Monster World

by Michael James Ploof

  The unicorn blew out its nose and reared. It charged Scarlett, but she didn’t even flinch as it sped by.

  “You almost messed that up for me,” Scarlett told Eva as she stuck the horn in her thick belt.

  “Maybe you should have told us what you were doing,” said Eva. “I don’t like surprises.”

  “What you did to your arrows,” I said. “Was that magic? The rhiger died, but the unicorn was only put to sleep.”

  “You’re observant,” Scarlett said snarkily, but lightened up. “These are enchanted arrows. Really expensive but worth every gold queen.”

  “What else can your arrows do?”

  “Trade secret,” she said with a wink.

  We went west. The clouds had thinned and the sun beat down on us with a vengeance. I didn’t mind the heat so much, but the bugs that came with it were enough to make a person crazy.

  Seeing how we were struggling to fend off the little beasts, Scarlett tossed me a small jar. “Dip your finger in it and smudge a little bit behind your ears.”

  I opened it and looked inside. It contained a balm of some sort, snot-yellow and thick. When I sniffed it, I got a distinct whiff of peppermint. The princess looked at the jar with sever judgment and turned up her nose, but whatever was in that jar was better than being swarmed. I dabbed the greasy salve behind both ears. Almost instantly the bugs went away, but they continued to swarm Eva.

  “It works great,” I said and offered her the jar.

  Eva swatted a deerfly on her neck and hastily applied the balm. The bloodsucking denizens backed off, and she smiled.

  “Thank you, Scarlett,” Eva said. She trotted to catch up to the mysterious, sexy archer.

  I glanced at Doughboy, who was wading through the tall grass and eating grasshoppers like a frog.

  “What do you think of Scarlett?” I asked the pint-sized menace.

  “Sweeeet,” he said and offered me a thumbs-up.

  “Haven’t you learned how to say anything else?”

  He thought about that, shrugged, and said, “Nooo.”

  I laughed, and Eva turned to me with a curious expression that suggested that she thought we were gossiping about her.

  “Doughboy just said another word,” I said.

  “Doughboy, huh?” said Scarlett. She regarded him with interest. “So what’s with you two, anyway? Is all that goddess stuff true?”

  “Yup,” I said. “I was on my planet, Earth, just minding my own business and making pizzas, when a goddess brought me to this planet to be Eva’s champion.”

  “That’s incredible, or you’re insane and your Doughboy is a demon. I haven’t decided yet.”

  “Oh, it’s true,” said Eva. “Jake is from another planet.”

  “How do you know?” Scarlett asked. “Did you see him appear?”

  “Well, no, but—” She glanced at me with a frown.

  “What?” I said to both women.

  “Your story is farfetched,” said Scarlett. “Goddesses don’t just pull people from other planets. How is it you speak our language?”

  “The goddess blessed me with the ability to understand all languages. Well, almost all. I couldn’t understand the big-nosed monkeys or your magic words, but I understand humans and goblins and orcs.”

  The two women glanced at each other, and there was comradery there. They were bonding through their suspicion of me.

  Friggin’ women.

  “Okay, Eva,” I said. “Explain how I knew you prayed to the goddess for a champion to free you from the tower.”

  Doughboy looked up at her too, and he crossed his arms as if to say, “Well?”

  Eva thought about that for a while, then shrugged. “I suppose you could have heard me through the window, praying to the goddess, or one of the goblins did, and you learned it from them.”

  I snorted. “What about this?” I pulled my pizza shovel from the strap on my back and handed it to Scarlett.

  When she wrapped her fingers around the rune-covered shaft, her eyes widened. “This weapon is imbued with great magic,” she said with reverence.

  “Exactly. Goddess magic.” I accepted it back from her and hooked a thumb at Doughboy. “And how do you explain a sentient wad of dough? Seems like goddess magic to me.”

  “There are many types of magic in this world, both good and evil,” said Scarlett.

  “Does he look evil to you?”

  “He eats heads,” Eva reminded me.

  “He eats monster’s faces, and the skulls too.”

  “So he’s cute and a killer?” said Scarlett. “That’s a deadly combination.”

  “Sweeeet,” said Doughboy. He jumped to Scarlett’s shoulder, and she let out a surprised giggle.

  We left the dark forest behind and hurried across a wide meadow to get to the hills ahead. I didn’t like being out in the open. I glanced back every few minutes, thinking I would see the Goblin King and his warriors flying toward us on a dozen bats, but we were stalked only by sunshine.

  There wasn’t much wildlife, or else it stayed well hidden. That was just fine by me. The rhiger and unicorn had been enough mystical fun for one day. The fewer monsters and magical creatures we ran into, the better.

  I thought of gold as we trekked through the tall grass. After some quick calculations I realized my share of the reward would be worth over $1 million dollars on Earth. I had no idea how I was going to go about selling it, but that was a problem I didn’t mind having. With that kind of cheese, I would never have to work again.

  Maybe I’d get my own place. I imagined the name in lights: Jake Baker’s Pizza Parlor.

  No, maybe I would call it Baker’s Parlor or Jake’s Pies. Nah, those were lame too. I glanced at D. “Doughboy’s Pizzeria.”

  I realized there were probably already dozens of restaurants with that name.

  “What did you say?” Eva asked, walking beside me.

  “I was just talking to myself. I was trying to think up a name for my pizza parlor.”

  “What is pizza?” Scarlett asked.

  “Only the best food on Earth. It’s like a pie, but instead of berry and fruit filling, it’s got red or white sauce, cheese, pepperoni, sausage, you name it. You bake it fast and furious. It’s delicious.”

  “Not sweeeet,” said Doughboy from Scarlett’s shoulder.

  “Sorry. No offense.”

  “On this planet you call Earth, you’re a baker, not a champion?” Scarlett inquired.

  “Pretty much.”

  “Then why would the goddess summon you to this world to rescue the princess?”

  I cast a guilty glance at Eva. “Celesta made a mistake.”

  “What?” both women said in unison.

  “Apparently she meant to summon some dude named Verasorian Smite from the planet Vanguard 5. But since she got me instead, she enchanted my pizza shovel and Doughboy, and sent us on our merry way.”

  Eva stopped, blocking my path. “You’re telling me you were brought here by accident?”

  “Yup,” I said and walked around her.

  “You said you were my champion.”

  “I am.”

  “By default!”

  “Whatever.”

  “I can’t believe this. Not only do I get a baker, but I get one who isn’t even a champion.”

  “Maybe you should register a complaint on the goddess’s helpline,” I joked, but of course neither woman got it.

  I don’t know if the princess was being a bitch because Scarlett was around and she had an audience, or if the woman always reverted to her bratty self, but it was getting old.

  “You’re wrong about me not being a champion. Before I screwed up my knee, I was undefeated in the local MMA circuit.”

  “What does that even mean?” Eva asked.

  “It means I destroyed twenty men in twenty bouts and was never defeated,” I said evenly. “But the goddess healed my knee, and I’m feeling better than I have in years. Besides, I defended you against the goblins more than onc
e, as well as orcs, trolls, and friggin’ murlocs, so I don’t know what you’re complaining about.”

  “I’m just hot,” said Eva dismissively, fanning herself and squinting at the sun.

  Scarlett, who had remained silent for most of the conversation, regarded us with a laugh. “You two are the worst kind of lovers.”

  “Excuse me?” Eva clutched her chest.

  “It’s so obvious,” she went on. “You two are crazy about each other.”

  “I have never heard such a preposterous presumption in all my life, and I’ve spent most of it in the king’s court, listening to a bunch of pompous old hens!”

  “I have been around all kinds of people most of my life, which I believe has been slightly longer than yours,” said Scarlett in a near perfect impersonation of the whiny princess. “And I can tell you it’s all the same. When two people have fallen for each other, it is as apparent as a woman’s baby bump at month five. Try and hide it all you want, but the wind will give it away, whether through whispered secrets or bluster.”

  “You are just as crazy as Jake,” Eva decided and stomped ahead of us.

  “Wait, Eva!”

  I waved her off. “Meh, let her go.”

  “Eva, stop!” Scarlett cried, pulling an arrow from her quiver.

  Eva stopped, arms crossed, and glared.

  Behind her, a huge horned cat sprang from the grass.

  Scarlett’s arrow zipped past Eva’s left ear and thudded into the beast’s chest. No sooner had it dropped than Eva turned and screamed when another cat sprang into view. My enchanted shovel was off my back and singing through the air in a heartbeat. I slashed the cat’s face. Another pounced from the grass, and Scarlett’s bow sang twice.

  “Rahhh!” I screamed as I spun my pizza shovel in a blur of motion, and the cat I had injured decided it wasn’t worth it and bounded away. “Is everyone all right?”

  Eva quivered and staring at the dead cat in shock. Scarlett, on the other hand, took aim at the fleeing cat. I could still see it, but it was too far away.

  “It’s not a threat to us anymore,” I said.

  “The crougar will tell the others where we are.” She released an arrow. At first I thought it would miss, but as the beast sped through the grass, it intersected the path of the arrow, which slammed into its back.

  “Are you just that good, or is your aim enchanted or something?” I asked the beautiful archer.

  “I’m just that good,” she said with a wink, then called back her arrows and wiped the blood from the tips.

  Once Eva snapped out of it, and Scarlett had harvested the crougars’ canine teeth, we hurried to the distant hills. We reached them when the sun was directly overhead, by which time my stomach was telling me it was time for lunch.

  We stopped and took a break on the rocky hillside, which overlooked the meadow on one side, and sprawling hills on the other. Eva didn’t have an appetite, but that didn’t stop me or Scarlett. She was more than happy to accept my smoked pork, and she added some of her own food, including wild mushrooms, red berries, and roasted roots that tasted like sweet potatoes. She had her own waterskin, and even some wine, and I gladly accepted a sweet-smelling red.

  At the mention of wine, the princess perked up and took a cup too. She had a distant look in her eyes, and I could see she was contemplating something heavily and not liking what she discovered.

  “What’s wrong, Eva?” I swirled my wine.

  She snapped out of her reverie. “Nothing.”

  “Ever since the lion attack, you’ve been quiet,” Scarlett added.

  Doughboy had sensed it too, and he snuggled up to her with big, sympathetic eyes.

  Eva tried to smile at him. “It’s just… I’m so useless when things become dangerous.”

  “No you’re not,” I said. “You stabbed the hell out of that orc that took you captive on the ship, remember?”

  She shrugged. “That just happened. I was scared. I’m always scared.”

  “Only crazy people never get scared,” said Scarlett. “But if you want to learn how to fight, you’ve come to the right place.”

  “I hate fighting. I hate violence and blood and death.”

  “So do I,” Scarlett admitted. “But sometimes it’s necessary. I grew up in an orphanage in Longshire, and some of the monks there had a taste for frightened little girls. So for me it was either endure their nightmarish abuse or do something about it.”

  “What did you do?” Eva asked.

  “I cut off one of their dicks.”

  I laughed and slapped my knee. “Serves the perverted fucks right.”

  “I agree,” she said and tossed back her wine.

  “I am truly inspired by you, Lady Black,” said Eva.

  “Hah! I’m no lady.”

  “Oh, I’ll change that when we reach Zenfindel,” said Eva. “I shall name you Lady Black of Arbor Hill, or perhaps you would prefer the Vineyards of Chellious.”

  “I don’t want a manor or a title.”

  Eva was shocked. “Why in heavens not? Wouldn’t you prefer a nice home of your own? Servants to tend your crops? Don’t you want the finer things in life?”

  Scarlett opened her arms wide. “These are the finer things in life. My land spreads as far as you can see. My manor reaches from sea to shining sea. I am my own queen, and I answer to no one. What more could a woman want?”

  “What about food?” Eva asked.

  “I harvest my own and kill what suits me.”

  “What about when you get sick… you know, once a month?”

  “I carry on and know that soon it will pass.”

  “What about hygiene? Surely you like to bathe.”

  “I bathe quite often,” said Scarlett. “You are quite needy, even for a princess.”

  “I’ve been telling her that for a while now,” I said, but seeing how that made Eva pout, I offered her a smile and told her I was only kidding.

  “Back to what I was saying,” said Scarlett. “I could teach you how to defend yourself.”

  “Me too,” I said. “I could teach you both some simple moves that would help you against just about any opponent.”

  “I’ve trained with the Shogon monks,” Scarlett said with a hint of Eva’s royal air. “I doubt there is anything you could teach me.”

  “Really?” I said with an raised brow. “Then we should roll sometime.”

  “I look forward to it.” She drank the last of her wine, not taking her eyes off me. “Let’s go. The day is waning.”

  We made good time the rest of the day, and luckily we didn’t run into any more trouble. About an hour before sunset, we made camp in the middle of an outcropping of stone with only one entrance and a defendable ridge. Scarlett insisted she was going hunting, even though I still had a bunch of smoked pork in my pack, so I gathered deadwood with Doughboy. The flexible wad of dough could carry a pile five times larger than he was, and between the two of us, we had enough for the night in no time.

  I got the fire going and laid out one of the fur blankets. Eva, who had been doing who knows what while I was away, pulled her fur over to the fire and lay on her side, propped up on one elbow.

  “Jake,” she said as she watched the flames. “Do you think Scarlett is pretty?”

  Oh boy, tread carefully, Jake. “Uh, yeah,. In a wholesome, granola kind of way.”

  “Wholesome?” said Eva with a look that suggested I was nuts.

  “She can fend for herself. She’s a strong woodsman. She’s a free spirit with no boundaries.”

  “You would like someone like that,” she said.

  “Are you jealous?” I teased.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about. You asked me over and over about Lord Berdink. Does that mean you are jealous?”

  “You two are hilarious,” said Scarlett as she joined us. She was carrying two dead birds.

  “That was quick,” I said. “Are those doves?”

  “Yes.” Scarlett put them down beside the fir
e and warmed her hands.

  “Doves? How disturbing,” said Eva. “They mate for life. Now there are two doves out there without their partners.”

  “It’s all right,” Scarlett said. “They were mates.”

  That elicited a gasp from the princess, but I couldn’t help but laugh.

  “You’re both such brutes,” Eva said, scowling.

  Scarlett gave her a sharp look. “Don’t tell me a princess has never eaten dove.”

  Eva shrugged guiltily, and Doughboy slapped his forehead.

  Scarlett pulled a big flat rock over to the fire, rinsed it with water, and produced a small hatchet from one of her hidden satchels. She promptly chopped off the doves’ heads and threw them to Doughboy. Like a dog at by the dinner table, he snatched the heads out of the air and went off to eat in private.

  We passed the wineskin around as the fire crackled. When Scarlett had finished gutting, plucking and cleaning the birds, she skewered them with a shaved stick she had wet and charred, and set them over the fire.

  Zodin’s eye caused a city glare in the distance, but since it was below the northern horizon, the stars were out in force. Constellations I had never seen twinkled in the dark sky, and something like Earth’s aurora borealis moved across the southern sky like ancient spirits. Ripples of blue, purple, and violet moved through the brushstroke streaks of light, and I stared in awe for a long time as the girls chatted about the wider world.

  When I tuned back into the conversation, Eva was explaining to Scarlett how she had run away and been abducted by the Goblin King.

  “Why did you run away?” was Scarlett’s first question, as it had been mine.

  “I don’t know,” Eva said.

  “Dragon shit,” said Scarlett. “You know why.”

  It took Eva a while to decide whether or not she wanted to elaborate, but she finally relented. “I was having second thoughts about my marriage to Lord Berdink.”

  “What else?” Scarlett pressed, and I perked up. There was more?

  “Nothing else,” said Eva.

  “Come on,” Scarlett pressed.