The Journey to Dragon Island

by Claire Fayers

  “A dinosaur happened. I’ll tell you about it later.”

  “Well done, Peter,” said Ewan. He shoved his daggers through his belt. “Lucky I keep a pair of these down my trousers for emergencies.”

  “You keep daggers in your trousers?” said Peter. “Doesn’t that hurt?”

  He winked at them. “Only when I sit down.”

  CHAPTER 13

  She’s clearly not gutless when it comes to a cutlass;

  She is skilled with her left hand and right.

  If her fortunes reverse, well, things could be worse,

  And she never turns tail from a fight.

  (from THE BALLAD OF CASSIE O’PIA, Verse 315, Author Unknown)

  Brine’s thoughts sang. Peter and Tom had come for her. Just as she knew they would and exactly at the right moment, just when Marapi was saying it would never happen. The whole thing had felt almost magical. Ewan Hughes was humming, and Brine bet he was making up more verses for the Ballad of Cassie O’Pia.

  “This is madness,” shouted Marapi. “These people attacked us—they destroyed our home—and now you’re treating them like guests!”

  Ewan Hughes broke off his humming. “Does anything rhyme with dinosaur?”

  Marapi stared at him.

  “How about Apcaron, then?” he asked cheerfully. “No? What is this, the land that rhyme forgot?”

  Marapi opened and shut her mouth a few times, her single-eyed gaze filling up with venom. Brine grinned. Marapi liked to threaten everyone, she thought, but she didn’t know what to do if people stood up to her.

  Cerro started toward one of the huts. “Marapi, you are no longer in control here. You may come and sit quietly, or you can be tied up in a corner—it’s your choice. Someone bring food. Bandages, too,” he added, glancing at Cassie’s feet.

  A few of the villagers looked like they were going to argue, and then they caught Ewan’s gaze and suddenly became very interested in nearby trees and rocks. Marapi still had support here, Brine thought: They’d have to be careful of that. She hung back from the main group and gazed from face to face, trying to find someone she recognized. There was no one. Her initial excitement after the fight slowly soured to disappointment. But what had she been hoping for exactly? That she’d take two steps onto the island and her parents would magically appear and shower her with dragons?

  “Do you remember me?” she asked Stella.

  Stella turned to stare at her. “Why would I remember you?”

  “Because I might have lived here.” Brine tried to push through the crowd after Cassie, but there were too many people and they wouldn’t move, not even when she kicked them. “I was found on the other side of the world, and I can’t remember how I got there. I must have come from somewhere.”

  Stella peered at her closely then sighed and shook her head. “I’m sorry. But the magi started taking more kids to Orion’s Keep two or three years ago—usually people whose parents had died. You might be one of those.”

  So her parents might be dead. Brine’s hope curled up and died.

  Peter and Tom squeezed back to join her. “They’re talking,” said Tom, adjusting his glasses, which had been knocked sideways in the crush. “It looks like it might go on a while.”

  Brine groaned and sat down on the grass. She wished she were back on the Onion, or even in Orion’s Keep in the sky—anyplace other than this village where she clearly didn’t belong. And she missed Boswell. “We should be out looking for dragons, not sitting about here,” she said. “Are there dragons in the flying castle?”

  Stella snorted. “What is it with you people and dragons? No. There are no dragons in the castle. Or on the island. The castle is named after a dragon, if that helps—Orion’s Keep.”

  Orion was a dragon? Brine wondered.

  Tom was also shaking his head. “Orion’s a sailor. He sailed his ship all the way north, into the sky.”

  “Orion is a dragon,” said Stella firmly. “A lady dragon. According to the story, she lived on this island before there were any people. There was another dragon, Marfak, and he and Orion fought every day. In the end, Orion won and flew up into the stars, and Marfak was buried and became a volcano. That’s why the volcano is called Marfak’s Peak.” She finally seemed to notice they were all staring at her. “What’s wrong?”

  “Marfak West named himself after a defeated dragon?” asked Tom. “That doesn’t sound like him.”

  Brine hushed him. Her arms prickled with cold. She knew this story, she thought: Two dragons fighting—their golden bodies were like a bright flash of memory. She rubbed her hands over her face. “There’s more, isn’t there? Something about Orion returning?”

  Stella gave her an odd look. “Orion’s supposed to come back from the stars one day, and Marfak will burst out of the ground to fight her. Either that or Marfak will break free and Orion will return to fight him. In any case, the whole island will be destroyed. Cerro says it’s just a warning about the volcano.”

  A vengeful, defeated enemy who was going to destroy everything. That sounded more like Marfak West.

  “It’s only a story,” said Stella.

  “There’s no such thing as ‘only a story.’” Brine picked a handful of grass and separated the stalks. “Every story starts with a little bit of truth. Sometimes it’s not the truth you were expecting, but it’s always there if you look for it.” She scattered the last pieces of grass. She’d remembered a story—or she’d almost remembered it, which was just as good. At last, a piece of memory had come back. All she had to do now was find more pieces to fit around it.

  “You said you tried to rescue your brother,” she said. “How did you get into the castle?”

  Stella hesitated. Then, as if she’d decided they might be able to help after all, she grinned. “I’ll show you. It’s just outside the village.”

  Brine looked back at the crowded hut and the four posts with ropes dangling off them like snakes. Marapi might be afraid of Cassie for now, but the village could turn unfriendly again very quickly. If Stella’s brother needed rescuing, they should do it soon.

  Tom hung back, but Brine dragged him after her. “I’m the chief planner, remember? Come on—you can blame me if this goes wrong.”

  * * *

  It was a bag. Peter walked around it slowly. A bag big enough to hold a dinosaur, draped over bushes, tethered down at intervals, and attached with ropes to a basket woven out of thick green strands. It lay across fallen trees and undergrowth, striped golden with the afternoon sunlight.

  “This is how you got to the castle? What did you do—catapult yourself in it?”

  Stella lifted one edge of the fabric. “No, it’s a balloon—Cerro invented it. He thought it would be a safe way of traveling around the island. You heat the air up inside the sack, and it lifts off the ground. It’s just like flying.”

  That was impossible—you couldn’t fly without magic. Peter hadn’t even worked out how to do it with magic.

  Something roared not too far away, and he jumped.

  “We’re safe here,” said Stella. “Apart from the teradons, this area is dinosaur-free.”

  “Do the dinosaurs know that?” Peter poked at the balloon. “You must be using magic.”

  “It could work without,” said Tom. “Hot air is lighter than cold. How do you heat the air? You light a fire underneath the balloon, I suppose.”

  “Actually,” Stella said, “we do use magic for that part. We have heatstones. We use them for lighting fires normally, but if you put them in the mouth of the balloon, they’ll heat the air. You just have to keep them away from the balloon fabric or it’ll catch fire. The basket is made from dried sandvines—they’re useful when they’re dead. I was hunting some earlier when I found you.”

  “I have starshell,” said Peter. He took it out and showed it to her. “I can make heat. And I’m good at pushing and pulling things.” It had sounded impressive in his head. Out loud, it just sounded like he was trying to show off.

&
nbsp; Stella picked the starshell out of his hand, looked at it for a moment, then shrugged. “It’s a decently large piece. Not much use at the moment, though, is it?” She handed it back.

  Peter had never met anyone who’d not been impressed by magic before—he wasn’t sure how to react. He put the starshell piece back in his pocket. “So you tried to rescue your brother. What happened?”

  Stella’s gaze clouded. “Cerro got into the castle, but when he found Ren, Ren didn’t recognize him. He started shouting, and the guards came before Cerro could escape.”

  “Your brother didn’t recognize his own father?” Peter interrupted sharply.

  “Just like I’ve forgotten my parents,” said Brine, sitting down on the ground.

  Stella walked around the balloon. “Anyway,” she said, “Cerro jumped off the castle to escape. He landed on the balloon, but he broke his legs in the fall, and I made things worse by crashing. Since then, I’ve been coming here every day since and making repairs.”

  She glared at them all defiantly. Cerro couldn’t walk, and from what Stella had said, no one on the island was willing to help her. And yet, she hadn’t given up.

  “We’ll get your brother back,” said Peter. He wasn’t sure how—the thought of flying beneath a bag of air made him feel queasy—but they’d do it.

  Brine elbowed him in the side. “Peter isn’t the one making the plan—I am—and my plans always work. Your mistake was going in secretly. You should never sneak in somewhere you can’t escape from.” She sketched a castle in the dirt with her finger. “We’ll take as many people as we can fit in the basket and we’ll fight.”

  Stella stopped walking. “Is she serious?”

  Peter felt a grin break out. “Oh yes, completely serious.” Brine was planning again.

  “Let’s see what Cassie says,” Tom hedged.

  But Peter already knew what Cassie would say. A magic castle, a stolen boy, and stories about dragons. Whole herds of dinosaurs couldn’t keep her away.

  CHAPTER 14

  In the time of dragons, two dragons were greater than all the others, and their names were Orion and Marfak. Day and night they fought until Orion finally threw Marfak down into the earth, and a mountain sprang up to cover him. And Orion, in her triumph, flew up into the sky where her stars may still shine.

  (APCARON LEGEND)

  “No,” said Cassie.

  She sat inside the hut, her legs stretched out, one of her feet bandaged. Ewan hunkered down next to her, two daggers stuck into the ground in front of him where he could reach them. Rob, Bill, and Trudi were all eating—plates of orange-red stew that smelled vaguely of apple.

  Trudi held out her plate. “It’s flying tree frog,” she said. “Try it—it’s better than it sounds.”

  It sounded completely horrible. Brine shook her head, her gaze still on Cassie. Brine must have misheard her; Cassie never turned down an adventure. She didn’t dare look at Cerro, though she could feel him watching her, and Marapi, too.

  “You can all stop looking at me like that,” snapped Cassie. “I’m a pirate, not a bird. I am not flying.”

  “The balloon is perfectly safe,” said Tom. “Well, in theory. How did you think we were going to get into the castle?”

  Cassie shrugged. “I don’t know. I thought there might be a secret tunnel or something.”

  “To a castle in the sky?”

  “A secret tunnel makes more sense than a giant flying bag.”

  Cassie stood, balancing her weight on her left leg. “It’s getting late. We’ll return to the Onion for the night and make plans tomorrow.”

  “That’s not fair,” said Peter. “We promised.”

  “You promised,” said Cassie. “I didn’t. And you’re already in enough trouble for wandering off without permission. We’ll talk about this later. Right now we need to get back to the ship.”

  Cerro struggled to stand, but Marapi was faster, on her feet in an instant. “Didn’t I say this would happen?” She jabbed a finger at Cassie. “Outsiders. Thieves and killers. You can’t trust anything they say.”

  A mutter of agreement spread around them. Cassie dropped a hand to her cutlass. Another minute and they’d be fighting again, Brine thought. She pushed between Cassie and Marapi, hoping neither would draw a weapon at this particular moment.

  “We’ll come back tomorrow,” she said. “The castle isn’t going anywhere. The magi can spend the night dreading our arrival if they like.” She smiled, but her voice wobbled. Standing this close to Cassie, she could see how ill the pirate captain looked. Her eyes were ringed with shadow, and her face tightened with pain as she shifted her weight from foot to foot. Cassie never turned down a rescue, and she always kept going, no matter what. To see her looking pale and tired felt like part of the world had collapsed.

  “I’ll go with them on their ship,” said Stella. “They’ll need help avoiding the dinosaurs.”

  “No,” said Cerro.

  Marapi smiled and stepped back. “Very well,” she said. “We’ll let you go—but on one condition. Tomorrow, you will go to Orion’s Keep and bring back my nephew. If you fail, then my brother’s faith in you is unfounded and his judgment is unbalanced. He proves himself unfit to rule and he steps down.”

  Marapi didn’t believe they’d come back, Brine thought. She was sending Stella off with the pirates so that she could take back control of the village. If Brine had still had her sword, she’d have pulled it out and hit her.

  “And if they succeed, I prove myself entirely fit to rule,” said Cerro. “And you stop interfering.”

  Marapi’s single eye glittered with a mixture of malice and triumph. “Agreed. Shall we say sunset tomorrow?”

  Cassie nodded curtly. “Sunset.” She swayed and righted herself quickly, then let go of Ewan and limped away.

  Brine swallowed a hard lump in her throat. “Don’t worry,” she told Stella. “Cassie never fails.”

  “She better not,” replied the girl. “When this is over, you can get in your ship and sail away. I have to carry on living here.”

  * * *

  Brine had never been so happy to see the Onion. She’d half expected to find the ship had vanished after everything else that had gone wrong that day, but the ship was exactly where they’d left her, floating, safe and familiar.

  A small dragon-shaped missile catapulted into Peter’s knees.

  “He’s missed you,” said Tim Burre. “Where have you been?”

  Brine wasn’t sure where to start, but it didn’t matter because Trudi and Rob launched into stories of dinosaurs, sinksand, and sandvines.

  Boswell wriggled up over Peter’s shoulder, setting fire to the back of his shirt. Brine patted out the flames quickly.

  “That’s a dragon,” said Stella.

  Brine grinned, enjoying the mix of confusion and outrage on the older girl’s face. She remembered the feeling of finding out the world was a lot bigger than you’d imagined. “Dragons?” she said innocently. “They’re just stories.”

  Peter shifted his grip on Boswell so he could scratch the dragon’s belly. “I’ll show you around,” he said to Stella. “Coming, Brine?”

  But Brine shook her head. “I’ll stay here for a while.”

  She sat at the edge of the deck, watching as the last of the daylight faded and the island was swallowed by darkness.

  Her thoughts buzzed like insects in annoying circles. So far, Dragon Island had completely failed to be anything like she’d expected. No dragons, and she was no closer to finding her family.

  Cassie’s voice drifted out. “Ewan, take charge. I’m going to bed. Wake me if anything happens.”

  They should all get some sleep, Brine thought, but she wasn’t tired. The magicians at Orion’s Keep must know they were here. What were they waiting for?

  She looked up as Tom sat beside her. “You’d think I would remember something,” she said. “This is all going wrong.”

  “It’ll be fine,” said Tom. “We can rest toni
ght, and tomorrow you can make us a rescue plan.” He pushed his glasses up and grinned. “Maybe Peter can work out the spellshape for magicking us up to the castle so we won’t have to use the balloon.”

  “And maybe Peter will make a mistake and drop you all into the volcano by mistake,” said Peter, strolling back across the deck with Stella and Boswell in tow. “When I decide to experiment with new spellshapes, I’ll do it on my own. I don’t want anyone getting hurt.”

  He smiled, but Brine knew he was serious. This wasn’t just him not knowing the spellshape. Peter had used magic without spellshapes before. He was still worried about using magic.

  Boswell pawed at Stella’s leg, and she crouched to stroke him. “I can’t believe you have a dragon. Did you really find him at the top of the world?” Her voice held a note of wistfulness. “It must be nice to live on a ship, to go anywhere you want.”

  “We like it,” said Brine. “Of course, there’s always the chance you’ll drown in a storm or get eaten by sea-monsters.”

  “But you’d be free,” said Stella. She sat back, tilting her head up to the stars. “I never told Cerro this, but when we were building the balloon, I thought that once we’d rescued Ren, I might go flying, just for the fun of it. To see what else is out there.”

  Brine smiled, looking down at the deck. She’d come here wanting to find her home and she’d met a girl who wanted to fly away and see the world. “We could ask Cassie…,” she began.

  Boswell bolted upright, and Stella yelled in pain as his claws went into her legs. “What’s he doing?” She tried to lift him up, but he clung to her, hissing at first, and then he began to howl.

  An answering howl came from the sky. Brine sat up straight. More dragons? But there weren’t any dragons—Stella had said so.

  Dark wings cut across the sky—lots and lots of them.

  “Teradons,” said Stella, and then it was raining yellow streaks.

  The streaks landed in sizzling blotches all over the deck. One of them landed on Brine and she yelled, partly because it stung, but mostly because of the smell, which was like rotten eggs mixed with bananas and the very worst of Trudi’s curry.