Dragon Keepers #3: The Dragon in the Library (5 page)

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her everything else they had learned: about the missing professor and about Sadie Huffington's really being Princess Sadra, about her coming to Goldmine City looking for her boyfriend, St. George.

Emmy listened in stony silence and then burst out: "That dame is bad news!"

"Pretty much," said Jesse, wondering where Emmy had picked up a word like
dame
. Surely not in one of their library books.

"I bet she's got the professor under lock and key," Emmy said. "We have to find him!"

"We will," said Daisy.

"And then spring him!" said Emmy.

"First Kilimanjaro, then Everest," Jesse said, invoking one of the professor's favorite sayings, which meant "one step at a time."

Daisy said, "In this case, Kilimanjaro is Sadie Huffington's castle on the other side of town. We're going to start by spying on her...which means it's leash time for Emmy."

Emmy grumbled, "Why do
I
have to be the dumb dog all the time?"

"Maybe because Daisy and I can't turn into dogs?" Jesse suggested.

"But I
hate
being a dog. It
itches!"
Emmy said.

"We can always give you some of Miss Alodie's

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valerian tea," Daisy said, moving to get the thermos from the backpack.

"Oh, very well!" Emmy said, and grumpy dragon masked into equally grumpy dog.

Jesse attached the leash to her purple Great Dane collar. Then the cousins wheeled their bicycles out of the garage and Jesse set out, leading the way, with Daisy and Emmy bringing up the rear. They rode right down the center of Main Street because it was deserted. Everyone was indoors with their air-conditioners, and the little town hummed with the sound of the units turned up to high.

Choosing the least steep streets, they gradually worked their way up into the foothills of Old Mother Mountain. At least that's what most of the townspeople called it. To Jesse and Daisy it was now the Hobhorn, in honor of their friend, Her Royal Lowness Queen Hap, ruler of the hobgoblins of the Hobhorn, whose kingdom lay inside the mountain.

Old Mine Lane dead-ended a quarter of a mile from what had once been the entrance to the gold mine. They knew that the old castle sat smack at the end, not that either of them had ever seen it. It had been blocked off from outsiders by a high wall overgrown with bushes and vines since before they were born. The number of houses along the road

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began to dwindle until there were just weed-choked vacant lots. The cousins finally arrived at the end of the road, where a brand-new plywood wall loomed at least fifteen feet high. It was the kind of wall you'd see at a city construction site, except this one didn't seem to have any peepholes for curious pedestrians to look through.

The cousins parked their bikes and waded through the weeds over to the wall. A big new sign warned, NO TRESPASSING. GUARD DOGS ON PATROL.

"Guarding the poor professor would be my bet," Daisy said.

Emmy growled, baring her teeth, the fur along her spine standing up.

"I know just how you feel, Em," said Jesse. "Let's check it out."

They walked along the wall, Emmy leading the way with her snout, nosing around for an entrance or a gate or a driveway. But they just kept following the plywood around until about fifteen minutes later, when they found themselves right back where they had started.

"Weird," the cousins said together, exchanging looks of deep perplexity. How did anyone get in or out? On the other side of the wall, they heard a loud, persistent buzzing sound.

Jesse looked around. There wasn't even a tree

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nearby to climb to get a look over the wall.

"We need a ladder," said Daisy.

"Or a good leg up," Jesse said.

"Will I do?" Emmy asked, startling them both by suddenly unmasking into a dragon.

"Emmy!" Jesse and Daisy cried out together and looked around, afraid she would be seen.

"Don't worry. No one will see," Emmy said. "Come. Climb up onto my shoulders and spy."

Jesse hesitated. "It won't hurt you?" he asked.

"Do I look like a delicate dragon to you? Don't be a dork," Emmy said. "Climb." She turned around.

Jesse climbed up the ramp of her tail, his sneakers getting surprisingly good traction, and made it up as far as the back of her neck. But even if he were to stand on top of Emmy's head (which did
not
seem like a good idea), his own head would still be a good three feet from the top of the wall. He signaled to Daisy, who nodded and quickly scrambled up after him.

Jesse said to her, "I'll give you a boost up and you spy."

Jesse bent down and offered Daisy a stirrup made from his linked hands. Daisy placed her hands on his shoulders and her foot in his hands. Jesse grunted as he lifted Daisy up. She wasn't very

53

heavy, but Jesse felt himself wobbling beneath her weight.

"I have you, Jesse," said Emmy. He felt her talons enclosing his calves, steadying him.

"I'm up!" Daisy whispered, holding on to the top of the wall and peering over. She was amazed at how new the castle looked, as if the last stone had been set into place only that morning. "Wow!"

"Ask her what she sees," Emmy whispered up to Jesse.

Jesse whispered up to Daisy, "What do you see?"

Daisy whispered back, "It looks
exactly
like the castle we saw online, Jess. It's got three stone towers, two small and one big. And the ramparts are made of wood."

"Are they riveted with sarsen stones?" Jesse asked.

"What's a sarsen stone?" Emmy whispered.

Daisy ignored them both. "I see squint holes," she said, "and killer holes, too."

"Murder
holes," Jesse corrected.

"Whatever
. And it's double-walled."

"Ask her what the buzzing noise is," Emmy told Jesse.

Daisy heard Emmy's question. "Lots of things. Lawn mowers. Trimmers. Other landscaping tools,"

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Daisy said. "There's a whole crew of workmen cutting grass and whacking weeds on the grounds outside the wall. Jesse, it really is a life-size replica of Uffington Castle. And to think it's just been sitting here..."

Jesse said, "St. George built it when he was head of the mining company a hundred years ago."

"And Sadie Huffington used magic to fix it up," Daisy said. Either that, or the army of sweating, shirtless workmen who were now toiling away on the lawn had worked very hard and very fast to whip the castle back into shape. Now they were digging holes for saplings, setting the root-balls into the holes, filling in the holes, and making neat circles of stone around the newly planted trees. A harnessed team of dogs dragged a sled loaded down with piles of cut stone.

Emmy whispered up to Daisy, "Tell us more."

Just then, Sadie Huffington strode through an arch in an outer wall. Even in the heat, she wore a long black coat that reached her ankles.

"I'm looking at the Top Dog herself," Daisy said.

"Yikes," Jesse said. Daisy felt Jesse's arms begin to tremble beneath her feet.

"She's wearing a black coat that looks exactly like St. George's," Daisy reported.

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"Boy! She must be boiling," said Jesse.

"I don't know...she looks like a pretty cool customer to me," Daisy said as she watched Sadie Huffington stop before the dog team and reach into a cloth sack slung across her shoulders. "Ugh," she said.

"What's going on?" Jesse whispered, giving Daisy's legs an impatient squeeze.

"She's got a bunch of dogs pulling a sled," said Daisy. "And she's got this bloody sack full of raw meat...and she's feeding the meat to the dogs."

"Hey, do you think those are the dogs that are missing from the pound?" Jesse said.

"That's exactly what they are," Daisy said. Sadie Huffington was walking among the men now. "Oh, wow! She's feeding the
men
raw meat, too!" she whispered.
"Ick
." As each workman got his bit of bloody raw meat, he chewed it up, not neatly like a man, but sloppily and greedily like a dog. Sadie scratched one of the men behind the ear. Another man scratched his armpit, then shook himself from head to foot.

"Holy moly," said Daisy. "I think she's done worse than just stolen them from the pound."

"What?"
Jesse and Emmy both whispered fiercely.

"The men," said Daisy. "I think Sadie might

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have turned some of the
dogs
...into
men."

"Whoa!" Jesse said. "Really?"

"Well, they're eating raw meat without using their hands or getting grossed out," said Daisy. "And they're panting. If they had tails, I bet they'd be wagging them."

Jesse's arms started to shake again. "Whoa again," he whispered.

"She's nothing but a witch," Emmy said. "A wicked,
wicked
witch."

Daisy watched as Sadie Huffington bent to examine one of the rock circles. She rose up and, raising her switch, thrashed the nearest worker. No red meat for him! "She just whacked one of the men with that whip of hers," she reported grimly.

"Witches make very bad Keepers," said Emmy in a loud whisper.

It saddened Daisy to see any living creature, man or dog, being treated this badly. She looked away and scanned the ramparts, nearly crying out when her gaze fell upon two of the biggest dogs she had ever seen. They were pacing the battlements just outside the large tower.

"What's the big tower called, Jess?" Daisy whispered.

"The donjon," Jesse told her.

"Right, and you said it's where they kept

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prisoners in olden times?" Daisy asked.

"Yep," Jesse said. "My arms are getting tired. Are you almost done spying, Daze?"

"Just a sec," Daisy told him. She couldn't take her eyes off the dogs. Everything about them was huge: their heads, their paws, their blue-black tongues, their eyes. The one nearest Daisy stopped and turned its enormous shaggy head in her direction. Then it opened its jaws and let loose a howl that vibrated the wood beneath her fingers. Daisy reared back and lost her grip on the wall. She teetered so wildly that Jesse lost hold of her, then Emmy let go of Jesse, and all three of them went toppling toward the earth.

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Chapter 4 CHAPTER FOUR HIGGLETY PIGGLETY POP!

"What's the big idea!" Daisy whispered furiously. She dabbed her tongue on the bottom of her shirt and showed them the dot of blood. "Look! You guys made me bite my tongue!"

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Emmy, masked again into dog form, whined apologetically.

Jesse cocked a thumb toward the road. "We've got company."

The dogcatcher's truck made a slow turn in the cul-de-sac. Ms. Mindy leaned out the window and called to them, "What are you kids doing so far away from home?" She looked a lot less cheerful and considerably more frazzled than she had the morning before at the library.

"Checking out the blackberry bushes!" Daisy called back to her. "My pop knows we're here."

Ms. Mindy nodded. "Well, news flash. I've had ten reports of runaway dogs since my shift started this morning. First the break-in and now this. If I were you, I'd take my doggie on home and sit tight till we figure out what's going on."

"Sure thing!" Daisy told her.

Jesse and Daisy and Emmy watched as the truck turned around and went slowly back up the road.

When the dogcatcher was out of sight, Jesse lay back in the weeds and felt the sweat pouring off him. All around, the weeds buzzed with the sound of cicadas. It was a hot sound, like live electricity. He knew they needed to pick themselves up and

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figure out how to find the professor, but it was too hot to move and almost too hot to think. "I wonder if Ms. Mindy has any idea those dogs she's looking for are all on the other side of that plywood wall."

"There's no way she could know," Daisy said. "And we can't tell her, either. For all
we
know, Sadie Huffington can turn people into dogs just like she turns dogs into people."

"I wonder what kind of dog I'd be," Jesse mused.

"A mutt, probably," Daisy said.

"Good," Jesse said. "Give me a mutt any day over one of those nervous Nelly breeds."

"How can you say that?" Daisy said. "Emmy's a breed, and she's no Nelly."

Emmy woofed.

"Emmy's a
dragon
, you dork," Jesse said.

"Oh, right," Daisy said, laughing.

Jesse said, "Do you think one of those dogs could be the professor? What kind of dog would she turn him into, I wonder. She called him a hound dog, but I'm thinking he'd be one of those nifty little terriers, you know, like in
Higglety Pigglety Pop!"

"I think he's a prisoner in the donjon," she said.

Jesse sat up quickly and looked at Daisy. Her face was bright pink from the heat and she was