Dragons and Magic

by Blair Babylon

  “I’m afraid to.”

  “Do something!”

  Ember clapped her hands and then pushed them apart, huffing out her breath hard.

  The air elemental disintegrated with one last, manic cackle that reverberated on the high ceiling and far walls of the airport terminal, returning to the magical ether from where she had drawn it.

  The crowd in the terminal was looking around, fixing each other’s hair and clothes after being thoroughly tousled by the miniature tornado. One guy was still grousing, “I don’t know who was stupid enough to open a door when there must be a hurricane outside.”

  Ember muttered, “Like a hurricane is ever going to hit Las Vegas in the middle of the desert. Dammit. I had two good spells last week. Why does this keep happening to us?”

  Bethany flitted around, trying to tidy up. “We’ll figure it out. We’ll be okay, someday. Maybe Willow figured out some secret that can help us while she was in Paris.”

  “I’m sure she would have said something about it when we talked to her last week over WitchChat.”

  They’d been over it a thousand times, hypothesizing that maybe their parents were infected with a natural virus that had stunted the three girls’ witching abilities, or maybe chemicals in the plastic that they had teethed on had leached into their bodies and messed them up, or maybe it was pesticides or herbicides or saltpeter in the water.

  All three girls’ parents had taken them to witch doctors and magic seers, but no one could find anything wrong with them. They had volunteered at animal shelters during their summer breaks while in high school, trying to find familiars to stabilize their magic. Animals liked all three of them fine, but none had formed the special witch-familiar bond with them.

  Their magic just didn’t work right, and no one could figure out why.

  Bethany smoothed her dark hair and adjusted her blouse, which had blown halfway around her. “It’s such a mess in here. I just hate messes. I hate them.”

  Ember turned to Bethany, her eyes wide. “Beth, don’t compound my error in judgment.”

  “It’ll take just a minute, and then everything will be cleaner.”

  “No, don’t!”

  Bethany didn’t bother with her usual spellcasting crutches—paint pots and runes—but just composed a quick rhyme and punched a hole in the magical ether and summoned helping spirits. “Come, spirits. This place is a mess. Help clean it up before I crack, I guess.”

  Later, she figured out that she shouldn’t have said crack.

  Strings of firecrackers popped on the floor at her feet and ignited around the room, sparking and leaping off the industrial carpet. She jumped, and most of the people in the crowd did, too. A few dove for cover. A little kid started crying.

  The spirits dissipated.

  Bethany shrank in her skin. She couldn’t even apologize to people because she couldn’t admit to practicing witchcraft. Half the naturals in the room wouldn’t even hear her because they were so deeply in denial about the existence of magic. The other half would think she was a lunatic.

  The other supernaturals in the room would know exactly what had happened and were probably laughing behind their hands at her.

  Bethany bustled around the room anyway, straightening up after the elemental and brushing firecracker ash off of plastic tables and chairs. “Well, Willow will be here any minute.”

  Ember sighed. “I’ll bet she knows we’re here now.”

  Through the crowd, Bethany could see Willow’s bright blonde hair, now shot through with bright pink streaks, weaving through the crowd. She’d piled it on top of her head in a complicated braided, cone-shaped updo. “Willow! Over here!”

  Their friend shoved her way through the crowd and grabbed both of them around their necks, hugging them hard. “I am so glad to see you guys.”

  Bethany hugged her girlfriend. “We’ve never been separated so long. It’s weird to be without you.”

  Ember asked, “And what am I? Chopped unicorn liver?” Her voice sounded strangled from where Willow was hugging her, too.”

  Bethany said, “You know what I mean. It’s always been the three of us.”

  Ever since they had started kindergarten together and then discovered that they were also in the same Saturday morning magic class for supernaturals, the three girls had been best friends.

  Willow whispered, “I saw the air elemental that got out of control. I assume that was Ember?”

  Bethany said, “Well, whenever there is a magical disaster, one of us is sure to have caused it.”

  Ember straightened and peeled Willow’s arm off of her neck so she could speak. “I think we’ve just gotten into a negative mindset. Maybe our magic is going wrong because we expect it to go wrong. Maybe we need to visualize harder. Maybe we just need to be more positive, all the time, no matter what happens. I think we need to stand up, whenever we can, and say yes, I can do it, and then show them that we can.”

  Willow said, “Maybe that will fix us. I mean, my parents sent me all the way to Paris for that three-month course in remedial potions, and I don’t think that improved my magic any.”

  The hope for a Parisian miracle drained out of Bethany. “I was really hoping that you learned something, that there was some trick that we are missing, and all we had to do was just figure it out.”

  Willow sighed. “No. I learned new potions, but they blow up half the time, same as always.”

  Ember said, brightly, “Then we have nothing to lose. From now on, everything we say is positive. We are going to hold our chins up and we are going to say, yes we can.”

  Bethany could see that this was going to end just like all their other tries at becoming competent witches like everyone else, but it was no use arguing with Ember when she got an idea stuck in her head. “Okay, I’ll try.”

  “Not try, do! We can do this, if we try hard enough. Before, we were kids, and we just didn’t apply ourselves.”

  Bethany had studied as hard as she could and applied herself every day until the veins in her eyes had popped. “Okay.”

  “Positive! We will be positive! No matter what happens, we will be positive in all ways and at all times!”

  Willow glanced at Bethany, her side-eyed look full of trepidation. “Didn’t we try this when we were sixteen?”

  “But this time it’s going to work! Because we’re older, and smarter, and more determined!”

  Bethany nodded. It probably wasn’t going to make anything worse. She asked Willow, “Did you check in some luggage?”

  “After a three-month course in potions? I have so many liquids in those suitcases that I’m surprised TSA hasn’t pulled me aside to ask just what I’m doing. But I’ve also got French chocolate, so let’s go get my bags and eat all of it.”

  Shambles

  MATH Draco arrived at the Dragon’s Den Casino after an early-morning flight.

  And by “flight,” yes, he let his dragon anima out and flew there, a duffel bag tangled around one hind claw. The sun warmed his wings as he flew over the forested San Bernardino Mountains and then the wide expanse of the Mojave Desert to Las Vegas.

  He landed on the roof of the building, snapped back into his human form, dressed in a suit from the duffel, and found an open door to the building’s stairwell system. He’d rent a car later, and he had enough suits for the couple of weeks or so he’d need to sort out this mess.

  He poked his head out of the stairwell on the penthouse floor.

  The hallway was carpeted and painted, but no art hung on the wide, blank walls. There weren’t any little tables or other furnishings like on most penthouse hallways, either.

  Math took one of his master keycards from his pocket and swiped it through the card reader of one of the smaller suites.

  The lock clicked under his hand.

  Inside, the penthouse suite looked like a construction zone.

  Board ends and sawdust littered the carpeting. Dust hazed the wide windows. Again, no couches or tables stood in the dining and
living rooms, and as he stuck his head through the door, he found no bed in the bedroom.

  Four more penthouse suites were in the same empty and dirty condition.

  One had a bed and other furnishings, but the construction debris hadn’t been cleaned up before the furniture had been dumped haphazardly around the suite.

  Oh, jeez. This was worse than Math had thought.

  And he was only on the top floor of the building.

  As he clattered down the stairwell, his duffel bag swinging from his shoulder, he ducked into more hallways. Most of the hotel rooms were unfurnished. All were dirty.

  Math stashed his duffel bag in one of the less filthy but smaller rooms that only had a queen-size bed in it. His feet were going to hang off the end.

  At the casino level, things got worse.

  The gaming tables and slot machines had been moved in, but the construction workers were still working on the trim and interior walls of the upper floors. Power saws screamed through wood, and hammering echoed through the air. Music twanged over the noise.

  Sawdust and plaster grit floated in sunbeams from skylights, drifting and settling on the green felt of the blackjack and poker tables and the thick carpeting.

  The powdering of dust on everything thickened as he stood there, watching.

  He pushed through the revolving doors that led out the front. Late-spring desert sunlight beat down on him, heating his dark hair and warming his shoulders through his suit.

  The fountain out front—the centerpiece of the casino, a dancing-water spectacle that was to feature towering displays of acrobatic water—was off.

  He approached it.

  When Math was halfway across the wide cement courtyard, the huge casino and hotel towering behind him and glaring in the hot sunlight, the smell became noticeable. At first, the scent was almost pleasant, like mown grass and a distinct green aroma.

  As he neared the thigh-high retaining wall around the fountain, the smell thickened.

  The odor swirled and condensed as he approached it, becoming more like fermenting cabbage, and then cat vomit, and then a rotting, open sewer.

  Math swallowed hard, doing his best not to gag, and leaned over the fountain.

  Inside the fountain’s pool, the dark green, syrupy water rippled gently. Patches of red algae floated atop the sludge. Brown lumps bobbed to the surface and sank again. Algae tendrils climbed up and over the sides of the pool and completely encrusted all the mechanics with black and green fur.

  He stepped back and then jogged backward before gulping fresher air.

  The Dragon’s Den Casino was in a lot worse shape than he had been led to believe, and it would take a miracle to have it ready for the angel investors’ walk-through in a month.

  He sprinted through the casino and to the financial department, where four people were sharing a couple of pizzas and drinking beer.

  “What the hell is going on?” Math demanded.

  One of the guys leaned back in his chair. “You must be the new guy that DD Inc. was sending today. I’m Folant Vishap, head of Finance.”

  Math pointed to the door. “The casino is in shambles. The fountain is disgusting. And I need you to open your damn spreadsheets right now!”

  The guy slowly pulled his feet off his desk. “Yeah, about the finances. Olwenna Zomok was in charge of overseeing requisitions and approving funds, and she quit suddenly last week. I’ll bet her books are a mess.”

  The Witch in the HR Office

  MATH Draco slammed open an office door bearing the nameplate of Smedley O’Tentacle, Human Resources Manager. “Smedley!”

  The thin man behind the desk waved his arms. “I’m in the middle of an interview, here.”

  A woman sat opposite the HR manager. Math got a quick impression of a slender female, business suit, black hair, with her hands clasped in her lap. “I’m sorry, miss. I don’t mean to interrupt. There’s an emergency.”

  Smedley protested, “Mr. Draco, you need to make an appointment through the intra-office system—”

  “This is an insane situation, Smedley. I need to hire a service or a crew immediately.”

  “Mr. Draco, there is a hiring freeze due to non-availability of funds. It’s been in effect for weeks.”

  Math didn’t listen to what the HR guy was saying. It wasn’t important, anyway. “I need dozens of people in here, right away. Maybe hundreds. I didn’t realize the level of catastrophe this casino is facing.”

  “We have instructions not to hire anyone. There is an official hiring freeze in effect.”

  “Everything is at risk. If we don’t obtain this first round of outside funding, we’ll lose the entire initial investment, and this endeavor will be an utter failure. There is construction debris all over the casino. The rooms are in shambles. We need an army of housekeepers or those people who come in after a hurricane to shovel out the two feet of contaminated muck.”

  A woman sitting over in the waiting area, ready to be interviewed, stood up. “I can clean it up.”

  Math spun to look at her. She was slim, pretty, and oh-so-very young, but looks can be deceiving. She might be a fae and five centuries old. He asked, “You can? Do you have a cleaning company or a team of cleaners? Do you have a disaster recovery service?”

  She jutted her chin into the air. “I’m a home and hearth witch, one of the best of my generation. I can conjure whatever I need to clean up any mess. With enough time, I could have cleaned up Los Angeles after Typhoon Esmeralda.”

  Her confidence was as entrancing as her sharp chin and dark eyes, which seemed to illuminate from a golden glow within her. She wore a black, business trouser suit, which seemed smart and professional. Too many job applicants dragged themselves into the HR department as if appearances and orderliness didn’t matter. The only unconventional thing about her outfit were the sparkly, violet witch boots peeking from under the hems of her dark pants.

  Also, he liked the way she discreetly plucked a tissue from her purse and ran it over the edge of Smedley’s desk, wiping off a trace of dust. Attention to detail was important, as was discretion.

  Math raised one eyebrow. “Typhoon Esmeralda wasn’t a hurricane. A mage lost control of a mob of wind and water elementals, and they rioted.”

  She grinned at him. “Yes, but the naturals don’t believe in magic, so they don’t believe what they see or hear. They’ll do anything to explain away what is obviously a magical occurrence, even pretending that a hurricane hit Los Angeles.”

  Math knocked an ashtray off the desk, scattering ashes and half-burned bits onto the floor. No one smoked in the office area of the Dragon’s Den Casino, of course, but little fire accidents tended to happen around dragon shifters. “Let’s see you clean that up.”

  The witch pulled a small whisk broom and dustpan out of her purse and flicked the ashes and charcoal into the pan. She tipped it into a wastebasket.

  Math laughed. “I meant with magic. Your little whisk broom isn’t going to be able to clean up tons of construction debris or scrub that algae-crusted fountain clean.”

  She pursed her lips. “Sometimes, the simplest way is the best, but if you want to see my magic, we can do that, too.” She kicked the wastebasket over.

  The cold ashes spilled out. Shredded paper and old food wrappers tumbled on top.

  Math stepped back from the ashy mess. He’d just had his shoes shined by his house staff that morning.

  The witch pulled a large art notebook out of her purse, the kind with that thick ragstock paper for drawing or pastels. “Give me a minute. Incantations are kind of like making a shopping list. You know, you have to categorize each item, separate the sub-lists by where they are in the grocery store, and then alphabetize everything.”

  That sounded very organized. Math should try that. Maybe he could sort his contacts list into folders and sub-folders, based on the committee or division that he knew the person from.

  Using brushes dipped in pots of ink that floated beside her in the air, t
he witch drew a complicated pattern on the paper.

  He moved around behind her to get a better look at the colorful swirls and decorations she drew. The pattern was kind of pretty, but the way her hand moved as she flipped and drew the design fascinated him. He shook his head, and a tendril of smoke escaped his nose.

  Odd, his nose only smoked like that when his dragon was awakening, and his dragon hated business and spreadsheets. It slept through audits, though it awoke during confrontational meetings to add power to his voice and influence. His anger at the accounting department and Smedley the HR Guy had probably roused his beast.

  The pretty little witch held her drawing at arm’s length, alternately peering and scowling. “Okay, I think it’s ready.”

  She ripped the paper out of the notepad and held it up.

  Math could have sworn that he heard her muttering under her breath, “Please work. Please work. Please work.”

  The witch blew on the piece of paper. The puff of air from her breath levitated the paper in the air for just a moment before it burst into colored smoke and fiery sparkles.

  Math’s dragon heartily approved of the way her magic looked. Fire was warm. Fire was comforting. He felt the beast lift his spiritual head and scent, trying to inhale the magical smoke.

  As the shimmering firefall of her magic reached the floor, the flames coalesced into a dozen glittering, multicolored mice that scurried into the pile of debris. Working together, the apparitional rodents scooped and shoved the litter back into the wastepaper basket.

  Some of the smoke that had risen into the air curled in on itself and became small birds that grabbed the basket, tugging it upright.

  Two of the birds landed on the witch’s shoulders and gave her a nuzzle, but she just laughed at them and sent them back to work.

  Oh, was that just stinkin’ cute, or what?

  The mice burrowed into the carpeting, cleaning up every last speck of ash and dust that had come out of the wastepaper basket and tossing it in just as the rim rose too high for them to reach.