The Cursed Dragon

by Rachal M. Roberts

  “Stop!” Todd scrambled into action. “What are you doing?! Stop!” he reached over and grasped her hands. “Jenniffer, what are you doing?!” he pulled the knife from her hands.

  She didn’t fight him but she wasn’t relieved either, she had wanted the other outcome.

  “They’re not contac.....” her voice faded. Jenniffer’s fingers went to her eye and held it open and leaned in close for Todd to see.

  Todd was stunned. Her blueish green beautiful eyes were real, the irises had a three-dimensional depth to them they captured the light and reflected an iridescence that was a perfect match to peacock feathers. “Whoa! They’re real! How did you get them to look like that?”

  Her lips shut and she warned him that she couldn’t talk about it by shaking her head.

  “Jenniffer, come on, surely you can say something. You’re scaring me. You don’t like your eyes? How did you do it? I think they’re awesome! But I’m taking all your knives now, you know that don’t you?”

  Jenniffer wanted to say something but knew that no words would come out of her mouth until her thoughts changed. It was hard to stop thinking about it, her intense hatred of Annette was what fueled her and kept her going. She thought about the curse and possession so much that she worried she may go mad from that singular thought. Jenniffer turned back to the TV in an effort to think about something else. A loud infomercial came on the air then, breaking her concentration for a moment, as they are so good at doing.

  After the commercial she looked at the clock to see how much longer she had until the sun went down, then she spoke. “Follow me in your car. Let’s go to a movie right now, but stay away from me and only watch what I do afterwards. No matter what, don’t talk to me.”

  “Alright, I’ve got time. But why can’t we talk or sit together?”

  “Because I can’t!” She angrily stood up to get ready, wiping a tear from her eye.

  Todd noticed the top edge of a tattoo when she got up, it was hard to miss. “Hey wait a minute, did you get a tattoo?”

  Jenniffer froze where she was with her back to him. She sighed and then dropped her jeans just far enough for him to see a wild tramp stamp, it said ‘Bill’s Parking Space’ underscored with an oil spill like what would be seen in a mechanics garage, there were deer antlers also, and it was bordered with camouflage and flames.

  “Oh man Jenniffer. You do know what that says don’t you?”

  “Don’t remind me.”

  On the way out the door Todd confiscated all of her knives.

  Jenniffer walked out of the theater when the movie ended, Todd followed her discreetly. He watched her target a man who had just seen the same showing, he was alone. Todd saw his sister escort him outside into the night where she used her yellow car for an office. Never once did she look Todd’s way and he was in total disbelief at what he saw. After a while of steamy car windows, the man got out and she drove onto the highway to head east out of Tulsa.

  Todd followed her all the way to Bill’s house, he hung back and actually parked on the highway, then he hiked through the woods and crossed Bill’s yard under the cover of night. Todd saw Jenniffer’s yellow car in his drive, she was already inside. He stood under Bill’s bedroom window and got an ear full of the lovers. Bill had conveniently left his curtains pulled back, there was no mistaken, Jenniffer was having a lot of intense fun with his best friend. Todd felt very weird having seen what he did and quickly left, not able to explain what he’d just witnessed.

  Todd couldn’t rest, he checked the clock and saw it was early still. Using the excuse of hunting, he drove over and banged on Bill’s door a mere four hours after he’d left them.

  Finally, Bill answered “What are you doing here?”

  “Telling you you’re not lying.”

  “Come on in then.” Bill offered him a beer. “It’s too early for coffee.”

  Jenniffer appeared at the doorway, a dirty sheet wrapped around her. “Todd?! What are you doing here?”

  Todd looked over at Bill who was trying to come up with an answer. It was obvious Bill was worried he would be slapped.

  Todd answered quickly for them both. “We’re gonna go hunting, wanna come?” he smiled. He knew Jenniffer hated killing innocent animals.

  “No, y’all go on.”

  “Well, alright then. Bill, go get dressed already, we’re probably missing that big buck.”

  Bill jumped up and happily left them alone.

  Jenniffer yawned, “Well, I’m going back to bed.”

  “Hey sister, you’re up. Let’s talk.”

  “No, I’m tired. You should be too.”

  “Can I ask you something?”

  “No.”

  Todd got up and stepped in her path. “Sister, I just have to know, how did you know about the gift of the rooster?”

  “What?” her eyes avoided him, “Oh, yeah, you helped Bill with that didn’t you? Thanks.”

  “But how did you find out about it? Did Annette tell you?”

  “Yes, she did, she thought it could help Bill and I. Now good night Todd.”

  He blocked her attempted detour. “But it’s so gross, why did you go along with it?”

  “It’s not that gross, you did it, and besides, Bill needed help.”

  “But I thought you hated Bill. So why are you here?”

  “He’s good in bed.” she smiled and evaded him.

  Todd let her go, he was more puzzled than ever.

  On the way to their favorite hunting spot Todd apologized to Bill.

  Bill was easy to forgive his best friend. “No problem. You see what I mean though? She was all over me.”

  “OK, OK. No more visuals please? I just want to figure out why.”

  “What? You don’t think I’m good enough for her?” Bill asked defensively. The extra testosterone in Bill’s blood was affecting his sensitivity.

  “Settle down, I didn’t say that, you’re better than she deserves, but I just want to figure out why Jenniffer is lying and hitting you every morning. Don’t you want to know too? Better to find out now before y’all get married instead of ending in divorce.”

  Bill straightened his jacket, “I guess you’re right. What did you think of her tramp stamp? I designed it.”

  “Yeah, I thought so, it has everything you love on it.”

  “She makes it look good too.”

  “Come on, man! No guy should have to see his sister that way.”

  “Alright, alright. Let me know if you find out anything.”

  “I will, don’t worry. Until then, why don’t you stop sleeping with her?”

  “No way. I’m sorry, but no way.”

  “You idiot, I mean after your fun, send her home. Or better yet, why don’t you start going to Tulsa, then you can leave afterwards and no harm done?”

  “Oh, I guess I could do that.”

  Todd was anxious to get to the sweat lodge that morning. After he’d paid his sexual offering to the veiled goddess he reverently knelt and asked “Great Mother Earth, please fix Jenniffer before she hurts my friend.”

  The tingly voice shattered and spoke “The rooster’s gift protects him, do not worry for him.”

  “Great Spirit, if he is fine, then what of Jenniffer? Please fix what is wrong with her.”

  “She is not broken.”

  “She is not happy during the day.” Todd returned.

  “Rightly so. Your sister hunts at night, and during daylight she wishes she was hunting.”

  “She doesn’t seem to be longing to hunt.”

  There was no answer. Todd feared the ceremony was over. “Great Spirit, please, how can I help her to be happy?”

  There was no answer. The smoke began rising normally again and faded into the daylight. He knew the ceremony had ended.

  After a quick lunch and a healing rub for Ms. Whilamer’s arthritis, Todd went back to Tulsa and to Jenniffer’s apartment.

  He knocked lightly on her door. “Jenniffer, it’s Todd again, can you ope
n the door?”

  The door opened.

  Jenniffer looked a mess “Well? Did you follow me?”

  “Yes I did. Can you talk about it now?”

  “No.”

  “Alright then, listen to me while I talk. I saw you last night with Bill.”

  “Oh, Jeez.”

  “I’ll ask you again, Do you like Bill?”

  “No.”

  “What? I can’t help you if you are going to lie to me. I saw you with him, not that it was something I wanted to see. But yeah, you were on top, you were happy – I think. Do you at least remember what I said to you this morning when I came to get Bill for hunting?”

  “Yes, you asked me to go with you, then you asked about the gift of the cock and why I was with Bill.”

  “Yeah, and you said he was good in bed. You also didn’t seem to care that we were going hunting to kill an animal which is odd. So why were you there?”

  “I told you I can’t tell you.”

  “Fine. Then what can you tell me?! Can you explain how you knew about gift of the rooster?”

  “Annette kinda told me.”

  “I find that hard to believe.”

  “Believe what you want to. I knew it was too good to be true that you would help me.”

  “Jenniffer, come on. I’m trying to but you are making it difficult, just tell me why you are different at night. Why are you whoring around?”

  Jenniffer ignored him by turning back to her TV with a face of stone and beautiful eyes that were full of tears.

  “Whatever.” Todd grabbed his truck keys out of his pocket. “You are screwed up in the head, you know that? If you won’t talk to me, then at least meditate and reach out to our ancestors, tell them your problems and maybe they’ll send you a spirit guide to help you.” He walked to the door, “One last thing – stay away from Bill.” He shut the door behind him.

  Chapter 12

  It felt good to leave his tears in the seer pool so he wouldn’t have to know their sting. The cold water shocked his system but not as much as that spell’s unexpected failure shocked him. He was devastated. Why didn’t that spell work, especially when so much was pending on its success? Kalara’s words echoed in his ears, ‘You don’t have to say anything, just get it over with.’ He couldn’t do it, the thought of taking her life caused his stomach to knot up, he felt bad enough without her having to say that. The water took his tears but it could not wash away the image of her standing at the water’s edge, exposing her lovely neck, waiting for the killing blow. He hated himself for loving her still. No matter how hard he tried he could not tear Kalara from his heart. Ravanan wanted to forget ever finding her alive.

  He had placed so much expectation on that spell, wanting to bring his mate back to life, that when it failed Kalara died all over again in his mind. It was too much to relive, his chest quaked in sorrow and the chilly subterranean water offered no solace. She was gone, dead to him, and she had been for nearly a year. He shouldn’t be broken down and weeping, but he was. Even as he felt his aura kick in and take over his breathing, he swam deeper, he continued to shed tears.

  It was difficult to have her body back but not his mate, and seeing her constantly reminded him of his loss. They had done so many things together, shared a history that spanned two thousand years, there was a familiarity and a history there that the woman currently staying in his lair just did not have, but he did.

  Ravanan knew the flooded cave shaft backwards and forwards, and though he didn’t need light to navigate he cast “STARLIGHT” anyway for comfort. He was tired of constantly being reminded of her fate which was worse than death, tired of the oppressive sadness in the lair, he longed to be out and in the bright daylight, free and away from things he could not change.

  He could not fix her. He had put everything into those spells, they were powerful, and so rare that he’d actually felt faint from the depletion of his magical blood when he cast them. It wasn’t a lot of blood but he could feel the loss all the same. He even felt the drop in Kalara’s blood when that final spell was cast through her by his mind control. The spells were sent out, why didn’t they work? They should have. She was calm, unguarded, no defenses, no armor, and she was willing. His other spells worked on her, so why didn’t these? It was true the spells were not efficient or well-practiced but they still should have worked, his blood loss was testament to that. It went against the very principle of magic and there was no reason for it.

  She trusted him, believed he would help her, she needed him and he let her down. He felt flawed and less than the dragon he thought he was, he wasn’t good enough to undo her damage. He failed to find her past and seeing her would only make him remember his failure. No, he wouldn’t even gaze upon her. He didn’t want to be near her, but he couldn’t bring himself to kill or imprison her either, the only thing he knew to do was leave. She didn’t need his protection now that she was home and under his blue mist. He didn’t have to be there. She was safe in Black Blade.

  Kalara’s reaction to the failed spell had been to run from him he was sure, he knew she thought of him as cruel and that he didn’t love her, she was ignorant enough to mistaken his irritation of having to constantly teach another dragon as hatred. He could still feel her aura, it was powerfully sorrowful, yearning and calling out for him, it pained him not to answer it but he had to get away from the hurt.

  He would be beyond her siren call when he entered the main flow, already he could feel the current begin to pick up speed. He couldn’t shake the ruinous feelings of not being able to help her. He hated failure. He hadn’t failed in a task in over a thousand years, defeat was unknown to him. To be unable to solve the one problem his mate had was eating him up.

  Even though he knew his mate was gone for good, Ravanan could not kill that woman, not yet. He wasn’t to that point and he didn’t know if he would ever be. But if that horrible day did come he would be the one to end her life, not the Acamas. He feared that day would come soon. Acama business was so random and unpredictable. He knew they would find out about Kalara’s condition, it was only a matter of when. All one of them had to do was summon her and when she didn’t show up they would come calling. She thought he wasn’t in a hurry to recover her memories, but she couldn’t be more wrong.

  In his efforts, he had done the unthinkable, used his prime spell of manipulation on Kalara, he’d treated her like a lesser being, a mere human. He controlled her mind as he had countless times on prey. He knew what his spell did to the mind, he crafted the damned thing! He knew how it ripped the mind away from the spinal cord and unplugged it from the very core of feelings and signals and yet he did it anyway – at her request.

  Invariably, death was rewarded quickly to his victims so there was never an issue of long-term effects but if one were to be left alive such as she was, he knew the tear would take time to mend and he surmised she’d have a tremendous and lengthy headache with possible irrevocable mental scarring.

  As the pressure of the water increased, so did his anger. He hated himself for controlling her, even though he’d used it only as a last resort and she wanted him to do it, he shouldn’t have, he was just so desperate to bring his mate back from the dead. He cursed himself for listening to her sweet, enticing, persuasive talk. In all his life he never could resist her and he knew it wasn’t her aura or magic, it was just her, there was no magical defense against love and it was maddening. To listen to the reasoning of a dragoness, especially one that is a step away from insanity, instead of following his own common sense was idiotic and he hoped nothing bad would happen to her mind because he had walked inside her head.

  He realized that the chances of getting her memories back were slim, but if somehow he found a way, what was she going to think after she finally woke up from her amnesia and she remembered he had laid with a lesser being during her absence, taken advantage of her frailty. What was he to do? How could he know whether to take the ruined Kalara to his bed every night or stay away from her?
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br />   Ravanan tried to think more on what his mate would want, he marveled that after two millennia with Kalara he wasn’t sure, it felt like he should know her better than that. The topic of ‘what if you lose your mind?’ had never come up. Ravanan wondered if any other dragon had ever suffered the same fate. He hoped his mate would understand his dilemma if she ever came back, but if she wouldn’t forgive him he’d at least be happy her mind was restored and then he could focus fully on working things out with her, provided she didn’t try to kill him.

  Then Ravanan considered something worse, what would she do when she remembered he’d walked inside her mind, controlled her, treated her like livestock and severed her neurons? He contemplated that she might hate him because he had done that to her.

  In all ways things were grim, he was alone and with no treasure, nothing to show for his life.

  He entered the main water course then, with its large tunnel and fast moving current. He allowed his human body to transform back, becoming once again the magnificent blue dragon that he was. He didn’t hate the human form but he didn’t love it either, it was merely another tool in his arsenal. One thing he didn’t like about using a human body was its easy manner of turning sadness into all-out crying, that was one thing he didn’t need. But it was the one thing he felt like doing.

  He heard Kalara’s sweet voice again. ‘You don’t have to say anything, just get it over with.’ She was ready to die. He wanted to roar in upset. He felt the water pick up even more speed, there was no turning back from its pursuit of sea level and freedom. He could see the familiar faint light up ahead. He was ready, more than ready. Heartbeats later he launched like a bullet from the top of the waterfall, beating his powerful wings to soar out over the jungle and dry his cerulean blue scales with the warm sun.

  His waterfall was far below him now, splashing into mist and flowing out to join the larger river, Ravanan bellowed a mighty roar and flew free, hearing the non-sounds of the quieted and fear-stricken creatures of the jungle. He favored the wild panic of his aura accompanied with a good, throat-clearing, fierce roar and longed for the places such as this where he could get away with it. Today however, even his Dragon Fear was not enough to make him happy.