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As the Mother Star began to lean toward the horizon and its faint shadow became longer, Joe docked the platform to the second tier, near Sid's bar. Goody and Leo were already waiting for him. The doll waved cheerfully at Joe as he carefully aligned the edge of the platform with the dock. Leo turned around and picked up the hedgehogs that had gathered in a big ball behind his back.
"Well, shall we start, Joe?" he said, stepping onto the platform on all four paws while the hedgehogs positioned themselves on his back, adjusting their little helmets.
"Yeah, just wait a minute more," the lanky pilot smiled back and leaned over to get a good look at someone in the crowd at the bar's entrance.
"Don't wait for them, let them get on foot," squeaked one of the hedgehogs on Leo's back.
Goody went to the edge and crouched with his feet overhung in the canyon.
"Aren't you scared?" Leo asked, lying down next to him.
"I don't understand what it is to be scared," the animated one ringed.
"It's when you really don't want anything unpleasant to happen," Leo murmured, rolling his eyes and twitching his shoulders in an attempt to calm the hedgehogs crawling up his back.
"What's the unpleasant thing that could happen?" Goody asked, staring with his eyes wide open.
"For example, you can fall, crash, cease to exist," replied the lion, raising his left eyebrow.
"It's hard for me to imagine it," replied the animated one and looked down, "In my past life... I only remember some pieces... I was often high up, and I was never scared."
"Because you've never lost anything?" the lion suggested.
"I lost a hammer once," Goody answered seriously.
"Is the hammer worth worrying about?" Leo laughed, and the hedgehogs on his back shook and laughed with him.
"I worry about the fact that no one can tell me how to become human," the animated one ringed sadly.
"What do you need that for?" the lion asked in astonishment.
"Raud said that my relationship with Gerda is doomed as long as I don't have a mouth."
"Ha-ha," Leo grinned, "Don't listen to this storyteller."
Out of the corner of his eye, Goody spotted in the crowd the upright hammer he'd met at the lion and the big guy contest. It stopped, turned toward the animated one, as if wanted to say something, but got confused, hung his head down, and walked slowly toward the bar.
"I also lost my master. Will that do?" Goody asked, after thinking for a while.
"Master? Did you love him? It happens when the victim loves their tormentor," he laughed again.
"No, no," Goody shook his head, "I don't remember him at all. I remember the image, the dark figure against the window, coming up and putting me in the backpack."
"Then it doesn't work either," Leo waved his paw.
"Cast off!" Joe exclaimed behind their backs.
At his call, two people jumped onto the platform from the crowd: the girl in the cloth tree dress and the bald archer – Goody had seen them at the Baron's this afternoon. They, too, crouched on the edge, legs overhung, and the platform began to rise slowly over the canyon, turning smoothly. Glancing once more into the crowd near the bar, Goody saw Raud. He was talking about something with Snorri, who looked straight into the eyes of the animated one and became first more serious and then melancholy calm.
"Never mind that nerd," Leo murmured, following the doll's gaze, "He's been like that for as long as I can remember."
"What's wrong with him?"
"I don't know. He's always been like that. He's been with the Baron since the beginning. He appreciates Snorri. I guess he does that for a reason," the lion shrugged.
"He's not scared, either," Goody said, looking up at the first sunset, already turning scarlet beyond the plateau, "When we got out of the prison, he fought... he fought better than he fought you."
Leo hummed and said nothing, also staring at the horizon, where dunes rose into the sky in a haze.
The platform was sweeping over a plateau that stretched so far out that one could not see it: to the south it bordered the horizon, and to the north and east it was desert. The western part of the plateau was backed by even taller mountains, the tops of which were blue with a red sunset, like the smile of a cat that had caught a mouse. Goody watched as the ground flew beneath his feet. Everyone was silent, not daring to interrupt the rustling wind. The hedgehogs huddled on the edge of the platform, their noses poking out of it.
A petal fell on Goody's hand, trembled for a moment, and then flew away. The animated one looked up and saw that the platform was flying in a stream of whorls and petals of the very flowers that grow in the valley, on the opposite side of the canyon to the grotto where he had danced with Gerda. The petals fell on them like rain, spiraling behind the platform and laying on the ground in a whimsical pattern. The silent beauty was happening on its own, without the involvement of anyone's directed will.
The platform slowed, and Goody looked around. They stopped in the middle of the rain of petals in front of the giant elongated structures. There were three of them, and they were the biggest ones Goody had ever seen. Bigger than any building. He craned his head so high that he staggered and fell from the platform down. But Leo managed to pick him up, throwing his paw forward.
"Hey, I told you to be careful," smiled the lion, placing the doll closer to the center of the platform.
But Joe had already landed, and the animated one, looking at the lion with gratitude, jumped down himself and ran toward the white giants. It was a long run; they were still far enough away. He stopped, trying once more to grasp the sight and absorb their overhanging bulk over the plateau. And then he spread his arms and began to run in circles on the dusty surface.
"What is it?" he shouted to the lion.
"Zeppelins. Big airships," the lion grinned and hurried after the girl and the archer. Goody stopped, lowered his arms, and looked again greedily over the structures, as if he were trying to eat their immense power with his eyes. Joe's platform floated by, the hedgehogs still there, now fully occupying it. They were just as mesmerized by the unseen engineering marvel and rolled over the platform in admiration. Goody came to his senses and hurried after the others, raising the age-old dust of the plateau behind him. Ahead of the zeppelins was a hangar, and from it the scaffolding that encompassed one of the giants rose upward. Work was still going on there, and Goody saw figures crawling through the scaffolding, hoisting additional plates onto one of the reinforcement ribs.
The rain of petals stopped as they got closer to the hangar. One of Lila's sisters ran toward them, waving her arms and tumbling. Goody, too, ran toward her, overtaking the lion and his companions, but stopped. The monkey was clearly frightened and, running closer, could only shout:
"B-b-beast! Monster!"
Leo jumped toward her, covering half the distance in one leap, but the roar from the sky deafened him, and he fell to the ground, clutching his head. The next moment it was dark. Goody looked back and saw that the sunlight was obscured by a dark figure with wings that occupied the entire sky.
"Björnveig," Leo wheezed, raising his head.
Beside him, crouched on one knee for ease, the archer drew his bowstring. The arrowhead flashed in a beam of light from behind the monster, and the arrow whistled through the air, shooting toward the darkness overhanging his friends. There was an even more deafening roar, and the monster flew upward.
"No, it's not the 'Death Sower,'" the archer shouted, taking a second arrow from his quiver, bigger than the last.
Leo stood up; the monkey grabbed his paw and pulled him toward the hangar.
"Hurry," she shouted, "Take cover!"
The lion stumbled after her. Goody walked first, then ran after them. The bowstring flashed, and the sky gave another terrifying scream. Goody looked up as the monster glinted reddish scales in the sunset, its muzzle split open by rows of spines, flames shooting from its fang-like mouth. The monster went into a dive and fell right on them. The archer reached for his next arrow, but not in time. The monster burst into flames – and a pillar of fire erupted where the man was standing. There was a scream. But Goody couldn't make out whose, he was thrown back by a wave of heat and hit the back of his head, but he didn't lose consciousness.
When he opened his eyes, he tried to find the monster, but all he saw was a monkey waving at him. Goody struggled to get up. Something in his right knee was crunching and prevented him from walking properly. But he overcame the resistance and waddled toward the hangar. In the black smoke that enveloped the plateau, no matter how much he searched with his eyes, he saw no one else. Somewhere behind and to the left overhead came a new roar. Goody looked around in a hurry, but again he could see nothing but black swirling fibers of smoke. As he ran out of them, he saw the beast circling over one of the zeppelins, pouring fire over it. On its chest he discerned a small figure clinging with all its might to the large scales. The monster stopped in two sweeps and fired another salvo at the unfinished structure. Melting under the pressure of the fire, it lost its shape and flowed hot blobs of molten metal down, burning through the scaffolding and bracing around the animated workers who had fallen.
The hangar doors creaked and began to slowly open. Goody looked back at the sound. The smoke gradually cleared, and the animated one could see that Joe was moving one of the flaps on his platform, and several of the monkeys were moving the other, but they were having a much harder time of it. Goody, limping, rushed to their aid. Something rumbled behind him, and he looked back – it was Joe, who had finished opening his flap, pushing a massive hanger structure out of the hangar, apparently intended for a zeppelin. On it was mounted the figure of a knight – in polished armor, it sat on a chair, holding in its hand a long white spear mounted in the manner of a cannon with a lifting and turning mechanism. For some reason the knight turned his head and looked at Goody as well, but then it turned away and twirled one of the control rings, raising its spear. A blue discharge went through the spear, and an arrow of yellow-blue flickering flame flew out with a crackle and a rumble, scorching the monster's wing. The beast roared, turned with its face toward the hangar, rose higher in three sweeps, and began to plummet downward, diving over those gathered in the hangar. The closer it got, the clearer one could make out the figure on its chest. It was Leo, clawing at the scales with all his might. The knight spun the steering wheels, but there was no way it could raise the spear enough to fire at the monster. Joe lowered the platform to the edge of the structure left inside the hangar and shouted:
"Weight! We need to get it up!"
Joe's platform lifted the nose of the structure with the knight, but it was not enough to take good aim at the monster. Goody sprawled and leaped onto the platform. The thing swayed. The knight fired, but the blinding beam came just below the beast's paws, nearly hitting Leo, who had fallen on one of them. The lion shifted its weight to the other paw at the last moment and dodged the shot.
"Careful, you fools, he's alive," the old man shouted as he leaped out of the darkness of the hangar with the barrel in his hands and hoisted it onto the platform, which rocked even more. In the metal scope of the spear, hastily attached to the side, Goody could see the approaching figure of the monster and Leo jumping on his shoulder. But the spear was still walking on the end below the diving monster. From the corner of his eye, Goody noticed the hedgehogs dragging bolts and nuts and each other onto the platform.
"Come on, all together!" shouted the animated one. "One, two, three!"
He, the hedgehogs, Joe, and Father jumped up almost simultaneously. The platform, along with the structure, swung upward again, and the knight fired. A deadly beam of light slid toward the monster and touched its left wing, causing the monster to twitch, swerve sideways in front of the hangar at the last moment, and crash into the ground, pelting the entire company with rocks. Their mechanism flipped over, the platform flew into the depths of the hangar, and Goody was thrown up and sideways, tiny splinters clattering against his shell.
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The animated one came to his senses in a pile of construction materials at the far end of the hangar. A huge hole was now gaping in one of the walls. Dense clouds of smoke and dust were pouring in from outside. He shook the metal shavings off his head and heard someone yell from the street:
"Master, the cylinders are intact!"
"Good," murmured Father's voice somewhere near Goody, "They're intact, but the wing isn't. Shamarahwarahat. Where is that red moon ointment?"
In the darkness some vials rang, something fell and broke.
"Macrathafatar," the old man hissed, and appeared with a small flask in his hands in the dim light that filtered in through the broken roof of the hangar.
"Oh, it's you," he said in surprise. "Go find Joe, would you? I need him."
Goody stood up, tentatively trying his knee, but then he leaned on it and rose all the way up, balancing awkwardly on the wreckage. He jumped down onto the stacked metal plates, which rang like a bell as his wooden soles touched their polished surface.
As he looked around, Goody spotted the platform sticking out of the work tables in the very recess. He jumped off the plates and staggered toward it, limping on his right leg. Among the wooden beams he saw Joe's body, slumped in a lounging position. His long legs dangled down as if he were lying in a hammock, sheltered from the midday heat. Goody tugged at his arm, and the man rose abruptly, looking around dazedly, but suddenly groaned and grabbed his left shoulder. He yanked it with a growl, but he only howled harder. Goody came over and helped him down, giving the man a footing.
"Hold my arm," Joe muttered, "Just firmly."
Goody looked around and, finding nothing better to do, rested his feet on the workbench table and gripped the man's arm tightly. Joe yanked with his whole body. Something crunched and he screamed.
"There's no need to yell," the old man with the flask in his hands wheezed, "Take it off."
Joe looked at Father with utter indignation, but still began to slowly remove his coat, arching his whole body.
"It's okay, hold still," the old man said as he helped him remove his shirt and rubbed an ointment from a flask on the sniveling man's back.
"He's still alive," the monkey shouted as she ran into the hangar.
"I know, I know," said the old man. "Tell you what, Joe, fly over to my workshop and get me as much of this ointment as you can," the old man jabbed the flask in Joe's face; "It's under the canopy in the little room to the right of the entrance, where I have the precision instrument."
Joe nodded.
"And without delay," the old man squeaked, "Zip in and zip out."
"I got it, Father, don't worry."
"All right," the old man nodded and turned to Goody, "Let's go."
He walked briskly toward the hole in the hangar wall, smoke billowing from it. Goody waddled after him. The old man quickly disappeared into the black clouds that rose through the torn metal ceiling into the sky. Goody lost sight of him briefly, but a sinewy hand fished the animated one out of the thick smoke and into the fresh air. The suns had set, and the plateau was illuminated by young moons streaming rapidly across the sky. The monster that had plowed the ground lay at the side of the hangar with its wing unnaturally curved, torn in half, dark blood oozing from the lacerations. The dummies, previously working on the zeppelins, were now scaffolding around the wing to get up to the wound. The old man ran up the thin ladder with the ease of a young boy, and poured the rest of the ointment over the wound. The monster twitched, and acrid green smoke billowed from the wound.
"There, there, hold on," the old man hummed and moved down the stairs. Goody saw several monkeys carrying the lion on a stretcher.
"Leo!" the animated one shrieked and waddled toward him.
"He's all right," the old man nodded toward Leo, "He hit his head when he fell. But his skull is strong, so it's okay."
Goody went over to the stretcher and placed his hand on the lion's chest. The monkeys left their burdens and went to help the rest of the dummies.
Leo was breathing deeply, and the doll's touch opened his eyes.
"Your hand is so warm," he wondered quietly.
A sob could be heard in the distance. The lion, squinting in pain, turned his head uneasily, and Goody looked back after him. In front of him, he saw the girl dressed in the cloth tree leaves leaning over a pile of black ash. Covering her face with hands stained with black soot, she was weeping over what was left of the archer. Goody went to her, but the lion grabbed his arm and spoke softly:
"Don't. She's better off alone now."
Goody looked at the lion, then at the girl, and crouched on the edge of the stretcher with his head bowed. The wind rippled her hair, and it blended with the streams of black smoke rising from the ground, so that she seemed to smolder with them.
"This dragon, son of the red moon, where did it come from?" the lion wheezed and stood up.
"Is that a dragon?" Goody was surprised when he looked at the monster.
"Yeah, who else," Leo muttered. "I haven't seen them, only heard of them. I'm surprised they're still alive, here in the wild, and not in the circus of some ruling house or sultan from the coast."
"I don't even want to ask you what the coast is," Goody shook his head.
"It's far, far away from here, beyond the great desert," the lion murmured, rising and sitting down next to the doll.
There was an eerie rattle above their heads. Both looked up in sync to see the huge, rigid structure of the zeppelin collapse in on itself and fall to the ground with an inexpressible rumble, drowning in a flood of dust and sand.
"Oh, archaha twarchwana haru," came the old man's voice from nearby when the rumbling subsided a little.
Leo coughed and fell backwards on the couch.
"What a day," he murmured.
"The beginning of the thirteenth cycle," the old man squeaked, sitting down next to him. "How's your head?"
"It's okay," replied the lion, coughing.
Joe landed between them and the dust-covered figure of the weeping girl, with many vials on his platform.
"Great!" Father exclaimed, grunting, jumped up and ran to Joe. "Danu, fetch the others and get them all on the wing!"
A few monkeys ran away from the dragon and followed the old man to the platform. He was already scurrying back toward the scaffolding with three jars in his shriveled hands. He climbed up and began pouring the ointment over the wound, which hissed and sparkled. The dragon roared and twitched. But the old man soothingly screeched in his incomprehensible language:
"Ashar mah sharu. Akhtara shara mah uto. Spsharumkaramah. Haru. There, there, hold on," he almost hissed in the dragon's ear, and then shouted, "Lift up!"
The dummies jumped on the lever and lifted the torn wing to the monster's shoulder, hissing from the ointment. The old man abundantly poured the place of the rupture, secured it to the shoulder with two wooden beams, clamped the wing and shoulder of the monster between them, and the dummies tightly fastened the beams with metal braces.
The dragon was breathing heavily, but did not interfere with his conquerors.
"Why is he treating him?" Goody asked, turning to the lion.
"Father can be hard to understand," Leo shrugged, "Maybe he wants us to have our own dragon. Now we don't have one zeppelin."
Goody turned to the remains of the flying fortress, now just a pile of metal. The air around was still full of dust. The girl in the cloth tree dress continued to sit and cry inconsolably at the place where her lover died.
"Look. That's what loss is, Goody," Leo murmured, lowering his head.
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