The Last Dragon Chronicles: Dark Fire (23 page)

read. He believes the dragons don’t read methodically left to right or top to bottom or even in a circular shape; he thinks they just take in the pattern as a whole. If you flip over a couple of pages you’ll find a more grammatical account, with Steiner’s continuity   suggestions.   Like   most languages, dragontongue has a unique syntax. By the weekend, scholars all over the world are going to be putting their own twist on it, but the crucial elements are very clear: the dragons were threatened with extinction and they set out a plan to deal with their enemy. It’s powerful stuff. Take your time.”

Lucy slanted her gaze downwards. The first thing she noticed were some of the names: Galen, Gessine, Gyrrhon, G’larne

– which was the first indication of

authenticity for her. They all began with G. Anything like ‘Ember’ or ‘Elrond the Red’ would have seen the magazine flying straight out of the window. She took her time, as Tam had suggested, picking out phrases,   reading   snippets,   digesting unusual   sequences   of   words.   Yet somehow, despite the need to know, her eyes kept jumping over the script without being able to settle, as if it required a special kind of concentration just to acknowledge the words were there. She thought about sharing the task with Gwendolen. But the little dragon  was asleep in her bag and it would have been unfair to wake her.

So Lucy changed her approach and

searched for the one word she knew

would be meaningful. When she found it, however, it tore a small strip of surprise from her heart. The name
 
Gawaine
 
leapt out several times, but the word always ended with an ‘e’, suggesting a feminine gender. Maybe it was the way the dragons spoke back then, like olde worlde Englishe when Shakespeare was alive? Gawain,
female
?   That   was   silly. Impossible. She studied the context where his name occurred. The word ‘chosen’

appeared and also ‘receiver’. In another, much denser section, she read ‘drinker of tears, gatherer of fire’. And suddenly it struck her what this meant. The other

dragons, the remaining eleven of the ‘Wearle’   (that   word   was   evident

throughout) had shed their tears through ‘the unnatural eye’ (whatever that meant) and Gawain had… she drew back a little.

Ingested
 
them? If that was correct then Gawain would have had the auma of

twelve
 
fire tears sparking through his body, including his own. He’d be like a ticking bomb. With that thought in mind, she focused her attention on the one

outstanding section where his name was mentioned, right at the very centre of the script. The text here was dark and heavily- compacted, but she read it three times just to be sure. And each time it made her cry a little more.

She wasn’t aware as she closed the

magazine that the car had rolled to a halt

again.

“Hey,” said Tam. He moved his hand

across hers.

For several seconds she could not

speak. Only when she pulled away needing a tissue did she ask him, “What’s the matter? Why have we stopped?” They were in the middle of a much smaller

road, on a slight downward incline, with hedgerows and verges to either side.

He pointed upwards through her side of the windscreen.

Beyond the hedge was a whole ridge ofhills, stretching away under a string oflow cloud. One of them, Lucy noticed,looked out of place. It was bumpy. Morelike a wart than a part of the naturallandscape.

“That’s Glissington Tor,” said Tam.

Lucy closed her hands around the tissueshe was holding. From the way he’dspoken, she guessed this was only part oneof the tour manifesto. She was right. Asher eyes panned across to the oppositeside of the road, Tam leaned well back inhis seat. And there, through his window,she saw what they had come for.

The flowing body of the Scuffenburywhite horse.

The Old Grey Dragon

“What now?” Lucy asked, as a few drops of light drizzle began to spot the windscreen.

Tam dipped into his jacket and pulledout a business card. He flipped it towardsher like a folded banknote. “I’ve booked

us in here.”

“The Old Grey Dragon?”

“It’s a guesthouse,” he said. “Bed and Breakfast. Right on the side of the Tor. It says in their blurb that on a still night you can hear the dragon snoring. I thought it might make you feel at home.” He paused, waiting for her to dip into her usual bag of cynicisms. Her fingers were stroking the picture of the dragon. “You OK, Lucy?”

She put the magazine back into the bag. “Yeah. Let’s go.”

Beeping the sat nav again, Tam took the Range Rover on. They swept along atwisting country lane, further and furtherinto the hills. By now the odd cottage wasbeginning to appear. A postbox fixed to adry stone wall. Tractors, off road. Cows. A bicycle. The suggestion of life, albeitminimal. Then, as they crested a raggedstone bridge over a deeply-boulderedstream, Glissington Tor  was huge in frontof them, just like a strange green bubble inthe earth.

Tam dropped through the gears andpowered the car up and round the bottomof the Tor. The steepness of the ascentwas making Lucy dizzy and she was

grateful when, after a couple of bends, Tam swung off onto an access road where a large Victorian red-brick house, halfhidden by its sloping garden and the retinal branches of a cadaverous tree, awaited them.

“This is it,” he said, pulling up. He turned up his collar and quickly got out. Through her rain-touched window Lucy could see a flight of rough, weed-ridden steps, climbing through what looked like the sort of garden where people grew their own vegetables or herbs. She spotted a cloche and that settled it for her: they had come to a hippy house. Its deep-set austere windows were just visible beyond the slope, their glass crisscrossed with strips of lead. Nothing about the place

appealed to Lucy, until she caught sight of a smoky grey cat tucked up in a furry bundle on the steps. It turned its head and stared lazily at her, more concerned with soaking up the pillars of sunshine that the tree and the rain had not been able to

block.

Behind her, the rear door opened and Tam started pulling out their bags. “Lovely rainbow over the Vale.  Yougoing to sit there all day or what?”

He slammed the door shut before she

could answer.

By way of reply she got out, marchedround to the back of the vehicle, hoistedher travel bag onto her shoulder, stuck outher tongue at him, ignored the rainbow andmounted the steps. As she reached the cat,

she crouched down to stroke its dewy fur. It stared fixedly ahead, unfazed by the contact, as if it had known her all its life. But when Tam approached, the cat got up and quickly, but unfussily, disappeared behind a tent of bean poles generously endowed   with  twining,   heart-shaped scarlet runner leaves. Sounding a small note of triumph, Lucy walked on.

They crossed a gravel pathway (where someone had left a wheelbarrow and

some long-handled tools) into a short porch. The multi-panelled guesthouse door was already half-open. Tam pressed the bell. After a few moments the door

swung back and they were greeted by a short, carefully-dressed woman who Lucy guessed was roughly the same age as her

mum.

“Mr Farrell?” the woman asked, beaming through a pair of dark designer spectacles, whose top edges flared like the fins of a rocket.

He let loose his killer smile. “Tam.”

“Lovely. And this must be your niece?”

“N—?” Lucy began. She let the word soften to ‘nice to meet you’. Niece was more acceptable than sister, she supposed, and certainly less open to question than ‘friend’.

“My,” said the woman, “what lovely red hair you’ve got.”

Lucy smiled aimlessly. She was used to being complimented about her hair. But for some reason – maybe because of the way this woman was staring so intently at

her, making her feel like a museum exhibit – she was tempted to say ‘all the better to clog up your hoover with, grandma’. (She didn’t, of course.)

“I’m  Hannah,”   said   the   woman, touching her breast as she invited them into a generous hallway with a stunning mosaic floor. “Two single rooms, for just the two nights, is it?”

“If the rooms are available we may stay longer,” said Tam. “It rather depends how things pan out. I’m on a working vacation. Lucy’s come along to see the sights and generally explore the area with me. I’m a historical writer, researching a piece about dragons.”

“Well, you’ve come to the right place,” said Hannah. “There’s an enormous

amount of history attached to Glissington. You know about the legend, I take it?”

“Is the dragon meant to be grey?” Lucy had picked up  a leaflet which gave some history of the guesthouse. Despite what had happened to Gwillan and Grace, a grey dragon didn’t seem right to her. Green. Ice blue. Red. Gold. Definitely. But
 
grey
? She was prepared to debunk the myth there and then until Hannah said, with brusque authority:

“The colour of wet clay – or so I’m told.” Her closed mouth formed a tightlipped smile. “We’ve got more leaflets over there on the sideboard. And Clive, my husband, would be happy to fill you in with anything you don’t already know. He’s got every book ever written on

Glissington. He’s in the guest loungewatching the television, I think. He oughtto be outside harvesting some food – wegrow our own organic vegetables here –but there’s been some news about this mist

thing in the Arctic and he can’t seem to drag himself away. Clive?” She marched across the hall and pushed open a door. What sounded like a news broadcast

filtered out. “Clive, come and meet our new guests.” She beckoned Tam and Lucy

over.

“Welcome to The Old Grey Dragon,” Clive said, wiping his hand across the seat of his jeans before holding it out for Tam to shake. He looked a little organic himself, Lucy thought, with Medusa black hair cascading onto his blousy white shirt.

Lose the crooked  nose, gappy teeth andtwenty adult years and she could havequite fancied him, in a vampirish sort ofway. “Been following this?” he asked. Hisboyish blue eyes were full of wonder. “It’s absolutely astonishing.”

“What’s happened?” said Lucy. “Hasthe mist gone?”

Clive shook his head. “Late last nightthere were reports of seismic disturbancesin the high Arctic. Really got the ships onfull alert. Around ten this morning, anenormous island of ice floated out of the

mist. Since then, several more have appeared   in   different   geographical locations. The mist has receded, but it’s still covering the central polar region – and they still can’t breach it.”

“What have they found on the islands?”

asked Tam.

Please, let it be bears
, thought Lucy.

Clive chuckled at the question. “I don’tsuppose they’ll let on until the militaryhave been all over them. Hannah’s cousin

is on one of the ships. It’s all very hush hush, isn’t it, Han?”

She clamped her hands together and spoke to Tam. “Let me show you to your rooms. You can sign in later, once you’re settled.   We’re   very   relaxed   about everything here. There’s only one other guest. An elderly lady, Ms Gee. She’s been here for several weeks. She’s

practically a resident.”

Tam picked up his bag. “With all this

talk about dragons I’m surprised you’re

not putting people up in sleeping bags in the grounds.”

“Yes, it’s very quiet,” Hannah said. “Almost ominously so. Do follow me.”

As they recrossed the hall Lucy thought to ask, “What’s the name of your cat?”

“Cat? We don’t have a cat,” Hannah replied.

“Oh, but I saw one in the garden. Smoky fur.”

The  rocket-like   spectacles   almost fizzed. “Really? Well, it wouldn’t be ours. Clive’s allergic to anything with fur. There’s a private house a little higher up the road. They have animals. I expect it strayed down from there.”

Turning swiftly, Hannah led them up a wide-angled   staircase,   beautifully

carpeted in chequered beige. At the top she offered them a choice of rooms, but in the same breath decided that Lucy should have what she called ‘the rose’. It was

obvious what she meant the moment they entered. The walls were papered a delicate shade of pink, and everything from the towels in the bathroom to the

cushions on the chairs and the floral duvet

cover matched it. “Lovely view from here,” said Hannah, marching to the window and opening the shutters. “Right across the Vale.”

“Can you see the horse?” asked Tam, stopping by a fireplace as tall as his shoulder to examine a fist-sized lump of rock on the mantelpiece. It was the same greyish texture as the boulders they’d seen

in the stream.

“No, you’d have to climb the Tor for that,” said Hannah, stepping aside to let Lucy look out, “but it’s only fifteen minutes to the top from here, right out of our kitchen door.”

“There!” Lucy suddenly sprang onto

her toes.