by Katie Tsang
Billy and Charlotte reached the centre of the cavern and lunged for their friends. The four quickly threw their arms round each other, solid proof that they were there, alive, and that this was actually happening. Then they turned to face out, each one like the sentry at a different point on a compass. For a moment, Billy hoped his theory was right – that now the four of them were together, the dragons would disappear as the tiger had. Instead, the dragons moved closer.
The red dragon blew a stream of fire round them, circling them – trapping them. Billy and his friends instinctively moved closer together, tightening their stance. The heat of the flames was fiercer than anything Billy had ever felt. And there was no way out.
‘What now?’ Dylan whispered, adjusting his glasses very slowly.
Billy stared at the blue dragon. Its eyes locked onto his. Billy felt an unexpected calm descend on him. It was like he was in a dream, or outside his body, watching what was happening. He knew that they couldn’t defeat the dragons.
But he also knew, with a sudden sharp clarity, that if the dragons had wanted to kill them he and his friends would be dead already.
This felt more like…
A test of some kind.
‘I think,’ Billy murmured hesitantly, ‘I think we should try to communicate with them. Dragons are meant to be smart, right?’
‘Dragons aren’t meant to exist,’ said Dylan. ‘And I’m pretty sure, from my limited knowledge of them, that they are man-eating monsters.’
‘I agree with Billy,’ whispered Ling-Fei. ‘The silver one has my necklace! That can’t be a coincidence.’ She nodded to where the silver one watched them, Ling-Fei’s jade necklace swaying from its front claws.
‘We should find out what they want,’ said Charlotte.
‘What if what they want is to eat us?’ said Dylan.
‘If they want to eat us, they’re going to eat us no matter what,’ said Billy. ‘If we try to communicate with them, we might have a shot at surviving.’
As the friends muttered amongst themselves, the dragons pressed closer. Billy thought he saw something like curiosity alight in their eyes. The blue dragon blew a stream of cold air at the flames surrounding them, turning the fire to a wall of ice.
They were still trapped, but no longer at risk of being barbecued.
As Billy wondered how they should try to talk to the dragons, Dylan suddenly cried, ‘DON’T EAT US!’
The green dragon began to slap its short arms together, claws clanking, and bared its teeth in what looked like a terrifying grin. Did it… Could it… ?
‘Can you understand us?’ Billy shouted. ‘Do you want something from us?’
The dragons looked at one another. And then Billy knew for sure that they could understand what he and his friends were saying.
The silver dragon flew over the wall of ice, slithering down next to them. The friends pressed even closer together.
‘You are not what we were expecting,’ it said in a smooth and hypnotic voice.
‘You… you can speak?’ Billy stammered. However he had imagined communicating with the dragons, he had not expected this.
The silver dragon smirked. That was the only word for its expression. ‘Of course we speak, human fool. We are superior to humans in every way imaginable – don’t you think we would also master your simple tongue?’
Ling-Fei burst out in Mandarin, speaking so quickly Billy couldn’t understand her.
The silver dragon responded in kind.
‘What did you ask it?’ Billy whispered.
‘Don’t bother whispering,’ the silver dragon said. ‘We have incredibly advanced hearing. If we focus enough, we can even hear your heartbeats.’
Billy wondered how loud his own heartbeat was.
‘Your friend asked me about her necklace,’ the silver dragon went on. ‘Why I have it. She seems not to know just how valuable it is.’
‘My grandmother gave it to me,’ Ling-Fei said in a fierce voice. ‘It means more to me than it does to you.’
The silver dragon whipped its long tail against the ice wall, shattering it. Billy ducked and shielded his face from shards of flying ice, as did Charlotte and Dylan. But Ling-Fei stood unflinchingly amidst the ice shards and fearlessly faced the silver dragon.
‘The necklace is not what interests me,’ the silver dragon hissed. ‘I only care about this.’ With one sharp claw, it plucked the jade stone from the necklace setting. ‘Here,’ it said, tossing the necklace round Ling-Fei’s neck like a lasso.
Ling-Fei’s hands shot up and she clutched the now-empty necklace. ‘Give that back,’ she demanded.
‘Least of our worries, Ling-Fei,’ Dylan said in a low voice.
‘Give me my jade stone back and let us go,’ Ling-Fei said, louder this time.
‘You should have been more careful with the necklace,’ the silver dragon taunted. Then it sighed. ‘Though I’m glad you dropped it, so you had reason to return.’
‘You wanted us to come back?’ asked Billy. Something began to dawn on him. ‘You need us for something,’ he said slowly. ‘That’s why you’ve trapped us here. That’s why you captured my friends in the first place. And why you haven’t killed us.’ He steeled himself. ‘Tell us why we’re here.’
The Dragon Of Death
‘I suppose we owe you that much,’ said the silver dragon.
‘We owe them more than that!’ The green dragon spoke for the first time.
‘After all, you opened the mountain,’ said the dragon with the sparkling blue mane, in a surprisingly soft voice.
‘We did?’ asked Billy. He didn’t think anything could surprise him at this point, but he hadn’t expected that.
‘But it isn’t enough!’ snapped the silver one.
‘They are the ones we’ve been waiting for!’ said the green dragon. ‘Haven’t we tested them sufficiently? They are brave, loyal, strong and true! And working together! If they weren’t… well, they would still be outside, doing whatever it is humans are doing in this age, and we’d still be stuck in here.’
‘We’ll still be stuck in here unless we can convince them to co-operate,’ hissed the silver dragon.
‘Then maybe you should be more co-operative!’ huffed the green one.
‘SILENCE!’ roared the red dragon. Hot, sulfuric breath rushed over them, stinging Billy’s eyes.
‘I must be dreaming,’ said Dylan, sounding a bit dazed. ‘This can’t be happening. None of this. Dragons don’t talk.’ He started to laugh, a little hysterically. ‘Dragons don’t exist.’
Charlotte reached over and pinched Dylan on the arm. Hard.
‘Ow!’ he said, rubbing his arm. ‘What did you do that for?’
‘To show you that this is happening. Now pull yourself together!’ She turned to look up at the dragons. ‘What do you mean, you’ve been waiting for us?’
‘We’ve been trapped inside this mountain for many years,’ the blue dragon said. ‘Waiting for four humans to come and open it.’ The dragon smiled. ‘Although we didn’t expect you to be so young.’
‘Little more than hatchlings,’ said the silver dragon with a sneer.
‘But with your youth come pure hearts, and that will help us all,’ the blue dragon went on.
The friends looked at each other and back at the dragons. ‘What exactly do you need us for?’ said Billy.
‘Food, probably,’ muttered Dylan, moving slightly behind Billy.
‘Please,’ sniffed the silver dragon. ‘You’d barely be a snack.’
‘Stop antagonizing the humans,’ said the green dragon. ‘That isn’t the way to get them on our side.’
‘And what side is that?’ said Ling-Fei.
‘Yeah, because if it is dragons versus humans, we are definitely on the human side,’ said Billy with as much bravado as he could muster.
‘It is a question of good versus evil,’ said the red dragon.
‘Pretty sure that fire-breathing, man-eating dragons aren’t on the good side,
’ said Dylan.
‘We like to avoid eating humans,’ said the green dragon. It gave a sly glance at the huge red dragon. ‘Even him, despite what he might want you to think.’
‘So what do you mean by good versus evil?’ asked Billy.
‘Let us explain. It might be easier to show you,’ said the blue dragon, taking a deep breath and blowing frosted air on the wall behind them. Pictures began to appear in the ice, of dragons and humans and mountains. ‘There are two realms that exist in this world. The Human Realm, which you know, and the Dragon Realm, where we are from. This mountain you stand in now is one of the only passages between the two realms, and it has been sealed shut for –’ the blue dragon paused, calculating – ‘at least one hundred human years, maybe more. We used to be the guardians of all that passed through, human or dragon.’
‘Why would dragons want to come into the human world?’ asked Billy.
‘I told you,’ whispered Dylan. ‘To eat us.’
‘Because one of the greatest ways for a dragon to gain power is to form a bond with a human,’ said the red dragon. ‘Not any human, you understand. Only a human with a heart that matches its own.’ The images on the ice showed a dragon flying with a human on its back.
‘One dragon,’ said the green dragon, ‘an evil dragon known as the Dragon of Death, sought to enter the Human Realm to find a heart as evil as her own, and use her powers to rule over all dragons and humans across both realms. We had a great battle in this very mountain. Much blood was spilled.’ The images on the ice changed, showing one dragon slaying other dragons, until their bodies piled up.
‘The river of dragon blood,’ said Ling-Fei in awe. ‘It’s true.’
The silver dragon snapped its head round. ‘How do you know about that?’
‘It’s an old legend,’ said Ling-Fei. ‘I should have known that all legends have a grain of truth.’
‘How did you defeat the Dragon of Death?’ asked Billy.
‘We didn’t,’ said the red dragon flatly. ‘She is the reason we are stuck in this mountain. We managed to create a time portal to an age before humans and before dragons, but, as we sent her back, she cast a curse to seal us in this mountain until we found four hearts that matched our own.’
‘So we’ve done that?’ said Charlotte, staring at the dragons. ‘You mean our hearts match your hearts?’
‘It appears so,’ said the green dragon. ‘Otherwise you couldn’t have opened the mountain.’
‘It was only after you came to the mountain, together, that it opened enough for me to slip out and grab three of you. We needed to know that you were loyal, which is why we left one of you to decide what to do for yourself,’ said the silver dragon.
‘Does the disappearing tiger we saw have anything to do with this curse?’ said Billy.
‘A disappearing tiger?’ repeated the green dragon, drumming its claws on its jaw. ‘Intriguing. Tigers and dragons don’t usually get along, you know.’
‘A tiger chased us here and, when we thought it was going to attack us, it just… disappeared,’ explained Ling-Fei.
The dragons looked at each other.
‘Perhaps it is part of the curse,’ mused the silver dragon. ‘But you made it here, either despite or because of it.’
‘And opening the mountain is only the start of what we need from you,’ said the red dragon.
‘We’d hoped that by sending the Dragon of Death through the time portal, she would be lost in time for ever. But she is returning,’ said the blue dragon. ‘I am a seer dragon. I can see into the past and into the future and I have seen the return of the Dragon of Death. She is even stronger than before. And she will bring devastation to both realms.’ It turned its bright blue eyes towards the children. ‘We need your help to get into the Dragon Realm and to stop the Dragon of Death for good.’
Four Hearts
‘I think there must be some sort of mistake,’ said Dylan. He turned to Billy, Ling-Fei and Charlotte. ‘No offence, but I don’t think we’re the ones to help defeat something called the Dragon of Death.’
‘You opened the mountain. You wouldn’t have been able to do that if you weren’t the ones foretold to break the curse,’ said the blue dragon.
‘Foretold to do… what exactly?’ said Billy. He couldn’t imagine that the four of them – four kids – could do anything useful to help four giant, fire-breathing dragons. And yet here they stood, talking to dragons. If that was possible, anything was possible.
‘You are wise to be hesitant,’ said the green dragon. ‘What we are asking of you is no small thing. We are asking you to join a war. To fight. To save both your world and our own.’
Dylan audibly gulped.
‘And if we say no?’ said Ling-Fei softly.
‘The Dragon of Death will return. She will destroy both realms,’ said the red dragon. It turned to the blue dragon. ‘Tell them what you have seen.’
The blue dragon closed its eyes. ‘The Dragon of Death has an unquenchable thirst for power. She will kill humans and dragons alike. In the future I have seen, evil and chaos reign under her rule. Her followers will rise up, poisoned by their desire to share in her dark power. There is a name for those who betray all that is good to join the Dragon of Death – the Noxious.’
‘Otherwise known as the nox-wings,’ said the green dragon grimly.
‘They spread devastation wherever they go,’ continued the blue dragon, its eyes now open. ‘The Dragon of Death and her nox-wings will enslave humans and dragons for her own dark devices. Your world will be unrecognizable in its devastation.’ The images on the ice behind the blue dragon shifted again, showing a world in chaos – humans and dragons in chains, all lorded over by a dragon wrapped round a tall spire, its head thrown back in triumph.
Billy shivered.
‘So… um, if you don’t mind me asking, how accurate are these visions?’ asked Dylan. ‘The future is kind of wobbly, isn’t it? Like, if you said I was going to be hit by a car tomorrow, I just wouldn’t cross any roads.’ He paused. ‘I realize you might not know what a car is – it’s this thing with wheels… oh, man, do you know what wheels are?’ He looked at Billy. ‘I chose the wrong metaphor.’
‘I think what Dylan is trying to say,’ said Billy, a smile twitching at his lips, despite the fact that they were face to face with fire-breathing dragons who had just told them an even more dangerous dragon was going to end the world as they knew it, ‘is that the future is changeable, isn’t it?’
‘I understand what you are asking,’ said the blue dragon. ‘I see many visions. There are countless variations of the future. All depending on the choices we make now.’ The blue dragon looked at each of them. ‘I have seen what will happen if the Dragon of Death is not defeated. It is an accurate vision of what will come unless…’
‘Unless we help you,’ Billy said. He kept his voice steady even though he was reeling from everything.
‘Precisely,’ said the green dragon.
‘And how are we meant to help you?’ Billy went on, still trying to get his head around what the dragons wanted.
‘We’re asking each of you to accept the rare and ancient dragon-human bond that can only happen when a human heart matches one of a dragon,’ said the blue dragon. ‘We already know your four hearts match ours, but that is not enough. It is the bond itself that will allow us, all of us together, to change the dark destiny I foresee. But you should know this: only death can break the bond between a human and their dragon. It is no small thing to take on.’
‘We cannot force you to accept the bond,’ said the green dragon.
‘Unfortunately,’ muttered the silver one. ‘That would make this all much easier.’
‘Ignore her,’ said the green dragon with what looked like an attempt at a smile.
‘The bond must be made with a willing heart,’ said the red dragon. ‘But, if you do accept the dragon bond, together we will be strong enough to fight the Dragon of Death. And you four will be able to join the
battle, tipping the balance in our favour.’
‘What do you think?’ said the blue dragon.
‘Sounds like we’re going to get fried by dragons either way,’ said Billy slowly. ‘I guess it’s a question of if we want to try to do anything about it, or just wait it out.’ As he said the words, he wondered what he wanted to do. Fighting alongside dragons sounded exciting in theory. But did he really think he could survive in a dragon war? He thought about his parents, his brother. Would he ever see them again? Then he remembered the images on the ice wall. And he knew he’d do whatever it took to stop anything bad from ever happening to his family.
‘I can see the appeal of waiting it out,’ admitted Dylan. ‘In my own bed. Cosy. Ideally sleeping when all this devastation happens. Wouldn’t notice a thing.’
Charlotte rolled her eyes. ‘Don’t be such a chicken.’
‘You want to do this? Go and fight dragons?’ said Dylan. ‘Super-powerful, evil dragons?’
‘I’d rather go down swinging than just lie down and let someone stomp all over me,’ said Charlotte. ‘And it isn’t like it would just be us versus dragons. We’d be fighting with dragons.’
The red dragon let out a snort that might have been a laugh. ‘I like your fire,’ it said.
Billy ran his hand through his hair. ‘Charlotte’s right,’ he said.
‘She is?’ said Dylan incredulously.
‘I am?’ said Charlotte.
‘I think so too,’ said Ling-Fei.
‘We can’t go back to camp, back to our old lives, and pretend none of this happened,’ Billy went on. ‘We have to do whatever we can to help stop this future from happening.’ Here was a chance to do something extraordinary. The chance to be a hero. To do something that would make his family, make everyone, proud. And, on top of that, he knew he would never forgive himself if he missed out on an adventure like this. He looked up at the dragons. ‘And you’re sure it’s the four of us?’