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Twigleg looked around importantly. “As soon as the moon rises, our prisoner will escape,” he said, “with all the information Nettlebrand wants and that bottle of brownie spit. He’ll tell his master where to find the entrance to the cave and how to open it. He’ll polish Nettlebrand’s armor with brownie spit, and then,” concluded Twigleg, smiling, “he’ll lead him to his doom.”
“How are you going to make sure he doesn’t see through the whole plan?” asked Ben.
“You leave that to me, young master,” replied Twigleg, looking at his finger, which still shone golden from the metal of the molten scale. “This is going to be my revenge for three hundred years of misery and the death of my eleven brothers.”
50. Deceiving the Spy
Gravelbeard had done his best to loosen his bonds. He had thrashed around on the cave floor like a fish on dry land, rubbing his bound wrists against sharp stones and trying to get at the knife in his pocket. It was no use. The rat had tied some very professional knots. So he lay there like a sack of potatoes for hours on the hard, rocky floor, grinding his teeth, while thousands of wonderful stones glittered down at him in the dark and he dreamed of tearing the spidery legs off that treacherous homunculus.
When at long last he heard steps approaching, Gravelbeard expected to see the fat rat or one of those hairy brownies coming back. But much to his surprise, it was Twigleg who emerged from the dark passage along which he himself had been dragged. That traitor Twigleg was still wearing Gravelbeard’s hat.
“What are you doing here?” spat Gravelbeard, wriggling like an eel in his bonds. “Come to question me, have you? Get out! Go back to your friends. But you can give me my hat back first, you revolting spider-legged traitor.”
“Shut up!” hissed Twigleg. He knelt down beside the dwarf and, to Gravelbeard’s terror, took a knife out of his pocket.
“Help!” shrieked the dwarf. “Help, Your Goldness, he’s going to murder me!”
“Nonsense!” Twigleg began sawing at Gravelbeard’s bonds. “Although if you go on squirming like that, I may accidentally cut off one of your fingers. And if you keep shouting Sorrel will have you for breakfast.”
Gravelbeard closed his mouth again. “Brownies don’t eat dwarves!” he growled.
“Oh, they do sometimes,” said Twigleg, cutting through the last knot. “Once I even heard a brownie say that dwarves were nice and crunchy.”
“Crunchy?” Gravelbeard struggled up. He listened. Only the eternal whispering of the stones.
Twigleg handed him his backpack. “Here are your things, and now let’s get out of here.”
“Get out of here?” The dwarf looked suspiciously at the homunculus. “What’s the big idea? Is this some kind of trap?”
“Don’t be silly!” hissed Twigleg, hauling the dwarf along after him. “You nearly ruined my wonderful plan, but even so I’m not going to let the brownies get you. Anyway, I need you as a messenger.”
“What are you talking about?” Reluctantly the mountain dwarf followed Twigleg down the dark passages. “What plan? You cheated us! You sent Nettlebrand off to the desert. Do you know I spent days and days there digging him out of the hot sand? All thanks to you!”
“Nonsense!” whispered Twigleg. “Pure rot. I’m not a traitor. I’ve been Nettlebrand’s faithful armor-cleaner for more than three hundred years, longer than you’ve spent tapping away at your stones, you halfwit. You think I’d turn traitor just like that? No, it’s all the ravens’ fault! Those ravens have been telling lies about me. They never did like me. But I’m the one who’ll make sure Nettlebrand can go hunting again at long last. I, Twigleg, not those miserable birds with their crooked beaks. And you’ll help me.”
“I will?” Dazed, Gravelbeard was stumbling along after him. “How? What —?”
“Psst!” Twigleg put a hand in front of his mouth. “Not a squeak out of you now. Understand?”
Gravelbeard nodded — and then his jaw dropped and his eyes popped, for they had reached the great cave.
Never in his entire dwarfish life had Gravelbeard seen such wonders. The stones dazzled him. Their voices sang in his ears, countless beautiful voices speaking in tones such as he had never heard before. When the homunculus dragged him roughly on, Gravelbeard woke as if from a dream that had held him spellbound.
“What’s the matter? Planning to hang around here and turn to stone?” hissed Twigleg, dragging the dwarf on through the glittering heart of the mountain. He led Gravelbeard past the sleeping brownies, past the rat lying beside her plane and snoring, past the human boy who was curled up like a cat. Gravelbeard noticed none of them. He saw only the glowing moonstones, he followed the bright pattern they traced on the cave walls — and then he stumbled over the tail of a sleeping dragon. He stopped short and gasped.
Two silver dragons lay before him, so close to each other that you could hardly tell where one ended and the other began.
“Two?” he whispered to the homunculus. “Only two? Where are the others?”
“In another cave,” whispered Twigleg. “Now, do come on! Or do you want to be here when they wake up?”
Gravelbeard hastily stumbled on. “How many are there?” he whispered. “Tell me, Twigleg. His Goldness is sure to ask me.”
“Twenty,” hissed Twigleg over his shoulder. “Maybe more. Come on.”
“Twenty,” murmured Gravelbeard, looking back once more at the sleeping dragons. “That’s a lot.”
“The more the merrier,” Twigleg whispered back. “Bet you that’s what he’ll say.”
