Dragon Rider

The rat stepped back, looking pleased with himself. The computer hummed like a captive bumblebee, the screen flickered — and went black.



“Oh, no!” Gilbert Graytail jumped on the keyboard, hammering at it frantically, but the screen did not respond.



Ben and Sorrel exchanged anxious glances. Gilbert leaped up, swearing, and slammed the lid of the laptop down over the keyboard.



“Like I told you,” he said crossly. “Nothing but trouble. Just because a little salt water got into it. I mean, do you stop working if you happen to drink a sip of salt water?” Furiously he jumped off the desk and onto the chair that sheltered his little study, slid down one of the chair legs, and began rummaging around in the matchbox index-card files.



Ben and Sorrel lay down on the floor and watched. “You mean you can’t help us after all?” asked Sorrel.



“Yes, yes, I can.” Graytail was fishing tiny fingernail-sized cards out of the files and flinging them down on the desk. “If that stupid thing won’t work I’ll just have to do it the old-fashioned way. Can one of you great big giants open the third drawer down in the chest of drawers there?”



Ben nodded. When he opened the drawer a large quantity of maps fell out: maps large and small, maps old and new. It took Gilbert Graytail some time to find the one he was after. It looked odd, quite different from the maps Ben knew, more like a small book folded up over and over again, with narrow white ribbons dangling from the pages.



“A map?” said Sorrel, disappointed, when Gilbert proudly spread this oddity out in front of them. “You mean all you have for us is a map?”



“Well, what did you expect?” Looking offended, the rat put his paws on his hips.



Sorrel didn’t know what to say. Tight-lipped, she stared down at the map.



“Look at that, will you?” Gilbert passed his paw lovingly over the seas and mountains. “This map’s got half the world on it. And very few blank spots — only those places I couldn’t discover anything about. But unfortunately, as I was saying, most of those do happen to be where you’re going. See these ribbons?” He beckoned the two of them over and pulled one of the ribbons. Part of the map immediately unfolded, and another map came into view.



“Cool!” exclaimed Ben.



But Sorrel just made a face. “What’s that for?”



“This method,” said Gilbert, proudly twirling his whiskers, “is my own invention. By pulling the ribbons you can see each part of the map again on a larger scale. Useful, don’t you think?” Looking pleased with himself, he closed the map again and tugged at his ear. “Now, what else? Oh, yes. Just a moment.” Gilbert took a little tray from his desk. On it stood six thimbles full of ink, each one a different color. A bird’s feather with its quill sharpened lay beside them.



“I’ll write down the meaning of the different colors for you,” said Gilbert portentously. “I expect you know the usual: green for lowland country, brown for mountains, blue for water, and so on and so forth. Everyone knows that, but my maps tell you more. For instance, I’ll use gold,” he said, dipping the pen into a thimble of bright gold paint, “for my recommended flight path. And red,” he added, carefully wiping the pen on the leg of the chair and dipping it into the red ink, “to shade in places you ought to avoid because the humans there are fighting one another. Yellow means I’ve heard strange stories about those parts, and misfortune clings to them like a snail trail, if you take my meaning. Yes, and gray means: This would be a good place to rest.” Gilbert wiped the pen on his white fur and looked up at his two customers. “All clear?”



“Yes,” growled Sorrel. “All clear.”



“Excellent!” Gilbert put a paw in his jacket pocket, brought out an ink pad and a tiny rubber stamp, and thumped it down on the bottom corner of the map as hard as he could. “There!” he said, inspecting the mark left by the stamp closely before nodding, satisfied. “Easily recognizable.” He dabbed at the mark with his sleeve, folded the map up with care, and looked expectantly at Sorrel. “So, now we come to the matter of my fee.”



“Fee?” said Sorrel, taken aback. “Rosa didn’t say anything about any fee.”



Gilbert immediately put a protective paw down on the map. “Oh, didn’t she? Typical. Well, customers have to pay me. How they pay is something I leave to them.”



“But I … I don’t have anything,” stammered Sorrel. “Only a few roots and mushrooms.”



“Huh! You can keep those,” said Gilbert scornfully. “If that’s all you’ve got then the deal’s off.”



Sorrel tightened her lips and rose. Gilbert Graytail came only up to her knee. “I’ve a good mind to shut you in one of your own drawers!” hissed the brownie girl, leaning over him. “Since when do people ask to be paid for a little friendly help? You know something? If I wanted to I could just snatch that map from under your fat little ratty bum, but I don’t want to. We’ll find our way to those Himble-layers, or whatever they’re called, without it, see? We’ll —”



“Just a moment,” Ben interrupted. He pushed Sorrel aside and knelt down in front of the rat. “Of course we’ll pay,” he said. “It must have been an awful lot of work making that map.”



“I should say so!” squeaked Gilbert, still sounding affronted. His nose was quivering, and his long white tail was agitatedly tying itself in knots.



Ben searched his pants pocket, took out two pieces of chewing gum, a ballpoint pen, two rubber bands, and a small coin, and laid them all on the floor in front of the rat. “Which do you fancy?” he asked.



Gilbert Graytail licked his lips. “Hmm. A difficult choice,” he said, examining everything very thoroughly. Finally he pointed to the chewing gum.



Ben pushed it over. “Okay. Now let’s have the map.”



Gilbert removed his paw from the map, and Ben put it in Sorrel’s backpack.



“Give me the ballpoint, too,” squeaked the white rat, “and I’ll tell you something else that could be useful.”



Ben pushed the pen over to Gilbert and put the other things away. “Go on,” he said.



Gilbert leaned slightly forward and whispered, “You’re not the only ones looking for the Rim of Heaven.”



“What?” gasped Sorrel, taken aback.



“Ravens have been turning up here for years,” Gilbert went on, still in a whisper. “Very peculiar ravens, if you ask me. They ask questions about the Rim of Heaven, but what they’re really interested in is the dragons said to be hiding there. Naturally I haven’t told them anything about the dragons in my dear cousin Rosa’s part of the world.”



“Are you sure?” asked Sorrel suspiciously.



Looking offended, Gilbert drew himself up to his full height. “Of course I’m sure. What do you take me for?” He wrinkled his nose. “They offered me lots of gold. Gold and pretty precious stones. But I didn’t care for those black birds.”



“Ravens?” asked Ben. “How come ravens? What have they got to do with dragons?”



“Oh, they don’t want the information for themselves.” Gilbert Graytail’s voice sank again. “They’re acting on behalf of someone else, but I haven’t found out who yet. Whoever it is, your dragon had better be careful.”