We Sled With Dragons

by C. Alexander London

  38

  WE’RE NOW HERE

  THE SLED BOUNCED along the ground, smashing through piles of snow and rattling from side to side. As it drew closer, Oliver and Celia recognized it as their old dogsled, except the dogs were riding inside with their parents. It looked like their mother and father had tied the harness ropes to what could only be a baby dragon, dragging them in a mad flight to the North Pole.

  Oliver turned to his sister. “How come I can go my whole life without seeing a single dragon, and then I see two in one day?”

  “I guess that’s what being an explorer is all about.” She shrugged. “New experiences.”

  “Right . . .” Oliver nodded, considering it. “It’s not too bad.”

  “If you like that sort of thing,” finished Celia.

  The baby dragon charged straight for them. Their mother and father, both holding the reins, heaving back, pulled the dragon to slow it before it crashed into the twins. It had a large steel bit in its mouth that was actually a piece of the steel research station door.

  The dragon skidded to a stop just in front of the twins. Its long body curled around itself, coiling like a snake, and it lowered its head to study them.

  Their parents’ sled careened sideways, spilling both parents and sled dogs across the ice like a scattered bag of cheese puffs.

  The dragon sniffed at them. Its eyes narrowed to slits. It shrieked.

  Oliver, still distrustful of lizards, jumped behind his sister. Celia, still unwilling to back down to an animal, no matter its size, didn’t even flinch.

  “Down there.” She hitched her thumb toward the scar in the snow where the canyon had sealed itself up again. The dragon sniffed at the ice, gave a nod, and bolted up into the air, trailing the empty dogsled behind. It turned and shot straight down, boring into the ice like a drill and vanishing beneath the surface.

  “How’d you know it wasn’t going to eat us?” Oliver asked, still squeezing onto Celia’s shoulders.

  “It was just a kid,” said Celia. “All it wanted was to go home.”

  “Oliver! Celia!” Their father brushed himself off and raced over to hug them. “You’re okay!”

  Their mother ran to them, squeezing them from the other side so their faces were squished together in a hug, like two ice floes crashing into each other. “I knew you guys would be all right!”

  “How’d you know that?” Oliver grunted.

  “Duh!” said Celia. “Destiny.”

  “Well, sure,” said their mother. “And this.” She pulled their universal remote control from her pocket. “It turns out, watching TV comes in handy.”

  “Told you so,” said Celia.

  “Did you see that?” Their father laughed, hugging the twins when their mother was done. “We rode in on a dragon! Dragons are real!”

  “We know,” said the twins in unison.

  “We named this one Brandon,” said their father, still smiling.

  “So?” Their mother looked all around them at the endless field of ice. She glanced at the old North Pole sign. She turned back to her kids. “Did you . . . find anything?”

  “Were we supposed to be looking for something?” Celia scowled.

  Her mother’s shoulders slumped.

  “Kidding.” Celia shook her head. “Jeez, Mom . . . so serious.”

  “We totally found Atlantis.” Oliver smiled.

  Their mother’s expression brightened.

  “It was a ruined city below the ice, with moats and statues and obelisks,” Celia explained.

  “And dragons,” said Oliver.

  “And talking squirrels,” said Celia.

  “There was a squirrel, anyway,” said Oliver.

  “It talked,” said Celia.

  “Just in your head.”

  “That’s still talking.”

  “It kind of isn’t.”

  “It is.”

  “It isn’t.”

  “It is!”

  “And the library?” Their mother stopped their argument. “Did you find the Lost Library of Alexandria?”

  “Not exactly,” said Oliver.

  Their mother frowned again.

  “But we found something even—” Oliver started, but Celia elbowed him in the side.

  “We didn’t find it,” she said.

  “But we—ow!” She elbowed Oliver again.

  Oliver furrowed his eyebrows at her, but he couldn’t tell what she was thinking.

  “Hmm,” said their mother.

  “We don’t have to worry about Sir Edmund anymore, though,” Celia added. “He came after us, and well . . .” She nodded toward the mound of ice where the canyon used to be.

  “I did the Norwegian Knot!” Oliver boasted. “It worked!”

  “So, I guess you’ll want to keep looking for the Lost Library?” said Celia. She watched her mother’s face closely. A flicker of doubt ran across it, but then she shook her head.

  “No,” said Claire Navel. “Maybe some questions are better left without answers. Anyway, I think I’ve been gone long enough. It’s about time we do like that dragon and go home.”

  Celia smiled. That was what she wanted to hear. Oliver grinned from ear to ear.

  “By the way,” their mom asked. “How did you guys get all the way here without your dogsled?”

  “Odd brought us,” said Oliver.

  “Odd?” Their father looked around.

  “He’s a mailman,” said Oliver.

  “There are no mailmen at the North Pole,” said Dr. Navel.

  “Well, he wasn’t really a mailman,” Celia explained. “He was more like—”

  “An enigma,” smiled Oliver.

  “Exactly,” said Celia.

  “The problem with an enigma,” said their mother, “is that it won’t help us get home. We need a ride.”

  “But we’re in the middle of nowhere,” said Celia.

  Dr. Navel raised his finger in the air and smiled. “Remember that nowhere also spells now here!”

  “Not now, honey.” His wife patted him on the back. “If we stay out here too long, we’ll freeze or starve . . . or both.”

  “That’s not the worst of our problems,” he told her.

  “Freezing and starving sound like pretty bad problems,” said Celia.

  “I agree.” Their father nodded. “But getting eaten is surely worse.”

  The twins and their mother followed Dr. Navel’s gaze to the hungry polar bear loping toward them across the ice. It had traveled for days pursuing their scent and it was not about to give up now.

  Oliver rummaged through his pockets, hoping for one last bag of cheese puffs to give the bear. His pockets were empty. The dogs started barking, but the bear kept coming.

  “We could really use a fighting walrus about now,” said Oliver.

  “Walruses don’t live this far north,” said Dr. Navel.

  “Of course not,” said Oliver with a roll of his eyes. “Why would nature want to help us out?” He turned to Celia. “We could really use one of your deus ex machinas now.”

  “They’re not my deus ex machinas,” said Celia. “They’re just a thing that happens. And on TV, they only happen once. I think we already used ours up.”

  “Mom? Dad?” Oliver looked to his parents.

  “Don’t worry,” said Dr. Navel. “We have never let you get eaten before. We won’t let you get eaten now.”

  Celia had her doubts, and she was about to express them when the bear scratched at the ice and roared. Then, with the full of force of his thousand pounds, he charged the Navel family. Sometimes a polar bear likes to get the last word in an argument.

  39

  WE DON’T RUN AWAY

  OLIVER AND CELIA’S parents threw themselves in front of the twins as the bear surged at them. Their fa
ther puffed out his chest and shouted. Their mother yelled and waved her arms.

  “I think they’ve gone crazy,” said Oliver.

  “They’re trying to establish dominance,” said Celia. “To scare the bear off.”

  “I don’t think it’s working,” said Oliver.

  When the bear had closed the distance between them to a few feet, all six sled dogs jumped onto its back, snarling and biting into the tough fur. The bear thrashed and groaned, shaking and swatting the dogs off into the snow. The Navels turned, grabbed Oliver and Celia by the hands, and started running.

  “We won’t get away!” said Oliver.

  “We’ve done this before!” said Celia.

  “What about the dogs?” said Oliver, glancing back over his shoulder.

  The bear hadn’t given up on a meal of Navels. It was already in pursuit, even as the loyal dogs bit at its heels. They were slowing it down, never relenting, even as the bear’s massive paws swatted them away as easily as we would swat at gnats. Of course, the Siberian husky, at sixty pounds of muscle and fur with powerful canine jaws, could be quite a bit more pesky than a gnat.

  Seeing the Navels getting farther and farther away, the bear bellowed in frustration.

  “We can’t just let it eat the dogs!” said Oliver.

  “It doesn’t want to eat the dogs,” his mother said, pulling him through the snow. “It wants to eat us!”

  “No.” Celia turned. “It wants to eat cheese puffs!”

  “What?” Oliver spun out of his mother’s grasp and watched the bear tearing at a giant pallet of cheese puff bags. The fur of its face was covered in orange dust. Plastic wrapping flew in all directions as it tore the bags apart. The dogs watched from a slight distance, ready to pounce again. The bear glanced back at them, suddenly indifferent, and dug back into its cheesy meal.

  “I told you so!” said Oliver. “Everyone likes cheese puffs!”

  “Where did that come from?” Dr. Navel marveled.

  “There!” Celia pointed at the sky. A plane was circling around, dropping pallets of food from the sky. A whole case of beef jerky smashed into the ice, not far from the cheese puffs. The bear sniffed the air and trudged over to it, ripping into the dried-meat product with abandon. The dogs watched, licking their lips.

  The plane had two large skis on the bottom instead of landing gear, and as it circled, it tipped its wings. They saw the initials C.B. painted on the side.

  “That’s Corey Brandt’s private jet!” said Oliver.

  “I guess we get a celebrity ex machina,” said Celia.

  “Is that a thing?” said Oliver.

  “It is now,” said Celia.

  “I hope he lands in time.” Oliver looked back to the bear, who had glanced up from its meal and turned toward the dogs. It stepped toward them slowly, its head lowered like it was stalking them.

  “Maybe it didn’t like junk food,” said Celia, her heart thumping in her chest. The lead dog had its snout just inches from the bear’s face. The bear lifted one of its paws in the air, preparing to swipe, and the dog stretched its paws on the snow in front of it, lowered its head, and lifted its back in a playful bow.

  “Don’t play!” Oliver shouted. “Run!”

  The bear cocked its head. The dog wagged its tail. And suddenly, the bear rolled over on its belly, the dog jumped on it, and the animals did what comes naturally to anyone who has a full belly and nothing better to do: they played.

  Within seconds, the other dogs had joined in, rolling and jumping around the bear in the snow, barking and yipping and swiping at each other without the slightest hint of violence.

  “I guess they don’t hold a grudge, huh?” said Oliver.

  “The animal kingdom can teach us humans how to live,” said Dr. Navel. “If only we could learn to heed their lessons and treat them with the respect and—”

  “Da-ad,” the kids groaned. “Can we please not have a explorer lecture right now?”

  “Fine.” He sighed, because if anyone had earned the right to not learn anything else, it was Oliver and Celia. They had discovered Atlantis, after all.

  The plane landed and the door opened. Corey Brandt, wearing custom-tailored cold-weather gear, stood smiling at the top of the stairs. “You like the duds?” he asked, showing off his outfit. “Corey Brandt’s Polar Pants! Limited Edition!”

  “Bwak!” Dennis the chicken clucked at his feet, wearing a matching sweater. Patrick the monkey screeched with glee, climbing onto the celebrity’s head.

  “Where’s—” Oliver started, when he heard a loud hiss, and Beverly, the only lizard in the world that Oliver could stand, came scurrying toward him down the steps. It was like a scene from one of Celia’s soap operas. Oliver ran toward her. She ran toward him. And then she stopped, frozen in place.

  “Like all lizards, the Heloderma horridum is cold-blooded,” said Dr. Navel. “She’s in suspended animation now.” Dr. Navel lifted Beverly by the tail. She was stiff as a popsicle. “She’ll be fine once she warms up.”

  “I guess that’s how the dragons live under the ice,” said Oliver.

  “Remind me never to warm up a dragon again,” said Celia.

  “So.” Corey showed them all onto the plane. “Where to now?”

  “We could go look for Sir Edmund’s mysterious zoo,” suggested Dr. Navel.

  “I could show you around Hollywood,” suggested Corey.

  “I have a crazy idea,” said their mother.

  “Oh no,” said Oliver.

  “Oh no,” said Celia.

  “Let’s go home and see if there’s anything good on TV.” She smiled.

  Oliver and Celia exhaled. There was always something good on TV.

  40

  WE DON’T MISS A THING

  “TONIGHT WE PRESENT this year’s Explorers Club Award for Excellence in Exploration to the youngest winners in our club’s history,” Professor Rasmali-Greenberg declared to the packed Great Hall of the Explorers Club in New York City a few weeks later.

  All the gathered adventurers, explorers, daredevils, and globe-trekkers burst into applause. Even the stuffed animal heads all over the walls seemed to smile down on the ceremony. In fact, the only explorers who were not smiling were Oliver and Celia Navel, standing on the stage at the front of the room.

  “I can’t believe we’re the guests of honor at a Ceremony of Discovery,” Oliver whispered to his sister.

  “I can’t believe we have to stand here the whole time,” Celia grumbled back.

  Their father and mother, each dressed in their finest outfits, cheered the loudest of all the explorers. Neither of them had ever been more proud. The Ceremony of Discovery was a time-honored tradition of the Explorers Club, where fortunes were wagered, discoveries declared, and honors awarded. Some of the greatest explorers ever to have held a compass had stood on this very same stage to receive this very same award. Dr. Navel kept using the sleeve of his tuxedo to wipe away his tears. His wife had to hold him steady.

  In the crowd, Sam, who had come all the way from South Sudan, leaned over to whisper to a boy in the red robes of a Buddhist monk, who had come all the way from Tibet, who leaned over to whisper to a boy from the one of the last tribes of sea-nomads on earth, who leaned over to whisper to a girl in a fuzzy wool hat.

  The girl, Oliver and Celia’s friend Qui, nodded at the boys, all Oliver and Celia’s friends from past adventures. She held her hands up in the air where Oliver and Celia could see them from the stage. She wiggled her fingers.

  “That’s the sign,” Celia whispered into Oliver’s ear. “It’s time! We have to go!”

  “We’ve haven’t gotten our medals yet!” Oliver whispered back.

  “And now,” the professor declared to the room, “the medals!” He pulled two shining gold medals from a heavy wooden box. They each hung on bright-blue ribbons and th
ey shined under the gleaming lights of the stage. Oliver’s eyes widened.

  “We’re going to miss the beginning of the show!” Celia said.

  “I want to get my Explorers Club Award for Excellence in Exploration medal,” he answered.

  “That’s a stupid name for an award,” said Celia.

  “It is not,” said Oliver.

  “It is too,” said Celia.

  “It is not,” said Oliver.

  “It is too,” said Celia.

  “It actually is,” said the professor, smiling down at them then turning back to the crowded room, holding the medals high in the air. “Which is why we are renaming it after our newest patron, whose generous donation to the club has paid for this glorious celebration! Let’s have a round of applause for Mr. Corey Brandt and the brand-new Corey Brandt Prize for Excellence in Exploration!”

  Corey Brandt strolled onto the stage, dressed in a crisp black tuxedo, sporting a brand-new hairstyle, which had quickly become the most popular hairstyle in the world, and big smile across his face.

  “You guys are the best,” he told the cheering crowd. He reached down and gave high-fives to some of the people in the front row. Madame Xpertina, world-famous trans-Siberian motocross racer, fainted. Corey Brandt had that effect on some people. They were usually teenage girls, but he had been famous for long enough not to be surprised by the occasional fainting trans-Siberian motocross racer.

  “I’m thrilled to be here tonight,” he said. “To, like, honor my friends, the two bravest kids I’ve ever met, Oliver and Celia Navel! The greatest explorers in history!”

  He gave them a sideways wink and Celia couldn’t help but wink back. Oliver gave Corey a thumbs up.

  “I’m also excited,” Corey continued, “that tonight we’ll see the premiere of my newest made-for-TV movie, The Accidental Adventures of Celia and Oliver Navel!”

  Again the whole room burst into applause, although this time Oliver and Celia happily joined in.