The Beasts of Upton Puddle

by Simon West-Bulford

  “I am so very, very sorry, Joseph.” She wept.

  “Why?”

  “I have let so many people down, but I think deceiving you to bring you to this island is the worst thing I have ever done.” She finally let him go. “I am so very glad you are still alive.”

  Joe looked down at her: a tiny woman, perhaps the oldest he’d ever seen, bursting with so much energy; it was a shame to see her waste it all on regret. And with such celebration happening around him, he could never hold any kind of grudge against her.

  “I know why you did it.” He shrugged. “It’s okay.”

  “It isn’t okay. But fate has been kinder to me than it ought to be. I don’t deserve to have you forgive me, Joseph Copper.” She touched his cheek.

  They turned toward the raucous celebrations, but before Joe could join in, he heard the thrumming engine of a jeep pulling up on the hill behind them. He swung around. The jeep parked, and two figures got out and walked toward them, one tall and stooping, the other short and stout. The tall one spoke. It was a man, and Joe could hardly believe his eyes.

  “Ronnie? Joe? I . . . It’s me . . . Heinrich.”

  And with him stood Aunt Rose.

  On the beach, weaving through the wreckage of the Copper Celt and heading toward the Nesting Caverns at high speed, another jeep bounced across the sand. Four people sat inside, dressed uncomfortably in camouflage uniforms. Not far behind them, the chatter of gunfire and the whoosh of rocket-propelled grenades rent the air as they fled the scene. Sweating in the driver’s seat, Argoyle Redwar throttled the wheel as though it would fly away if he let go. Ms. Burrowdown sat in the passenger seat with an expression so sour she looked like a disgruntled pug sucking splinters through a straw. And being thrown around in the back like puppets in a bouncy castle, Kurt and Scott Duggan fired shots wildly at two dragons chasing them.

  “My God, man! Are you planning to hit anything with that, Duggan, or do you just like the sound of gunfire?” Redwar shouted.

  “Perhaps if you drove straight for two bloody minutes, I might be able to get a”—whump!—”clear sodding shot!”

  “Mr. Redwar’s doing best ’e can,” said Burrowdown.

  One of the dragons swooped in, hooking the side of the jeep with a talon, briefly lifting the vehicle’s wheels from the sand. The jeep roared like a crazed animal as Redwar, screaming, leaned into the pedals. Kurt Duggan, who had been given a shotgun by his father, let off both barrels at the creature’s claw. The recoil sent him sprawling back, but the dragon roared and released its prey, darting backwards into the sky, leaving the chase to its partner.

  “See that, Dad? I got it! I got it!”

  “Yeah, big deal. Your mum could’ve killed it at that range with her tongue.”

  “It’s more than you did. You can’t even—”

  “Shut up and shoot,” cried Redwar. “There’s still another one after us.”

  The other dragon had soared overhead, then hovered ahead of them, taking advantage of their distraction to pause in readiness to unleash fiery death upon them.

  Redwar’s face bulged with fury. “Shoot! Shoot! Shoot! We’re almost there, damn it.”

  The jeep juddered over a rock as Redwar tried to swerve around the reptilian obstacle. Kurt screamed. Scott aimed his semiautomatic rifle at the beast’s mouth and pumped eight shots into it. The dragon turned its head, screeching in agony as a torrent of fiery sulphur arched through the air to their right, sizzling into the sea. They drove straight through the cloud belching from the water as the dragon staggered and fell dead into the sand to their left.

  “I bik my kung!” Kurt wailed.

  “Yes!” Scott raised his gun above his head, shaking it triumphantly.

  “Don’t congratulate yourself just yet, Duggan. That other one might come back, and they may send more after us,” said Redwar, racing toward the cave entrance.

  “I bik my kung!”

  “Shut up, boy,” said Kurt’s dad, making his point with a slap to the head. A look of pure contempt curdled his features. “I brought you along to show you the ropes, teach you a few things about being a real man, so stop whining and reload like I showed you.”

  Redwar brought the jeep to a stop just inside the cavern, left the headlamps on to illuminate the cave, and got out. Ms. Burrowdown and the two Duggans followed.

  “Just as I remember it,” muttered Redwar. “But this time I’m the one in charge.”

  “Diamonds,” said Scott Duggan, ogling the sparkling walls.

  “Indeed, Duggan. Diamonds. Lots and lots of diamonds, and they’re all m—ours.”

  Duggan pointed his rifle at Redwar. “No way. I didn’t take this job for a nice little picnic on the beach, and you aren’t paying me enough for what we’ve had to handle so far. I’ll be taking this lot, not you.”

  “You moron. Exactly what do you think you’re going to do? You need me to get off this island, and what do you think the rest of my men will do when they see me at gunpoint?”

  Duggan chewed his bottom lip and squinted. He looked upward as though he might find the answer lurking somewhere on the top of his head where he couldn’t quite see it.

  Redwar turned to Ms. Burrowdown. “Didn’t he used to be our head of security?”

  “Yep.”

  “I thought I fired him after all that nonsense with the break-in.”

  “Yep.”

  “Then why was this meathead employed as my bodyguard?”

  “Interviewed and hired by Mrs. Young last week. She didn’t know Duggan was fired.”

  “Young? Who’s Young?”

  “New personnel manager.”

  “I thought Chatterly was the personnel manager.”

  “Fired.”

  “Blast! Fire Young as soon as we get back.”

  “Oi!” Duggan waggled his gun. “The diamonds?”

  Redwar turned to point a chubby finger at Duggan but froze when a rumbling shook the cavern. Fire swirled above their heads, and they threw themselves to the ground, swatting their skin.

  The other dragon had returned, and it must have used the mountain tunnels to find a back way into the cavern. From the entrance to a cloudy hole, a serpentine head the color of evergreen slid into view, its jaws stretched wide open.

  Redwar scuttled backward like a fat crab in overalls, cutting his hands on shells with every move. The others cowered against the wall.

  “Wait!” Redwar screamed. “Don’t kill me. We can make a deal. We can end the hostilities between us today if you just listen to me. I am in command of the forces attacking you. Some of my men have been ordered to plant powerful bombs around your island. The war ship was just a diversion, I swear. If you spare me, I will tell you the location of every single bomb.”

  Great drops of sweat rolled over Redwar’s skin as he waited for a response. The dragon had stopped its advance and appeared to be sizing him up.

  Redwar blinked several times as if something had flown up his nose. “What?” he said. “Did you do that? I thought I imagined a name. Makariel, was that?”

  A seraph popped into view before Redwar’s eyes. “Tell me now. No deals,” said the seraph.

  “My men will cause such destruction on this island it will be nothing but ashes if you choose to ignore me.”

  “But you will die.”

  “And so will you.” Redwar stood now, jutting his chin, brushing powdered shell from his army clothes. The seraph held him with a cold gaze, apparently thinking it over, and the dragon leaned its head back, puffing slow streams of smoke from its nostrils.

  “I have another proposition for you,” the seraph said.

  A distant, ear-splitting explosion boomed outside, causing a powerful tremor, and an orange glow lit the cave entrance.

  “A demonstration of your intentions?” The seraph’s voice was low and menacing. “If any damage has been done to the Tree of Sanctuary, I will paint the walls of this cavern with what remains of your broken body.”

  The drag
on’s head snaked forward, the jaws opening even wider.

  “No, no,” panted Redwar. “I have no idea what that was, I swear. My men would not dare to detonate any of the bombs without my permission.”

  Scott Duggan had edged his way to the entrance. “Remember that big war ship of yours?”

  Redwar held his breath as Duggan spoke again.

  “Well, bits of it are flying through the air. I don’t think there’s much of it left.”

  THIRTY-NINE

  “Noah’s beard! What in the world was that?”

  Mrs. Merrynether squinted through her spectacles at the cloud mushrooming a few miles from shore. Everyone had been so overcome by Heinrich’s reappearance that the massive explosion was even more of a shock.

  “That’d be our brave Heiny,” said Aunt Rose. She grabbed his hand and squeezed it against her chest as though it were a cuddly toy, then beamed at Joe. “And Joe! My word, I’m so relieved to see you’re still in one piece, dear. Quite a place, this island, isn’t it?”

  Joe rushed over to give her a hug. “I’m so glad you’re safe.”

  Mrs. Merrynether shot Joe a glance of puzzlement before placing her hands on her hips and questioning Heinrich. “You have a lot to explain, Heinrich Krieger, and you’d better start now before I—”

  “Before you what?” Aunt Rose stepped forward, her hands also on her hips, making her look like a cannonball with handles. “If it wasn’t for Heiny, you’d all—”

  “Let me tell you a few things about Heiny here.” Mrs. Merrynether pointed a finger as though it were a magnum.

  “Ladies, please! Rose, let me explain everything to Ronnie. It is very important. And, Ronnie, hear me out. I beg you.”

  Deep breaths were drawn all round before Mrs. Merrynether nodded stiffly.

  “Thank you, Ronnie. The explosion you saw was Argoyle Redwar’s war ship. With the help of Joe’s aunt, I blew it up.”

  “You blew it up?” said Joe. “But we thought you were working for Redwar.”

  “That is where you are completely mistaken. Argoyle Redwar is not who any of us thinks he is. On the day you accused me of helping Mr. Redwar, I went mad with despair. I was very hurt, and I could not understand why you would tell such lies about me.”

  “But they weren’t lies. I saw—”

  “Please let me finish. I know now that you did not lie, but I did not lie either. We were all deceived. I wrote my letters to a man named James Merson.”

  “James Merson?” said Mrs. Merrynether, aghast. “But we agreed he should never be contacted.”

  “Wait,” said Joe. “Wasn’t James Merson the boy whose parents died on this island all those years ago?”

  “Yes,” said Heinrich. “James Merson and Argoyle Redwar are the same man, Joe.”

  “What?” cried Mrs. Merrynether and Joe together.

  “Yes, it was he who contacted me many years ago by letter, claiming he had been abandoned by his foster parents and needed help. I decided to help him by writing back and sending him one of our diamonds. We kept in contact for years and years. Each time, he had a new reason for needing more money—his new foster mother was sick and needed an operation or he wanted to buy a new house—and I . . . I kept sending him more diamonds. I had no idea he was building a business empire with it. I grew more and more guilty about not telling you, but I thought you would be angry and send me away.”

  “Oh, Heinrich, I would never have sent you away, but you’re quite right: I would’ve been very angry with you. I am very angry with you.”

  “How did you find out about him?” Joe asked.

  “That night when I stormed out from the mansion, I went to find James Merson at the address I was posting the letters to. I wanted to prove my innocence, but obviously I did not find him. Instead, I found a private school run by a man named Toby Burrowdown. It was difficult to get information from them, but eventually I found out that they were forwarding my letters to Argoyle Redwar at Redwar Industries. It was then that I suspected they were the same man and he had assumed an alias.”

  “But why would he do that?” Mrs. Merrynether asked.

  “I found that out when I confronted him.”

  “You went to see him?”

  “Yes. He was surprised to see me, and I think he took a certain amount of delight in telling me he was going to destroy everything I held dear. He assumed a new name so that we would not suspect who he was when he set up his head office in Upton Puddle. He wanted to get closer to us so that he could find out the location of Pyronesia by any means necessary. He knew we would never tell him, especially if we knew who he really was.

  “He is a very bitter man, Ronnie. He told me it was true that his foster parents abandoned him. They could no longer bear to hear his stories about the dragons and the island, so they sent him to a boarding school to be cared for. They thought all he needed was to be disciplined. Eventually he was released, and that’s when he sought me out. When he had a big enough business empire and enough money from me, he funded expeditions to find the island, but the seraphim kept it hidden from his sight, as they do to all who come close to finding them. All Redwar could find were some of the smaller islands close to Pyronesia, which is where he found some of the rare species he keeps locked in his vault.”

  “And now he wants to get revenge on the dragons that killed his parents,” said Mrs. Merrynether.

  “And to become even richer,” said Heinrich. “He knows this is where the diamonds come from, and he wants to take the island by force. He managed to bribe a lot of people within the government and the military to get what he needed. Many of the men on those boats are mercenaries.”

  “The idiot! He has no idea what he’s started by coming here. But how did you get to the island with him?”

  “It was not hard to convince him I was on his side. I found it uncomfortable to lie to him, but I told him I wanted revenge for the way the dragons had disfigured me and would gladly help him. It was then that he told me he’d found out the exact location of Pyronesia, and I asked to come along. I did not realize he tricked you into going so that he could follow, but I came in one of the boats and joined the crew, hoping to stop him and find you.”

  “That was when he found me,” said Aunt Rose. “He learned they had me as a prisoner on board. He sneaked me out, bless him.” She gave Heinrich a warm smile, and he blushed. “After that, we pinched some of their explosives and rigged them up with a timer when all the fighting started. Then we escaped, saw there were more dragons fighting on the other side of the island, and guessed you might be involved. Looks like we were right.”

  “Remarkable,” said Mrs. Merrynether, twinkles lighting her eyes.

  “Heinrich’s my hero,” said Aunt Rose. “There’s never been a man to match him since my Fred was alive, God rest his soul. I’m not letting this one get away.”

  Heinrich smiled sheepishly at Mrs. Merrynether and shrugged.

  “I’m thrilled for you both,” said Mrs. Merrynether, grinning.

  Joe smiled as Danariel fluttered over, glowing brightly and planting herself across Heinrich’s face. An admiring crowd surrounded Heinrich.

  “I hate to interrupt your reunion, but our troubles have only just begun,” came an exhausted voice from behind them. Tabariel collapsed at their feet, his glow distinctly subdued as he lay in the grass.

  “Tabariel, are you all right?” said Joe, stooping to pick up the seraph, who felt as cold as a garden frog.

  “Kalladrad is dead,” Tabariel said quietly.

  Like a flying brick, it hit Joe that Kalladrad must be the name of Tabariel’s dragon, the noble beast Joe had come to know over the last few days.

  “I’m . . . so sorry,” Joe said. “Is there anything I can do?”

  “Not for me, no. I will recover from the shock in a little while, but no seraph is quite the same when his dragon is killed. We fade away in time.”

  “Are you sure there’s nothing we can do?”

  “Never mind me. Y
ou must all prepare yourselves. Tonight’s battle was a mere scuffle compared with what is to come. Gnauserous is regrouping her forces. Redwar’s army is no longer attacking. He has joined her.”

  “What?” said Mrs. Merrynether. “The Conclave hate humans. Why would Gnauserous side with him?”

  “I don’t know, but whatever the reason is, Gnauserous will put up with Redwar only as long as she has to. She probably considers it much easier to take on one group than two at a time. Once she has finished us off, she will deal with Redwar. Then she will turn her attention to the rest of the world.”

  “How long do we have?” Joe asked.

  “They will most likely attack at dawn. I doubt she considers us much of a threat, but Gnauserous is not foolhardy. She will consider her strategy carefully.”

  “So we have a few hours to prepare,” said Heinrich.

  “Prepare?” said Mrs. Merrynether. “Prepare what? That last fight took all we had. If Gnauserous knew how few of us are left, I doubt she would bother to wait at all.”

  “Mrs. Merrynether is accurate in her assessment,” said Kiyoshi. “We have only nineteen dragons, sixty-three wyverns, one hundred twenty trolls, and a handful of us left. The squonks may help, but that cannot be guaranteed. The enemy still commands thousands of dragons, several hundred trolls, and now they also have a small army of heavily armed human mercenaries.”

  “So what do we do? How do we stop them?” Joe asked.

  “Should we run? Try and warn the governments before they attack?” Heinrich suggested.

  “It would take too long to convince the outside world,” said Mrs. Merrynether. “And soon their numbers will be even greater when a new nest of dragons hatch later this year. Somehow we have to find a way to end all of this on the island, but I have no idea how.”

  Joe looked at Danariel, a grave solution becoming painfully obvious to him, and he decided to put a voice to it before he was able to change his mind. “We have to kill Gnauserous. She’s the one most determined to go to war, so without her, we might be able to change the Conclave’s mind.”

  Danariel stared at Joe, her angelic face expressing both grief and resignation. Silence fell, so strong, so tangible, Joe thought it would crush the noise of the celebrations behind them. With the death of her kin-tie, Joe had just offered Danariel a slow and lingering death.