The Dragon in the Volcano (7 page)

Jesse and Daisy looked on as Emmy caught up to Jasper and thrust her head to either side of his. It looked sort of like the way people in Europe kiss, first one cheek and then the other, except that it went on longer and no kisses were exchanged. It was just a bunch of head bobbing.

“I guess that must be clinching,” Jesse said.

“Whatever it is, our girl sure doesn’t believe in playing hard to get,” Daisy murmured sadly.

Jesse turned away. “Tell me when the two lovebirds are finished with their weird ritual,” he said.

Daisy said dolefully, “It’s going to take a mighty powerful plan to pull those two apart.”

Jesse threw up his arms. “How are we supposed to come up with a decent plan in only three days in this totally hostile environment?”

“I don’t know … but we’re going to have to,” Daisy said. “If we want to keep our dragon.”

Emmy came back, heaving a huge and sappy sigh. “I miss him already!” she said. “Isn’t he dreamy?”

“Dreamier than Dewey Forbes, at least,” Jesse said grudgingly.

“He’s very nice,” said Daisy carefully. “But doesn’t he seem a little old for you?”

Emmy shrugged. “Everyone knows older males are so much more worldly and intriguing,” she said.

Daisy rolled her eyes.

“It’s true!” said Emmy. “I read an article about it in
Shimmer
. ‘Mature Males Make Better Mates.’ ”

“You read that article to me,” Jesse put in. “It also said same-age guys make better dates. And you’re way too young to get married.”

“Silly boy,” Emmy said. “Dragons don’t get married.”

“What
do
dragons do?” Daisy asked.

Emmy thought for a moment and then heaved her shoulders. “Beats me! I’m new to all this. Come on! Let me show you my new home.”

“Home?”
Daisy echoed shrilly.

Was Leandra right? Had Emmy found herself a new nest?

They went with Emmy down a diamond-paved road that wended its way along the shoreline of the Lake of Fire.

“It’s so dark here,” said Jesse. “When does the sun come out and brighten things up?”

“Never,” said Emmy. “There is no sun. It’s always sort of dark like this. Isn’t it cozy?”

Jesse had read about places where, during the winter, it was almost always dark. But in those areas, it was also freezing cold. It felt odd being in a place that was always dark and yet was as hot as equatorial Africa. It looked much the way things did in his dreams: dim and shadowy and a little spooky. He didn’t like it. “It’s too weird,” he said.

“Oh, give it a chance, Jesse Tiger,” said Emmy.

On the way to Emmy’s house, they passed dragons out strolling who nodded to Emmy as if they had known her always. Two of them stopped to say hello.

“These are my boons, Opal and Galena,” Emmy said.

The two she-dragons were bigger than Emmy, one pale and lustrous, the other with lilac-colored scales.

“We’re so lucky that little Emmy landed in our midst!” Galena gushed.

Opal added, “Emerald is one of a kind!”

“Are you and Jasper coming to the Fire Ball?” Galena asked.

Emmy suddenly looked bashful. “I don’t know … he hasn’t asked me yet.”

“Oh, he will!” said Opal.

Galena said to Opal in a meaningful undertone, “What if
you-know-who
comes back?”

“Emmy can take care of herself,” said Opal.

After Opal and Galena had gone on their way, Daisy said, “Who is you-know-who?”

“Who knows?” said Emmy. “It’s not like I’ve met every single solitary fairy and dragon in the realm. Not yet, at least. But I plan to. I like it here so much.”

“Just how long have you been coming to this place?” Jesse asked.

“Since you started school,” Emmy said. “Each time I visited, I liked it a little more. Then I met Jasper and the dime was cast.”

“That would be
die
,” Jesse said. “The singular of dice.”

“The dice was cast,” Emmy said, standing corrected.

“What did Lady Flamina mean by ‘trying times’?” Daisy wanted to know.

Emmy’s brow furrowed and she leaned down and whispered as if there were spies about. “Some of the smaller fire fairies have been mysteriously disappearing—”

Suddenly, the ruby-berried bushes on their right erupted into flames. Three fire fairies, about a
third the size of Jesse and Daisy, popped out and cried: “Emmy-Emmy-Emmy!”

They bounced over and latched onto Emmy’s tail, bouncing energetically up and down. “Go! Go! Go! Give us a lift, Emmy!”

Emmy laughed and walked on, giving the three little fire fairies a ride on her tail. “Jesse and Daisy, these are my boons Spark, Flicker, and Fiero,” Emmy said, pointing to each of them in turn.

Spark had a head that came to an orange point like the flame on a birthday candle. Flicker flickered, white one moment and blue the next. Fiero was smaller than the other two and round.

“Spark and Flicker are boys. Fiero’s a girl,” Emmy pointed out.

“You’re Emmy’s Keepers, aren’t you?” Fiero said, growing even rounder and rosier-looking when she spoke.

“Emmy’s told us all about you,” Spark said.

“Can you be
our
Keepers, too?” Flicker asked, his voice as tentative as his flame. “And protect us from the fairy-nappers?”

“Feeble-flamer!” Spark scoffed. “There are no Keepers in this realm. Why do you think they can’t stay?”

“They can stay if they like,” Fiero said smugly. “Because Keepers have special powers.”

“What special powers?” Spark said.

“The powers conferred upon them by the purple flask of the fire serpent,” Fiero said.

“How did you know about that?” Jesse asked.

Fiero shrank into a bashful little ball. “I licked up through the crater lake and saw you standing on its banks, swigging from the purple flask.”

“Fiero!” Spark shrilled. “No fair! Why didn’t you take us with you when you did that?”

“Maybe because it’s against the Beacons’ Code to lick into the membrane,” Flicker said.

“Oooh, that’s true!” Spark scolded Fiero. “Bad, bad flame!”

“At least I’m bolder than you two pale embers,” Fiero scoffed. Then, turning to Jesse and Daisy, she said, “Emmy is our favorite dragon. She’s much more fun than the others. She likes to
play
.”

“Don’t dragons play in the Fiery Realm?” Daisy asked.

Emmy said, “They can play but they can’t fly. I’m the only one who can fly, although I am not supposed to fly here. But the dragons here can do something I can’t. They can flame. You should see them. They have contests to see who can hurl the biggest flame.”

“What fun,” Daisy said politely, but it sounded dangerous to her.

“Does anyone know who’s napping the fire fairies?” Jesse asked.

Flicker whispered, “Some say they just get extinguished by strange forces. Others say they have been spirited away to other realms!”

“That’s why we tag around after Emmy,” said Spark.

“Emmy will protect us,” said Fiero.

“Then she’s like
your
Keeper,” Daisy said.

“Yay! Emmy’s our Keeper!” Fiero said, bouncing around like a little rubber ball.

“Here we are at my cozy cottage, cousins!” Emmy said at last.

Jesse and Daisy stared up at it.

Emmy’s “cottage” looked remarkably like Miss Alodie’s house, only about three times as large and with a wide porch overlooking the Lake of Fire. It was made of fat, shiny lozenges of precious stone held together with mortar. The mortar was molten and throbbed like a living thing. There was even a garden, planted with rows of ruby and amethyst dahlias and long-stalked sunflowers with drooping topaz heads.

“I love your garden!” Daisy said.

“We helped Emmy make it,” Spark said. “But we have to leap along now. We’ll catch up with you later!”

“At the royal runching!” Flicker added, as the three of them flitted off down the path.

“I like them,” Jesse said. The idea that anyone would want to kidnap such cute little creatures made him seethe with anger.

“I like them, too,” Emmy said as she led the cousins up a set of amethyst steps and through the front door. “And looky-looky. My head doesn’t bump the ceiling!” Emmy jumped up and down to demonstrate. “Now do you see why I like this place? I have my very own home with a living room and a couch and a bedroom and a generous porch. There’s no nosy neighbors, and the best part is I don’t have to be a sheepdog ever!”

Daisy slid her eyes toward Jesse. Jesse sighed. They had both known Emmy was bored with being their pet sheepdog, but they hadn’t realized until this moment just how fed up she was.

Emmy went on enthusiastically, “And if I want to make my house bigger, I just do this.”

The cousins watched as she touched one of the walls and began to mold the mortar as if it were clay. As she pushed outward, the mortar stretched, and the precious stones multiplied. Before the cousins’ astonished eyes, Emmy added a brand-new room to her cottage. “See? Now I have made you two your very own bedroom!”

Jesse and Daisy watched as she went on to furnish the room, forming two beds side by side, with lava mattresses and blankets and pillows. There was even a table between the beds that held a computer. It was an almost exact replica of Jesse’s room, right down to the rug on the floor and the fancy computer keyboard sitting on the desk.

“Is that a working computer?” Daisy asked, giving Jesse a meaningful look that he knew meant
Maybe we can contact the professor and find out how to get Emmy out of this place
.

“Oh, no,” Emmy said. “But I thought it would make you feel more at home. Let me show you my room.”

Emmy took them next door, where there was a familiar-looking packing crate, twice as big as the one in the Earthly Realm. The slats were made of amber, and it was filled with lava socks. “Look, cousins! It’s just like my nest at home, only the right size, and I’m next door to you, in case you wake up in the middle of the night and need me.”

Wait a minute
, Daisy wanted to say,
aren’t
we
the Keepers
? But she didn’t, because Emmy was totally caught up in the task of folding up pads of lava and adding more socks to the mound in her crate. The sight of Emmy making herself so at home in this strange place made Daisy want to weep.

Emmy stood back and admired her crate. “Warm and cozy! We can all stay and live here happily ever after,” she said.

Daisy looked around at the beautiful shimmering walls of Emmy’s cottage. It was a very nice place to visit, but she was truly glad she didn’t have to stay.

“Lord Feldspar and Lady Flamina say we have to leave on Monday,” Jesse reminded Emmy.

“Oh, piffle!” Emmy said with a wave of her bright-green talons. “They will let you stay longer. His Lordship and Her Ladyship are crazy about me. There is even talk of their making me a member of the Aura.”

“What’s the Aura?” Daisy asked.

“The court of the Grand Beacons. Don’t worry,” Emmy chirped. “They’ll warm to you, too. I wouldn’t be surprised if they wound up letting you stay here forever.”

“Forever is a long, long time, Em,” said Daisy. “We’ll talk about it more tomorrow. Right now, it’s time for bed.”

They tucked Emmy into her lava-sock-filled crate.

“Are there any books here for us to read to you?” Jesse asked. Even though Emmy was a
lightning-fast reader, she still liked to be read to at bedtime.

Emmy shook her head. “The books in the Fiery Realm are like the computer, just pretend. I’ll show you what we do here instead of reading books … tomorrow, because right now I’m sooooo sleepy. This has been such an exciting day.”

Jesse and Daisy went next door to their own room. Daisy noticed that there was no bathroom, which was odd. Then again, she didn’t have to go. Nor did she feel the need to wash her face or even brush her teeth. It was as if all activities involving water were out of the question, as if water itself had evaporated from existence here.

They climbed into their beds, and the room darkened to a deep maroon hue that reminded Daisy of the color of the insides of your eyelids as you’re drifting off to sleep.

Jesse’s voice sounded very close in the darkness. “It’s like sleeping inside one of those blanket forts we used to make, isn’t it, Daisy? Warm and cozy.”

“It is,” said Daisy.

Jesse yawned. “Do you think Emmy made a crate of socks for herself because she misses the one in the garage?”

“It’s the only bed she’s ever known.” It was Daisy’s turn to yawn. “This bed is so much more comfortable than mine,” she said.

Jesse’s voice came back at her, sharp with worry. “You’re not thinking of sticking around any longer than we have to, are you?” he asked.

“Of course not!” Daisy said.

“Listen, Daze. I’ve lived in some pretty neat places, but you always wind up with scorpions in your shoes and snakes in your toilets, trust me. I
want
to live in Goldmine City. I did not sign on for this.”

“Sign on?” Daisy said.

“You know what I mean,” Jesse said. “Living in the gloaming like this. It’s like being stuck inside a lava lamp. Besides, how great a world can it be if someone’s going around swiping all those cute little fire fairies? Now let’s get some sleep. I have a feeling we’re going to need it.”