Free Igraine the Brave by Cornelia Funke Page A

among the trees than in the hills. The horses grew restless; they picked up the acrid scent of bears and wolves. Igraine and the knight had their swords at the ready, but apart from a couple of robbers who made off at the sight of their armor, nothing but hares and deer crossed their path.
    It was a hot day, but under the trees it felt cool, and early in the afternoon Igraine saw the Duke’s castle on a hill not far away. It was surrounded by miserable straw huts, and the peasants with their children were toiling away in the fields outside, sweating in the baking sun.
    Igraine reined in her horse. “Look at that,” she said. “Even the children have to work from sunrise to sunset while the Duke goes out hunting. I wouldn’t want to end up that sort of knight.”
    The Sorrowful Knight smiled. He was smiling more and more often now.
    “I hardly think we need worry about that, noble Igraine,” he said.
    They went on following the river. Soon it made its way, foaming, through a ravine with steep and densely overgrown sides. Only a narrow path led along it above the water.
    “Why don’t you live in your castle anymore?” Igraine asked the knight as they followed the path side by side. “It must be terribly cold and drafty in that tower.” And there were probably any number of spiders, but presumably the knight didn’t mind them.
    For some time he didn’t answer. And when he finally did, his voice was dark with sadness. “I was once the guardian of a castle,” he said. “Three ladies lived there, and I was appointed to protect them.”
    “What for? Couldn’t they protect themselves?” asked Igraine.
    “They weren’t like you,” replied the knight.
    “What became of them?”
    There was another long pause. Then the knight said, “Rowan Heartless, whom you call the Spiky Knight, stole them away, and I could do nothing to stop him.”
    “Oh!” Igraine looked at him in dismay. “But how could they just let themselves be stolen away like that?”
    The knight never got around to answering her. There was a rustling in the bushes on the slope to their left. Lancelot shied away as something slithered down the ravine with a loud squawk. It landed in front of the stallion’s hooves in a shower of leaves and twigs that had been torn loose, rolled on, and fell into the river with a mighty splash.
    “What was that?” asked Igraine, bending over Lancelot’s neck.
    Three heads emerged from the river, spluttering, the third one noticeably smaller than the other two. They all belonged to a moss-green dragon that hauled itself out of the water, snorting angrily, and stared grimly up at Igraine and the Sorrowful Knight.
    “Oh, no! Two more of them!” growled the smallest head. “It’s one of those days again.”
    “What are you gaping at?” bellowed the other two heads. “Are you out hunting dragons for fun, too? Do you need a dragon’s head to hang over your castle gate? Look at my third head, will you? The One-Eyed Duke cut it off, and it still hasn’t grown back any larger than one of your silly human heads. I really am sick and tired of this. And today that fellow’s after me again! Don’t you and your sort in those tinpot helmets have anything better to do? What the …”
    “We don’t hunt dragons!” Igraine interrupted as soon as she could get a word in. “Really we don’t. Word of knightly honor!”
    “I wouldn’t give much for that!” growled the dragon back. “But I don’t fancy sitting about in this icy water any longer, either.”
    It sneezed three times as it waded to land, going red in its three green faces, and once on the bank it shook itself so vigorously that Lancelot almost bolted. The Sorrowful Knight’s mare, however, seemed to be used to dragons.

    “Look at me!” muttered the dragon, dragging its tail out of the river and gloomily examining its reflection. “Ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. My head is no bigger than a plum, and if that Duke had his way, I’d have three