by B. J. Smash
Montague? Montague had the power to hand over the woods to Izaill? Montague had to be Old Sam McCallister. I swallowed over the knot in my throat, standing on my tiptoes to see over Drumm's shoulder.
“You will never have Ivy—not until the last breath leaves my body.” Drumm pushed me back and stood solidly in front of me, bow and arrow in hand.
“It will be no great loss when that happens, elf. And it will be sure to happen.” Izaill held the comb up, retrieving something else from his pocket. From the distance between us, it appeared to be a small blue felt bag.
“This here…was given to me by my wonderful sister, Magella.” Glancing down her way, he winked.
“Stupid girl. Thought she could just up and steel the rolling pin with no consequences,” Magella yelled up.
Izadora leaned on her staff before her, squinting her eyes at Izaill. “What do you speak of? What is your silly plan?”
“With the spell from my late and great uncle, my mother's brother…” He paused as though this uncle had been of great importance and explained further. “My mother took him out of the game, for the fact that he had been a great nuisance to her. Oh, he still lives, but remains powerless. That is why he is the late and great, you see. Regardless, I came upon an old spell of his that states that when you remove a comb from a mermaid, you take her power. I managed to accomplish that. Then all I needed was the hair from a maiden. Once I have the hair, I apply it to the comb, and I have control of the maiden.”
“Ivy? What does he mean?” Izadora's voice wavered as she scowled at me.
Izaill withdrew something from the small bag. Hair.
“It seems that when your Ivy was departing Magella's houseboat, my dear sister of mine grabbed a handful of Ivy's hair to remember her by.”
“No.” Even Drumm seemed full of despair. He clenched his fists.
Izadora looked to me, her shoulders sagged in defeat; sorrow engulfed her features. “Do not do it, Izaill. You cannot win this game.”
“It looks as though you are outnumbered, sister. Magella and I will take you down this time. We will take you out of the game. But before we do”—he placed the hair through the comb—“she comes to this side, and you must watch.”
My body began to shake, and my legs moved forward on their own. My feet dragged over the ground, and I tried with all my might to stop them, or slow them, but my tendons tightened, and sweat dripped down my back. I could not stop myself from walking toward Izaill.
Drumm pulled the quiver back on his bow, slamming an arrow into Izaill's right shoulder.
Izaill jolted back in surprise—he was momentarily stunned—but it didn’t last. “You fool,” he spat. He said a few words beneath his breath, and instantly a fierce wind blew. A wind tunnel formed of sand shot up from the ground, encircling Drumm. He was immediately helpless, and couldn’t break through. It continued to spin at a vast speed, forcing him to stay inside.
I'd reached Izaill's side. The arrow protruded out the front of his shoulder, but he pulled it free as though it were nothing but simple a toothpick. “Don't think I didn't take precaution. I drank nightshade tea, covering myself with a spell before I came. One of the very few things to ward off elven arrows. Another of Uncle's spells.”
I knew nightshade to be poisonous, but then again, he wasn't totally human. And with his dark soul, I doubted he had much human left in him.
Izadora, gaining her composure, stood straight as a tree, lifted her staff, and pointed it at Drumm. “Release him.” A bolt shot out, smacking the wind tunnel, stopping the wind, and scattering the sand to the ground.
Drumm gasped for air, and I think he'd inhaled too much of the sand. He bent over, leaning on his knees for support. Wiping his face, he said, “You will be sorry. I promise you.”
“Now that the girl is mine, there is no stopping us.” Izaill grabbed my arm, and his touch was scorching hot.
“Ow, you’re hurting my arm!” I yelped. I would be surprised if his hand didn't leave a mark on me.
“Shut that girl up and her whining. I told you, I have a migraine coming on!” Magella screamed, her voice high pitched and scratchy.
Izadora glared down at her. “Magella, why don't you rise up for the occasion?” She then proceeded to take a slimy piece of seaweed from her robe pocket—the piece she'd had Drumm acquire for her prior to this meeting. She stood on the planks, her back ramrod straight, and swung the seaweed over her head. She muttered a few words, and a massive wave rose up equal to the cliff, with Magella's boat at the top. The wave continually flowed up and cascaded back down to the sea, like a fountain.
Magella held on to the edge of the boat, swearing and cursing throughout the whole process, “Damn you, Izadora!”
As the houseboat remained steady on the flow of water, Magella quickly tried a few reversal spells. None of them would work. “Let me go, you old fool. He's got the girl and there isn't a thing you can do to stop him,” Magella said teasingly.
“We shall see.” Izadora seemed confident, but it was hard to tell.
“I doubt that. There is two of us, and one of you,” Izaill spoke up.
Magella and Izaill both cackled in harmony.
“You are both beyond deranged.” Izadora appeared weary from their company.
As they continued to argue, an engine could be heard fast approaching the battle zone. The sound of rocks flew up from the tires. A four-wheeler. It parked somewhere, and the engine cut off.
I don't believe anyone but Drumm and I heard the vehicle, and if they did they didn't acknowledge it. Too busy arguing, the three of them bickered simultaneously.
“You will suffer for this.” Izadora raised her staff toward Izaill, but Magella raised her arms, calling out a command to the sea.
Before Izadora could say another word, Magella shot a wave of water at her and when it hit, it soaked her to the bone, turning her to ice. A solid piece of ice. Her mouth gaped open, as she had been in the process of calling out a spell. She never got to finish.
“What have you done to her?” Drumm pounded his fist into the dirt.
Izaill and Magella howled with laughter. Izaill slapped his knees, and Magella stood atop the wave in her boat, clapping her hands.
“That shut her up! Good one, sister,” Izaill belted out. “Blasted bitch.”
My mouth hung open, and not from what had just transpired between the siblings, but from whom I had just seen arrive. The person from the four-wheeler approached.
“Oh God. Oh my God.” I couldn't have been more surprised. There was no way—no way—that he should be here in his condition.
“GG Edmund!” I called out. “Why are you here? You must go at once!”
GG Edmund continued to walk slowly toward the battle zone, his back slightly bent.
“Ivy…” Drumm tried to calm me.
I tried to move, but Izaill's spell held me tight. “Let me go, I must tell him to leave! He's a fragile old man. Don't hurt him and I will do whatever it is you wish.”
“Ivy! Hush!” Drum shushed me.
“But…” I started to say.
Drumm looked pleased at my GG Edmund's sudden appearance.
“I can't believe it. Do my eyes fool me?” Magella rubbed her eyes mockingly.
“Magella.” GG Edmund acknowledged her with a nod of his head.
“What are you doing here…Montague?” Izaill interrupted.
“Good to see you too…brother.” GG Edmund grunted.
“GG Edmund, what…what did you call him? You can't be…you can't be Montague. You are my great-grandpa.”
GG Edmund looked toward me. “Ivy, I will explain in time. Right now, I have something that needs to be taken care of.”
My skin began to tingle, and a rush of adrenaline whipped through my body. Could this be true? My dear, sweet old great-grandfather was the brother to these freaks?
He nodded at me and did something I will never forget. He held his elbows, and I had pity for a moment, thinking that it was the ar
thritis. Not so. He rubbed his elbows and said, “I haven't done this in ages.” He held his hands out to the side and shook them once, igniting a fire in his hands.
I gasped in utter shock.
It looked as if someone had dumped kerosene and dropped a match in his hands. He gave me a crooked smile, turned to Izadora, and held his hands above his head. Shooting his hands forth, he shot fire up at the ice figure.
Izaill tensed up, too flabbergasted to speak in time to retaliate against GG Edmund; he just stood there.
When the fire hit the ice, the ice popped and busted into pieces, the remainder of it melting into drips of water.
Izadora breathed deeply, her chest heaving up and down. She turned to my great-grandfather. “Monty? I knew you'd come. And just in the nick of time. Thank you, brother,” Izadora said as she pulled in air, catching her breath.
GG Edmund acknowledged her with a nod of his head.
Drumm looked just as astonished as I did. Scratching his chin, he said, “Impressive.”
Izaill began chanting something in the background. He stomped the ground, and the earth trembled and broke apart all the way to the tree that Izadora stood in, cracking it in half.
She jumped off, swooping down, and turned into an eagle. She flew to the next tree, and turned back to her human form.
Drumm stood steady, holding his arms out for balance as the ground shook. GG Edmund never faltered.
“If you will, brother, hold him still for me,” Izadora said to GG Edmund.
“Certainly.” My great-grandfather shook his hands once and aimed for Izaill.
Izaill grabbed me and held me, using me to shield him. His body emanated waves of heat. “If you shoot fire at me, you kill the girl. That's not what you want, now is it, Montague?”
GG Edmund stood back, alarmed.
It couldn't end this way; I knew it couldn't. Good always prevailed over evil, didn't it? As I thought that, the stone from my mother's necklace warmed my skin. My whole stomach and chest tingled. I stared into Drumm's turquoise eyes, imagining my people, the elven people, and thoughts came into my mind. I had let the spell overtake me because my will let it. But I could also reverse the spell using my will. I had power. I had an elven stone sitting on my chest. Not only had that, but something else burned within my pocket. Slowly, using Drumm's eyes as a focal point, I forced my will upon my arms, telling them to move. Slowly, the tension from the spell released and I reached into my pocket, feeling the rose pin that Aggie had given me. Izaill hadn't noticed, for the fact that he couldn't stop babbling about how great he and his plans were. I clasped the pin, pointing the sharp pin between my forefinger and middle finger. I whipped it out and stabbed him in the leg.
He jolted back, screaming bloody murder as the pin stuck out from his leg; a dark blood oozed from the wound. The pin had debilitated him. It sizzled, and smoke spiraled up as he swatted at the pin. Having no mercy, as soon as I was out of the way, GG Edmund shot forth fire, enclosing Izaill in a fireball.
I figured this was it for Izaill; he would surely burn to death. Instead, he stood inside the fireball, trying to push out of it, to no avail. His face was full of rage and he yelled out, but couldn't be heard.
As GG Edmund held him in the ball of fire, Izadora took care of business.
“Let's end this, here and now!” Magella shrieked at the top of her lungs. Wind swooshed by us, carrying the smell of the sea.
“Let's.” Izadora’s eyes changed color, turning almost white. She clenched her fists and opened them. A wind circled her at such speed that we could feel it on the ground. Little bolts of energy crackled around her, and she looked as though she would explode, but she seemed to pick up more and more energy to match her anger.
Holding her hands up to the sky, a bolt of lightning shot up from the ground and passed through her and out to Magella's boat, obliterating it to pieces and sending Magella spiraling down to the ocean. “My boat!” she screamed on the way down.
The look on Magella's horror-stricken face right before the strike was priceless.
During all of the chaos, several merpeople had appeared and were floating in the water, waiting patiently for this moment. When Magella splashed in the water, they went for her. I could only imagine what they'd do, and thoughts of seamen being lead to the eerie depths of the ocean came to mind.
“Find a lake, and build yourself a crannog,” Izadora yelled out after her.
A crannog—I was to find out later—was a Scotch-Irish house built on a lake, with pillars shoved into the lake floor for support.
“And you…” she looked to Izaill.
GG Edmund pulled back the fire, releasing him.
Izaill held up his hands as if to retaliate, but Izadora was too fast. She spoke some language, some strange words, freezing him in his tracks, and it cast a wind so strong that it went right through him, stealing his breath—or perhaps his very soul. The wind swooped back around and reentered his body, and from the inside out, he glowed.
Had she just killed him? Expecting some sort of combustion, I closed my eyes.
Drumm nudged me. “Check it out.”
When I didn't hear an explosion, I opened my eyes. There, on a broken boulder, sat a rabbit. A cute little fuzzy rabbit, with tan fur.
“Catch me the rabbit, Drumm,” Izadora commanded.
He hopped away, trying to escape, but Drumm had him moments later. “Here you go, Izadora. What will you do with him now? Keep him in a cage?”
She had him by the scruff of the neck, and she took her finger and thumb and flicked him in the nose. “No. I haven't had rabbit stew in some time. At least a few months. Looks like rabbit stew is on the menu tonight.”
“Izadora!” we both yelled out.
GG Edmund, aka Monty, laughed. When we looked at him, he wiped the smile from his face.
“You can't eat him!” Drumm said as the rabbit kicked and scratched. “That's disgusting.”
“I can”—she flicked his nose again—“and I will. Be still, rabbit,” she commanded, and the rabbit was powerless.
“Sister, we shall find a better punishment, shall we?” GG Edmund asked.
But Izadora would hear none of it. Changing into an eagle, she held the rabbit in her talons and flew out into the night sky.
The aftermath of their battle was horrifying. Dust and smoke floated through the air; trees were cracked and burned. The ground had splits and crevices through it. Part of the cliff was missing.
Magella floated in the water, encircled by the merpeople. “Izadora!”
“Maybe they will let a whale eat her,” Drumm said as we all turned to go.
I hugged GG Edmund before he mounted the four-wheeler.
“I had no idea—” I started to say, wiping dust from my eyes.
“Of course you didn't. If it wasn't for you sending a message to me in the sea and telling me, as your great-grandfather, the severity of the problem, I wouldn't have come. I did it for you. But you must know why this all began. Take a minute to hear me through, and then we shall get out of here, and see what we can do for Izaill.” He grinned for a moment and then cleared his throat.
I could tell he had a touch of the madness that the rest of his siblings shared. One would never guess, though; I had always known my great-grandpa to be gentle, kind, and caring. However, I realized his brother was corrupt and insane, and in a way, it was funny how Izadora had turned Izaill into a rabbit. But the rabbit stew part seemed just too disgusting.
“Ivy, there is something you should know,” he said. “Your father and grandfather…well…they never went on a hunting trip for animals. They went in search of your Aunt Cora's fiancé. He had been taken about twelve years ago. He had been taken into fairyland.”
I didn't understand what he was telling me. This whole mess happened because of Aunt Cora?
“Ivy, I must do something right now, but I will explain this later. I promise.”
***
A cauldron boiled water on the stove in th
e kitchen of the tree house. The rooms were lit by a hundred candles that lit up the whole house. Izadora hummed a tune as she sprinkled salt in the water. “Now a little thyme, a few sprigs of rosemary. Yes, that will go good with rabbit.” Turning, she wiped her hands on her apron and pulled down a frying pan from a hook on the wall.
Izaill the rabbit had a rope tied around his neck, and he was tied to a chair leg. He squirmed, wriggled his nose, and laid his ears back.
“I wonder, is he conscious of what's going on?” I hoped the answer was no. Izaill might be the biggest jerk in the world, but this punishment was gross—and final.
“Yes. He knows exactly what's going on,” she uttered with a giggle.
We watched Izadora as she scurried through the kitchen, occasionally grabbing something out of a bottle that hung on the tree limbs of her living room. She continued to gleefully hum a melody, and occasionally she swayed her hips like she was attempting to dance.
“This must be a joyous occasion for you,” I began, “but it's so final. You don't really want to stoop to his level, do you, Izadora?” I stared at a red candle as it dripped wax down upon more tiers of wax.
“Hmmm? Did you say something, Ivy?” She continued to hum.
Sometime later, we heard the four-wheeler rumbling nearby. The engine cut, and I assumed it was GG Edmund parking out by the circle path.
Drumm ran to the balcony, and seconds later, he was talking to someone. “No, she's got him up here.”
I walked out on to the balcony to see GG Edmund next to the four-wheeler. Behind him stood a familiar yet scary person.
I gripped the railing. “Aggie?”
“In the flesh,” she yelled up, not looking at me. The only light to see in the darkness of the night was the brilliance from the candles inside, radiating outside. I could tell she wore the white pristine dress.