Dragon Rider (Dragon Rider 1)

“A dragon?” Gilbert Graytail looked at Sorrel in surprise. “Where’ve you hidden this dragon, then?”

“In an old factory,” Ben answered quickly before Sorrel could open her mouth. “Not far away. He’ll be safe there. No one’s been in it for years.”

“Aha!” Gilbert nodded his white head sagely.

“Well, what about it?” asked Sorrel impatiently. “Do you know where the Rim of Heaven is? Can you tell us how to get there in reasonable safety?”

“One thing at a time,” replied the rat, twirling his whiskers. “Nobody knows where the Rim of Heaven lies. There are a few vague rumors about it, that’s all. But the highest mountain range in the world is the Himalayas, no doubt of that. All the same, it won’t be easy to find a safe route for a dragon to take. Dragons,” he pointed out, chuckling, “aren’t exactly inconspicuous, know what I mean? And their horns and claws are in great demand. Quite apart from the fact that anyone setting up as a dragon slayer could be a big star on TV for weeks. I’ll admit I wouldn’t mind taking a look at your friend myself, but,” he said, shaking his head as he turned back to the computer, “but I never go farther than down to the harbor. Far too risky for me with all those cats prowling about. And there are other dangers, too,” he added, rolling his eyes. “Oh, you wouldn’t believe the half of it! Dogs, great big clumsy human feet, rat poison. No, thank you very much!”

“But I thought you’d been all over the world,” said Sorrel in surprise. “Rosa said you were a ship’s rat.”

Gilbert tugged at his whiskers, looking embarrassed. “Well, yes, so I am. Learned the trade from my granddad. But I get seasick as soon as a boat casts off, even a little rowing boat. On my first voyage I jumped overboard while we were still in harbor. Swam back to the bank and never set paw on one of those swaying sardine cans again. Ah.” He leaned so far forward that his sharp nose touched the screen. “Here we are. The Himalayas. Also known as the Land of the Eternal Snows, Roof of the World, and all that. You’ve a long journey ahead of you, friends. Follow me.” Paw over paw, Gilbert Graytail made his way along a cord stretched right across the room from the desk to the big globe. He sat on top of the heavy wooden stand and kicked the globe with his hind paws. Squealing, it moved slightly, and Gilbert brought it to rest with his paw again.

“Well now,” he murmured. “What have we here, then?”

Ben and Sorrel looked inquiringly at him.

“See that little white flag?” asked the white rat. “It more or less marks the spot where we are now, but the Himalayas,” said Gilbert, swinging himself over the stand and tapping the other side of the globe, “the Himalayas are here. And the Rim of Heaven, so the old stories say, is somewhere in their western parts. Unfortunately, as I was telling you, no one knows any details, and the area we’re talking about is unimaginably large and extremely inaccessible. It gets bitterly cold by night, and by day,” he added, grinning at Sorrel, “by day you’d probably be perspiring heavily in that fur coat of yours.”

“It’s a terribly long way off,” murmured Ben.

“Indeed it is!” Gilbert Graytail leaned forward and traced an invisible line on the globe. “By my reckoning your journey ought to go something like this: a fair stretch south first, then turn east.” He scratched his ear. “Yes. Yes, that’s it. I think the southern route is best. The humans are at war with one another again in the north. And I’ve heard some very nasty stories about a giant.” Gilbert leaned so close to the globe that his nose was pressed against it. “See that place? The giant is said to be at large there, in the Tien Shan mountains. No, no, take my word for it,” continued Gilbert Graytail, shaking his head, “you’d better take the southern route. You may get your fur baked in the sun now and then, but look on the bright side: There probably won’t be much rain at this time of year. And rain,” he said, chuckling, “I’ve heard that rain makes dragons melancholy. Is that right?”

“Usually,” replied Sorrel. “But where we come from they’ve had to get used to it.”

“Correct, I’d forgotten. You’re from the wettest part of Europe, aren’t you? But let’s get on with it.” Gilbert gave the globe another little push. “Where was I? Oh, yes. Up to here” — he tapped the map with his paw — “I can offer you first-class information. By the time you reach this spot you ought to have most of the journey behind you. But the region beyond—” Gilbert sighed and shook his head. “Zilch, zero, nix, nought, nothing, total radio silence. Even a tourist party of Buddhist temple mice I met down by the harbor last year couldn’t tell me anything useful about it. And I’m afraid that’s exactly where the place you’re looking for lies — if it really exists. I’m planning to ask a relation of mine to survey the area some time soon, but until then,” he said, shrugging his shoulders regretfully, “until then you’ll just have to ask your way — if you get that far. I’ve no idea who or what lives around there, but I’ll bet,” he said, stroking his white whiskers, “I’ll bet there are rats. We rats go everywhere.”

“That’s a great comfort, I’m sure,” muttered Sorrel, looking gloomily at the globe. “Looks like there’s a long-haul flight ahead of us.”

“Oh, it’s even farther to New Zealand,” said Gilbert, swinging paw over paw back along the cord to the desk. “But I’ll admit it is a long way, even for a dragon. Long and dangerous. May I ask what put the idea of such a journey into your minds? I know from Rosa that the dragons have quite a comfortable life up there in the north.”

Sorrel looked at Ben and cast the rat a warning glance.

“Oh, I see.” Gilbert Graytail raised his paws. “You’d rather not say in front of this human. Of course. We rats have had some bad experiences with humans, too.” Gilbert winked at Ben, who was standing there feeling embarrassed and not sure where to look. “Nothing against you personally, understand?” Graytail went back to his computer and began typing again. “Right, here goes. Destination: Himalayas. Travel party: one dragon, one brownie. Travel options: calculate safest route, danger spots, places to avoid at all costs, best traveling time. Enter.”

The rat stepped back, looking pleased with himself. The computer hummed like a captive bumblebee, the screen flickered — and went black.

“Oh, no!” Gilbert Graytail jumped on the keyboard, hammering at it frantically, but the screen did not respond.

Ben and Sorrel exchanged anxious glances. Gilbert leaped up, swearing, and slammed the lid of the laptop down over the keyboard.

“Like I told you,” he said crossly. “Nothing but trouble. Just because a little salt water got into it. I mean, do you stop working if you happen to drink a sip of salt water?” Furiously he jumped off the desk and onto the chair that sheltered his little study, slid down one of the chair legs, and began rummaging around in the matchbox index-card files.

Ben and Sorrel lay down on the floor and watched. “You mean you can’t help us after all?” asked Sorrel.

“Yes, yes, I can.” Graytail was fishing tiny fingernail-sized cards out of the files and flinging them down on the desk. “If that stupid thing won’t work I’ll just have to do it the old-fashioned way. Can one of you great big giants open the third drawer down in the chest of drawers there?”

Ben nodded. When he opened the drawer a large quantity of maps fell out: maps large and small, maps old and new. It took Gilbert Graytail some time to find the one he was after. It looked odd, quite different from the maps Ben knew, more like a small book folded up over and over again, with narrow white ribbons dangling from the pages.

“A map?” said Sorrel, disappointed, when Gilbert proudly spread this oddity out in front of them. “You mean all you have for us is a map?”

“Well, what did you expect?” Looking offended, the rat put his paws on his hips.

Sorrel didn’t know what to say. Tight-lipped, she stared down at the map.

“Look at that, will you?” Gilbert passed his paw lovingly over the seas and mountains. “This map’s got half the world on it. And very few blank spots — only those places I couldn’t discover anything about. But unfortunately, as I was saying, most of those do happen to be where you’re going. See these ribbons?” He beckoned the two of them over and pulled one of the ribbons. Part of the map immediately unfolded, and another map came into view.

“Cool!” exclaimed Ben.