The Dragons of Blueland (3 page)

Chapter Three

THE MEN ON THE SLOPE

"It's a lovely night for flying," thought the dragon as he hurried toward the north, urged on by cool brisk winds. The rain had stopped long ago, and a crescent moon shone palely. Looking down, he could see the outline of Seaweed Bay, and then a point of landcalled Due East Lookout. At this point he must tin n and fly directly westward over Seaweed City, across Spiky Mountain Range, and over Awful Desert to reach the Blueland Mountains in the heart of the desert. Many people had tried to cross the desert and climb these mountains, but there was no water, and treacherous sandstorms raged all year round, making traveling almost impossible. So far, no man had succeeded.

"It won’t be long now!" sang the baby dragon as he passed over Seaweed City, over the coastal Spiky Mountain Range, and then started over Awful Desert beyond.

"What a lovely night!" he thought again. And then, all of a sudden, he realized how clear it was over the desert. "Where are the sandstorms? Yes, where are the sandstorms?" A sick feeling came over him. In weather like this a man might be able to cross the desert into Blueland, might see one of the dragon
family, and learn the dragon secret,
that dragons still live in Blueland!

Faster and faster he flew, and way up ahead he saw a tiny light where the mountains rose straight up out of the desert.

"Men!" thought the dragon. "If only I'm in time to warn my family."

Onward he sped until he could see that the light was the blaze of a campfire on the rocky mountain slope.

He counted four or five men sitting around a campfire.

"I'd better find out what they're planning to do so I'll know how to save my family," thought the dragon, circling down and landing below the men. He carefully picked his way through the huge rocks on the slope and hid close enough to hear what the men were saying.

"If Frank and Albert and the rest don't find water soon, we're sunk. We'll have to get back pretty quick, and what if the weather changes? After all, this is the first time, so far as anybody knows, that the weather has ever been clear over the desert, and I don't trust it to last very long."

"Me neither," said another voice.

Just then they heard a shout farther up the slope and a man came running down toward the fire.

"Did you find water?" they asked him.

"Water! Loads of it. The mountains form a circle, and all the streams from these mountains flow toward the center to make a tremendous lake. But that's not all we found!"

"You mean you found evidence that the great dragons of Blueland actually did exist at one time?"

"Evidence!" said the man who had run down the slope. "Evidence! Why, we've got fifteen of the most beautiful dragons you ever dreamed of trapped in a cave that seems to have only one entrance. The rest of the men are guarding it."

"Fifteen trapped in the cave!" moaned the baby dragon. "Why, that's my whole family—my six sisters, seven brothers and my dear gigantic mother and father. I'm the only one left to save them. But why didn't they fly away?" He listened to the men again.

"How do you know you have fifteen in a cave?"

"We took them by surprise. They were asleep at the entrance, and when they saw us they rushed inside. What a sight!"

"Fifteen dragons!" One of the men whistled. "What did they look like?"

"They went so fast it was hard to see, but there was one huge blue one, a big yellow one, about five smaller green ones, and the rest were blue and yellow. They all had red horns and feet, and gold-colored wings!"

"I can't wait," said one of the men. "Why, every zoo in the country will want one!"

"Oh, no!" groaned the horrified baby dragon, hiding behind the rocks.

Chapter Four

IN THE CAVE

As the men went about packing up knapsacks and putting out the fire, the dragon carefully crept up the mountain slope. "It's a good thing they don't know that the cave does have another entrance, but I wonder if I can still squeeze through it."

It was the tunnel through which he had gone when he ran away to sit on the cloud. At that time, only he and his two youngest sisters were small enough to fit into it. "Maybe, just maybe, I can still get through," he thought.

He hurried up the dry rocky slope of the mountain, racing to get to the tunnel before the sun broke over the rim of the desert.

"I've got to rescue them!" hethought frantically. Over the gap between two snowcapped peaks he galloped and then down into the beautiful green alpine meadows in the center of the mountain circle. Here, streams babbled down the slopes to a bottomless lake. Masses of wild flowers, gentians, butterfly weed, painted cup, all colors,

paraded along the brooksides. In the pastures, everywhere, were giant snapdragon plants looking more like bushes than flowers, but the dragon did not have time to stop and gaze at his beautiful home in the great high mountains of Blueland. Already the sun was reaching over the horizon, lighting up the sky.

"Here it is," he panted and he dove into a thick clump of snapdragons growing over the entrance to the small tunnel. He had seen the men across the lake guarding the cave with an enormous net. "I wish I knew what they're planning to do next," he thought. "But it's too late now. I'll have to wait until dark."

He tried to pass into the tunnel, but the roots of the snapdragons had grown over the entrance, and dirt had washed in from above. "Dig carefully. They might notice the stir in the bushes," he warned himself as he cleared the way. At last he could fit into the hole, and he started the long trip through the tunnel.

"I might get stuck any moment," he groaned as the tunnel turned corners and gradually dug deeper into the side of the mountain, always only just big enough for him to squeeze through.

On and on he crawled, and just when he thought he would surely get to the large part of the cave, he got stuck. He pushed and wiggled, but he could not get through. Tears rolled down his blue cheeks. "I wanted so badly to see my family," he sniffled. "But maybe they're near enough to hear me now," and he whispered, "Mother, Father, are you there?"

"Who's that?" asked a voice that sounded like his sister Eustacia's.