White dragon with green vines

The boats are back early and the harbour smells of diesel and wet rope, but I have something to tell you that Dad won't believe. Last Tuesday the Morwenna brought up a net so heavy the winch groaned, and when it cleared the water there were no fish in it at all. There was a dragon. White as a gull's belly, long as the mooring chain, with a whiskered face like an old man's and green weed wound round its body as if the sea had tried to keep it.

Nobody wanted to touch it. Pete Gillow swore it was a seal tangled in a bad dream, until it opened one eye, which was gold, and looked straight at him. Then it unhooked itself from the mesh one claw at a time, very politely, and held out a small red glass float it had been carrying, the sort we use for marking pots. Mum says it's a sea spirit and we should leave it a fish each morning. I think it wanted its float back.

So Pete set the float on the quay, and the dragon took it in one claw, coiled off the stone and slid down into the green water, leaving a trail of leaves on the slipway that dried to nothing by noon. The nets came up empty for three days after. Then on Friday they filled so fast Dad cried, which he has never done, not even when Gran went.

I keep thinking about the thin pale line that trailed from its head, like a kite string snapped in the wind. I suppose it was only a thread of net caught on its whiskers. I hope so. Come home when the weather turns, and bring me one of those red floats if you find one.

Your loving sister, Jenna