The Search for the Red Dragon - James A. Owen [59]
“Oh no,” groaned Jack, who had rejoined his friends but was also keeping a respectable distance from Aven. “Does that mean we can only solve the riddle if the Red Dragon is present?”
“I don’t think that’s it,” said John, peering more closely at the Geographica. “The handwriting is complicating the translation somewhat. But try this—what if Dante didn’t mean the actual Red Dragon, but was simply referring to a red dragon? Say, Samaranth, or one of his companions?”
“Same pickle, different barrel,” said Bert. “We don’t have a way to contact any of the dragons from our present position.”
“That’s a dumb riddle,” said Laura Glue.
“Not now, Laura,” Charles said. “This is very important.”
The girl stomped her foot. “I told you, my name is Laura Glue. And I said it’s a stupid riddle because everyone knows what dragon’s breath is.”
“They do?” Jack said, crouching to look the girl in the eye. “What is it?”
She shrugged. “It won’t do us any good anyway,” she said glumly. “There aren’t any volcanoes around here.”
John and Bert looked at each other in surprise.
“The Red Dragon’s breath,” said Charles. “Red, as in hot vapors?”
“It’s worth trying,” said John.
Aven called to several of the fauns to bring over some of the cord from the balloon rigging. They fashioned a makeshift harness for John, then lowered him gently over the side of the ship that seemed closest to the sulfur that was venting from below the Chamenos Liber.
Carefully, John held open the Geographica to the pages that depicted Autunno and Dante’s notations. The thick fumes made him cough, and his eyes watered, but sure enough—in seconds, something began to appear across the pages.
“Pull me up!” he yelled. “I have it! I have the answer!”
They hoisted John back to the deck, and he opened the Geographica.
“That’s why Jamie couldn’t just tell us the words,” he said excitedly. “I think it’s only possible to see the necessary words here, or wherever else there might be volcanic fumes.”
“Lucky us,” Charles said drolly. “What does it say?”
“It’s an Opening,” said Bert. “The third kind of spoken spell. Go ahead and read it, John—after all, you figured it out.”
John traced the near-transparent letters with his fingers, then began to recite the words:
By knowledge paid
For riddles wrought
I open thee
I open thee
By bones bound
By honor taken
I open thee
I open thee
For life eternal and liberty gain’d
To sleep and dream, as kings we reign’d
I open thee
I open thee
John closed his eyes, then opened one and looked around quizzically. “Ah, Bert? What happens now?”
Bert raised his eyebrows. “Don’t have a clue. I haven’t done this before either.”
For one minute, then two, the companions simply looked at one another, and at the water around the Indigo Dragon.
“All right,” Jack began.
“Wait,” said Charles. “Can you see that? Something’s turning the ship around.”
“That’s not the ship,” said Aven. “It’s the water.”
The sea within the Chamenos Liber was beginning to rotate. Slowly, but the motion was unmistakable now.
As they watched, the clockwise motion started to move faster, and then faster still.
“I think we’d better hold on to something,” suggested Bert. “I have a bad feeling about this.”
“Let’s get you into the cabin,” Jack said to Laura Glue.
“No!” said Aven. “If we capsize, it’ll be safer on top.”
“Good enough,” said Jack, who wrapped one arm around the girl and the other around a stout section of railing.
The sea was making a noise like breakers crashing on the shore, but it was constant, and growing louder with the speed of the rotating water, which was forming a gigantic whirlpool. It opened in the center of the islands, and then spread rapidly outward until it caught up the Indigo Dragon against the crest. The current pulled the little craft over the edge just as the sound crescendoed to a roar, and the sides of the whirlpool dropped