The Dragon Who Stepped Out of the Drawing

Ellis had drawn a dragon. He was green and round as a potato, with three red horns, an orange wing, one big eye and a pink heart in the middle of his tummy. Ellis named him Ned and hung the drawing on the wall beside the bed.

‘Goodnight, Ned,’ said Ellis, and turned off the light.

In the middle of the night, Ellis woke to a sound. Scratch, scratch. Scratch, scratch.

Ellis switched on the nightlight. The drawing was empty. Where the dragon should have been, there was only white paper and a little green smudge in one corner. And there on the floor sat Ned, as big as a cat and as green as the crayon, blinking his one eye.

‘Hello,’ said Ned. His voice sounded like a crayon being dragged quickly across paper. ‘I'm hungry.’

‘What do dragons eat?’ whispered Ellis.

‘Colours,’ said Ned, as if everyone knew that.

Ellis got out the pot of crayons. Ned sniffed them and chose a blue one. He nibbled it up like a carrot, and at once his wing turned as blue as the sky. He tried flapping it. He lifted a little way off the floor and landed on his bottom.

‘One more wing,’ said Ned. ‘Then I can really fly.’

Ellis would have loved to draw him another wing. But there had only been one blue crayon in the pot, and now it was in Ned's tummy. The big box of crayons was in the kitchen.

The hallway was dark. The floorboards creaked. Ned huddled behind Ellis's legs.

‘Are you scared?’ asked Ellis.

‘Dragons are never scared,’ said Ned, in a wobbly voice. ‘But you'd better go first.’

They tiptoed through the hallway, past Dad's coat, which looked like a troll in the dark, and all the way to the kitchen. The crayon box was on the table. Ellis climbed onto a chair and reached for it.

Then came a whirring sound. A little green light came on near the floor, and something round and flat began rolling straight towards them.

‘MONSTER!’ yelled Ned, and jumped into Ellis's arms.

It was the robot vacuum cleaner. It usually came out at night when everyone was asleep. It whirred and turned, sucking up everything on the floor. And a dragon made of crayon was very nearly the same as crumbs.

‘It won't get you,’ said Ellis, holding Ned tight. ‘I promise.’

Ellis stuck out a foot and nudged the vacuum cleaner the other way. It gave a surprised whirr, had a little think and rolled away under the kitchen table.

Ned looked up. The heart on his tummy glowed a little pink.

‘You were brave,’ he said.

‘You were too,’ said Ellis. ‘You came with me.’

Outside the kitchen window, the sky was beginning to grow light. Suddenly Ned looked worried.

‘I have to get home before the sun comes up,’ he said. ‘A drawing has to be on its paper in the morning. Otherwise it can never get back.’

They ran through the hallway, past the troll-coat and into the bedroom. On the way, Ned snatched a blue crayon from the box. He took a running jump, straight into the white paper. There was a rustle, and then there he was again, flat and still, just where Ellis had drawn him.

Ellis wriggled under the duvet and was asleep before even reaching the pillow.

But the drawing wasn't quite the same.

When Dad came in to wake Ellis, the dragon in the drawing looked just as he had before, with three red horns and a pink heart. But his wing was blue. And in one paw he held a little blue crayon.

‘Have you changed your drawing?’ asked Dad.

‘No,’ said Ellis, smiling. ‘He's had something to eat.’

That morning, Ellis finished the drawing: one more wing, and a little bed beside the dragon, so Ned would have somewhere to sleep until the next night.