Prairie Fire Read Online Free Page B

her online aliases after what we’d engineered last spring. I didn’t understand it fully—something about sock puppets, which apparently the Internet is desperately against—and having direct access to us was something she cherished. Usually we didn’t mind letting her have the first go, but the haircuts had been kind of spontaneous.
    Sadie brought the clippers over to the Thorskards’ on Friday after school, as we’d planned, an hour before Owen’s weekly sit-down with Sheila, the editor-in-chief (and also main photographer, copy editor, ad saleswoman, and espresso machine operator) of the Trondheim Weekly . I’m pretty sure we were all standing there wondering if this was a terrible idea.
    â€œI think we should hack off most of it with scissors,” Sadie said, twisting her ponytail in her hand. “That way it’s kind of past the point of no return.”
    â€œWorks for me,” I said. “Except you’ll still have to do it. I don’t think I can hold scissors.”
    â€œSit down, the lot of you,” said Lottie from behind us. We’d left the deck door open and I hadn’t heard her get close. “On the steps.”
    Lottie dragged a chair over, and sat down behind me. In a second, she had snipped off the braid Sadie had woven the night before, and handed it to me. It seemed a lot thinner than I’d expected. The clippers whirred to life and I felt the tickle as the blades ran along my skull.
    â€œI hope your head doesn’t have a funny bump to it,” Owen said, running his hand over his own scalp.
    â€œThanks,” I told him. “To be fair, I’ve been hit around the head fewer times than you have, so it’s more likely that you’ll have something weird.”
    Sadie laughed, pitched a bit higher than usual. The last time Owen had gone up against a lakus , he’d got the tail across his back as it was dying. It had knocked him into the side of a barn, and he’d ended up with a concussion. The farmer was absolutely horrified that Owen had been injured on her family’s property, even though my mother ended up calling every day for a week to assure her that Owen was fine. One of the local newspapers had run an op-ed about how it was time for helmets to become standard for underage dragon slayers, but I wasn’t holding my breath on any legislative change. It had taken long enough to get helmets into minor hockey.
    Lottie slowed down as she went around my ears. My head felt very odd, and I twisted my hands in my lap. She ran her fingers across the top of my head, searching for any hair she had missed, but found none. She rested her hands on my shoulders and squeezed.
    â€œGood lord, Lottie!” Hannah said from the kitchen. “Can’t I leave you alone at all?”
    â€œIt was my idea,” I said. Which was almost true.
    â€œDid you tell your parents?” Hannah asked. She was the one in the Thorskard family who did most of the active parenting, after all.
    â€œUm,” I said. Because of course I hadn’t. They were expecting me home with, at worst, a set of bruised knuckles.
    â€œOh, for Pete’s sake,” Hannah said. “Lottie, give me that.”
    Lottie managed to look a bit sheepish has she handed over the clippers, and Hannah rolled her eyes before dropping a quick kiss on her upturned face.
    â€œYour turn, Sadie,” Hannah said. “Assuming this was a group decision.”
    â€œIt was,” Owen said, as Sadie shifted to be better sat in front of Hannah.
    Sadie managed not to flinch when Hannah cut off the bulk of her hair, but her smile got a bit watery when the clippers started up again.
    â€œWell, it’s practical,” Hannah said. “If a bit showy.”
    â€œI never understood why anyone wore the helmet,” Lottie offered. “It itched. And it was hot.”
    â€œWe might not get assigned to the desert,” Sadie pointed out.