The Dragon's Apprentice

CHAPTER NINE

  STEALING A DRAGON

  Toby hurried to catch up once the shock of seeing Sanelle had passed.

  “But you came to get even with Blaise and free your mother,” Toby reminded her. He couldn’t force himself to give Blaise his official title anymore.

  “And I will,” Sanelle assured him as they reached the outskirts of the small town that supported the castle. Most of the food was grown down here and many of the workers lived here too. “Tomorrow we’ll go back and get the gems for Klel, and then we’ll find a way to get the talisman.”

  “We will?” Toby was astounded at the self-confidence Sanelle showed. He had intended to go back but not so soon after being banished.

  “As long as we keep away from Blaise I can keep us safe.” Sanelle stopped at the edge of a small market place and bought several apples. She threw one to Toby and took a bite of her own.

  “We still don’t know who’s got them though,” Toby pointed out.

  “Didn’t you feel them?” Sanelle stopped chewing and stared at him. “Princess Kaylene was wearing them,” Sanelle told him and Toby realised what she was talking about.

  “My fingers, they tingled when I was near her!” Toby exclaimed. At last, a real sign that he was a sorcerer.

  They reached the centre of the market place and Toby saw a crowd was gathering around a covered wagon that had just pulled up. It was drawn by the skinniest horse Toby had ever seen, and the poor animal had been left hitched up to the wagon while its master set up a platform.

  There were letters on the side of the wagon’s cover that once would have been bright red but now they were faded to a dull orange. This traveller had obviously been around a long time. Toby studied the letters and formed the words slowly in his mind.

  “Chilton’s Cures.” He smiled at his success then frowned. Most of the townspeople could obviously not read or they wouldn’t waste their time there.

  Sanelle had wandered off to buy some more food but Toby stayed at the back of the crowd to see what sort of response the traveller got once the people knew what he was selling.

  “Ladies and Gentlemen.” The man stood up on his platform and Toby frowned to see that he still hadn’t taken care of the poor animal that brought him here. “People of…” He paused and looked around for someone to supply the town’s name.

  “Castletown!” a young boy called out and the man nodded in appreciation.

  “People of Castletown. I am Healer Chilton and I have here something that will change your lives.” He reached under a covered table that he had placed on the platform and pulled out a bottle of green liquid. “No more aching backs, no more illness, no more baldness…”

  People had started to wander off already. It was hardly surprising, as travelling healers couldn’t really expect to compete with a dragon’s scale, although this was the first one he had heard that promised a cure for baldness.

  “What’s he selling?” Sanelle asked as she came back with a bag full of delicious smelling food. She looked at the wagon and laughed. “He’s hopeful.”

  “Good people!” Healer Chilton called as he realised his customers were leaving. “Where else could you get something that will cure everything?”

  “The dragon up at the castle,” was the reply from the boy who had told him the town’s name. He was the last one standing in front of the platform and obviously had nowhere better to be right now.

  “A dragon?” The healer looked astonished and sank cross-legged onto the platform so that he was at eye-level with the boy. “Tell me more.”

  Toby didn’t take much notice of the travelling healer and the boy as he and Sanelle sat under a tree to eat. It wasn’t until the boy started taking some men to the healer that he thought there was something going on. The men the boy fetched for the travelling healer weren’t the kind that Toby would trust if his life depended on it, he wouldn’t even trust them with his lunch.

  “I wonder what they’re up to,” Toby said and pointed at the small cluster of men gathered around the back of the wagon.

  “Looks like a very suspicious group,” Sanelle agreed and after a thoughtful look she made a pattern in the air and this time Toby caught the word ‘Sapphire’ as she muttered it. She rested her hand lightly on Toby’s shoulder and he felt one eyebrow lower in a small frown, he much preferred holding her hand.

  “Are we invisible?” Toby saw a young girl walking nearby and as she neared the tree she suddenly changed direction and hurried off, looking nervous and scared. “I don’t think it worked.”

  “I do know a few other runes, you know.” Sanelle got up and pulled Toby up without letting go of his shoulder. “To them we look like the most despicable, untrustworthy pair of robbers they’ve ever seen.”

  “Oh.” Toby realised that holding hands would not look right considering their disguise. He was about to ask why they looked like that when the boy who had been talking to the travelling healer came up to them.

  “Wanna earn some coin?” he whispered, not getting too close. By the way his nose wrinkled Sanelle must have added a very bad smell to their disguise. Toby was glad he was immune to it.

  “What’ve we gotta do?” Sanelle’s voice slurred in a perfect imitation of a drunken low-life.

  “Catch a dragon,” the boy replied in a whisper

  “Dragons are pretty dangerous.” Sanelle appeared to be thinking it over and rubbed her chin with her free hand. “How much coin?”

  “Go see the healer.” The boy backed away and then ran off, peering into alleyways and tavern windows.

  Toby and Sanelle wandered slowly over, people clearing a path for them as they passed through the market, and stopped at the side of the small, but ugly, group of men.

  “How much you payin’?” Sanelle called just loud enough to draw attention to them. Disguise or not, she had guts and Toby was impressed.

  “Two brass each if you get the dragon, nothing if you don’t,” Healer Chilton offered, looking them up and down and Sanelle nodded in agreement.

  “Will it fit in the wagon?” Someone asked and Healer Chilton frowned as he sized up the inside of his wagon.

  “I hear it’s twice that size,” one man offered.

  “Nah, it’s no bigger than a dog,” another argued.

  Finally, after much arguing, they decided that the wagon was probably big enough and Healer Chilton broke up the meeting.

  “Meet me at the fork in the road just out of town after dark. We’ll be done by moonrise.” He went into the back of his wagon and dropped the flap, whistling tunelessly to himself.

  Toby and Sanelle wandered back to the tree and Sanelle drew a quick sign in the air.

  “It cancels the spell,” she told him when he raised an eyebrow in question. “So what do we do about that lot?”

  “They won’t get past the guards. They’re no threat to Klel,” Toby assured her, but it worried him that people would actually try to steal Klel.

  “Still, I think we should go along with them tonight just to make sure,” Sanelle decided.