Dragon's Eye

by Robin Joy Wirth

  “There’s simply no talking to you about this, is there, Grelda?” said Felicity with resignation. “I would be better off trying to swap recipes with you than attempting to modernize your backward mindset.”

  “Oh? Have you got any that I might like to try out?”

  “I was teasing you, witch, as well you know,” Felicity grumbled.

  “Well, my dear girl, you’ve done enough for the day,” she said. “And, as graduation is in one week, I believe you need to be studying more than you need to be cooking and cleaning with me. I’m going to give you the week off.

  “Now, I highly doubt that the council would choose to apprentice someone as brilliant as you with me, so if they don’t, you must still come to see me upon occasion, else I will miss you greatly.”

  “Oh, Grelda, don’t go all weepy on me,” Felicity said as she kissed her cheek. “I promise you, I’ll come as often as I can. Life would become quite dull without all your stories to sustain me.”

  “You’re such a dear young lady,” she said as she gave her a hug. “I cannot fathom how such a polite, unassuming miss would ever have broken the law to begin with.”

  “Neither can I, to tell you the truth,” Felicity admitted. “However, I’m a firm believer that everything happens for a purpose. Perhaps I broke the law so that I’d have the honor of becoming friends with you.”

  “Get out of here, imp, and mind you go straight back to the Academie,” she said. “Some of the young wizards have been up to no good ever since that silly law was appealed.”

  “Don’t remind me,” Felicity grumbled. “I may as well have done nothing at all, for all the attention my words received.”

  “It’s all to the good, dearie,” Grelda said. “You know that law would never have worked out to our advantage.”

  “Yes, I suppose you’re right,” she answered just to be agreeable. “I’ll see you again soon.”

  Felicity stepped outside and raised her wand high in the air, floating back to the Academie like a rapid beacon in the evening sky.

  NINE

  It had been quite a while since Felicity had enough free time to frequent the massive library that filled one entire tower of the Academie Magica. She spent as much time inside its walls as possible during the week of finals, just in case she would never get the opportunity again. The day before the graduation ceremony Felicity received the happy news that she had, indeed, missed absolutely no questions on her final tests, and that she would be the Valedictorian. Though she had always expected to be thrilled by such news, she found that she had mixed emotions about it, now that the hope had become a reality.

  For ten years, from age seven to seventeen, her only true purpose in life had been to achieve this one goal. She had known, at the core of her very being, that she was going to do so. And now that she had, she almost felt a hollowness deep inside her, like she’d suddenly lost her direction completely. What was her purpose in life to be now that she’d obtained her lifelong goal? What new achievement should she strive for, when she didn’t even know to which profession she was about to be assigned?

  A moment of dread passed over her when she had the uncomfortable thought that she would be relegated to a kitchen for six more years. If they did that, she’d be tearing her already unruly hair out by its never-ending roots. She couldn’t do it—she wouldn’t do it, if they tried to place her there.

  That was not to say she disliked Grelda in any way, of course, she just didn’t think doing dishes was the place where she would be the most useful. Surely with so much learning and a mind filled with innovative ideas, she ought to be sent somewhere they could make better use of her skills than that.

  As Felicity continued to speculate on her future, she suddenly felt the pull of some unseen force tug at the back of her mind. It persisted for a few minutes before she was certain it was not going away.

  Curious, she followed it to its source, and found a most unusual book hidden in the farthest corner of the library on a dusty old shelf. It looked as though no one had even come back here for ages, for her footprints were clearly the only ones to have disturbed the heavy coating of dust that covered the dark tiles.

  “Why would some book compel me to come back here?” she mumbled as she stepped forward to pick it up. It looked as though it would weigh a ton, yet somehow it seemed almost as light as a feather in her grasp.

  She wiped off the thick layer of grime so that she could read the cover. Engraved deeply into a leather background, the lettering etched the following words: ‘The Lore and Magic of Dragons.’ Realizing that Grelda’s mention of dragons had struck a chord within her before, Felicity was certain that finding this book could be no coincidence.

  She finished removing the filth, then surreptitiously slipped the book into her bag, promising herself that someday she would return it, after she’d figured out its purpose in her life. For as she well knew, nothing of a magical nature happened without a purpose.

  Once she returned to the main floor of the library, Felicity headed casually toward the exit, fingering books here and there along the way. She didn’t want to appear as though anything was out of the ordinary—especially since if the librarian happened to catch her sneaking out the book it would either extend her sentence or land her back in another jail cell—neither of which occurrences she had any desire to endure.

  “Ah, Miss Lake, I heard you were named the class Valedictorian,” said the librarian, Miss Gilwalter, with an enigmatic smile. “I was so happy for you when I heard. I know it’s what you’ve always wanted.”

  “Indeed, yes,” said Felicity with as pleased a smile as she could muster. “I was certain that I could do it.”

  “Were you working on your speech just now?” she asked curiously. “You seemed to have disappeared for quite a while.”

  “Really?” she asked, genuinely curious herself now. “It didn’t seem very long; only a moment or two.”

  “Oh, no, I’m sure it was almost an hour,” she told her. “I was beginning to wonder if you’d gotten lost somewhere.”

  “Not at all,” Felicity chuckled. “I was just saying good-bye to this dear old library. I’m certain that wherever life takes me, I won’t be seeing it again anytime soon, for I won’t have time tomorrow to return.”

  “I’ll be sad to see you go,” said Miss Gilwalter with a melancholy little sigh. “You’ve become a bit of a fixture around this old place.”

  Felicity’s nerves were starting to get the better of her as she stood chatting with the witch, who obviously was hoping to have a long conversation to make up for her loss. She grew even more upset when she could swear she heard the inside of her bag begin to hum.

  “Miss Lake? Are you quite all right? I’ve asked you three times already?”

  “What? I’m sorry,” Felicity said with a shake of her head. “Just a bit of nerves, I guess.”

  “Nerves? You?” she laughed. “You’ve never batted an eye a day in your life.”

  Felicity snorted at this. “Of course I have, I just didn’t let anyone know about it.”

  “Well, I’ve never seen you batting them at any of the boys around here, either,” she teased. “Is that something you’re planning on doing now that you’ve accomplished your original goal?”

  “What, and end up being stuck at home trying to feed seven kids?” Felicity shuddered. “I don’t think I’m quite ready for that yet.”

  “Oh, Felicity, you don’t have to start mass producing children in order to enjoy the company of a man,” she told her with a chuckle. “They are useful for more than just one thing, you know.”

  “To hear them talk, they’re the only ones who are useful for anything at all,” Felicity sniffed disdainfully. “Just look at Dervish McTavert, for example. He thinks he knows everything. And then, of course, there’s Lancelot Jones.”

  “What about Lancelot Jones?” she asked. “He looks rather like he’d be useful for plenty of things.”

  Felicity gasped, and her face turned fla
ming red. “I wouldn’t know,” she lied.

  Miss Gilwalter laughed at this enigmatically. “Ha, I thought as much. You’ve been spacing off excessively ever since you met that particular wizard, not that I can blame you in the least. The question is, what do you intend to do about it?”

  “Do?” Felicity asked. “What do you mean, do? Why would a powerful, influential wizard who could have his pick of the litter want anything to do with a bookish, wild-haired witch like me? Especially after the way we met.”

  “Because you are a bright, beautiful young witch who just happens to catch the eyes of many gentlemen, both young and old, whether you are aware of the fact or not. And I happen to know that Lancelot Jones has a particular preference for petite, pretty girls.”

  “And how do you know that?”

  “Had you never seen his wife, then?” she asked. “She was very much like you in many ways. Very small, but very bright, and certainly a powerful witch in her own right.”

  “I hadn’t even seen much of the wizard himself until the very night we met,” Felicity pointed out. “But what ever happened to his wife in the first place, may I ask?”

  “Apparently she ran off with an elf,” said Miss Gilwalter conspiratorially.

  “My goodness, that poor man,” said Felicity, feeling a bit more sympathetic than she ought, all things considered.

  “That was over ten years ago,” she added. “Surely he's over it by now. These days he seems to be married only to his work.”

  “But perhaps that means he isn’t over it at all,” Felicity pointed out with a dejected sigh.

  “No, I think not,” she agreed. “I happened to see him at one of the dating halls I frequent a few months ago. I think Dervish must have dragged him there. McTavert himself has a great eye for the witches, and there are plenty who have an eye for him as well.”

  “And did Lancelot Jones seem at all interested in anyone there?” Felicity asked curiously. “Why didn’t you try for him yourself?”

  “Well, I might have done, if I hadn’t already hooked up with a really hot wizard earlier in the evening, well before the two of them came in,” she explained. “He and I were just leaving together at the time.”

  “And how did that work out?” Felicity inquired with a girlish smirk.

  “Let’s just say that my bed seems a bit warmer these days,” she chuckled. “Though I should probably not be telling you such things as yet. Drop me a line when you know where your placement is, and maybe we can talk some more.”

  “Yes, I’d like that,” Felicity said. “Maybe we could go shopping together sometime.”

  “And here I thought you were immune to the more frivolous things in life,” she laughed, then moved forward to give her a hug. “By the way, since that book called you, it’s meant to be yours. You needn’t bring it back at all, you know.”

  “How did you—”

  “I’ll talk to you soon, my dear,” she chuckled. “Perhaps I’ll tell you then.”

  Felicity skipped quickly up the hall and on toward the dorms. She took the stairs three at a time as she went to the top floor, four stories up, and flung her bag on top of her bed so she could open it and remove the humming book.

  “That must be it,” she said with a shake of her head. “She must have heard it humming after all.”

  Felicity knew she should be writing her speech, but she spent the greater part of the night with her nose stuck in her newest treasure. She dozed off only a couple hours before she had to get dressed, and her eyes were puffy as she rushed out to join the other acolytes who had gathered in the main hall.

  “Are you ready for this, Felicity Lake?” asked Jane with a smile.

  “As ready as I’ll ever be,” she answered, and they all walked out to the field for their ceremony.

  TEN

  Even though it seemed like twenty hours later when it was finally time for Felicity to give the speech she was supposed to have prepared, only about twenty minutes had actually elapsed. Knowing she had no idea what she wanted to say did not sit well with her, since she was normally prepared for every circumstance at all times.

  “Good afternoon, everyone,” said Felicity as she stepped up on the stage. “Can you believe we’ve finally made it to the top? Here we’ve been studying so long and so hard, the time has just literally passed us by.”

  The audience laughed.

  “Yes, we’re all finally graduating from Academie Magica, and moving on towards the world of adulthood,” she said with a sigh, then a shake of her head. “But if you’re anything like me, it’s just hit you that moving on also means there are many things we will be leaving behind. Like all the friends that we have made over the years, and all the dear old haunts we have grown used to, and even this wonderful old school itself, for example.

  “Every magical brick in this place was lovingly crafted throughout the centuries. Over that time, it has grown larger to accommodate our growing needs, yet it is, despite that fact, the one constant that remains fixed in our otherwise shifting world.

  “But perhaps that is as it should be. The Magi have been clinging to their past for far too long. We have followed the same old ways as our ancestors before us for centuries, clinging to them like they were the Veil itself.

  “Yet the world outside has changed as well. The Mundanes have advanced their technologies and improved their way of life while we stood still. If we are to keep up with them, we as adults must usher in a new era if our world is to continue to thrive.

  “In the past, it was always taken complacently, for example, that we could not grow our own food because magic imbues it within the confines of the Veil. But nobody that I know of, since the Veil was fortified, has ever attempted to discover any new spells that could make it possible.

  “And nobody in recent history has even tried to strike a bargain with the Mundanes before Archibald Flanders’ recent attempt. We have, instead, sunk to an even greater low, not only failing to honor the deal made by the High Mage for the return of Theodore Lundy, but then also elected to requisition our own lands in Mundania through the bewitchment of its true owners.

  “These are the kinds of behaviors that are leading our people down a path we ought not to take. I want to challenge each and every one of you to consider alternative methods to using force to have our needs met.

  “I believe that we could live in peace and harmony with all of creation, to work toward the common good of all creatures, if only our people would try.

  “And now, you and I are the people. No longer are we the unheard children of our pasts, but a strong new force, ready to take on the world.”

  “Propagandist!” shouted Bruno Lovette from the back of the assembly. He shook one of his fists and stood to turn fully around, showing her his back.

  “And I also believe the best place to start making the necessary changes must be among ourselves. For if I cannot even complete a five-minute speech without somebody flinging irrational statements my way, then we truly have a long way to go to right the wrongs of this world.”

  Hardly anyone clapped when she finished speaking. Headmistress Meriwether looked quite ill at ease as she stepped forward to congratulate the graduates. Most of the students threw their caps at Felicity rather than up into the air.

  Felicity dodged their well-aimed missiles with a flick of her wand as she accepted the certificate the headmistress handed her. Then she did a double take as she looked at the back of the room again.

  There, standing alone in the background, Felicity spotted the one person she would never have expected to attend. She was quite surprised as he lifted a wand and floated to the front of the field to wait for her.

  “Hello, Director McTavert. What brings you to my ill-advised little speech?” said Felicity as she stepped off of the stage and came to stand at his side.

  “Well, lassie, as a matter of fact, ye have,” he told her in his heavy brogue. “The Council deliberated a great deal about where to place ye for the next six years. It se
ems thot nobody wanted to take on a discipline case, let alone a young woman who apparently attempts to sow the seeds of discontent wherever she goes. But I thought of the perfect place for a woman as spunky and headstrong as ye.”

  “Oh, really?” Felicity answered, not at all certain she liked which way this conversation seemed to be headed. “And where might that be, sir?”

  “There’s only one place I want a wee bit of a lass who was able to get inside my Magical Museum so easily, and thot would be within the walls of thot very same Museum itself, where I can keep a close watch on ye,” he said with an enigmatic grin. “I had no trouble at all convincing the other members of the Council just where ye belong.”

  “You can’t be serious,” said Felicity. The first wave of shock had now passed, and a second was gathering steam already.

  “I’m quite serious, Miss Felicity,” he insisted. “Lance has been in need of an assistant for some time now, whether he likes to admit it or no. And ye are imminently qualified for the task. I had a look at thot charm ye conjured in my office before. Was it something ye invented yerself?”

  “Of course it was,” she said as if the answer should have been self-evident. “I make up spells and charms on the fly all the time.”

  “Aye, I thought as much. Then how would ye enjoy a job categorizing and archiving thousands of spells thot are so rare thot only the copies within our Museum remain?” said Dervish in a conspiratorial tone. “Ye have to keep them under wraps, of course, but I have no fear thot a girl so honorable as to take all the blame for an idea thot was not even her own would betray thot trust.”

  “You’re right, sir,” she agreed. “I’m nothing, if not loyal.”

  “On lunch breaks ye can even study anything ye wish, which I’m sure would tickle yer fancy as well.”

  “Very much,” she said. “But I do have one question, sir. Have you told Lancelot Jones about all of this?”

  “Och! Of course I told him, lassie. I’d never presume to hire an assistant thot the wizard with need of one wouldna approve of first,” he said. “In fact, I believe he took the whole thing rather well. We have agreed thot Lancelot, and not I, will be yer protector till ye come of age.”