That night, Ren flew into the camp in the guise of a Sparrow hawk, the strangers had set guards about their perimeter; first Ren made them drift off into a deep, deep sleep. A few minutes later he was joined by two-hundred and twenty-three more Golden Dragons, each concentrated on one newcomer each. Within a few minutes, it was done and they all apparated away again. The guards woke with a start, none the wiser about what had just occurred.
The next morning, while breakfast was being prepared, Llewellyn wandered into the encampment, headed straight for Big John, and spoke.
“There you go, who said you can’t teach an old dog new tricks?”
Big John looked over with a start, as did several others.
“How come we can understand you now?”
“Simple, you all learnt our language in your sleep last night, now here we are in the morning with a whole new understanding.”
They all laughed and looked at each other in amazement.
“How come you’re a wizard then?” asked Big John.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, where we come from, all the wizards wore long flowing robes and special hats, you and most of your compatriots just dress normally like us common folk.”
“Because we choose to, some of our wizards, especially those with an exceedingly high opinion of themselves wear wizard robes all the time, but most of us just dress normally like everyone else. We only wear our robes for formal occasions, weddings, investitures, and so on.”
“So how do you know when you’re talking to another wizard?”
“You can mostly tell if someone is a wizard, you can sense their inner aura, their spark, the magic within them.”
“What if you can’t?”
“Meaning what? We do have some who can suppress their spark and act as hidden wizards, but they are few and far between. Listen, what’s all this leading to?”
By now, the whole congregation of the strangers was listening in on the conversation and watching Llewellyn very closely. For some reason, Llewellyn was feeling quite uncomfortable as they were not only all listening to his every word but staring at him as well. He didn’t know why, but he felt he needed some backup, and a moment later he was joined by Flintock, Gwen, Faraji, plus Glynda and the boys. Glynda stood next to Llewellyn, sword drawn and in front of her.
There was a long silence, broken by Llewellyn.
“Who are you really? I know you call yourself Big John, but who are you really?
“We are the descendants of Giamillus-Weorod.”
As he spoke, they all transformed into wizards, each with long elegant and tapestried gowns covered in gold threads and fine jewels, their gowns and cloaks were rich in colour, deep greens, crimson reds, dark blues, colours of every hue and each held a staff with a bright shining gem in the top.
“I apologise for our charades over the past couple of days, but we had to be sure who we were dealing with before we showed ourselves. Last night, when you sent your Golden Dragons to teach us your language, one we spoke fluently anyway, we each, unknown to the dragons, drew down all their knowledge of you, your family, your council and everyone else in Trymyll, even, as you would call him, a wizard with an exceedingly high opinion of himself called Llewel Mathias Gaynor.”
He then turned to address Glynda, “You, daughter of Giamillus-Weorod, keeper of the Dragon Slayer, are gifted amongst wizards. I am afraid that when I picked up your sword the other night, I threw myself across the yard, I know well the power of this sword, but I too am worthy to hold it.”
To demonstrate, he held out his hand and a force which Glynda could not resist pulled the Dragon Slayer from her hand, and it flew across into the hand of Big John.
“See,” he said, “I can take it from you and hold it at will, but you are now its rightful owner and so I return it to you.”
He then passed the sword back into the safekeeping of Glynda. There was a shocked silence amongst the small troupe from Trymyll.
“When the Master was wreaking havoc in our land, we, the few remaining wizards disguised ourselves as peasants, suppressed our sparks and hid amongst the ruins. This was not an act of cowardice on our part, we knew that the only way to defeat Muenda, the Master, was with the sword called Dragon Slayer. We only had to find it. We had no idea where to look, but then you, sweet sister, brought it to us.”
“But the Dragon Slayer was made by Dwarfs and enchanted by elven magic in Trymyll over two millennia ago,” Llewellyn said.
“No,” Samuel’s voice came from behind, he paused, “no, it was made by my ancestor dwarfs and enchanted by the elves, but not in this land. I too came from there to here in search of any remnants of the name Giamillus-Weorod and came across the family of Glynda, I knew that through her we might find the sword and return it to its rightful home, but the portal was one way, and we could not go back. Once the sword was recovered, Glynda and I would have returned to the Land of Kenefick, there I have said its name now, although we little knew why they so desired its return.”
“Did you know about this plan?” Tom asked Glynda.
“No, I swear this is the first I have heard of it. Oh, Samuel, how could you not have told me?” Glynda said, turning to him.
“But this doesn’t make sense,” Llewellyn added, “Glynda was born here, and Samuel has been her guardian for many years, the whole timeline with Muenda doesn’t hang true.”
Big John continued, “It does if you allow for the fact that we have been fighting him for more than a dozen years. He is not quite the great and omnipotent wizard he pretends. There are many thousands more of us hidden back in Kenefick, but we are the elite, those you saw as children when we arrived are full adults, those you saw as old and feeble are fit and young. When your youngsters came through and found us, we were neither sick nor injured, all an illusion, all for show.”
“Well now you are through, what do you propose to do?” Llewellyn enquired.
“Join the fight, help you defeat and dispose of this so-called Master once and for all.”
“But we tend not to go for disposing, we like to capture, spare and imprison.”
“You will soon weary of that, we too have captured the Master scores of times, then tried him in our courts and imprisoned him. But always, within a few weeks, he found a way of escape. Nothing can hold him except death itself.”
“And if you fail in your attempt? What then?”
“We die trying as many have done before.”
“And if you succeed? Where then?”
“We return to our land of Kenefick.”
“How do you propose to do that? The portal of Mynydd is one way, no return.”
“We have a portal with us inside the firebox of Ren the Golden Dragon.”
“How did you know that?” asked Tom.
“When Ren tried to teach us your language, we found all the information then.”
“Then let us convene a council of war,” Llewellyn said.
Later that morning, in the council chamber of Blaenoraid, the council of war met. There were the eight High Elders of Trymyll and seven equivalent High Elders of Kenefick. However, they were called the Elite and Big John was the Elite of the Elite.
After the clerk had done his normal introduction of the proceedings Llewellyn took front and centre, although it was quite difficult to move in the chamber, it had not been designed for this many people and there were now fifteen chairs in the circle, all touching each other.
“High Elders of Trymyll, Elite of Kenefick, first a small matter of diplomacy and etiquette. Apart from our clerk, who is a creature of great habit, we like to dispense with formalities, titles, points of order, precedence and all the other treacle that councils love to wade through to slow down procedures. If you are happy with that, we may continue,” Big John Nodded and Llewellyn continued, “so if you would introduce your team, I will do the same.”
“Well, my name is Big John, next to me is Little John, then George, Cuthbert, Albert, John, and Joan.”
“So, you have three Johns on your team.”
“Very common name where we come from.”
“As it is here, but obviously not that common. I am Llewellyn, Flintock you have met, Govannon Staley, you have also met, and then we have Lintang Ananas, Aneta Stepanek, Penvro Dey, Sugreev Sridhar, and Asmodeus.”
Big John and the other members of the Elite, nodded to them, each in turn.
“First off,” said Big John, “do you know where the blighter is?”
“No, not at the present time.”
A voice from the gallery piped up, “He’s in the Blue Mountains in the Valley of King Evon.”
“How do you know that Glynda?” asked Llewellyn.
“That’s where we tracked him to and I just asked Ffanci to check with Evon if he was still there,” she said stroking her beautiful Russian blue cat.
“May I ask who this King Evon is?” asked Big John.
“He is, to give him his latest title; The most Worshipful King, Evon the First, Supreme, Inerrant, and Merciful Ruler of all Blue Dragons,” she said with a giggle.
“And who is Fancy?”
“Ffanci is my companion Blue Dragon and also my cat.”
Ffanci stood arched her back, raised her tail vertically and made all the hairs on her back and tail stick out while giving Big John a very stern look up and down.
“You mean there’s a dragon in the council chamber?” Big John asked shakily.
“Probably anything up to four,” she said smiling, “but don’t worry, I think she likes you.”
“We don’t have dragons where we come from and we don’t particularly like them, the last of them, the two headed serpents were driven out by your ancestor, as you know.”
“Well, you should like them,” Glynda retorted, “they are great in battle, and they frighten people.”
“Exactly!” Big John said, in a frightened sort of voice.
“Order, order,” the clerk said intervening, “silence in the public gallery unless called upon to speak.”
“Clerk,” Llewellyn said, “I think on a matter as important as this we need anyone who has information which might be useful to contribute.”
The clerk sat down sadly, shaking his head.