The Last Dragon Chronicles: Dark Fire (33 page)

“We’re pretty sure Gawaine – the mother – transferred most of her power to her son before she went into stasis, and that’s how something as huge as the icecap came to be created when he shed his fire

tear into the ocean. It’s an awesome feat, even though the dragons that made it possible might have deemed it wasteful. But when you think of the influence the icecap has had, not just on the climate, but on the variety and density of life this planet supports, then Gawain has at least fulfilled the most basic principle of dragon ideology: through him dragons

have commingled with Gaia and earned their right to be called the spiritual guardians of the Earth. The only thing that’s really in debate is whether the outcome was accidental or altruistic.”

“And I suppose you’ve got a theory on

that?”

“Not yet. We’ll know more when the

old Wearle has risen.”

Zanna rubbed the back of her neck. So

many questions she wanted answered, not least what would happen to Alexa when the ‘old Wearle’, as David put it, was brought back. “What did you mean when you said that the other dragons made it possible  for  Gawain  to   create  the icecap?”

“Have a look at the magazine. Steiner’s

translation gives a pretty good account of their final meeting. At the end of the last colonisation, eleven male dragons came together on Hella and cried their fire tears through their unnatural eye, into a hollow in the floor of a cave. I should explain that all dragons have a defect in the duct in one eye, a kind of sac that won’t allow the whole tear to pass. It’s considered to be a kind of safety mechanism, a secondchance blessing from Godith; a dragon shedding its tear in this way will always retain a little of its spark. The eleven who went through with this ritual wouldn’t have been able to function for long on the modest amounts of energy they’d be left with, but they would have had enough to enable them to fly to a mountain top and

hibernate for a few thousand years, by which time their tears would regenerate. The supreme tear as it came to be called, the one they’d pooled, was  given to Gawaine. Steiner’s translation has her

drinking it, but it’s more likely she would have just snorted it up through her nose. Whatever the means, it would have endowed her with enormous power.”

“But the tear wasn’t meant to end up in

the
 
ocean
, surely?”

“No,” David said. “Gawaine’s task was to use it to destroy the Ix.”

“How?” Zanna asked, framing the word carefully.

David sighed and looked around the room, as if everything in it was a treasure to him. “We think her Wearle had adopted

the same approach as ours. She was probably expected to open herself for illumination, with the idea of drawing the Ix to her. Such a vast amount of power would have pulled them all in. Once the Ix had commingled with her, she’d have sacrificed herself in the Fire Eternal. End

of dragons. End of Ix.”

“But instead we have an icecap, and

the Ix are still around.”

He nodded, looking serious. “For somereason the transcendence never came

about and Gawaine went into stasis

instead, giving birth to a son along the way. Maybe it was something to do with him. Or maybe she just couldn’t cope with the moral consequences of what she’d been asked to do.” Stepping forward, he

touched  Zanna’s arm, letting his hand slide down to her elbow. “We know that the Ix

were fond of commingling with chosen members of the human race, inciting them to acts of aggression against the dragons. The Wearle on Hella must have been

prepared to accept there would be human casualties if their plan to defeat the Ix went ahead. But if the Ix got wind of their intended fate they could have tried to shelter themselves by commingling en masse with human hosts, forcing Gawaine into a dreadful dilemma: kill her natural

enemy, yes – but wipe out their largely

innocent hosts as well.”

Zanna looked away. “This is what Lizwouldn’t talk about to Lucy. She hintedsomething to me when you came back

from Africa.”

David nodded again. “Liz learned of itwhen Steiner rang Arthur at his office afew days ago to tell him the translationwas done. She didn’t know, of course, thatthe Gawaine Steiner spoke about was
their
 
Gawain’s mother.”

“And you didn’t think to put them straight?”

David  opened  his  hands.   “What difference would it have made? The

knowledge is just as hurtful either way. As I said, we’ll know the full story when Gawaine rises from Glissington.”

“And  then  what?”   Zanna   turned

towards  the  door.  “The Wearle tries

again? With better odds? Keeping their scaly claws crossed there aren’t six and a

half billion Ix out there so they can leave a

few worthless human survivors behind?”

“It’s not like that,” David said, but she

had already stormed away.

He threw his head back and looked at

the ceiling, at the luminescent stars he’d

once   helped   Lucy   stick  up   there. Sometimes he wished he could be nothing more than a speck of cosmic dust among them.

In those few small seconds of gloom,he missed the entrance of Gruffen – and

would have probably missed him entirely were it not for the sound of the guard dragon’s coughing.

David saw him hovering by Lucy’s lampshade.   “Gruffen,  what  are  you doing?”

Hrrr!
 
said the dragon. Cleaning. Heproduced a small feather duster andproceeded to demonstrate. A cloud of dustflew up off the lampshade.

David shook his head.
 
This whole

house  is  going  crazy
,   he  thought. “Gwillan would be proud of you,” he said, not realising, as he walked away, just how much truth lay in those words…

Into the Tor

At exactly one o’clock, Tam and Lucyturned up in the kitchen where Hannahwas already waiting for them, dressed inthe clothes she’d walked out in at dawn.

Handing them both a torch, she beckonedthem across the room to a sturdyfarmhouse door. She rattled it off its latch

and switched on a light. The cold sigh of dampness   entered  the  kitchen.  Lucy glanced into the open doorway. At the bottom of a flight of red-brick steps she saw the outline of wine racks and a dented

beer barrel. Beyond that, only shadows.

“Close the door behind you,” Hannah whispered to Tam. She was down the steps in seconds like a ferret, warning

them to crouch when they reached the cellar proper. Lucy went down gingerly and sideways, yet still managed to slip halfway and crack flakes of whitewashed plaster off the walls.

“Sorry,” she muttered, stepping onto a concrete floor that rang like the slap of a wet pavement.

Hannah took her hand and drew her

into the light. “That’s the hardest part done with. Now, follow me.”

She led them in single file past the wine, into a small utility area lit by a row of bulkhead lights heavy with  spider webs and condensation. At the cellar end she

put her torch into her pocket and called Tam forward, asking him to move aside a large section of tongue and grooved

timber propped against the wall. Another gasp of stale air blew into the cellar as his efforts uncovered a hole in the brickwork

behind the wood. With the air came a

whistling moan. The scent of dampness intensified. Lucy’s heartbeat rose. A drip of water crowned her shoulder, making her give a little peep of fear.

Hannah   said   quietly,   “Don’t   be concerned about rats, we haven’t seen one down here for weeks.”

Lucy, undecided about whether hermouth wanted to construct the question ‘rats?’ or ‘weeks?’, merely gulped.

Hannah smiled and flicked another

switch, and there before them lay a roughhewn tunnel, cut upwards from floor level to a height of about five feet. It was lit by

a string of candle-shaped bulbs, stapled to the wooden beams which held back the

earth to either side and above. It continued

for some twenty yards into the hill before the trail curved away to the left.

“Welcome to our best-kept secret,” said Hannah.

“Doesn’t look terribly safe,” said Tam, nodding at the slews of fallen earth which banked the pathway on either side.

Hannah shone her torch into his face.

“All adventures carry a little danger, Mr Farrell. Not getting cold feet, already, are you?” She didn’t give him the option to respond. “Watch where you’re treading. It’s very slippery until we reach the excavations proper. Aim your lights down for now.”

“Does Clive know we’re doing this?”

Hannah had already stooped into the entrance and had to twist back to answer

Tam’s question. She smiled like a wide-mouthed  frog.   “He’s  keeping  watch

upstairs.”

Without waiting for a comment she

continued forward.

Tam held Lucy back for a second. “Becareful. Stay close. Just in case… ”

“In case what?” she hissed anxiously. Any moment, Hannah would turn andquery the delay.

In case it’s a trap
 
, he wanted to say. The auma from his right hand was urgingcaution. But all he said was, “Any timeyou want to go back, just say.”

She frowned, then bent down and

followed Hannah.

Thankfully, the back-breaking turkeytrot only lasted for about a minute. Afterthat, even Tam was able to straighten upfully as Clive’s makeshift tunnel brokethrough into a professionally-dug one. Thearea was well-lit and stocked with a

number   of   kerosene   lamps,  digging implements, rope and several boxes of Lucy knew not what. (She imagined the possibility of dynamite, and shuddered.) The new tunnel stretched left and right for a few metres before plunging into darkness both ways. Hannah handed each of them a kerosene lamp, explaining they would light them further ahead and leave them as markers. She then took a sharp left turn, warning them to expect sheer

blackness for a while and suggesting that they group together and pool their torchlight as best they could. Lucy dropped in beside Tam, letting her light glance off the wall so she wouldn’t crash into the framework of beams. Every now and then more bulkhead light fittings glinted at her like the cat’s eye reflectors that guided motorists in the road at night. She wondered why they couldn’t be switched on, but was afraid she’d just seem silly if she asked. Instead, she did something that Hannah had advised against and looked back the way they’d come. Seeing nothing but the diminishing tawny glow at the junction, she was suddenly struck by the closeness of the earth pressing in and her insignificant mass

compared to that of the Tor.

“I’m scared,” she said to Tam. “It’s hard to breathe.” His nod acknowledged the truth of this. The air was plentiful enough but its texture was thick with decomposition   and,   despite   the omnipresent tick of dripping water, it now lacked humidity.

“How far do we have to go?” he asked Hannah, offering Lucy his arm for support.

Hannah’s light wobbled and veered to the right. “Stop here.” Her lamp clanked as she crouched down. Within seconds she

had removed the glass and lit it. She positioned it on a ledge which seemed to have been deliberately constructed for the purpose. Lucy was never more thankful to see Tam’s face. He was looking ahead,

throwing his torch into the shadows.

“Is this a fork?” he asked.

“One of several,” said Hannah. “Go left and you’ll find a dead end. The diggers created many, usually where they struck rock. Clive filled most of them in

with the soil he needed to displace; the soil from the cellar tunnel went to make

the water feature in our back garden.”

Tam played his torch around. “I thought this was purely an earth mound, no rock?”

“You’d have to ask Clive; I’m not a geologist,” said Hannah. “Shall we go on?”

Lucy, who’d recovered a little for thebreak in walking, nodded.

Twice more they stopped to lightmarker lamps. By  then, the route had

narrowed again in those places where Clive   had   continued   his   personal explorations. Before they set off on the final leg, Lucy realised she was beginning to shake. Not that it was cold. Quite the opposite, in fact. Like the cave she’d spent time in on the Tooth of Ragnar, the air here was surprisingly warm. What was getting to her now was the weight of responsibility which lay with her ancestry. They had to be close to the dragon.

Hannah saw this in her face and said, “Maybe now would be a good time to sing?”

Tam rested a hand on Lucy’s arm. “No one’s talked about the danger of the tunnels collapsing, Hannah. Assuming Lucy is able to wake the creature, there’s

going to be a large amount of earth dislodged.” His mind was going back to the TV scenes from Svalbard.