Werewolf versus Dragon
Page 8
Just then, the dragon’s tail whipped around, smashing against Orson’s head.
Orson clung on. “I’m not going to hurt you,” he said, trying to calm her.
The Baron reached in with a pole, jabbing Orson in the neck. “Ow!” Orson said, letting go.
The dragon lashed with her tail. It smashed Orson’s jaw, knocking him backward. He tripped on his chains, crashing to the floor of the pit. The back of his head hit the metal ring poking from the ground.
Orson lay still. His eyes were closed.
“Orson!” Tiana cried.
The dragon stood over him, red-hot spit dripping from her mouth.
“Kill!” Baron Marackai shouted.
“Kill! Kill! Kill! Kill! Kill!” the crowd chanted.
Just then a long, loud howl sounded from the woods. It echoed around the clearing.
The chanting stopped.
The crowd gasped as a werewolf leaped from the trees and jumped into the Ring of Horrors.
Chapter 23
“WEREWOLF!” BARON MARACKAI HISSED.
Ulf crouched between Orson and the dragon, baring his fangs. He could smell blood, sweat, and fire.
“You’re going to die, werewolf!” Baron Marackai shouted. He held up his megaphone. “Ladies and gentlemen. This beast wants to die!”
The crowd cheered.
“For your pleasure and delight, I give you werewolf versus dragon!”
Ulf looked up and saw humans cheering, waving their fists.
“Werewolf versus dragon. Werewolf versus dragon. Werewolf versus dragon,” they chanted.
Ulf saw Dr. Fielding desperately trying to free herself from the ropes.
Ulf faced the dragon.
He could smell her fiery breath. He looked into the dragon’s eyes. Inside they were burning and swirling with rage.
Aziza screeched, smoke pouring from her nostrils. Then she lunged, her mouth wide open, exposing rows of razor-sharp teeth.
Ulf jumped backward.
The dragon lunged again, and Ulf leaped up the side of the pit.
He dug his claws into the earth and ran around the pit wall, dragon fire licking at his heels, singeing his fur.
Aziza twisted and turned.
Ulf leaped off the wall onto the dragon’s tail. He scrambled up her hard scaly back and clung on, hooking his claws into the metal collar around the dragon’s neck. It was wet with blood.
The dragon tried to turn and bite Ulf. She was roaring, throwing her head one way, then the other.
Baron Marackai threw a rock, and it hit Ulf on the shoulder. Ulf’s grip loosened, and he fell crashing to the floor of the pit.
The dragon came for him with her claws outstretched. The crowd cheered, shouting for more: “Kill him! Kill him! Kill the werewolf!”
Ulf rolled to the side as the dragon’s claws raked the ground, gouging out clumps of earth and stones.
The dragon lunged, her jaws wide open. Ulf threw himself out of the way just in time to see the dragon’s teeth slam into the ground.
Ulf sprang to his feet. He ran underneath the dragon’s belly, diving at the chain between her legs.
He bit straight through the metal.
The chain snapped and the dragon’s foot stamped down, just missing Ulf’s head.
“The werewolf’s crazy!” someone shouted from the crowd.
Ulf bounded from underneath the dragon’s belly, and the dragon twisted around, trying to tear him to pieces.
Her tail was lashing. Ulf leaped onto it, hooking his claws into the scales, clinging on for his life. He clawed his way onto the dragon’s back and desperately held on as the dragon started bucking, trying to throw him off.
Ulf pulled himself along the dragon’s neck and Baron Marackai hurled another rock. “Die, werewolf!”
The rock missed and struck Aziza in the eye. She looked up.
Ulf growled: “It was him. He killed your baby.”
Ulf bit through the chain on her metal collar. The chain snapped. Aziza the dragon shook her neck, and the chain fell to the ground. “You’re free,” Ulf growled.
“You fool!” the Baron shouted. “You stupid werewolf!”
Ulf dropped down off Aziza’s back and stood on all fours, panting. He looked up to see the dragon opening her mouth. He braced himself for more flames.
Instead, he felt Aziza’s hot breath warm his fur. She was panting too. She turned her head and looked up at the Baron on the edge of the pit.
Aziza roared. Ulf howled. The crowd began screaming. Ulf could smell their fear.
The dragon beat her wings, and Ulf gripped on to her tail as she rose out of the pit. He jumped off, landing on all fours in front of the humans.
The dragon took off into the air, and the crowd began running, fleeing the clearing. Aziza swooped after them, scorching the ground with her fire.
The humans ran away as fast as they could into the woods.
The small man in the ragged suit and the big man with the thick beard leaped into the cranes. They drove off through the trees.
As they fled, the Baron was shouting, “Cowards! Come back, Blud! Come back, Bone!”
Baron Marackai threw down his megaphone and picked up a rifle. He took aim and fired at the dragon. The bullet shot across the clearing and ricocheted off the dragon’s hard scales. Ulf watched as Aziza hovered in the air beating her wings, screeching at the Baron.
Baron Marackai took aim, shooting again and again.
Aziza blasted a jet of fire.
“Not my face!” the Baron screamed. He tried to shield his face as the flames engulfed him. His fur coat was burning. He furiously patted the flames, trying to put them out. Smoke was rising off him.
Ulf saw Aziza soaring away into the night sky. He looked back at the Baron’s sooty face. It was clenched with anger.
“You horrible, useless, little piece of fur,” the Baron spat. He loaded a shiny bullet into his rifle and pointed it at Ulf. “You can be the first to die.”
Ulf snarled.
“Leave him alone!” a shrill voice shouted. It was Tiana. She flew between Ulf and the Baron.
“Don’t worry, fairy, you’re next,” Baron Marackai said. He cocked the trigger. “Say bye-bye, werewolf. The RSPCB won’t save you now.”
He was about to pull the trigger when a shadow loomed overhead.
He looked up. “Noooo!” he cried.
It was the dragon. A set of huge claws reached down from the sky, plucking the Baron from the ground. As the claws grabbed him, he dropped the rifle.
“Get off me!” Baron Marackai shouted. “Get off me!”
Ulf watched as Aziza beat her wings and rose into the air with Baron Marackai dangling beneath her. He was kicking his legs.
Aziza the dragon was lifting the Baron high above the treetops into the sky. She screeched, carrying him off into the night.
“I’ll be back!” Baron Marackai shouted. “You’ll see!”
Ulf ran to Dr. Fielding and bit through the ropes around her arms and legs, releasing her.
She tore the gag from her mouth. “Ulf, are you okay?”
Ulf smiled with his fangs.
Then he heard a groan from the bottom of the pit and looked down. It was Orson. “Where’s the dragon?” the giant asked. He was sitting up, rubbing his head.
“It’s over, Orson,” Dr. Fielding called down to him.
Ulf looked up and howled at the moon.
Chapter 24
THE NEXT DAY ULF WOKE UP IN HIS DEN. HIS wolf hair had disappeared back under his skin. The door to his den was open. Outside were a pair of jeans and a T-shirt. He slipped them on.
Tiana flew toward him, humming to herself.
“Ulf!” she said. “You’re back!”
Ulf looked at his hands. They were filthy. He had just a patch of hair on each palm, and his claws had gone.
He looked out at the sky. It was a bright sunny day. It would be a whole month until the next full moon.
“Dr. Fielding le
t you stay out all night,” Tiana told him.
“In the wild?” Ulf asked.
“Don’t you remember?”
Ulf licked his teeth. His fangs were gone.
“Not really,” he told her.
“You’re a hero,” Tiana said.
Ulf heard a trumpeting roar. He looked over and saw Orson leading the biganasty out of the Big Beast Barn.
“Orson!” he called.
The giant waved. “Thank you, Ulf!”
“You saved his life,” Tiana said, hovering outside Ulf’s den. She smiled, then shot off in a burst of sparkles, following Orson across the paddock to the Dark Forest.
Ulf found Dr. Fielding in her office. She was writing.
“Is everything all right?” Ulf asked her.
“Everything’s fine, Ulf. Thanks to you.”
Dr. Fielding put down her pen and slipped a piece of paper into a file labeled BARON MARACKAI. She stamped the file with a rubber stamp: CASE SOLVED.
The Helping Hand crawled out from the storeroom.
“Will you file this, please?” Dr. Fielding said to it.
The Helping Hand picked the file up and scuttled off.
“Marackai would have tricked us all if it hadn’t been for you, Ulf.”
“He locked me up,” Ulf told her. “He said he’d come back to take what was his.”
“Nothing is his,” Dr. Fielding said. She took a piece of paper from her desk and showed it to Ulf. It read:
The Last Will and Testament of
Lord John Everard Farraway
“This is Professor Farraway’s will,” Dr. Fielding said. “Marackai was nineteen years old when the Professor died. The Professor left everything he had to the RSPCB. Marackai got nothing.”
Ulf looked at the will. It was old and dusty. He thought about the ghost in the library and how it had tried to warn him.
“Marackai was nasty,” Ulf told her. “Druce says he was cruel to beasts.”
“Marackai must have wanted Farraway Hall for himself,” Dr. Fielding said. “He seems to have been planning his return extremely carefully. He must have known all about the dragon migration, and realized that NICE wouldn’t send an inspector straightaway.”
Dr. Fielding stood up and went to the window.
Outside, a shiny black car was pulling up at the entrance gates.
“About time,” Dr. Fielding said.
“Who’s that?” Ulf asked, following her to the courtyard.
Ulf watched as a man stepped out of the car. He was short and fat, dressed in a black coat and a bowler hat.
“My name’s Inspector Hector,” he said. “I’m from NICE. I’m very sorry I’m so late. I’ve come about the dragon.”
“Then you’d better come inside. You can park next to that truck,” Dr. Fielding said.
She pointed to the Baron’s big black truck in the courtyard. “We have much to discuss.”
While Dr. Fielding led Inspector Hector to her office, Ulf headed to the tower. He ran up the spiral stairs to the observatory and grabbed The Book of Beasts from the table where he’d left it.
He looked out of the window at the beast park. He looked toward the aviary. The Roc would be back home by now, he thought.
Ulf heard a tapping sound and looked up. Druce the gargoyle was dancing on the glass dome. He started singing: “He kills beasts just for fun. But not this time, cuz Fur Face won!”
The gargoyle blew a loud raspberry at Ulf, then scuttled back along the rooftop to his perch.
Ulf headed down the spiral staircase with The Book of Beasts.
Halfway down, in the wall of the tower, he opened a door that led into the main house. He stepped into a dusty room with a grand piano. A giant moth was hanging from the ceiling, and wood lice the size of cats scurried across the floor.
Ulf hurried through the room and out into the Gallery of Science. He ran the full length of the corridor, through the Room of Curiosities to the door of the library. The door creaked open, and Ulf stepped into the darkness.
He felt his way to the painting. “Professor Farraway? Are you here?”
A candle flickered on.
“It’s over. Marackai’s gone,” Ulf said.
Ulf placed The Book of Beasts on the table beside the candle. “Thank you for the book, Professor,” he said.
As he turned to leave, he heard a noise behind him. He looked back and saw the book floating toward him. It pushed itself into his hand.
Ulf turned it over. On the back, written in dust, were the words:
THIS BOOK WILL SAVE YOUR LIFE.
“But we’re safe now, Professor,” he said. “Aren’t we?”
Ulf felt an icy draft pass straight through him, and the candle blew out.