by Deck Davis
Charlie opened his hand to see a ginger-colored jewel in his palm, the same shade as Mia’s freckles.
The door burst open. Charlie pocketed the jewel, then braced for Serpen’s’ booming voice to shout something crazy.
Instead, Larynk hurried into the room, grabbed Charlie’s coat collar and almost yanked him off he chair.
“We’re leaving,” he said.
“So long, boys,” said Mia.
“What’s wrong?” he asked Larynk.
“Just shut up and walk.”
The went down the spiral stairs and out of the atrium and outside, where Apollo waited. His tail swished wildly from side to side when he saw them, swiping the air like a serpent.
Larynk hopped onto Apollos’s saddle ahead of Charlie. “Hurry up,” he said.
Charlie shook his head. “I don’t think so. Boy…tip him.”
Apollo rocked to the side, sending Larynk crashing off the saddle.
“I’m the tamer,” said Charlie. “You might have the sphere, but the ride is mine. Climb on.”
They set off away from the dragon tower. As Apollo carried them toward the forest, Larynk spoke in Charlie’s ear.
“I tried talking sense into him,” he said. “But it’s no good. It’s a matter of time now before he loses it completely.”
Charlie thought about Mia. To her, Charlie was just a fly caught in a trap. He guessed that al lot of guys would have made for very willing flies in her web, but not him. What worried him most was what she’d said about Larynk.
“Mia said that Serpens is keeping you here so he can barter you for his own safety,” he said.
“With the demis?”
“Who else?”
Layrnk gripped Charlie’s waist tighter as Apollo sped up. “I wouldn’t put it past him. That must be why he’s using forbidden worship – he knows the risks of it, but it’s the quickest way to fill a sphere. Force people to worship you around the clock, don’t let them eat, don’t let them sleep, and use just enough power to keep them alive. Once his sphere is full, he’ll come for me.”
“Can’t he just leave you for the demi-gods to deal with? If you’re stuck on the planet, then there isn’t much you can do to stop them.”
“He wants the credit for it. He wants to deliver me to them himself. Just telling them I’m here won’t be enough of a bargain.”
Charlie thought about it. If Serpens destroyed Larynk, if he rendered him powerless, what did that mean for the rest of them? Serpens hated mortals by the looks of things, and that didn’t bode well for him, Flink, Longtooth, Apollo and Gully. Crosseyes, meanwhile, was a demi-god…but Serpens would just leave him for Mia. Maybe as reward for her services, because she was working with him.
That was it. Mia was brokering the deal between Serpens and the demi-gods. She didn’t care about Crosseyes at all, did she? The only thing she cared about was sowing discord among them all for long enough to stop them even trying to get away.
“We need to leave. Tomorrow at the latest,” he said. “How close is Crosseyes to fixing the ship?”
Larynk scoffed. “You think we can just leave, Charlie? Not a chance. Even if we get passed the damn dragons, Serpens will stop us.”
“Then we need to deal with him.”
“You don’t deal with the god of dragons. Especially not when a few months ago your greatest accomplishment was finishing a spreadsheet on time.”
“We could get hold of his sphere. That’ll even it out, won’t it? Especially if we can fill your sphere a little more.”
“You mean the one he keeps in the eye of his dragon? Yeah, that’d do it, but good luck trying. Even if we get his sphere, get the ship working, and defeat Serpens, Mia and her pirates will try and shoot us out of the sky. Don’t underestimate a woman who’d get an incredible reward for handing me over to the demis.”
They reached the forest now. It had rained since they had last been in it, and the giant leaves were covered in dew, and the mud was soggy. Apollo gingerly stepped around the boggiest part of it, since he hated to get his paws wet.
“Let’s say we do all that,” said Charlie. “We get the sphere, all of that. We just need to figure out a way to deal with Mia.”
“We could hand Crosseyes over to her once we know the ship is fixed,” said Larynk.
That stopped Charlie’s thoughts in their tracks. It was cold hearted, and what’s more…it was the kind of thing he’d expect Mia to say, not Larynk. He’d hoped Larynk would have a little more heart than that. Maybe he’d given him too much credit.
What did that mean for him? Would Larynk sell him out just as easily if he needed to save himself?
Focus. There were too many problems, too few solutions. He couldn’t deal with a duplicitous god on top of everything else. He was just gonna have to take Larynk as he saw him. What other choice did he have?
“It wouldn’t work anyway,” he said. “Mia doesn’t care about Crosseyes. It’s a cover.”
“Charlie…Crosseyes is the only thing she cares about. It isn’t just about him stealing from her. It goes way beyond that. He hurt her deeply, and believe me, everything in her life is set around him.”
“Say we hand Crosseyes over to Mia. Can you even fly the ship?”
“I’m a god, Charlie. I can figure it out.”
“You’re the god of corn.”
“Have a little faith.”
Have a little faith – ha. Easy words for a god. Truth was, Charlie wasn’t sure who to have faith in anymore. Who could he trust? Crosseyes? No – the demi-god wanted to find out Larynk’s Alter, probably to buy his own safety. Mia had promised him a way home or a part in her crew, but he trusted her less than he’d trust a shark who asked him to clean its teeth and promised not to bite his hand. And Larynk…well, just a second ago, he’d brought up the idea of selling Crosseyes out.
That left Flink, Gully, Longtooth, and of course, Apollo. He could trust them. Deep down, he felt that. That didn’t open any new options for him, though.
They soon reached the village, where they found Flink, Gully and Longtooth sitting with the villagers, deep in a conversation.
“Newchie!”
Flink sprinted over to them. “They’re all worried about Ozkar. They’re blaming you, Newchie. Where is he?”
“Ozkar isn’t coming back, and I think they know it.”
Larynk strode over to the guest dwelling. “Come on.”
The followed him. Inside, Larynk began gathering all of their things. He tossed Charlie’s bag over to him, then found Flink’s, and then his own.
“We’re leaving,” he said. “Serpens can probably find us anywhere on his planet, given enough time. The thing is, I don’t think he’ll wanna waste sphere power to locate us instantly. Not when he has little enough as it is. The only reason he’s in a position to barter me for his safety is that his sphere power is holding them back. If the demis get through on their own, they don’t need to make a deal.”
“Where are we going?” said Longtooth, joining them, his rat face scrunched in worry.
“Away from the village. Anywhere, just not where he knows we’ll be. When he finally turns on us, we’ll at least make him work for it. We better go find Crosseyes.”
“He’s with the ship,” said Flink. “He’s been working on it for two days straight.”
“Then he must be getting close to fixing it. Let’s go get him, then find somewhere to stay. I have a few messages to send.”
“Messages?” said Charlie.
“Shooting stars. It’s time I found out who’s with the demis, and who isn’t.”
“What’s going on?” said Flink. “Where are we going?”
The swirl of thoughts in Charlie’s head began to settle, and he saw the solution to their problems.
“We need to get Serpen’s sphere,” he told her. “And to do that…I’m going to tame his dragon.”
Well, he had the solution – but that didn’t mean it was easy.
Chapter Sixteen
>
Empathy, shapes, and patterns. That’s what he focussed on when he and Apollo left the village and travelled four miles south of the forest, emerging into yet another new landscape. This one was an array of blue, with leafless, azure trees, denim-colored grass, and sapphire rocks, some of which glittered with crimson, hard-shelled snails. The smell in the air was like autumn when he was a kid, a leafy kind of smell, one that made him wonder where his football was, and whether he could go around up enough kids for a game.
Simpler times. Never underestimate a childhood on earth. Once, his biggest stress was that he had a paper route to finish after school and now, he faced thirty pirates led by a temptress bounty hunter, and a dragon god one mental slip away from a rampage.
“At least I’ve got you, buddy,” he said, stroking Apollo’s fur.
But he wasn’t here to reminisce on his past, and if he thought about it, nostalgia was blocking some pretty hefty stuff inside him. His childhood wasn’t as sweet as his brain sometimes wanted to trick him into thinking.
His family had nothing. Not a cent. Food banks bailed them out sometimes, and his mother and father worked twelve hours shifts six days a week. What Charlie called a paper route, was more like a paper military operation. He took a job from four different shops, all of whom had separate customers, and he combined them into an insane route that took four hours to finish every day, two before school and two hours after. One summer of that and his feet were calloused as hell, and he had calves the size of pumpkins. As if that wasn’t enough, both his parents had died by the time he was out of his teens. He had no uncles, no aunts, no siblings.
So yeah, when the flora on an alien planet made him feel wistful about his childhood autumns, he knew that at least part of the feeling was bullshit.
If there was one thing that being broke and losing both your parents did for you, it made you look to what you could do, not what was impossible. Here, in this part of Dragyuren where everything was a different shade of blue – Serpens must have worked at a Gap store when he designed it – he knew what the something he could do was.
One of the somethings scuttled in front of him, claws clacking on the blue stone ground. It was like a Komodo dragon, with a mean face and rocky-looking skin, wearing the kind of expression that said, ‘don’t mess around with me.’ Unlike other lizards, this one had cracks in its scales, and mustard colored hair sprouted from it, some strands so long they trailed along the ground.
It stopped scuttling ten metres away from him, and it was completely still. Even so, Charlie shuddered, the sense of being watched creeping up over him. Its slanted eyes fixed his way.
Okay, so it wasn’t a real-sized dragon, and it – hopefully – didn’t breathe fire. But it was a lizard, and Charlie’s reason for being where was twofold; one, he needed to improve his taming, now he’d realized where he’d been going wrong. Two, his educated guess was that dragons were part of the lizard family, so taming a smaller version might help when he needed to try and sweet talk Serpens’ pet into giving up its sphere eye.
Crosseyes had told him about the place. He found it when he’d wandered here looking for some kind of mineral he needed to help with the ship, and he’d told Charlie about the mean, scaly, hairy creatures who’d watched him.
One such creature eyed Charlie now, and it opened its wide lips a crack and poked a little forked tongue out.
Charlie gathered his focus. He needed this tame to work. If it didn’t, his confidence would be shot to hell. Then, even if it did work, he was going to have to face up to a dragon big enough it could have its own mountain named after it.
The hairy Komodo seemed to be sizing Charlie up. It licked its lips with its forked tongue, and then it scampered toward him. Its claws made a rapping sound on the ground, and a blue-tinted breeze made its thick, ginger hair strands swoosh around.
Charlie honed his attention on it. He cast his emotions aside now, he threw his motivations out of his head. Forget that he needed to tame this thing so he’d have confidence to tame a giant dragon - that was a selfish motivation, and he already knew that empathy was key to his taming, not self-advancement.
Rap-rap-rap went the Komodo’s claws as it drew nearer, its mouth open to show aa mishmash of jagged teeth, some razor-sharp and others chipped, salvia glistening on deep red gums.
More rap-rap-raps joined in from all angles, and he looked around and saw hairy lizards to his left, his right, on jagged mounds of rock, beside azure-trunked trees. Dozens, maybe more, of the scaly, hairy beasts, some as stiff as rocks, others clawing toward him, their disease-laded claws scraping on the navy-tinted ground like nails on chalkboard.
That ended the session short. He needed to tame something, but he wasn’t going to be stupid about it. He hopped on Apollo’s saddle and lightly slapped his rump, and the chimera turned and pounded way from the Komodo army and to the tree line not far away.
“Back to the ship, buddy,” said Charlie.
He mentally cursed Crosseyes. He’d told him that he’d seen one or two of the creatures at most, and that it’d be safe for Charlie to come here with Apollo. Now, he found himself being chased away, and the worst thing was that he hadn’t done what he came here for; he hadn’t tamed a lizard. He hadn’t gotten that shot of confidence he so painfully needed.
Suddenly, Apollo reared up. A blur of a shape leapt from behind a tree, and Charlie had just enough time to see the snarling face of a wolf before it collided into him, and he hit the ground on his back.
Twigs and tones dug into the back of his head, and his chest wheezed from having the air forcibly pummelled out of him for a second time. He tried to sit up, but agony rocked through his chest and ribs, aching stabs that commanded him not to move. Had he broken his back? Cracked a rib? Whatever it was, his breath wheezed in his throat like an old man who’d smoke a pack every day since the Great Depression.
A face appeared in front of his. Snarling, hairy, a giant black nose with a scratch on it, its mouth opened wider than should have been possible to show two rows of teeth, each row capped with two fangs that would have made light work tearing through the side of a tank.
He flicked Darkness into place on his blade switcher. It had one in six chance of blindness, and a blind angry wolf was the best he could hope for.
He jabbed the blade into the wolf’s side, piercing through its flesh. It snarled, drenching his face with spit, and its dark eyes burned with anger as it snapped at him. Teeth pierced his skin. A flare of pain burned in him so intensely that color spots burst in his eyes, and he felt like someone had poured molten lava on his face.
Then, a shape crashed into the wolf, and Charlie felt a weight leave him, but he couldn’t stand. His face was on fire, and when he brought his finger to his nose he felt that the tip of it was gone, and his fingers were coated crimson.
The realization that it had torn away part of his nose stung him even worse than the pain. He staggered, but he forced every ounce of his energy into keeping himself together.
He tried to cast Heal. Using magic required focus, both for the mana to gather, and to assemble the spell in your mind. Now, Charlie managed only two seconds of focus before his pain broke through the barrier each time.
Rat-rat-rat. More crunches. More feet scraping across the forest floor, too light to be a wolf’s. Lots of them.
He focussed again. Healing winds. Mana. Calm. Healing winds. Mana. Calm.
And he cast the spell on himself, and the nourishing mana spread the barest of numbing touches on him. Four seconds of focus was all he could manage. It didn’t take the burn away, it didn’t fix his nose, but it was enough for him to move without wanting to throw up.
He got to his feet now, Darkness in his hand. Apollo was on top of the sole wolf, pinning in under his great lion paws, snapping and tearing at its neck and trying to deliver the killing bite.
But the wolf didn’t worry Charlie anymore. It was the dozen hairy Komodo dragons who’d followed him into the forest. The ones who quickly s
cattered into a circle, spreading around him so swiftly that every direction was cut off.
And then the spell wore off, and the agony hit his nose anew. The wind blew against his raw wound, every gust of it seeming to hold fire, or it felt that way at least. He tasted blood on his lips, thick and iron-like, and it made him want to heave.
He’d only have one chance to use a spell. Maybe Fire Arrows would take one or two dragons out, tops. Then the rest would be on him. Or, he could take his chances on Apollo, see if the chimera could leap over them and then speed away.
But no, that wasn’t an option because the komodos were wise to it, and he saw now that another dozen lizards had joined the hunt, these ones staying further back. If he tried to escape, Apollo would leap over one circle of them only to hit another.