The Journey to Dragon Island

by Claire Fayers

  Boswell whimpered and hopped back a step. “Go away!” Peter shouted, hating himself. He picked up a stone to throw, but he couldn’t make himself do it. He let his hand fall. He couldn’t hurt Boswell, not even to save the dragon’s life. “Boswell,” he pleaded. “You know how to fly. Fly away.”

  “You’re hopeless,” said Stella. She took the stone off Peter and threw it. Boswell jumped back, looking more startled than hurt. The next stone Stella threw hit him, and he flew up into the air. Stella sent another stone sailing after him.

  The dragon cried and made as if to land again, but Stella drew her arm back and he wheeled away, still calling out.

  Stella sank back to the ground then. “You know your problem,” she said shakily. “You’re too soft.”

  “I know.” Peter dragged himself across to a flat rock and sat down on it. “You should go, too,” he said miserably. “I really can’t walk.”

  “I know. And I’m really not going to leave you, so don’t bother arguing. I’m glad Boswell’s gotten away, but I’m fine here.” She settled herself comfortably on the ground beside him as if to prove the point. The baby dragons squirmed in her lap, attacking alternately her and one another.

  Selfishly, Peter was glad. Even though it wouldn’t make any difference if she stayed. All it meant was that she’d die along with him—the baby dragons, too.

  Peter struggled to upright himself. “Seriously, you have to go,” he said. “The dragons are important.”

  Stella lifted the bronze dragon up and stared into its face. “I didn’t do this for dragons,” she said at last. “I did it for Apcaron.” She smiled. “That, and to stop you from getting yourself killed.”

  “Brine says that trying is all that matters,” said Peter.

  “She may be right.”

  They both gazed down the mountainside at the clouds of smoke and patches of boiling rock.

  “I don’t think I’d make it much farther anyway,” said Stella. “The whole mountain is falling apart. You never know: Maybe Cassie will come to rescue us.”

  Yes, maybe she’d sail the Onion straight up the mountain to them and they’d all sail off into the sunset. That would be good. Peter reached his hand out. Without looking at him, Stella took it and closed her fingers around his.

  “Nobody will know,” said Peter. “Nobody will tell stories or sing songs about how brave we were.”

  Stella squeezed his hand. “Yes, they will. They’ll tell new stories about how the dragons came back just for a little while, and the biggest and bravest dragons of all were called Peter and Stella. Peter for the earth and Stella for the stars.”

  And Brine for the sea, Peter thought. Brine should be in the stories somewhere—Tom, too. A flutter of movement caught his gaze—probably just a handful of burning grass, but he sat forward to look.

  Something bit his hand. Peter yelped in pain, then yelped again in astonishment. A tiny bronze dragon shook itself and sneezed. Its tail was black with soot and smoke coiled from its ears.

  Stella looked at the three dragons in her lap. “What?”

  “It survived!” said Peter. “It must have followed us.” He scooped up the dragon and dropped it again as it burned his hands.

  Stella poked the dragon carefully. “It’s hot. The lava should have burned it up, but it didn’t even hurt it.”

  Different eggs, different dragons. They’d found Boswell’s egg covered in ice; these dragons obviously preferred fire. Peter started to laugh, and once he’d started, he couldn’t stop. He laughed until his stomach ached and tears ran down his face. “The dragons can survive in lava. We did it! They’re all going to live.”

  CHAPTER 35

  RECIPE FOR A STORY

  Take a good-sized pinch of truth, one handful of adventure, and another of the best thing you can imagine. Season it well with humor, stir with goodwill, and add in as much of your own heart as you can spare. Leave to mature, taking it out every so often to test it until it’s ready.

  Best served shared.

  (from COOKING UP A STORME—THE RECIPES OF A GOURMET PIRATE)

  Ebeko and Hiri turned in surprise when Brine walked back onto the Onion’s deck.

  “Where’s Kaya?” asked Ebeko.

  Brine tried not to think about it. “He’s … around somewhere.” Her mind was a whirlwind. The two magi must have known Kaya wasn’t really her father. They’d probably known her real parents, probably stood and watched while they fled the island with her and ended up who knew where. Whatever influence Kaya had had over them, one of them could have said something.

  She squared her shoulders and did her best to look authoritative. “You both heard him say I was assistant captain. He’s not here now, so that puts me in charge. Let the crew go, and I’ll talk to them.”

  They were so used to taking orders that they almost obeyed her. Ebeko hesitated a few seconds, then shook her head and brushed past Brine to the hatch, Hiri following. Brine stayed where she was. She could feel the ship’s heartbeat through her feet, so loud that she was surprised the whole crew couldn’t hear it.

  Trudi let out a yell and flailed about.

  “Danger ahoy!” shouted Tim Burre from the mast.

  Rob and Bill leaped up and drew their swords.

  “Everyone, calm down,” said Brine. “We don’t have much time, and I need you to listen.” Her heart beat in time with the ship’s. She let Kaya’s staff go; she didn’t need it. “This ship is called the Onion because someone once couldn’t spell Orion,” she said. “But it’s more than that—much more.” She took a deep breath. All around her the crew stood, confused but listening.

  “When the world was young,” said Brine, “the island of Apcaron was called Dragon Island because dragons came there to nest in the golden sand every spring. And the two mightiest dragons were Marfak and his sister, Orion.”

  The story became more real with every word. How could Brine have ever thought Orion was a sailor? Of course Orion was a dragon; she couldn’t be anything else. The thrumming in the ship’s boards grew louder. Less like a heartbeat now and more like the beating of wings. Out of the corner of her eye, Brine saw Ebeko come back onto the deck and stop.

  Ebeko had loved Kaya, Brine thought. Maybe she hadn’t seen past the facade of a man who was only ever trying to do the right thing. Or maybe she’d seen deeper still, seen through all his lies and weakness and glimpsed something underneath that was worth loving after all. When she told his story, Brine would leave some details out. Kaya had tried to save the island, too. He would be like the man trying to steer his ship between a sea-monster and a whirlpool, destruction on either side.

  But first, the story of Orion needed to be told. “Year after year, the dragons fought,” she said. “Sometimes Marfak would win and sometimes Orion. But at last Orion cast her brother down into the earth and sprang away, into the stars, and Marfak became a great volcano, full of fire.”

  “Um, Brine,” said Trudi. “Something is happening to the ship. Something strange.”

  The Onion moved, as if lifted on a swell of water, but the sea was completely flat. And the world shifted and then split in two. In one half, Brine was sitting on a ship, telling a story to the enraptured crew. And in the other, she was clinging to the back of a dragon, rising out of the waves with the roar of the wind blotting out all the shouts of the crew.

  She was Brine Seaborne of the Onion, and she was Oshima of Orion’s Keep. She had ties to the island that would never break, and yet she loved the Onion with all her heart. She turned to face the two magi. “One day Orion will come back, and Marfak will rise out of the ground to meet her in flames,” she said. “Or maybe it will be the other way around. Marfak will rise first, and then Orion will return to see his end.” She laughed at the panic on Ebeko’s face. “You might want to grab hold of something, by the way. This ride is going to get bumpy.”

  And with that, the Onion lifted out of the sea altogether, and the great dragon Orion spread her wings and soared into the sky.
The deck changed beneath Brine’s feet, one second becoming a huge scaly back, and the next shifting back to weather-beaten timber. Brine fell flat and hung on. The crew instinctively grabbed for anything that looked solid.

  A second set of wingbeats cut through the sky, and Boswell came flying down. The little dragon was covered in soot and flew awkwardly as if one wing wasn’t quite working. But instead of landing, he circled the deck then darted away, in the direction of the smoking mountain. Orion turned to follow, cutting through the sky like lightning.

  Smoke poured from Marfak’s stricken sides, and then red lava came tumbling down into the sea, where it turned the waves into boiling mist. And, high above them, the solid shape that was Orion’s Keep finally wavered and began to fall.

  CHAPTER 36

  They tell many tales about the Onion. The greatest pirate ship on the eight oceans. The only ship to have sailed to the top of the world and returned. Now they’re going to have to add another story to that list, but I don’t think anyone will believe it ever.

  (from THOMAS GIRLING’S BOOK OF PIRATING ADVENTURE)

  Orion’s Keep tilted. The third turret slid away and tumbled down. Tom scrabbled back from the edge, leaving the useless length of rope and knotted sheets that were nowhere near long enough anyway. They needed magic or another balloon, and unfortunately neither of those were going to turn up now.

  Cassie tossed the makeshift rope over the castle wall and started to tie the end to the battlements. “We have to do this now. If we wait until the whole castle is falling around us, we won’t stand a chance. Tom, come on.”

  A writer should always be open to new experiences, Tom thought, pushing himself unsteadily to his feet. It was how you learned about the world, and how you learned about yourself. Besides, there was a very small chance they’d survive if they climbed down and no chance at all if they stayed where they were. Any-sized chance was better than none.

  “Take it steady,” said Cassie, “and don’t look down. I’ll be right below you. Try not to worry it could be…”

  The stones parted by her feet. Tom yelled and grabbed hold of her, and Cassie threw him back, sending him staggering away from the castle’s edge.

  “Cassie!” shouted Ewan.

  Tom turned, panic blotting out everything else. Cassie had disappeared. For a second Tom was certain she’d fallen and he couldn’t bear to look, but then he saw her hands clinging on to the crumbling castle edge and he heard her voice. “Can someone pull me up? Quickly, if you don’t mind.”

  Tom felt dizzy with relief.

  “Stay there,” commanded Ewan. Tom wasn’t sure whether he was talking to him or Cassie. Both, probably. He knelt down—it felt safer that way—and started to crawl to the edge of the castle. Ewan didn’t bother with crawling; he just threw himself flat, slid, and grabbed Cassie’s wrists. “Hold on!”

  “The thought had occurred to me.”

  More stones fell away. Ewan began to haul Cassie up, but then a piece of battlement right next to him broke away and he started to slide again. He wedged his feet into the broken floor and hung on, his arms straining. “I’ve got you,” he said. “Don’t worry. I won’t let you go.”

  Tom edged forward as far as he dared. Looking over the edge, he could see Cassie’s pale face, her hair streaming behind her.

  “Tom, get back,” Ewan snapped.

  Tom shook his head and reached down to Cassie, sick with terror. But Ewan was already at arm’s length, and Ewan’s arms were much longer than Tom’s. Tom leaned as far as he dared, but there was still a gap the length of his hands between him and Cassie.

  He unrolled his sleeve and let it dangle over his fingers. The edge of it brushed Cassie’s hand.

  Almost. Just a little farther.

  Cassie’s hands slipped. She cried out, tried to catch hold of Ewan, and missed.

  Ewan didn’t even hesitate. He threw himself straight over the broken parapet after her. He caught up with Cassie in midair, and their hands reached for each other and clasped tight.

  Ewan’s voice drifted up to where Tom watched. “I won’t let you go.”

  And Cassie’s voice came in return. “I know.”

  Tom’s eyes filled with tears. Then the battlements gave way completely, and he was falling, too.

  * * *

  “Look!” shouted Stella.

  A shadow blotted out the sun. Peter forgot the pain in his leg and his blistered hands. He even forgot the smoldering ground for a moment. Now he knew how Ewan Hughes must have felt when the new Onion had come to the rescue in the ice floes of the frozen north. One moment they were sure they were going to die, and the next it was as if the whole world had been reborn around them.

  The Onion sailed through the sky. Fire and smoke billowed around it and magic crackled like stray lightning, and in the next moment, the ship had become a dragon. It glided with wings outstretched, its tail whipping the smoke into billows behind it. Its scales ranged from glossy ebony to bright silver, and they kept changing color as Peter watched.

  “It’s Orion,” said Stella. She stood, staring up with openmouthed astonishment. “She’s come back to see Marfak die.”

  Peter shook his head. No—this was Brine’s doing. He didn’t know how she was doing it, only that it had to be her.

  The dragon dipped closer, and Peter saw Boswell. The little dragon flapped on ahead of the giant one, flying lopsidedly, but definitely alive. Peter’s heart surged. He struggled to his feet and stood painfully on his undamaged leg. The four baby dragons clung to his clothes, hissing angrily. They seemed to blame him for all this.

  “I guess we’re not going to die after all,” said Peter, and tears started down his face again.

  The dragons circled above them, flying lower. Orion’s shape became more solid each time she flew around, though Peter still caught glimpses of the ship’s hull through the multicolored scales.

  “There’s nowhere she can land,” said Stella.

  A rope thumped down by her feet. Peter grinned at the surprise on Stella’s face. “I guess that solves that problem.”

  He had to let himself be hauled most of the way, his leg still refusing to support him. He sprawled onto what was either the deck of a flying ship or the back of a great dragon. The crew crowded around, and Brine’s face appeared above him, filled with worry. Peter groped around in his shirt for a dragon and lifted it up for her to see. “Look. Here be dragons.” For some reason, this seemed to be the funniest thing ever, and he laughed until he cried.

  Stella flopped down flat next to him. “Are we alive?”

  “I think so.” Peter managed to catch his breath, and sat up. His body ached in a thousand different places, but at least he was alive to feel it. It could be worse.

  “Where’s Cassie?” he asked.

  “Kaya left them in the castle,” said Brine. “Ewan and Tom, too. We’re going for them now.”

  Peter couldn’t see Kaya anywhere. He wondered what had happened to the magus, and decided that this was not the best time to ask.

  Orion wheeled around, and the whole deck reverberated with each beat of the dragon’s wings. Below them, Marfak’s Peak belched more and more smoke until, in a rush, the whole side of the volcano blew out into the sea and lava flowed in a bright-red flood, hissing and smoking and becoming solid rock as it touched the water.

  At the same moment, Orion’s Keep fell apart.

  Orion lunged forward. Pieces of stone fell around them, but the dragon shrugged them off and, in the midst of the falling rubble, Peter saw three small figures. Two of them were holding hands. Orion folded her wings and tore down underneath them.

  Cassie and Ewan landed on the deck with a crash. Half a second later, Tom fell on top of them. They all lay so still that Peter was terrified they were dead, but then Cassie groaned and lifted her head.

  “Why is my ship flying?” she asked.

  CHAPTER 37

  Magic does not corrupt: It transforms. Resist the transformation, and it will
gradually eat away at you. But accept it, and it will change you into something new and quite wonderful. Like Orion’s Keep or the Onion.

  (from THOMAS GIRLING’S BOOK OF PIRATING ADVENTURE)

  Brine limped across the back of Orion and collapsed down next to Peter, Stella, and Tom. She felt emptied out, barely able to think straight, and they didn’t look much better. In a daze, she watched Cassie giving orders and the pirates surrounding Ebeko and Hiri and tying them up. Brine didn’t think the two magi would cause any more trouble. The loss of Kaya and the transformation of the ship into a dragon had shocked them both into inertia, and they didn’t resist. Meanwhile, the great dragon Orion flew on across the island. Boswell flapped around in a frenzy of excitement, sometimes landing, then taking off again and turning somersaults in the air. The four newborn dragons finally gave up fighting. They curled up together in a red-and-bronze tangle and went to sleep.

  Four new dragons, Brine thought. That was enough to start a family. She leaned over the edge of the deck—or the edge of the dragon’s back, depending on their point of view—and watched the treetops skim along far below. When Orion passed over the coast, Brine thought she could see people waving, and she waved back.

  “What’s going to happen down there now?” she wondered aloud.

  Stella ran her hand over the deck/scales. “Cerro and Marapi will have to sort something out. I guess the magi will join us in the village. What did happen to Kaya?”

  His name sent a sharp pain through Brine’s chest.

  “You can tell us later,” said Peter.

  Brine shook her head. She’d had enough of secrets. “Kaya wasn’t my father,” she said. “My parents were magi in the castle. Kaya was using me to create magic, and they tried to escape with me. I ended up on the other side of the world, alone, but they may still be alive somewhere. Marfak West told me—I met his ghost.”

  Tom’s eyes became round. “Marfak West’s ghost is really here?”

  “He is. Sorry I didn’t believe you before, Peter.” She should have trusted him more. She ran her hands over her face and sighed. “Anyway, Marfak West told me the truth, and Kaya admitted it. And then Kaya tried to take control of the ship, but he couldn’t do it, and all the spells in his staff tore him apart.”