by Chrys Cymri
‘I stand corrected. What do they call themselves, I wonder?’
A series of bellows boomed across the water. Nessie’s head emerged, and she angled her long neck towards me. ‘They say I talk strange. And I don’t have to put my head in the water to speak to them.’
‘You were away for a long time,’ I replied soothingly. ‘But can they understand you?’
‘Mostly. And some speak Welsh.’
‘Can you please ask them why they took the submarine?’
‘I’d rather know,’ Burrows said, ‘what their demands are to let us go.’
‘If we know why they wanted the Themis,’ Morey pointed out, ‘we’ll have a better understanding of what it might take for them to let you leave.’
Nessie asked, ‘Pam wnaethoch chi gymryd y tiwb metel?’
In amongst the splashes and booms, I could hear the words, ‘Tegan!’ ‘Tegan sgleiniog!’ ‘Teganau pert!’ I had to remind myself that they were saying the Welsh for ‘toy’ and not calling out the name of the Fifth Doctor’s companion.
If the dinosaurs saw the submarine as a toy, perhaps, like most children, they’d already tired of their newest possession. I worked out the Welsh in my head. ‘Ydych chi wedi diflasu gyda'ch tegan?’
I could see water rippling from Nessie’s chest, and I hoped she was repeating my question in sea speak. The Welsh responses, at least, confirmed what I’d hoped. Yes, they were bored with their toy.
‘Did you understand the last bit?’ I asked Morey.
‘The Welsh is a bit rough.’ He cocked his head. ‘I think one was complaining that she’s tired of the boat because it just sits in the water. She’d wanted to push it around, but the others stopped her. They’d heard the broadcast message from Abella’s pod.’
‘Thank goodness,’ Burrows muttered. ‘Some of the officers wanted us to use our torpedoes. I would’ve given the order if they’d started to damage the boat.’
‘So how about letting the boat go home?’ I continued. I pointed at Burrows. ‘The toy is full of people like this, and they want to go back to their own ocean.’
Although I couldn’t be certain, the tone of their responses didn’t sound positive. Then one of the dinosaurs lifted her head further from the water, small eyes focussed on the gold necklace shining against Nessie’s green-brown neck. Water rippled from her chest.
‘They like my decoration,’ Nessie told me proudly, arching her neck. ‘I told them it’s my payment, and it’s what they’ll get as well.’
‘Oh, bother,’ Morey muttered as the sea erupted around us. Elasmosauri splashed and bellowed, bumping against the Themis and each other as they fought for a better look at the necklace. ‘That’s torn it.’
‘They all want one,’ Nessie said, sounding happy. ‘Give them gold, and they’ll let you have the metal tube.’
I took a deep breath, asked God’s forgiveness, and prepared to lie. ‘If they let the submarine go, I’ll arrange for each of them to be given a gold necklace.’
‘But not better than mine,’ Nessie retorted.
‘Not better than yours. None of theirs will have a pearl. But please don’t tell them that.’
I waited while booms and ripples passed back and forth, along with a few words in Welsh. Nessie swam closer, her long neck effortlessly bringing her head near the top of the tower. Burrows flinched as the jaws opened, revealing the rows of sharp white teeth. ‘They agree. But they want the gold first.’
I shook my head. ‘No. Let me take the submarine home. Then you’ll be sent the gold.’
More disruption followed Nessie’s translation. I hardly needed her to tell me, ‘They disagree. Gold first.’
‘Her Majesty’s Government does not pay a ransom to kidnappers,’ Burrows reminded me grimly. ‘We do carry a small number of firearms. Would a few shots convince these creatures to let us go?’
‘Can you shoot faster than they can sink a submarine?’ I asked. Then a thought came to me. ‘Captain, they’re only really interested in the boat.’
‘Which they want to toss around like a toy.’
‘And if it’s empty?’
Burrows pulled herself up to her full height, which was a full four inches greater than my own. ‘Padre, do you have any idea how much it costs to build a nuclear submarine?’
‘I’m certain you could tell me in pounds and pence,’ I said. ‘But what sort of value are you going to put on the lives of your crew?’
Morey rose to his feet, digging his claws into my shoulder. ‘Penny has a point, Captain. The elasmosauri appear to be only interested in the Themis. Let us try to get your crew home. Then your government can decide what to do about the submarine.’
‘There won’t be any sort of accident?’ I asked nervously. ‘The nuclear reactor won’t blow up or something if there’s no one left on board?’
‘There are a number of nuclear submarines littering our own world’s oceans,’ Burrows said. ‘The ocean keeps the reactor cool, and any escaping radioactive material in diluted many times over. But I'm still not happy about leaving government property in the hands of these creatures.’
‘If it’s only an empty vessel,’ Morey pointed out, ‘any gold the government pays is for salvage, isn’t it? Not a ransom.’
The captain glared at him. ‘You’re splitting hairs.’
‘Not exactly. I'm just speaking politician.’
Burrows shifted her gaze to me. ‘He’s always ready with an answer, isn’t he? Must be hell to live with.’ And as Morey spluttered, she continued, ‘So, say I agree to this. How are you going to evacuate over a hundred people?’
I leaned over the railing. ‘Raven, if we were to rig up netting between two search dragons, how many humans could they carry at a time?’
Raven’s ears flicked. ‘How big are these humans?’
Fair question. I glanced at Burrows. She turned to address the dragon. ‘On average, most are around my size. We have about twenty men who are much larger.’
‘And how far?’
Another good question. ‘We need to take them to a land thin place.’ I glanced at the captain. ‘Crossings between our worlds form where something terrible has happened.’
‘Scotland should have plenty of those.’ Burrows nodded. ‘Assuming we’re still near Skye, Glencoe shouldn’t be that far away.’
‘Glencoe,’ Raven repeated. ‘Yes, I’ve found it. About an hour’s flight from here. Twenty pairs of search dragons, each carrying around six humans. This will cost me a fair bit of gold.’
‘I’ll make it up to you,’ I promised.
He gave me a wink. ‘Yes, you will.’
‘Just a moment,’ Burrows said, frowning. ‘Glencoe will be full of tourists this time of year. A hundred and twenty mariners suddenly appearing in the glen would cause a bit of stir, I should think. The area will need to be cleared.’
‘Good point,’ I acknowledged.
‘So I should fly there on the dragon,’ Burrows continued. ‘I’ll cross over and put in a call to my admiral.’
‘Or I could go,’ I said quickly. For some reason, the thought of the captain taking a flight on Raven made me uneasy. ‘I could contact Sue Harkness.’
‘You need to stay here with the sea creatures and Nessie,’ Burrows countered. ‘She listens to you.’
‘Nessie trusts Penny,’ Raven agreed. ‘Abella’s shoal is on the way to Alba, and I’ll stop there first to ask them to prepare the nets. Then I’ll fly on to Glencoe for the sending of the message. After that, I’ll go to the settlement to recruit forty search dragons.’
‘Come back here after Glencoe,’ I said, hoping desperately that Raven might pick up on my unspoken message. There was only so much I dared to say with Burrows standing beside me. ‘There’s no need to take the captain to the settlement. Bring her back to her crew, then collect me and we’ll go together to the settlement.’
‘I’ll go find my XO to tell him he’s in charge,’ Burrows said. ‘If the dragon can stay where he is, I’ll use
the hatch to join him on the hull.’
For a moment it was just me on the tower, and I readied myself to explain my concerns to Raven. But before I could speak, a crew member joined me, mobile phone in hand. ‘Just wanted to see the dragon, Padre,’ he told me cheerfully. ‘Name’s Bruce Smithson. Do you think he’d mind if I took a selfie?’
‘Knock yourself out,’ I said, biting back my annoyance. Then I turned my attention back to Nessie. ‘Tell your sisters that we’re arranging to take the people away from the metal tube. Later, gold will be brought to pay them for the toy.’
Nessie relayed the message. ‘They’re not interested in the humans,’ she told me. ‘Just the toy. And the gold.’
Burrows had emerged on the deck. I watched her walk over to Raven and exchange a few quiet words. The confidence with which she mounted the dragon led me to suspect that she was used to horse riding. Her face still paled as Raven kicked them away from the submarine, and I saw her grab at the neck spine in front of her.
<><><><><><>
A crew member was sent up to invite me inside for lunch. ‘We’ve got a great chef,’ she said cheerfully as she led me back to the officers’ mess. ‘Keeps us going, he does. I think it’s steak and kidney pudding today.’
‘Lovely,’ Morey replied enthusiastically. ‘Penny loves a bit of kidney, don’t you?’
‘It’s called offal,’ I muttered, ‘because it is.’
‘There’ll be plenty of chips,’ the woman continued, ‘if that’s more your thing.’
Still no sign of Raven or the captain when I returned to the tower, a little over an hour later. When I saw the first pairs of search dragons flying towards us, nets slung between them, my cursing startled the junior officer standing next to me. Raven had indeed gone with Burrows to the settlement.
‘What’s the matter?’ Morey demanded.
‘Sorry about that,’ I told the young man. ‘Do you speak any Welsh, by the way?’
He shook his head. ‘Not a word of it, Padre.’
‘Air thin places,’ I told Morey quickly in Welsh. ‘Raven would have taken her through at least a couple to reach the settlement.’
‘I’d really prefer your government not to know about those short cuts,’ Morey replied, also in Welsh.
‘Exactly.’
‘Maybe she’ll just see it as part of the general weirdness she’s experienced in Daear.’ Morey waited while I worked my way through the Welsh. Then he added, ‘You need to give some instructions to the dragons.’
A half dozen dragons were nearly upon us. The nessies called to each other, their voices high with excitement. ‘Land on the hull!’ I shouted over the noise. ‘From the far end! Side by side! Try not to tangle up the nets!’
The dragons obeyed, snarling as the webbing caught up in their feet. The deck was wide enough for them to stand side by side, but not as far apart as I might have liked. There would have to be some sorting out before the first crew members took their places.
‘Padre?’ The junior officer had been replaced with someone far more senior in age and rank. ‘Daniel Cooke, Executive Officer. I’ve run some quick calculations. If those dragons are typical of their size, we’ll be struggling to fit all forty on the hull. I think we’d better start the evacuations. We’ve told the crew to pack lightly, no bags.’
I nodded. His greying hair and calm demeanour reminded me of Peter. ‘Do they know what they’re in for?’
Daniel grinned. ‘Half of them are excited, and the other half decided to skip lunch.’
‘And you?’
‘I enjoyed my lunch.’ He glanced at the elasmosauri, then back to the dragons. ‘I’ve had some interesting voyages, but this takes the biscuit. I guess it’s all going to be locked down under the Official Secrets Act or something?’
‘Or something,’ I said. ‘That’s not my department.’
Another pair of dragons appeared in the distance. Daniel climbed down the ladder. When he reappeared, he said wistfully, ‘I wish I could talk about this. My husband is a huge Game of Thrones fan. He’d love to hear that dragons are real.’
The first crew members walked from the tower. They’d tugged fleeces of various colours over their uniforms. The two men in the lead gave the nearest dragons respectful bows and introduced themselves by name. Then one asked, ‘Do you mind if we straighten up the netting?’
‘Good move,’ Morey said. ‘Dragons respond well to confidence.’
The dragons held still as the men untangled the webbing and spread it out on the black hull. Then the first eight crew members managed to stop staring at the dragons long enough to step into the gap between them. I nodded in approval as the men put their legs through spaces in the nets, arranging themselves so that they’d be sitting on the ropes.
‘They’re the guinea pigs,’ Daniel explained. ‘Foster down there’s asking the dragons to only go a short distance in case eight is too much for either them or the men.’
The dragons inflated their chests. As they rose from the deck, their fore and hind feet grasped the ends of the net. Ropes stretched and creaked, and I winced as I saw the cords press into the dragons’ skin. There was very little strain to their wingbeats. Which, I realised, shouldn’t have surprised me. Tyra and Raven had managed to carry a male orca, who would have weighed many times more than eight humans.
The dragons kept about twenty feet apart, which meant that the men sat at a comfortable distance from each other. They pounded their wings in unison, and so avoided a clash of skin against skin. The man near the front shouted down, ‘All okay up here!’
‘You’re good to go!’ I called out the dragons. ‘Take them to the thin place in Glencoe!’
The evacuation picked up in pace. There were a couple of near accidents. One crew member had to grab at the webbing above him when part of the rope on which he was sitting gave way. The dragons hovered as he found a new position. Another pair of dragons rose too close together, and their wings slammed against one another. The men shouted as their legs nearly crashed against the hull, but the dragons managed to regain their balance and pull them away.
Raven appeared when nearly half of the dragon pairs had left with their cargo. After a quick landing near the sail to allow Burrows to slide from his back, he flew to the far end of the hull. The angle of his horns and ears told me that he was pleased with himself.
Burrows disappeared into the submarine, and a few minutes later was standing at my side. ‘It’s going well.’ She looked as calm as ever. ‘Everything is being shut down. I can’t say I'm happy about ordering the evacuation, Padre, but the lives of my crew have to take priority.’
‘You must have had an interesting flight on Raven,’ I said carefully. ‘I remember my first dragon ride. I felt quite disorientated afterwards.’
‘Raven’s settlement is very interesting,’ the captain continued. ‘I’m quite certain we were in a different time zone.’
‘I’ve been involved with Lloegyr for a year now.’ I fought hard to keep my tone casual. ‘Seems to me, there are some things perhaps best kept to ourselves. A bit of “What happens in Lloegyr stays in Lloegyr.” Or Alba. Don’t you think?’
‘Hmm.’ And her expression gave nothing away.
Chapter Twenty-Six
By late afternoon, the last dragon pair had lifted a net full of humans from the submarine. Captain Burrows went with the final group. She’d led me to the sail hatch, so now it was just me, Raven, and Morey left on the hull.
The dragon waited for me to come to his side. ‘Any more errands? Or shall I just take you home?’
‘Home,’ I agreed. ‘And thank your friends for me. They really came through.’
‘It is amazing,’ Raven agreed, ‘how many friends one has when gold is offered.’
Morey’s ears drew back. ‘I thought you lost everything when you burned down your tent.’
‘I earned enough from your clan to rebuild my business,’ Raven said. ‘And I’ve borrowed from the settlement’s bank to cover today’
s services. My carvings are selling well again, so I should be able to cover the repayments. And, if not, I can always work as a tacsi dragon.’
‘No, you won’t,’ I burst out. ‘Never again.’
‘Then I’d better leave the monastery and concentrate on my carvings,’ Raven said cheerfully. ‘Ready to go?’
I kept quiet on the journey home, although I was appalled at the sacrifice Raven had made in order to help the human crew. I had no gold of my own, no jewels to offer him. If only there were some way to repay him. There must be something I could do for the dragon.
Someone had made a casserole, and a portion was waiting on the kitchen counter with a note in Skylar’s flowery handwriting. Just needs warming up and it’s good to go!
I slid the dish back into the oven, set the timer, and poured myself a glass of wine. Then I sent a text to Sue. All crew retrieved okay from Glencoe?
All through, Sue replied. Sounds like a very disturbing experience.
The Glencoe massacre? I offered.
Quite. Should stop any of them from trying to cross back over. Where are you?
I glanced at the oven before texting, About to have my dinner.
That’s quick. The captain reported that you and she left the submarine at 18:00. Scotland to the Midlands in less than an hour. No idea dragons could fly so quickly.
I scowled at my iPhone, wishing I’d been a bit more circumspect. The nessies want gold necklaces to let the sub go. There are twelve of them.
Noted. Not entirely happy to have left valuable government property in the hands of a foreign state.
I felt as if a teacher had peered over her glasses to tell me, ‘Could do better.’ At least the crew are safe.
Yes. We can thank you for that. Can we count on your assistance on taking payment to the dinosaurs? And we’ll need to think about taking a fresh crew out to pilot her home.
A ping told me that my dinner was ready. I busied myself emptying the casserole onto a plate. The warm smell of beef and gravy filled the kitchen. When I returned to the iPhone, a further message had been sent. Would appreciate prayers. Mum frail.