by Booth, John
I’d beat a hasty retreat as Betty indicated she was up for seconds and I was already certain that the firsts had been a disastrous mistake. Mam had a way of sensing when I’d done something wrong and as for my wives, well; Esmeralda’s forensic ability could detect a single foreign body hair on my clothes. That only left the BatCave as a place to go and lick my wounds.
The BatCave was the massive place I’d found for Fluffy in the mountains when he had grown too big to hide at home. It had a launch platform hidden by magic that he used when he went out hunting for sheep. The local shepherds lost a lot of sheep and were always moaning about it. They believed there was a big cat, like a lion or a panther roaming the hills and killing their stock.
[Jake.] Judging by the smoke swirling around me (with just a hint of mutton mixed in with the sweet smell of dragon oil) my dragon was displeased with me.
“What have I done now?”
[You vanished on Jenny this morning, and don’t think for a minute that Esmeralda doesn’t know what you two have been up to.]
“I’m not sure that what I do with my wives is any of your business.” There were limits to friendship and Fluffy was pushing it. I was feeling guilty enough as it was without him rubbing it in.
[It is not. Nor do I care about your mating habits. Though you should wash the female’s scent from your body before you see either of your wives. The point I am making is that when you vanished on Jenny, you vanished on me. Have you forgotten that I am tasked with protecting the multiverse from you and your mistakes?]
He moved his head closer to me and nudged me with his nose. [This is serious, Jake. I need to stay close to you.]
“You were keeping an eye on me through Jenny?”
[I always do.]
“I returned to Earth and had a home cooked breakfast from Mam, borrowed a metal detector from Malcolm, which I’ve broken, found some buried treasure and fought a knight from another world equipped with sword and amour that negates magic.” I summarized. “And it isn’t tea time yet.
[Only stopping on the way to take a maiden’s virginity after you vanquished the knight?]
“She wasn’t?” I was shocked.
Fluffy sniffed me again. [No, she wasn’t.] He sounded almost disappointed. [Who was this alien Knight?]
“Called himself Sir Grendon and claimed to be a member of the Knights of Justice for the Diamond Worlds. Bit of a nutcase, but he knew who I was and claimed to be carrying out a legal death sentence on me.”
Fluffy screwed up his face and I knew he was communicating with all the other Dragons because I’d seen him do it before. According to Fluffy, it wasn’t like a conversation, more like searching a library of all their shared knowledge. I knew it must be stronger than that though, because I knew they would know instantly if something happened to Fluffy.
Fluffy stopped concentrating and looked at me in astonishment. [And you defeated him?]
“Yes… Why?”
[Because it has never been done before.]
I grinned.
[Tell me exactly how you did it.]
That wasn’t Fluffy asking the question, “Who wants to know?”
[The Knights have killed many dragons over the millennia. Their idea of justice is notably one sided.] It was Fluffy speaking to me this time. I could see he was shocked that his mind had been taken over so casually.
That fitted in with my experience and I couldn’t argue with the dragons’ right to know. Though the dragons were almost as bad as the Knight in some ways, they hadn’t killed me in the end. The idea of Fluffy getting killed by a Knight swung it. I couldn’t tell him without telling them. I explained my method and the thinking behind it.
[Ingenious; and it can be adapted. We are in your debt, Wizard Morrissey.]
Fluffy shuddered and sat down on all fours.
[I did not know they could do that to me.]
“Perhaps they are watching you as closely as you are watching me?
Fluffy laughed and I beat at the couch to put out the flames. We sat for a while without speaking, each lost in thought.
[I thought you were going to be faithful to your wives?]
“I planned to be faithful. I’m just having problems with the execution part of it.”
[It has been barely two weeks since your marriage.]
He had a point. I rubbed Fluffy on the back of the neck in the place he likes.
“I know. Don’t rub it in. But girls have been all over me because my subconscious has been using magic to make them. And then when Betty threw herself at me after I turned it off…”
Fluffy nodded sagely as if he totally understood, which is more than I did.
[You were frightened that marriage had neutered you.] He didn’t say it as a question.
“That’s stupid.”
[You have the powers of a god with no one who can stop or judge you. That is why the wizards of Valhalla become evil, no one can stop them and they do not choose to judge each other. The Spirit people of the Hidden Worlds are equally powerful, but do not allow such behavior in their society. The Diamond Worlds have created the Knights to mete out justice on errant wizards. But who judges you, Jake? Who judges you?]
I gave him a rueful look. “You do, Retnor. You, me, Jenny, and especially Esmeralda. Isn’t that enough?”
[If Esmeralda has you skinned and made into a rug, I promise to give what is left of you a decent funeral and I will not walk over your pelt with dirty claws.]
I thumped my friend on the scales. Not that he would notice. Dragon scales are hard and my hand throbbed afterwards.
“Do you have any idea how the Knight found me?”
Fluffy laughed and I extinguished the couch. I was going to have to buy a new one soon, as this one was burning through.
[You were told your image has been posted. That means everything that you are. Enough of you for any wizard to hop to your side.]
“They learn English?”
[Welsh too, and all the other languages you speak. That is also part of who you are and other delegates will be expected to talk to you.]
“I think I should go and see this notice board.”
Fluffy stood. [Get on then.]
I climbed onto his back and he slipped us into glim.
A dragon doesn’t hop in the way of Wizards. As a species they are less connected to the multiverse than the rest of us. They can choose to dissociate themselves from the universe and at the first level of dissociation they are invisible, then they become insubstantial and then they can step outside of everything into Hop Space. They call this process glimming and it is a noun, a verb, an adjective, and largely indescribable.
I had hopped Fluffy places in the past and glimmed with him on a planet, but this was my first experience of glimming in Hop Space. When I stop in mid hop and experience Hop Space, it looks like mist with lights that represent whole universes. Riding on Fluffy’s back, Hop Space is unicorns running through luscious forests, water cascading over rocks, seagulls circling whirlpools, an endless stream of wonder and delight. It is no wonder Jenny loves to ride with him.
We passed through a circle of squeaking dolphins into a canyon whose walls were carved with the faces of ancient deities, each one looking sadder than the last as we progressed through them. We shot through an arch made of dove feathers sending them scattering in all directions and arrived in what looked like a Greek temple. Marble pillars held up an impossible roof of glass through which we could see galaxies spinning.
Fluffy landed on a perfectly smooth white stone floor.
It was impossible. This was a real place in Hop Space, but Hop Space is an absence of reality, not a reality in its own right. And yet here we were, in the nave of a Temple that seemed to run all the way to the horizon. I wondered if I could find this place again without Fluffy. I couldn’t hop here because it wasn’t anywhere and the route he’d brought us wouldn’t look remotely the same if I travelled it alone.
[Look between any of the pillars.]
There were an uncountable number of pillars running in parallel lines on either side of us. As I stared between the nearest of them an image formed. I saw the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. The longer I looked the more of her essence I saw. She wasn’t remotely human; though on the surface there were only subtle differences about the eyes and the ears.
As I looked longer I knew her name, Issus. Just one word that was somehow more significant than the lineage of a human would have been. She had lived for the best part of 100,000 years and was still considered young to have been selected as a representative by her people. I felt her pride. I understood her language, knew her values. There was no way I could compare myself with such an intellect. At that moment I knew who she was sufficiently to find her no matter where she was in the multiverse. It was no wonder I had been so easy to find if other wizards had access to this.
“How many delegates?” I whispered.
[One hundred and twenty three thousand four hundred and twenty two.]
“So many,” I said in awe.
[So few you mean. Less than a hundredth of one percent of the peoples of the multiverse are represented. Acceptance of representatives to the Conference Between the Worlds are incredibly rare. Tens of thousands of intelligent creatures have their delegates rejected every century. Millions of species have not yet reached the level of maturity where they might even discover that the Conference takes place.]
I shuddered as I finally began to realize the damage I had done. This was so much bigger than I had thought. How could I have been such a fool?
“And they would accept me?” It seemed insane.
[You are more than you know. They have already accepted you. Only representatives like you can see the information in the temple. That is why so many want your death. Until the conference starts they are safe and time is running out.]
“When does it start?”
[Soon, nobody knows the exact date. It will be decided by those who created and call the Conference. They provide no representative and even the dragons do not know who they are. Some believe they created the multiverse, for a purpose beyond our understanding.]
“What am I going to do, Fluffy?”
[Try to survive. It is what you do best.]
8. Malevon
Fluffy and I prepared to leave. The place we were in was called the Temple of Representatives and Fluffy believed it might be one of the places where the Conference would be held. When I asked him how representatives would be summoned he shrugged.
[I do not know.]
“That’s one place you won’t be able to follow me.”
[I will be coming with you.] He sounded surprised as he said it.
“And how will you manage that miracle?”
[I have been nominated as the Dragon’s representative. The previous candidate has withdrawn.]
That was news.
Fluffy pointed at the gap between two pillars on the other side of the aisle. When I looked a familiar image formed.
[It would have been nice if they had informed me.]
“But you guys know everything about each other?”
[If we are told, or know to look. This change has happened since we arrived]
“Some strict vetting procedure then?”
Fluffy frowned in that way that suggested he was communicating with his fellow dragons.
[The change was anticipated by the Conference Organizers and was immediately approved. This anticipation has caused consternation. Dragons do not want to be predictable.]
I put out my hand as if expecting Fluffy to shake it. “Hello fellow representative. I hope we can get on together.”
I ducked and put up a shield as dragonfire burst towards me. It took me a couple of seconds to realize that Fluffy was laughing and not attacking me.
We rose above the ground and Fluffy aimed us back the way we had come. Eagles were flying in a vertical circle formation. As we entered the circle, lighting flashed at us from all directions. Hop Space turned dark and I felt Fluffy slump under me.
“Fluffy?”
There was no response. We were falling, though there was nothing against which I could reference our fall, but I still recognized the feeling. Fluffy was breathing but his head hung limply. Healing magic flowed out of me and into Fluffy. Urda had taught me how to heal a few weeks ago, though I would never be her equal.
Despite my best efforts I could sense nothing wrong with him. There was nothing to fix. He should be awake. I leaned forward and slapped his face, but it caused no response.
Something flipped us out of Hop Space into a real world.
We were tumbling, bright blue skies alternated with deep blue water. The air was hot and wet and sunlight blazed down on us. It was difficult to stay on Fluffy, it was difficult to think. Fluffy is heavy and dragon flesh resists wizard magic. I stopped us spinning just in time to see the sea rushing to meet us. I wrapped a shield around us shaped like a cone pointing in the direction of our trajectory just before we hit the water and we dived into the deep. That allowed me time to reduce our velocity in a survivable manner. Large fish gave us incredulous looks as I pulled us out of the dive before we hit the sea bottom.
Shaping our shield to form fins, I converted our velocity into horizontal motion. As the sea bed rose I steered us higher until we broke the surface and surfed towards the white sands ahead. I gave our shield a keel and we glided in a stately manner to shore. The shield lifted us above the water so it looked as though Fluffy was flying though his wings were limp at his sides.
On the beach were large white tents that looked like a circus. Blue flags barely flapped in the hot sticky breeze. Women in white togas came out of the tents and began to point at us. We were slowing, but it could not have been clear to them if we would stop before we hit the tents. Despite this they looked unbothered by the threat.
Their leader was a young woman, whose toga barely covered her groin. For a second I thought she might be Issus because her stance showed the same certainty of purpose. But as we got closer I could see her features were different and there was a haughtiness to her look that reminded me of Esmeralda. This was a woman used to getting her way.
When we reached the sand I dissolved our keel and allowed our momentum to be slowed by friction between the sand and shield. I applied the brakes at the last second so we slewed to a stop in front of the woman and her servants. It was an unfortunate coincidence that my braking effect shoveled a wave of sand over our host. I would never do something like that on purpose, now would I?
I stepped off Fluffy’s back and allowed his head to sink slowly onto the sand. Turning to face the woman coughing in front of me, I couldn’t help noticing that not only was her toga ridiculously short, it was all she was wearing. In my defense, she didn’t have to pull it up to shield her face.
“What have you done to Fluf… Retnor and why did you bring us here?”
I could feel her anger. A wave of magic flung sand back at me, but I was expecting that response and deflected it.
“I believe I asked you a question?”
The woman stopped coughing by what looked to be an act of sheer will power.
“Representative Lord Wizard Morrissey. I needed to talk to you, so I brought you to me.”
“What have you done to my dragon?”
She seemed surprised at my response. “You are not his rider so why are you so upset? It is unfortunate that the dragon survives as it might create diplomatic tensions.”
I was getting increasingly angry and strengthened the shield I’d put around Fluffy. Whoever these bastards were they couldn’t talk so casually about killing my friend without serious repercussions. The diplomatic problem they had to deal with right now was me.
It was at that point I got a clear look at the people I was dealing with. They were all women, apparently in their early twenties, and built like a young man’s wet-dream. Every single one of them. Under other circumstances I would be putting on the famous Morrissey charm at seeing so much bar
ely dressed pulchritude. But not as things were.
“Why did you try and kill Retnor?” Damned if I was going to call him Fluffy in front of them.
“It is of no importance, this is a matter between Representatives.”
I had a good answer to that, but it occurred to me that it might be best to keep Fluffy’s new status quiet for a while. God, this woman was hot. I felt a wave of lust run through me. Reminding myself that I was not here to get laid I tried to focus on the matter at hand.
“Who are you and who do you represent?”
“My name is Alisandra and I represent the Malevon. Your fame is spreading through the multiverse and I thought it was time we met. Do not worry; I will not make any further attacks on your dragon now that I know he is under your protection. Perhaps we can take tea together?” She indicated the tent behind her.
I took one last look at Fluffy, who appeared to be sleeping peacefully, before allowing myself to be led into the tent. As she turned, her pert backside showed from under the back of her toga and I felt another surprisingly strong surge of lust.
The tent was divided into rooms by elaborate tapestries. The space we entered was filled with large cushions tastefully arranged around a highly polished wooden table that sat on stubby legs raising its top less than four inches from the floor.
“Please sit, Lord Wizard.” Alisandra indicated a cushion and I sat on it. She moved to the other side of the table and descended onto her cushion to end up crossed legged. Her short toga lifted as she sat, revealing rather too much of her for me to feel comfortable. I looked anywhere but at her. The carpets that made up the wall turned out to have images with a sexual theme on them, which didn’t help. Something strange was going on and I struggled to figure out what it was.
She laughed. “Does my body displease you, Lord Wizard? Your profile suggested you were fond of the female form.”
“I am a married man with two wives.”