The Dragon Boat

Aunt Zelda was panicking. "Where is the key? I can't find the key! Oh, here it is." With shaking hands she drew the key out of one of her patchwork pockets and opened the door to the lantern cupboard. She took out a lantern and gave it to Boy 412. "You know where to go, don't you?" asked Aunt Zelda. "The trapdoor in the potion cupboard?" Boy 412 nodded. "Go down into the tunnel. You'll be safe there. No one will find you. I'll make the trapdoor Disappear."

"But aren't you coming?" Jenna asked Aunt Zelda.

"No," she said quietly. "Boggart's very sick. I'm afraid he may not last if I move him. Don't worry about me. It's not me they want. Oh, look, take this, Jenna. You may as well have him with you." Aunt Zelda fished Jenna's Shield Bug out of yet another pocket and gave the rolled-up bug to her. Jenna tucked the bug into her jacket pocket. "Now, go!"

Boy 412 hesitated, and another crack of lightning split the air.

"Go!" squeaked Aunt Zelda, waving her arms about like a demented windmill. "Go!"

Boy 412 opened the trapdoor in the potion cupboard and held the lantern high, his hand trembling a little, while Jenna scrambled down the ladder. Nicko hung back, wondering where Maxie had got to. He knew how much the wolfhound hated thunderstorms, and he wanted to take him with him. "Maxie," he called out. "Maxie boy!" From underneath the rug a faint wolfhound whine came in reply.

Boy 412 was already halfway down the ladder. "Come on," he told Nicko. Nicko was busy wrestling with the recalcitrant wolfhound who refused to come out from what he considered to be the safest place in the world. Under the hearth rug.

"Hurry up," said Boy 412 impatiently, his head sticking back up through the trapdoor. What Nicko saw in that heap of smelly fur Boy 412 had no idea.

Nicko had grabbed hold of the spotted scarf that Maxie wore around his neck. He heaved the terrified dog out from under the rug and was dragging him across the floor. Maxie's claws made a hideous scraping noise on the stone flags and as Nicko shoved him into the dark potion cupboard he whined piteously. Maxie knew he must have been very bad to deserve this. He wondered what it was he had done. And why he hadn't enjoyed it more at the time.

In a flurry of fur and dribble, Maxie fell through the trapdoor and landed on Boy 412, knocking the lantern from his hand, putting it out and sending it rolling away down the steep incline.

"Now look what you've done," Boy 412 told the dog crossly as Nicko joined him at the bottom of the wooden ladder.

"What?" asked Nicko. "What have I done?"

"Not you. Him. Lost the lantern."

"Oh, we'll find it. Stop worrying. We're safe now." Nicko hauled Maxie to his feet, and the wolfhound skittered down the sandy slope, his claws scrabbling on the rock underneath, dragging Nicko with him. They both slipped and slid down the steep slope, coming to rest in an unruly heap at the bottom of some steps.

"Ow!" said Nicko. "I think I've found the lantern."

"Good," said Boy 412 grumpily. He picked up the lantern, which sprang to life again and lit up the smooth marble walls of the tunnel.

"There're those pictures again," said Jenna. "Aren't they amazing?"

"How come everyone's been down here except for me?" complained Nicko. "No one asked if I might have liked to look at the pictures. Hey, there's a boat in this one, look."

"We know," said Boy 412, shortly. He put down the lantern and sat on the ground. He felt tired and wished Nicko would be quiet.

But Nicko was excited by the tunnel. "It's amazing down here," he said, staring at the hieroglyphs that ran along the wall as far as they could see in the flickering light of the lantern.

"I know," said Jenna. "Look, I really like this one. This circle thing with a dragon in it." She ran her hand over the small blue and gold image inscribed on the marble wall. Suddenly she felt the ground begin to shake.

Boy 412 jumped to his feet. "What's that?" he gulped.

A long, low rumble sent tremors up through their feet and reverberated through the air.

"It's moving!" gasped Jenna. "The tunnel wall is moving."

One side of the tunnel wall was parting, ponderously rolling back, leaving a wide-open space in front of them. Boy 412 held up the lantern. It flared into a brilliant white light and showed, to their astonishment, a vast subterranean Roman temple laid out before them. Beneath their feet was an intricate mosaic floor, and rising into the darkness were huge round marble columns. But that was not all.

"Oh."

"Wow."

"Phew." Nicko whistled. Maxie sat down and breathed respectful clouds of dog breath into the chill air.

In the middle of the temple, resting on the mosaic floor, lay the most beautiful boat anyone had ever seen.

The golden Dragon Boat of Hotep-Ra.

The huge green and gold head of the dragon reared up from the prow, its neck arched gracefully like a giant swan's. The body of the dragon was a broad open boat with a smooth hull of golden wood. Folded neatly back along the outside of the hull were the dragon's wings; great iridescent green folds shimmered as the multitude of green scales caught the light of the lantern. And at the stern of the Dragon Boat the green tail arched far up into the darkness of the temple, its golden barbed end almost hidden in the gloom.

"How did that get here?" breathed Nicko.

"Shipwrecked," said Boy 412.

Jenna and Nicko looked at Boy 412 in surprise. "How do you know?" they both asked.

"I read about it in A Hundred Strange and Curious Tales for Bored Boys. Aunt Zelda lent it to me. But I thought it was a legend. I never thought the Dragon Boat was real. Or that it was here."

"So what is it?" asked Jenna, entranced by the boat and getting the strangest feeling she had seen it somewhere before.

"It's the Dragon Boat of Hotep-Ra. Legend has it he was the Wizard who built WizardTower."

"He did," said Jenna. "Marcia told me."

"Oh. Well, there you are, then. The story said Hotep-Ra was a powerful Wizard in a Far Country and he had a dragon. But something happened and he had to leave quickly. So the dragon offered to become his boat, and she carried him safely to a new land."

"So that boat is - or was - a real dragon?" whispered Jenna, in case the boat could hear her.

"I suppose so," said Boy 412.

"Half boat, half dragon," muttered Nicko. "Weird. But why is she here?"

"She was wrecked off some rocks by the Port lighthouse," said Boy 412. "Hotep-Ra towed her into the marshes and had her pulled out of the water into a Roman temple that he found on a sacred island. He started rebuilding her, but he couldn't find any skilled craftsmen at the Port. It was a really rough place in those days."

"Still is," grunted Nicko, "and they're still no good at building boats either. If you want a proper boatbuilder you come upriver to the Castle. Everyone knows that."

"Well, that was what they told Hotep-Ra too," said Boy 412. "But when this oddly dressed man turned up at the Castle claiming to be a Wizard, they all laughed at him and refused to believe his stories about his amazing Dragon Boat. Until one day the Queen's daughter fell ill, and he saved her life. The Queen was so grateful that she helped him build the WizardTower. One summer he took her and her daughter out to the Marram Marshes to see the Dragon Boat. And they fell in love with it. After that Hotep-Ra had as many boatbuilders working on it as he wanted, and because the Queen loved the boat, and she liked Hotep-Ra too, she used to bring her daughter out every summer just to see how they were getting on. The story says the Queen still does that. Oh, er ... well, not any more, of course."

There was a silence.

"Sorry. I didn't think," muttered Boy 412.

"Doesn't matter," said Jenna a little too brightly.

Nicko went over to the boat and expertly ran his hand over the gleaming golden wood of the hull.

"Nice repair," he said. "Someone knew what they were doing. Shame no one has sailed her since though. She's so beautiful."

He began to climb an old wooden ladder that was propped up against the hull. "Well, don't just stand there, you two. Come and have a look!"

The inside of the boat was like no other boat anyone had ever seen. It was painted a deep lapis lazuli blue with hundreds of hieroglyphs running along the deck inscribed in gold.

"That old chest in Marcia's room at the Tower," said Boy 412 as he wandered along the deck, trailing his fingers along the polished wood, "it had the same kind of writing on it."

"Did it?" said Jenna doubtfully. As far as she remembered, Boy 412 had his eyes closed most of the time he was in the WizardTower.

"I saw it when the Assassin came in. I can still see it now in my head," said Boy 412, who was often troubled with a photographic memory of the most unfortunate of times.

They wandered along the deck of the Dragon Boat, past coiled green ropes, golden cleats and shackles, silver blocks and halyards and endless hieroglyphs. They passed by a small cabin with its deep blue doors firmly closed and carrying the same dragon symbol enclosed in a flattened oval shape that they had seen on the door in the tunnel, but none of them felt quite brave enough to open the doors and see what was below. They tiptoed past and, at last, reached the stern of the boat.

The tail of the dragon.

The massive tail arched high above them, disappearing into the gloom and making them all feel very small and a little vulnerable. All the Dragon Boat had to do was swish its tail down at them, and that, thought Boy 412 with a shiver, would be that.

Maxie had become very subdued and was walking obediently behind Nicko, his tail between his legs. He still had the feeling he had done something very wrong, and being on the Dragon Boat had not made him feel any better.

Nicko was at the stern of the boat, casting an expert eye over the tiller. It met with his approval. It was an elegant, smoothly curved piece of mahogany, carved so expertly that it fit into the hand as if it had known you forever.

Nicko decided to show Boy 412 how to steer.

"Look, you hold it like this," he said, taking hold of the tiller, "and then you push it to the right if you want the boat to go left, and you pull it to the left if you want the boat to go right. Easy."

"Doesn't sound very easy," said Boy 412 doubtfully. "Sounds back to front to me."

"See, like this." Nicko pushed the tiller to the right. It moved smoothly, turning the huge rudder at the stern in the opposite direction.

Boy 412 looked over the side of the boat. "Oh, that's what it does," he said. "I see now."

"You try," said Nicko. "It makes more sense when you're holding it yourself." Boy 412 took the tiller in his right hand and stood beside it as Nicko had shown him.

The dragon's tail twitched.

Boy 412 jumped. "What was that?"

"Nothing," said Nicko. "Look, just push it away from you, like this..."

While Nicko was doing what he liked to do best, telling someone about how boats worked, Jenna had wandered up to the prow to look at the handsome golden dragon head. She gazed at it and found herself wondering why its eyes were closed. If she had a wonderful boat like this, thought Jenna, she would give the dragon two huge emeralds for eyes. It was no more than the dragon deserved. And then, on impulse, she wrapped her arms around the dragon's smooth green neck and laid her head against it. The neck felt smooth and surprisingly warm.

A shiver of recognition ran through the dragon at Jenna's touch. Distant memories came flooding back to the Dragon Boat...

Long days of convalescence after her terrible accident. Hotep-Ra bringing the beautiful young Queen from the Castle to visit her on MidSummer Day. Days turning into months dragging into years as the Dragon Boat lies on the floor of the temple and is slowly, so slowly, put back together by Hotep-Ra's boatbuildcrs. And each MidSummer Day the Queen, now accompanied by her baby daughter, visited the Dragon Boat. The years wearing on and still the boatbuilders have not finished. Endless lonely months when the builders disappear and leave her alone. And then Hotep-Ra becoming older and more frail, and when at last she is restored to her former glory, Hotep-Ra is too ill to see her. He orders the temple to be covered over with a huge mound of earth to protect her until the day she will again be needed, and she is plunged into darkness.

But the Queen does not forget what Hotep-Ra has told her - that she must visit tbe Dragon Boat each MidSummer Day. Every summer she comes to the island. She orders a simple cottage to be built for her ladies and herself to stay in, and every MidSummer Day she lights a lantern, takes it down into the temple and visits the boat she has come to love. As the years go by, each successive Queen pays a midsummer visit to the Dragon Boat, no longer knowing why, but doing it because her own mother did so before her, and because each new Queen grows to love the dragon too. The dragon loves each Queen in return, and although each one is different in her own way, they all possess the same distinctive, gentle touch, as does this one.

And so the centuries pass. The Queen's midsummer visit becomes a secret tradition, watched over by a succession of White Witches who live in the cottage, keeping the secret of the Dragon Boat and lighting the lanterns to help the dragon through her days. The dragon dozes the centuries away, buried under the island, hoping one day to be released and waiting for each magical MidSummer Day when the Queen herself brings a lantern and pays her respects.

Until one MidSummer Day ten years ago when the Queen did not come. The dragon was tormented with worry, but there was nothing to be done. Aunt Zelda kept the cottage ready for the advent of the Queen, should she ever arrive, and the dragon had waited, her spirits kept up by Aunt Zelda's daily visit with yet another freshly lit lantern. But what the dragon was really waiting for was the moment when the Queen would again throw her arms around her neck.

As she had just done.

The dragon opened her eyes in surprise. Jenna gasped. She must be dreaming, she thought. The dragon's eyes were indeed green, just as she had imagined, but they were not emeralds. They were living, seeing dragon eyes. Jenna let go of the dragon's neck and stepped back, and the dragon eyes followed her movement, taking a long look at the new Queen. It is a young one, thought the dragon, but none the worse for that. She bowed her head respectfully.

From the stern of the boat, Boy 412 saw the dragon bow her head, and he knew he was not imagining things. Neither was he imagining something else. The sound of running water.

"Look!" yelled Nicko.

A narrow dark gap had appeared in the wall between the two marble pillars holding up the roof. A small trickle of water had begun to pour ominously through the opening as if a sluice gate had been nudged open. As they watched, the trickle soon became a stream, with the gap opening wider and wider. Soon the mosaic floor of the temple was awash with water, and the stream pouring in had become a torrent.

With a thunderous roar, the earth bank outside gave way, and the wall between the two pillars collapsed. A river of mud and water swept into the cavern, churning around the Dragon Boat, lifting and rocking her from side to side, until suddenly she was floating free.

"She's afloat!" yelled Nicko excitedly.

Jenna stared down from the prow at the muddy water swirling below them and watched as the small wooden ladder was caught up in the flood and swept away. Far above her, Jenna became aware of some movement: slowly and painfully, with a neck stiff from all the years of waiting, the dragon was turning her head to see who, at last, was at the helm. She rested her deep-green eyes on her new Master, a surprisingly small figure in a red hat. He did not look anything like her last Master, Hotep-Ra, a tall dark man whose gold and platinum belt would flash in the sunlight glancing off the waves and whose purple cloak would fly wildly in the wind as they sped together over the ocean. But the dragon recognized the most important thing of all: the hand that once again held the tiller was Magykal.

It was time to go to sea once more.

The dragon reared her head, and the two massive leathery wings, which had been folded along the sides of the boat, began to loosen. Before her, for the first time in many hundreds of years, she could see open water.

Maxie growled, the hair on his neck standing up on end.

The boat began to move.

"What are you doing?" Jenna yelled at Boy 412.

Boy 412 shook his head. He wasn't doing anything. It was the boat.

"Let go!" Jenna yelled at him above the noise of the storm outside. "Let go of the tiller. It's you making this happen. Let go!"

But Boy 412 would not let go. Something kept his hand firmly on the tiller, guiding the Dragon Boat as she began to move between the two marble pillars, taking with her her new crew: Jenna, Nicko, Boy 412 and Maxie.

As the dragon's barbed tail cleared the confines of the temple, a loud creaking began on either side of the boat. The dragon was lifting her wings, unfurling and spreading each one like an enormous webbed hand stretching its long bony fingers, cracking and groaning as the leathery skin was pulled taut. The crew of the Dragon Boat stared into the night sky, amazed at the sight of the huge wings towering above the boat like two giant green sails.

The dragon's head reared up into the night, and her nostrils flared, breathing in the smell she had dreamed of all those years. The smell of the sea.

At last the dragon was free.