by T.A. Barron
“Great Heart, Great One.”
“Basil the Brave.”
“Dragon Unrivaled.”
“Wings of Peace.”
Names, he realized. They’re giving me names.
His massive lips curled upward. “No need to give me new names, my friends. I am simply Basilgarrad—and I am always glad to help you.”
The faeries’ whispers swelled, now more like a gust of wind than any form of language. He could no longer make out their words. But he couldn’t mistake their adoration.
At last, the blue cloud started to dissipate. The faeries departed, leaving Basilgarrad’s face. Their wings now moved more relaxedly; the flock seemed to be floating rather than flying.
He watched them go, hardly stirring as he glided over the scorched terrain. Cocking his huge ears, he strained to hear the last of their soft, whispery voices.
Those voices reminded him of someone else, a dear friend who moved with the grace and constancy of the wind itself. For she was, in fact, a wishlahaylagon—a sister of the wind. She had traveled far with him, and always called him “little wanderer” . . . even after he’d grown into a mighty dragon. But finally the day came when, like the wind, she had to move on, and nothing could convince her to stay.
His ears trembled slightly as he wondered, Where are you now, Aylah? In this world . . . or some other? The ears swiveled. Dragons are too big to miss anyone. Certainly anyone as flighty as you! But I suppose I wouldn’t mind hearing your airy voice again, or catching your cinnamon scent on the breeze.
A whiff of sulfurous smoke, belching from a volcano below, made him cough. And brought him instantly back to the present. Who could ever stay for long in a realm that smelled so bad? Time to return to the sweet glades of Woodroot!
As he raised his wing, banking a wide turn, he caught a final glimpse of the departing mist faeries. With a rumble of amusement, he said, “Wings of Peace? Not half bad, really. Not half bad.”
Then, with a mighty slap of his wings, Basilgarrad headed for the wooded realm he called home.
3: AN EXCELLENT TIME TO DO IT
A good sleep—such a treasure, it shouldn’t be wasted on the weary.
Curling his gargantuan body into a circle, Basilgarrad filled almost the entire bowl-shaped valley. This had long been one of his favorite places to sleep—partly because it held no trees, so he wouldn’t be tickled by their trunks snapping under his weight. And partly because it lay in the deepest forest of innermost Woodroot, a place so remote that he wouldn’t be disturbed. Except, of course, by Merlin—who could find him anywhere.
As his lids drooped, covering the bright green fires of his eyes, he produced a smell of marsh lilies and pond water—one of his most favorite, most soothing aromas. Soon the scent of lilies filled the air, and he sighed contentedly.
He thought back over the experiences of the day. His battle with Lo Valdearg, that murderer who had dared to take the name of Basilgarrad’s own father, the most powerful dragon of ancient lore—and who couldn’t contain his hunger for the dwarves’ flaming jewels. His conversation with young Urnalda, who couldn’t believe that he had once been small, even smaller than she. His brief encounter with the dactylbirds, and the grateful embrace of the mist faeries.
None of these things, he reminded himself, could have possibly happened before he changed from the scrawny little creature he’d been to the gargantuan one he was now. Life was entirely different these days! And yet . . . he mused, most of the time I still feel the same down inside.
He yawned, showing his cavernous, tooth-studded mouth, as his eyes closed completely. Sleepily, he thought about one more experience of the day: a minor scuffle with an ogre he’d met on the way home, somewhere in the western reaches of Stoneroot. The hairy fellow, who had body odor as repulsive as his manners, had developed an annoying habit of ripping the roofs off houses. Before eating all the people inside.
When Basilgarrad stopped the ogre from destroying yet another house and warned him to leave quietly, the fellow didn’t exactly respond well. He tore off an especially big roof and threw it at Basilgarrad. So what else could the dragon do but throw this nuisance all the way to the next realm? He’d heard, a few seconds later, a distant thud combined with the squelch of mud—or, perhaps, the ogre’s body.
Yes, he thought, drifting into sleep, it’s been a big day. Nothing unusual, though, for a dragon. Especially one who’s called . . . Wings of . . .
He snored, making a gentle, soothing sound that could have easily been confused with a landslide slamming down a slope or a tornado crashing through a forest.
At that instant, he heard a voice, clear and loud. Not in his ears, but in his mind. He snapped awake, opening his eyes and growling angrily at the sound that had so rudely interrupted his slumber. Yet even as he did so, he knew that all his growling wouldn’t help.
For this was the voice of his friend Merlin—a good wizard, mind you, but someone with no sense at all about when to call telepathically. Wizards, unfortunately, have horrible manners.
“Basil!” called Merlin, sounding a bit out of breath. “How are you, old chap? Hope I didn’t disturb you.”
“Not at all,” the dragon thought grumpily. “You merely wrecked my first good sleep after—”
“Glad to hear it,” interrupted Merlin. In the background, something exploded violently. “Er, I just wanted to say, old chap . . .”
“Say what?”
Blaaamm! Another explosion echoed in the dragon’s mind, followed by the unmistakable sound of something sizzling.
“Just wanted to say,” Merlin went on, “that if you’d like to”—Blaaamm!—“ save my life . . .” The wizard paused while something crackled and something else slammed into the ground. “Er, Basil . . . this would be an excellent time to do it.”
Having given up on sleep, the great green dragon shook his head. “In trouble again, are you? Where this time?”
“The upper reaches of Fireroot, near the”—Blaaamm! Blaaamm!—“gobsken fortress. In the midst of erupting—”
“Volcanoes, I know.” Basilgarrad sighed. “Back to Fireroot! Just my luck. Sweet Dagda, I hate that smoky realm.”
“You’ll come then, old chap? I’ll be glad to see you. And so will”—Ssss-zzzaappp!—“Hallia.”
“Hallia?” Hearing the name of Merlin’s wife, the dragon stiffened. “She’s there with you?”
“She is, though not—” The rest of his words were drowned out by an explosion.
“Right.” The dragon lifted his head out of the valley, stretching his wide wings. “Just try to stay alive until I get there.”
“Will do my”—Kablaaamm!—“very best.”
Glancing up at the stars overhead, Basilgarrad noted the location of the brightest constellation, seven stars in a straight line known as the Wizard’s Staff. Since the very creation of Avalon, those stars had radiated powerfully, guiding night-time travelers. They had also inspired many years of speculation about what, really, were the stars of Avalon: Were they other worlds, or perhaps something more mysterious? But tonight he had no time for speculation. Trouble had erupted—once again. And this time, he felt sure, Merlin couldn’t just dismiss it as “growing pains.”
His green-tinted tongue pushed against the gap in his teeth, souvenir of his first real battle. This time, he knew, there would be no magic-eating kreelix to fight. Who would it be, then?
“All right,” he declared. “Time to fly.”
Taking his bearings, he stretched his neck due east—toward Fireroot. With several powerful beats of his wings, he rose out of the valley. His long, sinewy form lifted toward the stars, as gracefully as smoke from a candle flame.
4: FOR THE GOOD OF ALL
When you think of life as a meal, and imagine yourself as the chef in total control—that’s usually when you get cooked.
Flying by the light of Avalon’s stars, Basilgarrad beat his wings so fast they were just a blur of motion. No creature could fly more swiftly than a
dragon—and he was a dragon in a hurry. A great hurry.
“Merlin,” he grumbled as he streaked across the sky, “for someone with such awesome powers, you certainly have a knack for getting into trouble!”
His eyes, glowing green in the night, narrowed. Those troubles had been growing more frequent, as well as more dangerous. For both Merlin and Basilgarrad. And also for the world they loved, a place unlike any other. Avalon—the magical world within a tree, grown from a seed planted by Merlin himself.
It was a seed, the dragon knew well, that had held something more than a new and wondrous world. Something, in its own way, even larger—and even more remarkable. An idea. That somewhere in the wide universe, there might be one place where all creatures of all kinds could find a way to live together in harmony. To share their world with mutual respect. To draw strength, rather than conflict, from their differences. And to protect the many beauties of these realms.
The Avalon idea, Merlin liked to call it. It was a notion that stirred the heart as well as the mind. A notion that seemed increasingly at risk. Which was why, despite all his grumbling, he was glad that Merlin had called—as the wizard had recently been doing more often. So often, in fact, that Merlin was spending much more time with Basilgarrad than with his wife, Hallia.
Basilgarrad roared, even as he flew at dragonspeed. There was only one place he wanted to be—a place that had seemed impossible for the tiny little fellow of his youth, a place that now felt more like home than anywhere on the land. By Merlin’s side.
Looking below, his great scaled wings beating steadily, he recognized each of the seven root-realms. Soon after leaving Woodroot, whose forests smelled so fresh and sweet, he spied Waterroot—where seas gleamed, even in starlight, with all the colors of the rainbow. A few moments later: Stoneroot, whose bells he could hear chiming at any time, day or night. Now Mudroot, whose soil Merlin had enriched with the magic of life. Next came Airroot, called Y Swylarna by the sylphs, where he could see the layered clouds that were the dancing grounds of the mist maidens. In the far distance—the eternal darkness, blacker than black, that was Shadowroot. And now, just below him, the volcanic realm of Fireroot.
He veered north, toward the mountainous terrain where the gobsken had recently built a fortress of stone so thick that even dragons’ fire could not penetrate. Despite their antipathy toward the gobsken, for whom fighting was as natural as breathing, Merlin and Basilgarrad had decided to let the fortress stand. So long as the gobsken didn’t use it as a base to conquer other peoples, no problem. And if the gobsken’s long-standing feud with the fire dragons kept those two groups busy battling each other, the fortress could be a useful distraction. Was it too much to hope that this ongoing feud could occupy the dragons so fully that they would forget about their obsession with the dwarves’ flaming jewels?
Passing over a line of volcanoes, Basilgarrad searched for any sign of Merlin. Through the sulfurous fumes and eruptions of boiling lava, he spotted a troop of marching gobsken. A field of sizzling hot lava pools. A forest of dead ironwood trees, their trunks and branches blackened by flames.
But no sign of the wizard.
He turned slightly, skimming over the craters of an old volcano. The fetid clouds that clogged the air made his eyes burn, but he stared at the fire-scorched terrain. Something about those craters didn’t seem right. Almost as if . . .
There! Topping a ridge on the volcano, he spied a new eruption of flames. But this wasn’t the fire of molten lava. No, it was the fire of dragons. A whole circle of them, directing their deadly flames at one person who stood in the center.
Merlin!
Standing on the rim of a crater, the wizard hurled blasts of lightning from his staff and golden balls of fire from his free hand. Constantly whirling and spinning, while dodging the attackers’ blasts of flame, he looked more like a dancer than a warrior. But this was no mere entertainment. He was fighting for his life.
Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen dragons! Basilgarrad’s mind whirled. How could one man, even a wizard, have held off such an overwhelming force? And how should he, as the lone dragon on Merlin’s side, best help his friend?
He slowed his flight enough to scan the scene as he drew closer. Lit by the flaring volcanoes as well as the stars above, the attackers showed all the colors of Fireroot’s dragons: red, orange, and amber. And yes—among them was a huge scarlet dragon Basilgarrad recognized.
Well, well, Lo Valdearg, he said to himself. Feeling strong enough already to fight again? He snorted, nostrils flaring. How unlucky for you.
Focusing on the wizard, Basilgarrad noticed right away that Merlin’s face looked unusually haggard. His thick black beard had been singed, the hem of his cloak torn. Suddenly the dragon saw, hidden inside the crater, another figure.
Hallia! Though he recognized her, this huddled figure barely resembled the woman who had won Merlin’s heart long ago, whose grace and kindness and ability to transform herself into a deer were famous throughout Avalon. Wrapped in a tattered blue shawl, she leaned against the crater’s rock wall, dodging stray bursts of sparks and flame. Her auburn braid was coming apart; her eyes, as large as a doe’s, were filled with fear.
Something stirred within the crater and moved toward her. Another person! Basilgarrad strained to see through the volcanic haze—then recognized who it was: Krystallus, the son of Hallia and Merlin. In recent years, he’d grown into a strapping young man. As tall as his parents, with a mane of pure white hair, he seemed quite regal—despite the fact, to Merlin’s disappointment, he showed no sign of magical ability. As the dragon watched from above, Krystallus took his mother’s hand, trying to comfort her.
Basilgarrad then noticed something else about the crater. It held, in its center, a cluster of green flames—not the fire of battle, but the same magical fire that burned in his own green eyes. The fire of élano, the most powerful magic of all, the essential sap of the Great Tree of Avalon.
A portal, he realized in awe. Here in the remotest part of Fireroot! Had Hallia come here through that portal? Surely Merlin wouldn’t have brought them here intentionally—to this scorched wasteland where no one lived besides warlike gobsken and wrathful dragons.
Just as he shifted his wings, preparing to land, Basilgarrad understood why the craters on this ridge seemed so odd. Unlike the craters he’d seen elsewhere, they were perfectly round. Circular—as if they’d been . . .
Carved, he realized. Hollowed out—by people with the skills and tools to do so. People such as dwarves!
In the final seconds before touching down, he put it all together. These aren’t craters, after all. They are entrances! To the dwarves’ underground tunnels. Maybe even to—
Before he could finish the thought, he saw Merlin deflect a new, terribly fierce barrage of flames from the dragons. Time to announce my arrival, he decided—and landed with a thunderous crash, slamming into the blackened ridge right next to the crater.
The force of his impact nearly toppled Merlin from the crater’s rim, but the wizard managed to steady himself with his staff. Instantly, all the surrounding dragons halted their blasts of flame. In that moment of silence, the eyes of Merlin and Basilgarrad met.
“What took you so long?” asked the wizard, his voice gruff but affectionate.
“Oh, I took in some of the sights on the way.” Then the dragon’s eyes narrowed with concern. “What’s your plan?”
“Plan?” Merlin scowled. “I thought you would have a plan.”
“Green dragon!” boomed a powerful voice from the ring of attackers. “Whose side do you choose?”
Basilgarrad spun his massive head around to face the speaker—an enormous dragon whose orange scales were almost completely blackened by soot. Columns of smoke poured from his nostrils; rage burned in his amber eyes. Though one of the largest dragons in the ring, he was still only two-thirds the size of the green dragon who had appeared so suddenly. Standing beside the orange dragon, Lo Valdearg started in surprise. Then he grimaced
in rage. Smoke curled from his nostrils, and he angrily clawed at the remaining charred stubs of his beard.
“Which side?” demanded the orange dragon. “That of your brethren, the dragons of Rahnawyn?” He blew an especially dark puff of smoke. “Or this ragtag wizard who tries to keep us from our jewels?”
“Your jewels?” called Merlin, his voice booming nearly as forcefully as the dragon’s. “They belong not to you, but to the dwarves! Who are, even now, underground as I instructed them—but who would bravely answer your attack if necessary. You do not own the jewels just because you crave them as a mosquito craves blood.”
“Soon we shall!” Sparks of flame flew like spittle from the orange dragon’s mouth. “Just as we dragons will soon control every part of this realm, crushing any foes who stand in our way.”
By his side, Lo Valdearg nodded and glared at one foe in particular, the only dragon who had ever defeated him in battle.
The orange leader thumped on the ground with his foreleg, sending up a cloud of ash. “Choose now, green dragon, for tonight’s battle begins anew. And before it is over, any allies of that wizard will be dead.”
From within the crater, Hallia said something to Merlin, too quietly for anyone else to hear. The wizard frowned grimly in reply.
Moving his vast bulk slowly, Basilgarrad raised his tail into the air. All of a sudden, he brought the tail’s clubbed end down with a resounding crash. Rocks and dirt and ash flew skyward. Vibrations shook the ridge like a powerful tremor. Three or four of the dragons in the ring lost their balance, rolling into their neighbors. As the explosive sound faded away, he spoke—not only to the orange dragon, but to everyone in the ring.
“I am Basilgarrad.” From deep in his throat came a terrible rumble. “And I stand with Merlin.”
Instantly, the orange dragon—joined by Lo Valdearg and most of the others—shot a barrage of superheated flames. Basilgarrad swung around, protecting the people in the crater with one wing and his eyes with the other. But he didn’t retaliate. Not yet.