 Piccadilly Press presents The Boy Who Dreamed of Dragons, written by Andy Shepard and read by Ewan Goddard. Prologue. We dream of dragons, soaring, roaring, fire-flickering dragons. While we're tucked tight in bed, they light up our sleep, sparking, glittering aglow. Dreams are only the beginning of an even greater story, and if you carry on listening, you'll discover that there's a whole lot more story still to be told. Because the truth is, our dragons don't just visit us in our dreams. You see, a few of us know a secret, and that secret is that some dragons grow on trees. A very special tree, which grows at the bottom of my granddad's garden, in among the brambles and nettles. If I blurted this out to most people, right about now they've rolled their eyes and think I was joking, and that's good, because we don't want everyone knowing about this. In fact, it means we're doing our job, keeping the dragons safe and secret. But how about you? Do you think I'm pulling your leg? No. I think you've got that glint in your eye, like a dragon's fiery breath, sparking across your sights. And you know what? That tells me you're the right person to hear this. So are you ready? Chapter 1 The Marshmallow Wins It I gripped my knees tightly to Flickr's back, and wrapped my arms around his neck. A flash of colour pulsed across his scales, lighting up my hands, red, green, indigo and bright gold. It was like there was a rainbow shooting from my fingertips as the colour raced on towards his head. He twisted one diamond eye, catching mine. And then we dived. Yup, this was my life now, riding on the back of dragons. I kept my head low and hung on, the wind tugging at me, trying to pull me free. But there was no way I was letting go. Even though I'd left my stomach doing somersaults up there somewhere. A roar came from behind me, and I saw the golden shape of Ted's dragon, sunny, rocketing towards us as we leveled off. I'm coming for you, Thomas! Ted yelled as they shot past. Flickr swerved to avoid the fiery blast coming from Sunny's rear end. Not fair! I shouted. Flickr was fast, but he didn't stand a chance against Ted's dragon when he got one of those turbo-boosts. I was beginning to think we should disqualify Ted, or at least ban Sunny from scoffing giant marshmallows before a race. And then came the rest of the superhero squad. First Liam, riding Maxie, one hand raised, a massive grin plastered across his face. And to my left, Cat and Kai riding Crystal and Dodger, still neck and neck, their tails flicking out every so often, trying to make the other veer off course. Good. That meant they were too busy trying to beat each other to be a serious threat. There was a rumble and Flickr opened his jaws and blew flames shot out. This race wasn't over. Not by a long shot. Flickr's wings beat hard and fast. He let out another bellow as he gained on Sunny. Like when Flickr was only small and hiccuping sparks, I used to dream of flying, wondering what it would feel like to ride on a dragon. And now I knew. Above the clouds, arcing through the sky like a shooting star, I hollered with him. Up here, everything was so bright and clear, with the colours of the sunset lighting our way. Just us, in this brilliant moment that might last forever. Everything else hidden below. Even at dusk, the dragons wouldn't fly down through the cloud cover until we were right Sample complete. Ready to continue?