The Topaz Quest (2 page)

If the jewels of power see a dragon soaring secretly
Over the lost lands of the six towns
The spell will blast them away, blowing
Like a feather in the wind
.

She turned away and flew at a safe distance round the towering spikes of black rock enclosing Stoplar and its lands. She didn't see another pass during her long flight and her muscles ached as she neared the place she'd started from.
It's hopeless
, she thought,
there's definitely no other way through. We'll have to do what Finn suggested and let him fly me in
.

A tremendous groaning startled her into back-winging furiously. The storm ground to a halt with a great creaking and moaning, splinters of ice crashed to the ground, and the mists parted. Tia hovered in surprise as a line of people with horses and carts made their way out of the pass.

‘Traders!' Tia scanned the faces of the people below and saw her special friends, Kizzy and Florian. They'd be amazed to see a small golden dragon flying above them – and even more amazed if they knew it was her.

She glided down. Kizzy spotted her and pointed, wide-eyed. Tia couldn't resist breathing fire. She only meant to show off a little, but a great stream of flames shot from her mouth. The terrified horses squealed and threw their riders or kicked at the traces of the carts.

Tia couldn't believe what she'd done – she'd acted like Torkil who enjoyed making trouble for the Traders.
But I didn't mean to do that
, she thought.
I'll change back and see if I can help
. She looked round for a place where she could turn into her own form without being seen and realised, too late, she'd flown into the spell.

It caught her by the tail and shook her until her wings crumpled. She tumbled helplessly away from
the mountainside, over the foothills and towards the river. And then she was falling.

She'd reached the edge of the spell's power and it had dropped her but she was too exhausted to flap her wings and save herself. She plunged towards the river.

In desperation she gripped the opal with a scaly foot and thought –
fish!
She instantly changed into a salmon, twisting and turning as she hurtled to the river.

Splash! Salmon-Tia hit the water and was torn away by raging currents. Frantically she dodged the clashing ice floes streaming wildly along in the torrents of freezing water. Two floes closed in on either side and she leapt out of the water just as they crashed together. Down she came again, dodging jagged lumps of ice flashing by. She dived deep, right to the bottom of the river bed, and powered along with ice swirling above her.

She swam for what felt like miles before the current grew weaker and the floes moved more slowly. Then she drifted along until she reached shallow water. At last she changed back into herself, stumbled to the bank and fell to her knees, shivering violently.

A shadow fell over her. It was Finn, puffing out agitated little bursts of smoke. ‘Are you all right?'

‘I'm fine,' she said through chattering teeth, ‘just cold.' She wrapped her arms round herself and tried to stop shivering.

Finn grasped her in his claws and flew back to the campsite in the trees. While he flopped by the fire Tia changed into dry clothes. Neither her DragonBrother nor Loki said a word to her.

The fire crackled and Tia felt warmth gradually returning to her bones. Steam rose from her clothes drying in front of the fire and she tugged her spare jacket tightly round herself. ‘How did you find me?' she asked Finn and Loki.

‘When we realised you'd gone we went to look for you. I saw you fall and change into the silver fish,' Finn said.

Loki shook his wings. ‘You were easy to find – you were a very shiny dragon and you breathed a lot of fire.'

‘I couldn't help the fire...' Tia was going to say that her dragon power of breathing fire had unexpectedly combined with her witch-power but realised she couldn't, not if she wanted to keep it a secret. Besides, she had been very, very foolish.

She sighed. ‘I wanted to be a dragon so much.'

‘I knew you'd use that opal,' the jackdaw said. He pecked Tia's hand sharply.

‘Ow! What was that for?' Tia rubbed her hand.

‘To remind you not to be so stupid in the future.'

Tia hugged her throbbing hand and said nothing; she knew it served her right. ‘I'm sorry,' she said. ‘I really am.'

Finn swung his head round and looked at her steadily with his green eyes. ‘If you mean it, give me the opal.'

Tia's hand flew protectively to the jewel. ‘But I promise not to use it,' she said.

‘You promised before. Do you really think you'll be able to resist it now you know what it's like to be a dragon?'

Finn understood her better than anyone and she knew he was right: she'd be constantly tempted by the opal. Slowly she unfastened the collar and handed it to her DragonBrother. With his claws he delicately unpicked the metal hooks holding the jewel in its setting, threw the collar away into the trees and wrapped the opal in leaves.

‘Give me your book bag,' he said.

Tia fetched the little green and silver sack and gave it to him. He dropped the opal inside. ‘Have
you still got that ball of leather strips from Kulafoss?' he asked. When Tia nodded he asked her to tie the strips to the bag and then loop them round his neck. Once she'd finished, the sack lay snugly against his throat.

‘I need to keep the emerald,' Tia said, ‘so I can talk to Loki and send him with messages.'

‘Oh, that's right,' the jackdaw said. ‘Loki do this, Loki do that and never mind the danger.'

Tia stroked his ruffled feathers. ‘You know how important you are – we couldn't have stolen the emerald or the opal without you,' she said. ‘And Finn lets you ride him.'

She grinned at her DragonBrother. ‘You could let me ride you over the mountains into Stoplar.'

‘Never!' The little dragon's eyes glittered in the firelight. ‘I'll carry you – be ready just before dawn. And this time don't go missing.'

‘I won't,' Tia said meekly.

It was freezing in the dark spring morning and it grew steadily colder as Finn flew higher and higher over the mountains through buffeting winds and flurries of snow. Just as Tia thought she was going to freeze to death Finn began to fly downwards to where the air grew warm and the howling wind changed to a gentle breeze.

They landed on the edge of a huge circular plain that they could easily make out in the fading moonlight. ‘What a strange place,' Tia whispered.

Loki hopped from Finn's shoulder. ‘The sun's going to rise soon – he'd better go,' the jackdaw said to Tia.

She hugged Finn and he breathed smoke over her. ‘Be careful,' he warned.

‘I will.'

The gust of air from Finn's take-off blew into her eyes and she shielded them with a hand while she watched him fly up into the mountains.

When he'd gone Loki cocked his head to one side and said, ‘It's odd you can see him when no-one else can.'

Tia didn't want to tell the clever jackdaw it was because of her witch powers. ‘I suppose it's because I know him so well,' she said.

‘Hmm.' Loki didn't sound convinced. He flew into a tree growing nearby and hid amongst its leaves. Tia settled with her back against the tree meaning to watch the sun rise. Gradually she fell asleep in the balmy, sweet-smelling air.

She dreamt she was back in the Drakelow Mountains, in the teaching cave. DragonTeacher watched as she wrote runes in the sandy floor of the
cave with a metal claw that fitted over her finger. Freya, her DragonMother, had asked the Traders to make it especially for her.

‘No, no, no!' DragonTeacher said and swept away the shaky runes with his tail. ‘Try again!'

‘Stupid witch-brat!' a dragonet sniggered. The others joined in and their chanting grew louder, their voices echoing round the cave –
witch-brat, witch-brat, witch-brat
.

With a start Tia woke up. It was daylight. Sunshine warmed her face and the voices of children rang in her ears.

Tia stood up and stared in amazement. Stoplar lay in a sun-drenched bowl scooped out of the snow-covered black mountains towering around it. In the centre lay a vast stretch of rich brown earth tilled into low ridges. This was patrolled by children who waved and called to each other as they passed. Several also walked around a wall that divided the plain from slopes of lush grass dotted with plump sheep and small black cows.

Here and there stood farms, and behind them, reaching right to the boundary of the mountains, were orchards of apples, pears, cherries and other trees Tia didn't recognise.

On the far side of the bowl was the town. It was as strange and beautiful as the rest of this sunny
land in the middle of the cold mountains. Brightly painted houses filled rows of terraces that rose in steps up the steep foothills, while above them was a shining white building with hundreds of windows. It was so dazzling in the sunshine that Tia had to shade her eyes.

As she squinted through laced fingers she thought,
It must be Luona's castle but it's more like a palace
–
there aren't any fortifications or gates
. Tia supposed the High Witch felt protected by the ice-storm blocking the pass; her enemies would never be able to get through it.

Someone called out from quite close. It was a boy of about Tia's own age. He was glaring at an enormous, long-haired white cat scratching at the soil, scattering it in all directions.

The boy shouted and threw a lump of earth towards the cat. It fell well short and the animal ignored him.

Tia grinned. She climbed on top of the wall, took her sling and a pebble out of her pocket, whirled it around her head and pitched the stone towards the cat. It landed – thud – just in front of the cat's nose and the creature leapt straight up in the air with a screech of fright. It glared at Tia then ran away in a blur of white.

The boy stared at Tia as she wound up her sling, jumped down from the wall and walked up to him.

‘You nearly hit the Lady Luona's cat!' he said.

‘I wouldn't hit it,' she said indignantly. ‘I don't hurt animals – I just scared it off. Isn't that what you were trying to do?'

‘Of course, it's part of my job. But who are you, Trader girl? And what are you doing here? Your people left yesterday.'

Tia told her familiar story. ‘I'm Nadya. I fell asleep and got left behind.' She thought of another detail. ‘I suppose my parents thought I was with my cousin, Florian.'

‘What are you going to do? The Lady Luona won't open the pass just so the Traders can come back for you.'

‘I don't know. I suppose I could find work.'

The boy laughed. ‘You don't know much about Stoplar, do you? You can't have a job unless you get a work badge.'