So he ate tuna fish, which was his treat, and Science Diet. As long as we didn’t change his food too much, we were good. Anyone who ever owned a cat knows this. Add variety to a cat’s diet, and it will start coming out of both ends.
“So, why do you think that killing him is the right move?” I asked. “Say he is a fairy. So what? Aren’t they trying to protect the Earth in their way?”
“You squish spiders when they show up in your apartment,” Layla pointed out. “Why?”
“Because spiders are creepy!”
“And fairies aren’t?” Layla asked.
“That’s different. I mean, from my few encounters with them, the fairies are intelligent and self-aware.”
“So, is it okay to squish humans if they have low intelligence or perhaps, lose their memories?”
“Of course not,” I said. “Killing is never okay.”
“Unless it’s spiders.”
I sighed. “Okay, maybe I shouldn’t kill spiders either. But if I’m inconsistent about that, it doesn’t mean I should resolve that inconsistency by agreeing to kill other things, like fairies.”
“If this fairy is masquerading at Brag’mok,” Layla said, “it means it kidnapped the real Brag’mok. And with the shenanigans they pulled on New Albion with my dad and pretending to be Hector, you wouldn’t believe the kind of havoc they can cause.”
I shrugged. “Well, considering the instability in the elven kingdom, it gave you a chance to go back there without being immediately executed.”
Layla shook her head. “Doesn’t mean anything.”
“And you don’t think sparking a revolution in a kingdom that would see its own princess killed because she fell in love with a human might be a good thing in the long run?” I asked.
“People die in revolutions, Caspar.”
“I know,” I said. “Most of the time, that’s true. But that doesn’t mean it needs to be. What if you did take over your father’s throne? That could fix everything.”
Layla sighed. “Not possible, as long as he’s still alive.”
I nodded. “But it sounds like that was the fairies’ plan all along. Lure you back to New Albion, spark a revolution that leads to a regime change.”
“Me inheriting my father’s throne wouldn’t be a regime change,” Layla said. “That’s how hereditary monarchies work.”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I mean, Bloody Mary and Queen Elizabeth were sisters, and their visions for England were completely different. Mary used force to try to undo her own father’s Protestant reforms. Elizabeth took over and re-instituted his reforms but more effectively. They were family, part of a hereditary monarchy.”
“What’s the point?” Layla asked. “Even if I could make some radical changes for the better, it doesn’t mean the people would ever accept me. They’re brainwashed by the elven dogma.”
I snorted. “Sort of like medieval people on Earth were, due to their religious assumptions?”
Layla sighed. “You’re not going to prove to me that majoring in history was any more worthwhile than majoring in philosophy.”
I shrugged. “I could have majored in women’s studies. I hear that’s a great way to meet chicks.”
Layla rolled her eyes. “Another major that is, perhaps, important for a lot of reasons. But not exactly great for making a career.”
“When have you ever been so career-oriented, anyway?” I asked. “I mean, isn’t it noble for some people to study things that might allow them to have a voice in making social changes without thinking about their career prospects later on?”
“I don’t know,” Layla said. “If you can’t eat or provide for yourself at all, how much change can you effect?”
“A lot,” I said. “Gandhi pulled it off.”
“Gandhi was a lawyer, Caspar,” Layla said. “He starved himself to make a point.”
“See,” I said. “Knowing history is useful.”
“Then show me an example of a peaceful revolution,” Layla said. “Where a regime change happened without massive loss of life.”
“Well,” I said. “There was the Bloodless Revolution in the United Kingdom in the late sixteen hundreds. In the nineteen-eighties, they had a peaceful revolution in the Philippines. Another one in Germany.”
Layla folded her arms. “How do I know you’re not making that up?”
“I was a history major!” I said. “And like I said, it’s useful when trying to convince an elven princess to take over her father’s throne.”
“Was that on the college brochure when you chose your major?” Layla asked. “Come and major in history, save an elven kingdom!”
I laughed. “Not exactly. But that’s the point, Layla. Maybe the fairies are on to something. I mean, they didn’t kill your dad, right?”
“Still,” Layla said. “They were trying to deceive everyone. Force a revolution by luring me back to New Albion, putting me into conflict with their false Hector.”
I scratched my head. “And you didn’t play along with that? If that was their plan, they were handing your kingdom to you. Giving you a chance to claim it and end the war. Why wouldn’t you do that?”
Layla sighed. “They also had a plan to close the elven gate, Caspar.”
I nodded. “To prevent a war, I’m guessing, that would have brought elves to Earth because the elves would have misused Earth’s magic to conquer humans.”
“And if I went along with that, I’d never see you again.”
I sighed. “So you turned down a chance to save the world, a chance to take over your kingdom for love?”
A tear fell down Layla’s cheek. “For love, and because I still believe in the prophecy. I don’t know how it’s supposed to work out, Caspar. I really don’t. But what the fairies are doing, that’s not what was foretold. Their plan isn’t the only way to achieve peace.”
“And because New Albion is failing,” I said. “The magic that’s left can only last you so long.”
Layla nodded. “But it wasn’t to save New Albion that I came back. That’s part of it, of course, but it was you, Caspar. My love for you and my faith in you.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Faith is only as good as the object it trusts. You can have faith in a doorknob all day long, but insofar as your spiritual desires involve little more than opening and closing doors, it will likely betray you if you ask it to do much of anything else for you. It won’t do much good if you’re trusting it to save you when you jump out of a plane. You need to put a little faith in a parachute for that.
This was a part of the problem with Layla’s decision to come back to Earth.
Don’t get me wrong. I was glad she was back, but she’d effectively thwarted a plan enacted by fairies to do what I was busting my ass in the gym trying to do—to save the world. I mean, yeah, I’d made some progress. Training with Brag’mok, or the fairy who was pretending to be Brag’mok, had given me a few moves. Even Jag was impressed with how much progress I was making in the gym.
But let's be real.
A lifetime of training wasn’t going to be enough to stand against a whole legion, especially one that could take over the world. I mean, even if I was a badass, the James Bond of ministers, I was still one man. Sure, I might have some latent and untapped magical abilities, but I hadn’t progressed much in that domain, especially not since Layla left. One strike against Brag’mok in the park. It was a David-versus-Goliath moment for me.
Except that Brag’mok didn’t actually want to kill me.
That had to be the real Brag’mok. But the next time we met, when he didn’t want me to use magic, maybe that was the fairy? It made sense, I suppose.
But he’d still trained me, even after he convinced me that we’d gotten rid of the fairy. He taught me how to evade a strike and use my opponent's momentum against him.
It was pretty slick. How could that not be Brag’mok? Why would a fairy who had a plan that involved having me give up magic bother teaching me fighting moves?
A lyric popped in my head that summarized my feelings—revised, of course, to fit my dilemma.
Won’t the real Brag’mok please stand up?
Two trailer park girls go ‘round the outside, ‘round the outside, ‘round the outside…
Sorry, I got carried away.
Not sure what females who lived in a mobile home exploring the perimeter had to do with anything, either in my situation or in the context of the Eminem song.
But it was catchy. Not the first time I’d co-opted the rapper’s lyrics for my purposes.
I’d once created a flier for a missions festival at the church where we were talking about the return of Christ and how Jesus coming back should motivate us to go out and tell the world. You know, before it’s too late. Fear tactics sucked when it came to evangelism, so I tried to lighten the mood a bit.
The caption on the flier: Guess who’s back. JC’s back. Tell a friend.
I had a photoshopped picture of Jesus standing there with his arms folded over his chest.
I mean, Jesus was something of a rebel. Stood up against the man. It was brilliant, I thought, totally meme-worthy.
Matthias, my bishop at the time, hadn’t seen the humor in it. I wondered how he’d react to the Punk Rock Jesus comic books. I had the whole collection.
I just couldn’t accept the idea that Brag’mok was the enemy. Sure, he’d told me to lie to Layla, which was sort of a dick move. But he’d had his reasons for it. And he was willing to live with the pain of his brother’s loss, without his brother receiving his death rites, just to give Layla a chance to return.
But here was the dilemma.
If Layla was back and he knew it, and he was really Brag’mok, not a fairy, he’d want to retrieve B’iff’s body and close the gate.
But if he was a fairy, he might want to do the same thing. Only, he’d probably try to find a reason to get Layla through the gate. The fairies didn’t want her here. They didn’t want anyone here who could show humanity how to use magic again.
“I don’t think you can come with us,” I said.
Layla was standing at the counter, polishing her bow. “Like hell, I can’t.”
“Think about it, Layla. If it is a fairy and they know you’re back, they’re going to do whatever they can to send you back again before we seal the gate. If it is Brag’mok, he’s going to want us to retrieve B’iff’s body, which would also seal the gate immediately.”
“With the elves in disarray, divided against themselves, the giants will surely conquer us,” Layla said before taking a deep breath. “Maybe it would be for the best.”
I shook my head. “Maybe. Maybe not. But with the gate shut, we’ll never know.”
Layla sighed. “But there’s still the prophecy. That’s not how this is supposed to go down. You aren’t supposed to forever divide the people.”
“I’m supposed to unite them.”
Layla nodded. “I know it doesn’t make sense to put blind faith in a prophecy, especially when two of the seals haven’t even opened yet. When there’s still so much we don’t know.”
“If you have faith,” I said, “it doesn’t matter what the other two seals reveal. You know the endgame, right? You know what the chosen one, what I, am supposed to do, don’t you?”
“That part is clear. How it comes about? Those details are subject to interpretation. But we know that all division is supposed to end.”
I nodded. “Same goes for how different denominations interpret the Bible. Everyone agrees that Jesus is supposed to come back and defeat death and sin, but people disagree about tribulations, raptures, and whether Jesus is going to rule over some kind of kingdom for a thousand years, or believe those verses are symbolic. Some people believe the bulk of Revelation was fulfilled in the first century, while others believe that almost none of it has happened yet and obsess over finding parallels between the prophecy and what they’re seeing on the nightly news.”
“What view do you hold?” Layla asked.
I shrugged. “My view is that it doesn’t matter. I don’t think John wrote Revelation in order to help us predict the future. I think he wrote it to encourage people during persecution, people going through trials and tribulations, to know that the end is already decided. It’s sort of like when you’re watching a movie or a television show and the hero is in peril, but you know there are sequels or three more seasons, so despite how perilous it seems, you have faith that the hero is going to prevail.”
“And when it comes to the elven prophecy, I have to believe that somehow you are going to prevail, too. But what do we do in the meantime?”
I shrugged. “I guess we act as if.”
“What does that mean?” Layla asked.
“Act as if everything is going according to plan. Don’t panic. Don’t do anything rash. You know, like kill a giant who has been helping us just because we have a suspicion he might be a fairy. Or kill a fairy at all. If we’re acting as if we believe I’m going to unite all people, then we need to act like it now. That includes respecting the fairies.”
Layla sighed. “Then what can we do?”
“First thing, how about we eliminate killing anyone as an option?”
“You’re no fun.” Layla huffed and tossed her bow on the couch.
“This is supposed to be fun?” I asked.
Layla shrugged. “Elves just wanna have fun.”
“It’s trolls,” I said. “Trolls just wanna have fun.”
“Actually,” Layla said, “it was girls originally.”
I chuckled. “Yes, it was. But I don’t think however you sing it, having fun entails shooting arrows at people.”
“Just fairies.”
“Still people,” I said. “Not humans, but people. I mean, they have individual will, right? I think that makes them people.”
“So what do you suggest we do?” Layla asked. “If killing things is off the table.”
I shrugged. “We confront Brag’mok. If he isn’t a fairy, he surely knows more about what’s going on than he’s letting on. And we try to talk to the fairies.”
“You don’t talk to fairies,” Layla said. “Did the one who was messing with you while I was gone strike you as the conversational type?”
I bit my lip. “No, he just squirted ketchup on my butt cheeks.”
Layla furrowed her brow. “How did he do that?”
“Packets under the toilet seat.”
Layla laughed. “That’s fantastic!”
“If my butt was made out of French fries, maybe.”
“Well, before you started working out, I’d say it might as well have been.”
I smiled. “That’s a fair point.”
“I’ll tell you what,” Layla said. “We’ll try this your way. You go, bring Agnus along, and try to talk to the fairy.”
“To Brag’mok, you mean?” I asked.
“Whoever it is,” Layla said. “And I’ll be waiting with my bow in case the fairy gets anxious. Once Agnus figures it out, the fairy is likely to get violent.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
I didn’t like the compromise. I mean, nothing says ill will more than having someone lurking in the bushes, waiting to snipe you if you make the wrong move. I know I wouldn’t react well to that.
But I just couldn’t get on board with the theory that Brag’mok was a fairy. Sure, Layla had more experience with the creatures than I did. And yeah, it would be one hell of a prank for a fairy to pull, especially since he was the one who convinced me to embarrass myself with shoddy pick-up lines directed toward random strangers.
But to be a fairy pretending to be a giant?
I trusted Layla, of course. I didn’t want to doubt her, but I’d spent a lot of time with Brag’mok. Something in my gut told me she was wrong.
Sorting that out was the second biggest challenge of the day.
The first was trying to figure out how to bring Agnus to the park. Forest Park wasn’t a quick walk. I had to take the Metro. Getting him t
o ride in the car was challenging enough, a feat that had become a lot easier once Layla was in the picture. He’d sit on her lap and remain mostly content.
Not to mention, I was reasonably certain that you weren’t allowed to bring pets with you on public transit. Not unless it was a service dog or something, and I don’t think they have such a thing as service cats. Cats don’t serve. They are served. I was Agnus’ service human.
“You could fly,” Layla suggested.
I raised one eyebrow. “Seriously? Use magic? The fairy made it clear—”
“You’re going to be intimidated by a fairy?” Layla interrupted.
“You’re the one who wants to kill it, and you’re telling me I shouldn’t be intimidated by it?”
Layla laughed. “It’s not like it wants you dead. From what you said, all it did was pull a series of mostly harmless pranks.”
I sighed. “True. But if I come flying into the park in all my magical glory, if he is a fairy, he’ll know it. He’ll realize something’s up because as far as he knows, I’m committed to not using magic unless it’s necessary.”
“He’s going to realize something's up the second you show up with a cat anyway,” Layla said. “What’s important is to get Agnus near him so we can determine for certain that it is a fairy. If it is, we can try to convince it to tell us where the real Brag’mok is.”
“How exactly are we going to do that?” I asked.
“We’ll play it by ear,” Layla said.
I smirked, glancing at Layla’s pointy ears. “That’s funny.”
“That’s rude,” Layla said. “To make a joke at the expense of my superior ears.”
“Whatever,” I said. “You know I think they’re hot.”
Old Dogma New Tricks (The Elven Prophecy Book 2) Page 16