O dragão é Draco , e o livro é Heaven Cent de Piers Anthony, parte da série Xanth .
Você repetidamente ouve os personagens dizendo coisas como 'Tão certo quanto Água Apaga Fogo', apenas para ouvir outro dizer: 'Tão certo quanto o Fogo evapora a água' - eventualmente, Dolph os faz perceber que eles tinham uma falta de comunicação e o dragão escolhe para dar à viúva do Merman o par de valiosas opalas que estavam por trás do jogo.
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"Mela thinks you just attacked him and stole the opal," Dolph said. "She thinks you're a rogue dragon."
"There were no witnesses to the event, so I suppose she can think what she pleases. But I have told it as it happened. I threw fire, he threw water, plain as two days. I am absolutely sure of that, as I am of his bad attitude. That gem is mine!"
But something was nibbling at Dolph's memory. "Mela— she said something—I think it was just a saying she used— about fire and water. 'Sure as water douses fire'—something like that. I wonder—"
"That's backwards!" Draco growled. "I told you, fire evaporates water. Every time. You breathe fire on it and it heats and turns into steam and it's gone. When I come home and drip on the nest, I dry it out by heating it a little."
"But maybe to a merperson, who lives in water, it would seem the other way," Dolph said. "I remember something else she said, about sand displacing water—"
"That's backwards, too! Water covers sand! I'd heard that merfolk were addle-brained, and this proves it!"
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"But what I was trying to remember—Ah, now I have it! Fire melts sand, she said. So you know, they—"
"All backwards!" Draco exclaimed. "What idiots! They think fire melts sand, sand displaces water, and water douses—" He broke off. "Uh-oh."
"I wonder whether they play mat game the same way?" Dolph asked innocently. "Backwards?"
"Suddenly I very much fear they do! So that when I threw fire and Merwin threw water—"
"You mean he really did think he won?"
Draco snorted out a fierce jet of fire. "Oh, my," he hissed. "I wish I'd understood! We could have discussed the rules, gotten them straight . . ." He trailed off, his words fading into thoughts.