Dragonfire (6 page)

That evening, Sir James, the Ranger, Jamie Todd and the children sat grouped around the MacArthur’s throne in the Great Hall.

“The thing is,” Sir James was saying, “you can’t keep him here indefinitely. He’s a senior officer and is bound to have told someone where he was going.”

“In other words,” confirmed Jamie, “if you’re not careful, you’ll have a visit from Customs and Excise. And not a social call either.”

The MacArthur heaved a sigh. “We can’t have that!”

Clara looked shyly at Sir James. “But if you let him go, won’t he tell the Excise people what he found and bring them straight here?”

Neil looked at her in disgust. “Use your head, Clara,” he said. “If he tells them about Arthur, they’ll think he’s gone completely off his rocker.”

“But don’t you see, Neil? He doesn’t need to tell them anything about Arthur. He just has to get them outside the distillery with metal-detectors and the pipeline will lead them straight here!”

“You leave that side of it to me,” interrupted the MacArthur. “We have ways of protecting ourselves. The main problem was stopping Arthur’s supply and that has been done.”

“How is Arthur taking it now that there is no more whisky?” asked Jamie.

The MacArthur heaved a sigh. “It was bad enough when he noticed that his lake was shrinking but when it disappeared altogether he went wild. Roared around slurping up all the wee pools he could find and then rampaged about blowing fire and
smoke everywhere. I’ve had my fill of that dragon, I can tell you!”

“But he seems quite resigned now, does he?”

The MacArthur grinned. “Well, according to Archie, he still hangs hopefully around the tap but I think he’ll be all right as long as no one,” and here he glared at Archie, “gives him any more whisky.”

“Och! I’ll no’ be doing that again in a hurry, MacArthur. It’s just that Arthur is more depressed than ever now.”

Clara sounded sympathetic. “Is there nothing else that would cheer him up, Archie?” she asked.

“I ken fine what would cheer him up but it’s a pretty impossible dream.”

“Tell us anyway,” asked Clara.

“Well, he’s always talking about his lady-love. A beautiful dragon she was, but after the troubles he doesn’t even know if she survived. Bessie, her name was.”

“Bessie!” she repeated thoughtfully, her head tilting to one side. Then her eyes sharpened. “Archie, did you say … Bessie?”

“Aye.”

“Now think carefully, Archie. Did Arthur ever call her … Nessie?”

“Now that you mention it, I believe he did.”

“My … Goodness!!!” whispered Sir James.

“The Loch Ness … Clara! Do you realize what you’re saying?” gasped her brother.

The MacArthur, at a loss to know what was happening but aware that he had missed something vital along the line, gave a thunderous roar. “Will – You – Tell – Me – What – You – Are – All – Talking – About?” he screeched.

Clara said excitedly. “You see, MacArthur, we think we know who Arthur’s Nessie is! Wouldn’t it be great if we could bring them together again after all these years? Then Arthur wouldn’t be lonely any more.”

The MacArthur looked as though he were about to burst
a blood vessel. “I am
not
,” he stated, “I am
not
going to have another dragon in this hill! One is quite enough! Two would be two too many! I won’t have it, I tell you! I am not giving a home to any more dragons and that’s flat!”

“But I wasn’t thinking of bringing Nessie here,” explained Clara, her eyes alight. “I was thinking of taking Arthur to Nessie!”

Sir James almost had a fit. “Are you quite out of your mind, Clara? How on earth do you suppose that we could get a dragon from one side of Scotland to the other without anyone noticing? On a lead?” He threw out his hands helplessly. “Dragons, may I remind you, aren’t exactly everyday objects, you know. It would be bad enough transporting an elephant. People at least know what elephants are. But a dragon?” He shook his head. “It’s quite impossible!”

The MacArthur coughed. “Where,” he asked, “where does this other dragon live?”

“Up in the Highlands,” answered Neil. “They called a loch after her, Loch Ness.”

“Humph,” grunted the MacArthur, “did they now. Nothing new in that! Why do you think this hill is called Arthur’s Seat, eh?”

“The Highlands,” Archie crooned. “My, I’d love to see the mountains again.”

“We are not going to the Highlands, with or without a dragon, and that’s final!” snorted Sir James.

The MacArthur drew himself up to his full height, which wasn’t very high, and said authoritatively, “I am in favour of it!”

“You would be,” said Sir James, “but …”

“I am, too,” announced Jamie Todd. He quailed at the withering glare that Sir James shot at him but continued bravely. “Well, I am, Sir James. This here dragon has been nothing but a pack of trouble for as long as I can remember. If we can get rid of him for good then I think we should take the chance!”

“Well spoken,” said the MacArthur, slapping his knee. “My sentiments entirely!”

Sir James looked stunned. “You’re in favour of it? You must be out of your minds. All of you! Even if we did manage to get a vehicle big enough to carry him, what on earth would we do when we got to the shores of Loch Ness? Whole expeditions with the latest equipment spend months patrolling Loch Ness, hoping for a glimpse of her! What would we do? Stand at the edge of the water like complete ninnies shouting ‘Nessie! Nessie!’”

“Och! I can solve that problem,” said the MacArthur. “If Arthur’s Nessie is in that loch then there will be faeries looking after her. Dragons can’t fend for themselves at all. Actually, my daughter, Ellan, is visiting the Highlands at the moment and I will have her make all the arrangements.” He broke off in annoyance. “Weel, Hamish? What is it?”

A worried-looking Hamish, who had been trying to get a word in edgeways, now bowed low before his master. “MacArthur,” he said anxiously, “please give the matter some thought. Is it wise to let Arthur go?”

The MacArthur had the grace to look uncomfortable but stuck firmly to his guns. “I’m fed up with that confounded dragon, Hamish!” he growled. “Completely fed up! And I don’t see what difference it will make if he goes or stays. As long as we have the firestones, we are perfectly safe. We don’t need Arthur!”

Wishing fervently that the MacArthur’s daughter, the Lady Ellan, had not chosen that particular time to visit her mother’s family in the Highlands, Hamish persisted in his argument.

“Nevertheless, MacArthur, I don’t think it’s a good idea for Arthur to leave us. It’s too risky now that Amgarad has been seen on the hill. Lady Ellan would be the first to tell you so! Master,” he sounded anguished, “there are too many questions that remain unanswered! How did Amgarad break out of Jarishan? Why is he here? Is Lord Rothlan’s power returning? I
beg you; please keep Arthur here in the hill. This has been his home for hundreds of years. I’m sure Lady Ellan would agree.”

But the MacArthur, annoyed perhaps at the implication that his daughter knew better than he did, was adamant. “If we can get Arthur to Loch Ness,” he said flatly, “then he’s going! And if it’ll make you any happier then you can take the firestones into your care the minute Arthur leaves the hill! But he
is
going, Hamish.” He put his hand on the top of his head. “I’ve had that dragon up to here!”

The Ranger then chipped in. “Actually, I think I can solve the transport problem,” he said. “A farmer friend of mine often grazes his sheep on the hill. He’ll be bringing a flock down tomorrow and he owes me a few favours. There’ll be no problem about us having the use of his transporter for a few days. It’s a massive thing!”

“Hang on a bit, Dad,” interrupted Neil. “Before we make any plans, hadn’t we better tell Arthur? After all, he might not like being shut up in a big lorry and bumped over half of Scotland!”

“Don’t you worry about Arthur!” said the MacArthur grimly. “He’s going whether he likes it or not. Did you say that the transporter will be free tomorrow, Ranger?”

“Aye! Tomorrow afternoon.”

“Then,” said the MacArthur, “if everybody is in agreement, I suggest we plan ‘Operation Arthur’ for tomorrow night!”

It was a dark night, for which Sir James was profoundly thankful. As he and the Ranger stood beside the enormous transporter, waiting for Arthur to appear, Sir James shifted impatiently on his feet. “I wish they’d get a move on,” he muttered, looking round.

The Ranger too surveyed the scene with some misgiving, for the side of the hill was more than a trifle crowded. Apart from the flock of sheep that had been off-loaded from the transporter, the slopes were also home to a mass of MacArthurs who were being regimented here and there by their agitated chief.

Sir James eyed the proceedings apprehensively. “I don’t like the look of this,” he said to the Ranger. “It’s busier than Piccadilly Circus up here! What on earth is the MacArthur up to?”

The Ranger swept an eye over the ranks of the MacArthurs. “I don’t know,” he said slowly. “You’d almost think he was expecting trouble!”

Sir James muttered something under his breath.

The Ranger’s lips twisted in a smile. “How is everything going at the distillery?” he asked in an attempt to divert Sir James’s mind from the anxieties of the present.

Sir James’s face brightened. “Jamie,” he answered, sounding considerably more cheerful, “is just finishing things off for me. He’s done a wonderful job. We’ve managed to retrieve most of the whisky; so much so that I doubt if anyone will be able to tell that there was ever any discrepancy.”

“Pity he’ll miss seeing the dragon, though,” remarked the Ranger.

Clara rushed over to them, brimming with excitement. “Arthur’s coming now, Dad. And he’s really something. Look … there he is!”

The dragon emerged from the tunnel, his brilliant colours caught in the light of the MacArthurs’ torches. They watched as he moved forward across the hillside, flexing his wings in joy at being above ground. As he felt the breath of the cool night air, the dragon lifted his great head, stretched his powerful wings and flapped them experimentally.

“Dear goodness,” gasped Sir James in horror, “he’s … he’s going to fly!”

The MacArthurs, to give them their due, did what they could. They made a concerted rush for Arthur, but against a dragon they had their limits. The night air, the starry sky and the limitless curve of the heavens had woken old memories in Arthur. With a few effortless flaps of his wings he left the earth behind and soared skywards, revelling in his new-found freedom.

The MacArthur stomped up to the transporter looking sour.

“What are we going to do now,” gasped Sir James in a panic.

“I wouldn’t worry, Sir James. He’ll no’ be gone long, more’s the pity. Look over yonder!”

Neil grabbed Sir James’s arm. “Look, Sir James! Over there! An aeroplane! It’s coming in to land!”

Sir James paeld. “Oh no!” he gasped in horror. “It’s the London Shuttle!”

“I’d love to see the pilot’s face when he sees Arthur,” said Neil, watching with fascinated eyes as Arthur soared towards the plane.

The pilot of the Shuttle picked Arthur up in the powerful beam of his landing lights and at first refused to believe his eyes. His first incredulous thought was that Arthur was a kite or even a stray balloon but the steadily beating wings and supple movement of his body soon banished that idea from his mind. This was a living, flying dragon straight from the pages
of a storybook.

“What the devil?” he said savagely to his co-pilot as he banked hard to avoid colliding with Arthur. His co-pilot, in much the same state of disbelief, shook his head in amazement. “A dragon! But … but, they don’t exist … do they?”

“This one looks pretty solid to me!” muttered the pilot grimly as he banked again.

Dragons, as one would expect, don’t rate highly in any of the emergency procedures that pilots routinely follow. The Air Traffic Controller at Edinburgh Airport, enquiring politely as to why flight B6672 had left its flight-path to career wildly across his radar screen was not amused to be told by the pilot that he was trying to avoid a dragon, especially when the blips on his radar screen showed nothing of the sort.

“I don’t care if you’re not picking anything else up,” snarled the pilot, craning his neck to see where Arthur had got to. “Why don’t you just look out of your window?”

And against the backdrop of the night sky the Air Traffic controller saw the shape of the dragon, and watched in horror as Arthur flapped interestedly around the Shuttle.

Clara watched in dismay as the pilot put his aircraft into a steep climb. As it soared upwards, the resultant turbulence hit Arthur full on and sent him tumbling head over tail in a wild spin that left him disoriented and dizzy. Watching the performance in the sky, the MacArthur shouted triumphantly and ran towards the transporter. “Get the ramp down, Ranger, and be ready for him!”

“You mean he’ll come back?” asked Sir James.

“The daft beast! Of course he’ll come back! All he’s ever met in the sky before are golden eagles. That plane has probably scared the wits oot o’ him.” The MacArthur grabbed Neil’s torch and started to wave it wildly. “Come here, Arthur,” he roared in a mighty voice. “Come here, ye great daft thing!”

“There he is,” shouted the Ranger. “He’s coming in low.”

The plane’s surge of power and dreadful roar had reduced
Arthur to a shivering bag of nerves. Now totally petrified, he headed like an arrow for home. The MacArthurs saw him coming and scattered for their lives as he came in low, hit the ground at speed and ended up in a tangle of legs and wings, not far from the transporter.

From his perch, high up on the crags, Amgarad looked on with interest and some sympathy. These new monsters of the skies seemed beyond even the power of dragons! And only a few yards from Sir James, Dougal MacLeod also watched the proceedings with interest. In the general excitement, he had managed to free himself and revenge burned deep within him as he watched everyone dashing towards the dragon.

“Get Arthur over here, quickly!” Sir James shouted anxiously. “There’s bound to be trouble!”

“Trouble?” Neil asked.

“The police, Neil! They’re bound to have contacted them. They’ll be here any minute, I should imagine. Look, you and Clara had better get into the cab of the transporter. Once we get Arthur inside, we won’t be hanging around!”

Arthur, still in a state of shock and frantically trying to hide his head under his wings, was refusing to move. The MacArthur went over to him and gave him a great buffet with his arm.

“Come on, Arthur! Get moving! Up the ramp with you! Remember, you’re on your way to see your Nessie and we’re all coming with you,” he said determinedly.

Arthur opened a wonderful eye that was quite unlike any other eye that Sir James had ever seen. It blinked resignedly as he heaved himself grudgingly to his feet and obediently clawed his way up the ramp into the gaping maw of the transporter.

“In with you all!” screamed the MacArthur. In an instant the MacArthurs ran to the flock of sheep being held beside the transporter and, to Sir James’s amazement, seemed to dissolve into them. Watching from behind the rocks, Dougal MacLeod, too, watched with incredulous eyes. The MacArthurs seemed
to have melted into the sheep, who now seemed to be sheep with a mission! As one, the flock moved purposefully towards the transporter and, in minutes, had pushed and scrambled its way up the ramp to join Arthur.

When the last sheep was bundled in, Sir James and the MacArthur hastily raised the ramp and fastened the metal pegs that held the back doors in place before running to the front of the enormous vehicle and climbing hurriedly into the cab. The Ranger started the engine and, with a clashing of gears, the huge transporter lurched forward. Slowly and carefully it moved down the slope and set off for the distant shores of Loch Ness.