by Philip Reeve
“We are stuck here, then,” said Skarper.
“Poor Kestle!” said Zeewa. “Poor Woon Gumpus!”
“Oh, we’re all right!” shouted Kestle, appearing at that moment on one of the steep roads that led down to the island’s edge.
Everyone stood up (except Spurtle, of course), not sure whether to run one way and hug Zeewa, who they had thought was lost for ever, or run the other and hug the sea captains, who they had thought were burned. In the end, most of them did both, and when all the hugging and but-we-thought-you-were-dead-ing was over, Woon Gumpus said, “When Captain Kestle’s ship was burned by that dragon, we decided that we must find another.”
“We must!” agreed Henwyn. “Mortholow is flying towards the Nibbled Coast even now, and Hellesvor means to burn every town she sees there. We must find a ship, and go to help!”
“It is my fault that this peril has been unleashed upon the world,” said Rhind. “I shall slay that dragon, even if it means my own death.”
“And I shall stand beside you, brother!” said Breenge bravely, although she was still a bit sniffly about losing her rabbit.
“Well then,” said Woon Gumpus, “you will all be glad to hear that we have just the ship for you! Come and see!”
They hurried down towards the sea, with Spurtle rolling ahead on his swift casters. As they went, Kestle explained, “There are harbours all around the shore. The ships in most of ’em have rotted away to nothing, but we found one which must have been protected by some spell.”
“Just like the palaces on the heights,” said Henwyn.
“Perhaps it was Hellesvor’s own ship,” said Breenge.
“I can’t say who she belonged to,” said Kestle, “but they were lucky to have her. She’s a beauty!”
The ship was full of seawater of course, and lay low in the water like a floating log. But even landlubbers like Skarper and Henwyn could see how fine she was. A sleek arrow of a ship, made from the smooth white wood of some tree they could not name, her hull tapering to a high, carved prow shaped like a dragon’s head, her stern to a fish-like tail. Even her sails and rigging seemed to have survived the time beneath the sea; like the tapestries in the halls above, the white ropes and furled red cloth did not even seem wet.
She was a wonderful find, and it was easy to see why the two sea captains were so pleased. But as Skarper and the others fetched pots and buckets from the harbourside and started scooping out the water, Henwyn looked worriedly towards the east. A pall of smoke hung on the sky there, larger and darker than the stain that had led them to the wreckage of the Swan. It came from the Autumn Isles, he guessed. By now, the shadow of Mortholow’s wings must be falling upon the Nibbled Coast, and her fiery breath kindling the thatch of Choon or Floonhaven. And even in an elven ship, even with a west wind in her sails, the Nibbled Coast must be a day and a night away at least. By the time they reached it there would be nothing but smoke and embers.
“We shall be too late!” he said. “We shall be too late to help, too late to save anyone!”
The others understood. “But what else can we do?” asked Zeewa. “If we cannot help them, at least we shall avenge them.”
“No,” said Henwyn. “By the time we reach the Nibbled Coast, Hellesvor will have flown on. She will be far inland, burning Clovenstone, or Adherak, or Tyr Davas. Our only hope is to draw her back to us. We must make her leave off her attack upon the lands of men, and fly back here to Elvensea.”
“But what would bring her back?” asked Rhind. “She thinks her crab-army killed us. She thinks Elvensea is deserted. Why would she return?”
“She will come back when the Westlands are black and dead,” said Henwyn. “She will come back to see if her plan has worked, and if the smoke of the fires she kindled has called the elves back here from across the ocean. But what if we kindle a fire of our own, to call her here? If she wants her people to return to Elvensea, she would not want to see it burn.”
“Set fire to Elvensea?” said Skarper. It seemed wrong, somehow, to think of destroying all this beauty. But it was only stone, after all. Only empty buildings. It was not worth a single cottage in Floonhaven or Porthstrewy.
“Would it even burn?” asked Woon Gumpus. “It’s all wet and seaweedy.”
“These lower levels are,” said Henwyn, “but up above we saw rooms full of tapestries and fine furniture. Musical instruments. Papers. Books.”
“A treasure trove,” said Rhind.
“Kindling for a mighty bonfire,” said Skarper.
And somehow it was decided, without anyone saying another word. They left Gutgust behind to help the captains empty out the elven ship, and the rest ran back up the winding roadways and the stairs, seizing burning brands from the wreckage of the Sea Cucumber as they went. Back into the labyrinths of the elves’ high palaces they ran, and in each room and corridor they scattered fire like golden flowers.
Low over the blue swell flew Mortholow. Foam from the rippling waves flecked Hellesvor’s face where she hung in her harness under the dragon’s breast. Behind her rose the smoke of the Autumn Isles. The settlements there were so tiny and so scattered that she had not had the patience to burn them; she had just had her dragon start heath fires on the heathered tops of Grundy and Far Penderglaze, then soared on. Ahead of her lay the Nibbled Coast, the ugly white towns of the mortals littered in every bay and cove like tide-wrack, waiting for the cleansing dragon-fire.
But what was that? Northward, where the coast faded into mist, two man-shaped things too massive to be men. Hellesvor hauled on a rein and Mortholow obeyed her, veering towards the huge figures. Giants? She took the dragon higher, wondering. Elves had no argument with giants. But the Clovenstone goblins had counted a giant among their friends, if the stories of the fight at Adherak were true. Was this him? And if so, who was the other?
Up on Bryn’s hat, Fentongoose said, “Ready, take aim … not yet, Yabber – oh bother!”
The first shot from the Bratapult flew so wide of its mark that Hellesvor didn’t even realize it had been a shot until it crashed into the sea, far to the south of her. Then she understood. She tugged on the reins again, and Mortholow shrieked and folded her wings, diving towards the giants on the cliff.
“Left seven degrees,” Doctor Prong was shouting, up on Bryn’s hat. “Right just a whisker … elevate…”
“What does elevate mean?” Bryn wondered.
“Up a bit!” shouted Fentongoose.
Bryn tilted his huge face a little more towards the sky, and frowned as he saw the dragon plunging towards him like a black dart. With a clunk and a twang the Bratapult released its payload. The boulder went tumbling towards the oncoming dragon, and the dragon backed in mid-air and flapped wildly sideways to avoid it, missing it by a wing’s breadth.
“Yay!” cheered the goblins on Bryn’s hat.
“Reload, you fools!” yelled Fentongoose. “Fraddon!”
Fraddon passed a boulder to Bryn, who reached up with it so that the goblins could guide it into the cup of the Bratapult. But the dragon had recovered, and was rushing down on them again. Fraddon hurled another boulder at it with his hands, but that missed too, and before the Bratapult was ready Mortholow swept past Bryn’s head and let out a great gust of fire.
“Ow!” said Bryn.
Yabber released the Bratapult. The boulder sprang out and struck Mortholow’s tail, making the dragon squeal in pain and slide away downwind. But Bryn’s hair was burning like a gorse fire, and the platform on which the Bratapult had been mounted was starting to burn as well. Blazing chunks of it went tumbling down into the sea as Bryn stepped from the cliff, patting with one hand at his blazing hair while the other snatched uselessly at the dragon like a cat trying to catch a bird.
“Abandon giant!” shouted Fentongoose, as the sea surged around Bryn’s knees. Goblins hurled themselves from the blazing platform and cannonba
lled into the water, surfacing to shout, “Help! Help!” as they remembered that they did not know how to swim. Fentongoose plunged after them yelling, “Stay calm, I’ll save you!” and then remembered that he didn’t, either. Doctor Prong dived in and struck out for the shore doing a scientific doggy-paddle of his own invention. Fraddon lashed at Mortholow as the dragon soared past him, swerved, and dived at Bryn again. More fire. Twiglings fled rustling through Bryn’s beard. They were terrified by the flames, and so was Bryn. He floundered deeper into the sea, and the waves he threw up washed over Floonhaven harbour wall, sinking fishing boats and flooding seafront cottages.
“The sea!” shouted Fraddon. “The sea will put it out!”
Bryn did not hear him, so he took off his own hat, filled it with water, and flung it in the young giant’s face. Bryn was so startled that he lost his footing and fell backwards, arms outstretched, throwing up a wall of foam that set the bobbing goblins shrieking even louder. Steam burst up with the foam; singed strands of Bryn’s woody hair littered the waves. Fraddon turned, scanning the bright air for dragon wings.
High above, Hellesvor laughed her cruel, cold laugh. She had forgotten how clumsy and how helpless mortals were, and how pleasurable it was to destroy them. How quickly fear would spread across the lands of men when they heard that even giants were powerless before the fires of Mortholow!
She was just circling above the battle, waiting for the steam to clear and wondering whether to attack the old giant or finish off the young one first, when she happened to glance west. There was the smoke from the heath fires she’d lit in passing on the Autumn Isles. And there, beyond them, like a beacon on the world’s edge…
“No!” she said.
“No!” she screamed.
Was it her own folly? Had the fire she’d poured down on that ugly old ship or on the goblin on the stairs spread? No, it couldn’t be that. The mortals had survived somehow, and they were bringing ruin to her island, just as they brought ruin with them everywhere they went.
Mortholow was eager to attack the giants, claws extended, teeth bared; her saliva spattered Hellesvor’s face like hot rain. But giants would wait. With a complicated elvish curse so rude and magical that it stunned a passing gull, Hellesvor wrenched her dragon’s head towards the west.
Below, goblins were washing up on the beaches, or scrambling on to Bryn’s chest, or into fishing boats which brave Floonish folk had brought out to rescue them. They ducked as the batwinged shadow of the dragon swept over them, then began to cheer as they saw it speeding away, dwindling back into the west where it had come from, no bigger than a fruitbat, a bird, a butterfly.
“We won!” the goblins shouted. “We saw it off! We did it! Goblins is brilliant!”
But Fentongoose and Doctor Prong suspected dragons weren’t beaten that easily. So did Fraddon. When he waded through the sea to help Bryn up and the young giant asked hopefully, “We won, then?” Fraddon shook his head.
“We fought bravely,” he said, “and at least we saved Floonhaven from a burning. But that elf witch and her dragon were more than a match for giants and goblins. It’s not us she’s fleeing from. There must be other poor souls out west somewhere who she feels even more inclined to roast.”
Just as the water had rushed down the sides of Elvensea when it rose out of the ocean, so now the fire rushed up. Streams and rivers of fire; waves offire that broke in sprays of dancing sparks; geysers of fire that spouted high into the air above the island. White stone turned black; lovely statues shattered and tumbled; scraps of burning tapestry rode the thermals like dazzling birds.
“It’s such a shame,” said Henwyn. He had begun to regret his bright idea almost as soon as the first fires were lit. How Fentongoose would have loved all those old scrolls! How Carnglaze would have wondered at the statuary and hangings! And now it would all be ash. “If only Hellesvor had been a bit more reasonable. If only we could have made peace with her. Elvensea for the elves, the Westlands for mortals.”
“You saw her eyes,” said Zeewa. “Sometimes there is no peace to be made.”
Breenge said, “This place could be repaired, I suppose, if the elves ever come back across the sea.”
“You know what I think?” said Skarper. “I think maybe those elves cleared off because of Hellesvor, not us. Maybe it was her and her wars and her dragons that made them leave here and go looking for a new land to live in. You couldn’t blame them, could you?”
“I certainly wouldn’t want to share an island with her,” agreed Rhind.
They were standing on a wide battlement that jutted like a ship’s prow from the flank of Elvensea, just below the levels they had burned. From there they had a good view of the eastern sea, of the harbour below them where Kestle, Gutgust and Woon Gumpus were readying the ship, and of the roaring flames above. At first the heat of the blaze had been almost too fierce, and they had thought about going further down, but a lower vantage point would allow less warning if Mortholow came. Now, quite quickly, the fires were dying down; the flames had devoured everything that would burn among the old palaces, and they could not feed on stone alone.
“I hope it works,” said Henwyn.
Skarper wondered what had happened to the magic pool. The dome of Hellesvor’s hall had split open like an egg, letting out smoke and flames. Would some of the smoke find its way through the mist and into the super market, setting off the fire bells again? Or would the fire just melt the mist, and the portal into that strange world be closed for ever? It was a pity, he thought. He would have liked to explore there, and try some of the food on the super market’s shelves. It had been a long time since breakfast, and the memory of the way those burning boxes smelled made his mouth water.
The sun was warm, the fires were warmer, and the thought of all that lovely food was so pleasant that Skarper was almost asleep when Zeewa suddenly shouted, “There!”
And suddenly, luring Hellesvor and her dragon back did not seem like such a good idea. There it was, like a jagged black crack in the eastern sky, growing larger as they ran to the edge of the battlement to watch it come.
“Breenge!” said Henwyn.
She fitted an arrow to her bow.
“Zeewa!” he said.
She raised a bow too; a recurved bow of smooth white wood that they had found for her in Elvensea’s armouries before they set fire to them.
“Skarper?” asked Henwyn.
Skarper heaved his smoke squirter up on to the wall, pointing its nozzle towards the approaching dragon. They had not dared to test the squirter in case it was a one-time-only sort of weapon, so it was decided that Skarper should operate it, as he was the only one who had clearly seen it being used. It had a label on it like a tin can, with some useful pictures showing how it worked, but now that the time had come Skarper couldn’t help but worry that the thing might have been broken during its journey between the worlds. Or maybe it ran on some super market magic that just wouldn’t work here on the Western Ocean…
Morthalow was so near now they could hear the whoosh and crack of her leathery wings. She was so close that they could hear Hellesvor’s voice, wild and angry as the crying of the gulls. “Verminous mortals! Mud folk! Filth!”
It was only a few hours since they had seen the dragon, but somehow in that time they had managed to forget how big she was. How colossally, unreasonably enormous. How red her eyes, how wide her wings, how sharp and bright her claws…
“Skarper, now!” shouted Henwyn.
With a flap of her wings the dragon came almost to a halt in mid-air, her huge head reaching down towards the battlements. Still not quite close enough, thought Skarper, to be in range of the smoke squirter, so he scrambled up on to the wall with it. He could see clear down Mortholow’s throat into the furnace of her belly. He saw the flames ignite down there, and come roaring up towards him. He pressed the trigger of the squirter as shown in the instructio
ns, and the white smoke of the other world burst out with a hiss nearly as fierce as the noises the dragon was making. As it struck Mortholow’s nose the dragon flinched away, swallowing the fire she had been about to belch out. The white smoke had formed like frost upon her face.
The dragon screeched and fell sideways, away from the battlement. Breenge and Zeewa loosed their bows, one arrow missing its mark, the other thudding between the scales of Mortholow’s flank and sticking there. Her tail lashed around like a whip, and Skarper, who had been balancing precariously on the battlement with the smoke squirter when it hit him, was suddenly reminded why balancing precariously on battlements is Not A Good Idea.
It was a sheer drop, all the way to some sharp-looking turrets down at the water’s edge. As he toppled he looked back in horror at his friends. Henwyn had flung his sword aside and was reaching out to catch him, but all he caught was the smoke squirter. The slippery cylinder slid through Skarper’s fingers and he fell, arms flailing, a scream fighting its way up his throat …
… and then turning to a little squeak of surprise as his grasping paws grabbed hold of something.
That was lucky, he thought. But it wasn’t really, because the something was Mortholow’s tail.
The enraged dragon wheeled again above the battlement, Hellesvor jerking like an armoured doll in her harness beneath it as she struggled to control the creature. It snorted fire at the group on the battlements, but Henwyn raised the smoke squirter again and Mortholow swerved away, wary of this magic from another world. Breenge already had another arrow ready, but before she could loose it Henwyn shouted, “No! You might shoot Skarper!”
“Help?” suggested Skarper, as he flew past them, clinging desperately to Mortholow’s tail. But he wasn’t really expecting them to help him. What could they do but stand and stare as the dragon went roaring up into the sky above the island, and he went with it?