The Search for the Red Dragon

by James A. Owen

  “Laura Glue!” exclaimed Aven. “Where is she? Is she here? What did she say?”

  “Actually,” said Jack, “we left her sleeping in a wardrobe at James Barrie’s house.”

  At the mention of Barrie, Aven’s expression darkened, but she only nodded in understanding. “That’s who she should have gone to. Tell me everything.”

  After Artus, Bert, and the Caretakers gave her a hurried explanation, Aven sat at the table and looked over the book where they had found mention of a Crusade.

  “Jamie didn’t know what the message meant,” said Bert. “‘The Crusade has begun.’ It meant nothing to him, except for a fragment of a memory.”

  “This is the fragment,” Aven said, tapping the book. “The message is what tells me so. And Jamie knows more than he’s led you to believe.”

  “Why?” John wondered. “What can possibly connect Jamie and the two men Bacon wrote about? And why wouldn’t he tell us if he knew something more?”

  Aven set her jaw and looked at John. “Olly Olly Oxen-Free was the game Peter and Jamie taught all the Lost Boys. They invented it. It’s not a coincidence that the game and its creators are mentioned in the same passage.

  “The ship described in that book—the Red Dragon—has been seen firsthand only once in the history of the Archipelago. Everything else has been a story—the ‘friend of a friend whose cousin once saw it’ sort of stories. Even here in the archives, despite centuries of writing and record-keeping, there have hardly ever been any mentions of it at all.”

  “Precisely four,” Bert interjected. “The first recorded sighting was when Ordo Maas built it from the wreck of the Argo. The second was during the first great battle between Arthur and Mordred. The accounting you just read would be the third.”

  “When was the fourth?” Artus asked.

  Aven glanced at her father and hesitated. “It’s in a book from Verne’s personal archive. A future history that may or may not happen. And that’s what concerns me—the Red Dragon seems lost not just in space, but also in time.

  “The Morgaine said that the change that altered the course of history occurred seven centuries ago—but that the event that caused the change happened only nine years ago, because of something you did.”

  “Really,” said John, “I’ve racked my brain trying to figure out what we did wrong, but I can’t think of anything we did that wasn’t necessary to defeat Mordred.”

  “Jules would say that nothing you did was wrong, young John,” said Bert. “There are only choices that move us into the future—even if, at times, we seem to go back.

  “It stands to reason that all of this is connected—and there was only one place you went to where Time itself could have been affected.”

  “The Keep of Time,” said Charles. “Of course!”

  “That’s it, then,” said John. “We’re going back to see the Cartographer of Lost Places.”

  The companions each said good-bye to Artus, who already appeared apprehensive about the line of officials who had gathered outside the library with yet more documents and decrees that needed his attention, and began winding their way out of the Great Whatsit. As Jack turned to follow the others, Artus grasped his arm and pulled him over to a shallow alcove.

  “I want to ask you something,” the king said, his voice soft. “I want to ask if you will look after Aven. As a personal favor to me. And I’m not asking as king or anything. Just…me. Artus.”

  Jack started. He looked at the other man for a moment before answering. “Why are you asking me? Of course, all of us—”

  “I know all of you will be looking out for one another,” Artus interrupted, “but that’s not what I’m talking about.

  “I…I know how you felt about her, Jack. Before. I guess I’ve always known. So I hope you are not offended that I ask. To the others, she’s a companion and a friend. But of all of them, only you would understand this request from someone who truly loves her.”

  Jack could see it in the young king’s face. He did love Aven, deeply. And it took more courage to ask this of Jack, his onetime rival for her affections, than Jack believed he could have mustered had their positions been reversed.

  “Of course I will, Artus.”

  “Thank you, Jack,” Artus said, offering his hand.

  Jack didn’t hesitate to take Artus’s hand and grip it tightly with his own. “I’ll bring them back, Artus. Both of them.”

  It wasn’t until he had walked out of the Great Whatsit toward where the others awaited him that Jack realized how much he meant the words he’d just spoken.

  He did mean to bring back Aven and her son…

  But not necessarily back to Paralon.

  Aboard the Indigo Dragon once more, Aven instinctively slipped into command, as her father perceptively, subtly, stepped aside. The crew were accustomed to her, and indeed, seemed to step livelier to their tasks under her direction.

  Bert nodded contentedly and leaned against the forward spars as the airship lifted free from its moorings and rose into the air above Paralon.

  The smoke had been mostly cleared by the easterly winds, but a light haze remained, and the moon rose, unfocused, into the first frame of its nightly show.

  Charles, feeling a bit peckish, announced that he was going to go rummaging around in the galley below for something to eat. He was joined by Bert, who claimed to have learned a recipe from Tummeler for an exceptional millet and barley soup.

  “Good old Tummeler,” Charles said as he opened the door and began descending the steps. “I’ve often thought about having him for a visit to Oxford and London—I think he’d have a marvelous time. It’s just that…”

  “Difficult to explain a talking badger?” said Bert.

  “Actually,” confided Charles, “I was more worried about him getting wet. The smell, you know.”

  John stayed above, in part because he enjoyed the feeling of flight, but also to observe Jack. Since the trip had begun, neither he nor Charles had so much as mentioned Jack’s turbulent feelings regarding the death of his friend in the Great War. Everything had been moving at such a breakneck pace that it seemed to have been overlooked that Jack’s sleeplessness had begun long before the crisis in the Archipelago. There were larger beasts to be grappled with in his friend’s soul, and John was worried that if no one was watching, they might eventually devour Jack from the inside out.

  In their last voyage through the Archipelago, it had been John who was traumatized by the events of the war and who felt a profound loneliness at being separated from his wife. But then, he had been older to begin with, and had more life experience than Jack in the four years that separated their ages. So coming to the Archipelago as a Caretaker of the Geographica was cathartic. It compelled him to find strengths he barely knew he possessed.

  But Jack had come there with a different set of perceptions—and then saw a friend die as a result of his own choices and actions. There was no way for someone else to gauge how that might affect a man, especially when yet another friend was later lost in battle, and there was no real family to return to, to ground oneself.

  Without turning around, Jack chuckled. “I can feel your eyes burning holes in my back, John,” he said. “I know you’re concerned about me, but you needn’t be. I can take care of myself.”

  “Of that I have no doubt,” John assured him, sitting next to the railing. “But your friends are here to support you, Jack, in whatever way you need. And remember, I have some understanding of what you’re dealing with.”

  Jack started to retort, then caught himself and grinned wryly. “Nine years ago I might have argued with you. But I’ve realized in recent years that I sometimes argue just for the sake of arguing. I wonder why I do that?”

  “It’s part of what makes you a good teacher,” said John.

  “Maybe,” said Jack. “But with my students, I tend to win every time. It’s not exactly fair.”

  John smiled. “You just need to learn the difference between arguing fo
r arguing’s sake and arguing when there’s a point to be made. If it’s the latter, then it won’t matter if it’s fair. Just if it’s right.”

  Jack looked at his friend for a moment, then turned back to the sea and sky, watching.

  The moon was fully above the horizon now, and it dominated the sky, turning the seas to cream and dispelling the last of the vaporous clouds that had obscured a sky of distant fireflies.

  “It wasn’t Warnie,” Jack said suddenly.

  “What wasn’t Warnie?” asked John.

  “It wasn’t Warnie who began to call me ‘Jack.’ It was my own idea. Came to me in a dream when I was a child, actually. I just woke up and announced to my family that I was to be addressed as ‘Jack’ from then on. Sometimes it was ‘Jacks’ or ‘Jacksie,’ but Jack was what stuck, and Warnie was the first to pick it up. But I came up with the name myself.”

  John furrowed his brow and grinned wryly. “Then why tell us Warnie came up with it? What’s the difference?”

  Jack shrugged. “I don’t know. I supposed I just felt ill at ease telling anyone about the dreams. Maybe more so after recent events. The dreams I had about Aven, and the Giants…Well, those were similar. But this time, no one was whispering that I should change my name.”

  “Well, if it’s any consolation,” John said, “I’ve never gone by ‘John’ in my entire life. I’ve always preferred ‘Ronald,’ but the military used my full name, and there were times when propriety required that I be introduced as ‘John,’ and so that’s how Professor Sigurdsson came to know me. And then you fellows, of course. But there’s no one else in the world who knows me as John.”

  “We’re not really in the world, in case you hadn’t noticed,” Jack noted.

  “Point taken.”

  “So would you rather we called you Ronald?” asked Jack.

  John shook his head. “I don’t think so. Being ‘John’ is something I’ve come to associate with the Geographica and our travels together, and it’s almost as if I’ve become a different person here. So John is fine.”

  “How about you?” Jack said, turning to Charles, who had just emerged from the galley licking his fingers. “Anything you’d like to share about your name or names?”

  Charles cleared his throat. “Well, I once wrote a play, starring myself, in which I assumed the identity of a great adventurer, modeled after Baron Munchausen, whose name was Brigadier-General Throatwarbler-Mangrove. I tried to coerce my friends to refer to me as ‘Brigadier-General,’ or at least ‘TM,’ but it never really took.”

  Jack’s eyes goggled. “That’s amazing.”

  John laughed and snorted. “How old were you when that idiotic idea crossed your mind?”

  “It was last month,” said Charles, looking slightly put out.

  “Sorry,” said John.

  “You’d have been in fine company,” Bert said as he emerged from the cabin with two steaming mugs of millet and barley soup. “Baron Munchausen wasn’t his real name either,” he said, handing a mug to Charles.

  “Really?” said Charles. “What was it?”

  Bert puffed his cheeks and blew on the hot soup. “Ramon Felipe San Juan Mario Silvio Enrico Smith Heathcourt-Brace Sierra y Alvarez-del Rey y de los Verdes. But we all called him Lester.”

  “Dear God.” Charles shook his head. “I’m sorry I asked.”

  The night passed uneventfully, although Aven’s expression grew darker every time she noted the lack of ships on the great expanse below them.

  Bert, Aven, and the crew knew the way to the smaller archipelago, where the keep was located, well enough to make consulting Tummeler’s Geographica unnecessary. This was a reprieve for John, who was hoping that his error in leaving the real atlas in London wouldn’t come up.

  “We’re approaching the islands,” Aven said. “We should give the center a wide berth—remember the steam, from the volcanic cone? That will play havoc with the airship.”

  “She can’t quite bring herself to call it ‘the Indigo Dragon,’” Bert said to Jack. “Still too attached to the old one, I’m afraid.”

  Aven tossed aside Jack’s copy of the Geographica and snorted. “These children’s books are more a threat than anything. They don’t note things important to navigation, and they skip too many of the dangers in the Archipelago.”

  “Tummeler probably worried that it would be bad for sales,” Charles offered helpfully. “It’s the publisher’s dilemma.”

  “We’d probably better keep to the original,” Aven said, turning to John. “That’s what it’s for, after all.”

  “Ah, about that,” John began.

  “Oh, my stars and garters!” Bert exclaimed. “I don’t think this is a problem that can be dealt with by reading the Imaginarium Geographica.”

  The others crowded around the starboard side of the ship’s railing to see what the old man was talking about. Just ahead, in the creeping light of morning, they could see the silhouettes of the necklace-shaped ring of islands amidst the ever-present steam.

  The stone columns of granite were just as the companions remembered them—with one stunning exception.

  “The Keep of Time,” Bert said in astonishment. “It’s gone.”

  High above them, like a great gray comet…

  CHAPTER TEN

  The Tower in the Air

  The largest of the islands, where the Keep of Time had previously stood, was stark and barren.

  Aven piloted the airship in a lazy circuit around the island so they could take a better look. Where the tower had been were a few scattered loose stones, but no indication of the foundation. It was if the tower had simply been removed.

  “It seemed perfectly fine when we left it,” said Charles. “I don’t know what could possibly have happened to it.”

  “I’m beginning to,” John said slowly as he paced the deck. “True, it was fine—but that was the second time we left, remember?”

  As one, the companions all realized what John was referring to, and suddenly the Morgaine’s cryptic answers began to make much more sense.

  The Keep of Time had been an immense tower, inside of which were stairways leading upward to a seemingly infinite number of doors. Each one opened into a point in the past, with those at the bottom leading to the times most distant in prehistory, and they advanced chronologically as one ascended.

  Near the top, the stairs ended at a platform just short of the last door. That door opened into the future and was forever out of reach. Thus, the tower was constantly growing in tempo with the progression of Time.

  The next-to-last door, behind which they found the creator of the Imaginarium Geographica, who was known as the Cartographer of Lost Places, was the only one that opened to the present. But behind the fourth door from the top, John had found he was only in the recent past—and indeed, had a conversation with his dead mentor, Professor Sigurdsson, there.

  After John’s encounter with the professor, and their subsequent meeting with the Cartographer, the companions had descended the stairway to find their adversary, Mordred, the Winter King, had arrived on the island as well.

  And he had set the base of the keep on fire.

  The companions had gone in the only direction they could—up—and as they climbed, Charles conceived of the plan that would ultimately save them all.

  He proposed opening the door below the Cartographer’s and escaping into the immediate past. And sure enough, the door opened into the entrance at the base of the tower—one hour before the Winter King arrived. The companions then simply boarded their ship and left.

  Aven stared at the island in shock. “We left safely, but an hour later Mordred still came here, and he still set the fire.”

  “It never occurred to me that the Winter King might still have stormed the tower,” said Bert. “I always assumed he’d looked for us, not found us, and simply begun to pursue us again.”

  “Same here,” said John. “Everything came to such a head on Terminus that I didn’t stop to think of w
hat had gone before.”

  Charles was mortified. “You…you mean it’s my fault the tower was destroyed?” His legs began to wobble and he sat heavily on the deck, his head in his hands.

  Bert laid a reassuring hand on his shoulder. “You aren’t to blame, Charles. Mordred’s actions were his own. You were the hero—you actually thought of a way to escape, when no one else had an answer. Mordred had already started the fire. After we escaped, he simply did it again.”

  Bert’s words had no effect on an inconsolable Charles. “I destroyed it,” he murmured, disbelieving. “I destroyed the keep….”

  He sat up straighter. “Worse! I destroyed Time. That’s what the Morgaine were talking about. I actually wiped out an entire dimension.”

  “This really is some kind of extraordinary achievement,” John said supportively. “Not many people can lay claim to having broken Time, and we did it purely by accident.”

  “Oh, I don’t think it’s as bad as all that,” said Bert. “Time is sturdier than you’d think. But I do believe we’ve found the source of the crisis.”

  “Shouldn’t there be debris?” asked John. “I mean, even if the tower was burned, shouldn’t it have left a huge pile of rubble? A bunch of scorched stones? Something?”

  “It wasn’t an ordinary tower,” Bert replied. “It was actually made of Time—well, and granite, and, er, ragthorn wood. But there’s no telling how it would be affected.”

  As John, Charles, and Bert debated, Aven noticed that Jack was on the opposite side of the deck and hadn’t been looking at the island at all.

  “What are you looking at, Jack?” she asked. “You’ve been staring at the water since we got here.”

  “Look at this,” Jack said, waving her over without taking his eyes off the sea below. “There, just below us, see? That dark impression in the water? Could it be some sort of submarine, like the Yellow Dragon?”

  Aven squinted and peered down to where Jack was pointing. “It’s not a ship—it’s a shadow. See, where the airship is casting a similar shadow on the water, and how it changes position with the light?”