He could also drop his gaze and look downward, to where the islands were laid out in the deep, rich, dark blue of the sea just like jewels, or the crumbs the riddle had made them. Their sage-green shapes were jagged around the edges, each one as different from the others as a snowflake from its fellows. He saw one green shape like a huge letter C, fishing boats huddled inside its harbor, waiting out what was clearly now a burgeoning storm.
He saw others that were longer, or flatter, some with a single high peak that seemed to plunge straight from its top down into the sea, as if the mountain continued underwater.
As the sky turned gray, he began to wonder if they should turn back before the storm caught them, but he had no way to tell anyone what he was thinking.
And then, after what felt like a lifetime—with the sun already dipping toward the horizon—they reached the top of the chain of islands. The final two lay side by side, and beyond them, nothing but ocean, all the way to the great ice of the north. The island to the left was large, hills rising and falling, trees nestled between them.
But the little island to the right was tiny. The smallest, without a doubt. It had steep, rocky cliffs on every side, leaving not one spot where a boat could safely dock. The only way to approach this island was from the air.Had the dragons brought the wolves here, to their place of power?
The top of it wasn’t rocky at all, though. It was shaped like the inside of a bowl, one end higher than the other. The ground was perfectly smooth and green, marred by not one tree, not one shrub, not one stone. Just perfect grass.
But tucked into the higher side of the bowl was one thing to disrupt the flawless stretch of green—a small white house with a green grass roof. It was recessed into the slope, so only the front wall, the front door, and the windows were visible, the glass glinting for an instant as a hint of sun made it through the clouds.
The dragons started to descend toward it, the wind only growing worse as they lost altitude, twisting around the islands and the coastline behind them, vicious and unpredictable. Mikkel and Theo shot past Anders and Rayna, Theo veering dangerously off course, Mikkel forced to throw himself to one side at the last minute to avoid a collision.
Rayna was arrowing too fast, far too fast, toward the ground, and Anders wrapped himself around Kess and ducked his head, every muscle tense. At the very last instant, just as he was sure they were about to smash into the grass, he felt the shift of muscles in her back as she flared her wings and managed to slow them down. They landed with several tripping, bumpy steps, and then they were still.
The wind seemed to swirl around inside the cauldron of the island, nipping at them from every direction, and Anders uncurled cramped arms and legs, jumping down from Rayna’s side to drag off her harness as quickly as he could, so she could transform. Kess stuck her head out of her sling once, yowled her disapproval, then stuck it straight back inside again. Anders couldn’t blame her.
Mikkel and Theo had already changed, and Mikkel staggered over to help Anders with the harness. Anders felt incredible, invigorated by the cold, as if he could run the length of the island, but his friend was clearly feeling just the opposite, his face white, his hands fumbling.
They dragged the leather straps clear, and Rayna shifted back to human form, staying crouched on the ground. Anders hurried over and pulled his cloak off, wrapping it around her shoulders for extra warmth, and helped her to her feet. She was suffering as badly as the other dragons, and the twins hurried toward the house after the rest of the group.
They arrived just as Ellukka and Lisabet were pulling on the door—it was swollen with damp and wedged shut, but as they both tugged, suddenly it gave way, sending both girls stumbling back in surprise. All six children bundled inside, and Anders hauled the door closed behind them and then turned to see what kind of place they had found.
They were in a large room, lit only by what gray sunlight made it in through the salt-encrusted front windows. To their right was a large fireplace, surrounded by thick, squashy chairs that were covered in cushions, some of them losing their stuffing. To their left was a long-abandoned kitchen, dull pots and pans hanging from the ceiling above a long counter, an empty wood-burning stove behind it, with a pipe that led up to the ceiling and disappeared through the hill.
Down the middle of the room ran a long table, still strewn with books and papers, as if whoever had left here had intended on coming back to resume their work. The books were everywhere, stacked on the ground and crammed into shelves lining the walls, and a series of doors suggested the house led farther back into the hill.
“We need a fire,” Lisabet said, stepping away from the dragons, who were huddled in a small group, almost too cold to think. “The wind’s freezing, we’re surrounded by cold water, this place is terrible for anyone who needs to be warm. I’ll start one in the fireplace. Anders, you try the stove.”
Anders set down Kess, who scampered away to explore, then hurried over to the stove, crouching in front of it and pulling open the black iron door. There was a basket of kindling stored beside it, and blocky brown squares of peat. He raised his voice to call to Lisabet as he found two pieces of flint connected by a piece of string, hanging on a hook beside the stove. “The wolves might have used this place centuries ago, but I don’t think it was abandoned that long ago. More like ten years than a hundred. There’s not enough dust, and there’s still fuel here.”
Theo called out from where he was standing by the table, his voice shaking as he shivered. “And th-there are dates on some of these p-papers. Someone was coming here.”
“Our mother, hopefully,” said Rayna, tugging both her cloaks tighter around her. “And hopefully she left something behind.”
Anders had the feeling Drifa could have left all kinds of things behind—after all, the map was showing them where to find the pieces of the Sun Scepter because that’s what they’d asked about, but Hayn had said she’d hidden many of her most valuable artifacts. He wondered what else might be tucked around the house, if only they knew to look for it.
Soon enough, he and Lisabet had the two fires going, and the room was beginning to warm up. The water pump in the kitchen still worked, so they had water boiling on the stove, and Lisabet and Mikkel made toasted cheese sandwiches out of some of the extra supplies the boys had brought when they joined the others.
It had fallen dark outside, but the fires and lamps inside the hidden cottage cast a glow over the room, and everyone began to cheer up as the temperature rose—even Lisabet didn’t mind a little more warmth. A little exploration yielded a bathroom with plumbing that seemed to still be working. There was even hot water—pipes ran through the wall behind the stove to heat the water up, then poured it out of a spout and into the bath. They found a room set up like a scientific laboratory and finally three bedrooms, though Ellukka and Anders dragged the mattresses out to the living room, so they could all sleep together in front of the fire, where it was warmest.
“Well,” said Theo, sometime later. They were all sitting on the mattresses or in the squashy chairs in front of the fire, drinking cocoa and eating toasted cheese sandwiches, except for Kess, who had some roast beef in hers. “This place was once used for research, I’m sure of it. There are books on all kinds of things. It’s so cold up here, it feels like wolves could think faster and sharper here than anywhere else in the world. Maybe that’s why they came.”
“If they did, dragons must have flown them in,” Anders said, echoing his earlier thought. “There’s no way a ship could dock. Perhaps Drifa brought wolves here, and that’s how she knew about it.”
“There are artifacts here,” Lisabet said. “Odd ones, I can’t tell what most of them do.”
“I’d like it,” Mikkel said, “if it wasn’t so cold. We’ll need to keep warm tonight, so we’re well enough to fly out in the morning, assuming we can find the next piece of the scepter.”
“I wish I knew exactly what the scepter did,” Theo said, looking around at the piles of books. “I mean, it’ll make it warmer, but I don’t know how. Changing the weather is a big thing to do.”
“Whatever you do, it can affect somewhere else,” Anders said, remembering the artifacts he’d seen in the Skraboks back at Ulfar, when he’d first been searching for a way to find Rayna. “If you make it rain in one place, you might cause a drought somewhere else.”
“I wish we knew what heat would do,” Theo replied.
“We have to risk using it, even if we’re not quite sure what will happen,” Lisabet said. “Hopefully, it’s just like the Snowstone—the temperature around where it is changes. So if we set them against each other, they should cancel each other out. Hopefully.”
