Just before noon, she spied a small grove of trees next to the road ahead of her. It looked like a cool, pleasant place to rest for a few minutes, and she hurried forward. When she reached the grove, however, she saw that the trees were made of the finest silver, and their shining green leaves were huge emeralds. In the center of the grove stood a charming pavilion made of gold and hung with gold curtains.

Cimorene slowed down and looked longingly at the cool green shade beneath the trees. Just then a woman's voice called out from the pavilion, "My dear, you look so tired and thirsty! Come and sit with me and share my luncheon."

The voice was so kind and coaxing that Cimorene took two steps toward the edge of the road before she remembered the frog's advice. Oh, no, she thought to herself, I'm not going to be caught this easily! She turned without saying anything and hurried on down the road.

A little farther on she came to a tiny, wretched-looking hovel made of cracked and weathered gray boards. The door hung slantwise on a broken hinge, and the whole building looked as though it were going to topple over at any moment. Cimorene stopped and stared doubtfully at it, but she had followed the frog's advice this far, and she thought it would be silly to stop now. So she shook the dust from her skirts and put on her crown (so as to make a good impression). She marched up to the door, knocked three times, and snapped her fingers just as the frog had told her. Then she pushed the door open and went in.

Inside, the hovel was dark and cool and damp.

Cimorene found it a pleasant relief after the hot, dusty road, but she wondered why no sunlight seemed to be coming through the cracks in the boards. She was still standing just inside the door, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the dark, when someone said crossly, "Is this that princess we've been waiting for?"

"Why don't you ask her?" said a deep, rumbly voice.

"I'm Princess Cimorene of Linderwall," Cimorene answered politely.

"I was told you could help me."

"Help her?" said the first voice, and Cimorene heard a snort. "I think we should just eat her and be done with it."

Cimorene began to feel frightened. She wondered whether the voices belonged to ogres or trolls and whether she could slip out of the hovel before they made up their minds about eating her. She felt behind her for the door and started in surprise when her fingers touched damp stone instead of dry wood. Then a third voice said, "Not so fast, Woraug. Let's hear her story first."

So Cimorene took a deep breath and began to explain about the fencing lessons and the magic lessons, and the Latin and the juggling, and all the other things that weren't considered proper behavior for a princess, and she told the voices that she had run away from Sathem-by-the-Mountains to keep from having to marry Prince Therandil.

"And what do you expect us to do about it?" one of the voices asked curiously.

"I don't know," Cimorene said. "Except, of course, that I would rather not be eaten. I can't see who you are in this dark, you know."

"That can be fixed," said the voice. A moment later, a small ball of light appeared in the air above Cimorene's head. Cimorene stepped backward very quickly and ran into the wall.

The voices belonged to dragons.

Five of them lay on or sprawled over or curled around the various rocks and columns that filled the huge cave where Cimorene stood. Each of the males (there were three) had two short, stubby, sharp-looking horns on either side of their heads; the female dragon had three, one on each side and one in the center of her forehead. The last dragon was apparently still too young to have made up its mind which sex it wanted to be; it didn't have any horns at all.

Cimorene felt very frightened. The smallest of the dragons was easily three times as tall as she was, and they gave an overwhelming impression of shining green scales and sharp silver teeth. They were much scarier in person than in the pictures she remembered from her natural history books.

She swallowed very hard, wondering whether she really would rather be eaten by a dragon than marry Therandil.

"Well?" said the three-horned dragon just in front of her. 'Just what are you asking us to do for you?"

"I-" Cimorene stopped short as an idea occurred to her. Cautiously, she asked, "Dragons are… are fond of princesses, aren't they?"

"Very," said the dragon, and smiled. The smile showed all her teeth, which Cimorene did not find reassuring.

"That is, I've heard of dragons who have captive princesses to cook for them and-and so on," said Cimorene, who had very little idea what captive princesses did all day.

The dragon in front of Cimorene nodded. One of the others, a yellowish green in color, shifted restlessly and said, "Oh, let's just go ahead and eat her. It will save trouble."

Before any of the other dragons could answer, there was a loud, booming noise, and a sixth dragon slithered into the cave. His scales were more gray than green, and the dragons by the door made way for him respectfully.

"Kazul!" said the newcomer in a loud voice. "Achoo! Sorry I'm late, but a terrible thing happened on the way here, achoo!"

"What was it?" said the dragon to whom Cimorene had been talking.

"Ran into a wizard. Achoo! Had to eat him; no help for it. Achoo, achoo. And now look at me!" Every time the gray-green dragon sneezed, he emitted a small ball of fire that scorched the wall of the cave.

"Calm down, Roxim," said Kazul. "You're only making it worse."

"A choo! Calm down? When I'm having an allergy attack? Achoo, oh, bother, achoo!" said the gray-green dragon. "Somebody give me a handkerchief. A choo!"

"Here," said Cimorene, holding out one of the ones she had brought with her. "Use this." She was beginning to feel much less frightened, for the gray-green dragon reminded her of her great-uncle, who was old and rather hard of hearing and of whom she was rather fond.

"What's that?" said Roxim. "Achoo! Oh, hurry up and give it here."

Kazul took the handkerchief from Cimorene, using two claws very delicately, and passed it to Roxim. The gray-green dragon mopped his streaming eyes and blew his nose. "That's better, I think. Achoo! Oh, drat!"

The ball of fire that accompanied the dragon's sneeze had reduced the handkerchief to a charred scrap. Cimorene hastily dug out another one and handed it to Kazul, feeling very glad that she had brought several spares.

Roxim went through two more handkerchiefs before his sneezing spasms finally stopped. "Much better," he said. "Now then, who's this that lent me the handkerchiefs? Somebody's new princess, eh?"

"We were just discussing that when you came in," Kazul said, and turned back to Cimorene. "You were saying? About cooking and so on."

"Couldn't I do that for one of you for a while?" Cimorene said.

The dragon smiled again, and Cimorene swallowed hard. "Possibly.

Why would you want to do that?"

"Because then I wouldn't have to go home and marry Therandil," Cimorene said. "Being a dragon's princess is a perfectly respectable thing to do, so my parents couldn't complain. And it would be much more interesting than embroidery and dancing lessons."

Several of the dragons made snorting or choking noises. Cimorene jumped, then decided that they were laughing.

"This is ridiculous," said a large, bright green dragon on Cimorene's left.

"Why?" asked Kazul.

"A princess volunteering? Out of the question!"

"That's easy for you to say," one of the other dragons grumbled. "You already have a princess. What about the rest of us?"

"Yes, don't be stuffy, Woraug," said another. "Besides, what else can we do with her?"