Dragon Gold

by Shoo Rayner

  He’d trained Tân to return to the box by giving him a nice juicy worm as his reward for doing it right.

  ‘Are you ready, Harri?’ Mr Davies called across the playground.

  ‘Yes, sir!’ Harry answered.

  Mr Davies held up his stopwatch. ‘I’ll start counting the moment your dragon starts flying.’ He winked at the other children. ‘I can’t wait to see this. It’s powered by sausages, you know?!’

  ‘Sausages!’ The children laughed – and while everyone was distracted, Harri gave Tân the command to leave the box.

  ‘Dragon up!’

  With a flutter of wings, and a tiny mew of excitement, Tân rose gently into the air.

  A murmur of awe and amazement swept across the tiny crowd. Harri heard a tapping and realised that all the other pupils were watching from their classroom windows.

  ‘Wow, sir,’ Ben sighed. ‘It looks just like a little Welsh Dragon, it … it looks so real. It’s amazing!’

  Harri didn’t want anyone to think Tân was real. All Tân had to do was fly for ten seconds. And that’s all he did.

  ‘Seven … Eight … Nine … Ten!’ Mr Davies called. ‘Well done, Harri!’

  ‘And … dragon down.’ Harri slowly lowered the aerial of his control unit until it was pointing at the box. Tân knew the signal. Gently, with a scaly, papery fluttering, he descended right into the dark interior. Harry reached into his pocket for the last bit of Megan’s sausage-end as a treat. Then he closed the box and made sure it was shut tight.

  He’d done it. Or rather Tân had done it. He’d behaved himself perfectly!

  ‘That was magnificent, Harri!’ Mr Davies cheered. ‘A real commendation for the power of sausages! And did you make that all by yourself?’

  Harri raised an eyebrow and appeared to nod. He wasn’t actually claiming that he’d made Tân with his own hands, but then again, he wasn’t saying that he hadn’t.

  Mr Davies shook his head in amazement. ‘Well, Harri, that was a fantastic display. Now let’s see what you can do, Ryan.’

  The class cooed as Ryan opened his box and put the pieces of his plane together.

  ‘So what sort of a dragon is that?’ Mr Davies asked suspiciously.

  ‘It’s a Chinese dragon,’ Ryan explained. ‘It’s a model of the J-20 Mighty Dragon Stealth Fighter.’

  ‘Oh, very good!’ said Mr Davies. ‘Yes, I suppose that fits within the rules just fine. Did your dad help you with it?’

  ‘A little,’ said Ryan, pulling a twisted smile.

  Mr Davies held out his stopwatch. ‘Ready when you are, Ryan.’

  Ryan switched his switches and went through his pre-flight checks. The Tornado 3000 ultra-light power fan roared into action. The plane juddered on the playground tarmac and began to roll.

  The class ooh-ed as it picked up speed and then ah-ed as it lifted off the ground and woah-ed as Ryan managed to steer the plane away before it crashed into the nursery Portakabins.

  He wasn’t as good a pilot as his dad, who had given him strict instructions.

  ‘Don’t try to be clever. All you have to do is keep it up in the air for ten seconds. Don’t do barrel rolls or take it up too steeply and stall it in mid-air. Just let it fly, nice and gently, for ten seconds.’ He’d said it over and over again.

  Now that the moment had arrived, Ryan felt a real temptation to show off, to dive-bomb the little crowd and give them a scare. But he knew what his dad would say if he lost the competition. Ryan was as good as gold. He did exactly as he’d been instructed and made the plane fly around in circles.

  ‘Seven … Eight … Nine … Ten!’ Mr Davies called. ‘Well done, Ryan!’

  Ryan brought the J-20 into a bumpy landing and ran over to recover the craft before anyone else could touch it. It was so light and fragile, it could easily get broken.

  There was an eruption of banging and tapping of windows and muffled cheering as the whole school showed their appreciation from inside.

  * * *

  ‘Well,’ said Mr Davies, back in the classroom, ‘We seem to have joint winners. Two dragons flew for over ten seconds so they will have to share the Dragon Gold!’

  It was just as Ryan and Harri had suspected. With a flourish worthy of a magician Mr Davies pulled a bag of chocolate money from his top drawer. The class groaned. They’d been hoping for something more special.

  Secretly, so had Ryan and Harri, but they knew Mr Davies and his little jokes by now. They weren’t surprised.

  ‘So, are you going to share the prize? You can swap around, so one of you has it one week and the other the next!’ Mr Davies thought this idea was hilarious.

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Ryan. It was a bit of an anti-climax. He wasn’t sure what his dad would think. He’d never lost before.

  Harri was disappointed too. Coming first equal wasn’t actually winning, was it? He’d really wanted to win.

  * * *

  Ryan’s dad waited in the car. ‘Act cool,’ he told himself over and over. He didn’t want anyone thinking that he was bothered who won!

  Tiny snowflakes were falling from the sky. The latest weather forecast had threatened a real covering. It looked like school might be closed tomorrow. Good thing he had four-wheel drive on the Range Rover.

  He spotted Ryan and Harri walking across the playground towards him.

  ‘Well?’ he asked, expectantly.

  Ryan’s shoulders dropped. He looked at Harri, pulled a face and said, ‘Harri and I came equal first.’

  The two boys gazed into his eyes, wondering how he’d react.

  ‘Well … that’s … w-w-wonderful,’ he stammered, regaining his composure. ‘So who gets the prize?’ The prize is the most important thing, he thought to himself.

  Ryan held up the bag of chocolate money. ‘We share it,’ he said, gloomily. ‘Harri’s dragon was amazing!’ he told his dad. ‘I don’t know how he made it. It looked almost real. It flew really well.’

  ‘Can I see it?’ Ryan’s dad motioned at the box.

  ‘Err … it’s kind of top secret,’ Harri explained. ‘You keep the Gold,’ he said. ‘Your plane was fantastic, you deserve it.’

  Ryan’s dad nodded wisely. ‘We’ll keep it safe while we decide what’s fair.’ But already his brain was whirring. Somehow, he was going to win that Dragon Gold fair and square!

  * * *

  Ryan’s dad pressed the button on the controller and the conservatory blinds rolled up, revealing a winter wonderland outside. The snow was nearly ten centimetres deep all round. It frosted the trees and made strange shapes on the birdbath and garden furniture.

  ‘No school today!’ he called up the stairs to Ryan.

  He put the kettle on for a nice pot of tea and started a plan whirring around in his head.

  * * *

  ‘That’s your phone bleeping,’ said Harri’s mum. The shop never sold anything on snow days, so she was catching up with the bills and paperwork.

  Harri picked up the phone and read the text message. It was from Ryan.

  Want to do aerial battle? Dad says the last one in the air gets the prize.

  Harri felt the blood pump through his veins. Now there was a challenge! He knew he and Tân would win.

  When and where? Harri texted back.

  The challenge came back in an instant.

  11 in the park, in front of the Plas.

  Harri smiled. This was it.

  C U there, he typed.

  ‘I’m going to meet Ryan in the park, Mum,’ Harri called from the back door. He was sneaking Tân out in his box, before Mum could work out what he was doing.

  ‘Have you dressed up warm?’ Mum called out.

  ‘Yeah, and I’ve got my hat and gloves and wellies!’ he shouted down the corridor.

  Imelda poked her head round the shop door, winked and mouthed the words, ‘Good luck!’

  Chapter Nine

  The streets were silent. Hardly anyone was about. The black Range Rover was parked outside the gates of
the Plas. Tân’s box was getting heavy now and it was hard-going, trudging through the snow.

  Ryan’s dad was sprinkling salt on the tarmac apron that surrounded the front of the Plas. It was where summer fetes were held and where people stood to watch firework displays.

  They’d brought big red plastic snow scoops with them and cleared a perfect runway. The salt was acting quickly to turn whatever was left into a trickle of water.

  ‘Perfect!’ Ryan’s dad brushed his hands together. He took his glove off, licked his finger and checked that the wind was still blowing in the right direction for the plane.

  ‘Right,’ he said, ‘this is what I propose. The last dragon in the air will be the winner.’ He was desperate to see Harri’s dragon. How could he have built something as good as his J-20?

  That suited Harri just fine. He knew that the J-20’s batteries would run out long before Tân was ready to call it a day. ‘Okay,’ Harri said, meekly. ‘I’ll go and get set up over there.’

  Harri set Tân’s box down by the rhododendrons. It was a bit warmer now and the snow was slowly sliding off the shiny, green leaves.

  ‘This is it!’ Harri whispered to Tân. ‘Stay where you are until I give you the word.’

  Tân looked up at him with bright, shining eyes. Harri was convinced the animal understood everything he said. Sometimes Tân seemed to do things before Harri had asked him to, almost as if he could read his mind.

  ‘Ready?’ Ryan’s dad called out. Reluctantly, he gave Ryan the remote control. He had to keep reminding himself that this was between Ryan and Harri.

  ‘Ready,’ Harri replied. He winked at Tân and Tân winked back.

  Harri pointed the remote control at the box and flicked the switch to turn the light bulb on. He had to keep up the appearance of being in charge of a model.

  ‘Go!’ Ryan’s dad clapped his gloves together.

  The Mighty Tornado 3000 ultra-light power fan wound itself up to full speed. It was much louder here, in the deadening silence of the snow. Once again, it began to roll down the runway, picking up speed, shaking and rattling, as its tiny wheels hit small bumps in the tarmac.

  As it came past Harri, the front wheel lifted off the ground.

  ‘Dragon up!’ Harri ordered. Tân burst into life. He shot out of the box and hovered a metre off the ground while he took in the situation and got his bearings.

  ‘Bloomin’ heck!’ Ryan’s dad gasped. He knew what it would take to build a model dragon, and he knew what it would take to build one that could do what he’d just seen.

  Tân was in his element. He flew round the rhododendrons a couple of times and swooped up and over the roof of the Plas.

  Ryan was barely in control of the J-20 Mighty Dragon. He had it set to fly in a gentle circle round the fountain and snow-covered rose beds. Tân hadn’t flown with anything else before. This looked like fun. As he swooped down to investigate, his slipstream made the model plane wobble and stall for a moment.

  Tân came back for more. This time his claw caught the delicate fabric of the plane’s wing and tore a large gash in the surface.

  Ryan’s remote control began emitting an urgent beeping sound.

  ‘Thirty-five seconds of power remaining,’ Ryan announced.

  Ryan’s dad could not believe that he was being out-flown by a boy.

  ‘Right! Give me that, Ryan. We are under attack. This means WAR-R-R-R-R-R!’

  He grabbed the remote control from Ryan and pushed his son out of the way. Ryan tripped and landed on his bottom in a pile of slushy snow.

  His dad flipped up a red cover on the control unit and let his thumb hover over a button that glowed red for danger.

  ‘No, Dad!’ Ryan called from the ground. ‘Not the missiles!’

  Chapter Ten

  Tân was having a wonderful time twirling and spinning around the plane. Whatever kind of dragon it was, it didn’t look like him, but it didn’t seem unfriendly either.

  Until it started chasing him. The other dragon seemed to have changed its mood suddenly. It had a new master too, a bigger one.

  Tân flipped and rolled, climbed and dived. The other dragon did the same. It was after him!

  ‘Fire!’ shouted the new master on the ground.

  Bright lights burst into life under the wings of the black dragon. With a whoosh, the lights streaked towards him nearly knocking him out of the sky.

  Hey! That’s not very friendly! Tân thought. He turned and careered towards the ground. The black dragon banked and followed him into a ground-hugging pass in front of the Plas.

  The beeping was louder now, and more urgent.

  ‘Ten seconds of power left!’ Ryan called out.

  ‘Tân!’ Harri shouted up to the sky.

  Ryan’s dad was determined not to lose. He had one last shot.

  ‘Fire!’ he yelled, pressing the red button so hard that it cracked under the pressure of his thumb.

  Once again, Tân saw the bright red light as the firework rockets ignited and swooshed towards him. They shot past him, one on each side of his head. He felt the sparks on his ears. Right! That did it! This dragon was not friendly at all.

  Tân stalled in mid-air, letting the black dragon whoosh past underneath him. Now he was back in a good position. The black dragon couldn’t see him coming. He flew up until he was as high as the treetops. His heart was beating in time with that incessant beeping. He was angry with that dragon. It deserved to learn some manners.

  Just as he adjusted his wings into a steep dive, the beeping stopped and the whooshing of the dragon faded away. Silence reigned. That dragon is up to something, Tân thought. It’s either him or me!

  Tân dropped from the sky like a stone. Ryan’s dad was bringing the J-20 Mighty Dragon into land on gliding power.

  Harri was mesmerised. There was nothing he could do.

  ‘Tâ-â-â-â-n!’ he yelled into the sky.

  A small wisp of smoke trailed from Tân’s nostrils. He was almost upon the black dragon now. That dragon had really riled him, had set something burning inside, something fundamental, something essentially dragon-like, deep within him. He didn’t know what it was, but he knew it was right. He knew it was dragon.

  Tân took in a deep breath and roared!

  ‘Merde!’ Ryan’s dad remembered his very worst French. Harri had just reduced his J-20 Mighty Dragon to a pile of ashes.

  ‘Dragon down!’ Harri ordered.

  Tân, satisfied that the black dragon was no longer a danger, flew sweetly to his box and descended gently inside. Harri had no time for rewards. He slammed the lid shut, picked up the box and made to go.

  ‘That was amazing, Harri!’ Ryan’s dad looked stunned. ‘Aren’t you going to let me see how you made it? Aren’t you going to let me see what destroyed all my hard work?’

  ‘No!’ Harri said crossly. ‘You started it.’

  Slipping and sliding on the icy pavements, Harri rushed back home. His cheeks were red. He felt hot, bothered and angry, and he wasn’t really sure why.

  * * *

  Harri’s mum’s voice wafted up the stairs. ‘Harri! There’s someone here to see you in the shop!’

  Harri lay on his bed, still fuming. Ryan’s dad could have killed Tân with those rockets. What did he think he was doing? Once he realised Tân was going to win, he was like a baby throwing toys out of the pram. What a bad loser!

  And Tân! Where did that fire come from? That ball of flame turned the plane to ash in a second and melted a huge hole in the snow too! He should never have agreed to meet them in the park. It was going to be really hard keeping Tân a secret from the world now.

  ‘Harri! Ryan’s here!’ his mum called up the stairs.

  What? Ryan had never been to the shop before. They were friends in school and he’d been to Ryan’s house for birthday parties and things, but they weren’t close friends.

  Harri rubbed his eyes and told Tân to stay where he was.

  Ryan was in the shop, awkwardly examining the
stuff on the shelves. He had no idea what they actually sold in Merlin’s Cave. Most of it looked like girly, smelly stuff, but he knew some of it was supposed to be magic.

  ‘I brought your prize.’

  Harri took the Dragon Gold from Ryan’s outstretched arm.

  ‘You won fair and square,’ Ryan said. ‘Sorry about my dad. I don’t know what came over him, he just lost it. I hate it when he gets like that. He could have killed your dragon!’

  Harri winced. Did Ryan know the truth? The two boys locked eyes. Ryan was testing his reactions to see if he’d admit that Tân was real.

  Ryan heaved his shoulders. ‘You don’t think I believe you made that dragon out of washing-up bottles, do you? You live in a magic shop. I saw it. It’s too real not to be real.’

  Harri looked long and hard at Ryan, trying to probe his mind, deciding whether he could trust him.

  Ryan stood and waited. He wasn’t going anywhere. The silence went on too long. Harri had to say something.

  ‘D’you want a drink?’

  Ryan nodded. ‘Yeah, thanks!’

  Harri’s mum and Imelda raised their eyebrows as the boys squeezed past them and through the back room to the kitchen.

  ‘Orange juice?’

  ‘Yuh!’

  The boys weren’t sure how to start a conversation. They both knew what they wanted to talk about, but didn’t know how to say it.

  Harri dropped his shoulders and smiled. ‘Do you want to see him?’

  ‘Yeah!’ Ryan’s face lit up.

  ‘Come on, then.’ Harri led Ryan up the stairs to his room. He opened the door quietly so as not to disturb Tân.

  Tân was fast asleep on the bed. He’d worn himself out. Lighting up his fires had taken a lot out of him.

  ‘Oh – my – God,’ Ryan whispered, ‘he’s real!’

  Harri gently picked Tân up and put him on Ryan’s lap.

  Ryan could hardly breathe as he stroked Tân between the ears. Tân mewed quietly in his sleep.

  ‘Oh my God, he’s so cute!’

  Harri didn’t tell him the whole truth. When people don’t understand magic, it’s often best not to give them all the details. It was enough to let him know that he’d got him as an egg.