“No,” agreed William.
“Yes or no? Out with it,” said Merle.
“No. No,” said Declan. “I think the Great Dragon Saxbriton is in Orkney this time of year, is she not, lads?”
“Orkney.” Billy hiccuped.
“Oh,” said John, sitting back.
Declan eyed him. “You . . . seem disappointed,” he said.
“Oh, not . . . disappointed, exactly. It’s just that I was planning on slaying Saxbriton at some point anyway . . . so. I’m sure your dragon is great.”
Declan exchanged a furtive glance with Billy and William. “Well now,” he said. “The fact of the matter is that we don’t know for certain that it’s not Saxbriton—”
“Oh com’ on,” Merle growled. “It is or it isn’t?”
“Hard to say. Hard to say—she’s in and out so fast when she attacks the village . . . I don’t know that any of us has ever gotten a good look at her.”
Merle leaned closer to John. “Notice that it’s a she, now,” he said.
“She may be larger than we realize,” said Declan, ignoring Merle. “And I think it’s safe to say that the reports of Saxbriton’s great size are probably exaggerated anyway. I mean, really.”
Declan chuckled and passed the chuckle like a stack of party hats to William and Billy. They all made a great show of it.
“An’ . . . heh . . . an’ none o’ the other dragon slayers ever came back, so they couldn’t tell us what she looked—” said Billy, right up until William elbowed him in the ribs.
“Well, my friend and I will discuss it and get back to—” said Merle, but John was already standing.
“Gentlemen,” he announced, “I will slay your dragon!” Then the men cheered, and there was much backslapping, and John signed some piece of paper, and happy villagers stormed the pub.
CHAPTER 8
After the villagers rushed into the pub, they seemed to make a point of separating Merle and John, and they carried the younger man off on their shoulders while a couple of nice-looking young women cornered Merle and tried to convince him that they liked his beard.
“Oh, you do not,” said Merle. “Where’d my friend go?”
“The one with no beard?” said the short one. “They probably took him to the armory for a fitting.”
“Right. And then off to shrive himself and pray all night over his new armor?”
“I don’t know what that word means,” she said.
“They’ll probably want him to start up the mountain right away,” the other woman told him. “You know . . . element o’ surprise and all that.”
Merle was already moving for the door. “Right. Someone point me toward the armory? Thanks.” He pushed his way through to the street, asking for directions along the way. The armory was another newish-looking building up the road. It had a stone foundation but was otherwise similar to all the other indifferently built plaster people boxes that lined this main thoroughfare. Not one of them looked more than five years old. These were sand castles.
John rounded the corner of the armory, atop a horse, wearing a full suit of plate armor. This armor was dazzling—it should have had its own segment on the Home Shopping Network. It should have had a spokesmodel introducing it to you at a boat show.
“Uh-uh,” said Merle. “Nope. No way. You are not going to face a dragon dressed like that.”
“What’s wrong with it?” asked John as he frowned down at his breastplate. “I thought it looked great.”
“That’s the problem. This is parade armor. Not fighting armor. No one ever won the day by being the best looking.”
“They said Lancelot himself wore this.”
“Yeah, they seem to be saying a lot of things,” Merle groused as he looked sideways at the townsfolk. “But trust me, I knew Lancelot.”
A nearby villager leaned into another.
“Old man says he knew Lancelot.”
Merle took John’s horse by the reins and turned them around. “Lancelot wouldn’t have been caught dead in this. Whereas I think it’s more than likely you will be caught dead in this.”
John was petulantly silent.
“Look,” Merle added, “even if Lancelot did wear this armor, which he didn’t, who cares? It wasn’t the clothes that made the man, and he never would have worn a thousand-year-old antique just ’cause it belonged to someone’s famous grandpa.”
John sighed. “Fine, help me down.”
Merle helped John dismount his horse and waited patiently as he robot-walked back inside the armory.
The startled armorer looked up from his sweeping.
“You!” Merle said. “You put my friend in this lemon?”
The man scowled while Merle helped John with his gauntlets. “What? This is the nicest suit I have.”
“Yeah. It’s so nice you’ll wanna make sure you clean all the dead knight out of it before you hang it back up again. It’s not about who’s prettiest, you know.”
The blacksmith flapped his lips like a horse, but he had no answer.
“You keep saying that,” John told Merle. “You forget that your plan to win us those merrow’s caps was based entirely on me being prettiest.”
“Okay, but . . . you see this—this hood ornament?” Merle asked him with a wave of his hand at the brass lion head on John’s breastplate. “Or these . . . what are these, dolphins? Or this scrollwork? All of these would stop a sword, or a claw.”
John struggled with a buckle and smiled apologetically at the blacksmith. “Isn’t that the point, Merle?”
“We want to deflect blows, not connect with them. If Saxbriton gets a good toehold on any piece of your armor, she’s gonna tear it right off.”
“Look, old man,” said the smith. “Who do you think you are?”
“I am Merlin. Yeah. That Merlin. And I’ve seen enough dead knights for three lifetimes. Bring us something plain, sleek. None of your pimped-out suits. This one may as well have vanity plates.”
“I only understand half of what you say,” the blacksmith answered as he shuffled off.
“Well, I don’t care how it looks,” said John, and he was such a good actor that only Merle knew he was lying. “So long as it’s thick.”
“No, no. We want you built for speed. A direct hit from Saxbriton’s talon, or her tail? It’s gonna crush you no matter what you’re wearing. The full force of her fiery breath? It’ll boil you right in your kettle.”
“You should be a football coach. One locker-room pep talk and your players would hang themselves with their own towels.”
Merle pressed closer and lowered his voice. “I don’t like this, John. I know what a good con looks like. I was a good con man—making everyone think I was a wizard, putting Arthur on the throne. Have you really looked at the buildings in this town? They’re nearly all new. And they’re built like everyone’s just waiting for the neighborhood bully to come knock them down again.”
“I agree,” said John. “Because the Village of Reek has a really serious dragon problem. I think it’s Saxbriton!”
“And you’re . . . you think you’re ready to face her? Already?”
“Look, we’ve been assuming we’d have to fight her after she came to Earth. But why wait? Why not take the fight to her, in her own home—catch her off guard? You saw that prophecy of theirs. I’m supposed to do this now.”
“Yeah . . . about that. I’m not convinced that scroll’s legit.”
John coughed. “You can’t be serious. That wasn’t some vague fortune cookie, Merle, that was a painting of two men and a bird and a dozen nudes.”
“I just wonder . . . what if they decorated the scroll after they saw us? Somehow.”
“When? When was there time, Merle?”
Merle bit his nail, frowning. “Just ’cause I don’t know how the trick was done doesn’t mean it’s not a trick. I don’t know how they saw ladies in half either.”
John smiled. “I appreciate your concern, but . . . this feels right. I’m going
to do it.”
“And this thing you’re going to do . . . ,” said Merle as he studied John’s radiant face, “this is just about prophecy, and strategy? Not about you feeling down all week?”
John’s face fell a little. He glanced over at the blacksmith, who went abruptly back to his sweeping.
“Saxbriton has to be beaten. Everyone agrees on this. I’ll be saving two worlds if I beat her.”
“Unlike the ronopolisk,” Merle said, nodding. “Or that tree person you hacked to bits, then felt bad about.”
John sat heavily on a stool, still weighed down by scraps of armor. “The ronopolisk was just some poor dumb thing.”
“If you hadn’t killed it, I’d still be a rock or a toadstool or whatever I was,” said Merle. “All those people in your new fan club would still be weasels.”
“I know it. I know it. But listen. These past ten years, people have been all too happy to join my fan club. Before I was killing monsters and saving queens. Back when I was only pretending to kill monsters, and saving actresses, and singing about it.”
Merle smirked. “Is this the part where the action star says it’s firefighters who’re the real heroes?”
“Well?” said John. “Aren’t they? Look, there’s nothing wrong with playing dress-up, but I left my family to play dress-up. That’s what I got rich and famous for. And now this Chickadee business, and I can’t feel good about that either. But Saxbriton—that’s a slam dunk. Or a . . . home run, or a touchdown, or some other American sports metaphor.”
“You wanna talk mistakes, John?” Merle snarled suddenly. He paced the floor. “I tore the universe in two. I made the Gloria happen with my time machines and separated magic from the world and doomed millions to die in this . . . oversized terrarium! Emily said so—you heard her.”
“Emily might be wrong,” said John.
“Emily might be amphibious too, but nothing we’ve seen so far suggests either is true.”
The armory was quiet for a moment.
“Look, John,” said Merle. “I want a big win as much as anyone, but . . . we need a live actor more than a dead hero right now—you get that, right?”
John nodded. “You’d better help me pick a suit of armor, then.”
CHAPTER 9
Scott awoke to see the blue-dappled canopies of Pretannican trees passing overhead. The leaves gently waved to him. He gently waved back.
He was lying down. He was also moving. He tried to reconcile these two things as he lifted his head and found that Mick was carrying his feet.
“Ah, yeh’re up,” said the leprechaun, smiling. “Aces. Think yeh might be willin’ to carry yourself for a bit?”
No sooner had Scott become aware that he might actually be suspended several inches above the ground atop the heads of pixies than he heard Fi call, “Brothers! Time to execute maneuver the Dainty Butterfly!”
“The Dainty Butterfly?” Scott asked Mick.
“They let your sister name it.”
“Where is Polly?”
“I was holding up your head,” said Polly. Scott still couldn’t see her. “But now you’re holding up your head.”
“On my mark, brothers!” said Fi. “Mark!”
Scott’s whole body wobbled a bit, then listed a bit to the right and dropped abruptly onto the dirt.
“Ow,” said Scott.
Fi appeared at Scott’s side as he lifted himself up onto his elbow. “My apologies, Scott,” said Fi. “That was not a successful run-through of the Dainty Butterfly.”
“That’s okay,” said Scott, getting up. “What happened? Why did I fall asleep?”
“You succumbed to an errant thorn that was laced with a potion called the Dreaming Draught.”
“Did Polly name that, too?”
Fi straightened. “No. It was discovered and named by the legendary pixie hero Cornwallace, my great-great-great-great-grandfather.”
“Oh. Does my sister have tiny wings growing out of her back?”
“You ask a lot of questions,” said Polly. “Did you see me riding that bird?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Wasn’t I amazing?”
“Sure.”
Now that he was upright, Scott could return the favor by carrying Polly, Fi, and Fo on his shoulders, and Mick in his backpack. Denzil sat atop Mick’s head as Finchbriton once had, and Scott could hear the two of them talking politics or something. Fee had a personal issue with being carried, and insisted on sprinting alongside Scott and pretending that he wasn’t getting tired.
“How did you guys even find us?” Scott asked.
“We asked the birds,” said Fi. “Most of them are incurable gossips. Jackdaws and other crows particularly have always shown a special interest in the movements of men.”
“They said that you and Mick were almost the only travelers around,” said Polly. “Everyone else is home playing Monopoly.”
“Everyone else is home hiding from the ronopolisk,” Fi corrected.
“Do the birds know anything about Dad and Merle and Finchbriton?” said Scott.
“Some thought they might have entered a town many miles to the southwest. The birds lost track of them there.”
“Do you smell that?” asked Fo. “We’re getting nearer to the sea.”
Scott paused and asked Mick to hand him the map. He still had the one Emily had passed out not so long ago in a London basement. It featured, among other things, England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales—and a circular border that showed just how much of these lands still existed, here in Pretannica. Anything outside of the bubble had been consumed by the magical nothing of the Gloria Wall.
“So that pixie witch . . . ,” Scott began, holding the map so they all could see.
“Fray,” said Fi.
“Right. Where’s Fray’s island exactly?”
“It is too small to appear on this map,” said Fi. “But we will find it in the Irish Sea, just south of the Isle of Man.”
“Sorta right smack in the middle,” said Scott.
Polly screwed up her eyes. “Ooh,” she said, fanning her face. “Ooh, I’m remembering something important. What was it? Something Erno left a message about on Merle’s watch thing.”
Scott gave her a minute. Finally he said, “Before we left for Pretannica he was going on and on about that page from the old Freeman’s Handbook—”
“Yes! That’s it! The page was the start of some instructions on how to draw something—”
“The Sickle and Spoon,” said Scott. “The Freeman’s symbol.”
“Yeah, but all it said was to start by tracing a circle . . .”
“And then find the center of the circle,” said Scott. “Then that was it.”
“The circle on that map reminded me,” said Polly. “Erno left some message about how the center wasn’t where it should have been. How the circles didn’t match up.”
Scott waited for her to say more, but no more was forthcoming. “That was it?”
“I think so. We left the watch with Harvey.”
“The circles don’t match up,” said Scott. “The center of Pretannica isn’t where it should be. Because . . . if Merle’s time machine is responsible for the bubble . . .”
Mick peered over his shoulder. “Then the center o’ that circle . . .”
“Would be at Avalon,” Scott finished. “That’s where Merle and King Arthur were when Merle activated their time machines. You’d expect the bubble to have spread out in every direction from Avalon, but instead—”
“The center of Pretannica is Fray’s island,” said Fi. “Is it any wonder, then, that she controls so many rifts?”
“The witch is behind everything . . . for some reason,” Fee said with a slow nod. Scott began to walk again, toward the pickley smell of the sea.
“I don’t get it,” said Polly. “Did Merle’s time machine make the worlds split up, or didn’t it?”
“Maybe . . . ,” said Scott, “maybe the time machine was going to erase all the magic
from the world, so Fray cast a spell that saved some of it inside a bubble? I don’t know.” He was growing anxious—the trees were getting sparser, the land more wet and grassy. If the elves caught up to them here, there wouldn’t be any place to hide.
“There,” said Denzil, pointing, “the sea awaits! We shall convince some friendly seagulls to give us passage, and—”
“Scott an’ I can’t hitch a ride on no bird,” Mick interrupted.
“Not on the outside of one, anyway,” Scott murmured. He stepped lightly across the loose cobblestone of the beach, to the water’s edge.
“Then we shall build a raft!” said Denzil. “And name her for beautiful Morenwyn! She will carry us across the waters—”
“What is that?” said Scott, squinting. The Irish Sea lapped at the pebbly beach, and a low gray mist seemed to roll in and out with the waves. Out on the water, through the mist, a white shape drifted like a ghost.
Then, some distance behind them, a horn blew.
“Aw, bippity Christmas,” said Mick.
Scott turned his head and said, “Bippity Christmas?”
“Beg your pardon,” Mick said. “Back when I was a prisoner o’ Goodco I took to inventin’ swears. As a hobby. But that horn yis just heard? That’s the horn o’ Oberon. His troopin’ fairies are closin’ in.”
Scott turned and tried to see. “Probably those three we left sleeping in the forest, right?”
“If it were only them three, they wouldn’t need the horn. They’re calling to another regiment.”
Scott thought he could see elves back near the tree line. And another group, descending from the north . . . were they on horseback?
On the water, the spectral shape came ever closer. Now Scott could see it was a boat—long and lean, without a sail, but draped with languid garlands of silk.
He threw his arm high and waved to it, sending Fo flailing to keep his place on Scott’s shoulder. But the gesture might well have been pointless—the boat seemed to be heading right for them, whether they liked it or not.
“I don’t see any people,” said Polly.
“Plenty o’ people behind us, lass,” Mick answered. “Those three soldiers who netted us, plus another ten on horses. I think they see us.”