The Dragon's Eye (20 page)

“Where is it?” said Dr. Drake.

“The real Wantley is a village called Wharncliffe,” said Alicia. “It is not far from Sheffield.”

“Wharncliffe!” exclaimed Dr. Drake. “Of course! The knight that killed the dragon in the legend was called More of More Hall. I knew that More Hall lay not too far away on the other side of Sheffield, but I never thought of Wharncliffe. I shall leave tomorrow. Daniel and Beatrice, while I am away, I would like you to bring Billy and Alicia up to date on everything that has happened.”

“Aren't we coming with you?” I asked.

“Not this time,” said Dr. Drake. “I am afraid that it is too dangerous.”

“And what about the rest of the riddle?”

“Well, I'm hoping that part of it can be solved when I arrive. I'm also guessing that the Wantley Dam is another name for the Guardian. As for the ‘word' that I must take her, I have an idea what that might be. In any case, at least we are still one jump ahead of Ignatius Crook.”

I went outside with my record book and sat on the lawn. It didn't seem fair that Dr. Drake had taken us along on so much of this adventure but was going to leave us out of the most important part. Danger or not, I would have loved to have come face to face with the most ancient dragon in the British Isles. What stories she would be able to tell about days gone by!

I opened my record book to the page where I had written down the riddle. I took out my pencil and wrote:

I circled it over and over again.

Suddenly my record book was yanked out of my hand. I looked up to see a very familiar blue creature flying off with it.

“Flitz!” I shouted.

I got up and ran after him. Flitz flew through the trees, carrying my record book. Little sparks started to come out of his mouth, and I was worried that my book was going to catch fire. Somehow or other, I managed to keep him in my sights as he came to the road.

Alexandra Gorynytchka was waiting, sitting on a large black horse.

“Do be careful, Flitz!” she said with a laugh as Flitz landed on the pommel of her saddle and presented her with the now smoking book.

I stepped forward.

“That book is mine,” I said.

But Alexandra just held up her hand as she flicked through the pages. When she came to the page with the riddle, she tore it out, then tossed the book back to me.

“Here you are, Daniel,” she said. “I am glad that you are such a thorough little dragonologist. Luckily for you, I am in quite a hurry. Flitz can be rather nasty when I want him to be.”

“I thought Flitz belonged to Ignatius,” I cried.

“So does Ignatius,” said Alexandra, laughing. “What a fool!”

I backed away.

Alexandra laughed even harder.

“By the way,” she said, “I heard a rumour that Ignatius has sent those two ruffians of his here. And this time they won't be taking you prisoner.”

She cantered away, chuckling to herself, as Flitz flew round and round her head.

I ran back to the house as fast as I could, and dreading what Dr. Drake was going to say, I knocked on the door of his study.

The next day, the green dragon returned to Castle Drake — not a moment too soon as far as Dr. Drake was concerned — and we set off on our second dragon flight. Given what I had told everyone about Alexandra and Flitz, Dr. Drake had decided to take us with him after all.

“It is a question of the frying pan or the fire, I am afraid,” he had said. “And I would rather have you two with me.”

I felt that it had been my fault that Alexandra — and no doubt Ignatius, too — had discovered the location of the Dragon's Eye. But Dr. Drake had told me that I could not possibly have expected Flitz to have stolen my record book so spectacularly.

“And there is still a good chance that we shall get there first,” he said.

We flew up over Sussex in fine weather. This time we were not riding bareback. Billy and Alicia had brought a fine dragon saddle with them from London, which Dr. Drake said had been crafted by a very discreet saddler indeed. Even so, the journey was not particularly enjoyable this time, mainly because Idraigir was flying at full speed in an effort to reach Wharncliffe as quickly as possible.

Several hours later, we could see the smoke rising over a city that must have been Sheffield. Below us lay a moor.

“That must be Ramsley Moor,” said Dr. Drake. “Land there. Wharncliffe lies just to the east of it.”

Idraigir began swooping down in circles again and set us down near a small group of standing stones.

We climbed off his back, and Dr. Drake loosened the harness on the saddle.

Then he bowed low. “Idraigir,” he said, “I shall not forget what you have done for us.”

Idraigir thumped his front feet on the ground.

“Defeat that man Ignatius,” he said. “That is all I ask.”

Then he took off again and flew upwards. Soon he had become no more than a tiny green speck in the sky.

“Now,” said Dr. Drake, “we must search for something that could be called the smokestack. I imagine that it will be some sort of pile of rocks.”

But although we searched the moor for several hours, we could find nothing that Dr. Drake thought might be the smokestack, and since we were growing tired and hungry, Dr. Drake said that we ought to stop and find somewhere to rest for the night.

“But what about Ignatius?” I cried. “He and Alexandra might arrive here any minute.”

“That may be,” said Dr. Drake. “But you children need food and rest now, and that is what you are going to have. And I have another reason for visiting Wharncliffe. I think we are on a wild goose chase at the moment. I am going to see if I can find out some information.”

And Dr. Drake led us off the moor and to a small inn that lay on the outskirts of Wharncliffe village.

When I woke up the next day, I discovered that Dr. Drake had been up and about since the early morning, buying a spade, some provisions, and some candles, and trying to find out as much as he could about anything that might be called the smokestack out on the moor. He had been in luck. The lady who sold him the provisions had said that her mother often used to speak of it. It was a rocky hole in the ground from which, in olden days, smoke and flames had sometimes been seen. There was a story, that very few people believed these days, that there was a dragon under Ramsley Moor, and it was she who caused the smoke and flames to rise up, almost as from a chimney.

“It was right under our noses all along!” said Dr. Drake.

He led us back to the small circle of stones. And there, about a hundred yards away, I found a depression in the ground that was filled with rocks. I could almost imagine that if you crawled down, you might find yourself in some sort of vertical shaft. And when I leaned over it, I could indeed see that there was a sort of vent going downwards.

“Well done, Daniel,” said Dr. Drake. “Now that we have found the smokestack, we must find the entrance. It is hidden by a ‘barren floor.' Can you see a patch of ground that has nothing growing on it?”

This time it was Beatrice who found what we were looking for.

“There!” she said, pointing to a bare patch of ground a little farther on from the smokestack.

“Are you sure?” I asked. “There seem to be quite a few bare patches of ground about.”

“Look!” she said.

Suddenly it hit me. The other patches of ground were irregular, but
this
patch of ground was a perfect diamond shape.

Dr. Drake smiled.

“It's an obvious sign, really,” he said. “I wonder that we missed it before.”

The soil was soft, and it came away very easily. I began to dig but, after about half an hour, Dr. Drake took over, and very soon we had excavated a sort of pit. Then Dr. Drake's spade hit solid stone. He grew more excited, and excavated more and more quickly. The shape of some kind of ancient doorway began to emerge. When it was finally uncovered, it was about four feet high and about six feet below the surface of the rest of the ground. It was decorated with a fine carving of strange beasts, and at the top was a strange pyramid symbol with an eye. Around the bottom curled the body of a dragon. The door was made entirely of rock, except for the eyes of the creatures, which were made of gemstones. The creatures in the middle looked as though they were attacking each other: there was an ogre fighting a sort of serpent with a man's head, and an eagle and a phoenix battling it out above them.

“Look,” said Dr. Drake, pointing to the pyramid symbol at the top. “This is one of the very oldest and most secret symbols of the dragonological societies the world over. Few know it represents the Dragon's Eye. But I wonder how we can open this door.”

He thought for a while. Beatrice, however, was feeling all over the door with her hands.

“I think these gems might press —”

“Stop!” cried Dr. Drake.

Beatrice pulled her hand back from the gem in the eye of the phoenix at the last moment.

Dr. Drake smiled.

“I think I've got it!” he said. “Thank you, Beatrice.”

“How?” said Beatrice.

“Tell me the names of those four creatures in the middle.”

“Well,” said Beatrice, “there's an ogre, something that looks like an eagle, a strange bird that looks like it has flames around it, and a sort of snake creature.”

“Isn't that a naga?” I said.

“Indeed it is,” said Dr. Drake. “And the other creature is a phoenix. Think of the first letters. What is it we want to do with the door?”

“Um . . . naga, ogre, phoenix, eagle?” I said.

This time it was Beatrice's turn to smile.

“No, Daniel. It's ogre, phoenix, eagle, naga!”

“O-P-E-N. Open!” I said.

Dr. Drake began pressing in the eyes of the four creatures. Each time he did so, there was a click until at last the door swung silently open and a rush of hot air came out. It was hot air that carried a scent I recognised — the unmistakable smell of dragons.

Handing us a candle each, which he lit with some matches, we went in through the doorway. Dr. Drake paused to wedge it shut behind us with his spade.

“Do you think the door was booby-trapped?” asked Beatrice. She was obviously wondering what would have happened had she pressed the gems in the wrong order.

“I am sure of it,” said Dr. Drake.

We found ourselves in a low, narrow chamber that soon opened out into a tunnel about six feet high with walls carved all over with twisting serpentine shapes.

We did not have time to study the carvings. Dr. Drake led us on down the tunnel as it took a steep angle that led farther and farther underground.

On and on we went, farther and farther down into the earth, until at last we stepped out into what seemed to be a vast cavern. The walls were covered in the same dragon-shaped carvings that had lined the tunnel. I was awestruck. I stepped forwards, but Dr. Drake grabbed my shoulder.

“Be careful,” he whispered.

Looking down, I could see why. There was a chasm at my feet that seemed to run all the way round the walls of the enormous chamber. In the very centre of the chamber was a platform lit by a dim shaft of light coming from an entrance high above it.
That must be the smokestack,
I thought. The light bounced off a huge hoard of golden treasures vastly bigger than the one possessed by Scramasax. There were cups and weapons and necklaces and gems and many other wonderful things, rising in a great pyramid in the middle. And right on the top was a most magnificent gem, reflecting the light round the cavern in what seemed to be a thousand colours.