Old Man brought the tea over and poured himself a cup of it before pouring some more into a tiny bowl next to Rembrandt. He sipped the tea and savoured the flavour before turning his attention to the game ahead. He was not used to losing this particular game, but Rembrandt had proven his equal, and they had split the games they had played so far.
“I think today will be a good day.” Old Man smiled. “The sky is clear, the winds are kind, and the sunshine is warm.”
Rembrandt squeaked a reply. Like most members of his clan, he was keenly aware of the weather since rain and wind could severely complicate things for them. Unlike humans, rats could easily be washed away or even drowned by inclement weather, which was one of the reasons the clan had invested so much time and effort into mastering a diverse array of survival techniques. He was about to point out his first move of the game – it was his turn to start, and it was easier for Old Man to simply move the stones for him – when his ears twitched. He could have sworn that he had heard someone cry out.
“What is it?” Old Man asked. He hadn’t heard anything, but he knew that the rats had exceptionally keen senses.
Rembrandt took a tiny sip of his tea and replied with a frown.
“The Little Miss? Are you sure? I don’t hear –” Old Man stopped short as a scream most definitely rang out nearby.
Katie zoomed over their heads, her shadowy wings beating furiously. Not far behind her was the castle’s resident two-week-old dragon, Spot.
“Hmm…” Old Man rubbed his beard and tapped the side of his cup with one finger. “It would seem that they have succeeded in teaching Spot how to fly although he does appear to be chasing Katie a little too enthusiastically.”
Rembrandt must have agreed. The rat picked up his sword and pointed at a nearby tower.
“You want me to take you to the tower? All right. However, you may wish to call for reinforcements if you intend to pick a fight with Avraniel.”
* * *
Timmy was a highly intelligent man, but even he occasionally made mistakes – although if someone had asked Katie, his apprentice would have said that he made them all of the time. His most recent mistake was pointing out that if Avraniel wanted to teach Spot how to fly, well, they’d already managed to teach Katie how to fly, hadn’t they? His seemingly innocuous comment had led to the less than stellar situation unfolding in front of him, a situation that involved Katie flying as quickly as she could while a ravenous dragon – albeit a small, ravenous dragon – chased after her.
Of course, it hadn’t started out like that.
One of the main problems they had was that dragons did not learn how to fly immediately. Within two weeks of hatching, Spot was already a cuddly harbinger of death and destruction who could spew fire with reasonable accuracy and absolutely mangle things with his oversized teeth and claws. However, flying wasn’t something he could do. Timmy was certain that part of it had to do with Spot not actually having another dragon around to learn from. Flying probably had a strong instinctual component – it would have been completely ridiculous if dragons couldn’t rely on some instincts while learning to fly – but it was bound to be harder to learn without someone to copy from.
Avraniel, for all of her many fiery talents, could not fly. Sure, she could use her magic to launch herself through the air, but that wasn’t the same as flying. In fact, Spot had tried to copy her, and all he’d done was vomit fire at the floor and hurtle into the ceiling, which was humorous but also nowhere near real draconic flight. After that, they’d tried something else. Timmy had zombie wyverns and zombie drakes, so perhaps Spot could copy them.
It had worked – sort of.
Although his zombie creatures had boundless stamina and tremendous resilience, they simply didn’t have the same agility in the air as an actual dragon, nor could they achieve the dramatic shifts in speed and direction that Spot needed to learn.
That was where Katie came in.
And all things considered, Timmy thought their first attempt had gone rather well.
“Come on, twerp!” Avraniel bellowed. “Go faster!”
The girl scowled and continued to flap her wings. The elf’s constant thrashing around had knocked her glasses askew. “Can you hold on a bit less tightly? You’re choking me.”
Avraniel rolled her eyes. “If you have enough air to complain, then I am clearly not choking you. Fly faster!”
Katie had carried Avraniel through the air while Spot did his best to keep up. In a happy coincidence, Katie’s wings looked and worked a lot like a dragon’s. Then again, it most likely wasn’t a coincidence at all. It was entirely possible that his overly intelligent apprentice had deliberately modelled her wings on those of a dragon since dragons were the unquestioned masters of the sky. And with Avraniel waving and yelling encouragement, Spot had ample incentive to tag along.
But Katie had never been at her best when flying with someone else. Oh, she could do it, and she’d gotten a lot better at it too, but she was still much better when she flew on her own. And that was when the next phase of Avraniel’s brilliant plan had kicked in, which was also when Timmy should have said or done something.
What was Avraniel’s brilliant plan? It was something his master would have endorsed, which meant that it was the complete opposite of anything even remotely resembling common sense. The elf had gleefully upended a container of steak sauce over Katie’s head before throwing her out of a window and telling Spot to go after her. In retrospect, Timmy should probably have used his shovel to bash the elf and the dragon over their heads then and there. Well, maybe not Spot. It wasn’t the dragon’s fault that Avraniel’s ideas tended to be on the crazy side. Alas, Katie had chosen to do the worst possible thing when confronted by a recently hatched apex predator that was in the mood for some breakfast. Instead of flying back in through the window, she had chosen to fly away as fast as she could, which had caught Spot’s attention right away. Nothing got a predator in the mood for a hunt more than moving prey.
And that was how they had gotten to where they were now.
Katie streaked through the air as she ducked, dove, and banked around the castle’s many towers and raced along its walls and parapets. She had grown up in the castle, and she knew it better than anyone except for Timmy or Sam. She’d also gotten far more skilled in the air. But Spot was a dragon. He wasn’t anywhere near as fast as he would be one day, and his manoeuvrability could use some work, but he was still a dragon, and dragons were born to fly. As one particularly steep dive brought him even closer to Katie, the girl glanced back and shrieked.
“Katie!” Timmy shouted. “Watch out. He’s gaining on you, and he looks hungry!”
“I know, master!” Katie wailed. “Believe me, I know!”
Timmy rounded on Avraniel. The elf was watching the debacle unfold with an expression of mild interest and amusement. “You do realise that if your dragon eats my apprentice, I am not going to be happy. And I don’t mean that I’ll be a little bit annoyed. I mean that I will be very, very unhappy.” He paused and let some steel enter his voice. “You do not want me to get that unhappy.”
“Spot isn’t going to eat her,” Avraniel replied, and to his surprise, he was able to detect what sounded like real concern in her voice. “I’ve made it very clear that he can’t eat any of you. At worst, he’ll chew on her hair a bit. She’ll be fine.”
“She’d better be.”
Timmy’s gaze shifted to Katie as she swerved back toward them. Good. She’d finally worked out that the only way to get Spot off her back was to get back to the tower and land. She was almost there when the dragon tackled her in mid-air. Katie’s spectral wings crumpled, and she immediately wrapped shadows around herself to cushion her fall as she tumbled through the window and into the tower. Timmy put one hand on his shovel and stepped forward, ready to intervene if Spot got overenthusiastic.
But instead of screaming, all he heard were giggles as Spot clambered up Katie’s body and licked the steak sauce off her h
air and face. The dragon eagerly sniffed around for more before huffing in frustration and sitting on her stomach as he pawed through the pockets of her robes for more food. All he came up with was a pot of ink that he promptly spilled all over himself. He recoiled with a yelp and gingerly poked the spilt ink with one claw before deciding that it would be fun to smear it all over his scales.
“Get off me!” Katie shouted, but she wasn’t frightened so much as ticklish. Despite having grown half a foot over the past fortnight, Spot was still not particularly heavy. “Oh, fine. Stay there, but stop poking me with your tail.”
The space beside Katie rippled, and Old Man and Rembrandt appeared. The rat took note of Katie’s good humour and lowered his sword, but not before firing several angry squeaks at Avraniel. Not content with chastising the elf, Rembrandt leapt onto Spot’s snout and stared the dragon down, punctuating his remarks with some angry arm waving. The hatchling’s response was to snicker and tilt his head to one side. His tongue flicked out to try to reach Rembrandt, but the rodent was quick enough to avoid it. He ended up on top of Spot’s head, and he gave the dragon a stout poke with one paw.
“Hey, leave Spot alone, you one-eyed bastard!”
Timmy was tempted to make a snappy remark about the absurdity of a pyromaniac elf scolding a ninja rat for bullying a baby dragon but thought better of it. There wasn’t nearly enough room in the tower to dodge if Avraniel started throwing fire everywhere.
“Okay, that’s enough,” Timmy said. “Since we’re all here – except Gerald – we might as well discuss a few things. It’s been two weeks since Spot hatched. The Council wants to see him.”
“If they think that I’m bringing Spot to the capital, to that den of losers, idiots, bastards, and jerks…”
“No, they’re happy to see him via scrying sphere, which might be for the best. As funny as it would be to see Spot eat James, that would definitely make earning a pardon more difficult. Anyway, we can use Gerald’s scrying sphere in the dining room, and I’d prefer it if you could get Spot to appear as harmless and friendly as possible. The less some of the more… belligerent members of the Council get ideas, the better.”
Avraniel’s eyes narrowed into twin slits of molten gold before she nodded. Hopefully, she realised that some of the councillor’s might be interested in turning Spot into their personal weapon. On the upside, he was confident Vicky would do her best to stop that, and according to Gerald, they were, for the most part, under Vicky’s authority. The cleric had even gone so far as to say that she would do her best to ensure that the viewing was for her eyes alone, but Timmy knew that even she would struggle to get that much leeway from the rest of the Council.
When they reached the dining room, Gerald was already there, and he had his scrying sphere at the ready.
“Ah, there you are.” Gerald flinched ever so slightly when Spot brushed against his leg, but it was a far cry from the screaming he’d done the first time Spot had climbed into his lap. The bureaucrat had been assured that the dragon had no intention of eating him, but he always made sure to keep a few of the sweet cakes that Spot liked on hand or stored away with his magic. It was better to be safe than sorry, and bribing the hatchling with food seemed like a good way to earn his favour. “Councillor Winters was mostly successful. She will be the one viewing Spot, but she will also be working with one other councillor – Councillor Arthurs.”
“You mean James?” Timmy folded his hands together on the dining table. That jerk might try to make trouble for him, but James was mostly sensible when it came to important things, and a dragon most certainly qualified as important. He hoped that the other man would have the good sense to realise that the only person capable of getting along with and controlling a dragon was someone who couldn’t be burned, even by dragon fire, namely, Avraniel. “All right, Gerald. Activate the scrying sphere. Let’s get this over with.”
Gerald put the scrying sphere down in the middle of the table. It flashed several times, and an image appeared in the air above it. It was Vicky in what must have been her office. Sitting beside her in a chair was James.
“Can you see us?” Vicky asked. “And how about sound? Can you hear us?”
Instead of the ornate robes that she often wore as the highest-ranking cleric in the country, she had opted to wear the more practical clothing of a paladin. Timmy’s lips twitched. He wasn’t surprised. Vicky had never shied away from a fight if she thought it needed to be fought, and she’d made her marks on both the theological side of the Order of the Blessed Dawn and the military side. In terms of pure combat ability, there wasn’t a single person in the Order of the Blessed Dawn who could match her, and he wasn’t sure if there was anyone on the Council who could beat her in a straight up fight either.
Yes, despite her warm nature, Vicky was an absolute terror on the battlefield. Even James, the arrogant jerk, had admitted that Vicky could – to put it bluntly – kick his ass if she was so inclined.
“We can see and hear you,” Timmy replied before he turned his attention to James. “How nice to see you, James. You’re looking well.”
“Is that sarcasm?” James rolled his eyes, and Timmy wished, not for the first time, that this wasn’t simply a scrying spell, so he could whack him with his shovel. “I suppose I have no choice but to pretend to get along with you for a few minutes. So, yes, it is nice to see you. Can I expect anything else in the mail soon?”
“Are you still angry about the hydra in a box I sent you?”
Vicky raised one eyebrow. “You sent him a hydra in a box? How did you manage that? I wasn’t aware that the Everton Postal Service carried items of that size without special permits and regulations.”
“I would like to know the answer as well,” James added. “Despite the idiocy of thinking that you could harm me with a mere hydra, I must admit that it was somewhat ingenious.” He paused. “Plus, there are some people who I think would benefit from receiving a hydra in a box.” It was a well-known fact that not all of the Council’s members got along. Outright conflict was strongly frowned upon, but petty pranks and mischief were a common occurrence.
“It’s a trade secret – necromancer stuff.” Timmy shared a smirk with Katie. She’d helped him prepare the hydra in a box. It used a number of tricks he’d picked up from corpse dealers like Mike, along with some more exotic magic. His apprentice might have to use it one day since necromancers didn’t meet face to face very often. If she had enemies, the good, old hydra-in-a-box trick might save her the trouble of having to deal with them personally. And, quite frankly, anyone who couldn’t handle a hydra in a box wasn’t a suitably menacing nemesis for his apprentice. “I’m going to assume that you want to meet Spot now.”
“Spot?” James covered his face with one hand. “You named the spawn of Black Scales – one of the terrors of our age, a dragon that has eaten countless dignitaries – you named a dragon like that Spot?”
Avraniel growled. “Have you got a problem, you coin-throwing dick?” She stuck her chin out. “Because if you do, then you know where I live. You’re welcome to come over, and we can settle this the old-fashioned way – with me kicking your ass into next year. And what kind of name is James? It’s a crap name.”
“Oh, please.” James sneered. “You might know how to sling fire everywhere, but you haven’t got a chance of beating me in a real fight. And, yes, I do have a problem with you naming a dragon like that Spot. Couldn’t you have come up with something more appropriate?”
Vicky cleared her throat. “Perhaps we should actually see the dragon in question before we make any judgements.” She frowned in mild reproach. “And could you two please stop glaring at each other. We’re communicating through scrying spheres. No amount of glaring is actually going to do anything. Besides, if you’re going to murder each other, I would prefer that you wait until after Everton’s safety has been assured.” She softened her tone. “Avraniel, could you please show us Spot?”
“Yeah, yeah, Sparky,” Avraniel mutt
ered. “Come here, Spot.”
Spot moved toward her, and the elf lifted him up onto the dining table. He was two and a half feet long, and his black scales glittered in the light cast by the scrying sphere. Timmy was again struck by how oddly proportioned he was although it had gotten a little bit better since he’d hatched. His teeth and claws seemed far too large, which may have been why Spot sometimes seemed so clumsy on the ground. According to the book, that would change with time. Spot would grow into his teeth and claws.
The dragon bristled at the two unfamiliar faces he saw, and the leading edges of his wings glinted as the sharp, blade-like edges came to the fore. Black flame sputtered in his jaws until Avraniel ran one hand down his back to soothe him. Not liking the sudden silence that filled the room, Spot climbed back into Avraniel’s arms and trilled his appreciation when she tightened her hold on him.
Vicky leaned forward. Her face broke out into a broad smile. “He is… absolutely adorable! I just want to hug him right now!”
“What?” James blurted, utterly aghast. “Adorable? Are we looking at the same creature? That thing is a killing machine! Look at its teeth and claws! It’s two and a half feet long, which means it’s grown half a foot in two weeks. Think of how much bigger it will be in a few years!”
“Nonsense.” Vicky waved one hand dismissively. “And it’s a ‘he’, James, not an ‘it’. And he is cute.” She waved at Spot. “Oh, who’s a good boy? You are! Aren’t you, Spot? Yes, you are!”
Two Necromancers, a Dragon, and a Vampire (The Unconventional Heroes Series Book 3) Page 6