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Sorrel picked up Twigleg, put a finger to his lips, and made her way out of hiding.
“Did you say your name was Graytail?” she asked.
The rat swung around, dropping all her things in her fright. “What? Who? How?” she stammered. Then she jumped back into her plane and tried to start it.
“Wait!” cried Sorrel, standing in front of the small aircraft and holding on to the propeller. “Not so fast! Where are you going? Are you by any chance related to a rat named Gilbert who’s as white as a cultivated mushroom?”
Taken aback, the rat stared at the brownie girl. Then she switched off the engine of her plane and stuck her whiskered nose out of the cockpit. “You know Gilbert?” she asked.
“We bought a map from him,” replied Sorrel. “His rubber stamp looks just like the sign on your wings. Not that the map’s prevented us from getting lost in these parts.”
“A map?” The rat climbed out of her aircraft again and jumped down to the ground. “A map of the countryside around here?” She glanced at the cave, and then at Sorrel. “You don’t by any chance have a dragon in there?”
Sorrel grinned. “Yes, I do.”
Lola Graytail rolled her eyes and said, through gritted teeth, “Then it’s all your fault I’m surveying these godforsaken parts!” she snapped. “Oh, thanks! Thank you very, very much, indeed!”
“Our fault?” said Sorrel. “Why?”
“Ever since you visited Gilbert,” said the rat, picking up the things she had dropped when Sorrel suddenly appeared, “he’s been obsessed with the blank patches on his map! So he calls me up just as I’m having a nice little vacation visiting my brother in India and goes on and on to me. ‘Lola, you must fly to the Himalayas! Lola, do your old uncle a little favor! Lola, I simply must find out about the blank patches on my map. Please, Lola!’ So here I am.”
The rat groaned under the weight of the equipment she was hauling into the shelter of the cave. “Can’t you make yourself useful instead of just gawking at me?” she snapped at Sorrel. “Push the plane into the cave, or it’ll soon be hot enough to fry ostrich eggs on it.”
“Just like her uncle!” growled Sorrel, putting Twigleg down and fetching the plane. It weighed so little that she could tuck it under her arm. When she brought it into the cave, she found Lola Graytail standing transfixed in front of the sleeping Firedrake.
“Wind and weather!” she whispered. “It really is a dragon.”
“What did you expect? Don’t wake him up, he needs a good sleep or we’ll never get out of here.” Sorrel put down the plane and looked at it more closely. “Where did you get this airplane?” she asked, lowering her voice.
“From a toy shop,” murmured Lola Graytail without taking her eyes off the dragon. “Of course I did a conversion job on it. It flies really well. Even the mountains around here were no problem.” She took another cautious step toward the dragon. Standing on her hind legs, she was hardly any bigger than one of Firedrake’s paws. “Beautiful,” she whispered. “But what does he eat?” She turned to Sorrel, looking anxious. “Not rats, I hope?”
Sorrel chuckled. “No, don’t worry. Nothing but moonlight, that’s all he needs.”
“Ah, moonlight.” The rat nodded. “Interesting source of energy, that. I’ve tried building moonlight batteries. Never got them to work yet, though.” She turned to look at Ben, who was asleep near the mouth of the cave, still exhausted after his adventure with the giant roc.
“You’ve got a human with you, too?” she whispered. “My uncle only mentioned you and the dragon.” Pointing at Twigleg, she added, “He didn’t say anything about that little creature, either.”
Sorrel shrugged her shoulders and twirled the propeller of Lola’s plane with her paw. It whirred around. “Those two just sort of came along,” she said. “We have a bit of trouble with them now and then, but they’re not so bad really. The little one’s a homincolossus.”
“Homunculus!” Twigleg corrected her and bowed to Lola Graytail.
“Ah,” she said, examining him from head to foot. “No offense meant, but you look like some kind of toy human.”
Twigleg smiled shyly. “Well, in a way you’re right,” he said. “May I ask how far you’ve gotten with surveying and mapping these parts?”
“I’m almost through,” replied Lola, smoothing her whiskers. “Just dropped in here to write up my records for today.”
Sorrel looked at her in surprise. “Then you know your way around here?”
“Of course.” The rat twitched her shoulders. “I know every dratted stick and stone in these parts by now.”
“You do?” Sorrel ran over to Ben and shook him.
“Wake up!” she whispered into his ear. “Wake up — there’s someone here who can show us the way to the monastery!”
Ben turned over sleepily and blinked at Sorrel. “What is it? Who’s here?”
Sorrel pointed to Lola. The fat rat took a step back, for safety’s sake, but she put her paws on her hips and stared the human bravely in the face. Ben sat up in surprise and looked down at her.
