AN: Robed in the sable garb of woe, with haggard eyes the poet stood - The Bard A Pindaric Ode by Thomas Gray.

"I should take you out on the town! While you're here. There's a nice little pub I've found, King's Cross where we will be quite welcome." Jack winked at them.

Jenny refrained from asking why three people who, despite their best efforts, didn't quite fit in to the locale, would be welcome.

"Of course," he went on, "lots has changed since your day. Not quite enough but…better." He shrugged. "I've lived through it all. Campaigned. Useful of course, not being able to die."

"What has?" Vastra took the dive.

"Gay rights! The current campaign is to get equal age of consent. I've been arrested a few times now." Jack opened the door onto the street and they stepped out onto the pavement. "Right then. Welcome to Cardiff. These are the docks." He gestured round at the mass of grey water and boats. "We're based just under the Rift. They're regenerating the whole area, lots of plans from what I hear. It's not too bad now though. We get pizza from the Atlantic Wharf Leisure Centre. Terrible name. But good pizza. I'll take you there. We can go bowling."

"We?" Jenny asked, looking around her distractedly as she followed Jack. Not only was he talking about things she didn't understand but there was a whole new world to take in. Grey flat roads and white paint. Signs and poles. She nearly walked into one until Vastra pulled her aside at the last moment. Even the boats looked strange. She'd seen many barges and ships on the Thames, when visiting Albie, but none that were white and sleek like these. Strange smells assaulted her nose. Still, the smell wasn't quite as bad as London.

"Well, not really a "we". Torchwood Three! And that's about as many people as it has working for it. I've been working sort of freelance for them since the 1880's. And of course, the Doctor visits here in the future. To visit the Rift, just along from here actually. There'll be a great centre built there. And the Senedd. But that's all…" he waved a hand.

"So…we have to find a dragon?" Vastra interjected. She was twitchy and stiff. Jenny wondered what it was like for her, walking along in daylight with seeing the world through a black haze. A sudden urge gripped her, to grasp Vastra's hand and hold it tight.

"And capture it. Or lure it back. I've read the files." He nodded backwards at Jenny. "Quite the adventurer. The Doctor will be recruiting you if you don't watch out."

"I see plenty of action in my own line of work, thank you."

"I'm sure you do. The rift is what we're worried about." By now they'd reached a red brick building overlooking the bay and Jack turned right just beyond it.

"Rift?"

"There's a great rift that runs just under this area here. In the future it'll be called Roald Dahl Plass. After the author." At Jenny and Vastra's blank stares, Jack waved his hand again. "All after your time. Sorry. Anyway. Temporal rift. It sometimes sucks things into it. And they're gone. But we would've registered a negative rift spike if it did. But we have to catch it before it flies through. I don't want to know what happens to the rift, or to the Dragon…"

"Or to Cardiff Below…" Jenny thought that the loss of their Dragon might not go down well there.

"Or Cardiff Below," Jack nodded at her. "if it goes through."

"So, no pressure then." Jenny bit, as he lifted up what looked like an ordinary piece of stone to reveal a long ladder, disappearing downwards into darkness.

"None at all." He smiled, guided her forward to the edge. "Time to meet the team. Such as it is. Get you kitted up and then we'll be off."

Jenny was becoming increasingly dubious about this case, particularly as she suspected that once again they wouldn't be getting paid, but descended the ladder first. When they were all squashed together at the bottom of the ladder, Jack reached over and entered a code in a square box with lights and beeping and a door slid open with a hiss to reveal a cramped and haphazard office.

"Looks like everyone's out. Working overtime on this Dragon. Welcome to Torchwood Three, Jenny, Vastra. We'll need some scanners for you, amped up with alien tech, top of the range." He disappeared under a desk and rooted round in some cardboard boxes. Eventually he came back up with three identical black square boxes, with a small screen on them. "Like something out of Star Trek." He laughed at their blank stares. Jenny took hers with trepidation but Vastra seemed at home with it, approving of the technological advancements apes had made.

"Press that button there to switch it on." Jack instructed her. "And then if you want to switch scanning modes…" he launched into a small lecture on its use. Jenny was convinced it would be easier if she just used her eyes. Vastra, of course, was picking up all of Jack's instructions with ease.

"We've got a large area to cover. I mean it's a dragon. It can fly. All I could get out the Marquis is that it probably hasn't strayed beyond Cardiff. But that's still a lot of city to cover ladies. We're out hunting most days. Of course, occasionally we get reports from people who look up once in a while and have binoculars."

"Is there anyway to capture it? Or to even lure it down?"

Jack hesitated. "We have sonic lanterns to put a boundary round it, and a sonic net. We could use meat or some sort of prey but it's already…eaten, so we're not sure how effective that would be."

"Eaten…" Jenny repeated tonelessly.

Jack gave a nervous laugh. "We were kind of hoping as the experts in Below, you'd have more of an idea than us."

Jenny shook her head slowly.

"Right." Jack's voice went up a pitch. "Keep your swords handy then." He brought himself together. "As it's your first time out in the city, maybe don't split up. Other than that? Enjoy the sights of Cardiff."

They climbed back up the ladder in silence and set off along a road. Cars, as Jack Harkness informed them, were something else they needed to watch out for. "Like carriages without horses."

Jenny thought he was beginning to regret calling them in, if they didn't have the specialist knowledge the Prime Minister seemed to think they had. Peggy had insinuated that getting indebted to the Marquis was not something you'd want.

Lacking any better idea, she wandered down towards the docks, thinking of Albie and the rats. Of course, he would be dead by now. Over a hundred years in the future. Everyone would be. Her sister. Missus Blackett. The thought stunned her and she stood still at the railing. Vastra was fiddling with her scanning device and not really paying attention to her.

"Where did it disappear from?" Jenny asked after a while. "It must have a home. What did it want to leave for?"

Vastra looked up but took them to be rhetoric questions and didn't bother to assure Jenny of her complete ignorance in these matters.

"Are we really going to try and capture a Dragon without any idea of what it wants or where it's from?" Jenny snapped.

"It does seem unwise." Vastra conceded, finally lowering her device. "What would you propose?"

"Proper research!" Jenny threw her hands in the air. "Those Ravens and Eagles weren't dumb animals, why would this Dragon be any different? We need to find out where it came from, what it wants and if it even wants to go back, before we go around tryin' to capture it! You didn't like it much when apes did that to you."

Vastra blinked at Jenny's ferocity. "Where would you propose we start?"

"I dunno." Jenny frowned, trying to focus her thoughts. "Jack said it was the emblem of Wales. There's gotta be stories about that. Myths. And the last time we was 'ere, myths led us straight to the aliens."

"Apes seem to have progressed since we were last in Wales. They might not believe in such tales anymore." Vastra warned her.

"Bet they would if the dragon flew up an' threatened to eat 'em." Jenny muttered, folding her arms.

Vastra considered this in silent amusement. "And where would we find such tales?"

"Books. Maybe there's something in the Torchwood files. Or we could just ask someone?" Jenny suggested.

After more than a few strange stares and people walking off muttering about weird people from London, a middle-aged woman draped in a long scarf and a cardigan and carrying a pile of books finally responded.

"You mean the tale of the red dragon and the white dragon?"

"Possibly." Vastra hedged.

She stared at them oddly. "Some kind of research project, is it?"

"Yes. On Welsh mythology." Vastra grasped at the excuse.

"Yeah. Like the Pwll-y-wrach." Jenny added.

The woman's eyes flicked between the two of them.

"Well you'll be wanting the Mabinogion then." She gave them a short nod and hurried off.

"Mabi-what?"

Vastra shrugged. "Shall we try the Torchwood files?"

"Do you remember which stone it was to lift?"

Regret at ever agreeing to help filled Vastra's eyes.

Collecting a few more stares along the way, they tried several stones in the area before they found the one that lifted to reveal the ladder.

Heaving a sigh of relief, Vastra was brought up short by the keypad.

"Can you pick the lock?" she asked Jenny without much hope

"Don't need to." Jenny leaned round her and carefully pressed the same sequence she'd seen Jack put in. The door whooshed open. Jenny smirked at Vastra's expression and walked through. The smirk faltered as she was reminded of the minor chaos that was the Torchwood office.

"Don't they have any kind of library or…or system?" Jenny said in despair, rifling through various loose pages scattered on a desk. Vastra was investigated a clunky white box with a screen that was sat in the corner, pushing buttons at random. It lit up and a very blocky image appeared along with the words Windows '95. Jenny came over and they stared in fascination as it eventually loaded to a blank green screen, covered with yellow squares.

"Alien invasions, alien kidnappings, lost aliens, hostile aliens, aliens living in Wales, alien dignitaries, rift occurrences…" Jenny peered at the screen, reading the names. "The Doctor gets a whole file to himself look…"

"We had something similar. But of course, ours were far more technically advanced. We had clear images for one thing…" Vastra continued muttering under her breath as she found the small white object that moved the pointer and pressed a button on it whilst hovering the pointer over a yellow square with the title "Aliens linked to myths".

The glare off the screen was beginning to hurt Jenny's eyes and she left Vastra browsing and cursing under her breath and went to examine a set of shelves, filled with loose papers, box files and battered books. Given the lack of organisation she wasn't expecting to find anything but there it was, third shelf down, seven from the right.

"Vastra!" Jenny called, pulling it out. "Mabinogion. That's what that lady said." She showed it to the Silurian when she came over. Vastra opened it.

"It's not in English."

"What?" Jenny grabbed it back, riffling through the pages in dismay. "Ah! At the back. It's in English at the back."

"So is there a story about the illustrious red dragon?" Vastra hovered impatiently as Jenny flipped through the book.

"Here's one! Lludd and L…l…Llefelys? There's a red dragon which fights a white dragon…"

"There's two dragons?!" Vastra read over her shoulder. One dragon was bad enough… "Is that it? They're just imprisoned in a hill?"

"But that's at this place called Dinas Emrys. This is Cardiff, right? Cardiff Below."

"Maybe it fled here underground? This is mythology, after all. The rules of reality need not apply."

Jenny sighed. "Any luck with you?"

"Several interesting tales. More reports than anything. Alas, no dragons."

Jenny placed the book on a nearby desk and went back, pulling books off at random. Vastra stayed to help her.

"D'you reckon Jack knows about any of this?"

"I believe he is just trying to capture it. To stop it eating people by the sounds of it. Ah! Here's some more…" Vastra read silently. "They…fight? The red dragon wins…"

"Is that it?" Vastra handed the book to Jenny who placed it with the other one. "These don't tell us anything."

"What we need is a link to Below. Which is presumably what we were meant to be."

"Well if you see any rats, sing out." Jenny grumbled. "I'm hungry."

Vastra smiled. "Shall we see what Cardiff has to offer?"

"We ain't got any money." Jenny pointed out. "An' I'd rather not get caught thievin' in a different century." When Vastra raised an eye ridge, Jenny merely replied, "Turned honest when I started livin' with you." Which merely caused the second eye ridge to raise.

"It could lead to some questions." Vastra admitted after a return glower.

"I'm goin' back out to the docks!" Jenny slammed the book she was perusing back onto the shelf. "I c'n understand why that dragon would escape. Bein' trapped underground is maddening!"

Vastra followed silently as Jenny stomped her way back up the ladder, Jack had warned them against splitting up after all. And some fresh air would be nice.

Jenny leaned against a railing, scowling off into the distance. Vastra strolled up and down, wandering around small piles of construction equipment, enjoying the sun that had come out and wisely leaving Jenny be. But she stopped when she noticed Jenny stand upright suddenly. She watched curiously as Jenny decisively stood away from the railing and then turned round three times, anti-clockwise.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm goin' to offer him a favour."

"Who?"

"Me, Madame Vastra." The Marquis startled her by swirling out of some rags that had been abandoned by a stack of bricks covered in tarpaulin. "Did mine ears deceive me? Or did I hear mention of someone owing me a favour?" he clasped a hand to where his heart should've been in mock shock.

Well at least it worked, Jenny thought. "Depends if you can tell us what we need to know."

"Couldn't help you, if it's about the Dragon. I'm from London Below? This is rather out in the sticks for me." He gestured round at the undeveloped docks.

"Could you put us in contact with someone from this Below then?"

The Marquis made a show of stroking his chin and looking pensively at the sky. "I suppose I could put you in touch with The Bard. A favour you say?"

"No." Vastra spoke up. "Jenny will not owe you anything."

"But a favour is such a good payment." The Marquis pouted. "And she is the sister of a Ratspeaker."

Vastra drew her sword. "Consider the cost of not helping us."

The Marquis held up his hands slowly, unconcerned. "There's no need to be rude. But I cannot go around helping people without some payment. It's bad for business. You understand."

"I will owe you a favour then." Vastra replied. "A very, very small one."

The Marquis side stepped her sword and bowed. "It is agreed. If you would follow me?"

He led them past the roads, on which rode the carriages without horses, through streets and shops to a dingy alley. A tramp was slumped at one end. "Of course, he doesn't belong in Cardiff Below either. But alas, so many of the legends were abandoned here. Belief runs out." The Marquis shook his head sadly. "My Lord Taliesin. There are people to see you. They wish to enquire about the Ddraig Goch."

The tramp mumbled in Welsh. The Marquis turned, shrugged and walked off. "It'll cost you more, for more than that." With a contemptuous smile, he disappeared.

The heap of rags stumbled towards them. Jenny snorted against the smell of stale alcohol.

"Anglisc?" it asked.

"English?" Jenny said doubtfully.

It snorted in disgust. "English. Anglisc."

"Are you Taliesin?" Vastra tried. "We were told you could help us. We are looking for the red dragon."

"I'm Taliesin. What do you want with the red dragon?"

"We just want to find it!" Jenny reassured him. "It belongs in Below."

"It did not!" Taliesin shouted at her. "It did not belong here. No-one belongs here. But all the myths were buried, in the end. Killed. Or Below." He slumped heavily against the wall.

"Do you know how it escaped?" Vastra tried a different tack.

"It flew. Came up through the ground. Maybe it heard the white dragon was coming again." Taliesin laughed bitterly. Jenny and Vastra exchanged looks. "It must go back below?" the question had a pleading tone.

"It's a dragon. It…won't survive."

"You kill it? Sword and spear. You would kill it?!"

"No! Just…"

"You want to find dragons? Just find dragons?" Taliesin mocked her. "Go along the main road, away from the mountains. Find a hovel. Walk straight up to it. Knock three times." Taliesin knocked on the wall three times. "And click your fingers. Poof!" he clicked his fingers and disappeared, without even a puff of smoke for good effect.

"Wonderful." Vastra tutted.

"Three. Why is it always three?" Jenny sighed, defeated.

An: Atlantic Wharf Leisure Village was renamed in 2000 to be the Red Dragon Centre. The cinema isn't bad. R.I.P The Doctor Who Experience, who was most fun. Hopefully they leave the TARDIS there. There's a very nice café (The Lookout) which I hope is still open too. Try the faggots. (it's a type of meatball)

I'm totally ripping off Patricia C Wrede with the whole follow the main road and knocking on hovels. Dragonsbane is an awesome book, as is the entire series tbf. Cimorene is a kick-ass magic wielding Dragon's Princess who deals with her own knights and takes it to evil wizards by dunking them in soapy water (with a dash of lemon juice). I fully recommend reading.