Dragons and Mages: A Limited Edition Anthology

by Pauline Creeden

  “Luna, what are you doing?” I whispered as I purposely stepped in front of the doorway, shielding her from any passersby.

  There, inside room 321, in full view of the woman sitting in a chair beside the bed, was Luna, in all her crystal-blue ice dragon glory. Her sky-blue scales reflected the artificial lights that shone through her wings’ thin skin and her over-grown head nearly hit the ceiling while her long, armored tail slipped beneath the hospital bed. And worse of all, there was no denying Luna’s presence. A huge smile filled the lass’s face as she looked at me while scratching Luna right behind the ear.

  “Your pet?” she asked. “Her name’s Luna?”

  Crap.

  She had heard me whispering for Luna out in the hallway.

  There went my discreet visit to this realm.

  Chapter 2

  “Luna!” I shot my dragon a don’t-mess-with-me glare, which I knew was quite convincing. “Invisible. Now.”

  My ice dragon returned my stare with her puppy-dog eyes for only a moment before she disappeared with nothing more than a slight shimmer of the air where she had been, giving me a full view of the young woman who sat in the chair beside the hospital bed. Her skin was the color of milky tea, but despite its color, dark circles were clear beneath her dark brown eyes. Her complexion had a shine from fever like I had seen in many of the people I had treated back in the seven kingdoms.

  “You didn’t have to do that,” the young woman said. Her voice was hoarse and raspy, like those with the lung fever I cured back home. “She didn’t scare me.”

  Scare her? That wasn’t what I was afraid of. More like letting a mortal from this world know that dragons and magic really did exist. Sure, I might have joked with Ruby’s friend that I cured her with magic, but that wasn’t concrete proof. Now, a fully-scaled dragon standing right in front of you? That was a whole different story. Our world’s main fear was that the mortals from this realm—with their master grasp on technology—would be able to open up a portal to our world. Right now, our magical kingdoms remained not very crowded. We had exactly the number of people we needed. Could you imagine what would happen if the billions of people in this world flooded into ours?

  And worse than that, this world had never experienced dragons.

  What would these people would do when they discovered the magic a dragon possessed?

  And what about us witches? Could their guns, bombs, and other technology force us to do whatever it was they wanted? Magic must be kept a secret from this realm. How had Ruby talked me into coming here?

  I slipped into the lass’s room and shut the heavy wooden door behind me. “You can’t tell anyone about her.”

  “I already have.” She sucked in the corner of her pale lips.

  I stepped forward. “What do you mean?”

  She twisted her hospital gown between her slender fingers, giving me a view of her too-skinny legs. “I’ve been dreaming about dragons for as long as I can remember and have told a few people about my dreams over the years.”

  “I’m serious,” I snapped. Her head tilted back, and I knew I had stepped over a line. The big, scary lumberjack in this young lady’s room? I softened my voice. “You can’t tell anyone about Luna…or me. Please?”

  “Or you?” she tilted her head and narrowed her eyes at me. “Are you not supposed to be here?”

  “Something like that.” My hand fell on the doorknob. “Luna, let’s go.” I opened the door, but before we could leave, the woman’s voice caught me off-guard.

  “Please stay.”

  Her words made my muscles tense, and I glanced over my shoulder to where she sat. Such a small body, seemingly lost in the nearly empty room. “Why?”

  She shrugged and grabbed her knees, lifting her feet into her chair. “You’re the first visitor I’ve had in the month that I’ve been here.”

  She’d been confined to this awful smelling place for a month?

  That wasn’t my problem, though. All I agreed to do was help Ruby. There were millions upon millions of sick people in this realm and if I started healing them, I’d never return home. Sure, I tried to be helpful in my world, but I was not selfless, nor ever claimed to be selfless. I opened the heavy wooden door further, and took a step towards the hallway, but her voice stopped me again.

  “At least tell me your name.”

  My hand tightened on the knob. “Greyson.”

  “I’m—” but she didn’t finish. A coughing attack abruptly hit her, and suddenly, her room was ablaze with the sound of alarms from the machines she was connected to.

  From the hallway, a nurse rushed in wearing the oddest clothing with drawings of puppies printed all over it. Her name tag read, Marge.

  “What happened to Izzy?” she asked, not taking her eyes—or hands—off the young lady curled up into the smallest ball I had ever seen an adult compress themselves into.

  Izzy must be the lass’s name, and it fit her. She was a bit quirky and out there. “I don’t know. We were talking, and she started coughing.”

  Marge draped Izzy’s arm around her shoulder and then nodded to me. “Can you help me get her back into bed?”

  Before I knew it, I had the frail little frame of a woman who was as light as a girl back into the hospital bed. Veins ran through her eyes, turning the whites a dark shade of pink that was almost red. That hadn’t been there before her coughing, had it? The nurse handed her a pile of pills that this world was fond of, along with some liquid medicine, and in-between coughs, Izzy managed to swallow the medicine. Slowly, she settled down.

  “What’s your name?” the nurse asked when the room finally silenced.

  “Greyson.”

  “Are you a friend of Izzy?”

  I examined the lass lying in the bed. She wasn’t much different in age from me, yet her body showed signs it was failing. For a woman who would have been radiant if she was healthy, her hair was now dull and the deep brown almost seemed transparent as if all of its pigmentation had stopped being produced. The undertone of her tacky skin was greying. Her nail beds were pure white. “No. I’m not a friend.”

  Marge nodded. “I appreciate your help, but perhaps you should take off and let Izzy rest.”

  “No,” Izzy croaked, barely audible. “He is a friend. Right, Greyson?” My body seemed to grow lighter with the way my name rolled off her lips. With effort, she turned her head towards me. “Stay. Please. Tell me about Luna. At least until I fall asleep and dream of her.”

  “It won’t be long,” Marge said. “Her pain pills zonk her out in about fifteen to twenty minutes.”

  Pain pills?

  What was wrong with this woman?

  Marge took some measurements with the instrument around her neck and turned the lights down in the room before she left.

  I waved a hand towards the only corner of this room big enough for Luna to stand, knowing that my dragon wouldn’t have left me. “Go find Ruby and come get me when she’s ready to leave.”

  A bit of frost formed on the ground as Luna headed through the doorway after the nurse. When I turned back to Izzy, my heart went out to her. In my hands, I had the power to heal. How could I not do something about this situation? I did have the time.

  “You want to hear about Luna?” I asked, and when she nodded, I sat beside her on a chair and began to tell my tale. “I met Luna when I was sixteen. Way too old for a…person like me to meet a dragon, but she took to me almost immediately. I had just lost my father…” or rather, he disowned me and tried to steal my memories, “but Luna filled in my loneliness.”

  Izzy nodded. “I understand loneliness.”

  I continued, “Luna and I are always together. We watch each other’s backs.” By now, Izzy’s eyes grew heavy, and I reached out to touch her arm, to heal her, but instead, I found myself taking her hand.

  She wrapped her fingers around mine and smiled oh-so-slightly before her features relaxed and she whispered, “Please come to visit me again…” but then, her hand fell limp i
n mine and the pattern of her breathing slowed and relaxed like the rest of her.

  I leaned in closer to her bed, and lifted her hand, cupping it between both of mine. Closing my eyes, I sifted through the magical sand that filled her body, searching for the rocks, pebbles, and boulders of disease, but as soon as I felt the static charge of the sand, I knew I couldn’t help her.

  Her disease wasn’t brought on by anything in this world.

  She had been cursed by magic.

  And magic couldn’t reverse magic.

  With as much static that I sensed inside her, she had been fighting this thing for a long time. It was only a matter of time until the curse won. There was nothing I could do for this woman.

  She was going to die.

  I stared at her for way too long, admiring the few things about her that weren’t touched by the disease. Her black eyelashes were long and curled, her skin, though pale, was smooth and touchable. Her dainty fingers fit perfectly in my hand.

  I stopped myself at that thought. I didn’t have thoughts like that about my patients, and not about someone from this world. Who was I kidding? I didn’t have thoughts like that anymore. Period. Plus, Izzy was going to die. A heartbreak waiting to happen.

  “There you are,” Ruby called into the room, and I dropped Izzy’s hand and leaned away from the bed I had been hunched over.

  I pressed my index finger to my lips. “Shh. She just fell asleep.”

  Ruby arched an eyebrow. “She? Who is she?”

  I shrugged. “Just a patient here. Her name’s Izzy, and I helped the nurse get her to bed. Are you ready to return home?” I couldn’t wait to get the hell out of this hospital.

  When my sister nodded, I stood up but couldn’t leave Izzy’s hand—the one I had just been cupping like it was a valuable piece of gold—dangling at the side of her bed. I lifted it and tucked it beside her, letting my eyes linger on her a bit longer. My stomach swirled. I hated magic more times than I appreciated it. Here was an example. I was given this power to heal, but couldn’t do anything to help a woman who appeared to deserve a magical miracle. The situation was more frustrating since I had tried and failed than if I had never tried at all.

  “Is there something going on here?” Ruby asked.

  I straightened my flannel shirt and left Izzy’s side, not looking back. “No. I just tried to help her, but she’s been cursed.”

  “Cursed?” Ruby scrunched up her little nose. “Like from magic?”

  “How else?”

  Ruby and I worked our way off the hospital unit, feeling the coolness from my dragon not too far behind me. We had to trust Ruby’s dragon was there, too. When we disappeared down an empty hallway, Ruby laid her hand on my shoulder and Luke and Luna reappeared and touched us as well. Luke rubbed up against Ruby’s leg while Luna rested her cool, heavy head upon my shoulder. That’s all it took, and Ruby’s special magical skill had us transported back into the beige sandstone-walled throne room of her palace.

  Royal red and white tapestries hung on the wall, giving the large room a cozy feel despite the open floorspace that rivaled any ballroom of any palace in the seven kingdoms. Beneath the Mortia flag, Ruby’s boyfriend paced circles around the ornate gold thrones. Ty held his crown in his hand and his short blond hair stood on end, like he had been running his hands through it. His white tunic had golden dragons embroidered on it, resembling Luke. It was hard for me to remember that Ty had spent years hunting and killing dragons before he met Ruby.

  Ruby didn’t seem to notice his worry, though, keeping her attention on me. “So, what are you going to do about Izzy and the curse?” Ruby asked, without missing a beat.

  I shook my head, feeling my long hair tickle my temples. “There’s nothing I can do…and it’s not my fight.”

  “Well, if you don’t fight for her, who will?” Ruby asked.

  Luna lifted her invisibility spell. She fluttered her wings and pointed to her chest with her little dragon arms.

  “You can’t be the one to help,” I said to Luna. “You can’t break a witch’s curse.”

  “If I learned anything over the past year, it’s that a dragon will always surprise you.” Ruby said, then smiled slyly at me while Ty positioned himself beside her, wrapping his arm around her waist and giving her a little peck on the cheek. “And sometimes, you’ll even surprise yourself.”

  “Are you guilt tripping me into helping her? There’s an entire hospital full of hundreds of sick people. I can’t help everyone.”

  “But she’s cursed with magic. Sounds like it’s right up your alley.”

  “She’s not even in the same world as us. I can’t get back there.”

  “Nonsense. You can come back with me tomorrow when I check on Sonja.”

  I didn’t get a chance to say anything, because Luna was jumping up and down, causing the thud of her vibrations to tickle my feet. And honestly, it wasn’t my fight, but it was something that hit close to home. Magic curses were the specialty of my mother—or at least the woman whom I assumed was my mother, since that was a bit of information that my father had never told me. Was Luciana behind this?

  Izzy had been dreaming about dragons. Was that a sign I was supposed to follow? Ruby and I were the only two witches I knew who had dragons as familiars. How could Izzy have been dreaming about Luna? Maybe we were connected somehow. Maybe Izzy had some answers to the gaping holes of my past?

  I gave Ruby a nod as I picked up my olive cloak from off the nearby rack and draped it over the ridiculous clothes I wore. “Fine. You talked me into it. I’ll be back tomorrow.”

  “Goodie!” Ruby clapped, and I laughed. Only she could bring that side out of me, but how could you not laugh at the Queen of Mortia clapping like a child. Ruby had charm, that’s for sure. Someone in our family needed to get all the charisma.

  I patted Luna’s muscular shoulder and headed for the exit. What had I gotten myself into? Well, I’d have the whole flight home on Luna’s back to ponder that.

  “Greyson, wait.” Ty whispered something to Ruby, then followed me out of the throne room and into the hallway. “There’s something I want to ask you…but not here.” His hand fell on my back as we continued our way out of the castle and into the courtyard beneath the warm midday sun. Once we were away from the castle’s walls, his hand patted Luna’s other shoulder as well, as if he needed the distraction. “Ruby and I have been together for nearly two years now…and you’re all the family Ruby has.”

  I narrowed my eyes, trying to figure out what Ty was getting at. “Not true. Our father is in your dungeon.”

  “You consider him family?” Ty raised an eyebrow that was noticeably multiple shades darker than his hair.

  I shook my head. “No. You’re right.” But I had never considered myself the only family that Ruby had.

  “Ruby and I have been ruling Mortia together.” Ty laughed, running his fingers through his hair again with his crown still clenched in his other hand. “Actually, it’s technically her kingdom since she defeated…well, that doesn’t matter. Ruby’s technically only letting me help her rule.”

  “The kingdom’s rightfully yours,” I said, knowing the lore of long-lost prince Tyler now better than ever. Their story spread through the seven kingdoms as fast as the autumn storms.

  Ty shook his head. “Doesn’t matter.” He took a deep breath. “What I’m getting at is that I’d like to make Ruby’s and my relationship official. Ugh. That doesn’t sound right. What I mean is, I want to…marry her. I want Ruby to be my wife.”

  “Marry her?”

  “I know. She’s young yet, but when you know something’s right, you just know. It’s like she’s meant to be here…in Mortia…with me. Ruling the kingdom comes so easy for her…probably because she always does the right thing.” Ty was babbling, and I didn’t need to hear all the details.

  I clasped his shoulder. “Then ask her.” It was that simple.

  Ty looked up at me with the green eyes that were so rare in this realm.
“Are you giving me your blessing?”

  I laughed. “You don’t need my blessing.”

  “But you’re her closest family.”

  “I hardly know her.”

  Ty laughed. “You really think that? You two seem to have a bond like you’ve known each other all your lives. She cares for you.”

  I turned to Luna, reaching around her neck and using her wing to pull myself up onto her back. “You don’t need my blessing. If you are even considering marrying Ruby, you should talk to her about it. It’s her decision, not mine. My opinion is that relationships are overrated.”

  I pressed my heel into Luna’s side, causing her wings to flap. As she lifted into the air, Ty called after us. “I’m taking that as your blessing!”

  I chuckled as we flew away. Ty was a good man and he made Ruby happy. He was welcome to take that as my approval.

  Chapter 3

  I didn’t sleep well that night. Usually, I was good at separating Greyson the Healer from Greyson the Hermit. Once I was tucked away in the warmth of my quaint little cabin, smelling nothing but the burning wood from the fire and the crisp mountain air, all thoughts of the seven kingdoms vanished. I had to be that way, seeing what I did as a healer, because if I kept thoughts of those I couldn’t heal and the families left with burdens with me at all times, it’d drive me crazy.

  But that lass from the hospital yesterday? I couldn’t get her out of my mind. Who would magically curse her? And how did the curse get to the non-magical realm?

  I awoke early, and as soon as the sun rose above Dragon Mountain, I had Luna flying me to Mortia’s castle. With Luna following behind, my hand traced the sandstone wall of the dungeon that hadn’t been used in so many years, but now, contained the two people I least wanted to see in the world.

  Two people I had purposefully stayed away from over the past year.

  My father was there. The man who tried to erase my memories when I was just a child.

  And the woman who I believed was my mother, but who I had spent a decade with pretending that I didn’t remember my father, so I could never ask. Luciana had the same magical skills as me, but stronger, able to manipulate a person’s health, be it for good or evil.