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other two, providing a natural safe shelter, with views of the darkening sea reflecting the brilliant orange and pinks of the early evening sky.

    The sun, shaped like a large fire ball casting long narrow shadows of all who stood within its dying rays, was moving closer and closer towards the horizon, sinking slowly into the sea. The gentle breeze that had kept them cool during the heat of the day had suddenly become quite cold.

    George shouted as he ran towards some small thinning green and brown shrubs close to the large inverted rocks spotted by Grace. “I’ll collect some wood for a fire if you prepare some food for us Grace, come on Zach, give me a hand.”

    The two boys searched for firewood as Grace and Joel prepared a makeshift camp for the night, using the boulders as protective walls and the overhanging rock as shelter. Although there were numerous bushes and shrubs around, their pencil-thin stems were only useful to start a fire. To keep a fire burning required thicker wood and after some time of searching George and Zach returned with an assorted mix of twigs and thicker gnarled dead wood ideal for a small fire just sufficient to boil some water to make a welcomed hot drink.

    “Is that all you managed to find?” moaned Joel, who was tired, cold, very hungry and becoming quite irritable. Grace opened up one of the individual survival packages containing some food that obviously by the state of its faded and torn packaging, had been in the life raft for some time. “UGH,” she had bitten into the hard biscuit and taken a piece into her mouth. “This is horrible” she exclaimed indignantly. “If you think I am going to eat this you have another think coming.” “I’ll eat it” Joel cried out grabbing the round disk like object. He bit hard into the biscuit and swallowed. “Typical” Grace exclaimed, “you’ll eat anything.” The four children sat round the fire eating, drinking the freshly made tea and discussing how they were going to get off the island and of course how they were going to hide from any more dragons.

    Whilst they chatted, the deep red ball of the sun finally sank majestically into the rich rippling blackness of the sea. As it did so, shadows produced by the ebbing fire danced around the rocks and with the crackling of the last of the flames the fire dwindled into no more than hot ashes. “Is there any more fuel for the fire?” Grace quietly asked. “No afraid not and anyway it is getting quite late” George replied, “the best thing we can do right now, is rest and sleep; nothing to do until morning and it would be dangerous to try to walk in the dark.”

    Joel and Zach had already opened up the blankets taken from the backpack and were placing them neatly on the ground inside the safety of the sheltered rocks. “I am still hungry,” Joel moaned. Zach put his hand into his pocket and pulled out a very small bar of chocolate he had found in the bottom of the survival bag. “Here take this” he whispered, but don’t tell the others.” Zach, although the youngest of the group, believed he was tougher than his elder brother Joel and that he had to protect him. “Thanks Zach” Joel said, taking the chocolate bar and downing it in one go, “you’re a real pal.” Zach just gave a cheeky grin, for he knew it was true.

    With the beds laid round the dying fire all four snuggled against each other for warmth and one by one drifted into the land of dreams.

    The cold breeze of the night air swirled round the sleeping children. The now, not so hot ashes, blown by the cool evening breeze sparkled, creating a mass of little red and yellow glows. Some were lifted high into the blackness of the night sky, their flashes of tiny lights like hundreds of small flaming torches, mixing with the silver pin pricks of light, from a million stars.

    Dragon Green had reached one of the viewing platforms and was surveying the southern part of the island. He had been contemplating what he