The darkness helped hide his movements, but Dirk was relieved when Alba finally came to a standstill on the corrugated roof of a hut inside a yard full of beaten-up old cars. Dirk stopped on a nearby factory, keeping his distance. He looked around for an indication of where they were.
“Interesting,” mused Dirk.
“What is?” asked Holly.
“We’re in Deptford,” said Dirk. “Alba asked me about Deptford. I’m beginning to wonder whether this whole thing hasn’t been an act. Something’s going on and I don’t like it. Not one bit.”
Holly and Dirk were surprised to discover Archie riding on Alba’s back, but it was nothing compared to the astonishment Archie was feeling. He had knocked on Holly’s door every day since Saturday only to be turned away. On the last of these visits, Mrs Bigsby had hissed, “This incessant harassment must cease,” and slammed the door.
Archie didn’t want to cease anything. If calling for Holly was out of the question, then he would have to pursue other means. Then he remembered what Holly had said about her uncle being a detective. Archie had gone to the library, found a spare computer and typed in ‘Dirk Dilly’ and ‘detective’. After a little scrolling and a couple of dead ends, he had found a review written by a Carolyn Rosenfield recommending a private investigating service called The Dragon Detective Agency.
“Cool name,” Archie had muttered to himself as he typed this into the search engine. The name had led to a phone number, which he committed to memory. Back at home, he had called it. On the first three attempts, the phone rang out. But on the third attempt, someone did pick up.
“Please stop the ring ring, Aforrn,” said a female Spanish-accented voice.
“Er, what?” said Archie.
“Oh, hello? Is someone inside this thing?”
“I wanted to speak to Dirk Dilly,” said Archie. “I’m a friend of his niece’s. I was hoping he could help me.”
“Oh, you mean, you’re one of our kind,” said Alba. “He is helping me too. Although now, I have been left here and I have eaten all of the crunchy bean fruit.”
“Ri-ight,” said Archie uncertainly. “Now, where are you?”
“Inside and upstairs.”
“You might need to be more specific. You don’t know the name of the road?”
“Only the wall,” replied Alba.
“What wall?”
“The wall outside is called Ivydale Road. The door below is called 382. Is that a funny name for a door? We do not have doors where I come from.”
It didn’t take Archie long to get there and, before long, he was standing outside informing the white-haired old lady who answered it that he was a friend of Holly’s and there to speak to Mr Dilly.
“I don’t think he’s in,” she said.
Upstairs a loud CRASH rocked the whole building.
“Although I could be wrong,” she added, with a little wink. “Let’s go and see. Holly’s told you about Mr Dilly, has she?”
“Oh yes, we’re best friends, we don’t have any secrets,” Archie said, following her upstairs.
“Mr Dilly,” she called, knocking on the door. “Are you in, Mr Dilly?’
There was a pause then the same voice from the phone said, “I am not in, Mr Dilly is not in, there is no one here.”
Alba recoiled in fear as the handle turned and she watched the door open. She tried to hide under the desk but, in her hurry, missed and whacked her head against the corner.
“Ouch!” She rubbed her head and found herself staring at two humans. The elderly female was smiling but the young male was staring, utterly gobsmacked.
“Er, is that a dragon?” asked Archie.
“To be precise, she’s a grey-backed, blue-bellied Sea Dragon,” replied Mrs Klingerflim. “Possibly Portuguese?”
“Hu… Hu… Humanos,” Alba stammered.
“Actually, she sounds Spanish,” said Mrs Klingerflim.
“I am breaching the forbidden divide,” wailed Alba, trying to hide behind a newspaper but accidentally tearing it in two.
“Ivor and I used to spot Sea Dragons off the coast of Wales,” said Mrs Klingerflim fondly.
“You knew there was a dragon in your house?” said Archie, staring at the old lady with as much astonishment as he had looked at Alba.
“Oh yes, but I didn’t know there was a Sea Dragon up here,” she said, approaching Alba to inspect her more closely. “Do you mind if I feel your back?”
“Stay away from me,” said Alba, edging backwards.
Mrs Klingerflim stroked Alba’s tail and said, “You feel like you’ve been out of the sea for just over a week. Is that right?”
“How is a humano knowing so much about our kind?” said Alba accusingly.
“My dear Ivor used to love Sea Dragons,” she replied. “Sky Dragons have always been my favourite, though.”
“You know about Sky Dragons?”
“Oh yes, Ivor hated not being able to see them properly but that just made them more interesting to me. In fact, I ended up writing the chapter on them.”
“Do you know how I could be finding one?” asked Alba.
“Since you are a dragon, you could always try summoning it,” suggested Mrs Klingerflim.
“How can I be doing this?”
“As I recall, you have to fire liquid fire from the Outer Core into its heart. Sounds like a terrible to-do to me.”
Alba tilted her head to one side, digesting what she was being told. “This really works?”
“I don’t know for sure,” said Mrs Klingerflim. “I’ve never had the chance to test it. You can’t exactly buy liquid fire from the chemist.”
“I have some,” said Alba. “I have some in a flask.”
She showed them.
“Yes, but why would you want to summon a Sky Dragon?” asked Mrs Klingerflim.
“That’s just what I was going to ask,” said Archie, who had adjusted to the fact he was talking to a dragon and loving every minute of it.
“I must go to Deptford,” said Alba.
“Of course.” Archie grinned. “Where else would a dragon go? Hey, I can show you the way. My dad used to have a business down that way.”
Alba shrank away as Archie approached. “It would be very bad to carry a humano.”
“Not this one. I’m like a lucky penny. Ask anyone.”
Alba thought for a moment before responding. “This is more important to me than the forbidden divide so I am deciding to let you show me the way.”
“Cool.” Archie climbed on to the desk and jumped on to the dragon’s back.
“Ouch, you are kicking me.”
“Sorry. My name’s Archie, by the way.”
“And you can call me Alba Longs.”
“How lovely,” said Mrs Klingerflim, with a wistful glint in her eye. “If I was twenty years younger I’d be coming along but I don’t have the hips for riding dragons these days.”
She opened the window and took a step back, allowing Alba to leap out of the office.
“This is the coolest thing ever!” said Archie, gazing at the reddening sunset.
“Which way is the way?” asked Alba, before losing her footing on a solar panel, sliding down, then hopping to the next building.
“Be careful,” said Archie as her tail sent an aerial flying. “Head for that pub at the end of the street but mind the—”
His words were cut short by Alba knocking over a row of chimney tops like they were skittles.
As they made their way across the rooftops of London, leaving a trail of destruction in their wake, neither of them noticed that they were being followed.
They had been travelling for around half an hour when they arrived at a breaker’s yard on a road full of industrial estates and factories. Alba landed on the tin roof of a shack inside the yard. Battered cars were stacked up. There were piles of engines, exhausts, tyres and other car parts strewn around the place.
“You must get off here,” said Alba.
Archie clim
bed off her back and pulled a jelly bean covered in fluff from his pocket.
“Here.” He offered it to her.
“What is this small coloured pebble?” she asked cautiously.
“A jelly bean,” replied Archie. “It’s food.”
“Food? I am starving,” said Alba, taking it from his hand and throwing it into her mouth. Her eyes widened with delight. “This is delicious. I very like this jelly bean. Better than soap. Have you more?”
Archie rummaged in his pocket and pulled out another.
“I do not know how to be thanking you for these jelly beans but I must go and help my sister now. Thank you, Mr Archie,” she said, jumping down into the yard and prowling around, peering into gutted cars, looking for something.
A male voice called out, “In here!”
Alba looked around, confused.
“I think it came from that truck,” said Archie, pointing at a reddish-coloured vehicle by the gates.
Alba looked at the truck. The back doors were open. “Thank you, little humano,” she whispered, walking cautiously up the ramp into the back.
“Hello?” she called. “Who is in there?”
The back doors of the truck suddenly swung shut, trapping Alba inside. The engine started. Archie tried to see who was in the driver’s seat but the angle was no good. The truck reversed, backing into the gates and pushing them wide open, before swinging into the road.
Archie felt the corrugated iron roof buckle under the weight of something landing on it with such force that it knocked him off his feet. He looked up to see another dragon. This one had a green underbelly and a red back, and ears rather than gills. Its yellow eyes peered at him, then it spoke.
“So this is your friend, is it, Holly?”
Holly’s head appeared over the dragon’s shoulder. “Dirk Dilly meet Archie Snellgrove,” she said.
Archie lowered his voice. “There’s another dragon…” he said.
“I know. This is Dirk,” said Holly, sliding off Dirk’s back.
“There’s another dragon…” repeated Archie.
“No kidding,” said Dirk. “Where did Alba go? We lost sight of her. What was that truck doing?”
“I mean, there’s another dragon…” he said for a third time.
“Your friend appears to be stuck on repeat,” said Dirk. “It’s probably shock.”
“No,” insisted Archie, speaking through his teeth. “Another one. Down there.”
Dirk turned to see what Archie was looking at. A brown-backed, caramel-bellied Shade-Hugger stepped out of the shell of a once-white van, covering his eyes from the last rays of daylight.
“Double-crossing rats,” muttered Dirk.
“Karnataka,” said Holly.
“Do you know all the dragons in London?” asked Archie, turning to Holly.
“All the ones worth knowing, yes,” replied Holly simply.
Dirk flew down from the roof and landed on Karnataka’s back. He caught him by surprise but Karnataka wriggled free and the two dragons squared off. Watching from the roof, Archie let out a whistle of admiration.
“Cool uncle!” he said.
“You can’t tell anyone,” replied Holly.
“Who would believe me?”
In the yard below, jagged jaws snapped, sharp talons swiped and buckets of grey smoke gushed from the huge nostrils of the battling dragons. Dirk pounced, knocking Karnataka off guard and pinning him to the ground.
“I’m Dragnet Captain now,” whined Karnataka. “You can’t do this. I order you to release me.”
“Order me? You’re getting ideas above your station,” replied Dirk. “All this power has gone to your—”
His words were cut short as a metal cuff slammed shut around his neck. A sudden jolt brought his head into the side of a rusty Ford Capri.
“I think you’ll find my station exactly matches my ideas, these days.” Karnataka stood up and brushed himself down. “Good work, Officer Grunling.” He turned to Dirk and said, “Balti here is my most trusted officer.”
Dirk pulled his head out of the dent it had made in the car door to see the dirt-brown Drake, Balti Grunling.
“Oh, it’s you,” said Balti to Dirk. “You owe me pepper.”
Dirk remembered that he had bribed Balti the last time they met with the promise of some pepper to liven up his otherwise rather plain mud diet.
“I’ll get you all the pepper you need if you let me go,” Dirk said.
Balti dragged Dirk’s head into the car again, making the dent bigger, then he puffed out his chest and said, “Assaulting Captain Karnataka the Fearless is an extremely serious offence. Shall I read him his rights, sir?”
“Not just yet,” said Karnataka. “I need to speak to him in private. Leave us. I’ll call when I need you.”
“I’m sorry, sir,” said Balti pompously, “but that would be most irregular. This criminal attacked you.”
“As your captain, I order you to give me that chain and leave. This dragon and I have business,” said Karnataka.
“Well, it’s very unorthodox,” grumbled Officer Grunling, begrudgingly unhooking the chain from his tail and handing it to his superior. He waddled over to a small mound of rock, where he muttered something and disappeared into the ground.
Crouching on the roof above, Archie whispered to Holly, “Where did he go?”
“The rock took him down,” said Holly. “We need to help Dirk.”
“Why? I thought he said they were friends,” said Archie, although, watching Karnataka swing Dirk around on the chain, they didn’t exactly look very friendly.
“We need to help him,” said Holly, looking for a safe way down from the roof of the shack.
Karnataka pounced on Dirk. “Spill the beans, Dirk,” he said in his nasal whine. “You’ve found out, haven’t you?”
“What beans? Found out what?” said Dirk, struggling to breathe.
“How to contact a Sky Dragon, of course.”
Karnataka had dragged Dirk’s head so far back that Dirk was looking at him upside down. The angle was incredibly painful and not the most attractive view of Karnataka. Dirk could see right up his nose. So it was with great relief that Dirk watched a wing mirror smash into the side of Karnataka’s face.
“Ow!” exclaimed the Shade-Hugger. Dirk took the opportunity to twist round and send a mouthful of fire at Karnataka. Karny screeched in pain and Dirk jumped up, landing on top of him. He glanced up to see Holly and Archie standing nearby, poised with more bits of car to fling at his signal.
“Thanks!” Dirk called to them.
“No problem,” replied Holly.
Dirk reached behind Karnataka’s wing and retrieved a key hidden there. He undid the neck cuff, while holding Karny down with his other three sets of claws.
“Let me go,” said Karnataka.
“First things first,” replied Dirk. “How do you know that I’m looking for a Sky Dragon?”
“How? I… I… I’ll tell you how. It’s my job to know these things, that’s h-how,” stammered Karnataka nervously.
“But if you knew about the Sky Dragons that means—” Dirk stopped mid-flow. Something clicked into place. “You set the whole thing up, didn’t you, Karny?”
“I don’t know what you mean,” said Karnataka, trying to avoid his gaze.
“You sent Alba to find me and lead me to her sister’s cave. The ash outline wasn’t real, was it? The idea was to make me think her sister’s disappearance had something to do with a Sky Dragon. Shute was right. No Sky Dragon has materialized in hundreds of years. You tricked me. I’ll bet Alba doesn’t even have a sister.”
Karnataka writhed, trying to get free, but Dirk held him firmly.
“Delfina is real enough,” said Karnataka, “real and in prison, arrested by Officer Grunling on some trumped up charge of spying for the Kinghorns. You know how overzealous these Drakes can be with their arrests. When Alba came to me to plead for her release I came up with the plan to get her to hire you. I
knew that your first stop would be the last place her sister was seen and that you’d find the outline of ash I made in her cave and assume that a Sky Dragon was responsible for her disappearance. Then it was only a matter of time before you found out how to contact the Sky Dragons.”
“That two-faced, lying Sea Dragon…” snarled Dirk.
“Don’t be too hard on her. I told her that if she failed I would banish Delfina with the other Kinghorn traitors. She was only trying to save her sister – save her from the Inner Core.”
“Why Sky Dragons?” asked Dirk.
“The Kinghorns are rising, Dirk,” replied Karnataka. “They’re waiting for the right time to attack. If we don’t stop them it will be war – dragons against humans. The Drakes are tough enough but they haven’t got the brains or power to defeat Vainclaw’s army. Besides, offer them a big enough bribe and they’ll swap sides before you can say liquorice laces. We need allies, Dirk. We need the Skies on our side. You’ve heard the stories; they have powers beyond any of us. Firewalls, Dirk.”
Angry smoke poured from Dirk’s nostrils. “Why involve me?”
“Because I knew you could find the answer but I also knew if I asked you directly, you wouldn’t help me.”
“You were right about that,” Dirk snapped.
“Alba was supposed to meet me here as soon as she learned how to contact a Sky Dragon. I just got word from Balti that she was here. So where is she?”
“She got in a truck and it drove away,” said Archie.
Karnataka looked at the blond-haired boy. “More kids, Dirk? Really?”
“This one wasn’t my fault,” he replied. He turned to Archie. “You mean she was in that truck we saw leave?”
“Yes, someone called her in and it drove off.”
“Where’s the truck going, Karny?”
“I don’t know anything about a truck. She was supposed to meet me here in exchange for her sister’s release.”
“But if the truck is nothing to do with you…” began Dirk, his words trying to keep up with his racing thoughts. “Who else knows about this place?”
“No one, just me and the Drake.”
Dirk swung his head around to address Archie again. “What did the truck look like?” he asked.
Sky High! Page 8