Pat's head jolted as the back of a hand smashed into his cheek. He noticed his attacker grimace. The blow hurt him more than it did me, Pat thought. He was tied to a wooden chair and a large Chinese man was hovering over him.
"Where is neckliss?" he said, glaring in anger at Pat as he rubbed the back of his hand.
"I don't know what you mean," answered Pat, thinking fast what to say or do next.
Unwilling to hurt his hand any more, the assailant grabbed Pat's shirt in both hands and pulled him roughly towards him. "You know what neckliss. You have ring of dragon. Where is neckliss?"
Pat moved his fingers, tied behind his back, and realised the ring was gone. He had been unconscious and was still getting his bearings. They were in, what looked like, a hotel room. Not very classy, and not what Pat was used to. There was a double bed, a wooden table and two wooden chairs. A washbasin was between the bed and the door. There was no toilet or shower. The walls were covered in flower wallpaper, stained with age and peeling off in some places. A single light bulb hung from the ceiling, giving the room an eerie light, as it swung gently on its cable. The dark curtains were drawn, yet daylight was visible through the edges. On the table lay his ring.
The man continued to shake Pat and threw him against the back of the chair in frustration. "Where is neckliss?" he continued to ask.
Pat feigned semi-unconsciousness. He needed time to think and stop this man's desperation. The "neckliss" he was asking for must be the pendant his Aunt Gaby wore, the one she had found as a little girl hidden inside the back cover of the book, the mysterious book which seemed to be the instigator of all that was happening now. It was the story of Einarr, a young Irish warrior who had set out to find a treasure and had encountered a dragon. His experiences of being in a trance and dreaming of the dragon were similar to his own. He had met and spoken with his dragon on several occasions now; he had become a kind of mystical friend. Unlike Einarr, his dragon only appeared in dreams, or trances induced by meditation.
The book had led the way to Pat's initiation into the realm of the Dragon, and had led to this. He was trying to remember where he was. The Chinese man had momentarily given up and was pacing the room muttering. London. He was in London on his way home from Aunty's estate. This was the estate she had inherited from Nimakin, the Native American who was Aunt Gaby's guide when she found the book as a little girl. It was he who gave her the ring which was now his and lay on the table. The ring and pendant matched, with a circling dragon spitting fire at the centre. The raised flame of the ring fitted exactly into the flame shaped space of the pendant. Pat hadn't fully understood the significance of the two, but had felt a strange power from the ring and its connection to the pendant.
He had been on his way to Heathrow airport on the train
when he became aware of someone watching him. He tried to get lost in the crowd as he left the train, but was grabbed by two men and led out of the station and pushed into a car. That was the last he remembered after smelling chloroform.
The Chinese man was pointing at him and shaking his finger, his face red with rage. "Where is dammed neckliss, you white chicken?" he raged. This strange expression almost made Pat laugh. He thought it would be rather inappropriate to do so, so he held his face straight. A mobile phone rang and the Chinese man answered. It must be his partner, the other capturer. There was a short conversation in animated Chinese, at least Pat assumed it was Chinese as he didn't understand a thing. The man returned the phone to his pocket and turned to grin at Patrick.
"You will tell us where is neckless," he said with a sneer, then wagged his finger at Pat, "or you never see daughter again."
Pat stared at the man open mouthed as he turned and walked out the door, closing it behind him. At the mention of not seeing his daughter, Pat froze. His mind couldn't fathom such a statement. His daughter was only six months old and safely in Switzerland with Jenny, his wife. Or so he thought. What did the big Chinese guy mean? Who was that on the phone? Was his daughter in danger?
