The footprints were huge. Bodkin looked up from tracks they had been following and nervously scanned the thick woods that hemmed them in on both sides. He was not at all happy being even this close to a live dragon and was fairly sure he would like it a good deal less when they had to get much closer to one.

His companion, Smudge, was crouched down in the mud and moss, closely examining the tracks. He carefully placed his hand down inside one of the hind prints and slowly spread his pudgy fingers as wide as he could. His fingertips did not touch the edge of the footprint.

Smudge rose, rubbing his hands together in eager anticipation. “Cor, but she’s a beauty, she is,” he said quietly, staring down the path their quarry had created by her passage through the woods. “Can’t be more than an ‘our old, either,” he continued,