A Muddle of Magic

by Alexandra Rushe

  A large shape stirred in the dense gloom with a scaly hiss. In the shadows behind a stack of wine casks, an enormous pair of almond-shaped eyes gleamed back at her.

  Morven? The snake’s size wasn’t the only thing that had changed in the past few weeks. Flame’s trill had deepened to a tigerish purr.

  “Flame? Thank goodness. I’ve been looking everywhere for you. I was beginning to think you’d jumped ship.”

  Flame would never leave Morven.

  “Morven was worried.” Raine tried to sound stern but failed. She was too relieved. “I’ve called and called. Why didn’t you answer me?”

  Flame did not hear Morven. Flame was asleep.

  “For a week?” Raine stepped closer and tripped over a pile of rope. She fell and banged her knees on the deck. “Ouch. Are you sick?”

  Sick?

  Rubbing her throbbing knees, Raine sat down on a box of Esmallan tobacco. “Do you hurt anywhere? Are you feeling hot and achy?”

  No. Flame has the slows.

  “The slows? You mean you’re sluggish? I’m not surprised. You ate a lot of birds.”

  Flame was hungry, and there were no rats.

  “That’s ʼcause you ate them all. But don’t worry. Raven has promised to buy you some sheep.”

  Do sheep taste like rat?

  “No…at least I don’t think so. I’ve never eaten rat. On the plus side, sheep are much bigger.” Raine waited, but there was no answer. “Flame? We’re guests on the Storm. I don’t think you’re supposed to be in the hold.”

  Flame shifted his heavy coils with a thump. Flame likes the hold.

  “Raven wants you to stay in my cabin.”

  Why? Flame is comfortable here.

  Raine gave up. Raven would not be happy. Well, he could get over it. She’d tried, but the snake was too big for her to wrangle up the ladder alone. Besides, other than shuffling a few boxes around, Flame hadn’t done any harm.

  She got to her feet. “Okay. Have it your way, sleepyhead, but try not to disturb things.”

  A gentle snore was her only response.

  Raine left the grumpy snake and returned to the upper deck. The snake wasn’t the only one on the Storm who was out of sorts. The journey from Gambollia had been inordinately long, and the men were irritable and restless. To mollify them, Gertie had breached several kegs of ale and the sailors were partying. The merriment had started at sunup, and things had reached the rowdy stage. When Raine joined the festivities, the crew and Gertie were engaged in a lusty game of Tip the Troll. The rules were simple and straightforward: Gertie stood on her hind legs and the men, either singly or in pairs, did their best to knock her off her pegs. Since the troll was immensely strong and almost impossible to upend, the game was rather one sided, but everyone was having a rollicking good time. Brefreton sat on a nearby crate taking wagers. As he consistently bet on the troll, he’d amassed a tidy stack of winnings.

  A burly pair of sailors slammed into Gertie. The troll braced like a hairy linebacker and stood firm. The men crashed to the deck.

  Gertie spied Raine and straightened. “Hello, pet. Cup o’ ale?”

  “Highly inadvisable,” Glory said, gliding up in her graceful way. “I’d urge you to stay in your cabin, Raine. The men are in their cups and ale brews fools.”

  Turning, Glory shooed Chaz and the cabin boy, Tarin, below for a game of stakkers, the Finlaran version of bowling. Raine reluctantly followed. Glory was right. Gertie and Mauric guarded her like the last lamb in a meat shortage. If a drunken sailor so much as looked at her cross-eyed, heads would be broken, and she’d be the cause.

  Retreating to her cabin, Raine plopped on her bed and stared out the cabin window. The ship rocked in the choppy water. They were moored a hundred yards or so offshore. A jumble of daub and wattle huts clung to the rocky beach and a string of peeling boats bobbed next to a sagging wharf. The sand on the beach was a glorious pink, like crushed rose quartz. Mountains towered behind the small hamlet, their snow-capped slopes covered in fir, pine, and spruce. It was early spring in southern Finlara and the thatched roofs of the village were barren of snow. In a meadow halfway up a mountain, a clump of dingy, four-legged cotton balls grazed. Flame’s next meal, Raine thought. Poor sheep

  Raven was out there, somewhere. Several days earlier, he’d taken a longboat and gone ashore. Ilgtha, the young troll he’d rescued from a greedy trapper in Gambollia, had gone with him.

  “Ilgtha is miserable at sea,” Gertie had said. “This is as good a place as any to release her. No Finlaran would dare molest her, and she’ll find her way to Udom, soon enough.”

  Udom; the word sent a wistful pang through Raine. Her friend, Tiny Bartog, lived in Udom, the land of the monsters. She missed the frost giant, especially now that Flame had gone ninja.

  There was a tremendous thud from above, followed by a curse and a deep groan. Another sailor had taken a go at Gertie and paid the price. The men were feeling no pain, but there’d be a reckoning on the morrow, bumps and bruises, aching heads and bellies. Raven would not be pleased to return to a hungover crew. Gertie was responsible, but she’d be forgiven. Raven was crazy about the troll.

  Raine? Eh…not so much. Raven had been cool and standoffish since her near-death experience in the woods. He blamed her, she suspected for Squeak’s curse.

  Squeak, a mysterious and powerful forest entity, had rescued Raine from Xai, then had guided her to a cave deep in the woods, where she’d found Flame. Soon after, she’d been reunited with her friends. All had been well, until Squeak had discovered the wanton destruction of some of his beloved trees. Raven had confessed to the deed. Incensed, Squeak had handed Raven a sack of acorns, ordering him to plant the seedlings down to the last one, to atone for his crime. The onus Squeak had placed on Raven had resulted in numerous and frequent stops along the Finlaran coast, lengthening their journey by weeks.

  And, somehow, this is my fault? Raine thought. It wasn’t fair.

  She rolled onto her back and stared at the ceiling. At least Raven and Chaz were on excellent terms. Chaz had appointed himself Raven’s helper. The boy spent hours examining the seeds in the big sack, dividing them into smaller pouches for Raven to sow. The sack was nearly empty, and the geas on Raven would soon be done.

  Raine sighed. Once Squeak’s curse was lifted, perhaps Raven’s mood would thaw. His cold detachment and aloof manner made the confines of the ship uncomfortable, to say the least.

  By sunset, the revelry had died down and Raine slipped out of her cabin to the galley for a bite to eat. To her surprise, she found Brefreton there before her. The wizard was munching on an apple and a wedge of cheese and looking remarkably clear eyed.

  “Haven’t dared have a tipple since I drank Gertie’s brandy,” the wizard confided. “Know she’s waiting for me to let my guard down. If I relax, I know I’ll wake up with my clothes nailed to the deck or hanging upside down from the main mast.”

  “It’s an evil old troll,” Raine agreed.

  “You think I should be worried, don’t you?”

  “Oh, yeah.”

  “You’re right. Of course, you’re right.” Brefreton looked glum. “Drat Gertie. I wish she’d quit toying with me and have done. The suspense is killing me.”

  Raine made a sandwich of bread and cheese and carried it back to her cabin. A ghost waited for her there. No, not a ghost—a ghoul, with a shattered face and bulging eyes. He lifted the medallion around his throat and gurgled at Raine. Sea water bubbled from his mouth and puddled on the floor.

  “I won’t forget, Doran,” Raine said, setting the sandwich on the table for later. “I’ll give the medallion to your wife when I reach the Citadel, I promise. Now, shoo. You’re making a mess on the floor.”

  The ghost vanished. Climbing onto the bed, Raine crossed her legs and unrolled a piece of parchment to go over her lesson. She jotted down
a few notes with the pen Bree had given her. The harpy quill had come with a pot of never-ending ink, which was handy. Transmutation was challenging, and she’d failed miserably at her first assignment, a bird. She’d wound up with a mouthful of feathers and no wings. Flustered and embarrassed, she’d been the one to suggest a mouse, reasoning that something small and wingless would be easier.

  Wrong. Judging from Bree’s disparaging remarks about her legs and tail, she’d missed the mark.

  She was chewing on the end of her quill, pondering the finer points of a proper mouse derriere, when Mimsie’s ghost appeared. Raine still found her aunt’s youthful appearance disconcerting. The woman who’d raised Raine had been wrinkled and frail, not this pretty, young thing.

  “Trouble coming,” the ghost said in her Southern drawl. “Lock the door. I’ll go for help. This is a fine howdy-do—you in the soup and every man jack and troll aboard this tub drunk as Cooter Brown, and that Raven fellow off galivanting in the woods.”

  Raine dropped her quill, leaving a streak of ink on the parchment in her lap. “Get Bree. He’s sober.”

  But Mimsie was already gone.

  Raine scrambled off the bed and locked the door. Grasping her wizard stone, she retreated to the bed, her heart pounding. She didn’t have long to wait. A black blade slid between the door and the frame. The leather catch lifted, and the door creaked open. A small figure stood in the entrance. He resembled a burnt gingerbread man with a round, tarred head and stubby arms tipped with knives instead of hands. Hard knots moved beneath his rigid flesh in questing lumps.

  He watched her coldly for a moment, his black button eyes unblinking in his mouthless face; then he scuttled across the room and hopped on the foot of the bed. Raine shrieked and scooted up the mattress. The thing pursued her, blades scissoring. She shrieked again and clutched her wizard stone. There was a blinding flash of light, followed by a soft thump.

  Her vision cleared. A nimbus pulsed around her. She’d made a shield. Or, rather, her wizard stone had.

  “Thanks,” she murmured, giving the stone a grateful squeeze.

  She knelt and peered over the edge of the bed. The little man was lying on his back on the floor, his arms and legs whirring mechanically. With a disjointed jerk, he righted himself and hurled his body at the shield. He slammed into the magical buffer and hit the floor with a clatter. Raine yelped and shrank back.

  He rolled to his feet and cocked his head, regarding the barrier that separated them with dead eyes. Spreading his arms, he began to spin like a top. Faster and faster he whirled. The scaraboid lumps beneath his armored skin stretched and detached. Globs of pitch splattered the shield and stuck to the shimmering surface like tar roaches, dissolving the shield. The monster clacked his blades in anticipation and marched toward the bed. He was sharpening his talons, Raine realized with a stab of terror. She had to do something, or the demonic little butcher would gut her like a hog.

  On impulse, she shifted into a mouse. At once, she was assaulted by smells: the lanoline scent of the woolen blankets and the slightly musty odor of the down mattress, the polish on the wooden floor, and the yeasty, rich aroma of the bread crumbs she’d dropped from her sandwich.

  Most of all, she smelled the tarry little man. He smelled of creosote and death and burnt hair. The odor was cloying, especially to the mouse’s sensitive nose.

  Whiskers twitching in affront, she darted off the bed. The doll sprang after her and got between her and the door. Chrrrick, chrrick, he sharpened his knives. Raine squeaked in terror and scampered to the right. The mouse’s sense of smell was keen, but its vision was poor. Thwack. A wickedly sharp blade slammed into the wood floor, missing her tail by inches. She scurried to the left. Behind her, the doll’s blades gave a metallic snick. Her right ear burned, and she squealed in pain. Blood ran into her eyes, blinding her.

  Snip, snip. She heard, rather than saw, the little man closing in. Agitated and mindless with fear, she tried to dart under the bed, but the bed frame met the floor and was bolted down. She was trapped.

  There was a tremendous crash at the door, but Raine did not turn her head. She couldn’t. The mouse’s survival instincts had taken over. Move so much as a muscle, her mousy neurons warned, and the predator would see her.

  Clicking his knives like mandibles, the little man raised his blades to finish her.

  Morven?

  The voice penetrated the mouse’s haze of terror and brought Raine to her senses. The door and freedom were a few feet away, if she could get past the demon doll. Bunching her hind quarters, she jumped, sailing up and over the evil manikin and his slashing blades. Just when she thought she’d made it, a hard, muscular length whipped around her tiny body, plucking her from midair. The snaky tail lowered, and Raine found herself nose to nose with a monster, a fearsome beast with a large, crested head and a tapered snout. The monster’s jaws were parted, revealing long, sharp teeth. Almond-shaped eyes gleamed reddish-gold beneath heavy ridges of bone.

  The dragon nuzzled her curiously, brushing her quivering body with silky red whiskers. Silly Morven. Why are you a mouse?

  “Flame?” Raine chittered. “You’re a dragon?”

  Am I? Flame does not know. Morven said Flame is a—Flame paused and looked down. What is this?

  Still bent on its deadly mission, the maniacal doll was climbing up one of the dragon’s thick, scaled legs, his vacant, unblinking gaze fixed on Raine.

  Raine squealed with fright. “Don’t let it get me. It’s trying to kill me.”

  Do not worry, Morven. Flame will protect you.

  Setting Raine on one hulking shoulder, Flame grasped the scrabbling creature in his claws. The doll’s arms and legs whirred back and forth like a battery-operated toy, its featureless jaws working with frustrated hate.

  It is very ugly, I think, Flame said, examining the squirming creature. Perhaps the ugly attacked Morven because it is hungry? Perhaps the ugly likes mice. Morven should have thought of that.

  “It attacked me before I turned into a mouse. I was trying to escape the ugly.”

  Morven used magic to become a mouse?

  “Yes, it’s something Bree and I’ve been working on. It’s called transmutation.”

  Morven will be a mouse forever?

  “Of course not. I was going over my notes when the nasty little robot—”

  Robot?

  “The ugly. I was doing my lessons when the ugly attacked me.” Raine’s whiskers trembled at the memory. “I didn’t do it on purpose. It just happened.”

  Flame is glad Morven will not stay a mouse. Flame is hungry.

  “Flametongue,” Raine piped, much shocked. “You’d eat me?”

  Flame likes mouse very much. Almost as much as rat, and Morven smells delicious.

  Raine thought Flame was teasing, but she couldn’t be sure. Wiser not to tempt him, she decided, and de-mouse. Patting the soft fur of her chest with one paw, she located her wizard stone and closed her eyes. She felt a stretching, pulling sensation. When she opened her eyes, she was perched on Flame’s shoulder.

  No longer hampered by the mouse’s myopia, Raine climbed down to have a better look at the dragon. Flame was perhaps ten feet in length, not counting his spiked tail, and had a long, sinuous neck and four powerful legs tipped with wicked claws. A pair of leathery wings sprouted from his massive shoulders, and a spine of bony red spikes ran down his back. He was covered in shimmering black scales, except for his head, which was bejeweled in scales of red, blue, and green and tipped with a pair of wickedly sharp horns.

  Raine looked around the chamber. There was a dragon-size hole in the wall where the door to the captain’s cabin had been, and splinters of wood were scattered on the floor.

  “Oh, dear,” she said, surveying the damage. “You’ve ruined Raven’s lovely paneling. He’s not going to be happy, I think.”

  Morven neede
d me, and the hole to this space was too small. The other hole, as well.

  Raine stared at the dragon with a sinking feeling. “You busted the hatch to the cargo bay, too?”

  Flame was in a hurry. The hole is much bigger now. Easier for Flame to come and go.

  “Oh, dear,” Raine said again.

  The demon doll squirmed in Flame’s grasp, stabbing at Raine in impotent rage. She gasped and drew back.

  Flame does not like the ugly. Does Morven wish to keep it?

  “No, Morven does not,” Raine said, taking care to avoid the doll’s reach. “Though I’m not sure what to do with it. Bree or Gertie will know. Say, where is Bree? Mimsie went to fetch him.”

  Mimsie is the creature with the flowery stench?

  “Yes,” Raine said, smiling at the dragon’s description. Her aunt’s ghost invariably left a cloud of Arpege in her wake. “You met her once before, in the cave. Remember?”

  Flame remembers. Flame remembers everything about that day. Flame was very sad and lonely. Flame called and called Morven. Then Morven came and—

  “Flame,” Raine said, halting the snake. “Did Mimsie tell you I was in trouble?”

  Yes. The stinky one woke Flame from his nap and said Morven needed him.

  “Mimsie doesn’t stink. That’s her perfume.” She gave the dragon a fond pat. “Thank you for coming to the rescue. I’d be mincemeat, if it weren’t for you.”

  There was a thunder of footsteps and Raven burst into the cabin through the hole in the wall. Brefreton and Mauric were right behind him.

  “Tro,” Mauric said, gawking at Flame in astonishment. “It’s a dragon.”

  Raven drew his sword and advanced. “Don’t move, Raine.”

  Raven has a long tooth. Flame’s voice rose as Raven stalked closer. Why does Raven have a long tooth, Morven?

  “Stop that,” Raine said, stepping in front of Flame. “You’re scaring him.”

  “It’s a dragon, Raine,” Raven said, his expression grim. “It’s scaring us.”

  “It’s not a dragon. Well, technically, I suppose he is a dragon, but—” She stamped her foot in frustration. “Darn it, it’s Flame.”