by Alexis Davie
Ah. That was where she’d heard the name. Brinley could feel the distaste coming off Harry in waves. And… fear. A little fear.
“The lanky guy in the old suit?” she asked.
Harry leaned closer to her. “He might not bother with you, girl, but the rest of us could… or rather, we could bother you.”
Brin’s stomach was churning with fear again, heart in her throat. “I think I’d like to check with him, actually. I’ve got a couple of pressing issues to sort out. With my life. Where does old Garrick live, Harry?”
Shock. And for just a moment, she saw a warehouse, green-painted window frames… Harry glanced in a direction, and she felt that he didn’t want her to go that way. But all that happened in half a second. What Harry said was, “Not likely, little girl. Now run along. Go wherever you’re going, as long as it ain’t here.”
Brinley turned to the bar and smiled sweetly at Harry. “See you around!” She waved a little wave and span to face the door, to leave the bar.
Outside, it was getting dark. Raining still. She felt the crisp paper in her pocket, but it seemed like it was for later. She’d been going by instinct so far, and she felt, really felt, like the moody, lanky dragon king was who she needed to talk to now. Goodness knew how she would interact with him. He hadn’t exactly seemed like an open book, or as if he’d liked her. But he intrigued her. And, well, he might be one of the only people who could help her. With her father and with Xander… Bloody Xander. They would both be looking for her and for the book. Her father would be more concerned for the book, and then for the marriage. He wasn’t about to be overthrown—she was his meal ticket.
Brinley hoped her spell of distraction was helping. Xander was powerful, and her father more so. The anger would be clouding them, though; that was on her side.
She had turned back towards where she had walked earlier, and she was scanning the apartment buildings and converted warehouses for those windows. It was wet, and she was getting chilly and irritated, and then she saw them. Down a thin side street that used to be a back alley for deliveries, she supposed. Looking up, she didn’t notice the bike until it was passing her, a great roaring thing. And on it, him, Garrick, the bloody dragon king, swerving in the rain with no helmet on. He was going to bloody kill someone.
She didn’t mean to cast the spell. She didn’t even know she knew how to cast such a powerful protection spell. But she felt it pour out of her. She was thrown back against the wall behind her as it was, and she had to fight not to fall to the wet ground.
Brinley saw it happen while she stood there in the drizzle on Garrick’s street. She saw him take a turn too fast, felt herself righting him, saw the truck nearly hit him, saw him cut off a Volvo with a family inside… It was exhausting. Brinley stumbled across the road to the warehouse with the green windows. In the doorway, she slumped into a witchy little pile. She couldn’t keep her eyes open.
Brin dreamed of wings; loud wings that ripped the air into pieces, wings that must belong to something big, wings that fanned her face, sprayed the rain in her…
She woke with a gasp. The dragon was squashed into the narrow old street, looking at her, head to the side. Then, of course, he shrank, twisted. The last thing to go was the blue-grey sheen of scales, and Garrick was crouched there on the cobblestones.
He coughed, a little puff of smoke. He blinked, eyes flashing one more time, and then he said, “Hello, little witch. Why are you in my doorway?”
Brinley scrabbled to push herself up off the floor, leaning against the wall of the doorway. “I… There’s a really confused truck driver at Milton Keynes services, and the kids in the back of the Volvo are squabbling because their parents are lost…”
Garrick smiled, stretching his long arms. He was surprisingly muscular, his pale skin creamier than it had seemed before, in the dark bar. He had very little body hair. Even his leg hair was golden and soft looking.
“So,” he said, looking her in the eyes, “it was you then?”
Brinley nodded. “Apparently so,” she said. “I think I’m going to be sick.”
“Well, before you do that, could you grab me that bag over there?” Garrick pointed to a satchel that was laying on the ground, its strap snapped.
“You keep the fancy suits in there?” Brin asked and regretted trying to talk so much. She almost gagged. Then she half-crawled to the bag and threw it to Garrick.
“Thanks,” he said, “and yeah, I do. They were expensive even in the ‘60s. But I don’t have to show off all the time.” Brin raised her eyebrows and slumped back against the wall. Garrick pulled out a t-shirt and a plain pair of black jeans. She couldn’t help following his lovely, fluid movements. “You’re welcome to keep looking at me, little witch, but you’re about to see my bits.”
To her irritation, Brinley felt her cheeks coloring. She glanced down at her hands. “Thanks for the warning, wouldn’t want any additional mental scarring.”
Garrick laughed. “Never had any complaints,” he said. He stood. Brin looked up at him again. “I’ve had a shit evening, little witch, and I want to know why you did that for me. Come in and watch me drink whiskey?”
Brin staggered to her feet. “Why do you think I’m just going to watch?”
Garrick shrugged.
“If you can appreciate it, you can drink it, I suppose. Might as well consume every good thing I have. I’m about to have a pretty intense fall in standard of living.” To Brin’s surprise, Garrick put his arm around her. It was a little like being struck by lightning. “You can barely walk!” he said. “I might be a bit of a dick, but I’m not leaving you on my bloody doorstep. Come on.”
Deposited in a leather armchair, Brinley looked around at Garrick’s vast, open plan flat. “You’re not a family man, then?”
Garrick had bare feet, wet from the rain outside, so he was leaving footprints in a trail between the plates and bottles and dropped towels on his beautiful polished concrete floors. “Did it seem it when I was downing ales in the afternoon in a dark pub?”
Brinley shrugged, her energy beginning to return. “Dunno, my dad isn’t much better than that. Left my upbringing to hired help. Just thought maybe you’d have an heir, being… well, according to Harry, being Europe’s dragon king.”
Garrick made a noise she couldn’t really discern the meaning of. “Just haven’t met the one, I guess,” he said, filling a glass with water and downing it over the sink, “and anyway, what kind of a monster would bring some poor kid into the world to live forever?”
He turned to her. “Did you… make me say that?”
“No…” Brinley shook her head. “Did you not mean it?”
Garrick almost laughed. “Opposite. I did mean it. How unusual.”
Brin chewed on a fingernail, then stopped. Horrible nervous habit. Her father always slapped her wrist when she… She started chewing again, only taking her finger out her mouth to say, “I don’t know how to do a spell of protection like that. Not even nearly. You were, like, trying to get hurt.”
Garrick reached up to open a cabinet, his t-shirt lifting a little to show a hipbone, light hair leading to the button of his jeans. Brinley turned a weird gasp into… a weird cough? He pulled the cork from the whiskey bottle with his teeth and spat it onto one of the wet towels as he walked back over to her.
“Oh, very James Dean,” Brin said. “Whole look is, actually.” Garrick gave her a look.
“It just comes naturally,” he said and took a swig of the whiskey.
“Weird, ‘cos it looks so studied.” Brinley held her hand out for the bottle. Garrick raised his eyebrows but handed it to her. She took a slug, the room temperature liquid burning her throat beautifully, woody tang enlivening her mouth. Garrick looked surprised. “My dad is a high warlock,” Brinley said, passing the bottle. “We had a lot of good booze in the house, and like I said, he was never around.”
Garrick sat on the chair beside hers and pushed back its arms.
“These babies are laz
y boys,” he said, resting his feet on the kicked-out bottom of his armchair, leaning back into its leather.
“How very tasteless.” Brinley joined him in reclining. “So you’re bored of being alive? Seems a bit rude to try to take half the M25 with you. I’ll cut your head off if you like.”
Garrick laughed, that deep and gravelly laugh she had heard earlier, the laugh that was a surprise coming from him. “Blunt, aren’t you, little witch?”
“Yeah, but not usually this blunt. What’s happening?”
Garrick shook his head. “No idea… but I think I’m about to be challenged by a coup. And what, you’ve run away from home? Angry at Dad?”
Brinley nodded. “Yeah, guess so.” Without looking, she put out a hand and took the bottle. “I’m supposed to marry a real arse… the son of another high warlock. He goes around treating humans like puppets. And he looks like… well, looks don’t matter.”
“Oh, no,” Garrick said, “they do! How hideous is he?”
Brinley shook her head, turning to look at him. “Oh, he’s gorgeous. I mean, not my cup of tea… looks like a rugby player, I suppose. One of those kinds of… chubby, boyish, rich person faces. And a lot of muscles. Short, though.”
Garrick raised his eyebrows, puffed out his cheeks. “Disappointing.”
“Yeah… Well, so’s the fact that my father is trying to sell me off to secure warlock bonds. He’s worried about his power, too, and Xander’s father is a young and powerful warlock, blah, blah. God, I hate politics. Wait… what’s the coup about?”
The world was getting a little soft around the edges; the whiskey was doing its work. Brin didn’t take her eyes off Garrick as he explained.
“Ugh, they were mad about… The council was angry about that spell of yours. Apparently, there’s a lot going on humans might notice, and of course that’s the last thing we bloody need. Someone else is going to want to be head of the table… I mean, it’s a round table, but you know what I mean. Metaphorical. Anyway, let ‘em have it. I don’t bloody care.”
“Who will take over?” Brinley asked idly, and then she sat up, kicking her recliner in.
“Woah!” Garrick said. “What bit you?” His eyelids looked heavy.
Before she could stop herself, Brin leaned over and pinched him. That fizz…
“Ow!” Garrick slapped at her hand. “I’m a five-thousand-year-old dragon king, don’t you pinch me!” But he looked rather more awake.
“No, no,” Brin said, gesturing with the bottle.
“Careful!” Garrick grabbed at it, his chair in an upright position now, too.
“Garrick!” Brinley said. “If there’s a power vacuum, if you aren’t absolutely sure the right person will take over, then Xander and his goons will get his father in. They’re causing total havoc already, just waiting for something like this, they want chaos…”
Garrick sighed. “And?”
Brinley stood up, staggering a little. She wasn’t sure if it was the exhaustion from before, or the recent whiskey. Either way, she righted herself.
“And they’re all… you know… immortal master race. Do you want humans strung up by their toes?” Garrick shrugged. “Do you want to live under a regime that doesn’t allow…” She held up the bottle. “Humans make this, right?”
Garrick sat up a little straighter. “I… Yes, humans make that.”
“Do you want them to keep making it?”
He put his head in his hands, then pushed his now dry hair back. It was cleaner now; maybe just from the rain, maybe from the change to dragon and back.
“Yes!” he said. “Of course! But what am I supposed to do about it?”
God, this man was irritating. How could someone with such life experience act so precisely and totally like a toddler?
“Be the dragon king! How have you kept power for so long?”
“I know people.” Garrick leaned back. “I used to be nice to people. I dunno, the humans get everything done now. We just lay low, be cool.”
“It’s not cool right now! And if the humans are all strung up by their toes, or enslaved by—”
“Yes, yes, yes, then they won’t be able to run things… or make whiskey. Damn it.”
5
Garrick
Why had this little witch come to blow his world up?
Garrick stood up and headed to the sink. He drank another cold glass of water. Splashed his face a little. When he turned, Brinley was looking at him with those big green eyes. Warm green eyes, not like his, which he knew flashed cold. She made his palms sweaty, and he hoped it was with annoyance, though he suspected otherwise.
“I have a week,” Garrick said. “A week to come up with something, and then another council meeting, okay?”
She nodded. Then she walked towards the door and picked up her bag, brought it over, and sat on the floor in the middle of the room.
“I have…” The little witch pulled out a huge, weathered book. It almost seemed to wriggle out of her hands and slap onto the floor. “This.”
Garrick sat beside the little witch. He should stop thinking of her like that. Her red hair was tucked behind one ear. To look at the book, he leaned close to her, could feel the warmth coming off her skin. “What is it? It’s kind of…”
“Beautiful, I know. But it’s mad at me. It’s my family spell book. My father’s. I took it when I ran.” Garrick put a hand out to touch the book’s cover, but Brinley reached for his fingers. “I wouldn’t,” she said. “It’ll burn. You aren’t fam—” She hadn’t caught him on time, and Garrick’s hand was on the leather. Brinley gave him a sideways look.
“Are you… Your fingers should be smoking.”
“I’m a dragon,” Garrick shrugged.
Brinley shook her head, laid her hand on his, and turned it. No protective scales, no burns. And the book felt… She could feel it… Was the book happy?
“That’s so odd,” she said “It’s never reacted like that to a stranger.”
Garrick was finding it a little hard to breathe. Brinley still had his hand. He slipped his fingers in between hers, let his thumb stroke the base of hers. He hadn’t meant to do any of that. Both he and Brinley were looking at their hands, and then they were looking at one another.
“Wha—” Brinley’s mouth opened, but it was just a noise.
Garrick yanked his hand away.
“It’s late. You’re drunk, little witch. Can we get started saving the world tomorrow?”
“You’re drunk,” Brinley scoffed. Her hand was back on the book. “Clearly.” Her cheeks were pink. It was sweet.
“Where are you staying?” Garrick asked.
Brinley closed her eyes, mouthing an expletive. She pulled a piece of paper from her pocket and showed it to Garrick. “I was going to…”
Garrick, admittedly a little drunk, squinted at it. Then he laughed. Old Mollie Meitner’s place. Boiled cabbage, boiled socks, no visitors after eight.
“Oh, dear,” he said. “I wouldn’t. She’s… old fashioned. And smells very odd. And she’ll be long asleep by now.” He stood, straightening out his t-shirt. He walked towards the door. “Just stay here, on one of the recliners or something. Just for tonight.” Garrick left the big room, then popped his head back in. “Use the bathroom by the door.”
He padded into his room, sat on the low bed, pulled off his t-shirt, and flopped back into the duvet. He was more tired than he thought he’d been.
Garrick hadn’t meant to snooze like that, but he did. It might have been a second or hours between lying down and waking thinking, Blankets! He hadn’t given the little witch a blanket or a pillow. And for some reason, he felt compelled to look after her.
He grabbed a blanket from the cupboard his cleaner always kept stocked. Well, she had before she’d quit. I can handle tidying after one or two parties, but not every week. Good job she didn’t know it was just him… a one-man party. Except, well, a lot less fun. Garrick wanted a cigarette, but he didn’t want to irritate the sleeping Br
inley with the smoke.
He took one of the pillows from his own bed and moved as quietly as possible into the living room. It wasn’t hard in this part of the apartment, with the concrete floors. He almost tripped over a plate, though. He needed a new cleaner.
Brinley was curled on the recliner, both hands tucked under her cheek. She looked cold, and Garrick felt terrible for being such a shitty host. She’d be better off in those disgusting, cabbage-stinking bedsits.
Walking over to her, Garrick shook out the blanket and gently placed it over the sleeping witch. Her face was properly relaxed, and it made him realize how tense she had looked all evening. How worried and hard, despite looking, what, all of twenty-one? Which probably meant she was… anywhere between twenty-one and seventy-five. Very young for an immortal. But, he couldn’t help himself noting, definitely very, very beautiful, too. And what she lacked in experience, in years, she made up for in passion and in raw power. He could hardly imagine how amazing a witch she would be in a century… and she seemed good. Hell, she was making him want to do things. Fix things. He hadn’t wanted to do anything in years… decades, longer. He’d stopped caring about his duties a couple of centuries ago and stopped having fun half a century ago. And now here was this little witch, getting him involved in some plan to save them all. Save the humans. Looking after the delicate, breakable humans was part of what his grandfather had sworn was their duty. And she’d had to make sure he hadn’t killed any on the road.
Garrick’s head was spinning. He pinched the bridge of his nose. Sighed. Then, softly, he tucked Brinley in. He stroked her cheek gently. Could he lift her head for the pillow? No, it would surely wake her.
But as he was wondering, Brinley’s eyelids fluttered. She took his hand, slipping hers over it where it rested on her face.
“Thanks,” she whispered, and she smiled up at him with sleepy eyes and lifted her head for him to slip the pillow beneath it.
Garrick’s whole body was full of a fluttering. A feeling he wasn’t sure he’d ever felt before, or not in a long, long time. He pushed the pillow under her waiting head.