“You said it, not me.”
“But I don’t understand. How did you trade?”
“Miri, I had villagers visiting me every day from every place on the globe. I didn’t need to trade, and neither did any of my dragons. I distributed the wealth among them so that they could use their reserves to influence the societies on their continents.”
“Like a treasury.”
“Indeed.”
She couldn’t believe any of it. All of this was just a theory—one that many historians dismissed. Dragons refused to talk about Dark’s reign for fear of retribution, and so they spread misinformation to make themselves look better.
It was all crap.
Her thesis was already riddled with at least fifty errors. She second-guessed everything she ever knew. She couldn’t find any words to speak, and her mind was racing with all the follow-up questions.
Earl cleared his throat. “Miss, we ought to get going.”
Miri’s head spun. She glanced at her watch and composed herself. “You gave me a lot to think about. I have to go. I’ll be back tomorrow.”
“I suppose I’ll be here if I don’t tire of this place before then,” Dark said, sighing.
Miri smiled and left him staring after her.
XII
Frog paced around the edge of his pond. The studio was still in shambles from his fight with the crew, and he preferred to leave it that way—the shattered cameras, the broken glass, the overturned tables and chairs, the rack lights hanging down like black zigzags across the blue screen—silent aftermath. His rage often got him into trouble, but this time it was right. He had orbited the pond at least two hundred times. He was keeping count. Another hundred and he might pay for his anger with the right amount of after-patience, something his father taught him. Now there was a dragon that had terrible anger. His father would have destroyed the building and walked away without a single flesh wound.
This was the first round of thoughts since his meditation. He pushed them out of his mind as he noticed quiet birdsong.
The birds had returned. They always flew away during his fits, and their return signaled that he was finally in an okay place mentally to stop pacing after another hundred laps. A black and white bird with a splotch of red on its breast landed on his leg and he smiled as it pecked a clump of suet off one of his warts. Then it flew up into a quick arc and landed on the ground near the pond.
He looked up into the sky as dragonflies crisscrossed his head. Exhaling, he continued his laps, all one hundred of them, and then he eased himself into the cold water, which bubbled around him as he submerged up to his eyes. He closed them for a moment and let himself drift on the gentle waves of the pond. Joy overwhelmed him as he experienced complete emptiness—his body in the water, the water eddying around his eyes, the birds singing, the dragonflies buzzing, the distant drone of planes and helicopters in the air above, the whispering breeze lapping the surface of the water.
When he opened his eyes, Norwyn was standing on the edge of the pond, watching him. Rather, he was a hologram projected by a white orb that hovered over the dragon’s head. It blinked and glitched as the white dragon’s eyes narrowed.
“You’re enjoying yourself, it seems.”
He climbed out of the water and shook himself dry. “On a day like this, one needs his after-patience.”
“How about before-patience?” Norwyn asked. “That would have prevented this. Two hundred and fifty thousand.”
“Two hundred and fifty thousand what?”
“Spiras. That’s how much your little temper tantrum cost.”
Frog’s face hardened. “Shall I try for more?”
“Try for zero.”
“What was I supposed to do, bend over and lift my tail for ‘em?”
Norwyn snorted. “I can’t keep bailing you out every time you get upset. If you had seriously hurt someone, I wouldn’t have been able to interfere.”
“Our dragon pact supersedes Abstraction. You’ven’t forgotten, have you?”
“No. But Abstraction has its limits. This isn’t the old days. Don’t put me a position where I can’t honor my promise to your father.”
“What’s it like, your Abstraction? You don’t look in the best of health, if you don’t mind me sayin’.”
Norwyn stood and his hologram began to walk around the edge of the water. “I’m fine. When you reach old age, you’ll understand. As for my Abstraction, it’s better than death. Justice has its unique challenges.”
“Since you’re the guardian of justice, why don’t you go after the ones what tried to stop me? That’s obstruction of free speech.”
“They didn’t obstruct you,” Norwyn said. “If they had, maybe you’d have an argument.”
Frog sighed. He’d wanted the white dragon to do more for him, fight for him. Norwyn at least owed him that. He was the only one left who understood the old days. Frog felt foolish when he realized that one day, Norwyn might not be able to help him. And then he’d be truly on his own, and his next encounter with society might not end so well. He croaked at the thought, and a hiccup exploded from his throat.
“I’ve paid half your debt,” Norwyn said. “The other half will come from your equity. The networks will accept no less, so if you have to raise rent and prices for a time, that’s what you’ll have to do. And don’t worry about the CEO. She handed in her resignation so you’re free to choose someone else.”
“I thanks you very much.”
Norwyn’s face was blank. He glanced around the destroyed studio and shook his head. “I heard your broadcasts about Old Dark, you know.”
Frog chuckled. “Eh? Was it accurate?”
Norwyn stepped among the broken furniture and set his sight on a microphone laying on the ground. “You said something has awakened. Do you believe it?”
“From the bottom of my warts. Don’t you?”
“I sensed it, too. A few days ago.”
“You don’t think it was … him, do you?” Frog asked, smiling.
Norwyn shrugged. Frog expected the white dragon to say something, but he didn’t. Instead, he kept looking around the studio with his cobalt eyes.
“Did you check the bog yourself?” Frog asked. “It’s too difficult to tell if that was the spot.”
“My dislocation spell was too strong even for me,” Norwyn said. “I last saw the tomb one hundred and fifty years ago. I ran into trouble and needed money from the coffers. He was alive then.”
“Might he still be alive?”
“Maybe. If the curse didn’t completely destroy him by now.”
“You don’t blame yourself anymore, do you?” Frog asked. “For not being able to break the spell?” He reached out to put a hand on Norwyn’s shoulder but forgot it was a hologram. His hand went through the white dragon and the hologram flickered.
Norwyn puffed. “Not any more than your father did. If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s fate.”
“What about it?”
“It’s unpredictable. He’s going to wake up. It’s just a matter of when.”
The silver orb beeped and the small projector cut off, ending Norwyn’s hologram. The orb rose further into the air. Norwyn’s voice remained.
“Take care of yourself, Frog. And stay low for a while, will you?”
“I’ll try.”
Norwyn flew through the pink membrane surrounding the roof and disappeared.
Frog stared after him for a while, and when the white orb vanished behind a skyscraper, he waved his webbed hands, sending wisps of magic across the roof, and he started putting everything back to together again.
XIII
Amal Shalewood took the witness to a tea parlor on the fringe of Bogville and bought her a cup of tea.
The parlor was themed in the elven old school—there were watercolor paintings of ancient fishermen on the walls, casting nets atop a foaming sea. And everywhere, fish—painted on the walls, in the wallpaper. Even the tables were shaped like curved fish angl
ing for a line.
Amal disliked thoroughly elven places because the kind of people who frequented them tended to believe in elven superiority, and they were often condescending. She’d experienced plenty of that as a detective in the MCU. Suffice to say that she “got” elves and understood their sometimes strange ways, but she didn’t particularly get along with them.
Annette Potionberry sipped her tea and a wisp of steam swirled around her nose before dissipating. She stared at Amal with bright eyes. She had relaxed somewhat when Amal introduced herself and told her why she was here. As a detective, she’d learned how to defuse people, especially people who weren’t going to go to jail for answering a few questions honestly.
“Thank you for meeting with me,” Amal said. “It’s a shame that the media ignored you.”
“So you want to know about that night,” Annette said, not wasting any time.
Typical elven manners.
Amal began writing in her notebook but then thought the better of it. She set her smartphone on the table. Its sleek black shape stood out against the reclaimed wood. “Mind if I record?”
“This isn’t going to be used against me, is it?”
Amal smiled. “You’re not a criminal. I just want to know what you saw.”
Annette gave her permission to record. “Why do you want to know?”
Amal shrugged as she wrapped her palms around a hot porcelain mug of coffee. “I’m curious, that’s all. I want to help.” She sipped. The coffee was strong and chocolatey, with lots of cream and sugar to water it down just how she liked it.
Annette started slowly. Her gaze rested on the wall behind Amal as she spoke. “I was driving home from a district manager meeting in the city. I stayed to watch Governor Grimoire speak, so I was on the road late. As I entered the Bogville Highway, I noticed more cars than normal. They were pulled over. I passed them, not thinking much of it. Sometimes people stop on the side of the road to observe wildlife since we’re so close to protected land. But that’s when I saw the Magic Eaters.”
Amal remembered the reports of giant snails with tentacled legs who had been spotted on the highway. She had seen them in person once; she’d never forget their rotten smell and how they feasted on magic.
She opened her portfolio and pointed to a picture of a dead eater, splattered against the asphalt with one eye closed and the other bulging with fluid.
“That’s it,” Annette said.
“How many were there?” Amal asked.
“Hundreds. Maybe a thousand. I couldn’t believe it.”
“You said earlier that the media ignored you. What did they ignore?”
“The Magic Eaters were moving in uniform behavior. They were traveling in packs toward the Ancestral Bogs. But in the sky, there was a strange pink glow coming from the trees. They were definitely traveling toward something. An object or a place. It was like a giant pilgrimage. I’ve never seen anything like it in my life.”
“That’s more than the news reported,” Amal said. “They only told us that there were a lot of Magic Eaters. Hmm.”
Amal couldn’t help but scribble a few notes on her pad. She frowned, trying to put all the pieces together in her head. But something wasn’t fitting. Something was missing.
“You said you wanted to help,” Annette asked. “How?”
“There was a lot of damage done to the forest,” Amal said. “This is a good chance for me to play a role in helping with magical conservation. Anything I can learn will help prevent future incidents.”
Annette sighed and pushed back from the table. “So this is about politics.”
“Of course it is. What did you expect? Don’t go.”
Annette shook her head and flipped her tea cup upside down on the saucer to signify that she was finished. “I should have known better.”
“Let’s be honest,” Amal said. She laughed a little. “I have no chance of winning this election.”
Annette nearly choked. “I...what...I’m sorry. It’s just—I didn’t expect a candidate to say that.”
Good. She had managed to keep Annette’s attention. Most people would have walked away by now.
“I’m not the average candidate.”
A wry smile crept across Annette’s face. “I have to say it’s encouraging for me to hear. I’m being selfish, of course. Governor Grimoire already has my vote. Why won’t you just drop out? I don’t say that to be antagonistic, but come on.”
Amal clasped her fingers together and tried not to sigh. How many times had she heard this question? She could answer it in two compact sentences, sounding like a robot as usual, but she decided not to this time.
“I’m staying in the race because I don’t feel that we’re having the right conversation.”
“I think the conversation is simple, Mrs. Shalewood. It’s an easy choice.”
“I don’t think so. Lucan is all about shaking everything up. Governor Grimoire is about maintaining the status quo. Neither is good. We need a progressive in this race, a voice of reason to ask the tough questions that neither candidate wants to answer.”
“And that’s you?”
“Sure. I’m not the only one who feels this way. The majority of humans support progressive reform. It’s elves who reject it. You’re all drunk on magic. No offense. It’s awfully hard to go back on your standard of living when you’ve been living with magic all these years. I get that. But it’s not ultimately sustainable. Dragons know this, yet they have shirked their age-old responsibility, and that’s the real question we need to be asking.”
“So you’re one of those people,” Annette said. “You would send us back a thousand years into subservience, when dragons ruled the world?”
“No.”
“If it weren’t for elves, you’d be paying tribute to a dragon right now. How hard is it to be grateful for a magical society?”
“I don’t have a gratitude problem, believe me. But it’s worth asking why dragons have done nothing to curb magic use. For thousands of years they claimed it was their God-given purpose. You couldn’t separate them from their aquifers. Now with Abstraction, they are abandoning aquifer magic at an alarming rate. You don’t see an issue with that?”
“No. They finally realized that elves were right.”
“Right about what?”
“That magic was meant to be used. That a world without magic isn’t worth living in and we shouldn’t feel ashamed about it. People like you are the reason Magic Hope has lost prestige in the world. Magic makes everything better, so why ignore a good thing?”
Amal frowned. “Nothing wrong with moderation, you know.”
Annette stood and smoothed out her blouse. “In any case, I wish you the best of luck, Mrs. Shalewood. You’re going to need it. Thanks for letting me vent about the bog incident, and I hope it helped you in some way.”
“There’s no chance at all that I’ve changed your mind, is there?” Amal asked.
“No. You’ve confirmed what I’ve believed all along.”
“Ah.…”
Annette turned and walked out the cafe.
Amal glanced down at her notes. With the exception of the Magic Eaters swarming toward a central location, she had no more information than when she started. She sank into her chair, swilled a big mouthful of coffee, trying to figure out what it all meant.
She gathered her things and started for the door when she bumped into someone.
An elven boy, maybe nineteen or twenty, cursed at her as his backpack fell to the floor.
“What’s your problem?” the kid asked. He had bruises and cuts on his face. One arm was in a sling. His eyes looked troubled.
She recognized him; he had been sitting at the table behind her, quietly drinking tea.
“You okay?” Amal asked.
The boy’s eyes drifted to the floor, where photos of the bog and Magic Eaters lay scattered on the floor. He jumped at the sight of them, then glanced at Amal with squinted eyes.
He shoved past her and
ran out of the coffee shop, dashing up a stairwell to what looked like an apartment above.
“Maybe that’s my cue to get out of here,” Amal said to herself, picking up her things.
***
She turned onto the interstate when her husband called. His dark, mustached face appeared on screen and she sighed.
She didn’t want to talk to him now. She’d reserved the drive home for silence and introspection, trying to process everything that had happened, a painful reminder that she had failed. She’d have to go home to him, and maybe they’d really have to talk for real about quitting.
She put the phone to her ear.
“Hey, babe. I’m driving.”
“Where are you?” Demetrius asked. His voice was gruff, a tone that pervaded his voice after an interrogation. One that had not gone well.
“I had to get away.”
“You’re not mad about what I told you earlier? About dropping out?”
“No.”
“We should meet for coffee. I’ve got something interesting to tell you.”
“I can’t. I’m in Bogville.”
“That far? Campaign event? Isn’t that Governor Grimoire territory?”
“I don’t know why, but I came here to see if I could figure out what was going on in the bog.”
“Ah, that. That’s actually what I wanted to talk to you about.”
Amal turned on her turn signal and passed a truck carrying seashells in its bed. She stepped on the gas, and when she made it past the truck the sea opened up on her left.
“I just questioned Lucan Grimoire.”
“Lucan? Why?” she asked.
“He was shot.”
“My God.”
“He’s all right. I’ll tell you more later. What did you find out in Bogville?”
“Nothing. Just a couple of disgruntled witnesses. I made a big mistake coming here. It would have been more prudent to do a speech or canvass. I’m kicking myself for it, Demetrius. I really am.”
“You should’ve told me you were in Bogville. The man who shot Grimoire, he lived there. I’m looking for his son.”
Old Evil (The Last Dragon Lord Book 2) Page 8