by Jason Beil
were.
Elder Gods.
“They’ve come to watch,” Jane said. “They’ve come to witness my victory.”
Draco flapped his wings, his horror growing by the second. “They cannot be trusted! If you’ve somehow unleashed them, Jane, this world is doomed!”
“Oh, husband, do shut up!”
With that she cast a spell so potent it sent him tumbling away, flipping end over end through the sky. He was nearly a mile away before he could right himself. He was battered badly, and blood from his wounded scalp ran into his eyes. Some of his ribs were broken, and his right wing was badly torn. He could barely stay aloft. How could he continue to fight? Jane, laughing, prepared a killing blow.
And then, out of nowhere, a voice cried out from below.
“The power of animal!”
Dozens of gargantuan vultures came from everywhere, filling the sky and flying directly at Jane. She lashed out with bolts of lightning, but she could not strike them all at once. One after another rammed her with sharp beaks and buffeted her with vast wings. Crying out in frustration, she began to fall.
“Harvey use power of mineral!”
Rocks came from every angle, smashing into Jane as she fell from the air. Every time she tried to get control of her flight or form some sort of spell, another rock slammed her. She tumbled through the air until finally she smote the ground, crying out in agony.
Draco clumsily flew toward where she’d fallen and lowered himself to the ground. Limping, he approached her. The giant Harvey stood nearby, and with him were the she-wolf Sara and young Robert Paper.
“I’m not dead yet,” growled Jane, rising from the ground. She was battered, but far from beaten.
“Eat your vegetables!” cried Sara, entangling her in thick roots that shot up from the ground.
Jane struggled, but with everything she’d been through she seemed unable to break her bonds. Draco took human form and limped up to her.
“Thank you, Robert. Sara. You too, giant. You’ve all done well. I will take it from here.”
“Oh, you think you’re so smart,” Jane spat. “You haven’t won anything. Amy will die, and the power of all worlds will be mine.”
“Give up, Jane. You don’t have any tricks left.”
She smiled viciously. “Just one.”
A knife stabbed through Draco’s back and came out his chest. He gasped and looked down in disbelief. Blood poured from the wound. He turned his head and saw Jane behind him, holding the knife.
Impossible!
He spat blood and fell, losing consciousness before he hit the ground.
“What?” cried Bob. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
God, there are two of them!
The Jane entangled in roots laughed. “The spell every busy mother needs! How to be in two places once! Kill them, Jane!”
“With pleasure, Jane!”
Bob tried to summon his power, but it had deserted him. He looked to Sara and Harvey, but the stunned looks on their faces told him they were powerless, too.
“Goddess giveth, Goddess taketh away!”
Balls of hellish fire formed in Free-Jane’s hands. Laughing, she reached back to hurl them at the terrified threesome.
But then the ground shook. Coming up behind Free-Jane, running at incredible speed, was Wilberforce Quentin Stanton IV. And on his shell rode Hugo, Lupo, Vivian, and Deidre, each with wands pointed at the Witch-Queen. Above them and a little behind flew a very angry female dragon.
“What the hell…” muttered the Janes.
“Expelliarmus!” shouted the four magicians together.
Power shot from their wands, extinguishing Jane’s fire and knocking her to the ground.
Sara glanced at Bob, frowning. “Did they just say…?”
“Yeah.”
“Isn’t that from…?”
“Yep.”
Jane screamed, and the force of her howl knocked the Four Primes from the turtle’s shell. Wilberforce stumbled and flipped over, landing on his back. His stumpy legs moved helplessly in the air.
“Oh, shit,” he said.
The entangled Jane smiled silently while her other self rose from the ground.
“Don’t you see?” Free-Jane cried. “I cannot be stopped. I am Goddess! I am supreme!”
“Oh, get over yourself, Mummy,” said Amy, thundering to the ground to stare her birthmother in the eye.
Jane laughed. “What are you going to do? Breathe fire? It can’t hurt me. My magic can counter anything you can do.” She lifted her hands in exultation. “FOR I AM GODDESS!! I AM—”
Her last words were cut short as Amy bit off—and swallowed—her birthmother’s head. Jane’s body fell in a heap at Amy’s feet. At the same moment, the entangled Jane screamed horrifically and faded from existence.
“Well,” said Deidre, “that’s one way to do it.”
Later that day, they retired to Castle Draco in the heart of Satya. Bob thought it was a nice castle, if a little drafty, and with a decided lack of cake. Old Puffidoniel had managed to survive his wound. Apparently it was pretty hard to kill the Draco Magicae, especially when your dagger pierced only one of his six hearts. Amy had resumed human form and was off somewhere reuniting with her adoptive parents. Harvey and Wilberforce were having a game of chess; and Deidre, Vivian, Lupo, and Hugo were bickering by the snack table. Yagar had decided he still had a lot to learn, so he returned to the deep dungeons to continue growing his power and knowledge.
That left Bob sitting uncomfortably on the sofa next to Sara.
“So,” he said.
“So,” she replied.
After a long moment of thick, gooey silence, Sara said, “Are you really going to marry her?”
“Yeah.”
“What about us?”
He gave her a sympathetic look. “I care about you, Sara. I do. But I’ve loved Amy for years. I… I thought she was dead. Now I have her back. God help me, Sara, she’s the love of my life.”
Sara looked into his eyes and touched his face. She sighed, and her hand dropped into her lap. “I understand.”
Puffidoniel came in, wearing regal robes and his human form.
“Robert! You must tell me all about your life. How is your father? I want to know everything!”
He plopped down on the sofa between Bob and Sara, putting his arms around them both.
“Um,” said Bob. “This is all still a little strange for me. I mean… you’re Puff the Magic Dragon!”
“Yes I am.”
“And that song about you and my father… true?”
“Well… most of it. I mean, I did live by the sea, and it got pretty misty in autumn. But I assure you, I never, ever frolicked!”
“Not that there’s anything wrong with that.”
“No indeed,” said Puffidoniel, lighting a cigarette. “No indeed.”
And that pretty much wraps it up. It wasn’t long before the Four Primes were at war again, striving for dominance in Honalee’s primary city, Satya. Unfortunately, that was just their nature. Bob and Amy got married, and they spent half the year in Honalee with Puff, and the other half in Hoboken living near Amy’s parents. Sara traveled eastern Europe, meeting all sorts of interesting characters (mostly vampires) with whom she invariably had brief, torrid affairs. Harvey finally had the birthday of his dreams, and Wilberforce became an interior designer, leaving the burden of guarding the portals to his less-creative brothers.
And that, dear reader, is exactly how it happened.
Unless it’s not.
THE END (or is it?)
Bob woke screaming on the floor of the laundry room, Sara anxiously calling his name.
“Bob, you promised! You know the dye in that red velvet cake gives you delusions and bad dreams!”
Bob shuddered as realization dawned on him.
Amy, from the documentary on adult adoptees searching for their parents. His pet turtle. His sister’s care bear… the dog in the park. The two nasty old woman pos
tal clerks! All of them, in his dream!
“I promise, this time I won’t do it again. It was horrible.”
Sara and Bob got upstairs just as Sara’s father arrived with an armload of birthday gifts for Sara. After some good natured teasing, Bob announced he was still feeling a bit rocky and went to bed, leaving Sara and her father to have some quality time.
THE END (or is it?)
“Isn’t it about time you told that young man the truth?” Lupo demanded.
“I can’t,” Sara whispered. I need to wait. I have to be sure he really loves me first.”
In a fierce rasp, Lupo stated, “The only way to be sure is to tell him, and see if he stays.”
Sara looked at her father and said, “Yes, I think you are correct. The only way I’ll know for sure is to tell him the truth!”
Her father then got up, kissed her on the cheek and saw himself out. Sara watched her father leave and when the door closed, she turned and went to find Bob to finally tell him the truth.
THE END!
Or is it?
Other Books by the Authors
J Bryden Lloyd
The Chronicles of Jenson Quest, Meet My Shorts, Meet My Other Shorts, The Zubot Master (Book 1) – Time Slip
P.L. Blair:
Shadow Path, Stormcaller, Deathtalker, Sister Hoods
Jason N. Beil
The Talisman of Faerie, The Sword of Kings
Derek E. Keeling
The Umbras
Ella Stradling:
Revealing Rexa, Awakening Sand, Beneath the Sea (An Anthology), Kiss of Kelloree
Eric J. Zawadzki:
Kingmaker, Lesson of the Fire
Martin D. Gibbs
Tuesday, The Spaces Between, Following Yonder Star, Voltaire’s Adventures Before Candide, Dead Spaces: A Drunkard’s Journey Part II
Editor’s Note
The story you have just read is a collaboration of thirteen different writers. Some contributed greatly to the finished product, while others wrote only a few paragraphs or, in one case, a single sentence! The project was open to anyone, and both experienced authors and first-time writers joined in. Each person involved, no matter their experience level or their volume of input, added something integral and amazing to the tale, bending it in strange directions no one else had thought of.
As editor, I viewed it as my responsibility to clean up punctuation and formatting, as well as rearranging the various entries so that the story had a solid structure and a sensible flow. Although I changed a little of the language and grammar and carved away some redundancy, I made an effort to preserve the voices and eccentricities of the individual authors. While this choice allowed for inconsistencies of tone and mood throughout the piece, to do otherwise would have been a disservice to the authors, and would have eliminated much of the charm of the story.
Thus it stands, not as a masterpiece, but as a delightful, quirky, insane little fantasy, as fun to read as it was to write. I feel proud of my own contribution to the story, and am honored that I was able to be a part of it.—Jason N. Beil, contributor and editor.
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