The Shadow Dragons - James A. Owen [43]
“And how did she look?” he asked, trying to mask the eagerness in his voice. “Was she well?”
“As beautiful as ever,” said John.
The gatekeeper slumped his shoulders and sighed heavily with relief. “Thank you for that,” he said quietly. “It has been too long since I saw her.”
“You are Lancelot, aren’t you?” Charles asked.
The gatekeeper nodded wistfully. “I was. Now I am simply the gatekeeper. Much like your Green Knight, it is my way of doing penance—and part of the agreement is that I may be close, but can never again see her.”
“That’s awful,” said John.
“No,” said Quixote, nodding in understanding. “It is the price that must be paid for an unpayable debt. And it is the only choice a noble knight would make.”
The gatekeeper lowered his head. “Not noble enough, I fear.”
Quixote reached out and lifted Lancelot’s chin. “The most noble acts,” he said sternly, “are those performed when there is nothing left to be gained. You are not merely a gatekeeper. You are a brother knight. So speaks Don Quixote de la Mancha.”
The doorway to the cave lay open in front of them. “Farewell, Lancelot,” John said as the companions walked through it.
“May God go with you,” replied the gatekeeper.
Rose looked back, just once, in the direction where the green castle had been, as did Quixote.
“Good-bye, Mother,” she said.
“Good-bye,” Quixote whispered. “Good-bye, my beloved Dulcinea.”
And with that last farewell, the door swung closed and was a cave wall once more.
The sun was just beginning to set as the companions reached the eastern beach. Either a full day—or more—had passed while they were in the castle with Guinevere, or their journey had taken scarcely any time at all.
“It had to have been a few hours,” John said as he checked on the Geographica in his pack. “I’d swear to it.”
“I think that grotto, or whatever—wherever—it was that the meadow and castle sit, functions much like Quixote’s room in the keep,” said Charles. “I don’t think time there passes in the same way as it does for us.”
“You’re probably right,” said Jack. “It’s frozen, or at the least, passes much more slowly. How much worse would it be if we were to emerge and find out the reverse were true? That while we chatted with a long-lost queen for a few hours, centuries were passing by outside?”
“Brr,” John replied. “That would be a bit much. I’ve already been rather preoccupied with just the idea that we may have lost seven years of our lives by stepping through a drawing.”
“That’s one reason we should be underway as quickly as possible,” said Jack. “We’ve literally no time to waste.”
Jack reached into his pocket where he’d kept the bottle and pulled out their ship. With curt nods of approval from his companions, he windmilled his arm and dashed the bottle against the rocks in the shallow tidepools.
In moments the ship had grown to its full size, much to the companions’ great relief. It was much smaller than every other Dragonship, but it was large enough for the four men, the girl, and the owl to be comfortably seated within.
“There’s no sail,” Charles pointed out, “nor any oars. How do we move her about?”
“I think this is one of Ordo Maas’s special ships,” said Jack, stroking the Dragon’s head. “I think we just need to tell her where we want to go, and she’ll get us there. Right, girl?”
There was no audible response from the masthead, but for a few seconds, the Dragon’s eyes seemed to glow more brightly, and her neck grew warm under Jack’s hand.
With a crunching sound, the boat pulled itself out of the shallows, then glided swiftly through the water at the edge of the storm clouds of the Frontier. A few hundred yards from the island, she stopped and waited.
“Well,” John said, standing. “I’d say that’s our signal to start navigating.” He turned to Charles with a broad grin on his face. “All right, Sir Charles. Strip. It’s time to have a look at the map.”
“Well?” Charles asked, once he was naked to the waist. “Which way do we go first?”
“First