I gave Ivan a few minutes to compose himself.   To be completely honest, I would have to say I probably would have wiped away a tear, myself, if I hadn’t been a total jerk.  I mean, I was pressed to fault his logic, such as it was.  I could think of no other reason, myself, to leave my heart in the lands of the dead.

I had doubt, then.  Doubt is an insidious worm at the best of times, destroying what love and faith have made glorious.   The Serpent in the Garden was doubt, I am certain.  Part of it was a very personal doubt, that I would ever love anything so much as to be willing to do something that significant between our worlds for that reason, and part of it was doubt about my job here.

If I closed the gateway, there was only one way for Ivan to be reunited with his heart.

Possibilities flashed before my eyes, and I kept coming to the question: did Nellie love Ivan so much as to have him without his heart?  Was the safety of the Red Poets so much more important than her love that she wanted him cured first, and sacrifice her relationship second?  What would Ivan’s life be like, heartless as it was?

He wouldn’t be the first – it’s practically a fairytale trope (for which there ought be a whole ‘nother Wiki) to hide one’s heart somewhere else.  Perhaps there were support groups.  “Hi, my name is Ivan, and I have hidden my heart.” “Hi Ivan!” “I first lost my ability to care about other people when I traded it for the ability to speak the tongue of the dead.”

I focused after a moment.  I liked Ivan.  He was still in touch with his heart, or he wouldn’t be so likeable, would he?

Was this even my decision to make?  I was hired for a particular job.  I could just “follow orders.”

Yeah, that sticks in my craw, too.

“So?” Ivan turned around and asked.  It was a challenging tone.  “Do your…hocus-pocus, heh.”  He waved his hand as if he had no care in the world.

“Tell me first of dragons,” I said, suddenly.  I looked for Doloise without turning my head, but couldn’t feel her under the pressure of the situation.  Maybe she was behind me.  I wasn’t going to worry.

“Ah,” he said, as if I had suddenly earned a point, or at least some kind of respite.   He sat down again, his enormous frame fitting into the booth with the ease of practice.  He looked at me, squinting for a moment.  His hands moved in a way that indicated something specific, and he made words with the movement of his mouth.  “First, tell me why you ask.”

I felt the spell seize up the air around us.  It both relieved and intensified the oppressive sensation I’d been feeling since before I’d woken up.  It was a lovely privacy curtain, excellently delivered.  Ivan wasn’t just one of the Red Poets, he was at least a middle-weight champ.  I knew heavy-hitters who would have been hard put to do that with so little effort.

(It made me think of spy movies from the Cold War period, however irrelevant to the current situation.  What had Ivan been before he became a cook?)

“It has been weighing on my mind,” I tried to explain.  “Something about the way you referred to Doloise.  Was Artur trying to give me a hint?  The amulet that your Nellya wears.  Some ideas that just popped up in my head.”

He squinted at me again.  “You are a small wizard.”  He made that pinching motion with his fingers one uses to indicate distance.  It was not flattering.  “Andrei has good words for you.”   He leans back.  “And you come with daughter of Dragon to ask questions to one the Dragon has spit back!  You are small wizard, but parts of you are very big!  Hah!”

I didn’t ask him to elaborate.

“There are many routes to the lands of the dead.  I asked a Dragon to take me there.”

Oh.  “Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons.  I am crunchy and good with ketchup.”

“Pfah.  Ketchup!”  He gestured at the side of the table.  “We do not use it here!  But point! small wizard.  Dragons do not like each other.  Not even to,” and he made a motion with his hands that left very little to the imagination.  Might be why there’s so few of them left, really.

Ivan continued.  “I spent three days dead.  I spoke with many guardians of that land and ours and made deal for passage.   They were not all fair, but passed them I did.  I thought of my Nellya, and would return.”

He sighed, deflating.  “To return, I said, was part of the bargain.  The Dragon agreed, but wanted to choose his time.  I held my way.  He said he would then hold on to something to summon me at his need.  I agreed.  He took my heart.”

He smiled and pulled up his shirt.  In the middle of all the pasty flesh was something my eyes refused to focus on – I’ve told you, I can’t see gates.  But something from it still smoked.

“Once marked by Dragon’s blood, marked forever.  I do not know how a small wizard like you can fix it.”

I could close it.   I heard the sound, and it was not  a complicated pattern.  I felt the openness, the wrongness of the portal, and I wanted to, I really did.  So why were the words, “I guess that means we need to talk to the Dragon,” what came out of my mouth?