by Bill Allen
“It’s true!” shouted Gnaw. He, too, started jumping up and down, not so much from excitement as because the fireball in his hand was starting to burn. He threw it aside and blew on his palm.
“Calm down,” Nathan told them. “I can explain everything.”
“What you told Queen Gnarla was true,” Gnaw interrupted. “The dragon is not dead. How did you know?”
“As I said, I can explain everything.” And explain he did. He told the two spirelings all he knew of the last prophecy, except, of course, for the one minor detail about Greg being the Mighty Greghart.
Bart took a seat at the base of a tree next to Daniel, where the two stared blankly at the others, blissfully ignorant of the events around them.
“SO YOUR QUEEN KNOWS, THEN?” Ruuan asked the two spirelings.
Gnash nodded. “She knows.”
“And she understands why you have been hiding from us,” said Gnaw. “She wants me to assure you that your secret is safe with us.”
“You can hardly call it a secret anymore,” said Lucky. “About half a million spirelings know about it now.”
“Yes,” said Gnash, “but do not worry. We will not tell anyone.”
“What are we doing?” Priscilla interrupted. “Have you all forgotten? Everyone at home is about to be attacked.”
“There is no cause for alarm,” said Gnash. “Queen Gnarla has not yet rallied her troops.”
“She does not intend to march until noon,” Gnaw added, but then he lifted his chin, and everyone followed his gaze upward, where the midday sun was climbing high in the sky.
“We need to go,” urged Greg.
“What about our amulet?” Gnash insisted.
Lucky smiled. “No problem. Ruuan can fly to the northern border and back in minutes.”
“AND I WILL,” said Ruuan. “EVERYONE CLIMB ABOARD.”
After Nathan, Lucky and Greg teamed up to pry Ryder’s arms off the tree he’d stepped behind, they hiked off the trail a couple hundred feet, looking for a spot on Ruuan’s tail short enough for them to board. The others followed.
“Why are we walking in circles?” Bart wanted to know.
“Yes, why?” asked Daniel, who, even after climbing in and out of an enormous track in the snow, still remained unaware of the dragon he was about to board.
Melvin seemed to warm up to Ruuan far quicker than Ryder did, perhaps because he’d grown up in a family where his brother and father had spent their entire lives slaying dragons. Or maybe it was because he’d once witnessed Greg riding on Ruuan’s back and thought if Greg could do it, then so could he. Either way, it was not long before he sat perched between Ruuan’s shoulders with a huge smile plastered across his face, bragging about how he wasn’t the least bit scared and how he’d ridden on the backs of more dragons than Greg could count.
Ryder sat next to him, and though the general had not plastered the same smile across his face that Melvin managed, his face had grown so pale it could have passed for plaster.
“Relax,” Melvin said, when the dragon first took to the air. “This should be fun.”
“You look rather peaked, General,” said Bart. “Maybe you should lie down a moment. I’m sure the others won’t mind. I don’t know why we’ve stopped, but it looks as though they don’t seem intent on moving just yet.”
Greg found it hard to believe that even with magic the bard could be riding atop a dragon, thousands of feet above the ground, and not notice anything unusual. With magic like that, Greg was even more glad Ruuan was on their side. But Bart was right about one thing. The general looked awful.
“You need to calm down,” Melvin told Ryder. “Hey, I know. I’ll tell some of my jokes.” Greg, Priscilla and Lucky all groaned, but Melvin grinned as if he hadn’t heard. “How does a dragonslayer prepare for battle?”
Ryder didn’t seem to hear. His gaze remained fixed on the ground, or at least, where the ground used to be.
“He gets fired up,” shouted Melvin.
The joke did nothing to improve Ryder’s mood. In fact, the only one who seemed to enjoy it was Ruuan. The dragon started to chuckle, which Greg wouldn’t have minded so much, except when Ruuan laughed his ribs shook, sending the ten passengers lurching in all directions. Even though he was fairly certain Ruuan’s magic would keep him from falling, Greg could barely fight back his panic. Unbelievably, Ryder turned a paler shade of white. Melvin had to struggle to keep his balance, but the near disaster did little to put him off.
“You hear about the dragonslayer who lost his temper?” he said, and this time the question was directed as much to Ruuan as it was to Ryder. “They say he got steamed.”
“HA,” said Ruuan, and Greg was thrown so hard to the left he wondered if his theory about the dragon’s magic protecting him could be trusted. “THAT WAS A GOOD ONE.”
“Cut it out,” Priscilla shouted.
“Yeah, Melvin,” said Lucky. “You’re going to get us all killed.”
Bart smiled happily and picked up his lute. “Anyone want to hear a song?”
“No!” everyone shouted at once. All except Daniel, who smiled happily and took a seat near the bard’s feet.
Greg heard a peculiar whining noise. He checked on Rake, then realized the sound was coming from Ryder. The general had given up staring down, as Ruuan was now flying so high it would have been impossible to see the ground. Yet somehow the dragon knew their position. Ruuan stifled his chuckles long enough to announce they’d reached the northern border.
Gnash strode forward, looking less than comfortable walking atop a dragon soaring thousands of feet in the air. Ironic, since he and Gnaw had spent their whole lives living within an infinitely tall spire. “Why aren’t we stopping?”
“THE KING’S ARMY IS NOT HERE,” Ruuan answered. “I COVERED THE ENTIRE BORDER FROM EAST TO WEST AND SAW NO SIGN OF THEM. ARE YOU SURE THIS IS WHERE THEY WERE HEADED?”
“King Peter did say they might be on their way back,” Greg reminded them. “Do you know what route they might have taken, Ryder? Ryder?” He decided from the look on Ryder’s face that the general couldn’t have answered even if he wanted to.
“It’s okay,” Lucky tried to reassure him. “Ruuan’s trying to help us.”
“It’s not the dragon that has me frightened,” Ryder finally revealed. “Remember, I’m afraid of heights.”
“Oh dear,” said Priscilla. “You must be terrified.”
“Yes, well, it hasn’t been one of my best weeks.”
“I think I can help,” said Melvin. He was silent for a moment, a sober expression across his face, before he shared his carefully chosen words of wisdom. “Tell me, why didn’t the dragonslayer come home for dinner?”
Everyone moaned, including the spirelings, but Melvin was not put off. “He had a hot fling with an old flame.”
Again Ruuan began to shake, and each passenger scrambled to grab hold of a horn to keep from being thrown off.
But Melvin wasn’t finished. “I hear she was a real knockout.”
Ruuan laughed so hard, for an instant he actually lost control of his wings. Greg felt his stomach rise as the dragon dropped a full hundred feet.
“STOP, YOU’RE KILLING ME.”
“Yeah, Melvin, stop,” shouted Lucky. “You’re going to kill us all.”
Greg tightened his grip, knowing that if Lucky was starting to worry, there must truly be something to worry about.
“Yes, you really should be quiet, son,” advised Nathan. “Ruuan is trying to concentrate. He needs to stay focused if he’s going to find General Talbout and his troops.”
“I DON’T SEE THEM ANYWHERE,” Ruuan announced. “I’LL MOVE SOUTH A FEW DOZEN MILES AND MAKE ANOTHER PASS.”
The dragon turned, and Greg watched as the Infinite Spire glided soundlessly by. The
landmark was hundreds of miles away, he knew, yet it towered so high above everything else, it would have been impossible to miss. Within seconds the dragon had swept through another pass.
“NO SIGN OF THEM,” Ruuan announced.
“We’re running out of time,” groaned Priscilla.
“There is no point abandoning our search before we recover the amulet,” Gnash warned. “Its return is the only thing that will stop the battle.”
Though the spirelings surely held little power over the dragon at this height, Ruuan turned and began another sweep. Gnash’s heavily toothed jaw pulled itself into a grin, but the expression faded as soon as Melvin resumed telling his inane dragonslayer jokes. In spite of everyone’s objections the boy just wouldn’t stop.
“You’re all so tense. The least I can do is try to lighten the mood,” he insisted.
Greg just hoped Ruuan’s laughing didn’t cause the dragon to lighten his load. With each pass of the surrounding countryside, Ruuan’s chortling grew more forceful and the passengers grew increasingly frightened. Everyone, that is, except Melvin, who’d managed to gain a firm handhold on one of Ruuan’s horns and was relentless in his efforts.
Greg noticed that with each sweep the dragon completed, the Infinite Spire grew wider. He tried to drown out Melvin’s voice by asking Ruuan how much distance they had covered.
“WE’RE ABOUT TWO HUNDRED MILES SOUTH OF THE BORDER. I IMAGINE EVEN YOU HUMANS WILL BE ABLE TO SEE PENDEGRASS CASTLE WITHIN THE NEXT TRIP OR TWO.”
“That’s incredible,” said Ryder. It was the first he’d spoken since reminding Priscilla of his fear of heights and, given the lack of color in his face, a remarkable achievement.
Ruuan banked again, this time sweeping from east to west across the distant face of Myrth. As the countryside streaked below, Greg spotted Pendegrass Castle nestled among the trees.
“Hey, what do you call a dragonslayer with slow reactions?” Melvin started again.
The others begged him to be quiet, but Ruuan seemed excited to hear the joke. “GO ON, LITTLE ONE. WHAT DO YOU CALL A DRAGONSLAYER WITH SLOW REACTIONS?”
“Claude.”
It took a moment for the punch line to sink in, but when it did, Ruuan nearly doubled over with laughter—no mean feat when you happen to be a three-hundred-foot-long dragon in midflight. Priscilla screamed. Greg might have too, if he could have found his voice. Melvin, on the other hand, looked pleased over his effect on the dragon.
“What do you call a dragonslayer with even slower reactions?” he asked.
“Cut it out, Melvin,” warned Lucky.
“Patty.”
The dragon burst out laughing, spraying fire over the landscape. Fortunately they were flying so high, the flames died away before reaching the ground.
“I think that should be the end of your jokes,” Nathan advised the boy rather sternly, though given the circumstances, Greg thought he might have wanted to say it more sternly still.
“Wait. Just one more,” chuckled Melvin. “What do you call a dragonslayer who dives into a lake to dodge a blast of dragon fire?”
Both Gnash and Gnaw released their grips on the dragon’s scales to stride purposely forward and present their double-bladed axes. “We agree with the magician.”
Melvin opened his mouth to speak, but hesitated when he saw the looks on the two spirelings’ faces. “Stu?” he muttered anyway.
Ruuan practically exploded with laughter. His wings folded, and Greg felt the reassuring support of the dragon’s back drop out from under him. The spirelings gave up trying to intimidate Melvin and dove for the spikes lining the dragon’s back.
“STOP,” Ruuan shouted, though Greg found it hard to hear past the rushing wind and the pounding of his heart in his ears.
As the dragon fought to regain control, even Melvin screamed. Ruuan would never be able to pull out of the dive in time. Only Bart and Daniel remained calm. The bard strummed a chord on his lute and began to tune it.
Greg knew they were surely doomed, but then the dragon flapped with all his might, grunting under the exertion, and arced out of the dive, banking hard to one side to avoid a tree. In a moment they were rising again, and Ruuan was exhaling in relief. Still the dragon couldn’t help releasing a few last chuckles over Melvin’s joke.
“BOY, YOU SLAY ME. IN ALL MY YEARS I CAN’T REMEMBER WHEN I’VE LAUGHED SO HARD.”
“What did you say?” asked Greg.
“I SAID, IN ALL MY YEARS I CAN’T REMEMBER WHEN I’VE LAUGHED SO HARD.”
“No, before that.”
“UM,” said Ruuan, trying to remember, “I’M NOT SURE.”
“You said he slayed you.”
The dragon wound his sinewy neck back to offer Greg an intimidating glare. “IS THAT SUPPOSED TO BE FUNNY?”
“No, it’s not a joke.”
Ruuan’s glare strengthened. The others screamed and urged him to keep his eyes on the trees.
“I’M NOT SURE WHAT YOU’RE IMPLYING, SMALL ONE, BUT I DON’T THINK I LIKE IT.”
“No, don’t you get it?” shouted Greg. “Melvin just slayed you.”
“IT’S JUST A FIGURE OF SPEECH . . . AND YOU DON’T HAVE TO LOOK SO HAPPY ABOUT IT.”
“You don’t understand. All this time we thought I’d be the one bringing the Army of the Crown to victory because we thought Simon was talking about the hero from the last prophecy.”
Both spirelings emitted an odd noise and stared at Greg questioningly.
“We all assumed that the hero from the last prophecy and the hero from the upcoming battle were the same person,” Greg continued. “But Simon never said that. The first prophecy said I was going to sleigh the dragon, S-L-E-I-G-H, which I did. But this one’s different. It talks about the Hero who slayed Ruuan, S-L-A-Y.”
“Which never happened,” finished Lucky.
“Until now,” Greg corrected him.
“UH, I HATE TO INTERRUPT,” said Ruuan, “BUT I SEE SEVERAL HUNDRED HUMANS APPROACHING THE CASTLE FROM THE WOODS BELOW. DO YOU WANT ME TO SWOOP DOWN FOR A CLOSER LOOK?”
“By all means,” said Nathan, grinning widely, and Greg had to wonder if he’d known Melvin was the true hero all along.
Everyone started buzzing with excitement—but Gnash and Gnaw were not looking down like the others. They were staring intently at Greg.
Ruuan steered toward the ground as he was asked, and for the moment Greg’s unease over being the focus of the spirelings’ attention was replaced with the much greater horror of feeling like a passenger on a jet as it drops from the sky. In spite of all contrary images that sped through Greg’s mind, Ruuan landed safely in a wide spot on the trail just east of the area where General Talbout’s troops were allegedly marching.
The spirelings rushed toward Greg as Ryder led Bart and Daniel away down Ruuan’s tail.
“Finally,” said Bart. “I thought we’d never get moving again.”
“You are the Mighty Greghart?” Gnaw said, his voice so feeble as to be barely audible.
Greg couldn’t determine the spireling’s expression. It was somewhere between anger and awe. He regarded the axe in Gnaw’s hand. “Um, yes?”
Melvin made a rude noise, but said nothing.
“Where is our amulet?” Gnash demanded, though with obvious uncertainty.
“I don’t know, I swear.”
“Do not deny taking it. You were seen by . . .” Gnaw shuddered, “two of our kind.”
“I did take it,” Greg said, to which the spirelings’ expressions darkened, “because I was told I needed it for the first prophecy. But I put it back when I was through. Think about it. Would I have spent all this time and effort hunting out Widget if I knew where it was?”
“The boy is telling the truth,” said Nathan. The others, even Melvin, nodded.
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The spirelings continued to stare at Greg in a way that made him uncomfortable, not that there existed any other way. “Very well. Queen Gnarla says to continue hunting out this Widget person.” Still they stared.
“Okay . . .” said Greg. He was quick to disembark via Ruuan’s tail. The others followed.
“MY MAGIC SHOULD HAVE KEPT ANYONE FROM SEEING US,” said Ruuan. “HUMANS HAVE NEVER BEEN AS OPEN-MINDED AS SPIRELINGS.” He bent his neck until his head was even with Nathan’s—or at least the bottom of their chins were even. Ruuan’s forehead, of course, was even with a spot about ten feet higher.
“I’LL BE LEAVING NOW,” he told the magician. “THE CASTLE IS JUST A SHORT WAYS AHEAD, SO YOU NO LONGER NEED MY HELP, AND I DON’T THINK I COULD BEAR TO WATCH THE EVENTS TO COME.”
“It’s the only way, I assure you,” said Nathan.
A tear dropped from Ruuan’s eye, drenching Melvin, who was unlucky enough to be walking under the dragon’s head at that moment. Lucky, who was walking next to him, escaped without so much as a splatter.
“I WILL HAVE TO TRUST YOU, OL’ FRIEND. MAY THE FIRE IN YOUR LUNGS BURN HOT AND PURE. I HOPE TO SEE YOU AGAIN SOON.” And with that the dragon took to the sky, knocking everyone to the ground with the rush of air pushed beneath his wings. On the bright side, at least it helped dry out Melvin’s tunic before the poor boy caught his death of cold.
“What was that about?” Greg asked Nathan.
“You’ll know soon enough,” Nathan told him.
Anxious to be rid of the dragon and redeem himself as a leader of men, Ryder quickly took charge of the group. “Follow me,” he ordered.
“What happened?” asked Daniel. “I seem to have fallen. Where are we? What happened to the chasm?”
“No time to explain,” said Nathan. “We need to find General Talbout’s troops. They’re supposed to be marching close by.”
Daniel dropped to all fours and began studying the ground. “If they passed this way, I’ll know in a second.”
“Of course they passed this way,” said Melvin. “Don’t you see the huge swath cut through the snow?”
“Come,” said Ryder, “we already know where they are.” He led them west at a pace Greg had trouble matching, but one that allowed them to overtake the soldiers within a few minutes.