behind and the shouting:
“The dragon has kidnapped the princess!”
“The whole henhouse is abuzz,” Reason grumbled grudgingly.
“It is the barracks, not the henhouse,” Estella corrected.
Reason chuckled.
“And I’ll prove to you that the keepers’ barracks is no better than the henhouse, where a cunning fox will wring everybody’s neck in the morning.”
“Do you want to etch a dragon on the soldiers, or do you want to claw them yourself?” For some reason Estella was more afraid of Reason’s claws than she was of dragon fire.
“No. What’s a castle without guards? The neighboring kings would laugh at us. I have a better idea. When we get back, I’ll go to the cellar and pour all the guards some wine that’ll knock out their memory. They’ll think they’ve only dreamt of the princess being kidnapped by a dragon. Besides, there was no kidnapping. You rode the dragon yourself. Did you know that in the old days, riding a dragon was considered a great art?”
“Emerald didn’t kidnap me,” she repeated dumbly, trying to shield her new friend. “But to deprive the Watchers of their memories is despicable. They might forget their families, their duties…”
“And above all, they would forget their pay and rations,” Reason summed up. “We’ll avoid any unnecessary expenditure in the future.”
“Forget wages, that’s all right, but rations…” She squeezed her eyes shut in the strong wind that came from her flight. “People die if you don’t feed them, don’t they?”
“But an army of zombies wouldn’t be as much trouble as it was today. The dead are more docile than the living. True, they rot quickly, but skeletons can serve and fight, too. Believe me!”
Estella was no longer listening to him, but was enjoying her flight. The towns and villages below became so small, as if they were toys. If you ride a flying dragon, it’s as if you are the queen of a toy kingdom. You can’t even see the people below. But the starry skies are very close. It seems as if you could reach up and touch the stars like a bed canopy.
“When we get home, I’m going to order myself a star-colored canopy to resemble the night sky.”
“We could not get back!”
“What do you mean?”
Reason chuckled. Clinging to the twisted horn on top of the dragon, he clearly felt like a flight captain.
“When I fly, I feel like the king of the universe,” he declared. “I wish I had wings of my own.”
“Did you have wings?” Estella wondered. The only thing protruding from his skinny black back seemed to be hump-shaped growths.
Down below she glimpsed the roofs of fanciful castles and fortresses. She’d never seen such architectural marvels before.
“This is no longer Aluar!”
“That’s right! We are already abroad!”
“We’re abroad!”
“What did you want? Do you want to spend your whole life in your own country with a flying dragon?”
“I thought we’d be flying over the Aluar’s countryside and those woods where the Evil One supposedly dwells, but the fairies dance there at night.”
“You can’t even see the fairies from up there. They’re not flying close to the dragon’s mouth, and they’re not that stupid.”
“And I can see them!” Estella saw a bridge in the black clouds, shimmering like the moon. Winged, glowing silhouettes danced across it.
“They were moon fairies!” Reason instantly turned fierce. “They’d take you for their own kind if they saw you. Virgil, turn a little to the left!”
The dragon, oddly enough, obeyed Reason.
“And a little lower in flight! The princess wants to enjoy the view of foreign lands. From behind the clouds she can see little. She’s not as sharp as you.”
It was unclear whether the dragon was seeking to oblige the princess or Reason, but he was on his way down, almost touching the white stone tower of the tall castle.
“Not so low!” Reason howled, but it was too late. Though the dragon had turned on command, it had already knocked down a few towers.
“Let’s move before they cannon fire on us!” Reason raked anxiously around. The towers were crumbling, falling like rocks. Cracks were appearing in the castle walls, and a dragon was flying Estella away.
After a few minutes, Reason managed to reach the right height and speed. He knew how to get his dragon to do what he wanted, though not without effort. It must be hard to control the flight! Reason was out of breath, tugging at the dragon’s horn and then the spike on his ridge.
“That’s a hell of a first time,” he concluded, glancing back at the tremendous pogrom. “Trial and error is our method! And we think we’re smart, too.”
“You’re the smart one, not me. You are the one who is responsible!”
“Actually, I warned you against getting too close to a dragon.”
That’s true. She couldn’t blame Reason for that. She insisted on going to the dragon’s dungeons herself.
“Whose castle did we destroy?”
“Someone’s,” Reason replied indifferently.
“You don’t know exactly.”
“There are many castles in the universe, and they all have their masters.”
“I must know who to apologize to.”
“Don’t be silly! Why denounce yourself to someone like a bully. Unless the owner of the castle was a wizard, like your dearest father, there’s no way he could have sniffed out who had caused the night’s pogrom. You can only use a crystal ball or a magic mirror to identify the culprits if you haven’t seen them in person.”
“If we are unmasked, then the new ruler will move on me with a war. And this time the guilty party is really me.”
“They should at least raise the castle from the ruins before summoning the military forces. Surely everyone there has already been stoned to death. If anyone survived, their thoughts wouldn’t be on war, but on rebuilding. I was once involved in building a castle. If the stones are not carried by the Finodirri, then you can’t build a castle in one night.”
“What are the Finodirri?”
“They are the most faithful and unselfish magical helpers. They don’t charge you anything, and they don’t ask for gratitude, but you must know a secret if you want to manage them. I do know one. I was once summoned by a king to rebuild his castle in a cursed place. No sooner had anyone laid a foundation than the ground turned to swamp. I whistled
