Jonah and the Last Great Dragon (11 page)

It had been their second night in the air. Now, in bright daylight, they guessed they must be over the Arctic Circle, where the sun never sets in summer. The coast of Norway was on their right.

‘Are you okay?’ Jonah asked Ffyrnig.

‘I’m fine. I can go for hours yet.’ The dragon’s smoky breath streamed past, as he rumbled at Jonah.

Jonah turned round to look at Erin, who was curled up in her webbing cage behind him. ‘I just asked Ffyrnig if he is all right. What about you? Do you need to land again for a bit?’

‘Yes, please. It’s all that water I’ve been drinking.’ She sat up and leaned over to look down at the sea. ‘No ships down there. I doubt anyone’s seen us yet, but there are bound to be fishing boats soon, now it’s morning. What do you think we ought to do?‘

‘It’s OK,’ Jonah said. ‘Ffyrnig’s going to fly quite a bit higher now it’s daylight, so if we see ships out to sea or villages, people might think he’s just a big bird. But if we want to pee, we’d better go down now, before people are up and about. It would be real bad luck if we ran into anybody in the woods.’

‘I don’t see it would matter much. They will be too scared of Ffyrnig to do anything.’

‘Yeah, but they might be hunters, Erin, looking for deer or something. OK, so they can’t hurt Ffyrnig but, if they took a shot at him, one of us could get killed.’

Erin shrugged. ‘Suppose you’re right. Let’s land then,
before people start waking up. I’m desperate!’

Ffyrnig turned and flew towards land. There were dense forests below them and they couldn’t see any buildings. The dragon glided down towards the treetops, peering at the trees to find an open space that would be big enough to let him land.

‘This is awkward,’ he grunted, staring down at a large glade amongst the pine trees. ‘I think I can get down all right, but there’s not much space to get airborne again. Can Erin stop wriggling?’

She was chewing her lip anxiously. ‘Can’t Ffyrnig get a move on, Jonah?’

‘He’s not sure he’ll be able to launch himself again, if we land here.’

‘Oh, help! He’s
got
to go down. I so need to get off! What about him landing on a beach?’

‘Brill idea! That should work.’

‘Great. Then I can just run up into the woods.’

Ffyrnig agreed and it was only a minute or two before he noticed a long, white beach with a stretch of thick forest behind it. As he glided down, Erin was hastily unbuckling her harness and slid down his foreleg the moment he touched the sand. Her legs were a bit unsteady after sitting still so long, but she stumbled across the beach as fast as she could. By the time Jonah had unfastened his straps, she was disappearing into the trees.

‘My goodness,’ murmured Ffyrnig. ‘She shouldn’t rush off alone like that.’

‘It’s all right. She won’t go far enough to get lost or anything.’

‘No, but you don’t need to go far round here to get
eaten,’
said the dragon.

‘Oh! Not wolves?’

‘Wolves,’ said Ffyrnig. ‘And bears.’

‘I’ll go and call her to hurry up.’

Jonah crossed the beach, forcing his stiff legs to run. As soon as he reached the trees, he went behind one himself, and then went into the wood, shouting, ‘Erin! Erin!’

He stared through the pine trunks, where clouds of midges were dancing in patches of sunlight. Nothing else moved. Where was she?

He cupped his hands to his mouth and yelled. ‘E-ri-i-in!’ And then he froze, every sense alert, as he was answered. Because it wasn’t Erin. It was a wolf’s howl and it came from the forest ahead of him.

For a few seconds Jonah stood absolutely still, listening for an answering call, and then howls rang out around the forest, and his heart thumped hard in his chest. There was a sizeable pack somewhere ahead of him. The racket they were making must mean they had scented Erin.

In his mind, he relived last Friday night in Hereford Cathedral, when he had been attacked by the demon wolf pack that followed the terrible Wolfmaster. This demon, a slave of the dragon known as the Black Lord of Komi, had come to drag him into the Abyss and make him a slave of the Black Lord, too. Erin, swinging Saint Michael’s great sword, which he had left near the altar, had come to his rescue. Now Jonah wondered whether more demon wolves were tracking them to the Arctic. He
had
to find her, and fast.

Very cautiously, with the howls sending icy sensations crawling over his skin, he began to move deeper into the forest. He took each footstep slowly, with great care; he knew that the noise of a twig snapping underfoot would alert the wolves. His fingers trembled as he pushed aside the little branches blocking his way. He touched them as gently as he could, to make sure the leaves wouldn’t rustle. He was really scared!

He kept looking from side to side but he couldn’t see any sign of Erin or glimpse the wolves moving. He could hear them, though. With every step that took him further into the trees, he became more and more frightened. His legs seemed to have run out of energy; they didn’t want to keep going. And his mouth was so dry that he was sure he wouldn’t be able to call out to Erin, even if he dared. Where
was
she? He knew that he was risking his life with every step he took and, if he died, there would be little hope of getting the icedrakes to London.

If he didn’t find her soon, he thought he might have to go back and see if Ffyrnig could help. What was worse? Going deeper into the forest after Erin and possibly getting killed, or leaving her in danger while he went to get Ffyrnig to come? And what about hurrying to look for the icedrakes and help all the people back in Britain? That was why they were here, after all. Into his head came an awful picture of Erin running out on to the beach, only to see him and Ffyrnig soaring high in the sky, leaving her to the wolves. No, of course he couldn’t fly off without her! He had to find her, whatever happened afterwards.

Quite suddenly, the wolves stopped calling. Jonah stopped moving and gazed around. Out of the corner of his eye he seemed to see a slight movement over to his left. He stiffened, every muscle tight and ready to run. Then there was a tiny sound and, at last, there was Erin, half hidden by a pine tree. She put a finger to her lips, in case he should call out. As if! White with terror, she made her way towards him, step by cautious step, peering this way and that through the trees.

Jonah wasn’t sure what happened next. One moment the forest was quiet and still, and the next second the air erupted with yaps and growls and the sound of scurrying, as wolves came plunging through the trees.

‘Run!’ he shrieked and put out his hand to grab hers, as she hurtled towards him. He was aware of pulling her through the undergrowth, of the yowls and scampering feet close behind them. At any second he expected a couple of heavy bodies to slam against their backs, knocking them down and tearing at their flesh, before the rest of the wolf pack were on them, squabbling over the prey. But instead there was a thunderous roar and the sound of something enormous crashing through the trees ahead of them. Ffyrnig’s head appeared between two pines.

‘Get to the beach,’ he hissed. ‘I’ll deal with these.’

With the last of their energy, the children pushed their way through the undergrowth, and ran out onto the beach, pounding down towards the surf. They sank down on the sand, gasping for breath and staring back towards the forest. Ffyrnig’s roars echoed through the trees, above the sound of the wolves squealing. The children, eyes fixed on the forest, could make out where Ffyrnig was, from the way the trees swayed as he pushed through them. After a while, there were no more cries from the wolves.

‘Do you think he’s killed them?’ Erin whispered.

‘Well, one or two of them, maybe. The rest will have run off, I should think.’

Erin leaned towards the sounds coming from the forest, trying to hear better. ‘What’s that noise Ffyrnig’s making? It’s like he’s sort of mumbling with something in his mouth.’

Jonah glanced at her. ‘Or chewing,’ he said slowly.

Erin’s eyes opened wide. ‘Oh, he’s not! Tell me he’s not.’

Ffyrnig ambled out of the trees, a haunch of bleeding meat attached to a long furry tail swinging from his jaw. Erin gulped and looked away.

‘That is totally gross!’

‘Look, he saved our lives.’

‘I
know
, Jonah. I’m not a total bird-brain. Do you really think I don’t realise what would have happened if he hadn’t come to help?’

‘Well, then? What are you going on about?’

Erin stood up wearily and started to make her way up the beach to the dragon. ‘I love him, Jonah, you know I do.’

She went up to Ffyrnig and rested her head against his leg, stroking his gleaming red scales. Then, as Jonah trudged up, she added, ‘It’s just – well – eating the wolves like that. I mean, it’s sort of gruesome, isn’t it?’

Jonah grinned at her. ‘Maybe you’re right. So, no more steak and chips for you, then! Eh?’

They had been flying for over two days and nights, with just a few short stops, when the Great Dragon spotted a cluster of islands far below them, poking up from the ice-covered sea.

Erin stared at the Sat Nav, which had begun to work, and then leaned over to look down. ‘This is it,’ she said. ‘Franz Josef Land. Where Ffyrnig thinks they might be. So down there, that’s the Barents Sea.’

‘The land isn’t all covered with snow, is it? I thought it would be.’

‘Well, it’s August. Our teacher said some of the snow melts away in the summer. There are still loads of places where icedrakes can hide out, though. Do you think we really have a chance of finding them?’

‘We have to,’ Jonah said. ‘We totally have to. I don’t want to think about what might happen back home, if we can’t stop the Night Creatures spreading through London.’

Ffyrnig rumbled. ‘I will fly lower and start calling, Jonah.’

‘Do you think they’ll go to ground?’

‘I hope not. I hope they will be curious enough to come out of their caverns. I shall tell them I mean them no harm. With any luck, they will believe me. And if they agree to let me land, they can talk to you and I’m sure you will be able to get them to help.’

Privately Jonah was not at all sure that he could persuade the icedrakes to fly to London, but he told himself not to worry. Not just yet, anyway.

Ffyrnig swooped towards the sea, until the children could see nothing but floating ice spreading into the distance and glinting in the sun.

‘I’ll start on the western edge of the first island,’ he said, ‘and keep flying up and down, so I cover the whole area.’

‘Hey, we ought to be using sunglasses, Jonah,’ said Erin, holding his pair out. ‘If the icedrakes are pure white, I don’t know how we’ll spot them.’

For a couple of hours Ffyrnig flew low over the western islands, bellowing repeatedly. ‘I am the last Great Dragon of Wales. I ask for your help,’ he roared.

At first, Jonah and Erin peered down excitedly as they passed over hills and ice floes.

‘Look. Look, Erin. See all those walruses under that cliff? Wow, that’s amazing! I’ve only seen them on telly before.’

Erin grabbed Jonah’s sleeve. ‘And look. There’s a mother bear and her cub. Oh, it’s so sweet! It can’t have been born long.’

They spotted seals and more walruses, two Arctic foxes and several polar bears. Out at sea they found narwhals and an enormous pod of beluga whales. But after a while, the children began to feel anxious. They had seen nothing to suggest there were icedrakes in Franz Josef Land.

‘Do you think they are farther east?’ Erin asked.

‘They could be, I suppose. What if we can’t find any?’

‘Don’t give up yet. We’ve got loads more islands to see. And if there aren’t any sign of them here, we’ll just have to do Svalbard and then the mainland.’

‘That could take days!’

‘Well, we’ve no choice, have we? Look, we’ve got plenty of food and it’s light all the time, so when Ffyrnig is in the air, one of us can get some sleep, while the other one keeps looking. It’ll be all right, Jonah. I know it will.’

Jonah still looked a bit worried. ‘There are masses of animals around. We shan’t be very safe if Ffyrnig has to put us down for long.’

Erin laughed. ‘Why would he? And we can still sit on his back, even when he’s talking to the icedrakes. When we find them, that is.’

‘We’ll need the loo again, won’t we? We’ll have to find somewhere then.’

‘You’re such a worry-mutton! We’ll think about that, when we have to.’

As they flew over some snow-covered cliffs on the coast, which the Sat Nav identified as the edge of the large island of Prince George Land, Ffyrnig suddenly dipped lower and circled round.

‘Look there, Jonah. Look at the glacier. See that opening? There’s something there.’

‘Yeah, I can see it!’

Jonah squinted down. What he had thought were cliffs was, in fact, the snout of an enormous glacier, pushing its way through a great rocky upland.

‘Look, Erin. No, over there.’ Jonah grabbed her arm and pointed towards a dark cavern showing near the foot of the glacier. Something white moved in the entrance. ‘It’s got fur, whatever it is. I don’t
think
it’s a bear. Do you think we might have…’

‘Found them?’ Erin wriggled excitedly.

‘She’s tickling me again!’ Ffyrnig groaned. ‘I am pretty sure that is a drake’s nest, Jonah. I’ll go down a bit and start to call.’

The Great Dragon began to circle low over the glacier, bellowing greetings. Round and round, up and down he flew, his roars echoing in the still, icy air. Nothing moved. The children couldn’t see anything in the mouth of the ice-cave now.

Erin sighed. ‘Oh, Duw! Do you think it was just a lump of snow and we believed it moved, just because we wanted it to?’

‘Maybe. I don’t know.’ Jonah chewed his lip. ‘If they
are
here, we might be frightening them off.’

He thumped Ffyrnig’s scaly red shoulder to get his attention. ‘Could we be scaring them?’

The firedrake was just beginning to answer when there was a sudden outburst of shrieks and roars below them and a horde of huge, white dragons erupted from caves in the glacier. As the children shrank back, staring, the icedrakes launched themselves upwards, until the air was filled with the giant bodies. As a couple of the massive dragons flew at them, Jonah gasped: from head to tail-tip each icedrake had a ridge of razor-sharp spikes.

‘They’re ginormous,’ he said to Erin. ‘They are nearly as big as Ffyrnig. I somehow thought they’d be quite small.’

The children threw themselves down in their webbing cages, as Ffyrnig roared and flung himself through the air. A deafening noise of growling sounded all around them, as if a pack of giant white wolves were swirling around their heads. Ffyrnig beat his wings madly, trying to out-fly the icedrakes as they tried to drive him downwards to the glacier. The children flinched as huge bodies, their furred scales gleaming in the sun, drew in close beside the Red Dragon. Now, the rushing wind seemed to have grown even colder and Ffyrnig’s back was in shadow. Jonah looked up and found himself staring at the belly and clawed feet of an enormous white dragon that was flying just above their heads. On each side icedrakes pressed against the Great Dragon, while the drake above Ffyrnig dropped so low that the children felt that they could almost reach up and touch it. Ffyrnig bellowed in anguish as he was driven towards the surface of the glacier, floundering
to a stop on the slippery ice. The icedrakes landed easily and circled around him.

Jonah and Erin, crouched between Ffyrnig’s shoulders, lay still, trying hard not to attract attention. They stared at the icedrakes apprehensively. The dragons’ spikes glinted in the sun and their great white wings shone faintly pink or blue, when the light caught them. Where a drake’s scales had lost their fur, they changed colour in the sunlight as the creature moved.

‘They are awesome,’ Erin mouthed.

Ffyrnig stretched to his full height. Jonah guessed that he was trying to seem very calm and confident to impress the icedrakes, but he knew that if they chose to attack, Ffyrnig wouldn’t stand a chance against so many.

‘He can’t have realised how big the icedrakes are,’ he whispered to Erin.

‘Neither did I. I hope they don’t think Ffyrnig’s brought them a present.’

Jonah looked puzzled. ‘What sort of present?’

‘You and me,’ Erin murmured. ‘A gift snack-pack.’

‘Why are you disturbing us, Red One?’ Majestically the largest icedrake moved forwards, its jaws open menacingly to show a mouthful of wicked teeth. ‘We welcome no intrusion here.’

Ffyrnig looked around the circle of dragons. ‘I come in peace to request your help.’

The watching icedrakes hissed and swished their spiked tails in amusement. ‘Help? What kind of help?’

‘Silence!’ roared the drake that seemed to be their leader. ‘Let the firedrake explain himself. Let him tell us why he brings two human creatures to our territory.’

Jonah started frantically unbuckling his harness.

‘Don’t!’ Erin gasped. ‘You go down there and they’ll attack you.’

‘I have to. Look, I can understand what the icedrake is saying. So
he’ll
understand me. Don’t worry, okay?’

‘Don’t
worry!
Are you mad?’ She grabbed his arm and held on. ‘Please don’t get down unless Ffyrnig asks you to.
Please
, Jonah!’

‘Sorry, Erin. I just have to.’

Jonah wrenched his arm out of her grasp, and rolled over the side of his webbing cage. Ffyrnig felt him moving and put out his foreleg for Jonah to slide down. As the white dragons looked on curiously, Jonah walked forward to stand beneath Ffyrnig’s great horned head. The firedrake looked at the white leader and inclined his head courteously.

‘I am the last of the Great Dragons of the Isles of Britain,’ Ffyrnig began. ‘I am known as Y Ddraig Goch, the Red Dragon of Wales.’

‘Ah, I have heard of you,’ said the white dragon. ‘Your exploits are famous. I am Kauhu, the leader of this frost-clan. Why do you need our help?’ The icedrake peered at Jonah. ‘And why do you bring the young human creature?’

Jonah tapped Ffyrnig’s leg. ‘Let me answer, will you?’ He took a deep breath and made himself walk towards the icedrake.