Dealing with Dragons - Wrede Patricia Collins - Страница 22

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"Oh," said Therandil, looking considerably taken aback. "How do you know?"

"They came to visit and told me all about it," Cimorene said. "I think you should try for Keredwel. She's from the Kingdom of Raxwel, and her hair is the color of sun-ripened wheat, and she wears a gold crown set with diamonds. You ought to get along with her very well."

Therandil brightened perceptibly at this description but said, "But everyone expects me to rescue you."

"As long as you defeat a dragon and rescue a princess, no one will care," Cimorene said firmly. "And Keredwel will suit you much better than I would."

"Are you sure her dragon isn't female, too?"

"Positive," Cimorene said. "Gornul 's cave is two down and three over.

If you follow the path outside, you can't miss it. He ought to be there now, and if you leave right away, you'll be able to get everything settled before dinner."

"All right, then," Therandil said. "As long as you're sure you don't mind."

"Not at all," Cimorene assured him fervently. She saw him to the mouth of the cave and pointed him toward Gornul's cave, then returned to the kitchen. She gathered up the jars and bottles she had been planning to check, except for the copper jar with the jinn inside, and took them back to the treasure vault. Then she fetched an ink pot, a quill pen, and a sheet of paper from the library and began writing out a warning to attach to the copper jar. She didn't want anyone else to open it until the eighty-three years were over and the jinn could go home without killing anyone.

She was just finishing when she heard Alianora's voice calling from the rear of the cave. "I'm in the kitchen? she shouted. "Come on back!"

"You're always in the kitchen," Alianora said when she poked her head through the door a moment later. "Or the library. Don't you ever do anything but cook and read?"

"Look at this, Alianora," Cimorene said, handing her the warning she had been writing. "Do you think it's clear enough?"

"'Warning: This jar contains a jinn who will kill you if you let him out too soon. Do not open until at least one hundred and five years after the date when the Citadel of the Yellow Giant was destroyed,'" Alianora read aloud. "That's, let's see, eighty-four years from now. It seems clear to me.

You'd have to be pretty stupid to ignore a warning like that."

"Maybe I ought to show it to Hallanna and see what she says," Cimorene said, frowning. "I wouldn't want anyone getting into trouble by accident, just because I didn't make it plain."

"It's plain, it's plain," Alianora said. "Cimorene, what on earth have you been doing? How do you know there's a jinn in this bottle?"

"Therandil," Cimorene said, waving a hand expressively. "I was looking through some of the bottles from Kazul's treasure room, to see if any of them happened to have hens' teeth in them, and Therandil came in and wanted to help."

"And he opened it?" Alianora said. "Oh, dear."

"Exactly," said Cimorene. "But it came out well in the end. I think I've gotten rid of him for good. I sent him off to rescue Keredwel."

"You did? What if he doesn't beat Gornul?"

"Oh, he'll win. The jinn gave him a wish, and he wished to defeat a dragon." Cimorene looked apologetically at Alianora. "I suppose I ought to have sent him to rescue you, but…"

"That's quite all right," Alianora said hastily. "Getting rid of Keredwel will help a lot. And after everything you've told me about Therandil, I don't think I'd want to have him rescue me."

"That's what I thought," Cimorene said. "Oh, and I got the jinn to give me some powdered hens' teeth, so we can finally try that fireproofing spell."

"Good," Alianora said. "Let's do it right now!"

So Cimorene got out the spell and the ingredients she had collected, and she and Alianora spent the next hour on various necessary preparations.

First they had to boil some unicorn water and steep the dried wolfsbane in it. Then the mixture had to be strained and mixed with the hippopotamus oil and the powdered hens' teeth. Cimorene did most of that, while Alianora ground up the blue rose leaves and the piece of ebony.

Grinding the ebony took a long time, but fortunately they didn't need much. When Alianora finally had enough, Cimorene mixed it with the lue rose leaves and more of the unicorn water in one of Kazul's recently shed scales. Each mixture had to be stirred three times counterclockwise with a white eagle feather. Then Alianora dipped the point of her feather in her mixture and began drawing a star on the floor of the cave.

"Is this going to be big enough for both of us?" she asked, scratching busily at the stone with the tip of the feather.

"I think so," Cimorene answered. "Don't try to make it too big, or you'll run out of liquid and we'll have to start over."

Alianora did not run out, though she had used nearly all her mixture by the time she finished. "There!" she said. She sat back on her heels and studied her diagram to make sure there were no gaps, then set her dragon scale and feather aside and stood up. "Your turn."

"First we have to get into the center of the star," Cimorene reminded her. "Be careful not to smudge the lines!"

"Smudge them, after all that work?" Alianora said in tones of mock horror. She lifted her skirts and stepped carefully into the middle of the diagram. Cimorene followed, carrying a small mixing bowl half full of something that looked like brown sludge with a white eagle feather sticking out of one side. "It smells awful," Alianora said, grimacing.

"It doesn't matter what it smells like, as long as the spell works," Cimorene said. "Ready?"

"As ready as I'm ever going to be," Alianora replied, shutting her eyes and screwing up her face as if she expected to have a glass of cold water poured over her head.

Cimorene plucked the eagle feather out of the bowl and raised it quickly over Alianora's head before it could drip on the floor. She let four large drops of the brown gunk fall onto Alianora's hair, then brushed the end of the feather across her forehead twice. She finished by drawing a circle with the feather on the palm of Alianora's left hand.

"That tickles? Alianora complained.

"Well, you can do it to me now," Cimorene said.

Alianora took the bowl and feather from Cimorene.

"You're right," Cimorene said a moment later. "It does tickle."

"Now what?" Alianora said.

"Set the bowl down and shut your eyes," Cimorene instructed. When Alianora had done so, Cimorene closed her own eyes and said: "Power of water, wind and earth, Turn the fire back to its birth.

Raise the spell to shield the flame By the power that we have tamed."

"Oh!" said Alianora. "That feels peculiar. Can I open my eyes now?"

"Yes," said Cimorene, opening her own. "We're finished."

"Did it work?" Alianora asked, cautiously opening one eye and squinting at Cimorene.

"Well, something happened. We both felt it," Cimorene said. "And your hair and forehead don't have brown gunk on them any more."

Alianora promptly opened both eyes and studied Cimorene. "Neither do yours. What does that mean?"

"It means we go back to the kitchen and test it," Cimorene said. She bent over and picked up the mixing bowl. "We'll clean up later. Come on."

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