Dragonfell

by Sarah Prineas

  “My goat has plenty of milk,” I tell him. “Do you want some?”

  The pale eyes squint. “Huh?”

  He can’t see me very well because I’m in the shadows of the alley, so maybe my strangeness won’t frighten him. I hold up the brimming cup of milk. It’s already got particles of soot floating in it, I notice. “See? Milk.”

  The boy nods, edges into the alley, grabs the cup, and gulps down the milk. “Ta,” he says, handing me the cup and turning to go.

  “Do you want some more?” I ask, already squeezing more milk into the cup.

  “Aye,” the boy says, and leans against the alley wall as if he’s very tired.

  “Been working?” I ask him as I milk. Poppy blinks her golden eyes and watches the boy.

  “Aye,” the boy says again. “I work over ’t the mine. We dig coal for the factories. Been under since before day.”

  “Under?” I ask, and hand him the cup.

  “Aye. Underground. Workin’.” He takes a big gulp, then burps. “That’s good milk. Ta very much.” He drinks some more.

  I half don’t even want to bother asking about dragons, because what would a dragon be doing near a cold, slate-stone, coal-digging town like this? Poppy pushes her nose against the back of my knee. “All right,” I tell her. “I’m looking for dragons,” I tell the boy. “Is there a dragon here?”

  “Aye,” he says, not even surprised by the question.

  For a moment I just stare at him. “There really is?”

  “Aye.” The boy points. “That way, deeper in the slickens and mullock heaps.” He pauses and rubs the back of his hand against his mouth, leaving a cleaner patch behind. “You a beggar?”

  “I know I look like one,” I say, “but I’m not.”

  He leans closer, as if sharing a secret. “You’ll want to be careful, looking like a beggar as you do, an’ askin’ about the dragon. They’ll take you for a propitiation, even though they’ve just done one.”

  “What is that?” I ask. “What’s a propitiation?”

  He shrugs. “The mineworks keep burning. They think it’s the dragon that’s starting the fires there. The propitiation is like a present for the dragon, making it stay away.” He gives me a nod, hands me the empty cup, and heads out of the alley.

  While we were talking, the streets have grown quiet again. I slip through the shadows and outside the town into the hills of stone—the mullock heaps and slickens, the boy called them. They are huge humped heaps lit here and there by smoldering orange fires. The air is smoky. I clamber up the side of one slicken and slither down the other side. The sky grows dark with clouds, as if icy rain will start falling at any moment. Here and there are pools of water colored poisonous green, with curds of white foam around their edges. Poppy sniffs at the water, but doesn’t drink, and neither do I. After a while, the smoky air gets into my lungs, making me cough. I wipe a hand across my face and it comes away black with soot; I must be covered with it, just like the miner boy I met in town. Even Poppy’s cinnamon-colored fur is dusted with soot.

  At last we reach the base of the tallest mullock heap, three times as high and big as any of the others.

  Here. This is where I will find the dragon.

  A path zigzags back and forth across the steep face of the hill. People have climbed up here before. The townspeople doing their propitiation. Giving the dragon a present, just as the villagers in the Dragonfell used to give their dragon blue-painted teacups. Fingering the shard of teacup that I still have in my pocket, I climb the path, the sharp rocks slithering away under my feet and clattering down the steep slopes. Poppy follows, her little hooves sure on the slippery rocks. It’s something I’ve noticed about goats: if they have the choice to walk on hard stone or on soft grass they’ll choose the stone every time. They like it.

  Finally we reach the top.

  The darkening clouds press down from overhead. Behind them, the sun is starting to set. I can’t see any dragon. It’s like a wide hilltop up here, almost as big as the Dragonfell. Half of the top of the hill is gouged away to form a deep, shadowy cave made of rock shards. Tendrils of smoke drift out of the cave’s mouth. The dragon must be in there. In the wide, flat, gray space before the cave, about ten paces away from me, is a tumble of slicken with bigger, whitish-looking round stones, and sticking up in the middle of that is a wooden post.

  Tied to the post is a girl.

  Chapter 11

  She is the propitiation, I understand at once. The townspeople caught a beggar and put her up here to make the dragon stop breaking the mineworks—that’s what the miner boy told me.

  Is the dragon supposed to eat her?

  My heart pounds. Maybe this proves that dragons really are evil.

  The girl tied to the post has her head lowered, her eyes closed. She has shaggy, curly black hair, light brown skin, and she’s wearing an overlarge black coat and boots that look like they might be too big for her. She hasn’t seen me yet.

  I don’t want to startle her. And I don’t want to alert the dragon to the fact that I’m here. Slowly I slide a foot over the rocky ground. Then I take another quiet step toward her.

  Maaaaah! Poppy says loudly.

  At the post, the girl’s head jerks up. Seeing me, she brightens. “Hello there!” she calls in a dry, cracked voice. She has hazel eyes and a splash of freckles across her nose. Her clothes—shirt and trousers under the coat—are made of well-woven cloth. She’s about the same age as me, and she seems completely ordinary.

  “Are you here to rescue me?” she asks.

  “I—I think so,” I say, not wanting to tell her that I really came here to see the dragon. With an eye on the cave, I step closer to the post. Poppy follows.

  “Good!” The girl squirms a bit. “Mainly you’ll have to get these ropes off.” Her arms are bound to her sides; the ropes go around her, tying her to the post. “I’ve had the worst itch on my nose.” She scrunches her face up. “Would you mind terribly scratching it for me?”

  She’s tied to a post in front of a dragon’s lair and she wants me to scratch her nose?

  She nods at Poppy. “That’s a very nice goat you’ve got there. Does he follow you around? My name is Mad—um, it’s Maud, I mean.”

  Mad Maud. That sounds about right.

  “Apparently I’ve been offered as a particularly fine propitiation for the dragon.” With her chin, she points at the cave.

  I glance at it, keeping my face turned away from her. “Is it in there?”

  “’Course it is!” she exclaims, not seeming at all frightened. “Though it hasn’t shown any interest in me so far.” She sounds almost disappointed. “Are you interested in dragons?”

  “Yes,” I answer. Overhead, thunder grumbles and the clouds grow even heavier. I set down my bag and rummage inside for the knife Da put in for cutting the bread. Taking it out, I step closer and examine the ropes tying her to the post. They are as thick as my wrist and knotted tightly. Those townspeople weren’t taking any chances on Mad Maud escaping. I start sawing at the ropes with my bread knife.

  While I’m doing that, Maud squirms around to look at me.

  “Hold still,” I say.

  She’s staring. “You have the most unusual eyes I have ever seen.”

  This is the point at which most people start getting scared of me, so I grit my teeth and keep working on the rope. My shoulders tense as I wait for her to shriek like Lah Finethread.

  She leans forward to peer into my face. “The whites are ordinary, but the centers are so dark. How does the light get in? Do you have trouble seeing at night?”

  I glance up at her, then away again. “No.” I could tell her that I can see in the dark, but I don’t want her to get excited about it.

  “How did your hair get that bright fire color?” she asks.

  Grrr, I think. Quit looking at me, Mad Maud. A strand of the rope parts under the knife. “This is going to take a while.”

  “Oh, drat,” she says with a sigh. She peers
at me again. “I suppose you’re wondering how I got here.”

  “You’re not a beggar,” I say.

  “Obviously I’m not a beggar,” she sniffs. “I’m a scientist.”

  “What’s a scientist?” I ask, sawing away at the rope. It’s almost like wood, it’s so thick and strong. A quick glance over my shoulder shows that the dragon is still in its cave.

  “A scientist is somebody who gathers information and then tries to make sense of it,” she answers.

  “Uh-huh,” I say, not quite believing her.

  She chatters on. “Yes, like you, I’m very interested in dragons—I’m studying them, actually—and so I came here, and let me tell you!” she says, opening her eyes wide. “These Coaldowns people do not like it when strangers come into their town asking questions!”

  “I can believe that,” I say. Just a few more strands and the rope will be cut.

  “So as it happens,” she goes on, “I was asking a few simple questions, really not making a nuisance of myself at all, and yesterday morning they—Oh!” She interrupts herself and looks toward the cave. “Here’s the dragon now. Hello!” she calls.

  Maaaaah! Poppy says.

  I whirl to face the cave, the knife in my hand.

  Slowly the dragon emerges into the stormy gray light.

  Mister Flitch wants us to think that dragons are huge, cruel, greedy, dangerous, armor-scaled, hornèd beasts with curved, knife-sharp talons and sweeping wings. Mister Flitch’s book would say that dragons are massively powerful and breathe poisonous flames from sharp-fanged maws.

  This dragon isn’t like that.

  It’s about twice the size of a horse.

  Its dull, soot-gray, scaly skin sags on its heavy bones. It does have talons, but they are cracked and dull, and its belly scrapes over the rock shards as it drags itself out of its cave. Its wings are folded like tattered umbrellas on its hunched back. Hung on pieces of twine and string and fine chain around its snaky neck are pocket watches, and little clocks, at least twenty of them. As it comes closer, I can hear the watches ticking and bumping against each other. It’s a loud, rackety noise.

  One of the people in my village is Tansy Thumb the seamstress, who grows blue flowers on vines all over her cottage. She’s old and has achy bones in her knees and back that make her walk stiffly and hunched over, especially when the weather is cold and wet. The dragon drags itself along like that—as if its bones hurt.

  It pauses and with a cracked talon tip it turns over a lump of rock, inspecting it.

  “It hoards watches,” Maud whispers. “As you can plainly see.”

  I nod. And then I realize, with a sudden cold chill, that the white stones and sticks that are scattered about Maud’s post aren’t stones and sticks, they are human skulls and bleached-white bones.

  Maaaah, maaaah, maaah, Poppy complains, fleeing for the path leading down from the slicken heap. Poppy is a smart goat. She knows when trouble is coming.

  Then the dragon looks up with eyes that seethe with shadows and sees me, and I know that even though it is old and decrepit, it is still very, very dangerous.

  Chapter 12

  With a sudden heave, the dragon rears up, looming against the darkening sky. A creaky roar erupts from its mouth. The sound echoes, and the coming storm answers with a loud grumble of thunder.

  “Eep!” Maud gasps, and starts struggling against the last of the rope that binds her to the post.

  “Run if you can,” I tell her, and, gripping the knife, I step in front of Maud and the post. At the same moment the dragon launches itself into the air. Its rickety, raggedy wings batter the air as it cranks higher. With a whoosh, it banks and swoops toward me and I have to fling myself onto the ground. It zooms past, right over my head. The wind and clatter of its passing roars in my ears, and I climb to my feet and whirl to face it.

  At the post, Maud is pulling frantically against the ropes.

  Hovering, the dragon fixes her with a fire-red eye.

  “Over here,” I shout, to distract it.

  As its wings continue thunderously thrashing, it wrenches itself around and draws its head back, takes a gasping breath, and a gob of fire blasts from its mouth. The ball of flames wobbles through the air and splatters around me, and I throw myself to the ground again, rolling and leaping to my feet.

  The dragon takes another breath as if it’s about to blast me with fire again, but it only coughs out a few sparks that fall around me like shooting stars that hiss when they hit the damp ground. Its wings falter and it lurches sideways until it slams into the earth, scrabbling onto its clawed feet and snapping its head around to face me.

  It’s managed to put itself between me and Maud, who is still tied to the post.

  “Leave her alone!” I shout.

  Panting, the dragon folds its tattered wings. Its eyes, as big as my hand, are dark, deep with shadows. A leathery membrane—an eyelid—slides across one eye and back—a blink. Slowly, almost painfully, it pulls itself closer to me, its belly grating over the slickens.

  I stand ready, gripping my knife.

  “Are you all right?” Maud calls from the post. “Did you get burned?”

  “The flame passed right over my head,” I lie. “I’m not even singed. Can you run?”

  “No, curse it!” she shouts back. “This stupid, vile, ghastly rope won’t break.”

  The dragon turns its head to look at Maud, then it swivels back to inspect me, leaning close.

  “I don’t want to fight you,” I tell it.

  HmmmMMMMmmm, the dragon hums. Its burning hot breath gusts over me. I cough, but the heat of it doesn’t bother me.

  Slowly, keeping the knife ready, I edge around it, toward Maud and the post. It turns, following me. Its heavy, scaly head is cocked back on its long neck like a snake ready to strike.

  Maud is gazing at the dragon with wide eyes, but she seems more fascinated than frightened.

  At the post, I raise the knife to cut the last of the rope, and the dragon lurches into an attack, using its big head to shove me away from her. As I hit the ground, the knife flies out of my hand. Maud shrieks as the dragon drags itself closer, and before I can scramble away, it pins me down with a sharply taloned claw on my chest. I struggle against the heavy, hot weight of it, and it leans until my bones creak and I go still, like a mouse under a cat’s paw, trying to get enough air into my squished lungs. Gasping for breath, I gaze up into its deep eyes. I search for evil malicious creature in there, but I don’t see it. Instead, I see . . . sorrow. And age and weariness. The dragon is old, so old. It’s been alone for a long, long time.

  Time. That is what it hoards. The sound of its pocket watches is loud; they hang from its neck, swaying over me, ticking and clinking, gold and silver with shiny glass faces, almost near enough to touch.

  Then it turns its head to look at Maud.

  Almost as if it’s checking to be sure she’s all right.

  Ohhhh. The knife. The dragon thought I was going to use the knife to hurt her. It was protecting her.

  The claw is so heavy; I try to get a breath so I can speak. “Dragon,” I gasp. “I wasn’t going to hurt her.”

  At that, the dragon pulls back. Then its head comes closer again, and it studies me with its deep eyes. I hold still as its breath washes over me, hot and stale and smelling like burned-out embers.

  “I was trying to cut the rope so she can get away,” I manage to get out.

  “There’s no point in talking to it,” Maud calls. “It won’t talk back to you.”

  When the dragon speaks, its voice is deep and dry and crackly, and it leans close, peering at me with one huge eye. What manner of creature is it?

  “Oh!” Maud puts in from the post. “It spoke! What do you suppose it said?”

  “You heard what it said,” I mutter, without taking my eyes off the dragon that is staring down at me. Shards of rock are digging into my back, but I keep as still as I can.

  “Yes, but I didn’t understand,” she
says. A gasp. “Oh my goodness. Did you understand it?”

  I nod slowly.

  At the post Maud makes an excited sound, like eep!

  Trying to be polite, I say to the dragon, “Could you please let me up?”

  The dragon studies me for another moment, and then it lifts its heavy claw from my chest. Quickly I climb to my feet. Holding up my hands to show that they’re empty, I edge toward Maud. “Dragon,” I say to it. “Maud is still tied to the post, as you can see. She doesn’t want you to eat her, like you ate the other propitiations.”

  The dragon settles itself, nestling its scaly belly into the shards of coal. It makes a sound that is part sigh and part moan, and a trickle of dirty smoke drifts up from its nostrils. With a claw tip it hooks a bleached skull and holds it up. The human persons whose bones these are were tied to the stake and to them poison was given. The dragon doesn’t frown, like a person would, but somehow I can tell that it is angry. This was done to poison the dragon. But this dragon eats not such small, soft things and so it eats not the poison. And then it is as you see, youngling. The dragon tosses aside the skull, which goes rattling away over the coal shards. They die and turn to bones. Its gaze slides to Maud. Yet this small human one dies not.

  “Is it talking about me?” Maud whispers eagerly. “What’s it saying?”

  I blink. “It’s, um, noticing that you’re not dead.” I glance back at her. “Did somebody try to poison you?”

  Her hazel eyes widen. “No!”

  “I think you’re supposed to be dead. They’ve poisoned the other propitiations to try to poison the dragon once it eats them. Except it doesn’t.”

  “Doesn’t what?” Maud asks.

  “Eat them.”

  Maud makes a scoffing sound. “Well, of course it doesn’t.”

  I turn to the dragon. “Is it all right if I get the knife and cut the rest of the rope?”

  The dragon gives a long, ponderous sigh. Maud lets out a little squeak as the hot wind gusts past us.

  Taking the sigh as a yes, I fetch the knife and, watched carefully by the dragon, I cut through the rest of the ropes, freeing Maud.