The rat scampered nimbly up the rock, climbed Slatebeard’s tail, and crouched on his back. It was so quiet under the dark sky that only the sound of the rain falling and the rustle of foxes out hunting by night could be heard. Rat cleared her throat. “Humans are coming!” she cried. “They’ve woken their machines and fed them and sent them on their way. They’re already eating a path through the mountains only two days’ journey from here. The fairies will hold them at bay for a while, but they’ll get here some time or other — because it’s this valley of yours they’re heading toward.”
A groan ran through the ranks of the dragons. They raised their heads and pressed closer around the rock where Slatebeard stood.
Firedrake was a little way away from the others, with Sorrel perched on his back, nibbling a dried mushroom. “Oh, terrific, Rat,” she muttered. “Couldn’t you have put it a little more tactfully?”
“What does that mean?” one of the dragons called out. “Why would they want to come here? Surely they have all they want where they are.”
“Humans never have all they want,” replied Rat.
“Let’s hide until they go away again!” suggested another dragon. “The way we’ve always done when one of them loses his way and turns up here. They’re so blind they only see what they expect to see. They’ll think we’re odd-looking rocks, same as usual. Or dead trees.”
But the rat shook her head.
“Look here!” she shrilled. “If I’ve told you once I’ve told you a hundred times, those humans are making plans. But big animals don’t listen to little animals, right?” She looked around her crossly. “You hide from human beings, but you aren’t interested in what they’re up to. Rats aren’t so stupid: We go into their houses; we eavesdrop on them. We know what they’re planning for your valley.” Rat cleared her throat again and stroked her gray whiskers.
“Here she goes again, winding up the suspense,” Sorrel whispered into Firedrake’s ear, but the dragon ignored her.
“What are they planning, then, Rat?” asked Slatebeard wearily. “Come on, tell us.”
Rat fiddled nervously with a whisker. It was no fun bringing bad news. “They — they’re going to flood the valley,” she replied, her voice faltering. “Soon there’ll be nothing here but water. Your caves will be flooded, and none of the tall trees over there,” she said, pointing one paw at the darkness, “none of them will be left. Not even the treetops will show above the water.”
The dragons stared at her, speechless.
“But that’s impossible!” one of them exclaimed at last. “No one can do a thing like that. Not even us, and we’re bigger and stronger than they are.”
“Impossible?” Rat laughed sarcastically. “Bigger? Stronger? You don’t get it at all. You tell them, Sorrel. Tell them what human beings are like. Maybe they’ll believe you.” With an injured expression, she wrinkled her sharp nose.
The dragons turned to Firedrake and Sorrel.
“Rat’s right,” said the brownie “You’ve no idea.” She spat on the ground and picked at a piece of moss stuck between her teeth. “Human beings don’t go around in suits of armor these days, like they used to when they hunted you dragons, but they’re still dangerous. More dangerous than anything else in the world.”
“Oh, nonsense!” said a large, stout dragon scornfully and turned his back on Sorrel. “Let the two-legs come! Rats and brownies may be right to fear them, but we are dragons! What can they do to us?”
“What can they do to you?” Sorrel threw her nibbled mushroom away and sat up very straight. She was angry now, and an angry brownie is not to be trifled with. “You’ve never set foot outside this valley, dimwit!” she said. “I expect you think human beings sleep on leaves like you. I expect you think they do no more harm than a fly because they don’t live much longer than one. I expect you think they’ve got nothing in their heads but thoughts of eating and sleeping. But they aren’t like that. Oh, no, not these days!” Sorrel was practically gasping for air. “Those things that sometimes fly across the sky — being so stupid, you call them noisy-birds — those things are machines built by humans for traveling through the air. And human beings can talk to one another when they aren’t even in the same country. They can conjure up moving, talking pictures, and they have cups made of ice that never melts, and their houses shine at night as if they’d trapped the sunlight, and, and …” Sorrel shook her head. “And they can do wonderful things — terrible things, too. If they want to flood this valley with water then they will. You’ll have to leave whether you like it or not.”
The dragons stared at her. Even the one who had just turned his back. Some of them looked up at the mountains as if they expected machines to come crawling over the black peaks at any moment.
“Oh, drat it!” muttered Sorrel. “Now he’s gone and made me so cross I threw my delicious mushroom away. It was an oyster mushroom, too! You don’t find those around here so often.” In a thoroughly bad mood, she scrambled down off Firedrake’s back and started searching the wet grass for her tidbit.
“You heard, all of you!” said Slatebeard. “We have to leave.”
Uncertainly, their legs heavy with fear, the dragons turned to him again.
“For some of you,” the old dragon continued, “it will be the first time, but many of us have had to flee from human beings before. Although now it will be extremely difficult to find a place that doesn’t belong to them.” Slatebeard shook his head sadly. “It seems to me there are more and more humans with every new moon.”
“Yes, they’re all over the place,” said the dragon who had been mocking Sorrel a moment ago. “It’s only when I fly over the sea that I don’t see their lights beneath me.”
“Then we must just try living in harmony with them,” suggested another dragon.
But Slatebeard shook his head. “No,” he said. “No one can live in harmony with human beings.”
“Oh, yes, they can.” Rat stroked her wet coat. “Dogs and cats do, and mice and birds, even us rats. But you,” she said, letting her gaze roam over the dragons, “you’re too big, too clever, and,” she added, shrugging her shoulders, “too different! You’d frighten them. And when something frightens human beings they —”
“They destroy it,” the old dragon said wearily. “They almost wiped us out once before, many, many hundred years ago.” He raised his heavy head and looked at the younger dragons one by one. “I’d hoped they would at least leave us this valley. It was a foolish hope.”
“But where are we to go?” cried one of the dragons in despair. “This is our home.”
Slatebeard did not reply. He looked up at the night sky, where the stars were still hidden behind clouds, and sighed. Then he said huskily, “Go back to the Rim of Heaven. We have to stop running away sometime. I’m too old. I shall crawl into my cave and hide, but you younger ones can make it.”