We Sled With Dragons

by C. Alexander London

  “Really, though? The mailmen?” Oliver didn’t quite believe it.

  Celia snorted at him.

  “I mean, mailpersons?”

  “Messengers,” said Odd. “Without messengers, where would we be? Who would brave hungry polar bears and blinding snows to carry news to the far places? Who else would carry messages between the winds and the sky and the walruses?”

  “Walruses don’t get mail,” interrupted Oliver.

  “Shows what you know.” Odd harrumphed.

  Even though the mailman wasn’t a shaman, he sure talked as strangely as one, Oliver thought.

  “Whatever,” said Celia. She didn’t like being told she was wrong and she didn’t really need to unravel the mystery of the Mnemones. She just needed to find Atlantis, make sure the Lost Library was there, and trade Sir Edmund for it. With that done, they could go home and never do anything exciting again. She didn’t really believe Sir Edmund could use a library to rule the world anyway.

  “Are you taking us to the North Pole now?” she asked, unable to find the North Star in the daylight.

  “I am,” said Odd.

  “Good,” said Celia. After all they’d been through, Celia had decided not to trust anyone but her own eyes and her brother. She certainly didn’t trust this mysterious one-eyed stranger in a hydrogen balloon.

  “Do you know where we need to go when we get there?” Oliver asked.

  Odd stroked his beard. “The ancient Norse people believe that the All-Father left the city of Asgard to hang from Yggdrasil, the World Tree, for nine days,” Odd responded. “From there he could see the all the worlds below.”

  “Okay . . . ” said Oliver, puzzled. He turned to his sister. “Why does everyone have to be so enigmatic?”

  “Just because you know the word enigmatic doesn’t mean you have to use it all the time,” said Celia. “Anyway, he’s talking about the North Pole. Like Dad said, when you’re at the North Pole, everywhere you look is south. The entire world is below you.”

  Odd nodded slowly. “From there he could see the all the worlds below,” he repeated.

  “I knew that,” said Oliver. He scratched an itch on his cheek. “But, uh, just to be sure . . . explain it one more time?”

  “He means this World Tree thing is at the North Pole,” said Celia. “If we find it, we’ll find the way to Asgard.”

  “Okay . . . ” said Oliver.

  “And that’s the same as Atlantis,” said Celia. She thought Oliver had understood that by now.

  “So we’re looking for a tree?” said Oliver.

  “We’re looking for a tree,” Celia confirmed.

  “Because some dude hung from it for nine days?” said Oliver.

  Celia nodded.

  “So we’re not looking for Santa Claus anymore?”

  “They’re the same,” said Celia.

  “All lost places are the same lost places,” Odd said. “As all lost souls are the same lost souls.”

  “That’s what the explorer wrote in his journal!” said Celia. “It’s kind of—”

  “Enigmatic,” said Oliver.

  Celia frowned at her brother. But he was right.

  “The world is a library of stories,” said Odd. “Each different, but each the same.”

  “Are you sure you’re not a shaman?” Oliver asked.

  “You will understand,” said Odd, “in time.”

  “I really hope not,” said Celia, looking over the shifting ice to the round horizon at the top of the world. She did not want to get back to sixth grade talking like a fortune cookie. She just wanted to get back to sixth grade. And save her parents. And watch TV.

  Odd brought out some dinner for them in plastic containers and then returned to steering the balloon, pulling ropes and turning levers, almost as if he were following the ravens through the sky.

  Oliver leaned on the basket beside Celia, watching the endless white landscape below and picking at the strange jellied meat, which oozed red and green.

  “What is this?” he whispered.

  “Pickled walrus liver!” Odd called back. “In lingonberry sauce! Served on a bed of seaweed.”

  Celia gagged.

  Oliver sniffed, shrugged, and took a bite.

  “Not bad, actually,” he said, talking with his mouth full. Celia held her nose and ate. She didn’t share her brother’s appetite for Nordic cuisine. After eating they watched the ice drift below. Hours passed.

  “This is boring,” Oliver muttered.

  “Wasn’t skydiving, dogsledding, walrus roping, and escaping a polar bear enough excitement for you?” said Celia.

  “I guess,” said Oliver. “It’s just that I don’t like all this waiting around.”

  “You could read,” Celia suggested, handing Oliver the old explorer’s journal. He wrinkled his nose as he took it from her.

  “Don’t worry, children,” said Odd. “The wait is almost over. By morning we’ll be at the pole and you’ll be on your way.”

  “We’ll be on our way?” Celia spun around to face him. “What do you mean? You aren’t coming with us?”

  “I have mail to deliver,” he said.

  “You’re kidding,” said Oliver.

  “Do I look like I’m kidding?” said Odd.

  He didn’t.

  “You have your own destiny to fulfill,” he added. “I’m just an old man whose destiny is done.”

  “Ugh, destiny,” mumbled Oliver.

  “But we’re just kids,” said Celia.

  “Kids have destinies,” said Odd. “How else do they become adults?”

  “Yeah,” said Celia. “But most kids’ destinies are about, like, the soccer team and graduation and making a macaroni picture frame.”

  “Not in that order,” said Oliver.

  “Right,” said Celia. “Why is our destiny so . . .”

  “Exciting?” said Oliver.

  Celia scowled at him.

  “Dangerous,” she said. “Why does our destiny have to involve lost cities and ancient prophecies and dragons?”

  “Wait, what?” said Oliver. “Dragons?”

  “Growing up is far more dangerous than dragons,” said Odd. “You will see.”

  “Wait, what about the dragons?” said Oliver. “Like, real live dragons?”

  Neither Odd nor Celia was listening to him.

  “Maybe I don’t want to see!” Celia told Odd. “Maybe I don’t want to battle dragons or discover anything! Maybe I just want my life to be normal.”

  “Little girl, I am sorry,” said Odd. “But you don’t get a choice about any of that. No one’s life is normal.”

  “Will someone tell me about the dragons, please!” said Oliver.

  “But it’s not fair!” said Celia.

  “That is the oldest catchphrase in the world,” said Odd.

  Oliver opened the journal and flipped through the pages frantically.

  “It’s not a catchphrase,” said Celia. “It’s true. Nothing is ever fair for us!”

  “What do you want me to do about it?” said Odd.

  “You’re an adult!” yelled Celia. “Why don’t you help us find this city and save our parents and protect us from all this dangerous stuff, like adults are supposed to do?”

  “Aha!” said Oliver, finding the page he wanted.

  “No adult can protect you from your destiny!” Odd told Celia. “Otherwise, it wouldn’t be your destiny, it’d be theirs!”

  “Well, maybe I don’t want a destiny!” Celia yelled.

  “Well, maybe that’s too bad, because you’ve got one!” Odd yelled back.

  “Okay, I see the dragon here,” said Oliver, studying the drawing of a dragon that the explorer had put in his journal. It looked a lot like the fossilized one back in the tunnel at the research st
ation, except this one was covered in blue-black skin and scales and had giant fearsome eyes and huge fangs. Its long body was coiled around the base of a giant tree. “Is this, like, for real?”

  “Are Sir Edmund and Janice part of my destiny?” said Celia. “Because they’re the ones who are going to get the Lost Library. Is it my destiny to help the bad guys win?”

  “Your destiny will reveal itself to only you,” said Odd.

  “That’s such a cop-out,” said Celia.

  “Celia,” said Oliver, looking up from the journal.

  “I knew you’d be like every other adult we’ve met on this search,” said Celia. “You’d say a lot of strange stuff and be all enigmatic and then—”

  “Celia?” said Oliver again.

  “Yes, I know, that’s your new favorite word,” Celia snapped without looking over at her brother. Her eyes were fixed angrily on Odd. “Enigmatic,” she repeated. “And then, when it came time for you to answer some real questions or offer any real help, you’d be totally unhelpful and you’d leave us in some wilderness or something. For all we know, you’re lying about everything and you really work with Sir Edmund.”

  “Is that what you think?” said Odd.

  “Celia!” Oliver shouted. She turned to him. “We’re here.”

  Oliver pointed ahead of them to a place where the ice had split open in a wide crack, pushing against the other pieces of ice around it so there was a high wall around the opening. The snow covering the ice was veined pink and red, like it was alive.

  “Crimson snow,” Celia whispered. “Just like in the journal.”

  “Is it cursed?” Oliver shuddered.

  “Algae,” said Odd. “Blooms of bacteria and algae freeze in the ice and make the snow different colors.”

  “Good,” said Oliver. He preferred the scientific answer to the mystical one. He hoped all this talk of dragons would have a similarly dull explanation.

  As they flew over the wall of blue and pink and red ice and peered down into the large crack, they saw that it was not filled with the dark water of the Arctic Ocean like every other opening in the ice, but instead there was a deep canyon, at least ten stories high, and in the center, a tree, the biggest tree the twins had ever seen, poking up through a hole at the bottom, like fireman’s pole in a firehouse. Its trunk disappeared into the darkness below where the ocean should have been churning. The twins would not want to slide down there.

  “That’s impossible,” gasped Celia.

  “It would be best for you to forget that phrase,” said Odd, as he steered the balloon down between the narrow walls of ice. The canyon creaked and groaned as the ice shifted. A large boulder broke from the wall and rolled down past the balloon, shattering on the icy floor below. “Now, I must say good-bye and good luck.”

  As the balloon touched down deep inside the canyon, near the trunk of the giant tree, Celia turned to her brother.

  “Still bored?” she asked.

  He swallowed hard. He wasn’t the least bit bored anymore.

  “Right,” said Celia, taking her brother’s hand. “Let’s go find Atlantis.” She nudged him forward.

  “Hey, why do I have to go first?” he asked. Celia raised her eyebrows at him. “Oh, right.”

  “Mm-hmm,” she said and stepped onto the ground after him. They stood side by side and watched as Odd’s balloon lifted off again, rising between the walls of ice and disappearing over the edge.

  The twins stood still a moment longer. The air was warming at the bottom of the canyon, so they lowered their hoods and listened. The ice creaked and groaned. Oliver’s head snapped from side to side with every noise, thinking he’d heard the roar of a dragon. Or a herd of dragons.

  He wondered if dragons went in herds. Or was it flocks? Or packs, like wolves?

  “Do you remember your catchphrase?” he asked Celia.

  “It’s not fair?” said Celia.

  “No, the other one.”

  “Oh, yeah,” said Celia, with a long exhale. “Let’s get this over with.”

  30

  WE SLEIGH A DRAGON

  “THEY’RE TEARING THE place apart!” Dr. Navel watched on the little screen as Sir Edmund’s thugs rampaged through the research station searching for Oliver and Celia. “I don’t think they’ve even noticed the open kennel yet.”

  “Good,” said Claire Navel. “We need to buy the twins as much time as possible.”

  “How far do you think they’ve gone?” said Dr. Navel. “It took Robert Peary’s expedition over a month to reach the North Pole on dogsleds. And they were experienced and well supplied. Oliver and Celia have barely been gone a day. What we’ve asked of them is almost impossible.”

  “Almost impossible is a little bit possible.” Claire smiled. “And where Oliver and Celia are concerned, I believe that anything is possible. They’ll be just fine.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I have faith, Ogden.”

  Dr. Navel furrowed his brow. He wasn’t ready to surrender his children’s lives to faith. He started absently flipping channels on the security monitor.

  “Stop that,” his wife said.

  He didn’t stop.

  “Give it to me,” she said.

  He kept changing the channels. His wife reached over to grab the remote from him. He pulled it away. She reach for it again. He pulled it away again.

  “Stop being childish,” she said. She grabbed and caught it and they struggled over it for a few seconds, neither of them loosening their grip. Suddenly, the screen changed to a new image, an impossible image.

  Oliver and Celia standing in an icy canyon, looking at a giant tree.

  “Um.” Dr. Navel dropped the remote.

  “They made it!” their mother cheered.

  “That’s impossible,” said Dr. Navel. “The distance . . . the tree . . .”

  “There are more things in heaven and earth . . . than are dreamt of in your philosophy,” she quoted Hamlet at him again. “And we could sure help them out if we stole Sir Edmund’s helicopter.” She took a deep breath. “It’s time.”

  “The Polar Plot?” he said, his eyes still fixed on the screen as Oliver and Celia studied the tree. He took a deep breath. The image vanished. They were staring at the hallway of the research station again.

  Dr. Navel flipped the channel a few times, cycling through all the images, but he couldn’t find the picture of Oliver and Celia again. He touched the screen and exhaled. “Let’s do it.” He braced himself. “I’m ready.”

  His wife smiled at him and touched his shoulder gently. “We’ll get there,” she said. “We’ll help them.”

  Then she balled her hands into fists and punched her husband right in the stomach as hard as she could.

  “Oof!” He doubled over.

  “You okay?” She crouched next to him.

  “One more time,” he groaned. “It has to be believable . . .”

  She punched her husband again. Sir Edmund was no fool. It had to look real. Dr. Navel was slumped on the floor, his face almost green. It was about as real as it could get.

  “We’re coming, kids,” Claire Navel whispered, closing her eyes and thinking of her children. Then she rushed to the intercom. “Help! My husband! He’s ill!”

  “Quiet in there!” one of the thugs answered, his voice crackling with static.

  “But he’s really sick!” she said in her best whining voice.

  “Who cares?” the thug answered. “Soon he’ll be dragon food.”

  “What if he has a toxic parasite?” Claire asked. “You wouldn’t want Sir Edmund’s dragon to get sick. He’ll probably take the cost of the veterinary bills out of your paycheck.”

  No answer came. Claire Navel waited, biting her lip.

  “Just look on a security monitor,” she said. “There’s a camera in here
. You’ll see—he’s really sick.”

  “Ugh,” Dr. Navel groaned. He wasn’t faking it either; his wife really could throw a punch.

  The seconds ticked past like hours. They waited. Dr. Navel groaned on the floor; Claire Navel tried to look worried. It wasn’t too hard. She was starting to get worried for real.

  Then she heard the snap of a lock opening and chains falling to the floor. The door creaked open. As soon as the guard walked in, she karate-chopped him in the arm so he dropped his weapon, and then she elbowed him in the nose so he dropped to the floor.

  “Nicely done.” Dr. Navel pulled himself up, still clutching his stomach. A lump had formed where his head hit the floor.

  “Good job writhing in pain.” His wife kissed him on the forehead. “Now let’s go.”

  They pressed themselves against the wall of the tunnel and scurried through the shadows. They ducked inside the rib cage of the pliosaur fossil when they heard Sir Edmund shouting from down the passage toward the cargo bay.

  “Dogs!” he yelled. “You’re telling me they set out on dogsleds! Who do they think they are? Dr. Frederick Cook?”

  “Robert Peary beat Frederick Cook to the North Pole in 1909,” whispered Dr. Navel. “That’s who he means. Peary. Not Cook. Dr. Cook was a fraud.”

  “Now’s not the time for that old argument,” his wife whispered. “Come on.”

  “I’m on my way.” Sir Edmund stormed through the passage, brushing right past the Navels hiding in the skeleton.

  “We need to get to the lockers and put on some cold-weather gear,” Claire Navel whispered. “Then we’ll go to the helicopter pad.”

  “Can you fly a helicopter?” Dr. Navel asked.

  “Of course, honey,” she said. “Can’t you?”

  Dr. Navel blushed.

  “It’s okay.” His wife patted him on the shoulder. “Maybe I can teach you someday, when the kids get their helicopter licenses.”

  “You think they’ll want to do that?”

  “I think they’re starting to enjoy themselves with all this adventure. They just won’t admit it yet.”

  “We’ll see,” said Dr. Navel. They crept to the lockers and dressed quickly in the first cold-weather gear they grabbed. Dr. Navel accidentally grabbed a ladies’ parka, cut with luxurious curves, but they heard Sir Edmund’s men coming so there was no time to change. They had to stuff themselves into a locker as one of the thugs came around the corner. He stopped right in front of their locker. They could just see his chest through the vents as he spoke.