Ten-year-old Pai and his seven-year-old sister Pla lived in a house beside a stream. Every weekend the two of them would sit at the water’s edge folding paper boats. Today was no different - they sat folding side by side, racing to see whose boat came out better.
“Mine is better,” Pla announced, holding up her white paper boat.
“There’s a hole at the bow,” Pai pointed out.
“That’s… a window.”
Pai laughed and set his boat on the stream. It spun once and then shot off with the current. Pla launched hers after it.
They ran along the bank trying to follow, but the boats moved faster than they could run. They stopped, panting, watching until both boats disappeared around a bend.
“Gone,” Pla said.
“But how far do you think they’ll go?” Pai said, half to himself.
The question stayed with him all afternoon. And that evening, when they came back to the stream to wash their hands, they found something that made them rub their eyes.
The two paper boats were moored at the water’s edge.
But they were many times larger than before - big enough for a person to sit in comfortably. The hulls were still white paper, but solid and strong as wood.
“That’s…” Pla’s mouth fell open.
“Our boats,” Pai whispered - and stepped down into one.
The boats moved on their own, with no one paddling. The stream grew wider and wider until it became a river, and the river became an estuary opening into the sea.
The deep blue ocean spread endlessly in every direction.
“Wow,” Pla said, turning around slowly. “It’s enormous.”
“Don’t be scared,” Pai said, though he was a little scared himself. “The boat will take us where we need to go.”
The boats sailed with the wind, past a pod of dolphins that leaped over the bow, past small islands where brilliantly colored birds wheeled overhead. The two siblings sat watching everything with wide eyes.
Until a wall of black cloud appeared on the horizon.
“Storm,” Pai said, his voice tight.
The wind picked up. The waves grew. The paper boat pitched and rolled but didn’t capsize. Pla gripped the side with both hands. Pai spread his arms for balance. Rain began to fall - heavier, heavier.
“Pai!” Pla shouted.
“Stay still!” Pai shouted back. “The boat can handle it!”
And he was right. The paper boat drove through the storm without a drop of water coming inside, as if invisible hands were keeping them safe.
When the storm passed, the sky was clear and bright - and straight ahead lay a mysterious island that appeared on no map.
The island had a dense green forest, a silver waterfall tumbling from a high cliff, and at the edge of the beach, large stones arranged in the shape of a gateway.
The two siblings came ashore and walked into the forest. Deeper in, they found a wide clearing with an old wooden chest in the center, locked with a rusty padlock.
“Treasure!” Pla said, eyes bright.
“But something’s guarding it,” Pai said, pointing at a shadow moving between the trees.
A small green dragon, no bigger than a large cat, crept out and fixed them both with golden eyes. “Who comes to take my treasure?” it said in a high, thin voice.
Pai got ready to run - but Pla stepped forward.
“Is that treasure actually yours?” she asked.
The dragon blinked. “Well… I guard it.”
“That doesn’t make it yours,” Pla said. “If we answer a riddle, can we just look inside? We don’t want to take anything - we just want to know what’s in there.”
The dragon considered this, then nodded. “All right. Here is the riddle: what is something that grows greater the more you give it away?”
Pla thought for barely a moment. “Love.”
The dragon’s eyes went wide. It breathed a small flame at the padlock - the rust crumbled, the lid swung open.
Inside was not gold or jewels. It was a small mirror wrapped in silk. When Pai picked it up and looked into it, he saw a picture of home - his mother sitting at the door waiting, smoke rising from the kitchen stove.
“Do you want to go back?” Pla asked quietly.
Pai nodded.
Back at the beach, both paper boats waited. The small dragon followed to see them off.
“Come and play again sometime,” it said, sounding a little sad.
“We will,” Pai promised.
The boats carried them home as swift as wind - across the sea, through the estuary, up the river, until they arrived back at the stream behind their house just as evening fell.
The boats shrank back to their original size and floated there quietly, as if nothing at all had happened.
The two siblings sat looking at the paper boats in silence for a while.
“Nobody will believe us if we tell them,” Pla said.
“That’s all right,” Pai smiled. “We know it really happened.”
Pla took her brother’s hand. “Next time we go together again, okay?”
“Every time,” Pai said.
