Rain & Fire (11 page)

Grockle in chains

Bernard, realizing that what Arthur has told him is
the plain truth and that the dragon is sentient and capable of communicating with him, asks:

 

“Where did you come from?”

The dragon raked the ground. It seemed to understand, but its answer was vague and made no sense.

Zannnnnaaaa,
it growled.

“Zannnnaaa? What is Zannnnaaa?” Bernard said, frowning.

The dragon swung its head. The chain links rippled in the flashes of daylight streaking through the holes in the derelict roof.

Muuuuutthherrrrr.

The word rumbled around the stable. In a glassless window high in the gable away to their right, the raven landed with a flutter of its wings. A tic developed at Brother Bernard's mouth. “Mother?” he whispered.

The dragon whimpered.

“Then who is your father?”

With another fierce toss of its head, the dragon graarked as though the question was worthy of a bolt of fire. But no fire came. That area of its body still bound by mailing tape bulged with the instinct to
spread its wings. But there was no release. Its muted tail pounded the floor in frustration. Its talons raked the earth. It gave no answer.

“Tell me,” said Bernard, his throat growing sore from the demands of a language so lacking in vowels.

“Who is your father?”

Caarrkkk!
went the raven, making Bernard jump. This bird was beginning to make him uneasy. There was a dark light in the center of its eye. Why was it so often in attendance to the dragon? Was it some kind of familiar? he wondered. A spirit that served the needs of the creature? He heard footsteps nearby. The raven heard them, too. With another moody
caark,
it circled the barn and swooped back into the open air. Startled voices remarked upon it: Brothers Terence and Peter.

Bernard centered on the dragon again, “Quickly. Your father?”

The yellow eyes closed. The arches of the nostrils flared like trumpets.
Gaaaawwwaaaaaainn,
said his distant descendant, Grockle.

Bernard backed away with a hand against his throat.

Gawain.

That was all the proof he needed.

 

Meanwhile, Brother Vincent is locked in his cell, and an off-island envoy sent for, to establish what should be done about the situation.

Unfortunately, when G'reth brought back the young Fain entity to this world, another Fain being came, too. This one was a killer, out to punish G'reth's newfound friend, and to stop the fire star portal between Earth and the home thought-world of the Fain, Ki:mera, from opening. This entity took over the body of the envoy to Farlowe Island, desiring to find Grockle also, and cleanse this world of dragons. However, Grockle starts a fire, reclaims Gawain's claw, and escapes from the island, making his way to the Arctic, the Tooth of Ragnar, and the portal. The evil Fain follows. David is also in hot pursuit, using Bergstrom's invisible dragon, Groyne, to take him there through time and space.

Having reached the Tooth, David finds that Tootega
is already there, but his body has been taken over by the killer Fain being. A dramatic confrontation occurs, with unforeseen results for David and all those connected to him.

Did Grockle make it through the portal in time? Why has Gwilanna been trapped as a raven in an ice block? What will Liz do when she discovers that Arthur's mind was entered by the evil Fain, leaving him terrified, confused, and nearly blind? Did the young Fain escape its evil pursuer? And just what exactly is Bergstrom up to?

Five years have passed since the end of
Fire Star
. David has been missing in the Arctic for all this time, and is presumed dead by all but Lucy. Despite this, daily life in the Crescent has returned to relative normality for the Pennykettles — and for Zanna, David's long-term partner, and their child, Alexa, who now both live with
Lucy and Liz. Arthur has moved in, too, having been nursed back to relative health by the family. He remains blind.

Alexa is nearly five. A very bright child, she has powers and awarenesses that are only just becoming apparent, and are yet to be taken seriously. On the anniversary of David's disappearance, Zanna presents Alexa with a gift.

 

“Listen carefully,” said Zanna, dropping down on one knee. She brushed a curl of black hair off Alexa's forehead. “You know we talked about polar bears and the icy place they live?”

“Yes,” said Alexa, possibly hopeful of receiving one.

Zanna looked at her a moment and tried to frame the words. Those eyes. His eyes. That rich, dark blue. Unsettling and comforting, all in one glance. “Your daddy gave me a dragon there once. I want you to have him, because … because Mommy can't take care of him anymore.”

The little girl frowned and tilted her head. “Mommy, why are you crying?” she asked.

Zanna bracketed her hands as if she were holding an invisible piece of rock. “You have to look very, very hard to see him. But he's there. He's real. His name is G'lant and his is a flame that will never die out.” She opened her hands — as if she were scattering the ashes of her grief — and set G'lant down on Alexa's palms.

The girl looked thoughtfully at the space above her gloves. “I like him,” she said.

 

This gesture seems to set Zanna free of some of her grief, and when a handsome young man named Tam Farrell appears to show an interest in her, she considers responding. Tam, however, is a journalist who has been contacted anonymously by Lucy, who believes it is high time that someone did something about trying to find David. She thinks Tam might be able to help in the search. Tam visits the shop that Zanna owns and buys
a (“normal”) clay dragon, while casually probing for information about David Rain.

It's not long before the Pennykettle dragons work out that Tam is not quite what he claims to be. Determined to put matters right, they set up a chain of events that result in Tam's girlfriend giving the game away to Zanna just before Tam is due to have a reflexology consultation with her. Zanna, of course, is angry and upset with Lucy, but with Tam especially.

 

“You know, for one foolish moment, I let myself believe that you could be something special, like David, when all you were giving me were lies and deceit.”

“I can help you,” he insisted, coughing out pungent, oil-sweet smoke. “If you tell the world the truth, it will only raise your profile even more.”

“Truth?” said Lucy. “What do you mean?”

Tam shook his head. “That he never existed. The author of the book: David Rain. He's a cipher. It's all just a front, isn't it?”

 

In an attempt to prove Tam wrong, Lucy persuades him to take her to the address David wrote on his letter to Liz when responding to her original “room for rent” ad. However, events take a terrifying turn when, having found the place, Lucy is pulled through a rift in space by an evil force. She finds herself on Farlowe Island, among the community of monks who live there. But the monks have been taken over, en masse, by the Ix.

The Ix are the negative version of the benevolent Fain, and use the power of fear to break down any resistance to their plans. They are particularly interested in Lucy because of her ancestry of dragons and her ability to create sculptures, inherited from her mother. They force her to make an antidragon from a compound called obsidian. The template for this creature, which they call a darkling, is generated from a hallucination based on Lucy's deepest dread.

 

In general shape it resembled a dragon. Serpentine body. Powerful wings. But it was thicker-set and ugly. Cabbage ears. A gargoyle. Its feet and paws were stout
and immensely strong, the claws inside them conical, tapering to points. It had no ordered rows of scales. Instead, the surface of its body was pocked and ridged as if the skin had been sheared from brittle rock. And apart from its pulsing, bile-colored eyes, hooked green tongue, and gray-tipped claws, it was completely black. Yet Lucy could see lightning spidering inside it, as though she had opened a box of mirrors. She shook her head in fear as the creature turned toward her. With a granitelike click it unlatched its jaw. From its throat came a bolt of pure black fire.

 

And when she has done that, they intend to send her back through the same time rift they took her from but commingled with an Ix assassin….

In the meantime, David has found out a lot more about who and what he is, his history, and his purpose on the planet. We also learn where he has been and what has happened to him in the past five years.

David is now in the Arctic, attempting to save his beloved polar bears — and indeed the world. He has
teamed up with two of them, Kailar and Avrel, to search for the opening to the Fire Eternal, the most creative force in the Universe. David has in his possession the stone eye of Gawain, which has been brought up from the ocean depths by the sea goddess, Sedna. David intends to open the eye and free the spirit of the dormant dragon at last.

David is also accompanied by Gwilanna, who was left as a raven and trapped in a block of ice at the end of the previous book. Despite being a nuisance, Gwilanna agrees to help David with his quest, on the promise of being returned to human form by the end of it.

However, events take a surprising turn when an ancient mammoth appears in front of them all.

David is quick to recognize it as a projection sent by his daughter, Alexa, as a token of her love. However, Kailar is hexed into perceiving it as something else.

 

Kailar gave out a fighting growl and immediately drew up parallel to the mammoth's flank. Ignoring Ingavar's previous instruction, he began pacing back
and forth in a threatening manner, his head held low, his black tongue issuing from the side of his mouth. It was a gibe to the creature to come and challenge him.

Avrel tightened his claws. There was going to be trouble.

 

Indeed there was.

David urgently sends Gwilanna back to Wayward Crescent to protect Alexa when he realizes that his daughter's auma trail must have been detected by the Ix, via the projection she sent. Gwilanna returns just in time to face the Ix:risor, or assassin, that is Lucy. There are devastating and far-reaching effects as a result of the confrontation, some of which echo throughout the rest of the series.

David, meanwhile, is nearing the end of his quest, and polar bears in their hundreds are gathering around the gateway to the Fire Eternal….

What does David intend to do with all the congregated bears? Can he open Gawain's eye? Who does Lucy try to kill? And does she succeed? Which
Pennykettle dragon is in dire danger of extinction? And why is an ornamental “fairy door” so important? Will David ever return to Wayward Crescent?