Fire Star

by Chris D'Lacey

  Lucy leaned forward, her mouth popping like a pea-pod trying to shed its seed. “You mean, proper big dragons?”

  “Yes,” said the sibyl. “And one in particular.”

  Lucy’s skin turned cold. For she knew, without knowing, that her aunt was referring to the last true dragon the world had ever known.

  Gawain.

  16 DRESSING DOWN

  Do you know how powerful a polar bear is?”

  Anders Bergstrom folded his arms and sat back in his office chair surveying the two students standing in front of him. Neither ventured to answer his question.

  “From the report I’ve been given by the Chamberlain Bear Patrol, the male you encountered is as big as anything I have ever seen. That means he weighs close to six hundred kilos, over half a ton. On its hind legs, such an animal would stand almost sixteen feet high and have an attack speed of approximately twenty-five miles per hour. It has the strength to lift an adult seal out of water, throw it onto level ice, and rip a hole in its belly as easily as you or I would tear open an envelope. It could take a man’s head off with one swift blow, using roughly the same amount of energy that the man would exert to nip a flower off its stem. It is universally acknowledged as the most formidable predator on this planet. Am I beginning to frighten you yet?”

  David looked down at his shuffling feet. “I didn’t want to see it killed, that’s all.”

  “Jeez,” said a voice from across the room. Russ thumped his fist against the filing cabinet and pushed his hat way back off his forehead. “One person mauled in Chamberlain in the past thirty years. You two are here for less than a month and you almost triple the stats. Why didn’t you just stay in the trading post? You didn’t even get the supplies!”

  “Ask him about his story,” muttered Zanna.

  “Story?” said Russ, his freckled brow concentrating into lines.

  From a chair in the corner, Tootega glared at the girl and muttered something darkly under his breath.

  “Don’t worry, you’re probably in it, too,” she said.

  David clenched his teeth. “Zanna, shut up.”

  “Don’t you tell me to zip it!” she growled, whacking a hand across his chest. She stared doggedly at Bergstrom. “Ask him about Gwilanna and the tooth.”

  Russ pointed a finger at his temple. “This a private conversation or can anyone join in?”

  “It’s on the laptop,” she said, holding Dr. Bergstrom’s gaze.

  The scientist ran his knuckles down the blond hairs of his beard and swung his chair toward the pilot and the guide. He tilted his head in the direction of the door.

  “You’re the boss.” Russ sighed, and both men started to leave.

  Tootega paused briefly at David’s back. “That bear. He remember you — her as well. Next time, you won’t have chance to play dead.”

  The door closed. “What did he mean, ‘next time’?” Zanna snapped.

  Bergstrom’s deep blue eyes pooled into her. “The bear was shot with a fast-acting tranquilizer. A new development we’ve made in the past year or two. It was taken immediately to a steel holding pen, commonly referred to as the polar bear jail. It will be operated on for a bullet wound to the shoulder.”

  Zanna winced and looked away.

  “So he’ll survive,” said David, staring into the misted windows and whatever, in his mind’s eye, lay beyond.

  “He was lucky,” Bergstrom said, smoothing his palms. “The bullet had touched his lung but the injury was more impediment than fatal. It will heal quickly. When it does, we’ll fly him north and let him go.”

  “This is just too spooky,” said Zanna. “Read the story, Dr. Bergstrom. Now.”

  Bergstrom glanced at the open laptop, weaving colored pipework on its flat gray screen.

  “No, I’m destroying it,” David said. He stepped forward and moved the mouse. Bergstrom immediately clamped his arm.

  “You have a contract, remember?”

  David looked into the scientist’s eyes. It wasn’t clear whether Bergstrom was referring to Apple Tree Publishing or the personal promise David had made him to keep on writing about the Arctic. Even so, David said, “I’m wiping it.” And he dragged the file into the computer’s trash can and emptied it.

  This was still not enough for Zanna. “Defrag the disk.”

  “What?”

  “I don’t want it in memory, even in bits. Run a defrag over it. Now.”

  “But —?”

  “Just do it, David.”

  “Be my guest,” said Bergstrom, wheeling his chair away.

  Silently furious, David ran the program that would rearrange the disk so all the files were contiguous and any scraps of deleted files were eliminated. “There. Happy now?”

  “No, not really,” she said. “First you keep secrets about Gwilanna, then you won’t tell me why I’m not supposed to touch that bear, and now you’re trying to act like you’re some kind of hero. Well, you’re not.

  You could have died out there! Oh, and do you want the really bad news?”

  “What?”

  “We’re finished.”

  And then she was gone, leaving David and the door frame shuddering in her wake.

  17 TAKEN

  How?” demanded Lucy. “How will you make Gawain come back to life? You’d need his fire tear. You’d need —”

  “Be quiet,” snapped Gwilanna. “I know what I need. Everything is in motion, child.”

  Lucy’s gaze dropped to a furious squint. “That’s why you set Gretel free, isn’t it?”

  “What?” said her aunt.

  “Don’t lie,” Lucy said. “I know you sent Groyne.”

  “Groyne?” said Gwilanna, and it was clear then, and somewhat frightening to Lucy, that her aunt had no idea about that dragon.

  “He was invisible,” Lucy muttered. “He gave Gretel a flower and G’reth —” Here she stopped, realizing that what Gwilanna didn’t know, she should not be told. That could mean more fish tails or feathers.

  But Gwilanna merely turned away deep in thought. “Interesting. So the girl must be at work.”

  “Girl? You mean Zanna?”

  Gwilanna breathed in deeply. “Gretel has gone over to her, has she not? The girl must have sensed her powers and been active.”

  Lucy thought about this. It did make sense. Zanna had been devastated when Grockle had turned to stone. But if Zanna was involved in setting Gretel free, why had Gretel not confessed to this?

  “No matter,” said Gwilanna, wheeling away. “Her abilities are useless compared to mine. Without guidance, she is like a poor, lost sparrow. In time, she will grovel just to do my bidding, and so will your foolish unfaithful mother.”

  “What’s Mom done to you?”

  Gwilanna loomed up close. “She has put aside her duty to the ancient ways and sided with this boy. But when the star looms bright in the February chill, she will come back to me, to her true kind.”

  “February?”

  “Three months. We must prepare.”

  “We?”

  “You and I.”

  “Are you staying again?”

  Gwilanna laughed and her features began to change. Her hands grew thin and her face became gnarled. With a tapering finger, she made a vertical, shimmering fissure in the air, as though she had torn through the fabric of the universe.

  “W-what’s happening?” said Lucy, pulling her knees up under her chin.

  In his basket, Snigger turned circles of fear.

  “Come,” said Gwilanna. She put out a hand and the air around Lucy rushed toward it, pulling her toward the sibyl’s grip.

  “Mom!” she screamed, without hesitancy now.

  “Come,” Gwilanna snapped, “you have a date with destiny. Come, child, or the squirrel dies!”

  “Where are we going?” Lucy cried, squirming off the sofa. “I don’t want to go! Where are you taking me?” She was shaking her head, but already their fingers were interlocking.

  Gwilanna pulled her towa
rd the rip.

  And in a flash there was nothing left behind but dust motes skirting the inrush of air and a squirrel fretting in the corner of his cage.

  18 GROYNE RETURNS

  David put his face into his hands. “What’s going on, Dr. Bergstrom?”

  Bergstrom turned his chair square to his desk and began to flip through a file of notes. “I won’t be taking any action about what happened in Chamberlain, though the incident will be logged by the police up there. Your decision to confront a bear, after all you’ve been taught, was highly irresponsible. This episode won’t reflect well on the base. From now on, you’d be well advised to keep a low profile.”

  “That’s not what I meant, and you know it.”

  “Then explain yourself, David. I have a lot to catch up on, including all your latest data to read through. Your beryllium results are really rather good.”

  David shook his head in disbelief. “How can you be so casual about this? Zanna stands here ranting about Gwilanna and you act as if nothing is happening. You haven’t even asked me about the story.”

  “The story is deleted. You’ll write something new.”

  “Is that it?”

  “No, not quite. While you were trying to get yourself killed you had a call from America, from Elizabeth. She wants to speak to you, urgently. Something about your publisher.”

  David looked at the laptop and groaned.

  “You have my permission to use the telephone in the next office. I want you back in here at ten tomorrow with a clear scientific head on your shoulders. Oh, and David, regarding you and Zanna, this is a small base, remember. Bad feelings between workers bring everyone down.”

  “Tell that to her! She was the one who did the dumping.”

  “I doubt her petulance will last that long. If you want my opinion it’s not what you wrote that particularly concerns her, it’s the fact that she nearly lost you up there. Go to her later, when she’s calmed down. Now, if you would, I must get on.” He gestured absently toward the door.

  “I haven’t finished,” said David, hovering uneasily.

  Bergstrom raised his head again.

  “I lost the tooth.”

  The blue eyes narrowed.

  “During the skirmish, the loop must have broken. The leather was thin and only loosely knotted. I didn’t realize until we were back at the base. I don’t know what to say — or what this means.”

  Bergstrom picked up a pen and continued to work. “That tooth was a charm, a ward against evil. You’re fortunate to be alive. Perhaps its role is done.”

  “OK,” David said, with a sigh, “explain this: Zanna saw another bear in the road.”

  “The police reported one. That’s all I know.”

  “There were two in my story. A young one, injured by a gunshot to the shoulder; the second was wise, some kind of Teller. He knew about the stars. He was following a sign. It was you, wasn’t it?”

  Bergstrom breathed in low and deep. “Ten, tomorrow. Don’t be late.”

  “But —”

  “Tomorrow, David.”

  And the student, realizing he would gain nothing more, beat a fist against the wall and left the room.

  A moment later, the air above Bergstrom’s desk shimmered, and something small with a jagged white outline materialized on an upturned coffee mug. To a man’s eye, the creature was almost invisible. But to Bergstrom’s practiced squint it had the shape and features of a birdlike dragon.

  “Well?”

  The creature hopped down off the mug and placed a pencil and several small sheets of dotted paper in front of its master. One sheet had the letter G written upon it.

  “Draw the rest,” said Bergstrom.

  The dragon found itself another (sharper) pencil and started joining dots on the other five sheets, until each one displayed a letter.“You’ve done well,” said Bergstrom. “They were very close to knowing.” He stared through the window at the yellow star pulsing low in the sky. “And that would have been three months too soon. What news of the wishing dragon?”

  Hrrr, said Groyne, and took a large gulp of air.

  “All the way back? To the very beginning?”

  Groyne flicked his tail.

  “Then he is special indeed,” said Bergstrom. And closing the results file he had from David, he rearranged the sheets that Groyne had delivered, making a word that began with G.

  The small dragon jerked in surprise.

  Bergstrom ran a finger down its scales and smiled. He clicked his fingers and the creature changed into a piece of bone, etched with a variety of whirls and symbols. It fell into the scientist’s hand and he put it away in a drawer of his desk. Then he reached behind his printer and lifted some twenty sheets of paper from its tray. The first had a heading which said, The Shooting.

  “In the beginning was the auma,” he whispered, and laid the manuscript over the word on his desk until the letters had burned in like a watermark.

  And the word that was written there was this:

  G O D I T H

  PART TWO

  19 GRETEL DOES HER PART

  What have you told Henry?” David said.

  Through a crumpled tissue pressed tight against her nose, Liz replied, “That she’s gone to stay with her Aunty Gwyneth.”

  “Did you put any kind of time frame on it?”

  Liz moved her head slowly from side to side.

  A-row, mewed Bonnington, on the floor by her feet. His wide copper eyes were like a universe expanding. He rose up and placed a paw against her thigh.

  David reached out across the kitchen table. His palms, warm from the mug of tea he’d been cradling, covered and comforted his landlady’s hands. “Whatever it takes, I’ll find her. I promise.”

  Liz blew her nose and threw the tissue in the bin. “I’m so glad you’re home. Was Dr. Bergstrom annoyed?”

  “No. He arranged the flights and everything. He’s as keen as I am to see that Lucy’s safe. I’ll e-mail him when we’ve talked things through.”

  “And poor Zanna. She must be so disappointed.”

  “She was fine,” said David, rubbing her hand, giving no hint of the fallout in Chamberlain. “She’ll come here as soon as she gets back to America. Now, tell me again what happened. You heard Lucy screaming and you ran next door.”

  “Yes. I was just too late. I didn’t see them disappearing, but I felt the shift.”

  David threw her a quizzical look.

  “Gwilanna is able to pass through time and space. The movement leaves a ripple. It makes you dizzy for a second.”

  “You’re certain it was her?”

  Liz smiled and pulled another tissue from the box. “There aren’t many people with such a talent, David.” He sat back, making the chair legs creak. “And she left no note, no ransom demands? Nothing to say why she’d taken Lucy?”

  “Nothing. All I found was the squirrel.” Liz nodded at the empty wicker cage on the tabletop. “I set him free in the garden. It didn’t seem right to keep him cooped up.”

  A-row, went Bonnington, dribbling slightly from the side of his mouth. He padded across the kitchen and leaped onto the drainer. And there he sat, as he often did, watching the garden world go by.

  David fiddled with a place mat, as if putting it in alignment with the table edge might induce the answers he was seeking. “Was it Snigger?”

  “I couldn’t tell. I’m sorry.”

  “But why catch a squirrel? What have they got to do with it?”

  Liz touched her fingers lightly to her temples, stretching the skin into worried ridges. “Why steal Gadzooks’s pad? Who set Gretel free? What’s happened to G’reth? I don’t know, David. Something strange is going on and I’m very, very confused.”

  It didn’t help that the doorbell rang just then. Liz jumped and sat back with a hand across her heart. David pushed aside the place mat and went to answer.

  The caller was a healthy-looking Henry Bacon, who had not long returned from his sunshine cruise. “
Stand aside, boy, need to speak to Mrs. P.”

  “Henry, not now. Liz isn’t feeling good.”

  But by then Mr. Bacon was halfway down the hall, leaving fine, sooty footprints on the dark green carpet. “Bird down the chimney,” he was saying to Liz, as David made it into the kitchen.

  “Bird?” Liz repeated.

  “Could be bats, bird more likely. Probably a pigeon. Stupid creatures. Worse than squirrels.”

  “In the chimney?” asked David.

  “That’s what I said, boy. Or have you turned deaf again? Having breakfast this morning. Sudden fall of soot. Dust all over my scrambled eggs. Need to sweep it, Mrs. P. Anything your side?” “I’ll check upstairs,” said David, gesturing to her, “in case we’ve, erm, any … unwanted visitors.” He clicked his fingers at the listening dragon. A slightly baffled Henry turned to look. But in the blink of a human eye, the listener had sent an alert call to Gruffen and also adopted its solid state.

  David ascended the stairs in silence. On the way, he picked up a fishing net that Lucy always kept in the umbrella stand in the hall. As he crept on tiptoe into the den, Gruffen pointed a wing toward the chimney. Something was coming down the inside of the stack. David edged closer. A shower of soot fell. There was a scrape, then an object fluttered in the grate.

  “Got you,” David said, and netted it in an instant. The creature twisted and hissed and sent a fine jet of blue-white fire from its throat. It was blackened with soot from head to toe, but its violet eyes were blazing. And it was carrying what appeared to be a bunch of flower heads.

  Gretel.

  Gruffen gulped and jerked back. The potions dragon was not a happy being. Gretel punched her wings outward to tear through the netting, all the while huffing and stomping her feet and warning that if the flowers were damaged, then the stupid human only had himself to blame.

  “All right, all right, calm down,” he said, trying to lift her out of the grate.

  She spiked his hand and flew to the workbench.

  Immediately four guard dragons (pressed into service by Gruffen) closed around Grockle to protect him from attack.