Thomas Kindercook and the Pink Pyjamas

by Gerald Feather

“You're the first wizard I have met, that can cast permanent spells on the fly. Most wizards need to enchant objects to have lasting effects, and those objects are costly, so it's not done very often.”

  Thomas would have to think about the implications of that. Maybe there was some way he could use that to his advantage.

  Judy sprang up and pulled Thomas to his feet. “So Thomas. Where are you staying?”

  “With my uncle. I am just waiting for him to get out of the meeting.”

  Judy beamed with excitement, “Why don't you come and stay at my place?”

  “Uh... I... I ... I am engaged?” Thomas stammered not really knowing what Judy's intentions were.

  “I wasn't asking you to be my boyfriend silly. I just thought I could get to know more about you! It's not everyday you meet a wizard from another dimension. Maybe we can work on your spell casting!!”

  Thomas considered this. It would be nice to have another wizard, one who knew what they were doing, help him with spell casting.

  “I would have to let my uncle know where I am.”

  Judy yanked Thomas toward the door without warning and marched off into the academy. “Don't worry about that. I will leave word with the guards at the door to inform him!”

  Thomas whistled for the dog team as they left the wizard's arena. The dogs pulled the sled awkwardly behind them as they too, left the building.

  Outside it was snowing more heavily than ever. It had collected like soft ice cream, over the rooftops and bushes. The Christmas lighting gave a multicoloured glow to the town, and coupled with the candle and wood fire light emanating from the houses and shops on the street, it cast its own spell of calm over the area. Despite being quite late into the evening, many couples were out strolling the street, arm in arm, admiring the lighting. Children played in the snow, making forts and throwing snow balls. For a moment, Thomas could almost believe he was home again.

  The dogs pulled their sled down the steps and waited at the bottom expectantly.

  Thomas smiled. He had never had a dog sled ride before! He turned to Judy.

  “Come on!” It was Thomas' turn to pull Judy by the hand. Thomas dragged her down to the cart and invited her to step onto the sled.

  Judy gave the sled an uneasy look.

  “Don't worry about it! It'll be fun!”

  The sled looked as though it would just be large enough to fit the two of them. There was a strong team of ten dogs, and they seemed to be in good spirits.

  Thomas and Judy stepped up onto the sled. It shifted under their weight. The dogs looked back at Thomas still waiting for something. Thomas really had no idea how to run a dog team. He had seen movies where the musher on the sled seemed to yell at the dogs, but he really didn't know how that worked. Judy lifted an eyebrow as if to say, 'so?'

  “Husky team please take this sleigh

  Pull us now along this way,

  Into the snowy night,

  Along the path of coloured light,

  Move along at a steady pace,

  Take us back to Judy's place.”

  “You would be all kinds of dead if you tried to cast that one in battle.” Judy smirked. Thomas laughed at himself. The dog team, sleigh in tow, moved through the silent glistening streets of snow and off into the night, and for once, Thomas let himself just live in the moment.

  CHAPTER 38

  FORCES GATHER

  Knock, knock knock.

  The sound of someone at the door seemed to echo in synch with the pounding in Thomas' head. Judy and Thomas had stayed up a great deal of the night before, talking about spell casting, wizardry and about her life at the Academy. Judy had no parents, and lived in a home next to Sammuel's palace. Sammuel had been looking after Judy for most of her life, and considered her to be his daughter.

  Knock, Knock, Knock!

  The knocking was growing more insistent now. Thomas blearily made his way from the guest room, to the front door. Judy had stayed up longer than he. She had needed to do a few chores, and he had been quite tired.

  Thomas opened the door a crack to look outside. His uncle stood in the doorway looking a little dishevelled and quite distraught.

  “Thomas! Good, you are here.” Sammuel pushed his way past the door and into the main room. “Where is Judy?”

  “I think she's still asleep upstairs. What's the matter?”

  “Those damn dragons is what's the matter.” Sammuel crossed the room and grabbed Thomas' coat and threw it at him. “Get that on quickly. We will need to get moving soon.”

  “I don't understand uncle. What happened?”

  Sammuel took a deep breath and let it out. “Alright. As you know, last night I met with the dragon lords and the wizard academy. We decided that we would start out in a week's time, once we had the forces rallied. Ganton was resistant, but finally agreed to this.” Sammuel stepped to the bottom of the stairs.

  “JUDY! GET UP! We have to get going!”

  “So we are going to attack in a week's time.”

  Sammuel looked exasperated. “We were going to attack in a weeks time. When I got up this morning, I was informed that Ganton had left the dragon camp outside the city, and was heading for Mount Rift.” Sammuel went on gathering Thomas' belongings. “He left a note. He said that it was foolish to wait, the red dragon would go on ahead to battle. If we wanted to be a part of it, we should meet him at Vadric's gate, a rock formation before the passage up to Mount Rift.” Sammuel seemed to be worked into a frenzy. He continued to holler up to Judy. “Get up Judy!” A muffled voice came from the top of the staircase.

  “Just a few more minutes!”

  “Nice girl, but not really a morning person.”

  Thomas didn't see the issue. He didn't like Ganton all that much to begin with. If he wanted to throw himself at Victor first, then that shouldn't be an issue.

  “So you are going to move everyone because Ganton is jumping the gun? It seems to me if he is that foolish you should just let him go.”

  “It's not that simple Thomas. Victor isn't expecting a preemptive strike. If Ganton goes on his own now, he will blow the element of surprise as well as severely lessen the effect of our invading forces. As much as I hate Ganton, we need him in order to make a successful assault on the fortress.”

  Thomas sighed.

  “Make sure Judy gets ready, meet me at the main gate. I have yet to rouse the armies and wizard's guild.” Sammuel swept out of the place as fast as he had arrived, leaving Thomas feeling completely unprepared. Thomas walked to the room where he had stayed and started to pick up the brightly coloured rocks that lay there. He hoped that they would be enough.

  The snow had stopped early in the morning and the sky had opened up into a deep blue. Crystals of snow sparkled in the early morning sun like diamonds. It was an odd contrast to the near thirty thousand dragon and wizard warriors gathered in the open plane outside of Westminster. Waggons trundled through the snow carrying the giant war harnesses of the dragon warriors. The harnesses which had not been worn by any dragon in living memory, shone like the sun against the snow. Age had not touched these pieces of magical protection. They looked every bit as majestic as the day they were first created. Thomas almost could hear Alanna's grunt of disapproval in his head.

  Thomas and Judy pulled into the camp on the dog sled that Thomas had summoned the night before. The team was proving to be quite useful, but Thomas knew it was only a matter of time before he should send them back. Judy had been quite hard to get going as it turned out. She didn't really realize the enormity of the situation at hand.

  Carts and waggons of all sizes circled the outer perimeter of the plain, carrying more provisions than the army would need to get through a month. Thomas had never seen anything like it before. Just how long were they going to be at this for?

  Sammuel stood at the crest of the plateau directing the newcomers to their respective groups. He looked quite tired and deeply troubled.

  “Thomas! Judy. It's good that
you are here. We are going to need to pull out shortly if we have any chance of getting to the pass before nightfall.”

  Thomas' eyes were still boggling at the gathering of dragons and wizards. “There must be thousands here. Tens of thousands!”

  Sammuel regarded Thomas with a sullen look. “As many as it seems we have gathered, what we will face will likely make our force look like a drop of ink in a bucket of water. We must keep the element of surprise.” Sammuel turned to point over in the distance. “I believe there is a rather gruff older dragon who is looking for you over there.”

  Thomas peered through the crowd. The man that Sammuel was pointing out would have stood out in an army of a million soldiers.

  “Tretchbolt!” Thomas yelled at the top of his lungs.

  Tretchbolt immediately turned in Thomas direction and gave him a grim smile. Thomas bolted over to him, slipping in the snow several times before standing before the old warrior dragon. Tretchbolt looked serious, but none the worse for wear. As one of the few gathered who had experienced war first hand, he had the air of experience that the majority of those gathered here lacked.

  “I see you didn't get yourself killed.” Tretchbolt opened the conversation with his usual knack for etiquette.

  “I haven't been in any real danger since you tried to show me how to use a sword.” Thomas replied wryly.

  Tretchbolt just grunted. “Who's that?” Tretchbolt was nodding in the direction of Judy who was picking her way carefully through the crowd and across the snow. Judy was trying her best to make sure her dress wasn't getting ruined, but was largely unsuccessful. She still hadn't quite got it through her mind that she was going into battle, not to a ball.

  “That's Judy. She's a wizard in the care of my uncle, and a new friend of mine.”

  Tretchbolt smiled. “You better keep her away from Alanna. She doesn't handle jealousy well I hear.”

  Thomas had to admit that Judy was quite beautiful, and quite fun to be with, but Thomas' heart had only room for one girl, and that was Alanna.

  As soon as it was clear that everyone that was going to arrive, had, Sammuel organized the army into a march.

  Off in the distance, Mount rift loomed, the top hidden in dark ominous clouds that flashed with the occasional electrical charge. To the eye, it was one large group of humans marching through the new thick snow. Not a single Dragon took its natural form during the march, undoubtedly saving their energy for the task ahead. Thomas was thankful for more than the first time that day that he had the dog team with him. They made it easy to keep up with the crowd. Trudging through the deep snow seemed to be slowing the dragons, and it was clear that the wizards were not used to such an arduous trek. By the time that they finally arrived at the pass, Most of the humans looked ready to drop, and even the dragons showed some signs of exhaustion. The only two that Thomas noticed to look unaffected, were Alkamire and Tretchbolt. To look at the two, you would swear it had been a mere stroll around the park.

  The Red Dragon had already set up camp at the foot of the mountain. At least twenty thousand Ganton Dragons were already practising for the battle ahead. The sounds of metal on metal rang out across the field. Alkamire and Sammuel immediately set off across the encampment to have a word with Ganton. Thomas couldn't help but wonder that the noise the red dragon's made would draw the attention of Victor, however they seemed oblivious to the threat.

  The ambient noise of thousands of troops setting up camp and unloading provisions blotted out any sounds of nature around. Thomas and Judy sought a corner near the fire that was at least far enough away from the commotion that they could hear each other speak.

  Judy dropped down on the log and stared off in to the fire for a while. Thomas found the flames dancing on the logs hypnotizing. Every so often a spot of pitch in the branches would explode and hail down sparks that drifted to the ground like snow flakes. The warmth of the fire fought off the bitter cold of the now rapidly approaching night. A good half hour passed with them just sitting on the log, not talking about anything of real interest. The camp started to take shape. Long rows of giant tables, stacked with food of all sorts stretched off into the distance throughout the camp. There were thousands to feed, but even then, Thomas didn't see how they were going to even scratch the surface of all the food.

  “Thomas?” Judy seemed to break out of the fire's trance for a moment.

  “Mmm?”

  “Have you figured out a way to get around casting without speaking?”

  Thomas and Judy had spent the previous night practicing casting spells on the fly, much to the misfortune of Judy's cat. At first it was a surprise to see a cat in this world, but when he heard it had been a gift from Sammuel, it made more sense. Thomas and Judy had spent hours changing the colour of the cat's fur, giving it bigger ears, a longer tail, making it faster, slower, invisible. The list wore on with the night. The cat was going bonkers by the end of it all, and Thomas finished up by returning it to its normal state, but Thomas was unable to break the need for casting in rhyme. He had tried to cast silently, reciting rhymes in his mind. He had tried single line commands, nothing had worked.

  Thomas shook his head. “I don't think that it's possible for me to cast that way.”

  Judy gave Thomas a pat on the back. “Don't worry. I'll watch over you.”

  Thomas laughed. It was nice to have someone to talk to amongst the chaos and impending battle that loomed ahead. Thomas had learned a lot from Judy. He now knew it was impossible to block someone's ability to cast spells. It was not possible to interfere with their own magical abilities in the slightest. Judy had got Thomas to test it, hoping that he might be different, being from another world. Thomas couldn't believe that Judy had wanted Thomas to do such a thing. It seems she trusted him to give her powers back if anything went wrong. She trusted him more than he trusted himself!

  “I think that I might have figured out a way to get around it however.”

  Judy looked at Thomas with interest.

  Thomas brought a small bag of stones out of his backpack and placed them in Judy's hands. Judy opened the bag and examined the brightly coloured stones inside.

  “What do these do?”

  “They're enchanted stones. If they work right, they will activate when I throw them, casting various spells. I figured there may come a time when I need a quick spell, so I colour coded these according to the spell I put on them.”

  “That sounds great! If I were you I would have made more though.”

  Thomas took the bag back and carefully tucked it away into his backpack. “I was quite tired after just doing those ones. It uses a fair bit of my power to enchant one of these.”

  “Still, it's quite clever. There aren't many people who can enchant objects. One is a challenge. A bag like that would have taken even powerful wizards quite a while. You should be happy!”

  Judy always seemed to be happy. She shifted a little on the log and stared down at her feet.

  “Alanna's quite lucky.”

  Thomas felt a surge run through him at the comment.

  “If you weren't already seeing her, I might ask you out.”

  “uh...” Thomas was his usual articulate self.

  Judy laughed at Thomas' expression.

  “Don't worry silly. I'm not going to try to swoop in and take you away. I'm just saying, you are a unique person, and I can see why she likes you.” Judy leaned over quickly and gave Thomas a kiss on the cheek.

  “For luck.”

  With that Judy bounded up from the campfire. “I'm off to see how Edric's doing!”

  Thomas just sat stunned by the fire. Suddenly life seemed even more complicated if that were at all possible.

  *****

  The old, normally dark, castle was lit up like a lantern. Armies of Ganton and Storm Dragon worked on their armour for the upcoming battle. Mountain ogres, ferocious ugly brutes with large stringy muscles, packed their boulders to the edge of the cliff, overlooking the road up t
he mountain. The Shadow lingered at the edge of the courtyard watching the events unfold.

  Alanna sat shivering in the dark. Her cell at the uppermost level of the main tower, overlooked the gateway into the fortress. The shivering had only a little to do with the cold. She had watched Victor preparing his forces for the past few days, and knew what lay in wait for the army that approached. They were walking into a trap, and there was no way for Alanna to warn them about it.

  Gatsby sat beyond the bars of her cell, silently watching her as he had the past few days. Alanna had pleaded with him, but to no avail. Gatsby just sat silently, not saying a word during the entire time that they had been there.

  “A lot of those people coming up here are your friends. I can't understand how you can do this!” Still no response. Alanna didn't know why she kept trying to reach him. “What about Thomas?”

  For the first time since she was thrown in here by Gatsby, she saw a twinge in his normally stone faced expression. “Thomas is your friend too.”

  Gatsby snarled. Alanna pressed on. “What happened between us isn't his fault.”

  Gatsby finally broke the silence. “No. It's my fault for trusting him.”

  “What are you talking about? What did Thomas do to you?”

  “You know very well what he did!” Gatsby stood up stiffly from the chair he had been sitting in. “If he hadn't come along, I would have...”

  “You would have what? Hid from me for another thousand years? Face it. We were never destined to be together.”

  Gatsby wore a troubled expression. Alanna could sense the conflict inside of him. “You don't want to do this. I know you better than this. You aren't at all like your father.”

  “What do you know about my father?”

  Alanna approached the bars and reached a hand through to Gatsby. “I know that your father treated you brutally as a child. I know that he never agreed with the path that you chose in life. It hurts me more than anything to see you try to follow in his footsteps now. This isn't who you are.”

  Gatsby shook his head. “No. That's not true. I ran from my responsibilities as a lord of the Ganton Dragons. I should have been there to marry you when I had the chance. The Alkamire Dragons betrayed the Ganton Dragons.”

  “Who is leading who into a trap?”

  Gatsby spat. “I don't want to talk about this anymore.” With that, the young brooding Red Dragon sat back down on the chair and sulked.