The Chameleon Shop

The Kingdom of the Earth Realm

Early the next morning Kaylee awoke and sat up suddenly, cold and disoriented. Ruby, her fluffy feline comforter, had gone.

She began to panic, expecting to find a vampire bat chomping on her neck at any moment. She was frantically searching the lair for garlic or wooden stakes when the big ball of fluff reappeared seemingly from out of nowhere, with a limp animal in her jaws. A huge dead rat, which she dropped at Kaylee’s feet.

Kaylee jumped backwards a step. ‘Ah!’ she cried, startled and staring at the body in the dirt. Then she looked at Ruby, ‘Um, what’s that?’

‘A rat. Have you never seen a rat before?’

‘Well, yes I know it’s a rat,’ Kaylee said sarcastically, ‘but ─’

Ruby interrupted, ‘I caught it... for you... breakfast!’ Have you ever seen a cat smile? Ruby sounded so proud and pleased with herself Kaylee didn’t have the heart to say what she really felt, like saying, which was somewhere along the lines of ‘Argh! Dead rat! Eww, get it outside!’

She took a deep breath, and then stopped because the rat smelled really bad. ‘Thank you, Ruby, that’s very kind of you. But ... ah, I’m feeling a bit ... off ... this morning. Maybe you should eat this one yourself and perhaps Ill have something for lunch later on?’

‘Don’t mind if I do.’ Ruby polished off the rat as well as a few crunchy bugs, which had the misfortune of becoming stuck to her fur on her travels. Then she hacked up a truly disgusting hairball, retching so much Kaylee had to put her fingers in her ears to keep from wanting to throw up herself.

The big cat apologised for her shameful show of manners. She said, ‘Cats are clean animals and as you can see, I do have an awful lot of fur to clean.’

Ruby led them off another side tunnel near her lair and through the enormous black caverns, dimly lit by lanterns here and there. If Kaylee could put aside her fear for a time, it was actually a very interesting and beautifully mysterious place.

There was a part where white crystalline stalagmites jutted up from the floor of the cave taller than she was. Stalactites, which hung down from the ceiling so low, she had to watch she did not bang her head. Formed by calcium salts from dripping water over thousands of years, Kaylee remembered from her Science lessons. They occasionally met and in fact passed each other, like giant gnashing teeth.

Well, that’s a helpful thought to summon up when on a quest to chat with a dragon.

By mutual unspoken agreement, they both kept their voices low. It seemed a wise idea not to go shouting in such places. Avalanches came to mind; Kaylee did not fancy becoming part of the attraction in the caves ... permanently.

Other parts of the caverns flowed out onto precarious looking stone bridges which could have leapt right off the pages of a Dr Zeus story. These were so narrow in parts she wondered how they didn’t just crumble under their own weight.

Occasional rocks or pebbles would roll over the edge as the pair made their way gingerly across the spindly bridges. The echo of the pebbles falling and bouncing and then falling some more, went on and on for a seriously concerning length of time. She could not help but peek at the flight path of one such plummeting stone and had to pause for a minute, gripping Ruby’s fur for security; the giddiness was somewhat similar to what you get going down an elevator quickly.

They seemed to be travelling downhill mostly. She was not wearing a watch but it felt like their journey to the Gnome King Halls took about an hour and throughout their journey the smell of damp moss was getting stronger.

King Mossbreath, hmm? The name was appropriate, she supposed.

‘So, let me get this straight,’ Kaylee asked her guide, ‘the wasp combs were put here by the Crone’s black-magic, to keep the dragon trapped?’

‘Not just for that. It was to make trade harder for the Water Realm and the rest of the realms. No one can survive long without water. Wilfrey makes them use the ferrymen, who grudgingly do as he tells them because his spies watch the mainland docks closely. He has more control that way.’

‘So then … how does the dragon get food, if she can’t get out?’

’The gnomes kindly bring her some, so she, equally kindly, chooses not to eat them. But she is very large, as you will see.’

Kaylee swallowed hard. What the bloody hell do I think I’m doing, trying to talk to a ‘very large’ fire breathing, grumpy dragon?

Ruby continued, ‘I believe the dragon gets out somewhere else, though only under cover of darkness. The where of it, she keeps secret. But I’ve seen her a few times, flying out over the Byagal Sea.’

‘That must be incredibly lonely,’ Kaylee remarked.

‘I guess it must,’ Ruby replied.

With a feeling of entombment, Kaylee followed Ruby ever deeper into the darkness of the mountain. She became aware every now and then, of a faint clink-clink sound, which she heard echoing from other parts of the tunnels.

‘What is that noise I keep hearing?’ Kaylee asked Ruby.

‘That chinking sound? Oh, that will be the gnomes at work digging for gold, jewels and such. They don’t really need it for themselves you understand, or the dragon believe it or not. She is not as materialistic as one would think, you know. It’s to keep old Pretty-Boy up the hill happy,’ Ruby told her.

‘Pretty-Boy? You mean that nasty man, Wilfrey?’

‘Yes, him!’ Ruby spat the words out as though they were poison on her tongue.

Before long they heard the sounds of raucous laughter from a large gathering of men. They were almost at the Gnome King’s Halls. The jovial sounds helped ease Kaylee’s nervousness at meeting them.

Up ahead, she could see two very ornate carved wooden gates. These had to be the grand entrance to the hall of the Gnome King. The gates were very solid and must have been at least four inches thick. They stood about her height, made of a dark wood of some sort, with nice Celtic carvings in them. One gate displayed a very accurate likeness of a dragon, the other, a multi-faceted jewel. Two square-shaped stone posts, which had large flat unimposing tops, supported the gates.

Two bored looking gnomes, who must have been guards as they had iron helmets on in place of their usual floppy hats, were perched atop these solid gates. Their long spears leaned sloppily against the posts on which the gates hung. The guards obviously felt no urgent necessity to defend their King’s Hall at the moment.

The gnome with a wild bush of red hair was actually fast asleep, snoring his fuzzy head off. The other dark-haired one was digging for gold alright, his finger was halfway up his nose. When he spied Ruby approaching, the one with his finger up his nose jumped off the post and stretched his hand out behind him, giving his sleeping companion a rough shove. His companion, in turn then fell off and clambered to his feet, fists clenched ready for a fight and looked about for the culprit who attacked him in such a cowardly fashion.

‘Ow! What’d ya do that for, ya ....Oh, morning Ruby.’ He said acting as though they had been paying attention all along.

‘Resume your slumber, lazy beasts. I need you not!’ Ruby scorned them. She nudged the wooden gates open easily with her nose and strode through regally, fluffy tail raised high like a banner. Kaylee smiled awkwardly at the surprised look the gnome guards gave her, as she tagged along nervously in Ruby’s wake.

The gates led to a short corridor, which then opened into a large, well-lit room. Down the centre of the room ran several rows of long tables lit with countless golden candelabra. A glorious variety of gnomes sat before a banquet, their plates piled high with sumptuous smelling food that tickled Kaylee’s taste buds.

The gnomes laughed and tossed food at each other, having a ball of a time. Kaylee’s mouth watered at the thought of sitting down to that banquet, after turning down rat for breakfast over an hour earlier. The gnomes were happily clanging pewter tankards of whatever they were drinking between bouts of singing and laughing.

Kaylee wondered idly what the cause of their celebrations was, or perhaps they simply dined in this fashion all of the time, but she doubted she would be around long enough to find out.

A separate small group of them sat round a small table and appeared to be having a farting contest. As Kaylee watched with amusement, at the musical sounds emitted from beneath their seats, it appeared that the one with the weakest sounding fart had to go get the next round of drinks.

They were not exactly your garden-variety gnome; some had pointed hats like the garden variety at home but more often, they wore floppy hats that accentuated their large ears. However, there were enough similarities to make Kaylee smile. Their floppy or pointed hats were all sorts of colours including ochre, brown, green, blue and yellow ─ not just red. Then of course, another similarity to the garden one’s at home, most of them had lovely long beards.

There appeared to be a couple of female gnomes present. Buxom, friendly lassies that were not sporting beards, Kaylee was pleased to see. Other than this, they wore plain homespun clothes like a medieval peasant would wear. Their shoes were either boots or wooden shoes somewhat like clogs.

One of the gnomes at the far side of the cavern stood out as unique. He wore a funny hat with three droopy tips with little bells on the end of these, reminding her of court jester. He sat on a wooden stool by the impressive stone fireplace, near the King’s throne, playing a harp and singing in a surprisingly deep baritone for such a small fellow.

On a stage, not far from the enormous roaring fire, King Mossbreath sat. He had a definite regal presence. On his chin, he had a bizarre purple beard, for instance. Billy Connolly, one of her mother’s favourite comedians had one just like it. The King was a lot shorter than Billy though and a lot bigger around the belly. He had pointy leather boots and a simple crown of woven willow branches with the occasional dried flower poked in for decoration.

It made her like the King before even meeting him, to know that he did not feel a need to display himself in all the jewels his workers mined.

Her mother had taught her very young to be careful in choosing her friends. Dishonest, selfish, cruel people, Trish had taught her, we should avoid. Honest, generous, kind-hearted ones we should cherish. The trick was, working out who belonged in which group. It was not always obvious to the person doing the choosing.

‘What do we do now?’ Kaylee asked Ruby. She sat for a moment on a nearby wooden chair and tugged the green cloak Layla had given her, snugly to her body. She was feeling a little cold without Ruby’s fur to shelter in.

‘Someone will come to ask what we want.’ Ruby sat and proceeded to lick her fur, chewing out seeds, twigs and bugs. Before long, she heard footsteps and looked up to see a gnome approaching. ‘Here comes Ricky. I know him, friendly fellow, but a bit of a sneak. Watch that one won’t you.’

Kaylee tried to make a mental note of this.

Ricky was a tubby little gnome with the same floppy hat as the others though his was brown and he wore pointy shoes. He was munching on a wedge of cheese in one hand and chicken drumstick in the other as he approached them with a greasy grin. ‘What do you have there, Ruby?’

‘This is Kaylee. She wishes to talk to the dragon. She needs one of you to take her down to her cavern.’

‘Oh, she does, does she?’ Ricky tossed the chewed chicken bone over his shoulder, which landed with a thud on the head of a sleeping hound-dog. The hound sniffed it and woke up straight away to chew on it enthusiastically. After Ricky finished wiping his hands on his trousers he said, ‘Well she’ll have to ask Himself, first. Follow me if you would.’

He strutted up the aisle in the middle of the hall between the rows of tables, full of self-importance, receiving jests and jokes from his friends and firing them back with ease. The occasional onion or bun also went flying in his direction, sometimes hitting Kaylee and Ruby by mistake.

Ruby was not impressed and snarled at a couple of gnomes near her. They ducked under the table. She could have pursued them, but then it occurred to her that she could always nibble on whatever food stuck to her fur later, so she decided to let it slide.

Ricky bowed before the King and turned to shush the crowd. The room fell promptly silent. He then put out his hand in pompous introduction, ‘I give you Messenger Ruby and her companion, Kaylee from ...ah, lord-knows-where-but-I-believe-you-are-about-to-find-out.’ He rattled of quickly.

Introduction taken care of, he smiled cheekily and stepped aside, leaving Ruby sitting calmly and Kaylee standing ─ not so calmly ─ in front of the Gnome King.

King Mossbreath smoked a long pipe. Puffing on it, he squinted as the smoke drifted up towards his eyes, while he thought things over. He blew cleverly shaped smoke rings in her direction.

In the awkward silence between, Kaylee vaguely remembered that it was polite to curtsy before royalty, so she did her best impression of a curtsy, but stumbled a little when she tried to stand gracefully. The King laughed a kind belly-laugh.

‘You want to talk to the dragon, you say?’ King Mossbreath asked and Kaylee nodded.

‘What on earth for? Do you like pain or something? Grown tired of living, then?’ He jested and the rest of the room erupted in laughter along with him.

Hoping the King was only kidding she fiddled about in her backpack and eventually dragged out the iron key, which she held up like a talisman. Seeing this, the room fell silent again, with a few quiet ‘Ahh’s’ of curiosity.

‘No, I haven’t grown tired of living. It’s just ... well,’ Kaylee stammered. She drew her shoulders up and tried to speak with more confidence. ‘This brought me here. I’m told it must have been dragon magic.’ She lowered the key and tucked it safely back in her bag. Then she looked pleadingly at King Mossbreath. ‘I need to know why it brought me to this place and especially how I am to get back home again.’

‘Oh, aye?’ He puffed on his pipe some more. ‘I suppose you would, wouldn’t you?’ Then he turned to whisper to Ricky. Kaylee could not hear what it was he was saying, though Ricky had a very serious expression on his round bearded face.

What she could not hear the King whispering was, ‘She seems a nice enough wee girl, but Wilfrey will set his damnable wasps on us if we take her to talk to that dragon. Don’t know what his problem is, but you know what to do?’ He raised his fuzzy grey eyebrows in question and Ricky nodded.

Kaylee waited nervously. The King clapped his hands together twice and cleared his throat. ‘Right! Ricky here has volunteered to take you. Good luck, young Kaylee. We here in the Earth Realm hope you find the answers you seek.’

‘Thank you,’ she beamed, bowing appreciatively. With that, the music resumed along with the rumble of many voices in the hall, as everyone continued in their festivities.

Ricky rubbed his hands together as if he meant to be getting down to business. ‘Righty-o then! The King said I could show you the way, to the ah ... yes ... follow me then. You can go back to bug hunting if you like, Ruby. I’ll take care of wee Kaylee, here.’

Ruby circled him unnervingly close, ‘Be sure you do, Ricky. Because if I find out you haven’t, I’ll be crunching on something a bit meatier than bugs. Safe travels, Kaylee.’ Ruby turned to go and as she did her fluffy tail flicked round Kaylee’s face and making her go ‘pfff ... pfff’ to get the hair out of her mouth.