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  Copyright

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental. Any resemblance to actual dragons is a different story—a story that the author of this book would very much like to hear.

  Copyright © 2017 by Pseudonymous Bosch

  Interior illustrations copyright © by Juan Manuel Moreno

  Spot art here, here: © Nip/Shutterstock.com

  Cover art copyright © 2017 by Gilbert Ford.

  Cover copyright © 2017 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  Hachette Book Group supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce the creative works that enrich our culture. Incidentally, that is also the purpose of chocolate.

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book without permission is a theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like permission to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact [email protected]. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

  Little, Brown and Company

  Hachette Book Group

  1290 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10104

  Visit us at lb-kids.com

  First Edition: March 2017

  Little, Brown and Company is a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc. The Little, Brown name and logo are trademarks of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.

  ISBNs: 978-0-316-32048-1 (hardcover), 978-0-316-32049-8 (ebook)

  E3-20170218-JV-PC

  Contents

  COVER

  TITLE PAGE

  COPYRIGHT

  DEDICATION

  CHAPTER ONE: THE SECRET IN THE CRATER

  CHAPTER TWO: THE VIEW FROM NOSE PEAK

  CHAPTER THREE: THE MEETING IN THE TEEPEE

  CHAPTER FOUR: THE DRAGON IN THE YURT

  CHAPTER FIVE: THE NEWS FROM CAMP

  CHAPTER SIX: THE AIRSTRIP IN THE DESERT

  CHAPTER SEVEN: THE ROAD TO THE KEEP

  CHAPTER EIGHT: THE TRUTH ABOUT THE DRAGONS

  CHAPTER NINE: THE VIEW FROM THE HELICOPTER

  CHAPTER TEN: THE TERRORS OF DINNER

  CHAPTER ELEVEN: THE ENCOUNTER BELOW THE TOWER

  CHAPTER TWELVE: THE DISCOVERY IN THE BARNYARD

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN: THE PRISONER IN THE SILO

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN: THE VISION IN THE TOILET

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN: THE PRISONER IN THE SILO II

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN: THE RUN THROUGH THE JUNGLE

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: THE FIRE IN THEIR BELLIES

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: THE GUM IN CLAY’S MOUTH

  CHAPTER NINETEEN: THE MAN WITH THE TEN-GALLON HATS

  CHAPTER TWENTY: THE DESTRUCTION OF THE CASTLE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: THE ARRIVAL OF ARIELLA

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO: THE RETURN TO EARTH RANCH

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE: THE TRIP TO THE OTHER SIDE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR: THE RAID ON THE LABORATORY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE: THE THUNDER OF DRAGONS

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX: THE OTHER SIDE OF THE COIN

  APPENDIX

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  BY PSEUDONYMOUS BOSCH

  FOR ASA AND CYRUS

  (EVENTUALLY)

  FROM Secrets of the Occulta Draco; or, The Memoirs of a Dragon Tamer

  When people meet a Dragon Tamer, they ask many irritating questions, but the most irritating of all is: What is it like to ride a dragon—is it like riding a horse?

  Usually, my answer is to stare at my questioners until they nervously excuse themselves and go away. (Word of advice: Do not try this at the palace.) But if I am feeling charitable, I may say something like this:

  “No, riding a dragon is nothing like riding a horse. Unless the horse is a wild horse, galloping as fast as the wind. And you are riding without saddle or reins, your seat no more comfortable than a cactus. And there is every reason to believe that you are about to fall off and plummet to an early and painful death. Then, yes, in that case, riding a horse might be a little like riding a dragon. But even then, you’d have the horse’s mane to hold on to. Dragons do not have manes. Some have horns, true, but I dare you to hold on to a dragon’s horn. By which I mean never hold on to a dragon’s horn. They don’t like it.”

  Here I pause, allowing my audience to imagine what a dragon might do to them if they dare touch the dragon’s horn. Then I continue in a mocking tone:

  “If not a horse, then what? you ask. A rhinoceros has a horn. Perhaps a dragon is a flying rhinoceros? Here’s a test: Would you be afraid to make the comparison in front of a dragon? If the answer is yes, better to stay silent.”

  Now my voice turns to a growl. “In other words, to heck with horses! It is an insult to dragons. A dragon is not a mindless animal—a dragon’s mind is wiser and impossibly more complex than yours.”

  When I get to this last bit, I narrow my eyes into my most intimidating glare, which, if I may say so, is very intimidating indeed.

  “You really want to know what riding a dragon is like? First of all, you don’t ride a dragon; the dragon rides you. As soon as you climb onto a dragon’s back, you let go of the idea that you are in control. The dragon is the pilot; you are a passenger—no, a barely tolerated stowaway.

  “A dragon is so strong that even the slightest flap of a wing will raise a wind forceful enough to throw you back to the dragon’s tail. When the dragon flies, your face feels as though it is being torn apart. Your hair whips behind you, or is shorn from your head altogether. Clouds blur as you pass them. Birds seem to rocket backward, so much faster are you going than they.

  “Exhilarating? Certainly. If you are able to hold on. Oh, did I say you had to let go when you ride a dragon? It was a metaphor, a figure of speech, you nitwit.”

  Here I’ve been known to jab my finger into someone’s chest. (Note: This also is not a good thing to try at the palace.)

  “You can’t really let go, obviously. You have to hug the dragon’s mighty neck, dig your nails into the dragon’s scaly skin, squeeze your legs into the dragon’s massive sides. And don’t let go for a single second. Or else.

  “And when, as sometimes happens, the dragon makes one of its fabled leaps, then it is not only the dragon you must hold on to, but also your head. As the old ones tell us, Let not a dragon leap when you’re astride, lest you lose your mind on the other side.”

  That much of the saying is well known, and it is true that a dragon’s leap is not for the faint of heart. But there is more, known only to the followers of the Occulta Draco. Of course, I do not repeat the rest to strangers, but to you, dear apprentice Dragon Tamer, I will impart the whole:

  Let not a dragon leap when you’re astride,

  Lest you lose your mind on the other side.

  Yet if you must this dizzy journey make,

  Three things will keep you woozy but awake:

  First, your enemy’s sword will point the way.

  Next, the shield you made will keep ghosts at bay.

  Last, if you’d not return your brain half-dead,

  Please, a helmet from home put on your head.

  CHAPTER

  ONE

  THE SECRET IN THE CRATER

  There wasn’t supposed to be a moon.

  It was just a sliver, barely a crescent. Still, it cast more light than she would have liked. Even in her black clothes, her face smeared with soot, she stood out against the rocks that spilled down the sides of the giant crater.

  Pausing in the shadow of a boulder, she pulled her night-vi
sion goggles off her head—she wouldn’t be needing them after all—and considered how best to move forward. In a few moments, she would reach the top of the ridge. And she had no idea what or whom she would find waiting for her. Rather, she had several ideas, none of them cause for optimism.

  If only she’d gotten there two days earlier, she would have been making her ascent in perfect darkness, as planned. The problem was that instead of the anticipated four days to cross the Kalahari on foot, it had taken six. Or six nights, to be more precise. Traveling by night was cooler. Also safer.

  Supposedly.

  Of course, she’d met with her fair share of mishaps anyway, hadn’t she? The scorpion that fell out of her hat. The herd of Cape buffalo that forced her to walk three miles out of her way. The “water hole” that was really a mud hole. (Luckily, she’d spent a good portion of her childhood reading about quicksand.)

  And then there were the humans—nomadic San people. They couldn’t believe she was traveling alone. No guide. No camel. No cell phone. Her cover story about being an ultra-marathoner did not convince them. Running a hundred miles in the hot desert just because? So instead she told them she was a student from the university, studying the effects of drought on local animal populations. This they could believe. Although they still had a big laugh over her experimental sweat-conserving jumpsuit. They were right about the jumpsuit; it made her so hot that she sweated out more water than she saved. (Her experiments with urine were another story. A story better left untold.*) In the end, she’d spent an entire evening listening to their observations about the Namib Desert beetle—a fascinating creature, to be sure, but she lost precious time.*

  Never mind. Survivalist rule number one: Don’t dwell on what can’t be fixed.

  She felt around in a side pocket of her backpack, where she kept her energy bars—she’d packed a few as a special treat, despite the excessive sugar and nonbiodegradable packaging. There was only a half bar left.

  “Well, you wanted to travel light,” she muttered to herself, breaking the half in half.

  She popped one piece into her mouth and then stowed the rest for later.

  Hoisting her backpack onto her back, she resumed her climb.

  She would just have to summit as fast as she could and hope to find cover on the other side.

  She breathed a sigh of relief when she got to the top. There were no sentries pointing guns at her, just a narrow plateau surrounded by jagged rocks. She was exposed for only a moment before she was able to crouch behind a ledge and look around. No sign of cameras or motion detectors, she noted. Maybe they assumed that nobody would be foolhardy enough to come up there.

  Below her was the crater proper, a three-mile-wide bowl protected on all sides by walls of rock and miles of desert. An impressive sight, even in the dim light of the moon. What bribes or tricks the enemy had employed to lay hold of this vast natural fortress in the middle of nowhere she did not care to know. What concerned her was why they wanted it in the first place. They claimed in public documents to be building a “nature preserve and resort hotel,” but there was very little nature to preserve. All life at this location had been destroyed by a meteorite thousands of years ago. As for a hotel, the crater would be nearly impossible for most tourists to reach.

  Why, then, were they there? What nefarious activity required such an enormous and remote location?

  She’d been trying to answer that question for months when she heard a rumor about a secret and very technologically advanced breeding program. The rumor sounded far-fetched, yes. But when it came to them, nothing was truly far-fetched. Her colleagues had urged caution, but she felt there was no choice: She had to investigate.

  She put a scope to her eye and peered down into the distance. The satellite photos that she’d studied before her trip must have been older than she thought. Or else construction was proceeding very fast. Twinkling lights revealed at least three more buildings than she remembered. And she was nearly certain that the lake hadn’t been there before. Not to mention all those trees. Tens of thousands of them, it looked like. Where are they getting the water? she wondered. Talk about environmental irresponsibility. It was as though they were trying to create their own tropical ecosystem in the middle of a desert.

  She glanced at her watch. She had to get down there, survey the site, plant the hidden cameras and chemical-emissions sensors, and then climb out—all before daybreak. Less than three hours…

  EEEYAHYRR! A terrible screech pierced the silence.

  What on earth—?

  She stood still for a moment, then heard it again. EEEYAHYRR! It was not a human cry; nor was it like any animal cry she’d ever heard. Nevertheless, it was a cry of distress—of that she was certain.

  It sounded quite close, but she couldn’t tell where it was coming from.

  Cautiously, she made a circle, looking above and below and in the surrounding rocks. She saw no signs of life, not even a weed. Perhaps the creature was farther away than she thought.

  She was on the verge of giving up the search when a new sound caught her attention. It was a softer, hissing sound this time. And it was coming from directly beneath her.

  Suddenly very nervous, she turned on her flashlight.

  And then she saw it. About four feet down. Stuck in a crevice. Its yellow eyes staring, unblinking, into the flashlight’s beam.

  It was about the size of a small dog or maybe a very large owl. And its wings and tail were twisted together so that it looked like nothing so much as a bat being attacked by a snake.

  And yet there was no mistaking it for anything other than what it was.

  She studied the creature in mute astonishment.

  So the rumors were true; she had suspected as much, but it was another matter entirely to see the evidence in real life.

  How could anything be at once so fierce and so fragile, so earthly and so unearthly?

  EEEYAHYRR!

  It screeched again, its mouth opening to reveal several rows of sharp teeth. She took a step backward. She couldn’t tell whether the screech was an angry warning or a desperate plea, but either way, the creature was likely very dangerous.

  Moving slowly, she leaned in again. One of its wings was torn. There were almost certainly some broken bones.

  It couldn’t have been very old. It looked like it was still a baby.

  Without assistance, it would probably die where it was. But how to help?

  She had a first-aid kit, of course, but she wasn’t sure whether human medical supplies would work on fairy-tale animals. Or even whether she could pull the creature out of the crevice without it scratching her eyes out.

  She had to earn its trust. But there was hardly time for that.

  “Are you hungry? No nut allergies, I hope,” she whispered, reaching around to her backpack and pulling out the remaining bit of energy bar. “Normally, I wouldn’t feed machine-made food to a wild animal, but this isn’t really a normal situ—”

  Her words were interrupted by a decidedly machine-made roar. She looked up to see a helicopter heading straight toward her.

  She swore under her breath.

  How could she have been so careless? In her concern for the injured creature, she’d forgotten to stay out of sight.

  By now the helicopter was hovering low in front of her. It looked slick and new, like a helicopter one would expect to see ferrying executives to an office tower rather than patrolling a desert. Except, that is, for the extensive weaponry jutting out from either side. If it was a helicopter for executives, they were executives in a war zone.

  She hesitated. The ledge where she’d taken cover before would hardly protect her from cannons like those. Maybe she should jump over the side of the crater and scramble down the rocks, hoping she could lose her pursuers. In her mind, she went over the supplies in her backpack. She had ropes and grappling hooks. Flares that might provide a moment’s diversion…

  No, it was too late. Only a magician could disappear fast enough. She had m
any skills; vanishing into thin air was not one of them.

  Besides, if they shot at her and accidentally hit the baby dragon, she would never forgive herself.

  The helicopter’s floodlight hit her eyes, temporarily blinding her. The pilot’s voice boomed over the sound of the spinning blades:

  “Put your hands over your head and don’t move.”

  Cornered, she did as ordered.

  She thought about the various cover stories she’d used before. None seemed to explain why she was infiltrating their half-constructed nature preserve in the middle of the night, dressed like a ninja.

  As her eyes adjusted to the light, the helicopter landed in front of her on the small plateau, blowing sand in all directions.

  A woman leaned out of the passenger side, her platinum hair gleaming in the darkness.

  “Mon dieu. Is that who I think it is?”

  Her pale face registered only the slightest surprise.

  “It’s been ages, darling, but I would know those pointy ears anywhere. How kind of you to visit, Cassandra.…”

  Cass’s pointy ears tingled in alarm at the sound of her name. It had been well over a decade since she last heard that chilling voice; and yet suddenly she felt as if she were a young girl again, forever caught in the clutches of Ms. Mauvais.

  CHAPTER

  TWO

  THE VIEW FROM NOSE PEAK

  Although located on an island, and thus by definition surrounded by water, Clay’s summer camp, Earth Ranch, was tucked inside a valley, with mountains separating it from the ocean on all sides. If you wanted a glimpse of the ocean, the closest vantage point was a rocky hill called Nose Peak in honor of the unique geological formation on top. Nose Peak was steep and slippery, and, strictly speaking, campers weren’t supposed to climb it (or “peak the nose”) without special permission. But it was an open secret that Clay made the twenty-minute climb every day at dawn, usually returning only after the sun had risen well into the sky.

  This morning, like most mornings, he sat with his legs straddling the big rock proboscis, staring at the horizon. Price Island was home to a volcano, Mount Forge, which regularly belched smoke into the air and blanketed the island with a hazy layer of vog (volcanic smog). The volcano had been especially active lately. As a result, it was difficult for Clay to see very much.