The Griffin's Feather (Dragon Rider 2)

‘And then we left them in the nests that Tchraee destroyed!’ twittered Kupo.

‘Yes. That was TerTaWa’s idea,’ grumbled Patah. ‘I wanted to feed them to the crocodiles, but I guess the gibbon was right. Kraa would probably take revenge on Shrii for that.’

‘He certainly would,’ agreed Lola, landing in front of Winston’s sneakers.

TerTaWa had not been the only one to lower his head when Shrii’s name was mentioned. Knowing that the young griffin was still Kraa’s prisoner made all his friends feel that their own freedom was a betrayal. It was the same for Ben and Barnabas too.

‘Did this have to be our meeting place?’ asked Patah with a disapproving glance at the Whispering Tree.

Twigleg had asked Me-Rah to dictate him an account of the way to it, and had left it and his backpack in the dish in front of the griffin statue, trusting Lola to find it there. Of course the rat had not disappointed him.

‘The parrot’s idea, was it?’ Patah nodded to Me-Rah in annoyance. ‘Did she tell you what we call this tree?’

Even TerTaWa looked at him with obvious discomfort.

‘Monkey Strangler!’ called Patah accusingly.

The branches, laden with blossom and birds, rustled as if the tree thought Patah’s hostility was amusing.

‘Hey, it’s laughing!’ observed Hothbrodd, delighted. ‘And it says it doesn’t strangle you unless you steal eggs from the nests in its branches.’

He approached the huge tree as hesitantly as a child approaching Father Christmas. Not because he was afraid of it (he was afraid of nothing but wasps, a secret that the troll carefully kept to himself). No, the Whispering Tree of Pulau Bulu made Hothbrodd so happy that his own feet would hardly obey him, and he stepped under its crown, which smelled of cinnamon and nutmeg, with bated breath. When he touched the silky, pale grey bark, a shower of blossom fell on him. The laughter with which Hothbrodd picked the pale green flowers out of his hair was so loud that all the birds above him, pecking at the golden pollen, flew up in alarm. Only when the tree whispered soothingly to its leaves did they disappear into the deep flower-cups again.

In the protection of a tree that spread so much peace and joy, it seemed to Ben almost disrespectful to be planning a rescue that couldn’t take place without a fight, not to mention the theft of a sun-feather. Winston felt the same. He couldn’t remember any place where he had ever felt so safe and at peace with the whole world. The poachers, the griffins, the noise and restlessness of the human world where he had been born, all seemed nothing but a bad dream from which the Whispering Tree had woken him with the rustling of its leaves. All you wanted to do under this tree was to sit between its roots and forget the world! But Barnabas knew trees almost as well as he knew fabulous beings, and he saw that the Whispering Tree of Pulau Bulu would have to withstand many battles to protect those who took refuge in and under its crown.

‘My dear Me-Rah!’ he said, lowering his voice so as not to offend the monkeys. ‘Thank you. You have brought us to a perfect place! Here, maybe we can make a plan not only to save the Pegasus eggs, but also to set Shrii free!’

‘Oh, yes,’ growled Hothbrodd, running his green fingers over all the marks left by claws, teeth and machetes in the bark of the Whispering Tree. ‘We’re sure to think of something under this tree.’

A long scar, black as soot, showed where lightning had once struck the tree, and more than a dozen lead bullets had grown into the bark. The Whispering Tree told the troll the story of each of them, while the dragons rested on the flower petals covering the ground between its roots with a fragrant cushion. The branches above them spread so far that in spite of their own size, both dragons could easily find room under the tree. When Ben knelt between Firedrake’s paws, Winston knelt between Tattoo’s, whereupon Berulu looked at the dragon with unconcealed jealousy, but Winston tickled him behind the ears to reassure him as he himself leaned back against Tattoo’s scales. After all, new friends shouldn’t make us forget old ones.

‘Unfortunately, as you all know, time is short,’ Barnabas began. ‘And not just because of Shrii. Twigleg has just been working it out again. We must set off for home tomorrow if the mission that brought us here is not to fail! So we only have tonight to carry out our plan!’

‘Right!’ twittered Kupo. ‘What is the plan?’

And the discussion began. The light of thousands of glow-worms flickered over the dark water of the river. Fluorescent tree fungi bathed the jungle around them in ghostly green light, and countless eyes peering through the thickets of leaves and twigs watched the strange assembly that had gathered: animals, humans, fabulous creatures. Even for Pulau Bulu, where so many living things existed side by side, it was a unique meeting, and not only because for the first time since the island had emerged from the sea, it had two dragons visiting it. But by dint of good luck – or maybe because of the protection of the Whispering Tree – out of all the pairs of eyes observing the dragons and their friends, not one belonged to a servant of Kraa.

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

A Shortage of Space

To achieve great things two things are needed:

a plan and not quite enough time.

Leonard Bernstein

Cling-clang. The foals were growing, and their tiny hooves were now hitting the eggshells so hard that Guinevere jumped every time she heard the sound, and the geese and swans keeping the eggs warm craned their necks in alarm. But the shells would not break. They would soon turn into prisons, and in the end they would suffocate the three foals instead of protecting them.

Ànemos began avoiding the stable again, simply so as not to see how short of space his children were. By now, however, Guinevere knew the Pegasus well enough to realise that he was grateful for her company.

‘Have you noticed how strong Ouranos is already?’ she asked, when she found him down beside the fjord again. ‘I think he likes to play the clown! Vita tells me that the swamp impets are betting their caps and boots on him to be the first to hatch. And the nisses are betting acorns on which of the foals will fly fastest!’

Nisses and impets would bet on anything. It was stupid, but perhaps doing stupid things helped to keep fear at bay.

Ànemos looked at the sky and pricked up his ears. But it was only an ordinary airplane reflected in the water of the fjord. And Guinevere was certain that the Pegasus knew how many days they still had left, even though she had hidden the calendar.

Tomorrow the last three days began. And maybe the third of those days would bring the death of the foals.