My bedroom was the one with the moss green carpet.  Or was it olive drab?  It was this green-but-not-a-real-green-carpet (that’s cruel.) It was the first room on the left of the long hallway.  On the right was a bathroom and then my folks’ room, and there was a room for my sister and a guest room at the very end again on the left.

There was always something wrong about that last room on the left. Besides sounding like the name for an excrutiating drama (aren’t they all?) or horror flick, it started with a bad feeling.   Nothing specific, just a discomfort, like I wasn’t supposed to be there.  It was never off-limits, exactly (except to keep it nice for guests) but there was something wrong with it.

I tried, like a kid does, to tell my parents.  From your perspective, it makes sense, right?  You know, because you’ve been reading, that there are things Beyond that try to intersect with our world, our reality, and they really aren’t good for us.  Most people have at least one ghost story they can tell, and that’s my rule of thumb there.

So from the perspective of a kid, absolutely, let’s look into this.  Let’s get an exorcist in and let them do their thing, just in case.

Do you know what an exorcist costs?  You can get a lot of services over the internet, but you’re going to try to bargain-watch this one. Someone who is going to want you to give their organization a donation is probably your best bet, but remember the size of that donation should reflect the fact that they are pitting their soul (loaded word, remember) against the evils of what  is there.

Yeah, as a grown-up, you’re not so quick to listen to this.  Besides, you’ve been in that bedroom.  You’ve made the bed.  You’ve been in the closet.  There’s NOTHING THERE BUT YOUR  IMAGINATION, and why are you so worried about the guest room anyway?  Do you not want Grandma to come?  Is this some kind of bizarre repressed sibling rivalry?  Did you do something disgusting in there?  Do we have any clean sheets that fit that bed in the cupboard?  Go look in the cupboard for clean sheets.  I don’t believe you’re making me make the bed again and I have to go pick Grandma up from the airport and she’ll be waiting another fifteen minutes and she’s going to tell me all the stories about all the times I’ve been late in my life, and it’s all because of you.

As a kid, you’re not likely to make that mistake again. 

You could go all Frog Brothers, or even Monster Squad if you’ve got friends.  Or even just forget that cold chill your Grandma complains about every morning even though it’s 85 degrees before noon.  After all, it isn’t your problem.  Probably an overactive imagination, or so your school shrink says when you come visit on Wednesday afternoons because your 3rd grade teacher wasn’t so hot on your story about the vampires living in your basement.  (That one was totally made up, but it was good urban fantasy, and you don’t know why they confiscated the picture you drew with the best blood colour you were able to make with the bleak selection of coloured pencils you stole from the 6th graders doing their yearbook assignments.)

If it weren’t that you had bad dreams.  You really resonated with that line from Hamlet, and even though the shadows seem wrong (how can a place without much light have shadows?) you sneak into the guest room while Grandma is fussing about the kitchen with your mom.

Grandma has her own smell, but so does this room.  You like Grandma’s smell, it reminds you of visiting her and the little bathroom she had on the right with the National Geographic magazines and the crocheted toilet paper containers, and the funny saying on the wall that you didn’t get until you were older.  It reminds you of firm kisses on the cheek and that she’s always been nice to you.  The smell that competes with it is a dusty smell, even though you know your mom went crazy with the cleaning, and it smells like something old.  Grandma may be old, but she’s not like this smell.  Or maybe it’s the sound, the sound of slithering, if slithering was music that set your spine on edge.

It’s coming from the closet, of course.  You move around Grandma’s suitcase, careful not to touch anything in there.  You want to turn on the light, but you just have this feeling that if you do, you’re going to lose this tenuous connection with the wrongness, like light really chasing it away.  Your mom said you were too old for night lights, but you know this is why you want them, even if your sister says it just lets you see monsters better.

It’s that moment, the moment in your dream that you can’t turn away, that the veil is pierced. 

I can’t tell you I saw anything.  But I brushed aside Grandma’s coat, and there was a something there, a darkness within a darkness that sounded like sadness and tasted like neglect, and smelled like something forgotten so long that it no longer had a scent.  Something in it moved and I gave serious consideration to screaming or wetting my pants, but instead, I felt a flow of anger.  Anger comes from fear, and instead of flight, this once I chose fight.  It reached out from my left hand, and I gestured with the flow as if just closing a curtain, smoothing something down, wax-on, Daniel-san, a curiously non-obscene repudiation of the evil of the moment.

To my great surprise, it went quiet.  My hackles (wherever they are, just about the gills that turn green, I guess) lowered, and real silence, combined with the sound of mom yelling that she did too add the orange juice to the cranberries, and the smell of turkey roasting, and my sister laughing because of something on TV, and it all filled the room like it had been a vacuum.

The smell of Grandma.

I took a moment to breathe it in, and then made my way back out.  But I guessed then, even if I hadn’t known for sure.  It felt kind of like being a hero.  I had faced the darkness and won.

“…And this is Magdalena,” the object of, well, not my heart’s desire, but definitely the desire of something anatomical and inconveniently located offered a passel of other names for the girl she was introducing.  The names passed by me like so much exposition, and I smiled in vague attention, my focus on Binah, and her slightly exotic accent.  I passed one of the drinks I had just purchased over to her, on general principles.

“We’ve passed each other on campus,” Magdalena said, her voice perfectly modulated over the music and sound of the crowd.  She knocked back the shot and then extended her hand to me.  “Magda.  My mother’s side of the family adds the baggage, but since she also gave me the good looks, I tolerate it.”  I shook her hand on automatic, and took a moment to stop watching and listening to Binah as soon as our palms connected.  There was something…

She was fairly tall, but more importantly, most of it was leg.  She had on a pair of cargo shorts that showed them off, and a white tank top with a handful of gold necklaces that were a lot more subtle than anything that phrase should suggest of the 1970s.  Her hair was pressed back with some kind of ancient secret hair care product of which straight men are not meant to know.  She repressed a smile.

“A fellow artist,” she said, her other hand curling around mine.

I started to protest, as stick figures were high concept to me,  but then she wrote a symbol of light in the air between us.  I looked around, but she had been extremely, well, crafty, unlike my guilty glance.  She smiled, and I liked her lips.

“How do you know Binah?” I asked, blandly.

“Isn’t that my line?” she asked, releasing my hand with a certain grace.  “Honors Program, of course.  I’m looking to move to a Psychology degree, not convinced that this is the college to do it at,” she shrugged.   “And you?”

“Officially this is our first date,” I laughed.

“And you took her here?” she referred to the flashing lights and loud music.

“Her favourite local band,” I defended myself.

“What do you think?”

“Can’t stand them,” I shouted back, and Binah bumped back into me from talking to the other people she’d introduced me to, and I had just as quickly forgotten.

“What was that?” she yelled.

“Still trying to appreciate the music,” I yelled back at her.  Actually, to be honest, I didn’t think there was any music.  No melody, lots of screaming that had gotten louder in the last few minutes, and I was far away from the literal crush of people up near the front of the stage.  It was probably an acquired taste.

“It’s great, isn’t it?  They had an opportunity to get one of their songs on the radio,” she just about blasted my ear drums at that point, “but they stuck with their principles!  They’ll never sell out!”

“Great!” I responded, although I guess the ethics of the matter confused me because it sounded pretty idiotic, all things considered.  Still, Binah was bopping to what I guessed was the beat, and it was fabulous to watch all the movement under her black t-shirt.  Her smile was a flash of white against the darkness of her skin, and I had to expend effort to hold back the images that brought to mind.

“Should we move up?” she asked at a volume that may have been discernible from a passing jet, yet still something I had to strain to hear from back here near the bar.

“Do you want to?” it would be suicide, my leather jacket being poor protection against that much in the way of muscle and metal spikes.  Still, a slow death being ground (literally) against Binah had potential compensation.

“I asked him to stay back with me,” Magda said, in a conversational tone.  Binah and I had no troubles hearing it.

“You moving in on my man?” Binah asked, without blinking, but still quite loudly.

“I’m using him as an umbrella,” Magda said back.

“Oh.”  I thought it sounded as confused as I felt, but it seemed to be fine with Binah.  “I think I see Dezi down in the front.  I’m going in after her,” she said.  She gave me a quick, almost professional kiss on the cheek, and then jumped into the fray, quite literally.  On both counts – the jumping, and the fighting.

“I wanted to talk to you some more,” Magda explained.

“I kind of guessed.  I’m not a…” I waved my hand in some lame gesture of Hollywood wizardry.

“But you knew what I meant.”

“I’m also not an idiot,” I can actually say that in sign language, but the ironic thing is, I wouldn’t understand the response, provided it wasn’t obviously vulgar.

“Are you preter or super?”

“What?” I tried to make it sound more indignant than confused.  I might have managed it.

“Or are you natural, meaning human?”

“Oh!  No, I’m not anything, um, I’m human.”  I figured “anything crazy” sounded kind of racist.

“So what do you do?”

“One trick pony, and this isn’t the sideshow, sister,” I said, finally, normal voice and frustration leaking out like any just-about-to-be-a-dropout slightly post-adolescent male.

“Isn’t it?” she smiled.  She gestured around us.

“Huh.”  I grunted.  “Bitter, much?”

“It’s the name, mister.  I’m a myrhhbearer.  Bitter and used for gifts and funerals.”

“Is that like a ringbearer?”

“There were more Disciples than Ringwraiths.”

“I never saw Sauron’s resurrection as particularly biblical.”

I didn’t remember walking out of the bar and down the road.  Bye, Binah.  Bye visions of her writhing over me, on top of me, pretty much wherever she wanted.  I was hooked on Magda, who while still pleasing to the eye was far more intriguing to me, maybe even despite the attitude.

“What about Gandalf’s?”

“I read Narnia just thinking that Aslan was one heck of a neat lion,” I had to admit.  “And the voyage of the Dawn Treader I somehow have mixed up with Darwin and the finches.”

“Stars and angels.  Whether it is a wrinkle for our time or maybe even just a Babylon 5 reference,” she sighed.  “Where do you stand?”

“I like to think I’m on the side of the angels,” I decided.

“Well, yeah, but have the ones around us fallen?” she asked, cynically.

I remember kissing her, then.  Her mouth was sweet, the taste of her breath somewhat bitter.

“Have hope,” I told her.

“Oh, I do,” she smiled, and I decided I liked what her smile did to her face.  “I do.”

“It’s the edge of a kingdom,” Thomas said.

“It’s a crosswalk,” I responded.

“Strangely enough, we are both stating the truths obvious to us in apparent disagreement, but these truths, however self-evident, can in a declaration exist simultaneously.  This is a crosswalk, but it is also the edge of a kingdom.”

“I suppose like many governmental maps, it’s an artificial boundary, but why have you dragged me to the corner of Colfax and,” I looked up at the street sign, “Monaco, to talk about kingdoms?”

“Rather, I have dragged you to the eight corners of Colfax and Monaco,” Thomas corrected.

“I guess you could count it that way, if you wanted to be specific and not just `self-evident.’  Was the question not direct enough, or do I need to repeat it in a less appropriate manner to get an answer?”  It wasn’t that talking to Thomas was a challenge so much as that he seemed to take the most difficult path.  It was a kind of verbal bureaucracy, and, well, words mean things, but they don’t mean the same things to everyone.

“I want you to meet a friend of mine.”

“Not the one with the snakes?” I checked.  I have been known to get a little nervous around snakes, even if I’m generally alright with them.

“No, Adelina is busy tonight.”  He laughed.  “I’ll pass on that you remembered her, though.  It will tickle her.”

“It’s nice to have fans,” I suggested.  “However, it’s cold, it’s the witching hour, and the police have been by twice already to make sure we’re not making trouble.”

“If, by trouble, you mean they’re checking that we’re not having illicit gay sex on the sidewalk, and we’re not buying or selling drugs or women no matter how many offers we get.”  He sighed and watched another potential merchant pass with a shake of his head.

“If you weren’t such a pretty boy, you’d get less of them,” I laughed.

“The last one asked me how much you cost,” he noted with a half-snarl, half-grin.

“Hey, I could use a little cash,” I bantered.

“I’ll be sure to sell you as cheaply as you estimate yourself,” he sighed.  “Look over there.”

He pointed at the set of corners directly opposite.  A shadow of a man stood there, waiting for the light.  The shadow was probably, well, eight feet tall, and four feet wide, and humanoid.  As the light changed, it waddled across the street and became smaller and darker.  By the time he had crossed all of the streets, I saw a small man, maybe about four feet tall, in a dark trenchcoat, a soft black hat, and a cigarette.  The little skin that was revealed was blue.

“He’s a troll,” Thomas whispered.

“Quick and unsubtle to anger?” I asked.  I stared.  I’d seen some strange things on the streets.  A small blue man smoking a cigarette shouldn’t have been that weird.

“What’cha lookin’ at?” he grumbled under a waft of smoke.

“Potential lung disease, Sir Darius.”  Thomas seemed amused.

“Eh.  War or tobacco, I’m choosin’ the peaceful way.  ‘Sides, gotta run to hit my shift down at the station.  Gotta have an excuse to walk out of the box now and then.  Not everyone out this time of night, they don’t all have credit cards, y’know?”  He leaned up against the wall and began gathering a small aura of smoke.  “So, this your boyfriend?”  He gestured at me with an elbow.  His hands had remained in his coat pockets the whole time.

“Told you you were a pretty boy,” I said.

“This is the Portal Doctor,” Thomas said, ignoring me.

“Oh yeah, the one you mentioned to the King.”  He looked at me, but I still couldn’t tell you anything about his eyes.  I had the feeling they were dark and they glittered, but there was some kind of glamour involved that kept my vision just sliding off his face.

Or maybe it wasn’t his face.  Maybe he really was the 8 foot shadow I had seen before, which meant his blue navel was smoking.  This was odd, indeed.

Thomas waited to see if Sir Darius was going to say anything more, and then replied, “Yes.”

“Huh,” the troll knight said.  “If you could believe anythin’ a Mad Tom says, yer a wizard of some sort.  Kind of scrawny, really, but I guess you guys get yer exercise runnin’ demons and stuff down.”  He didn’t use the word “stuff.”

I would never consider myself scrawny, especially as I towered over the troll, but maybe he had different, far more Rubenesque standards.  “I’m not the athletic type,” I said, demurring.

“I don’t care what’cher boyfriend and you get up to,” Sir Darius suggested. “You’re no more ‘n a bite.  ‘Sall wizards are good fer, after.”

“After what?” I began to ask, but Thomas interrupted.

“He has not taken up your quest, Sir Darius.  He is here as an observer.”

“So yer goin’ do it?”  The troll sounded, well, more drunk than anything else.  “Thomas, m’friend, yer either Mad or True, and neither of those ever leave well.”

“Or leave well enough alone,” Thomas agreed.

“I serve a King of small things,” the troll said, looking at me.  It was the clearest utterance I had yet had from him.

“There can be big surprises in small packages,” I thought of a T-shirt I’d seen Binah wear once.

“Hoo hoo hoo,” the troll chuckled.  “Spoken like a wizard.  Look,” and for a moment, I could feel the immensity of the troll, as if he merely kneeled next to me, and spoke into my ear.  “Small kingdoms do not wage small wars.  I pass through seven boundaries merely to make a mortal’s time, and at that, my King is not seven boundaries small.”

He smelled like smoke, and like asphalt, and like rock, and like old blood.

I nodded, as if I understood.

He pulled out a hand from the pocket of his trenchcoat and laid it on the back of my neck.  “‘Member this, ‘mancer.”  It felt like that literal ton of bricks that’s mentioned in passing now and again.  “Seven boundaries, and seven anchors.  Bound an eight time and small things will begin to leak out.”

“That would be bad,” I guessed.

He put his hand back into his pocket.  “Yer good friend will be walkin’ across the street with me, then I’m catchin’ a bus.  Get yerself home.”

“Seven streets?” I asked Thomas.

Thomas nodded.

I never saw Thomas again, but there’s a small set of places where I might, someday, go looking for him.

When everyone present, the veche, the prince, and the rich merchants, had eaten and drunk all they desired, they began to boast and oh! the braggarts told tales that would make fodder for many fine witticisms of any a bard for long years to come!

That’s a classic line from these types of tales.  It fits with the aftermath of the announcement.  Cake was brought out, and the many friends of the bride and groom enjoyed the frosting and some of them had never had ice cream before, a story probably worth telling in itself by a storyteller better than I, and then the game began in earnest.

We will call the two teams Koshchey, the dwarf’s team, because it amuses me, and Claire, for Kievan’s friend.

“Why would they take my drink?” Claire asked.  “That doesn’t make any sense, because I could just get another.”

Sadko, her sylphic (as opposed to sylphan, because that sounds like sylvan, and is thus confusing to the ear) friend smiled.  “If it were of value, would you not fear it was stolen?”

“She said someone else would have it on the other team.”  She paused. “I did notice that the glasses are all quite different, so I should be able to find it.”

“No, we must confer with our teammates and negotiate its release.”

“Oh, I hope no one spit in it!”

Sadko knew it would not be so, and merely smiled.

Roo asked her partner, “What is it that we have lost?”

“It could be innocence, but it would be sheer impropriety to have losses so vulgar or of such notoriety,” her companion, who we name Nora laughed.  “However I overheard the words of one who made an exaggerated boast that it’s quite obvious our loss: the name of our host.”

“That is madness.  We were invited!”  Roo frowned.  “It is on the tip of my tongue.”

For yes, Vasilisa is a wise wizard.  That the invitation was remembered was to keep the trouble to a minimum, but the name, a name is less mutable, and can be hidden, but only until said.

“Is it an insult, or is it crass, that the other team asserts we took a glass?” Nora asked.

“Were it ambrosia, I would call it crass,” Roo suggested.  “But everyone knows the Gods drink `highly caffeinated carbonated colas’ these days.  Do we know what it looks like?”

“A pale indigo but not violet in hue, with cream coloured liqueur that turns it to blue.  Tall like a vase, but more like a square, a handle to lift it, but no real burden to bear.”

Have you caught your breath yet?  Good.  I have an idea of where to look next.

“Those people are…weird.”  Claire had tried for a number of synonyms that made her sound less, well, she was afraid she sounded like some kind of bigot, because she knew they were unusual, but all the ways you say that about someone end up sounding like you’re judging them.  Claire was, however, very frustrated.  She had tried to find another drink, only to be told they were out of glasses, or while she was searching for her own (she remembered it was a tall “adult milkshake” in a kind of rectangular blue mug) she’d keep almost seeing it but it would turn out to be someone else’s beverage. 

“You are not incorrect,” Sadko said, hiding his amusement as best he could.  “But do you have a specific in mind?”  He liked Claire.  She was like many mortals, oblivious to wonder but still in search of it. 

I see that this raises an argument for you.  We can speak of it later.  Let me finish this tale. 

“I don’t understand what they are looking for – do they really not know whose party they’re attending?  I would think Kievan would throw out this many crashers.”

“Crashers?  There has been no violence.”  Sadko chose his words carefully because violence was always a possibility, especially with some of those he saw represented.

“Party crashers.  What,” Claire smiled, somewhat distracted for a moment, “you never went anywhere without an invitation?”

Sadko’s eyes widened.  “That would be a serious breach of Hospitality.”   Yes, there was a capital ‘H’ in there.

Claire laughed. “You make it sound serious.  Not that I haven’t been to a few parties that could have used bouncers,” she shivered, instinct telling her that those at this gathering best suited for the idea were perhaps a little more careless with mortality than she would want to know.  “Honestly,” she changed the subject, “I didn’t know Kievan had so many weird friends.  Maybe they’re friends of the girl he married.”

“Perhaps,” Sadko agreed, with a sad smile.

“Hey, E, you’re into that weird stuff, right?” He didn’t use the word ‘stuff,’ but that was the kind of fellow he was.

Oh, I could argue the point, because there was a lot of “weird stuff” I certainly wasn’t into, but this was before the internet was quite as pervasive, and for what Jonath meant it was probably something I could at least give an opinion on, even if it was only, “That’s some weird stuff.”  And I wouldn’t use the word ‘stuff,’ either.

Jonath pulled me over to look at his computer screen.  “What do you make of that?”

It took a moment for me to make sense of the sight.  First, it wasn’t porn, which was what Jonath was normally using his screen to view.  The lack of bare flesh was its own distraction.  It was a picture of a couple of everyday normal guys, one standing in front of a doorway, the other in front of a piece of furniture I couldn’t be bothered to give a name to…okay, the word escaped me for a moment, but it was some kind of cabinet.  The kind of picture with very little interest to people who aren’t somehow related, kind of like a good deal of the credits to a movie.

Then I caught the weird stuff.

The gentleman on the left, in the doorway, seemed to fade out, and the gentleman on the right, you could see his hand through the one on the left.

“Overexposure?” I asked.  “One of those photography terms.”  It kept my attention.

“Digital.  None of the other photos show it, nothing weird on the lens.”  He shrugged.  “These were photos I took on the trip to see my family. What do you  make of it?”

“That was what, four months ago?”

“Eh, I forgot about downloading them until Mom nagged,” he shrugged.  “But that’s kind of weird, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.  That’s some weird stuff.”

I went and sat back on the bed, going back to my comics.  To make conversation, I asked, “Where was that taken?”

“Oh, that’s my mom’s new place.  It’s huge, and really kind of weird.  Lady lives there, buries her pets in the yard, wanders up at night chanting and stuff.   Real Stephen King, what was it?  Pet Seminary?”

“Cemetary, I think.  I don’t read a lot of horror,” I lied, trying not to laugh at the idea of a place pets went to become priests.  I stood up and went back over to behind Jonath’s chair.  “You have any other pictures of the place?”

“Oh, sure, here’s the grave in the front yard.  Here’s one in the back.”  He shifted through a few other photos.  “Here’s this ancient telephone.  Still works,” he showed me a couple of other photos, some of his family.

I wanted to ask a lot of questions, but finally, just shrugged.  “That’s a restless place.  Things aren’t being left to their regular entropy.”

“We have replaced their regular entropy with new Folger’s crystals?”

“Well,” I considered it, “the idea of spiritual caffeine is an amusing one,” I admitted.

“Huh,” he grunted.  “Weird stuff, right.”

There are thoughts that open portals, because with most people (maybe not Jonath) thoughts lead to actions on both a physical and mental level.   When you make a decision, it is an action, if only of will.

“Your mom doesn’t live in the state, does she?”  That was an act of will, too.

“Uh, no.”

I swore silently.  I didn’t use the word, “Stuff,” either.  This was my theory as to why wizards weren’t pictured reading newspapers.  With great power and all that.  Really, it’s true of any specialist, although at least I wasn’t the kind of doctor who got cornered at parties to look at someone’s rashes.  (Well, once, and it led to the term “spackle demons,” so it was kind of a story to be told, but not relevant.)  How far did my responsibility cover?  Did I have some kind of territory?   It’s not like I got some kind of per diem to pit my will against the Bumps in derNite.

Maybe it’s because my rule of thumb is that if you ask “Is this somebody else’s problem?” it is officially a moral dilemma.

I went back to my comic books.   Jonath moved back in with his mom when he couldn’t complete the school year.  I’ve not heard from him since.

[postnote: Thanks to D. Thornton for the bones.]

There are fewer of us now.

Some have lost interest in the experiment.  Others have been consumed.  Some fled at the sound of her wings, and forget our Lord has more than teeth and tail.

We wait.  Time has no meaning except as a measurement.

We have always known her to be thus, as she thrust the serpent symbol at us.    All at first she saw our master fearing he hungered for her disaster.  But us “alone” as single “we,” a magic she simply cannot see.

We are a mystery to her, one she would well devour and absorb did she not fear our Lord.

Would that we could say, “I.”

Her eyes are the same.

They’re a shallow blue, a tidepool, a sip of time that barely tastes of a moment.  She is starving, but so do many of her ilk, as dreams turn to dust and wars to circuitry and the bones of the Mothers are blasted through for roads.   Shrews and dinosaurs, and the myths fade from histories with no room for maybes like the Dragons.

Like us.

But there is the heart.  Her solace, her only meal for years, easily.  Those that feed the Dragons want the ones that are fiery red, burning hot white and blue.   Fast cars, fast Dragons, quickly eaten and no real lasting substance.

Not like a sorceror’s love.

It is a strange feeling that we hold that he, the small power has not touched us.  Some are sad, some strive us to tempt, some are angry.  And within, we almost feel the “I.”

Would he love us if we were one girl?  Can he love us now? 

We do not think he will come this far.

She moves quickly, her bulk slithering behind her.  They say cats have whiskers to determine their likelihood of being stuck, so how does she fit her wings so carefully within the walls?  It is a question he would ask.  She is more serpent than bird, but neither fish nor fowl.   The halls whisper her name. 

“You have not eaten,” she accuses us.

Like all of them, she has a collection.

Thin strands of gold snarl a nest of thorns both iron and steel, clasps, buckles, and horns, and more to conceal.    Herbal concoctions as sold in auctions, feathers and bone, from the dead and the flown.  What meals here are untainted we are unacquainted.

But it would not be Hospitable to say that.

We remain silent.

Candles and magic both light the room, leaving odd shadows in colours that have names that lack music.  It is painted in dishabille, rather than inusitation.   It is not a place for guests, but we are still bound by what we are. 

Are we captive?  She cannot use her magic to bind us here.  We are lacking reference as to which world we have been brought, but while it is not inimical  to our kind, our gifts are unreliable without synthesis into the weave.  What is ours remains, what is our environment is suspect. 

She is not without wit or charm.

Or power.

She is in a quandry, for she cannot harm us without cause.  Devour us in entirety, and she would be breaking many laws. 

“What are we going to do with you?” she asks, and part of it is that the phrase brings her comfort, and part of it is a concern. 

Her scales are made at least partially of bronze, of her Mother’s coils, and they reflect the light in glittering hypnotics, and protect her from the many slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.  Her eyes are lidded in gold, and her teeth are firm and made of the bones of warriors.   Her wings are freight trains and hurricanes and her tail is the lightning bolt. 

Yes, of course, she is a Dragon.

But within us is the blood of another.  Peredur he calls himself now, and we are a reflection of his Angharad.  He would not forsake us.

He remains silent.

“Who are you?  What are you?” the Dragon asks.

He is the breath of life, and we are then the breath of thorns and ashes.

Ill-luck, we named ourselves.

We have decided that is how this will end.  In thorns and ashes, as our Lord had made of us, and ill luck for those who have stolen us from our will.

We answer her.

“This is ridiculous,” said Claire.  “I don’t even know if I want it back,” she said.  “I can go get some water out of the bathroom sink if I’m thirsty.”  She was muttering at at this point.  “Which I’m not, because if I drink something I’d have to … I’d have to let it back out at some point.”

“But it’s part of the game,” Sadko said, part-concerned and part-cajolingly.  He pushed her gently with his hand towards where team Koschei was gathering.

“It isn’t worth it.  I hate getting up in front of people.”  Perhaps that was the source of her reluctance, and it was not one that Sadko shared, but it was still one he understood.

“I’ll play you a song,” Sadko suggested with sudden generosity.

Claire had never had anyone play a song for her – it is a special magic of its own.  There are different levels of this, from choosing to play on a jukebox at a restaurant or the “the right song” for a mix, to playing requests, and finally to writing something for someone you love.  The spectrum is an exciting one and full of all the things artists bring to those who sponsor them.

“Trust a dwarf to find a drink – it’s rather prejudicial, don’t you think?”  Nora smiled.

“We are not what we are best at, always.”  Roo considered this thought for a while because it wasn’t exactly what she had intended to say, but it was probably true.  She went back to her thoughts.  “I know of a dwarven ballerina.”

“You speak sooth? That would be quite a sight, if not uncouth.”

Roo had to agree it was, indeed, quite a sight, but then, she had seen it on a TV show, which made it even more unusual.

Kievan was annoyed at the dwarf. “Well, it’s my party.  And my wife’s.  I don’t even know who half of you people are.”  Once you get to “you people” you know someone’s capacity for rationality is impaired.  Those words are landmines seeking explosions.  Yes, I can imagine the singles ad.

“Yes, tell me about your lovely wife?” the dwarf asked.

“Well, she’s beautiful, and clever, if a little, I don’t know.”  He gestured in that fashion men have always done in regards to describing ineffable qualities in their partners.

“I am certain she is that thing.  Could you point her out to me?”

“Oh, she’s over there.” 

Vasilisa had just begun to gather the groups together. “Gentlefolk, if you would excuse me, I hear you have found what it is you have lost, but not yet retrieved it.  Claire, please be a dear and let us know what it is that was taken from you.” 

“A drink.  And if anyone spit in it, that’s just gross.”

“Perish the thought,” the dwarf said, relinquishing the drink. 

“And you, dwarf?”

“This is ridiculous.  One should not have stolen from them the name of their host.  Let alone the other coercions upon this gathering.”

“Is this to say you insult my Hospitality?”  Vasilisa asked.  Something great and terrible drew over her features, and even those in the audience who were blind to such things felt the threat.

“No, no, sir,” for that was the impression the dwarf had had of Vasilisa.  Dwarves are sometimes confused as to human gender as it is, and someone with power, well, no matter how that someone dressed, it should be a man, correct?

Yeah, I know.

“No `Sir.’  Vasilisa.”  She gave her name to the dwarf as the game was up.

“Yes, Vasily…sir.”

I snapped out of it.  “All that for a …shaggy dog story?”

He had the grace to look embarrassed.  “It was more all that for time to summon her.”

I looked around expecting a Muppet Movie-like reveal.  I realized I hadn’t said, “Myth,” aloud.

“Yes?”

I turned around quickly.  I didn’t know what I expected.  There were tales of Vasilisa the Beautiful, of course. Her eyes shined like fireflies, and her smile was sunshine.  Her cheeks were red and white, like the blush of an apple, or maybe blood and milk.  She was dressed in professional chic, except for a little doll pinned just below her shoulder.

Nikolai whined.  He did not want to go near her.

“Ah, little spell.  Do not be afraid.”  She turned and looked at me.  “We’ve heard of you, too, Portal Doctor.  That was good work with the Shadow King.”  Her smile brightened the sunshine.  That was the connection.  “Although you still have much work to be done.  Why is it you have summoned me, oh son of  Lev?”

Artur stood up.  “I seek vengeance against the Naul, for the slaughtering of the birds.  She has revealed herself in full, but while we were given transport to this place, we have only found guardians and no direction.”

“Is that what you’re wanting, E?” she looked straight at me.

“Um.  I don’t know anything about any birds, unless you know, you mean dames,” I started, but her brow hinted of crinkling, so I changed my angle.  “Do you know of Realms?  The community type, not the political or mystical, well, still mystical, but…”  Pretty girls are my kryptonite.

“I have no doubt that while the Dragon Naul might swallow Doloise Mallory, it would leave the beast with indigestion, made as she is of Peredur’s Blood.”

“Figuratively or literally?” I found myself asking.  It seemed completely reasonable that she knew of Doloise.  It’s a huge magic to accomplish, and while I hadn’t really known of the Mallory portion, it kind of fit as a name.  Besides, who knew who else was on the short list of dumb mortals who would face the Shadow King?

“Yes.  Although I need to be more specific.  In opposed to the collective, the singular was brought to life with Peredur’s breath.”

“Won’t Peredur get involved?”  Artur asked.

“Um, he did,” I said.  “He kind of sent me to find her.  Which I was going to do anyway,” I grumbled.

“I’ve the older claim,” Artur said, as if it made a difference.

“Let me change the subject, because I think it might have relevance here,” Vasilisa interrupted. “How do Dragons reproduce?”

I was suddenly uncomfortable.  “They’re Dragons.  I presume they eat people… and make baby dragons the squishy way.”  I was aware of the twinkle in her eye.  “Stop laughing at me,” I grinned.

Artur shrugged.  “That was my guess.”

“So you seek to be a Dragonslayer, Arthur, without Excalibur in your hand, and you know not the nature of the beast you are confronting?  Oh, that is not very wise at all.”

“Where is she?” he demanded.

“She’s here.  This is a matter of heart.”

“So the heart of this place?” I said slowly.

“The sorceror opened the portal at the throne of the mountains, and near was Viktor, the ambiance of a water Prince, and his spells collectively.”

“You mean all I had to do was click my heels together?” I grinned again.

“And find self-confidence,” Vasilisa smiled back at me.

“So we go backwards?” I nodded sagely.

“The only way to go forwards sometimes,” she agreed.

“I just want my fairy back,” I laughed.

“Be wary of what you claim, little power.”

Oh.  Yeah.  I said “my fairy.”  “That’s wisdom, alright.”  I agreed. 

“I won’t borrow trouble, but I will still reap some consequences,” she said.

“Best a la mode,” I offered, still enjoying the repartee. “How much do I owe you?”

“After having to hear that story?  I probably owe you a favour,” she winked at Artur.

“Let’s make it a mutual one.”  I decided not to blush because, well, I’m a guy.  “How about ice cream?” I asked.

“When next we meet, yes, I think that will be well.  And now a word alone, son of Lev.”  She spoke a Word I did not hear, and then took her leave the way wizards do, by disappearing.

“So what next?” I asked Artur.

“To the heart of the matter?” he smiled, but something haunted his gaze.

It is both true and untrue for me to say that I don’t keep up with the news.  I do not watch television, I think newsprint is dead [thanks, Egon!] (although it is still an important history from which to learn) and I certainly do not go out of my way on the internet to any news or news discussion pages.   I have enough things (even leaving my ex-boyfriends out of it) that raise my blood pressure to undesirable levels.

I talk, and that tells me much.

I listen, and it tells me more.

It was in talking to a healer who was afraid she was dealing with a creature that deals in plagued rashes that I found out about E.

Plagued rashes, in case you were wondering, require blessed creams.  Holy water can sting too much alone.

“I was surprised he let them take him in to the emergency room,” she was saying.  “He was completely in shock.  Kept reaching over for the ice cream in the passenger’s seat.   The car was torn almost in two, and there was this, no really, get this, a Dairy Queen sundae completely untouched next to him.   Big red spoon stuck in just like it was ready to eat.  Since it wasn’t all over the dash we figured it wasn’t the cause.   Anyway, he was cute and I wish he had asked for my number.  There was just something about him.”

I don’t think I remember feeling that way.  Oh, that’s not true.  I remember quite well what he was like.  A little shy, a lot geeky, an infectious smile, and he had what I have mentally dubbed the Preacher’s Gene: he became animated, a completely different person when you interacted with him in a place of his expertise.  (The Pastor’s Gene is really close to it, but it’s someone who becomes really animated when they interact simply person-to-person.  I wonder occasionally how many of those “genes” will not be passed on because of the scarcity of human contacts in the future.)

“What of the other car?” I asked.

“Not a bolt, scrap, or stain,” she said.  “Well, that isn’t entirely true.  There was a black piece of fiberglass that was shaped kind of like this,” she made a semi-circle shape with her fingers, “past the intersection.  I haven’t heard of anything coming from the model group yet, but they’re looking for a chewed-up black SUV.  It’d have to be something huge like that.  I hate it, you know?  Drive an SUV because you’re scared of being hit by SUVs.  Vicious cycle, unsustainable, and all that.”

I have been unsuccessful in spelling my GPS to follow leylines instead of streets, but I persevere.

I also recognize a partial semi-circle shape as a claw.

I sent her off with some herbs and a blessing, and sat staring at the wall for about twenty minutes.

Then I started to swear.  He should have called.  He should have let me know he was in danger, and then that he was just fine.  He should have had me pick him up at the hospital and drive him home.  He should have…

…done nothing of the sort.  We were over.  We didn’t owe each other anything, let alone me acting like his mom.

I picked up the phone to tell him so.

I didn’t know what I would have said if it had picked up.  I wasn’t going to tell him I couldn’t lose him.  He had been a part of my life too long for me to easily shut that down, but words like that were still easily misinterpreted, especially by men.  I let it ring.  And ring.  And ring.

And a cold bolt of jealousy hit me in the base of the spine.  Was he too busy with that Doloise creature to pick up the phone?  He always picked up the phone for me.  It was written in the depths of his psyche, and not even in my handwriting.  I tried again and this time got the “not in the range of service” message.

That wasn’t jealousy.  Oh, alright, the ridiculous thought of him and that exquisite woman was jealousy, but not the cold at the base of my spine. Something had happened to him.

“Sylvie!  Has E called you?  Oh, c’mon.  I’m his ex-girlfriend, heavy on the ex-, and I have no plans on changing that.  I’m just…”

I didn’t want to say it aloud.  There’s “magical thinking” for you.

“I’m a little concerned about him, that’s all.  Like, I had `a bad feeling about this’ kind of concerned.  Yes, I know, you’re younger than Star Wars.  Yeah, come on over.  I’ll start up some dinner.”  I heated the cauldron on my glass-top stove anyway.  Unless I needed flames, the water didn’t care how it was boiled.

“Matana?”  Her cellphone worked erratically at the best of times, so I called to her blood beast instead.  Just one of those magical strumming of the strings things like those that attract spiders in their webs.

The girls arrived at about the same time.  Matana from above, Sylvia from the car she and her roommates had a complex timeshare with, something to do with class schedules and phases of the moons and patterns of dew drops or somesuch esoterica.

“I’m worried about E,” I said.  No prelude, none of the overlong explanations I had been coming up with in my head.  “I think something has happened to him.”

“And rightly so,” Matana snapped.  “I lost track of him at the restaurant.”

Sylvia spun around.  “You were… stalking him?” and there was an accusation in her voice.

I jumped in and repeated it, but with far less shrill concern.  There’s no such thing as a vegetarian vampire.  The spiritual coin and necessary vintage may differ, but Matana’s was a blood craving.  E was safe from her because I had been granted the secret of what blood she needed before agreeing to the exchange.  It’s a secret, no, I’m not telling you.

Matana smiled.  If she were being possessed by her creature she might have flashed fang, but her expression was what the authors of those silly urban fantasies meant when they said that.  “He was interesting.”  She put out a shapely dark hand towards Sylvia.  “I sensed the Mark on him.”

“The Mark?” I think Sylvie and I said it in stereo.

“For the lack of a better term, his aura had been recently impacted by a number of strong magical effects.  You didn’t see?” she asked the last gently.  The one thing you never ask another witch is the extent of their power.  It’s a big etiquette buster.

I think “aura” is a dumb term – it’s more like gravity and you get a lot of space debris in it, but then, it takes me a certain level of concentration/meditation to see them.  I’m more of the type to listen to my gut instincts than ascertain the specifics of “Is this because of a psychological change or a sorcerous one?” from someone who is pinging my subconscious.

I got that term from E, didn’t I?  I think so.

“I don’t think I would have put it that way.  What restaurant?”

“It’s a little more complicated than that.”  When a vampire plays coy, you are welcome, nay, required to bristle, and that gentle hand came out to put distance between us.  “He was visited by a Power that charged him with something.  He may simply be seeking out a way to pay that off.”

Why does my boy get visits from Powers?  Wait, not “my boy.”  Deep breath, Mags.   I only invoked certain Powers when I thought things I was doing would interest them and they might want a piece of it.  It’s what made me mostly a witch, not a full-time priestess.  “What did he get into?  It’s something with big black claws.”  I forced myself to stay calm.

“Like the talons of eagles,” she said.  “He has meddled in the affairs of Dragons.”

“And he’s crunchy and good with ketchup,” Sylvia said, as someone had to.  “You guys are serious, right?  Dragons?”

“There are more things in Heaven and Earth,” I half-quoted from memory.

“So, is he a St. George type, or do we have to rescue him like a princess?” Sylvia demanded.

I don’t know what about that was funny to the vampire, but both of us broke out laughing.

“My mind is racing over all the terrible possibilities your Vasilisa left us with,” I said, moving quickly back up the hill.

“Terrible possibilities?” Artur asked.  He didn’t have to catch up so much as hold himself back well enough to hear me.  He didn’t quite have a full seven-league stride (not like the Water Prince) but with legs like tree trunks you do manage to eat up a lot of ground.  Only not literally.

“I was thinking about how Dragons reproduce, if they don’t… make with the squishy.”

“Parthenogenesis?” Artur suggested.

“That’s a word you don’t expect to come out of the mouth of a eight foot something tree guy.  Um.”

“What, too high-falutin’ for ya?  Mister `make with the squishy’?”

“If you imagine any word coming out of–yeah.”  I sighed.  “I was actually thinking things like, `It’s too late, she’s already expelled an embryo into Doloise somewhere, probably the esophagus for the pop culture reference.'”

Artur chewed on that for a moment, only not literally.  “Pleasant,” he decided.

“Or maybe a magical technique like that.   Dragons laying eggs in the Realm’s aura,” I shrugged.

“Naul has the talons of an eagle, not the features of a cuckoo,” Artur suggested.

“So eggs are a possibility.  I thought the scales made them pretty reptilian, but I guess Nellie looked kind of cuddly.  What is a Dragon?”

“Not ovoviviparous?” Artur asked, casually.

I broke down the word in my head, pretending I wasn’t talking to him.   Oh, fine, I wasn’t pretending.  “How old are you again?”

“Just because I look about thirteen doesn’t mean I don’t read.”

“I gave you the benefit of fifteen at least,” I retorted.  “You have the sullen kid thing down pat.”

“To the people of my father’s kind I will probably never be anything but,” he admitted.  “I would argue sullen, though.  I’m young enough, mortal enough to be a kid.  I like to think it gives me the excuse to have some of the exuberance of youth.  There’s a lot to be said for the freedom to make mistakes.  I hate to blame things on not knowing any better, but having my enthusiasm run away with me in trying to do the right thing is worth a heck of a lot.”

“Better to ask forgiveness than permission and all that?”  I shrugged, trying not to trip over Nikolai as he sped up past me.  He acted as if this were a great game and he was out taking a run with me. 

“Better than the being victorious or coming home on your shield part, I think,” Artur suggested. 

“How mortal are you?”

He laughed.  “Mortal enough not to kill you for your rudeness.”

“Hey, that’s why I asked you,” I teased.  “Seriously, though, is it every practitioner who likes to hedge the extent of their abilities?”

“If you hear someone say, `I can’t do that,’ it’d better be a moral stance,” he agreed.

“Huh.  I am so glad I’m small potatoes.”

“Not if it’s a hashbrown world.”

“I have never heard it put that way.”

“I eat a lot of fast food.”

“Can you do that?”  My curiosity will get the better of me, I’m sure.

“A lot of my kind have moral stances against all sorts of food, but I’m not that picky.  I digest some things better than others, but who doesn’t?   I try not to eat anything sentient, but I also don’t administer any kind of IQ tests.”

“You’re not hungry, are you?” I was kidding.

“After the smell of burning Ivan?  Nah, that put me off my appetite for another hour or two I think.”  He winked.

“So, no photosynthesis?  If I cut you you won’t bleed sap?” 

Artur looked down at his legs, as if suddenly noting he was part tree.  “Separation of kingdoms is a tough one, but life and magic have a common source.  And if you cut me, I will bleed a sap,” he threatened.

“So did your folks make with the squishy?”

The half-lesiye started laughing.  “Did yours?”

“Are you implying –”

“Hey, what does the spelldog have?” Artur interrupted me.

“Spell dog?  Sorcepup?  Spelluppy?  Spound of Spell?  Nevermind.”  I looked over to where Artur was pointing.  Nikolai was crouched down on the ridge.  Artur was going to have a better look, but it suggested a good time to be quiet and get down.

Good thing, too, because that’s when things started exploding.

There were too many sounds at first, and it hit like a wall.  My brain did a fairly good job at trying to separate the earth-shattering kaboom from the screaming of something that wasn’t human, and the other assorted noises of wood cracking and stone shattering and glass and other materials pushed by kinetic force to pieces.  My eyes watched as time compressed.  Artur fell over from the shockwave, Nikolai and I pressed ourselves even deeper into the dirt, trying to avoid splinters and shards as they rocketed towards us. 

Under all of the sound, a name.

My name.

What?

Things continued to split and snap, until the Rice Krispies metaphors were quiet like a bowl that sat there during your shower.  I don’t recommend it – leaves you with soggy cereal and that’s no fun.  (Well, unless it’s Cream of Wheat.  That’s designed to be soggy.)  Nikolai made a whine I could barely hear.

Artur was still down.

“I’d offer you a hand up,” I said, in the silence.

“No, no, I’ve got it.”  He twisted something, just like he was stretching his back or straightening his legs, and there was the change, tree trunks into legs, knees, all of that anatomy stuff.  I turned around – it made me feel uncomfortable, like I was watching someone dress…or undress… or something like that, and it wasn’t a cute girl and I wasn’t invited.

Nikolai made that same noise, and I looked at him.  Nothing had punctured him, but he wasn’t happy.  I couldn’t tell if it was a warning.  How much was the spell, well, spelled to be doglike?  How much of it was just a function of the things the spell did, like hunt? 

Wizards made my head hurt.  Trying to figure out what they could do was as bad as trying to figure out what they couldn’t do, and it seemed to be more of a matter of imagination than limit of power.  I didn’t want to believe it – it seemed to go against some kind of internalized gut-feeling of physics I had.

Speaking of physics, I stood up and looked over the ridge.

There had been some kind of structure there – a yurt?  A sweat lodge?  A 5 star Hilton?  I couldn’t tell anymore, well, except that on the latter there were no carpet remnants and I think there would have had to have been the detritus of a chandelier.  Maybe even a piano, and the piano would have still been burning.  No piano, no chandelier, no leather sofas, so it was probably something a little less grand.  Lots of wood, most of it still smoking, lots of stone, and a stairwell deep into the ground.

“We need a cleric and a thief and a fighter,” I said aloud.

I heard a grunt from Artur.

“You’re the wizard and probably the backup warrior.  Nikolai’s the scout.  I’m the henchman, I think.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about, unless it’s a bad fantasy novel.  Which, if you don’t mind my opining, is most of them.”

“Sturgeon’s Law hits fantasy at more like ninety four percent, I know,” I responded.  “I was making our adventuring group before we go down into the dungeon.”

“Under the lake.  The hidden city.”  He stood up, and he was wearing shorts.  They didn’t quite match his T-shirt, being more of the underclothing variety. 

“Echoes of Ys?  Is Nellie a water dragon after all?”

“You are a strange, strange man, E.”  He laughed and dusted himself off a little.  “Too much fantasy rots your brain.”

“My brain doesn’t have teeth.”  I didn’t add the “steel trap” metaphor.

“Something we can both agree on,” he snorted, walking up to take a look at the wreckage.  “So, did we trip something or is it the welcoming party?”

“I thought I heard my name.”

He paused, absorbing this information, then shrugged.  “Then we’re expected.”

Nikolai stood up and near me, pressing his head into my hand.  I scritched him absently behind the ears.  “Well, ready to go, boy?”  He was shaking. “Let’s see if we can get some nice juicy dragon steaks,” I told him.   I moved after Artur down the ridge and to the standing stones, charred as they were from the blast.

Nikolai sniffed the air and then followed. 

“You first?” I asked, hopefully.

“You’re the one with the invitation,” he pointed out, as I was afraid he would.

“Yeah, yeah,” I muttered.  “It looks dark in there.”  I fished out my phone and switched it to flashlight mode.  “This won’t last for long,” I warned.

“Or you could pick up one of the burning splinters and make a torch,” he pointed out.

“Oh, yeah.”  I knew how to do it in, well, abstract.  Artur was in his 15-year-old form, and barefoot.   I downgraded him from fighter/magic-user to halfling, but I didn’t say it out loud.

I did have some self-preservation instincts, after all.