Mistakes Were Made (A Pygmalion Fail Book 2)

by Casey Matthews

  “You’ve got one sentence to explain this.” Ronin’s voice was hard with a dark rasp, but higher now that it was un-garbled by the magic of her outfit. I thought very hard about how she could drown me in that bathtub and flush my body parts down the toilet.

  I opened my mouth to speak. I belched and farted at the same time.

  For a while, water just dripped onto me while her eye twitched.

  “D— Did that count as my sentence?” I asked.

  She palmed a shard of broken mirror and its sharp edge touched my junk. Not inner thigh—junk. Panic sirens wailed in my skull, but I dared not budge, cognizant I was one sneeze from a lonely existence. “Ah, ah, careful, don’t do that please!”

  “Explain,” she said, enunciating each part of the word as if unpacking it for a stupid child.

  “I made a rune stone to turn ghosty. I wanted to see your face, so I peeked—but to see your face, not your lady bits. Don’t neuter me. I really like my penis and I happen to think it’s a particularly good one.”

  She snorted, and that emasculated me more than the shard. I hardly cared, though, because she lowered it.

  I sighed. Then Ronin seized my arm, tossed me face-first onto the bed, and pinned me with one knee on the middle of my back. The world went black as she covered my face with a strip from her malleable clothing. “You want to keep still or be hogtied?” she asked.

  “Still is good.”

  I had to wait while she dressed and—full confession—I’m not really into the ropes-and-chains stuff, but with terror receding, my body elected that moment to be fully and weirdly turned on. It was the humiliating boner-in-class kind of turned on, though, and while I couldn’t see Ronin and was (thankfully) facedown, I could sense her smirk.

  “Sorry again,” I muttered.

  “Silence.” Her voice was garbled again.

  “I’ll shut up if you let me have a blanket.”

  Another snort. I expected it to mean “no,” but a pillow landed on my backside and just like that, the red-hot anxiety cooled.

  Ronin ordered me to stay there, left the room, and when she returned she ripped off the blindfold and tossed clothes onto the bed, including my damp vest. She folded her arms, waiting for me to dress.

  “Turn around,” I said, feeling I’d more than done my penance for sneaking up on her in the bath.

  She did.

  I set a rapid-changing record that would have impressed Clark Kent. “Now I understand the mask,” I said while lacing my Converse sneakers. “Hangings for female warriors.”

  “You assume you understand,” Ronin said.

  I frowned. “That’s not why you wear it?”

  She didn’t answer, but I sensed there was more to the story. I was no longer sure how her face could have answered any questions, unless she’d turned out to be Queen Eliandra or maybe a Predator.

  She opened her door. “I’ve got him,” she announced.

  Tammagan blew through the door and centered on me like a bull. Instead of charging, she strode, each step tense with angry power. “I have plans for you. Plans that involve yards of chain and creative body piercings.”

  “Before you Kathy-Bates-from-Misery me, keep in mind I’m adorable and you’ll feel bad about it tomorrow.”

  “Not bloody likely,” she breathed. Looking to Ronin, she asked, “How did he disappear?”

  “Made a rune stone and passed through the walls.” Ronin showed it to her, briefly, before pocketing it; apparently the ninja planned to keep it for herself.

  Tammagan had marveled at the stone, but it didn’t blunt her wrath when she turned back to me. “Do you realize what you’ve done? Nils has spies everywhere. Guards heard me breaking free, so he knows how easily you might escape. You’ve forced his hand. He’ll spur the Council to act immediately. You’ve swept all other options from the Queen’s table, you stupid ingrate.”

  “Not all.” I rubbed the back of my neck. “She could let me go.”

  “Let me boil it down,” Tammagan said. “Nils and the Council only tolerate Eliandra because of tradition. Riots would sweep the kingdom were she deposed. But make no mistake: Nils wants the crown.”

  “So he is a traitor. I knew it.”

  “Of course he is, you dolt!”

  “The goatee, right?”

  “No!” Tammagan snapped. “The part where he’s negotiating with Dracon—to exchange you for an army to quell the inevitable uprising when he deposes our queen. There’s already one army after you. If Eliandra can’t outmaneuver Nils at Council tonight, you’ll be chased by two.”

  I frowned. “This is information I’d have liked to have.”

  Tammagan shook with dark laughter. “Try to grasp this. It’s out of your hands. You’re part of something much larger.”

  It was true. I kept thinking Rune was my world; like I owned it and played the starring role. But from inside, I was just one more piece on a massive board.

  Tammagan looked at Ronin. “We need to put miles between Grawflefox and Nils in case the Queen’s bid fails. Dracon must not have him.”

  “We’ll leave on my ship,” Ronin said. “Now.” She snagged my wrist with that freakishly strong grip, dragging me down the corridor alongside Tammagan.

  “Two for transport,” Tammagan said. “Feast hall, orders of Captain Tammagan.”

  Before I knew it, I stood in the feast hall and Ronin no longer clutched my wrist. She and Tammagan were nowhere in sight. Also, the feast hall was flooded with twenty or so armored soldiers, shiny halberds directed at my throat.

  Chapter Three: Miss Congeniality

  “Heyyy, guys.” I shifted to the right and a dozen shining halberd tips moved with me. “What are the odds my bodyguard’s on the way?”

  “Slim.” Nils pushed two soldiers aside, stepping between them. Through the gap I glimpsed Queen Eliandra standing with poise, as if ignorant of the unusually large number of pointy weapons directed at her own throat. I had to give people of this world credit: they took their jobs very seriously.

  Ronin had stupidly confiscated my ghost stone. All I had was a vest full of art supplies. My weapons consisted solely of two fists that knew precisely zero karate. Therefore, priority one was figuring out where Ronin and Tammagan had gone, since they were my only defenses. In that moment, I was basically every comic-book damsel ever.

  “Show your hands,” Nils said.

  Doing so, I asked myself: What would Lois Lane do? The answer came like divine inspiration. “You’ll never get away with this, Nils.”

  “Oh, I already have. The Queen’s trial commences tonight.” He glanced back at her. “Sending her royal guard illegally into Dracon’s territory and provoking a war…” He tutted his finger her way. “Fortunately, once I turn you both over to Dracon, he’ll withdraw all his forces—except a small peacekeeping contingent to keep the government stable.”

  I glowered. “To put you in power.”

  “It’s about time Korvia were ruled by someone with her best interests at heart.”

  Summoning my inner feisty reporter, I shook my fist in the air. “Ronin will stop you!” Overacted, but serviceable, I decided.

  Nils grinned, showcasing his pointy canines. “I had the teleporters enchanted to divert them to another globe. One located outside the palace and, oh, about a mile up.”

  “No!”

  The soldiers opened shackles for Eliandra and me, but Nils waved them off. “Not until we’re out of the palace. I’m sure the wizard will keep his hands where I can see them, else we hack them off. Oh, and Eliandra—you may keep your crown and staff for now, but make so much as one squeak to any of your precious little guards and we kill you first.”

  “Wait,” I interjected. “Precious? Little?”

  “The slatterns Her Highness regards as personal protectors.” Nils flicked his hand dismissively. “We wouldn’t want my men to muss their hair, would we?”

  “Whoa. You shouldn’t say stuff like that.”

  Nils smirked and appro
ached, not quite coming up to my chin unless I counted his hat. “And why not?”

  “There are just certain rules.” I ticked them off on my fingers: “Advisors with goatees are evil. Wild-eyed old men who speak in riddles are secretly powerful. And people who insult the prowess of female warriors always die gruesomely. It’s just… I dunno, you should take it back or you’ll probably get shot in the dick with a fireball.”

  Nils sneered. “Move out, men.”

  They prodded me through the feast hall. “Fine. I’m not going to say ‘I told you so.’ But only because you won’t hear me over your shrieking, since your dick will be on fire.”

  The teleporters apparently couldn’t handle crowds, because Nils directed us down a corridor instead. Eliandra and I were marched side by side, and she whispered in her lilting, dignified voice, “I cannot believe you would joke mere moments after Ronin was slain.”

  “Add one more to my list of rules: main characters never die off camera.”

  “What is a ‘camera’?”

  I didn’t answer. I was busy pondering why the Queen cared enough to mention Ronin while ignoring Tammagan, her personal guard.

  The soldiers moved four abreast. Ahead, the corridor emptied into a wide circular chamber that looked like a magitech elevator. I had the impression this would be a shorter walk than I’d hoped, given the scale of the palace.

  Eliandra cleared her throat. “Nils, I’m afraid I have one more card to play. And you won’t like it.” The Queen stopped. Since we were sandwiched with ten soldiers in front and ten behind, it forced them all to stop. We both turned to face Nils, who marched near the back.

  “Play your card on the ship,” he sniffed. “I tire of your delays.”

  “It cannot wait.” Eliandra nonetheless paused a full three seconds for effect. “You aren’t the only one who struck a bargain with Dracon.”

  Nils paled. His eyes widened and danced a moment in his skull, trying to figure what the Queen was on about.

  She glided between soldiers, head bowed, subtly parting them by the force of her presence. “It doesn’t have to end poorly for us. You’re not an unwise man and we both understand the merits of diplomacy. That is why I promised the boy to Lord Dracon.”

  “What?” I lunged, but was halted by a halberd point leveled at my nose. “You backstabber—you’re selling me out!”

  “Why should I care?” Nils asked her. “If I get the boy to him first, they’re my spoils, not yours.”

  “You could have my crown; and I could have some largess to retire upon and a seat on Council. No assassinations, no civil unrest.” She stopped in front of Nils. “A peaceable transition of power.”

  “I hear you saying ‘could.’ No riddles—would you truly cede power to me?” asked Nils, licking his lips.

  “I promise you my staff and my crown,” she said.

  “How do I know I can trust you?”

  Eliandra smiled. “My word is iron.”

  “I’m interested in deeds, not words,” he snapped.

  “Then let me show you.” She lifted her staff of office gracefully in both hands, pushed a hidden toggle, and a crackling blue orb erupted from the tip, blowing Nils’s head off. He fell like a tree, his neck a smoking stump.

  Eliandra tossed her crown onto his corpse. “As promised: staff and crown.”

  The soldiers all launched back several steps but I was left staring, trying to figure out whether I’d prophesied something or if there had to be scorched genitalia to qualify.

  The soldiers set their halberds like spears, but Eliandra fired twice more on the men who’d marched behind us. The orbs tossed them like ragdolls, bodies of the first row of men bowling over the troops behind them. The Queen spared me a glance, the lilt in her voice girded with steel: “Run, you stupid fuck!”

  “Oh,” was all I could say. Gosh, she was pretty when she swore. “Oh!” I dashed between confused guards, who lurched after me.

  The Queen’s staff erupted with electric-blue energy, like a lightsaber blade except in the shape of a double-headed war axe. “Surprise axe!” she bellowed, severing a guard’s halberd with the humming weapon and stepping close enough to flick head from shoulders. Before the next man could react, her axe danced through his knee and he fell with a scream. Without ever losing momentum, she arced the blade from the second guard’s knee to the chest of a third, slicing cleanly through the steel breastplate and burying it in his heart. She breezed through melee like it weighed nothing whatsoever.

  I blew past the last few distracted soldiers and sprinted for the feast hall. I groped in the big vest pocket for my sketchpad, fished it out, and flipped through old drawings for something useful. Armored men gave chase, their mail jingling with every stride.

  The Queen, propelled by longer legs, zoomed past us all. Freaking elves. “They never expect the axe,” she shouted. “Hurry, human!”

  A crossbow bolt whizzed past my ear and someone shouted, “No! Take them alive!”

  I found the sketch I wanted. I’d scribbled it while waiting for a Five Guys burger order that came too quickly, so it was rough—a sloppy, jagged sketch of a mountainside with a winding river that worked its way to the foreground, terminating at the bottom edge of the paper. I tore the landscape free, shoved my sketchpad into its pocket, and slapped my picture onto the surface of the feast-hall door Eliandra had opened. I seized the crossbow bolt lodged in the door, wrenched it free, and pinned the sketch with it.

  I breathed onto the image.

  The moment I exhaled, energy zinged out my bones. Only then did I realize the volume of magic I’d drawn forth: on the sketch, tiny trees shifted in a breeze, indicating the scale of the river. Silver light filled my black scribbles. Water frothed and splashed out of the drawing where the river disappeared off the bottom edge of the page.

  Oh crap. I just summoned a river indoors.

  Water gushed from the page and covered my ankles, the surf slowing or tripping the soldiers behind us. And this was just the beginning.

  “Stop messing around and go!” Eliandra ordered. She dragged me into the feast hall and slammed the door, locking the crossbar.

  “Forget the door. Run!” I sprinted past her, fear lending me wings.

  She followed. “That door is solid oak. It will take them—”

  “Can you argue underwater?”

  “What? No.”

  “Then argue later!”

  A roar gathered behind us. Water surged beneath the door, which groaned and bowed. Eliandra accelerated past me at the sound, and we fled the feast hall through another corridor. Wood exploded behind us. A rolling black wave of river crashed up the hall, slammed into a far wall, and funneled after us. Something cackled and I risked a glance over my shoulder. Was there a face in the water? I hadn’t drawn that…

  “How was that a good idea?” Eliandra shouted from ahead of me.

  “No more guards!”

  “This is so much better!”

  “At least I didn’t summon the volcano!”

  Water splashed at our heels. Something clawed for my ankles. The corridor T’d up ahead at a hanging tapestry, and terror at what lapped behind me drove me shoulder-first into the fabric. Bouncing off the hard wall behind it, I scrambled down a new branch. A split second after launching clear, a deluge pounded the tapestry and abruptly swallowed me. Cold hands lifted me, threw me under. I tumbled into the river like I’d been put on spin cycle. A voice made from wet laughter roared in my ear and I broke the surface long enough to see three women rising from the spray—no, they were made of it. The elementals seized my limbs and plunged me back into the drink. I screamed and sucked in a mouthful of river.

  I heard two cracks of energy and the aftershocks pounded my body. The elementals released all but my left ankle. Eliandra’s hand seized mine and she dragged me from the water, through a hole she’d blown into the wall. It was narrow and my hips barely cleared it. On the other side, water spurted through the hole and took the form of a wild-haired
vixen leaning halfway in and laughing madly at us.

  Her glassy smile was razor-toothed and she blew a sweet kiss. Eliandra leveled her scepter, but the thundering of the river passed on the other side of the wall and the elemental liquefied, sluicing back into the rapids that had spawned her.

  We caught our breath and listened to elementals howling in the distance, off to do whatever elementals do when they’re not killing folks.

  I collapsed to my knees, head spinning with panic.

  “Why in the Nine Realms would you summon water spirits?” Eliandra’s staff stayed trained on the hole.

  “I didn’t… that is… I drew a river. Not spirits.” Realization hit me. “But the river was poorly drawn and huge. It took all my magic to bring it out. So there was more magic than there was drawing to guide it. Like if you dump a thousand gallons into a glass, it overflows and goes wherever it wants.”

  “Pardon?” Eliandra asked, lowering her scepter and wringing out her sodden gown.

  “If I cast big magic, I need to use more precise drawings. The art guides the magic; controls it; keeps it from going in random directions.”

  “When I get my palace back in working order, you will pay for the repairs,” Eliandra informed me, her tone more barbed than the sweet-sounding royalty I’d first met.

  “Don’t you dare pretend you’re the Queen,” I said. “Queen Eliandra is… is… not an axe-wielding adventuress. She’s dignified!”

  Eliandra lifted her jaw. “Ran fresh out of dignity when you spoiled my well-laid plans. Before you spooked Nils, I’d arranged to shatter his voting bloc by pairing the Council vote on your freedom with a mercer’s tax.”

  “A killer amendment,” I said. “To split the coastal elites down the middle and break their coalition.” She really did know her stuff.

  “Of course. Here’s a good rule of thumb: if someone is five times your age, assume she is smarter than you. Now, thanks to you, Dracon is at our front door.”