Rayna tied a bit of cloth around his finger, and as she did so, the knotwork around the edge of the map rearranged itself once more, presenting them with their next riddle.
“At end of day, it’s always best
To find a place to take some rest.
At Dragons’ Home, my place I make,
And there the staff my blood can take.”
“What?” said Rayna, blinking at it.
“Well, by my blood, she means us,” said Anders. “She means her relatives, her descendants.”
“And by Dragons’ Home, she means Drekhelm,”Ellukka said. “That’s what Drekhelm means in Old Vallenite.”
Anders’s stomach dropped. “How are we supposed to get into Drekhelm?” he asked. “That place is absolutely stuffed full of dragons, and they all must think we’re their enemy by now, since we haven’t showed up to celebrate what happened to Holbard and offer to do it anywhere else they want.”
But Lisabet was shaking her head. “I don’t think we have to go to Drekhelm,” she said.
“But that’s what—” Ellukka began, but she stopped as Lisabet shook her head again.
“Drifa wrote this before the last great battle,” she said, “and before the last great battle, the dragons didn’t live at Drekhelm.”
“Oh, you’re right,” Ellukka said slowly. “They moved to Drekhelm because the wolves discovered where Old Drekhelm was.”
“Right,” Lisabet agreed. “So when Drifa wrote about Drekhelm in this puzzle, she meant what we call Old Drekhelm.”
Anders considered this. “So we need to go to Old Drekhelm and figure out where she slept? And that’s where the staff will be? Is it as big as New Drekhelm?”
Ellukka nodded. “Maybe even a little bigger,” she said.
Anders groaned, and Rayna bit into her sandwich with feeling.
“At least it’s not full of dragons,” Lisabet ventured.
“We still have some of the day left,” Ellukka said. “We’d better get going.”
Chapter Ten
IT TOOK MOST OF THE DAY TO REACHOLDDrekhelm. They flew northeast, skirting Cloudhaven and flying above the village of High Rikkel, and past the top of Lene’s Pass, which linked the village to Port Alcher down on the coast, before they veered east.
Anders could feel how tired Rayna was by the time they arrived, the strokes of her wings taking that much more effort, her head a little lower. But she lifted it as Old Drekhelm came into sight.
High in the craggy peaks in the northmost reaches of the Icespire Mountains, they saw the huge, gaping maw of an opening. Ellukka flew confidently toward it—she had been here before, though long ago—and Rayna fell in behind her.
They landed in an enormous, dimly lit cave with a cold wind blowing through it. Once more they removedthe girls’ harnesses, pushing them off to the edge of the cave and into the shadows in case the wind picked up, and they transformed back to human form.
“There used to be big doors,” Ellukka said, pointing at the opening to the cave mouth. “This was the Great Hall, just like at New Drekhelm, but they took the doors off and brought them with them.”
“I suppose it’s not the sort of thing you’d want to make twice if you didn’t have to,” Rayna observed.
The farthest recesses of the cave were completely hidden in the dark, but Anders could see it was much bigger than the Great Hall at New Drekhelm. For a moment, he imagined it full of people and dragons, lights and even dancing, as they had seen the night of the equinox. And then it was empty once more, sending a shiver down his spine.
“This place is huge,” Rayna continued. “How are we possibly going to find out where she used to sleep?”
“Well, at least there are lamps,” Ellukka said, walking over toward the entrance to unhook four of them from the collection that had been left there long ago. “They’re dusty, but it looks like they still work, so we don’t have to wander around in the dark. Oh, and”—she looked up, concerned—“someone’s been here. There are footprints.”
“You came once, with the Finskólars,” Rayna pointedout. “Maybe someone came visiting again?”
