The King's Dragon (15 page)

They find themselves passed back and forth in treaties like so much loose change. Now, this is precisely what happened in our part of the vale a few years ago. The city of Sheal, our previous owners, blew the latest round of trade negotiations with the city of Geath, and as a result they ended up having to sell off part of their holdings along the Evesh to them at a vastly reduced price. When the land gets sold, the people get sold along with it.' He gave a wry smile. 'It doesn't make much difference most of the time, not really, because on the whole you only ever see city folk when they're there to hand over the deeds to the new owners, and the rest of the time you're still farming the land in exactly the same way... Only this time, it didn't work out that way. This time, the borders changed, and our farm got split down the middle.

Well, we weren't too pleased about that, for various reasons to do with tedious technicalities like no longer being able to use the services of the
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blacksmith over the bridge and having to go miles upriver instead...'

'Bureaucrats,' muttered the Doctor darkly.

'Quite. So we decided to make our opinion known.' The Teller frowned. 'Now over the years I've found that my little brother Beol comes in handy in those sorts of situations. I stand him next to me while I'm talking, and people are usually too busy worrying about him to do anything but agree with what I'm saying. This time, however, the citizens of Geath had rightly predicted that there might be some trouble. So they sent a few big strong boys along with their administrator.

'Now,' the Teller looked at the Doctor. 'Nobody wants to see their baby brother turned to a crisp by a giant dragon.' He glanced at Amy. 'Neither do they much like seeing him pounded to a pulp by goons. When he
could
stand up again, I decided that we weren't going to be passed around ever again and that we were going to find a better way of life.

So off we went. After half a year wandering around and not eating very much, the dragon turned up.

When it turned out to be so useful, I decided it was time to pay a visit to Geath.' He frowned down at the ground. 'Sheal was next on my list.'

Amy bit her lip and glanced over at the Doctor. He was leaning back against the wall and his face
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was in shadow. Quietly, he said, 'It's all true, you know.'

The Teller looked up. 'What's true?'

'Other worlds. Other beings. Travel between the stars. Universal suffrage. All true.' The Doctor leaned forwards. He was smiling. 'Just thought I'd mention it.'

The Teller closed his eyes. A slow smile — of pleasure and delight — crossed his face. Amy could see clearly the dreamer he must once have been, and probably still was at heart.

After a moment, the Teller opened his eyes, rubbed them, and cleared his throat. 'Well. Of course, that means for certain that Beol can't defeat these star-dragons by strapping on his armour and waving his sword at them. Not that he listens to me any more.'

'He's started to believe his own publicity,' Amy said. 'The townsfolk aren't helping. You've done too good a job.'

'If you have any suggestions,' the Teller said drily, 'I'm ready to hear.'

'Suggestions?' said the Doctor. 'I'm full of suggestions. Bubbling over with them.' He jumped to his feet. 'Now that the locked door is no longer an issue, for which my grateful thanks, I think we have three main problems. Firstly, we are caught in the middle of an ancient interplanetary civil war
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between deadly enemies equipped with equally deadly weapons. Secondly, we have an as yet undetermined amount of time to collect up every single piece of Enamour currently lying around the city of Geath.
Thirdly,'
he took a breath, 'if Beol by some miracle does manage to fend off both the Herald and the Regulator, he will start a war with Dant and the three of us could well be executed as spies.'

'Don't worry about that one, Doctor,' the Teller said. He was clearly starting to enjoy himself. 'I'll put in a good word for you.'

'For that, amongst other reasons, I am indeed not going to worry about our third problem - well, not until tomorrow morning at least. But! There's a long way yet till morning! And in the meantime, bearing in mind our most pressing problems, I suggest we do the following. Firstly, we make a start on gathering up the metal.' He pointed at Rory and the Teller. 'That'll be your job.'

'What will we be up to, Doctor?' Amy said. The Doctor folded his arms. 'I'm going to get that dragon if it's the last thing I do.'

Rory covered his face. 'You mustn't say things like that! Not out
loud!'

'Doctor,' said the Teller slowly, the magnitude of his task beginning to dawn on him, 'the whole city is covered in Enamour. How can we possibly
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collect it all? We can't knock on every single door in Geath. The Regulator won't have given us that much time, surely?'

'I have an idea about that,' said the Doctor.

'Well, it was Hilthe's idea, really. She set me thinking. She was on the right lines when she said that we could use the Feond technology in some way. Where she got it wrong was in wanting to make weapons. We'll never win that way — not least because I suspect both sides would incinerate us at the first sign of trouble. Besides, that's not what Enamour is good at. And it's not all that we found when

the

dragon

opened

up.'

He

started

rummaging around in his pocket. 'You're right —you can't knock on every door in Geath. However long we've got, I doubt it's long enough to do that.

But there's something else that we can try. Where is that thing...? Ah, here it is!'

He pulled out the impossibly tiny satellite dish.

'While you were chasing around town, Amy, Rory and I took in a movie.'

'Oh, very nice.'

'You wouldn't have liked it. Things exploding.

People dying. Depressing.' He looked down at the dish, which he was cradling lovingly in his cupped hands. A green light was flashing on the side. 'I used this as a projector. But it isn't just a projector, it can also work as a transmitter.' The Doctor pressed
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a button. The green light went off and a red one came on. 'If I set this up correctly, the metal should act as a receiver, for whatever we transmit. There's Enamour in every single home around the city by now. What you need to do,' the Doctor nodded at the Teller, 'is to tell people to bring whatever they have out to the main plaza. Amy and I will go and get the dragon and when the Regulator comes to collect, all of the Enamour will be out in the open, ready and waiting for them... If I decide that they've earned it.'

The Doctor looked round, expecting applause and finding only bafflement. 'It's perfectly simple!

You've no imagination! All right, let's show not tell... Amy, pass me that hideous brooch you seem to be wearing all of a sudden.'

'What?' Amy looked down at her shirt. 'Oh! Yes!'

She unpinned the brooch (it truly was hideous, what had she been thinking?) and handed it over.

The Doctor placed the brooch on the far side of the pallet. 'Keep watching that.'

He pointed the satellite dish at Amy and played with the controls. A tiny, crackly image of Amy appeared above the brooch.

Amy began to laugh. 'Help me, Obi-Wan!' she cried. 'Oh, I've always wanted an excuse to say that.'

'How can we be sure people will hand the stuff
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over?' Rory said. 'Doesn't it make them want to keep it?'

The Doctor turned earnestly to the Teller. 'This is where you come in. I need you to talk. Talk like you've never done before. You're going to tell the best story you've ever told, the story of your life.

Tell people they have to give up the metal. Tell them why. Get them to bring it out.' Seeing the Teller's doubtful expression, he said, more urgently, 'I know you can do it. You're a natural. You turned your little brother from a serf into a king!'

The Teller shook his head. 'Doctor, we both know it was the dragon that did that.'

'No,
you
did it. All your idea. All your words. I heard you in the council hall! You were magnificent.

And it's exactly like I told you - all that Enamour did was to amplify your voice so that people couldn't help listening.' He held the dish out. 'This will make your voice stronger than ever before.

And what you'll be telling is a better story than any you've told before. Because it's going to save the lives of every single person in this city.'

The Teller stared at the satellite dish. 'Let me see if I understand what you mean. You want me to speak to the people of Geath and explain that they must surrender the metal at once. That they should bring it to the grand plaza in front of the council chamber.

You want me to impress upon them the
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urgency of this and the terrible danger they will face if they do not comply. And, somehow, this tiny metal bowl will be able to take my words and the images I conjure up with them, and place them into every single house in the city of Geath.'

The Doctor gave him an appreciative look.

'You and Hilthe! You pick this stuff up so fast! I'm impressed! Yes, that's exactly what I mean.' He placed the dish with ceremonial care into the Teller's hand. 'Take care of it.'

Amy, who had been staring at her own image, turned to the Doctor. 'Television. You're going to save the world through television.'

The Doctor grinned at her. 'How else?'

'Doctor, you're brilliant! It'll never work.'

The Doctor put a hand over a heart. 'I swear it will be a ratings triumph.'

As if it could not bear to hear any more, the candle went out. Only the red button on the satellite dish remained alight, flashing away like a warning sign.

'Telly-what?' said the Teller; a lost, bewildered voice in the darkness.

170

Outside their cell, the
corridor was empty. One torch burned dimly.

'I sent the guards out to help with the defence of the city,' the Teller said.

'Good thinking,' said the Doctor. 'An instinctive revolutionary. Why you got mixed up in king-making I'll never know.'

The Teller led the three travellers quickly and quietly back up into the main levels. They came to a point where the corridor branched and the Teller pointed to the right-hand passage. 'That way leads back to the council hall if you're serious about stealing the dragon.'

'Not stealing,' said the Doctor primly. 'Saving
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Geath from itself.'

'Semantics,' coughed Rory under his breath.

The Doctor pointed in the other direction. 'Don't you have a live broadcast to make?'

Rory turned to Amy. 'No unnecessary risks, OK?'

'You know me!'

'Yes. That's what I mean. That's exactly what I mean.'

'Don't worry, I can take care of myself!' Amy said.

'Hmm.' Rory kissed her on the cheek. The Teller was plucking at his sleeve and giving him an assortment of impatient glances. Rory squeezed Amy's hand and followed the Teller down the left-hand passage. When he looked back, Amy and the Doctor were already lost to the shadows.

Rory and the Teller went along dark passages empty even of Enamour, heading steadily upwards. They came out, in time, on the far side of the main plaza.

Rory glanced back down at the council building.

'How long exactly have you been in Geath? Didn't take you long to map out all the secret passages, did it?'

'They're access tunnels for messengers,' the Teller explained. 'A quick way in and out of the hall. Very useful. And,' he admitted, 'at the back of
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my mind, there was always the fear that we would find ourselves driven out of town.' He led Rory up a stone staircase. 'How about here? Will this do?'

Rory looked back down into the plaza. Yes, it was a good spot. They would see very quickly whether or not they were having any success.

'Great! Perfect!'

'So what do we do now?'

Rory placed the satellite dish carefully down on the flagstones.

The Teller tapped it doubtfully with his toe. 'It's so small. Are you sure this is going to work?'

Rory, who was deeply unconvinced, said, 'Oh, the Doctor's a genius! His plans always work.'

'Hmm,' said the Teller.

Rory pointed the dish at him and operated the controls in the sequence the Doctor had shown him. He looked at the wall near the Teller, where a panel of beaten Enamour would, he hoped, act as a monitor. A fuzzy image of the Teller's face appeared on the flat surface. Rory laughed. 'Blimey!

It does work!'

The Teller stared at himself and touched his cheek. `Do I really look like that?' he said in horror.

'Camera adds a few pounds.'

'And everyone in Geath can see me?'

'I hope so. Don't worry! You look fine!' Rory
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turned a dial and focused in on the Teller's face.

'Come on! On with the telling!'

The Teller gaped like a fish. 'What do I say?'

'Try "bring out your Enamour". Only, you know, say it properly. Go on! Go for it!'

'Everyone
in Geath?'

'Absolutely everyone,' Rory said cheerfully.

The Teller blanched. 'People of Geath,' he whispered.

'Bit louder. I know — pretend it's only me. Talk to me.'

'People of Geath,' the Teller said, more loudly this time, although somewhat hoarsely. Rory put his thumb up in encouragement and the Teller took heart. 'People of Geath. Like me, you have seen remarkable events unfold this evening. Like me, you must have wondered where these great flying creatures come from and why they wish us harm. And in your hearts, like me, you must know the answer already.' The Teller clasped his hands together and leaned forwards, becoming more confident as the urgency of his message surpassed his nerves. 'You know how this trouble has arisen.