and look at Yang.

     "Alright, so how much do I owe you..." I asked him.

     "Would boy like a receipt?"

     "Yes."

     "Then. It has been good. Doing business with you." He said, bowing to me before leaving. I looked back down at the dragonling.

     "Now comes the tricky part. How I am going to hide you until I can talk my parents into letting me keep you." I told it as I reluctantly held my hand out for it to get on. It--no she, I reminded myself--looked at my hand before looking back up at me questioningly.

     "Come on, I don't bite." I told it. "If I'm going be your owner though, I'll need to get used to touching you sooner or later."

     She half crawled half slithered hesitantly from the table to my hand. She didn't stop there and continued on to my wrist. She curled around it and part of my forearm before settling down into a comfortable position. She was warmer than I thought she would be and I held her up to get a better look at her.

     The young lesser water dragon had a fat serpentine body and was about the same size and shape as a small and skinny ball python. It's head was longer than it was wide with long narrow snout. At the end of the snout were two slit shaped nostrils that it could close to keep water from getting into its nose. Between the nostrils and its upper lip were a pair of long fleshy and sensitive whiskers similar to the barbels on a catfish. It lacked the accompanying chin barbels which meant it was probably female since the males were the only ones to have them usually.