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“If you say so.” Sorrel sighed and let Rat hop down to the stony floor of the cave. “But he’s still asleep.”
“Then I’m waking him up!” spat the rat, making her way farther into the cave, where a fire burned blue, keeping the darkness and damp away from the heart of the mountain. Beside its flames the dragon lay asleep, curled up with his head on his paws. His long tail with its spiny crest was coiled around the warmth of the fire. The flames brought a glow to his scales and cast his shadow on the cave wall. Rat scurried up to the dragon, climbed on his paw, and tugged his ear.
“Firedrake!” she shouted. “Firedrake, wake up. They’re coming!”
Sleepily the dragon raised his head and opened his eyes.
“Oh, it’s you, is it, Rat?” he murmured in a rather hoarse voice. “Has the sun set already, then?”
“No, but you must get up all the same! You have to wake the others!” Rat jumped off Firedrake’s paw and scuttled up and down in front of him. “I warned you, I really did — I warned the whole bunch of you, but you wouldn’t listen, oh, no!”
“What’s she talking about?” The dragon cast an inquiring glance at Sorrel, who was now sitting by the fire, nibbling a root.
“No idea,” said Sorrel, munching. “She just keeps jabbering on. Well, there’s not much room for sense in a little head like hers.”
“Oh, really!” Rat gasped indignantly. “Honestly, I ask You, I —”
“Take no notice, Rat!” Firedrake rose, stretched his long neck, and shook himself. “She’s in a bad temper because the mist makes her fur damp.”
“Pull the other one!” Rat threw Sorrel a venomous glance. “Brownies are always bad-tempered. I’ve been up since sunrise, running my paws off to warn you. And what thanks do I get?” Her gray coat was bristling with anger. “I have to listen to her silly fur-brained fancies!”
“Warn us of what?” Sorrel threw the nibbled remnants of her root at the wall of the cave. “Oh, putrid puffballs! Stop winding us all up like this or I’ll tie a knot in your tail!”
“Quiet, Sorrel!” Firedrake brought his claw down angrily on the fire. Blue sparks flew into the brownie girl’s fur, where they went out like tiny shooting stars.
“All right, all right!” she muttered. “But the way that rat carries on is enough to drive anyone crazy.”
“Oh, really? Then just you listen to me!” Rat drew herself up to her full height, planted her paws on her hips, and bared her teeth. “Humans are coming!” she squeaked, so shrilly that her voice echoed all around the cave. “Human beings are coming! You know what that means, you leaf-burrowing, mushroom-munching, shaggy-haired brownie? Humans are coming — coming here!”
Suddenly all was deathly quiet.
Sorrel and Firedrake looked at each other as if they had been turned to stone. But Rat was still trembling with rage. Her whiskers were all aquiver, and her tail twitched back and forth on the cave floor.
Firedrake was the first to move.
“Humans?” he asked, bending his neck and holding out his paw to Rat. Looking offended, she scrambled onto it. Firedrake raised her to his eye level. “Are you sure?” he asked.
“Perfectly sure,” replied the rat.
Firedrake bowed his head. “It was bound to happen someday,” he said quietly. “They’re all over the place these days. I think there are more and more of them all the time.”
Sorrel was still looking stunned. Suddenly she jumped up and spat into the fire. “But that’s impossible!” she cried. “There’s nothing here they’d want, nothing at all!”
“That’s what you think!” The rat bent over so far that she almost fell off Firedrake’s paw. “Don’t talk such nonsense. You’ve mingled with humans, right? There’s nothing they don’t fancy, nothing they don’t want. Forgotten that already, have you?”
“Okay, okay!” muttered Sorrel. “You’re right. They’re greedy. They want everything for themselves.”
“They do indeed.” The rat nodded. “And I tell you, they’re coming here.”
The dragon-fire flared up, and then the flames burned low until the darkness, like some black animal, swallowed them. Only one thing could extinguish Firedrake’s fiery breath so fast and that was sorrow. But the dragon blew gently on the rocky ground, and flames flickered up once more.
“This is bad news indeed, Rat,” said Firedrake. He let Rat jump up onto his shoulder, and then went slowly toward the mouth of the cave. “Come on, Sorrel,” he said. “We must wake the others.” “And won’t they just be pleased!” growled Sorrel, smoothing down her ruffled fur and following Firedrake out into the mist.
2. A Meeting in the Rain
Slatebeard, the oldest dragon in the valley, had seen more than his memory could hold. His scales no longer glowed, but he could still breathe fire, and whenever the younger dragons were at a loss they would come to ask his advice. Once all the other dragons had assembled outside Slatebeard’s cave, Firedrake woke him. The sun had set. A black and starless sky lay over the valley, and it was still raining.
When the old dragon emerged from his cave he looked gloomily up at the sky. His bones ached from the damp, and the cold weather made his joints stiff. The others respectfully made way for him. Slatebeard looked around. None of the dragons were missing, but Sorrel was the only brownie present. The old dragon moved through the wet grass, with heavy steps and dragging tail, toward a rock that rose in the valley like a giant’s head covered with moss. Breathing hard, he climbed up on it and looked around. The other dragons gazed up at him like frightened children. Some of them were still very young and knew nothing but this valley; others had come with Slatebeard himself from far, far away and remembered that the world had not always belonged to humankind. They all smelled misfortune, and they hoped he would deal with it. But Slatebeard was old and tired now.
