The clouds cleared just after sunrise. And now at last Flax could see the Floating Forest, stuck on the topmost peak of Mount Tangle like a marshmallow on a stick, ready for toasting.

What? Yes, of course minch-wiggins eat toasted marshmallows. Who do you think invented them? It certainly wasn’t humans.

Flax’s heart thumped wildly, and she began to scramble up the mountain as fast as she could, desperate to see her beloved trees, which were full of magic from root to twig. Desperate to make sure that her cousins and aunties and uncles were unharmed.

She clambered over a slab of stone with a few stunted trees growing beside it. She trotted between two rocks, tall and forbidding—

And there, right in front of her was a tunnel entrance. There was another one to her right, and a third to her left.

All three led into the darkness of the mountain.

Flax stopped dead. ‘The labyrinth,’ she breathed.

She looked back at Rose, who was human, and therefore enormous. But next to the tunnels, she seemed terribly small.

So did the pup.

Flax had known that the dragon was big; she had seen it towing the Floating Forest across the sky.

But that was at a distance. Standing here, close to where it lived, was a different matter altogether. Did it need every inch of these monstrous tunnels? Did its scaly back scrape against the roof when it went in and out? Did its wings brush the walls?

A single thread of magic isn’t going to be nearly enough, she thought. I’d need a satchelful. And even then—

For the first time it struck her that defeating the dragon was not her only problem. Because even if she could beat it (which she definitely couldn’t), how was she supposed to get the Floating Forest back to where it belonged?

She couldn’t tow it. But neither could she leave it here, where an adventurous human might stumble upon it.

Her head spun, and if she had been by herself, she might have given in to fear and despair.

But the pup was pushing past her, sniffing at the left-hand tunnel.

His ears pricked. His tail wagged. ‘My mother!’ he said. ‘My father! They’re here!’

Flax blinked at him in astonishment. Throughout their journey, she had never really believed they’d find the pup’s parents.

She was here for the Floating Forest, not the Spellhounds. But the pup had been right all along.

‘They’re alive?’ she asked, just to be sure.

The pup’s tail wagged harder. ‘Yes!’

Flax thought he was going to bolt straight into the mountain. And she and Rose would have to run after him.

But he held himself back, even though his nose kept turning towards the left-hand tunnel.

Rose was as pale as a grub. She put her hand on one of the rocks, as if to steady herself. ‘Is there anyone else in there? Anyone – human?’

The pup sniffed again. ‘There’s a faint smell like rotting eggs. I don’t know what it is. But there’s another smell, a scorching—’

His ears flattened and the hair on his back stood up in spikes. ‘That’s the smell from our den. That’s the dragon!’

Eeeek! Flax clutched her satchel and sword. A sensible minch-wiggin would turn around right now and scramble back down the mountain.

But the pup’s parents were alive, and that changed everything.

They can help me fight the dragon, she thought. And – and maybe they’ll know how to get the Floating Forest back where it belongs!

She took a deep breath. ‘We need a plan,’ she whispered.

It was too hard to think with those huge tunnels looming over them, and the terrible darkness of the mountain. So in the end, they went back to the stone slab.

And there they huddled, like mice when the mor-kits are hunting.

‘The plan is,’ said Flax. ‘The plan is—’

She drew the sword, to give herself courage. ‘The plan is—’

‘Another interrupted nap,’ grumbled the sword. ‘Where are we now?’

‘On Mount Tangle,’ said Flax. ‘Near the labyrinth. We’re just trying to work out—’

‘Mount Tangle?’ croaked the sword. ‘The labyrinth? Nooooooo!’

And Flax found herself holding a belt buckle.

Rose gulped. ‘We mustn’t hang about for too long. We need to be quick.’

Flax nodded. Suddenly things were clearer.

‘Is the dragon in there right now?’ she asked the pup.

He tilted his head to one side, thinking. ‘The dragon smell was a leftover smell. Not a now smell.’

Rose leaned forward. ‘So it’s not in there?’

‘No,’ said the pup.

‘Maybe it’s off stealing someone else’s parents,’ said Flax. ‘Or someone else’s home.’ She swallowed. ‘Maybe we should rescue your parents, pup, before it comes back.’

The pup’s tail wagged once. Rose gave a very small nod.

Flaxseed, Destroyer-of-Dragons-and-Protector-of-her-People, gripped the belt buckle.

She stood up.

She led the way back to the labyrinth entrance.

The three of them crept into the mountain.

Spellhounds have amazing noses.

They can smell a storm from a hundred miles away. They can smell yesterday and the day before, and the day before that.

Sometimes they can even smell tomorrow.

But there are rare occasions when a Spellhound’s nose is wrong.

Usually when there is a dragon involved …