‘That depends.’ I braced myself, planting my feet firmly on the pavement. ‘What are you going to ask for in payment?’
She chuckled. ‘No more than you can afford, country girl. This time I’m just looking for information.’
I narrowed my eyes at her suspiciously, then shrugged. ‘Fine.’ I fell into step beside her, turning away from the useless male human without regret.
A whooshing sigh of relief sounded behind us as we left. Humans! It was as if no one had ever asked him a simple question before.
I would never understand this species.
‘So,’ Silke said brightly, as she led me back on to a busy shopping street, ‘what business do you have at that chocolate house you’re looking for? Because you know no one like us would ever be allowed inside.’
We’ll see about that. I stayed silent, firmly closing my lips.
‘No answers, eh?’ She gave me a mischievous grin. ‘All right, I don’t mind making up my own stories to explain it. How about … your family had to sneak out of Drachenburg fifty years ago to escape their enemies, but before they left they buried half of their fabulous treasure in a secret hiding place under that shop. Now you’re going back to sneak it out again and become a rich girl with a dozen servants! Am I right?’
‘What kind of fool would ever leave treasure behind them?’ I shook my head at her in disgust. ‘That doesn’t make any sense.’ Even humans wouldn’t be stupid enough to abandon their own hoards … would they?
‘Not that, then.’ Silke sounded pleased. ‘Hmm, let’s see …’ She led me swiftly down the street, weaving gracefully through the bustling crowd. ‘In that case, maybe you’re actually a noblewoman in disguise, and –’
‘Don’t you have anything better to do than make up stories about me?’ I asked. ‘More clothes to sell to country girls, maybe?’
‘Oh, I don’t spend all day selling clothes,’ said Silke. ‘That’s my brother’s job. Dieter likes sitting in one place. I prefer to keep on my feet and see what happens in my city. And you’re the most interesting thing that’s happened here in a while.’
She hummed to herself, rocking back and forth on her boot heels as we waited at a street corner for a tangle of carriages to pass. The horses neighed at each other in fury, and the people shouted in angry counterpoint, but a dangerous-looking smile spread across Silke’s face. ‘I know. Maybe you’re the first human ever to escape from the fairies’ underground kingdom in Elfenwald, and that’s why you don’t know how anything works in the normal world!’
‘What?’ The knot of carriages finally parted, but I didn’t move. My mouth dropped open as I glared at my guide, torn between disbelief and smoking outrage. ‘You think I’d ever have anything to do with fairies?’
Of course dragons were wary of humans, but we absolutely despised fairies. They might not have been spotted above ground in over a hundred years, but my family still told stories about how infuriating they were.
Only a few, dangerous humans could use magic, but fairies had so much of it, it glowed out of their skin like internal fire … and they were determined to cause mischief, especially for dragons. The only good thing about them, Grandfather always said, was that now that they’d all gone into hiding underground, we didn’t have to eat them to get rid of them any more.
Apparently, they tasted terrible.
But Silke laughed, a bright peal of delight, as she looked at my outraged face. ‘Well, well. That finally got your attention, didn’t it?’ She tugged my arm, pulling me towards the street. ‘If you really want to stop people wondering where you come from, by the way, you might want to think about changing more than your clothes. Who’s ever heard of a girl named Aventurine?’ She shook her head, a glint of mischief in her eyes. ‘I know. How about we call you Eva? That’s a nice ordinary name, with no mysteries at all. Just the way you like it, right?’
‘Argh!’ Gritting my teeth, I pulled my arm free and stomped across the street, turning the next corner at Silke’s direction … then rocked to a sudden halt as my nose picked up an amazing scent.
There!
‘The third district,’ Silke said cheerfully. ‘We aren’t far now!’
The identical yellow-and-white buildings of the first district were gone, replaced by houses of every colour. Skinny pink buildings stood pressed against bright blue, yellow or green ones, all rising high into the sky, with shops spilling out of their bottom floors on to the pavements outside. The chocolate smell was coming from only a few doors away, tugging at me like a delicious promise.
I didn’t see any chocolate, though, only humans, dressed every bit as ridiculously here as they had been in the first district. If anything, the men’s neck-knots were even more elaborate, and the women’s skirts billowed even wider.
And all of the women in dresses had long hair. Why hadn’t I noticed that part before? I’d been trying so hard to make myself look respectable with my new clothes, but had I ruined everything by letting my hair be cut?
Something very strange happened inside me as I looked from one long-haired woman to another in the street around me. It was as if my chest was growing smaller and tighter with every step. I could barely fit my breath through it any more. Worse still, something was pulsing hard and fast against my throat, as if a tiny bird had got trapped there and was trying to batter its way out.
‘The chocolate house is just up ahead,’ Silke told me. ‘Come on, mysterious Aventurine-from-nowhere. They’ll never let us in to join their fancy customers, but you might as well take a peek through their windows now that we’ve come all this way.’
Never let us in.
My feet wouldn’t shift when I tried to lift them.
What was happening to my new body?
I rubbed one hand against my chest, trying to loosen it back to normal. But my tiny new heart beat so rapidly against my hand, I knew immediately that something had gone horribly wrong with it.
Did human hearts often go wrong for no reason? What would happen if mine exploded inside me now, as I stood only a few doors down from the source of that delicious chocolate smell? I’d never eat any chocolate again! But then, I might never taste chocolate again anyway if the guard at this chocolate house took one look at my too-short hair and turned me away without a second thought. Then I’d have nowhere to go, and no chocolate, ever, and …
Whooosh!
I staggered and fell forward. Clamping my hands around my knees, I fought to draw a full breath.
‘Aventurine? What’s wrong?’ Silke’s voice sounded far away – miles from my malfunctioning body.
No, no, no, this cannot be happening!
I would not let my new body fail me. Not now! I was only a few doors away from all my hopes for the future. Of all the times in my life when I had to be healthy and strong, now was the single most important moment. I had to look and act like a normal, respectable human. I had to –
‘And stay out!’ bellowed a female voice three doors ahead of me.
My head shot up. A tall, pale-skinned boy had just come hurtling out of that doorway that smelt of heaven. My stomach sank as I took in the sight of him.
From his elaborate neck-knot to his boring dark trousers, he was the most respectable-looking human I’d seen all day. And they’d still thrown him out on to the street?
I don’t have a chance.
But no. This boy had run outside himself, and now he spun back around to shake his fist at the doorway. ‘I’d never come back even if you begged me! You’re the most unreasonable chocolatier in this entire city. You don’t care about anything except your stupid rules, and –’
‘And you know nothing of good chocolate!’ the voice bellowed back. ‘I should never have hired you. All you care about are appearances, not quality!’
‘Ha!’ The boy jerked his chin up as he smoothed down his green coat. ‘It’s no wonder no one important ever comes here, with an attitude like that. You’ll be closed down within half a year if you’re lucky. Less than that, when I
tell my uncle how you – aaargh!’ He ducked as something came flying through the air after him.
‘I won’t forget this!’ he yelled as he turned away, protecting his head with both arms. ‘And neither will my family! No one respectable will come anywhere near you or your stupid hole-in-the-wall shop ever again!’
A wordless roar of rage billowed out of the doorway and followed after him as he ran away and disappeared around the corner.
‘Phew.’ Silke let out a low whistle. ‘Maybe we should wait a minute or two before we look through those windows, eh? Or try a different chocolate house?’
‘Are you joking?’ I shook my head as I straightened. My heartbeat had slowed down again. I could breathe. And my chest felt just fine. In fact, I felt excellent. ‘This is absolutely perfect!’
I might not know what had caused my human body to go wild for a few minutes, but I knew exactly the sort of sound that had just come from inside that shop. And I couldn’t wait to meet whoever had just made it.
‘You’re delirious.’ Silke stared at me. ‘No wonder you almost fainted. Why don’t I take you back to the market now? We can find you some food, talk about where you really come from, and –’
‘No.’ I unfolded my scale-cloth and pulled out the single silver coin that I had left. ‘Thank you for your help,’ I told her, holding out the money. ‘Maybe I will see you again sometime after all.’
‘I can’t take that!’ She held her hands flat in front of her, looking horrified, as she backed away from my outstretched hand. ‘It’s all you have left, remember? And anyway, it’s too much. All I did was show you the way to a wild woman’s chocolate house!’
For the first time ever, I touched a human on purpose, folding Silke’s long brown fingers securely over the coin. ‘Trust me,’ I told her. ‘That’s exactly what I was looking for.’
The closer I came to the open front door, the more incredible it smelt.
The Chocolate Heart, read the sign over the entrance. Once I’d said goodbye to Silke, I had to use my bony human elbows to force my way past all the other whispering onlookers, but I ignored their complaints and glowering looks. After all, none of them seemed to want to go into the shop, despite the delectable smells wafting out from it. So it only made sense for them to make way for serious visitors.
Not that there were many in the Chocolate Heart itself. As I stepped through the front door, breathing in the incredible scent of pure chocolate, I saw empty table after empty table in the small, flame-coloured front room. The only customers I spotted were sitting clustered around three gold-coloured tables near the back, watching with obvious horror as two humans argued in the centre of the room, their arms waving wildly and their voices rising louder and louder with every word.
The taller one, a man with dark brown skin who looked as if he was in physical pain, said, ‘You can’t just go around behaving like –’
‘He was poisoning my chocolate!’ bellowed the woman. She was short and stocky and golden-skinned, and I recognised her voice immediately. ‘He should never have been allowed in my kitchen in the first place!’
‘He was not poisoning the chocolate!’ The man spun around to wave frantically at the remaining customers, two of whom had already got to their feet and started to sidle nervously towards the door. ‘That was only a figure of speech. Please do not pass it on! You know what a perfectionist our great chocolatier is. She only means –’
‘He was poisoning it!’ snarled the woman. ‘What else would you call it, when he was deliberately ruining the flavour of my chocolate by using substandard ingredients? He was too lazy to grate the fresh nutmeg, so –’
‘He is the lord mayor’s nephew,’ said the man. He clenched his fingers in his short wiry hair and tugged at it in what looked like desperation. ‘Not everything is about chocolate! Can’t you understand that?’
‘Ha!’ The woman snorted and crossed her big arms. ‘Maybe in those fancy first-district shops it’s not, but in my chocolate house –’
‘Even if you had to dismiss him, could you not have just tried to be polite, for once in your life?’ the man demanded, as the remaining customers sneaked past me out of the front door. ‘Couldn’t you have recommended him to a chef at one of the local restaurants to get rid of him without insult? Or –’
‘He should feel lucky I didn’t toss him into my oven!’ the woman roared, as the final few customers fled the shop. She spun around and pointed one accusing finger at the doorway where I stood. ‘I can tell you right now, if he ever dares show his face here again …’ She halted, her own face crunching into a furious scowl as her gaze finally landed on me. ‘And what are you looking at?’
What was I looking at? For the first time since my transformation, my human lips stretched into a sincere smile all on their own.
The smell of heavenly chocolate rose all around me. The walls blazed with colour, a gorgeous, hot blend of orange and crimson. The woman before me had a roar that would have made any dragon proud. And I’d just found a chocolate house that really was all about the chocolate.
‘I’m your new apprentice,’ I told her.
I knew exactly what I was looking at: my new home.
CHAPTER 9
‘Ha!’ said the woman again, and flung both her arms into the air. Turning sharply, she marched towards the pair of doors at the back of the room. ‘Apprentices – pah! I’ve had enough of them.’
The man closed his eyes for a moment as she passed him, lines popping up all over his forehead. Then he sighed and looked at me. ‘Ah …’ His weary gaze travelled from my short spiky dark hair to the red toes of my shoes, peeping out from underneath my new purple-and-gold dress. ‘We will be looking for a new apprentice, it is true, but I’m afraid right now isn’t ideal timing, and –’
‘I’ll grate all the nutmeg!’ I said. Whatever that is. ‘I won’t skip any steps or use any substandard ingredients, ever. I’ll do anything you tell me to, to make the chocolate better. That’s all I want – to learn how to make the best chocolate ever.’
The woman paused, turning back to look at me with one hand already resting on the door in front of her. ‘The best chocolate ever, eh?’ The face-fur over her eyes lowered as she studied me, her dark eyes piercing.
‘Chocolate is my passion,’ I told her.
‘Oh, for … !’ The man let out a pained half-laugh and shook his head. ‘We appreciate your enthusiasm, young lady, but may I ask: do you have any actual references? Any chefs who can vouch for your talents? Or any connections to important civic leaders or members of this community?’
‘No.’ My chest was starting to tighten again, my breath growing shorter, as I felt all of my lovely warm certainty start to slide away from me. ‘But … it’s all about the chocolate here, isn’t it?’
There was a moment of silence as the man and woman looked at each other.
I clenched my hands around my folded-up scale-cloth and forced myself to stay silent as they argued without words.
Finally, the man let out a hissing breath through his teeth. ‘Yes,’ he said tightly, ‘of course the chocolate is the most important part. But still – does your family have any influence at all? Any connections that might help our shop?’
They both turned their heads towards me, waiting for my answer.
I swallowed hard, conscious of Silke standing outside the window with the rest of the crowd, watching everything that happened inside with intense curiosity.
At least she wouldn’t be surprised. She’d told me that I would never be allowed to stay inside a place like this.
‘No,’ I said numbly. ‘No connections at all. Just – chocolate.’
‘Right.’ He sighed and shook his head. ‘In that case –’
‘Quite,’ the woman said briskly. ‘I think we’re finished here, don’t you?’ She pushed against the two back doors with both hands, and they swung wide open, emitting a burst of scent that made my mouth water. ‘Well?’ she demanded. ‘Are you coming or not, girl?’
‘I’m coming!’ I said, and hurried after the chocolatier before she could change her mind.
‘Think of it this way, Horst.’ Marina tossed the words back over her shoulder. ‘If this girl hasn’t got any fancy connections, then no one important will be offended when I toss her out on her ear for being useless. That should make you happy!’
He only let out a groan in reply.
But I didn’t have any time to worry about the future. I needed every bit of my attention right now for the cavern full of chocolatey bliss lying before me.
There were enough jewel colours in Marina’s kitchen to make any dragon hum with pleasure. The clean white walls were lined with shelves of tall, curving pots made of glinting silver, copper and gold, along with stacks of blue-and-white porcelain cups with intricately curling and ornamented handles. If I’d been back home in my cavern, I would have spent hours running my claws around every one of them, inspecting them with pure delight.
But they weren’t the best part of the kitchen. Not by a long way.
Where the front room had been painted the colours of fire, this room was full of flames, smoke and heat that didn’t have to be imagined. A big white oven bulked in front of me with a long piece of heavy stone laid on top of one of its grates. On my right, a long charcoal brazier billowed more smoke into the room, while two copper kettles and a massive silver-coloured pot cooked above it. On my left, a giant fireplace filled one full wall of the room, sending out so much heat I could have basked in front of it for hours.
A funny gold-coloured metal contraption hung over the hot fire, suspended on a long, thin bar, smoking with heat and turning over and over again without any human hand touching it. With each new turn, a shower of rattles erupted inside the metal casing, as if a whole pile of small, hard pebbles was being roasted inside it … but as I breathed in deeply my nose assured me that whatever was hidden within was much, much more intriguing than mere pebbles.
The Dragon with a Chocolate Heart Page 6
