The Palace Library

by Steven Loveridge

  “Pick up the dagger, girl!” hissed Guy to Eloise. “At least that’s got rid of that ridiculous dog and one of the children. Now come here. Finish the job and I’ll see to it that your brother is freed.”

  Eloise came towards Eleanor looking her straight in the eye, with the dagger drawn. But Eleanor noticed as she did so, she shook her head almost imperceptibly. A signal to Eleanor. Eleanor picked up her leg and scraped the sole of her shoes hard down Guy’s shin onto his foot. He released his grip and Eleanor threw herself out of the way, just enough for Eloise to push the dagger into his stomach, wound him and put him out of action.

  That wasn’t the end of it though. Eloise turned the dagger to herself, looking at Eleanor and mouthing the words, “I’m sorry.” She was about to kill herself to escape the guilt of it all. But the door was broken down by the Captain and the sailors who overpowered both the traitors.

  Outside the boat, the water was clear. Once she had recovered from the shock of the cold, which was like someone punching her in the stomach, Grace could see right down to the shallow bottom. She hated swimming without goggles and the salt water stung her eyes, but she ignored it and dived deeper. Below her, she could see Sophie struggling to pull the Sword from the sandy seabed with her mouth. It was cutting into her gums and jaw before she managed to gain a grip on its hilt and pull it up towards the surface and Grace. When they reached the surface, breathing air back into their lungs was a relief. Sophie drew the air deeply through her nose, resolutely holding onto the hilt, whilst Grace shivered, teeth chattering and lips turning blue.

  A boat had been launched to rescue them. It was only just in time to save them both from the cold and from sinking back under the waves.

  21. Dragons’ Lair

  Harry and Edwin knew nothing about the events on The Saint George. Once at the entrance of the cavern, Edwin and the oarsmen swapped places. Edwin would row now, whilst the two oarsmen were to leap out of the boat with a brazier each. These were full of Dragons’ Bane and would be lit from the lava and then tended by the sailors. Meanwhile, Harry and Edwin would go into the centre of the cavern, to the island made of treasure, guarded by the oldest and largest of the dragons.

  Whilst the sailors lit the braziers, Edwin lit up the pipe full of the Dragons’ Bane as well. The putrid stench of the lair and the revolting flowers combined into a really nauseous smell, but the four of them carried on with their work, ignoring it as far as possible.

  Edwin rowed slowly and steered with the oars. Harry whispered instructions to him from his strange position scrunched up inside the hollow in the figurehead. They went round the left-hand side of the water, so that their disguised boat would come towards what they hoped was the dragon’s blind eye. As they closed in, Harry puffed on the pipe, wanting to gag all the time and blew the smoke through the wooden figurehead’s nostrils. A trickle of smoke headed towards the dragon. Harry could see the smoke being drawn into the dragon’s nostrils, and then suddenly the creature lifted its head and a great rush of flame roared out of his mouth. The flames engulfed the little boat and waves rocked it. It was a dragon sneeze! Both Harry and Edwin were protected from the flames by the figurehead, and they held their breath. The dragon settled its head down again and Harry indicated to Edwin to pull forward, quite unable to stop his hand shaking as he did so.

  “I can’t see the oily stone,” whispered Harry. Then he made a brave decision. “I’ve got to get out. Keep smoking,” he told Edwin, passing him the pipe. Now Edwin had to manage two oars and the pipe. Even so, he reached out to make sure an axe was within easy reach. Harry slipped over the side and with some relief found the water was not only warm, but shallow. It was not rock though. The island was built of treasure and as Harry crept out of the water, gold and silver flagons studded with jewels shifted beneath his feet and caused him to trip. Clattering of metal on metal echoed throughout the cavern. Harry froze.

  Then the dragon opened his eye. It was looking straight at him and Harry prayed it really was blind.

  Suddenly, the dragon lifted its paw and scratched its nose, just as it had the night before. Then Harry saw the stone. The dragon had covered it with his paw. Harry took his chance and grabbed it, crouching back down as he did so and slipping it into his jacket pocket.

  The dragon put its paw back down, and Harry slowly crept backwards. But suddenly the dragon was groping around, sleepily. It knew the diamond was gone! Edwin blew another puff of smoke, but even in its sleep the dragon was angry and instinctively felt what was happening. Even the Dragons’ Bane could not keep the animal’s subconscious greed from working, and it lashed out its paw. An angry claw went right through Harry’s tweed jacket and sleeve, where it struck his skin and wounded him. Harry cried out and bit his tongue to try and stop the noise, but the pain was agony. Then the dragon couldn’t get its claw out and started to wave Harry’s arm around.

  Edwin was out of the boat in an instant with his axe, pipe in mouth, puffing away and chanced his moment. With a sudden crash, he cut off the dragons’ long toe with one blow and shouted, “Go!” Harry made it to the edge of the boat. In spite of the pain the injury must have caused the dragon, the extra smoke must have lulled it like an anaesthetic. It lay down to sleep again. But Harry was feeling so sleepy as well. One hand slipped off the side of the boat, and then the other, and he sank down under the water. Edwin grabbed the collar of his coat, picking him up by his neck like a small puppy, and threw him into an uncomfortable heap on the decking boards.

  Harry’s scream of pain and Edwin’s shout must have been heard. The cave began to fill with a shuffling noise as other dragons began to stir in their sleep.

  There was no way Edwin could tend to Harry now. They must get out of there. He turned the boat as quickly as possible and rowed furiously, collecting the other two sailors on the way. Outside, the fresh air was like a tonic but now the rowers had to fight against the waves.

  When they were half way towards The Saint George, the volcano started spewing.

  “Those be angry dragons,” said Edwin. Then loudly, “Pull hard!” As if the oarsmen needed more encouragement.

  Grace was watching the volcano from the poop deck of the flagship with the Captain. She was wrapped in her own heavy furs, with another borrowed cloak that was far too large spread all around her on the floor. Her teeth were still chattering from her swim and she wondered if she would ever be warm again. Darkness had fallen only minutes earlier as the clouds were gathering and the wind began to strengthen. It was blowing from the south and whipping up the waves. If they had not been so worried, what they saw might have been a marvellous spectacle. Sparks flew from the volcano, and then great fountains of light glowed and spat like Roman candles. It was a magnificent, spontaneous fireworks display.

  This was a display with a difference. Dragons flew in and out of the sparks. They circled the mountain blowing great streams of flames from their mouths. They dived down into the very centre of the volcano before more flew out, with others coming from the side. This was a not a nest of angry bees, nor even a nest of angry hornets. These were angry dragons stirred and waking from their sleep, gathering their strength.

  Down below, Eleanor was tending to an injured Sophie. Guy of Caen and Eloise were in the hold, clapped in irons, prisoners and traitors.

  For now, the worry was Harry. Peering down onto the roughening sea, Grace and the Captain could see the gig making its way as fast as possible back towards the boat, but no one could know if Harry was alive or dead. No one could know if their mission had been successful. The only certainty was that something had disturbed the dragons. As the boat grew closer and larger in their vision, they could see the two rowers, the two brave sailors who had volunteered. They could only see one short person. Was it Harry or Edwin? Four had gone into the dragons’ lair. Three seemed to be returning. Who was missing?

  As the gig made its final approach, pulley and ropes were set up with a makeshift stretcher lowered towards the water, swaying uneasily in t
he wind. The two sailors held the gig as steady as they could. Then Grace saw Harry was there, but crumpled in a heap. Edwin placed him on the stretcher before climbing up the side himself, followed quickly by the oarsmen as soon as they heard the Captain shout, “Abandon the gig!” Without the steadying power of the oars and with the waves whipping around it, the precarious gig with its wooden dragon, capsized and sank swiftly to the seabed. Grace did not see it. She was rushing to find Harry, forgetting all about the cold.

  The Captain was giving a torrent of orders: “Weigh anchor! Set the sails! Light the braziers!”

  No Captain in his right mind would light a brazier aboard a wooden ship. But these were no ordinary circumstances and they had been set as far back as possible to allow their ash to fall into the sea. They were full of Dragons’ Bane and smoke quickly began to bellow from the two containers. The risk of burning from the braziers was less than the risk of burning from the dragons. As the ship set sail heading east, back towards England, the southerly wind blew the smoke towards the dragons. They were now heading from the island towards the boat, streaks of flame and smoke in the sky. Harry was still unconscious and breathing unevenly. Edwin and Grace met at the Captain’s cabin where Harry had been placed on a cot. They looked at each other nervously. Eleanor had begun to tend to him. Edwin looked strangely at the other cot. The great deerhound Sophie was lying on top of it, her mouth bandaged, seeping with blood. There was no time to ask questions. He reached into Harry’s jacket pocket and pulled out the uncut diamond. It was the size of a hen’s egg. As he did so, he said to Eleanor. “Harry’s been poisoned by the dragon. Draw the humours out of him! My place is defending the ship!”

  Edwin ran up on the poop deck after collecting some tools. From the gig, he had seen the Captain holding the Sword of State, glowing green. Why the Captain had it on the poop deck, he did not know. Nor did he know why there was blood on the blade. But he needed to fit the diamond to the hilt to complete its power. As Edwin sat cross-legged with his tools and the Sword on the deck, the first of the dragons swooped low across the stern of the boat. As it did so, it breathed in the fumes of the smoke and pitched into the sea, instantly asleep. The other dragons held back, seeing what had happened. But they rose high into the sky, and then they circled ever lower and lower, gathering speed, led by the oldest, largest, angriest dragon. They sped up so much their wings changed the wind. They were whipping up a whirlwind, a mini hurricane with The Saint George in the eye of the storm.

  As the dragons came close to the remaining sail, Edwin finished his work and lifted the Sword above his head. The blade grew brighter than ever and then the diamond caught the reflections of the flames spewing from the dragons’ mouths. The whole ship was bathed in a deep green light.

  Edwin looked up and shouted. “Ascalon is reforged! Your ancestors were banished from England in exchange for mercy. Remember that! Be banished again, from England and all the islands of England forever. Take with you your hoards of stolen treasure or the wrath of Ascalon, Albion, St George and King Harry will be upon you and you and your kind will be vanquished forever.”

  The dragons circled around and around, faster and faster still, so that the air was drawn out of the sails and the ship lost its way. Then the flames reflected from the diamond seemed to be drawn into the Sword’s blade itself. The end of the Sword became like an electric storm in reverse, throwing green bolts of light up into the sky. Suddenly, as if a decision had been made, the dragons left and like a javelin of light, sped back to the island, before circling round the top of the volcano. One by one, they pitched down into the centre of the mountain before there was a roar and a great eruption of lava and ash into the sky. Then suddenly, the mountain collapsed in behind them and the effect was as if the lights were switched off. There was a silence and all that hung over the land was a cloud of dust. The Saint George rocked out of control before the southerly wind filled the sails again.

  Grace was the first to break the silence. “What just happened? I don’t understand.”

  Edwin replied, “I reminded the dragons of the mercy they were given by St George in exchange for their banishment from England, but when they came here, they still kept their stolen treasure. It seems that the memory of that bargain, combined with their greed for the treasure has outweighed their anger. They’ve gone back underground to live at the edge of hell with their hoard. We can go back to live at liberty.

  “But right now, we must look after Harry, and you must tell me what’s been happening since I left.”

  Edwin and Grace ran down to the Captain’s cabin where Harry and Sophie lay injured. Eleanor looked up with tears in her eyes. “Sophie will mend well, but I don’t know what’s wrong with Harry. He won’t wake up.”

  She had cut the sleeve from the tweed jacket he had been wearing. Harry’s arm had swollen up so that it was larger than Edwin’s huge forearms. A long scratch oozed green pus. The dragon’s claw now lay limp and lifeless on the floor where it had fallen after Eleanor had drawn it from his arm.

  “I need help,” said Eleanor looking at Edwin, tears flooding down her cheeks. “I wish Anwen were here to help us. She’d know what to do.”

  Edwin looked at Harry after placing the Sword on the third cot, the one that Eloise had used, so he could watch it carefully. “The dragon’s venom has been drawn into Harry’s blood,” he said. “It must be drawn out. Anwen uses poultices. Then it will heal.”

  “If the dragon’s poisoned him and it’s in his blood,” said Eleanor thoughtfully, “perhaps the Dragons’ Bane is making him sleep.”

  “He collapsed just after the scratch and fell into this deep sleep then,” replied Edwin. “He’d smoked enough of that filthy pipe too.”

  “Let’s use more Dragons’ Bane in the poultice to draw the poison out. Then perhaps he’ll be better, but I need help. I need help from Eloise.”

  “Where is she?” asked Edwin.

  The girls looked at him. Of course he did not know. He could not know.

  “She’s in the hold, secured with the other traitor, Guy of Caen,” said Grace bitterly.

  “He’s alive then?” asked Edwin, more and more confused.

  “Yes!” said Eleanor, “but let’s worry about Harry first. Eloise was good with the wounded after the storm. And she saved my life. I need her help now to prepare the poultices.”

  Edwin looked at her carefully. “I’ll get the Captain to release her, and once Harry is better, you can tell me this sorry tale. If Harry doesn’t survive, I shall drop Eloise overboard myself with that Guy of Caen!”

  So throughout the night, Eloise and Eleanor tended to Harry, whilst the others watched and waited. Each poultice slowly seemed to pull green pus out of the wound, until finally the swelling subsided and Harry’s feverish state relaxed into a normal sleep. Sophie’s dressings were changed and the cuts in her mouth treated with special herbs from Anwen’s dwindling supply. Edwin stood guard with the Sword of State, which he washed and oiled carefully, but never let out of his sight.

  Finally just before dawn, Harry opened his eyes and looked around at the familiar faces. He saw Edwin holding the Sword of State and he saw the diamond, the oily stone, in the hilt. He smiled. Then he licked his lips and said, “Did a dragon pooh in my mouth? It tastes disgusting. And I’m never ever going to smoke again!”

  Grace and Eleanor hugged him tightly. But Harry didn’t complain, even though he winced at the pressure on his sore arm. Sophie wagged her tail so that it thumped on the other cot. Eloise was pleased, but stood shamefully in silence at the side of the room. Edwin just said, “Welcome back, Harry. Good man.”

  Harry was exhausted and soon fell back into a deep sleep, but it was natural sleep, not a coma induced by dragons’ venom. It would take until late morning before he woke again and Edwin and Harry were told the full story.

  “After you rowed around the headland,” Eleanor said to Harry and Edwin, “we went to speak to Eloise about my dream. It seems that Guy of Caen, who came abo
ard this ship with the trust of the King, didn’t go overboard in the storm, but somehow survived and went into hiding in the hold. He was badly injured, but Eloise helped nurture him back to health. Then, he stole the Sword.”

  “That’s why she went missing so much,” said Harry.

  “Yes,” continued Eleanor. “He came up from the hold and killed two sailors guarding the door to your cabin.” Then she explained the rest.

  “Of course,” said Harry when she had finished. “The Prophecy warned us, To drown the Sword not once but twice will be the traitors’ game. It must have been Eloise or Guy who were responsible before.”

  “I’m sure they were both on that boat,” answered the Captain, who had been listening quietly now. “A confidante of the King and the Queen’s maid could have combined their resources and could have engineered access to the original Sword of State.”

  The Captain looked at them all. “You’ve saved the day. All of you. I’d be within my rights to judge Guy of Caen myself, for he’s murdered two of my sailors, but the Queen’s maid and this French traitor will be judged when you return to Clarendon.”

  Edwin muttered something about throwing both the traitors overboard right now, but Harry said quietly, “I think the Captain is right, Edwin. They must face the King’s own justice.”

  22. Traitors’ Gate

  “I have a gift for you, Harry,” said Edwin.

  It was the middle of the night and the children and Edwin were sitting around Master John’s table in the kennels at Clarendon Palace, where they had arrived little more than half an hour before.

  They were all saddle sore from their journey on horseback up from Christchurch where they landed. They had said fond farewells to the Captain and his crew, before following the River Avon back up to Sarum and thence to Clarendon Palace.