I declare the size of that update piddly! MORE!

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i am a yoyo.

Chris: yes

wait... wasn't it?

'She's here somewhere. She... must be...'

Yet we searched and searched, through big caverns and winding rocky ravines. These were the guts of the Garner. Dragonmother could have easily slipped into a crevise or ditch anywhere, and how would we have known?

'This is silly.' It was Toast that said it. 'Why don't we just go out and guard the entrances and wait?'

'With pie she can stay in here forever, Toast,' Brad explained. 'We have to find her and settle this before she meddles in any more of our plans.'

'What are we going to do?' I asked. It didn't seem like four girls, a skinny pirate, and a llama would be able to do anything against the Dragonmother. If she controlled the dragons, she was probably a woman to be reckoned with.

'Negotiate.' was the only answer I got, from an ever-more-determined Buzzfloyd.

'Stop,' Hsing said. 'I hear something...'

Hsing was still trailing at the end of our party, holding the weary, silent Joyce by the hand. We all stopped and turned to her, hushed and waiting.

While we all tried not to breathe too loud, Joyce reached out to the wall of the cave and touched it with trembling fingers. Hsing helped each step she slowly took past Jordan, me, and the others.

'What?' Brad began to protest.

'Shh.' Hsing sidled around the llama and took the torch as Buzzfloyd offered it. We resumed our course, more slowly this time, and let the voiceless old woman take us.

Because we traveled now at so halting a pace, twice as much time passed. I felt sure the sun was far set and the world outside cold and creeping with night. I also felt fairly sure that Dragonmother had been digested by the dark rock down here and that we would never find her.

Hsing dropped the torch twice in shock at either an odd shadow or a sudden turn of the passageway. Joyce never faltered or stopped, she just continued in short and dreadfully slow steps, feeling the wall and tugging Hsing with her.

I sighed.

Toast and Jordan were in front of me now, blocking most of the light and mumbling to each other.

'I always wanted to meet a pirate, really.'

'Heh.'

'Are you on our side now? Or,' this was whispered very low, 'are you a double-agent? You can tell me.'

'Heh.' Jordan did not seem to be in a conversational mood.

I said, 'Hush, Brad is just three feet ahead of you,' and the girl fell silent again.

'Aha,' Hsing said. We had reached a larger open cave, and she shone the torch around hopefully. There was no sign of anyone.

'Give it to me,' Brad said. I snorted at the idea of a llama holding a torch, but Buzzfloyd took it fom Hsing and handed it down. Brad caught the end in his teeth just right and walked sidewaysly forward, to the left, and forward again.

Joyce had let her fingers leave the wall and was staring at a point up above on the wall across the cave.

joe pancake?

So, I finally finished rereading it all. Woah. It's weird not having any more to read now.

Therefore!

Further installments are required.

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i am a yoyo.

Chris: yes

I want more to read!

"Hoher Sinn liegt oft im kindischen Spiel." (Friedrich Schiller)

boiling hungry

'What is she staring at, Hsing? Can you see?'

'Brad, give the light back.'

I was aware, in a sudden and uncomfortably heavy kind of way, that it was really really warm.

As Hsing reclaimed the torch and shone it up where Joyce seemed to be staring, there was a loud whistling grumble. Steam filled the cavern and nearly choked us all.

'It's so hot,' Toast complained. 'Eugh.'

'I think I see her,' Hsing said confidently.

'Go on then,' Brad said.

'Hurry. This steam is blistering.' Buzzfloyd took the rear and hurried Jordan, Toast, and I after the llama as we traversed the cave-sauna.

After a minute that seemed like ten Hsing climbed up a short incline and stopped.

'Dragonmother?'

It was hard to see through the clouds of white vapor, but somebody was sitting up there. She was throwing pebbles.

Brad clambered up and grabbed a mouthful of her tattered robes. 'Don't move,' he muttered.

'Brad, good grief,' Buzzfloyd said. 'She isn't running away.'

Hsing moved the light just a foot to our left and said slowly, 'No, but she could jump.' There was a drop off just there, black and echoing with the pings of thrown pebbles.

'What do you want, you lunatic llama-lovers?' Dragonmother's voice was stronger than she looked. 'Do you think I have anything you need?'

Joyce, who until then had clung rather helplessly to Hsing's sleeve, came forward and reached out to the Dragonmother. She still wasn't saying anything.

'You took the yaks,' Toast said.

'You took my Om Kranti. You've taken my cliffs. You took my island.'
Dragonmother stopped throwing pebbles and tore her robes from Brad's mouth.

'Your island?' I said.

'Quiet. Dragonmother, come with us out to the cliffs. We will negotiate this without any pointless threats. Out of this blasted heat.'

'Why should I cooperate with a llama? An evil scheming llama who can't figure the impossible from the possible? A stupid worthless llama who bullies people to make himself feel important? A cringing, slimy llama who might as well give up on ever being made human again?'

She was inching closer to the precipice. Hsing, I could tell, was trying to intervene and somehow block it, but Joyce, still reaching out and peering intensely at the Dragonmother, made things awkward. Brad was getting angry, but he did not move.

joe pancake?

Is she going to jump?!



And what then?

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i am a yoyo.

Chris: yes

housing all this doubt

I leaned against the cave wall and tugged at the scarf around my hair. The steam was making all of us sweat dreadfully.

'Dragonmother, you owe us this,' Brad demanded. 'All along you've known what's at stake.'

Dragonmother laughed, and stopped. 'More's the pity,' she said. 'What is it you think I can do for you? It's Maljonic you should be chasing.'

'That's not how this works and you know it, Dragonmother.'

Joyce was struggling up towards where Dragonmother stood, holding her arm out and silently twitching a little.

'What does she want?' Dragonmother snarled.

Hsing said nothing. Jordan shrugged. Joyce continued, in small, sure steps, to accost the other woman. Finally she reached her, placed two hands on each of Dragonmother's shoulders, and said, 'You're going to get a blank page.'

'Get off of me, woman,' Dragonmother mumbled. 'Brad, who is this old lady?'

'Hsing says--' Brad began.

'Joyce Ogg,' Hsing finished. 'Old Joyce Ogg. She just spoke to you.'

Nobody said anything for a minute. I wondered what the whole thing meant. How could this quiet old woman be anyone important? Compared to the alleged death of Captain Malory and the unbreakable llama-spell that rested on Brad, whether or not Joyce spoke or didn't speak seemed trivial. But still, I did sense that I understood too little of this island and its mysteries to judge what was important and what wasn't. I remembered my dream, and its cinnamony portents. What did that mean? What did anything mean?

'Joyce,' Brad said. 'Joyce, will you speak now?'

Hsing reached up and touched Joyce's shoulder, hope in her face.

Dragonmother coughed.

Joyce said nothing. It seemed silence had overtaken her again.

'Come down, Dragonmother,' Brad said. 'We can talk about this outside in the open air.'

To my disbelief, she obeyed and came with us as we trekked back out the way we had come. Hsing and Joyce led again with the torch. Brad was behind us all, making sure Dragonmother stayed close.

We emerged into a brilliant star-filled night.

The dragons snored in groups along the top of the cliffs. Moonlight and the sea's reflection of it glinted softly on everything. Cool night air was glorious after the stuffy, steamy insides of the mountain. Even so, i was tired and stiff from walking so far.

joe pancake?

'What now?' Jordan muttered when we had all sat down.

'Now we discuss things.'

What a great and vague beginning, i thought, while at the same time Dragonmother spoke, saying, 'Now I see that my Om is safe and unhurt.'

And she strode almost to the edge of the cliffs, threw her arms high, and waited.

Brad and Hsing lurched nervously at the sight of Dragonmother so near the cliff, but there wasn't much they could do.

Om the dragon, barely recognizable in the dark night, flew almost out of nowhere up to where we were gathered. This time the creature had nobody on her back. She clutched the edge of the cliff within mere yards of where Dragonmother stood, folding her wings with an outrageous gust of wind.

A few moments were wasted while the mother reached up for her Om's scaly nose and petted it briefly.

At last Dragonmother returned to our group and Brad abandoned his impatient look.

'May we begin?' the llama said.

Dragonmother's response was a shrug and a flick of her wrist. Om crawled part way up the mountain above the cave entrance and curled herself up. For the rest of the meeting I felt her reptilian eyes watching us.

joe pancake?

Shortest update ever!
Which is a pity, I mean, that it isn't more.


More. Please?

"Hoher Sinn liegt oft im kindischen Spiel." (Friedrich Schiller)

above and here below

'You're interfering,' Brad accused.

'Brad, be careful.' This was Buzzfloyd.

'Obviously. I felt left out.' Dragonmother's face wore a superior and enigmatic look. 'I don't see why you boys can't handle this.'

Brad coughed angrily. 'You had no right--'

Suddenly Brad and then Dragonmother and then all of them were looking at me and a great pause blossomed out of all of those stares.

'What? Surely, Brad, you aren't afraid of letting me know too much still?'

He lowered his eyes and twitched his tail. Dragonmother kept staring.

'Who are you, anyway?' she asked.

I just looked at her, skeptically. As if it mattered to her or anyone who I was. As if I even knew...

'Well? Who is she, Brad?'

He turned to her and tried to change the subject.

'I want you to stay out of the Sock Wars and to stay out of our business. Take your dragons and leave the island for all I care. You are just making everything worse.'

'I don't see how it can be all that much worse because of me. You seem to have made good use of Om Kranti.'

'But you won't play on our terms, Dragonmother. You come to our game and want to rearrange the way things are! We cannot watch you ruin it.'

'We?'

Toast had fallen asleep on Jordan's right arm. Just then she snored a broken little snore. Jordan himself looked half dead. Hsing and Buzzfloyd were attentive, Brad and Dragonmother actively involved. I wasn't sure about anything. I felt like an outcast, but at the same time an accomplice. If I could have introduced myself to this Dragonmother, maybe it would have felt less ambivalently awkward.

'Malory. And I. Malory and I have our own accounts to settle, you know that.' Brad was trying his hardest to be rational and not shout. 'Why did you have to interrupt it with your attention-getting tricks? Why now? Of all times, why?'

'If I may,' Buzzfloyd interrupted, 'I don't think it is your mere actions which upset Brad so much, Dragonmother. You have been conniving and secretive and so blasted quiet about it all. Stealing the yaks wasn't all of it...'

'If you would be straight with us we might get a long a good lot better.'

And now we all looked at the woman, watching her pick at her robes and smile into nowhere.

'I don't need your yaks. I don't need your socks or your filthy supplies down in that hole you live in. I don't need anything on this island. But I was here before all of these useless nobodies washed up. I and my dragons saw this island before any of your footsteps pressed across its muddy shore. I know that you are only ruining it with your silly fighting. And you hardly know what you miss.'

'And you mean to remedy that with your infernal interfering? We never asked for your help.'

'Help.' Dragonmother laughed. Her smile was far too big.

joe pancake?

She seems quite evil.

Moooooooore. Or Dragonmother's smile will eat you whole.

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i am a yoyo.

Chris: yes

drum drum drum

She's mad, I thought.

Looking up at Om Kranti, who blinked redly over our company, I thought about dragonskin. Orrdos had wanted Malory dead and had bribed the merpeople with dragonskin to kill him. That didn't make sense.

I stared at Brad, trying to figure it out. He and Dragonmother were making angry faces at each other. I was surprise he didn't accuse her outright of being mad.

I wondered how much any of them knew. Jordan had only told Orrdos. When Brad showed up I'd almost shouted everything out, but I hadn't. Surely the llama wouldn't have wanted the only man who had any hope of fixing his llama-ness dead? But ... how could he be ignorant of such a plot?

And where did Orrdos plan on getting his dragonskin anyway? I looked up at Om again. I would not want to part such an animal from its scales.

joe pancake?

Oooooo.....coooool.

More!

Fuck Shoes.

dawn and dueling

The sun had fully risen.

'I'm not going to take your word for anything, Dragonmother, and I don't feel that you'd give it to us anyway.'

She tilted her head and waited.

Brad coughed.

'Girls,' he said. 'You'll--'

'No,' Buzzfloyd interrupted. 'Not the girls.' She crossed to where the llama stood and whipsered fiercely, 'Brad, she controls those dragons. All of them.'

'We can't just let her run amuk!'

'You want to be tying me up?' Dragonmother laughed.

'Let me tie her up,' Jordan volunteered.

We all looked at him.

Buzzfloyd turned back to Brad. 'Just get it over with. If we lose, we lose. There will be Sock Wars again.'

'We cannot lose!'

'So maybe we won't,' Toast said. 'Dragons or no dragons.'

'If we can't do anything about this madwoman,' I muttered, 'then what are we doing here?'

Brad's llama eyes narrowed. He looked up at Om Kranti, down at Toast and Hsing, to Jordan, and me, and up into Buzzfloyd's face. 'Bring her with us.'

'I won't come,' Dragonmother announced.

'You will come. And you will leave your dragons on the cliff. You will leave your magic in the mountain.'

'For what? I don't owe you anything.'

The Garner grumbled and seethed. More smoke, darker smoke, rose into the bright morning.

'You got rope, Jordan?'

As the pirate nodded, Brad tossed his head towards Dragonmother. Jordan cautiously approached her, one eye on Om, one eye on the cliff's edge.

Dragonmother stared at the boy, stared as hard as diamond, and waited for his fearful steps to bring him close enough. At the last moment she flashed a look up at the peak of Mount Garner, took one step backwards, turned, and ran.

Brad and Hsing ran after her, but she reached the cliff's edge before them and was gone.

joe pancake?

Brad reached the very edge, looked over it, and swore.

'Brad, I'm almost sure you would've pushed her off yourself if you could've gotten away with it,' I said. 'What's the matter with her jumping?'

Brad didn't move.

Buzzfloyd reached out for my arm, 'Plaid, the dragons. Without the dragonmother, the dragons... Even Orrdos and Fred together had a hard time controlling Om Kranti, even when we had Dragonmother in our power. We don't know what they'll do.'

'If you had her in your power, how did she get out of it?'

Buzzfloyd hung her head.

Hsing turned around and suddenly shouted, 'Om... she's gone.'

We all looked up to the sky. 'Did anyone see where she flew?'

'We have to warn the others. Brad, we have to tell them.' Buzzfloyd ran to the llama and jostled him with her knee. He was still staring down over the cliff. 'You can't just stand here. We have to move.'

'Go on then,' the llama muttered.

And we did. Buzzfloyd fairly ran down the rocky way we had come up to the cliffs, Hsing close behind. Jordan, Toast, and I followed, keeping up as best we could. Brad ambled behind us. We lost him within half an hour.

When most of the mountain was behind us, Buzzfloyd sent Hsing and Joyce to the lake and Toast to the caves. The rest of us turned a bit north, toward the Bay, which I could just see far off, bordering the great ocean.

There were more trees this way. The forest was still cold from nighttime. I stole Jordan's hat.

'Damn ye,' he said. 'Give it back.'

I refused. I don't know why he didn't just fight me for it and reclaim it himself, but he didn't. We kept walking, trying to keep up with Buzzfloyd's frantic pace.

Pie came. We walked with the plates in our hands until we came upon a little spring in a quiet grove of tall old trees.

joe pancake?