Backyard Dragons

by Lee French

  He dropped into the chair with a heavy sigh. “She’s so needy. All the time, she’s asking me questions like I should know everything. How does this work, why do we do that, what’s this for, blah blah blah. Incessant. She has a good right hook, so there’s that, but her sprite can’t even take her places. We have to pay for a bus pass.”

  “Oh? What’s her sprite?”

  “A dragon. But not a real dragon. He’s tiny. This big. She couldn’t ride that if her life depended on it. Even if she could, people would notice, and she’d get too much attention. We can’t do our job with people watching us all the time, especially not now. She’d wind up in prison, then she’d escape and be on the run all the time. We can’t work like that. Or worse, they’d take away her locket because it’s prison and they take away everything.”

  “What now? What about her locket?”

  Something in Kurt’s tone bothered Justin, but he ignored it as a manifestation of his own exhaustion. “It’s a long story. The short version is her father was a Knight, and he crafted it somehow to keep her alive after a ne-phasm drained away most of her life force. I’m not clear on the details. All I know is it’s what makes her a Knight, and if she takes it off, she dies.”

  “Huh.” Kurt paced behind Justin. “She could be the witch.”

  “Claire? No. The Heart of the Palace granted her a weapon. She’s a Knight. And she was as surprised by the dragons as I was. Besides, I’ve seen her aura. That locket is powerful, but it can’t create a binding like the one I broke over the dragons. Wrong feel.”

  “Interesting.” Kurt continued pacing.

  Justin leaned back and dozed, thinking about Claire and Enion. Though he didn’t envy her the downsides of her sprite, the fact she could take him to the Heart for her challenges seemed downright unfair. Like cheating.

  After a while, Kurt cleared his throat. “I’m not sure what to do about that, but I have an idea for you to prepare for the moment you do figure out the witch problem. I imagine it’ll involve a fight. They tend to throw magic around quite a bit, if memory serves. Your armor and sword’ll certainly help a lot, but you could grab some insurance.”

  Justin snapped awake. All his concerns about Claire evaporated. With his legs still aching, he had a keen interest in extra power to face this witch. Those shadow snakes had almost killed him and Tariel both. They needed all the help they could get. “Will I need to take notes?”

  “Ha! No. Back in the day, I watched over some places with reservoirs of power that could be harnessed at need. Nothing fancy. You’ll have to kick over a few rocks, that’s all. No big deal for you.”

  “Sure. How many are we talking about?”

  “Oh, let’s see. Four? No, five. Three gravestones and the Skidmore Fountain, plus a stone in Goose Hollow. If you can grab a map of that neighborhood from 1920, I can help you find it. With the graves, you just need to knock the headstone over and cut into the ground under it. The fountain you’ll probably want to do in the dead of night, because people won’t stand by and let you stab it.”

  “There won’t be backlash like Tariel and I got when we cut the bindings on the dragons, will there?”

  “I don’t think so. Should just be kind of a wind, I think. Mind, I never used them, so I can’t be sure. Might be a whole lot more spectacular. Don’t think it should hurt you, though.” Kurt listed off names, death years, and locations.

  Justin paid careful attention, repeating them to himself several times so he didn’t wind up knocking over the wrong graves. He’d been to all three cemeteries; none of his visits had been pleasant. One name seemed familiar, though he couldn’t place it.

  “Why didn’t you ever tell me about these before?”

  “Well, you know. Time. I guess I always figured I had more. And at the end, I kind of had other things on my mind. That apprentice of yours? Don’t wait to tell her things.”

  Justin nodded. “I’ll take care of this.”

  “Good man.” Kurt clapped him on the arm. “I’ll see what else I can come up with for you.”

  Chapter 20

  Claire

  Claire and Drew walked to the nearest bus stop. Cold drizzle made the trip miserable, but at least Claire had a bright pink fleece sweater to hide the dagger now. She kicked gravel along the side of the road and couldn’t decide how to bring up anything about Rondy, Drew’s grandfather, or Justin.

  Drew seemed unaffected by the weather. He walked with his head up in his yellow raincoat. He had a bounce to his step, and she heard him humming off-key. For a while, she let it go, not wanting to experience him cracking all over her. As the bus stop loomed in the distance, she finally had to ask.

  “What’s up with your grandfather?”

  “What’s up?”

  “Yeah. Did you visit his grave or something? How did Justin find him?”

  “Oh.” Drew shrugged and watched the ground. “No. I met Kurt.”

  Claire frowned, more confused than before. She thought he’d said his grandfather was dead. “You mean…”

  “His ghost. I met his ghost. We chatted. It was surreal.”

  Something wild and hopeful and dark and crazy flared inside Claire. She knew Rondy would have a Phasm, of course, but she hadn’t yet considered that she might be able to find it and talk to it. Justin had made it sound like only corrupted Phasms had any real substance. If she could find Rondy and talk to him, she could make things right somehow. Maybe he could even help her figure out what Caius meant.

  “Yep. It was the weirdest thing.” Drew gazed off into the distance.

  “Hey, that means he was a Knight, right? Like Justin and me.”

  “Yeah, that’s what he said.”

  Claire grabbed a handful of his raincoat. “You know what that means? You could become a Knight too! We could hang out together in the Palace. Maybe…” She blushed, thinking of other things they could do with that much privacy.

  “That would be cool.” Drew smiled at her and took her hand. He tugged her closer until they stood face to face.

  The rain picked up. Claire squeaked, not wanting to get soaked through her fleece, and ran for the shelter of the enclosed bus stop. “I should’ve worn a raincoat like you,” she told him as he caught up and slid an arm around her waist.

  “We’re safe inside here, I think.” He brushed a fingertip across her cheek.

  Enion burst out through her hood. “Mine!” Flapping his wings so fast they blurred, he hovered between them, hissing at Drew.

  Claire swiped him out of the air. “Down, boy. Sheesh, you’re worse than Justin.” She set the dragon on her shoulder.

  Drew raised an eyebrow. “What?”

  Though it made no sense, Claire swore the red of his skin faded as she watched. “He’s being possessive. Hey, how did you get a sunburn today? I mean, it was sunny earlier, but were you really outside that long?”

  The rain picked up, hammering on the glass shelter and turning the day so dark Claire could barely see twenty feet away. Weird mist swirled up at the same time, making it even harder to see anything outside the glass oasis. She caught movement over Drew’s shoulder and leaned to see around him. Dark shadows approached. Their motion seemed wrong for a car or a person. It reminded her of snakes.

  Reaching for her dagger, she pushed Drew behind her. “Enion, can you actually breathe fire like you did in Caius’s realm?”

  “Only a little.” He coughed and made a tiny spark. When she needed a candle lit, he’d be her first choice for a helper.

  “Then how about you keep watch? Let me know if anything else shows up. I see four right now.”

  “What’s Caius?” Drew asked. She glanced back and saw he’d also noticed the shadows, yet he remained calm.

  She waved him off. “Not important right now.”

  The shadows slithered closer, unaffected by the rain. Claire put one foot toward rushing out to intercept them, but immediately realized that staying here was smarter. With only one entrance into the shelter, they wouldn�
��t be able to surround her or chomp Drew behind her back. She squared her shoulders and waited for the snakelike shadows to approach.

  All four closed in at once, their heads bobbing and weaving in weird synchronicity. The mesmerizing pattern distracted Claire until one lunged in. Its shadowy mouth clamped around her arm so hard she screamed. She was lucky, though—it misjudged her size and only gnashed its gums against her, its fangs chomping through her fleece. Desperate to get the thing off, she stabbed its head. The entire monster dissipated.

  Now jittery with the rush of battle, she slashed her dagger in front of the other three. They held back for some reason, swirling together. Drew moaned behind her.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “He’s holding his head,” Enion reported.

  Claire wondered if the shadows swirling together caused some kind of psychic attack that affected him more than her. She lashed out with the dagger, stabbing another shadow in the face and destroying it. Both remaining shadow snake-things surged forward. Claire threw herself at the glass wall. The shadows chomped empty air. Enion coughed a spark, hitting one shadow. It shrieked, its voice high and ear-splitting.

  Seeing an opening, Claire dropped her shoulder and lunged at both shadows, leading with her dagger. She stabbed through one, then the other, and wound up in the rain. Worried about Drew, she dashed back to his side.

  He sat on the bench, holding his head and rocking. “Why did you do that?”

  “Do what? Defend you?”

  “Why did you do that,” Drew wailed. “Claire is my friend!”

  “Who are you talking to?” Claire noticed the rain slacking off, returning to the mild drizzle they’d walked in earlier. The fog dissipated.

  “Please,” Drew begged. “I need her.”

  “Do you have any idea what this might be about?” Claire whispered to Enion.

  “No.”

  Drew surged to his feet. “She’s mine and you can’t have her!” He slammed his head against the glass wall.

  Grabbing Drew’s shoulders, Claire held him away from the walls. “Talk to me, Drew. What’s going on in there?”

  “Let me go! I can’t let him hurt you!”

  She picked him up. He kicked and flailed. She tightened her grip and carried him out of the shelter. He screamed so loud it hurt her ears. Wincing, she threw him at the ground. “What is wrong with you?”

  Drew curled up on the ground, holding his head. “Claire,” he grunted, his voice hoarse and strained, “you have to kill me. Please kill me now. Before he makes me hurt you.”

  “He? Who is he?” Claire had no intention of killing Drew, no matter how desperately he asked her to. She raised her dagger anyway, hoping this “he” would see she took his threat seriously. “I don’t get what’s going on, Drew. You have to help me out. I can’t fix what I don’t understand.”

  “He tried to eat you.”

  “Tried to—” Claire fingered the holes in her fleece. “Those shadows came from him? Where is he? I’ll beat the crap out of him.”

  Drew groaned. Then he laughed. “You can’t. He’s mine now. N—aaaugh!”

  With that bizarre statement, Claire understood. Something had moved into Drew’s head with him, and it wanted her dead. She’d faced spirits that wanted to eat her before. She’d even met one in a human body. That time, the body’s original owner hadn’t showed any sign of existing. Drew, on the other hand, seemed to be resisting.

  “You’re possessed,” she said. Despite the danger, she helped him stand and brought him back inside the bus shelter. “Drew, you have to keep fighting. You’re strong enough, I know it.”

  “Ha! This kid isn’t even close to strong enough to resist me. He’ll never be a Knight, that’s for sure. Couldn’t find a way into the Palace with both hands and a roll of toilet paper.”

  “What?” Claire shook her head, refusing to be distracted by the toilet paper comment. Instead, she grabbed Drew’s shirt and pulled his face close. “You listen to me, ur-phasm. Or ne-phasm. I’m not clear on the difference, but that doesn’t matter. The point is, I know you’re a ghost-spirit-thing and you’re trying to take Drew’s body away from him. Now that I know, there’s nothing you can accomplish that I can’t mess up for you.”

  Drew scowled. “You must be Justin’s apprentice.”

  Icy panic poured over her head. If this thing knew about Justin and guessed who she was, it knew more than she did. Compared to it, she flew blind here. “And you must have been made by the Phasm he’s dealing with. I’m not giving up Drew without a fight.”

  “You’re too late, little girl. He’s mine now.”

  She feared it told the truth but hoped it didn’t. Losing Rondy had been hard, and she imagined she’d have nightmares about it for a while. Losing Drew on top of that would crush her. Trying not to show how she really felt, she raised her dagger to his neck. “If that’s true, then I have no choice but to kill him, which will also kill you.”

  Drew stilled. For several seconds, she watched his soft blue eyes dart around behind his glasses until they rested on hers again. “Do it, Claire.” Tears slid down his cheeks. “It’s the only way. He won’t let me go.”

  Claire pressed her knife against his throat and tried to imagine him as nothing more than a vessel for a depraved spirit. “This isn’t fair,” she whispered. Her eyes burned.

  “No, it’s not.” Drew touched her hand and screwed his eyes shut.

  There had to be another way. With Justin’s help, maybe Claire could find it. Without him here, though, she had no idea how to manage Drew. The ghost possessing him would keep trying to eat her. The second Drew lost the ability to intervene for her, it would succeed.

  “I’m sorry.” She forced the tip of the blade into his neck. A drop of blood slid down the dragon tooth.

  “Whoa. Wait. I didn’t think you’d do it. We can negotiate.”

  Claire shoved him aside with a growl too full of emotion for words. She jumped to her feet and had to pace in front of him. Tears flowed down her cheeks. She’d been ready to kill him. She’d seen herself doing it and resigned herself to it. Did that make her a monster? Would Caius be proud of her?

  Pointing the dagger at Drew, she wiped her face on her sleeve. Her hand shook. “You have five minutes.”

  Drew touched his neck and looked at the blood. He raised both hands in surrender. “The only thing I genuinely want is to survive. I can do that without taking over. We can share. You can have him and I can ride along. He’ll be able to use my power. We can find other ways to recharge than eating Knights.”

  “I have a better deal.” Claire stayed a few steps away, wary of a trick. “You get out of him, and I don’t destroy you.”

  Drew gulped. “I can’t. I was created for the specific purpose of possessing him and can’t exist on my own. I’m bound to him. Find a way to separate us and we both die. I don’t need to run the show, though. We can be partners. Like you and your sprite, only in one body instead of two.”

  Claire’s heart ached for Drew. Of the two of them, he’d always been the one with hopes and dreams and plans. Most of that had no chance now. He’d been drawn into her world, the one she barely knew but could already tell would consume her life. “How do I know I can trust you?”

  “I don’t know. What would that take?”

  Claire lowered her dagger. They’d both asked questions with no answer and she knew it. “Do you actually know where Justin is, or was that just a ploy to get me out of the house?”

  Drew let his hands fall to his lap. “I know where the Phasm is.”

  Chapter 21

  Justin

  His first stop, Lone Fir Cemetery, had tourists. Justin rode Tariel through the opening in the wrought iron fence on the east side. They moved off the paved walkway to avoid a group of people in brightly colored raincoats. He’d been here once before, with his father. They’d visited a memorial for one of his ancestors, Corwin Evans. The man had died working at the docks, leaving a young wife and two ch
ildren to fend for themselves.

  At the time, he remembered wishing his own father would do that. “I’m a good father,” he murmured. He knew he sometimes did things to contradict that statement, but he made a serious effort to keep those moments to a minimum.

  “You need some sleep,” Tariel said. “I can feel how tired you are.”

  “I’ll sleep when I’m dead.”

  His last visit, almost ten years ago, had been during the spring. Every tree had offered shade in a dozen shades of green. Ivy and moss had covered half the standing gravestones. They’d happened across an old man wiping the plant matter off the stones, careful not to scrape them with his tools. Justin remembered thinking of the place as a park with odd stones growing out of the ground.

  It seemed more like a graveyard now. Brown leaves littered the grass left uncut since the first frost. The firs all drooped under the weight of near-frozen water. Other trees, merely black and brown sticks, reached into the air as if to scrape the life from the sky and drink it down. Even the headstones, slick with rain, seemed dark in the waning gray light of the overcast afternoon sky.

  Slouching in the saddle, Justin hoped this damnable task wouldn’t take long or get him into too much trouble. Dealing with the police always took time and effort, and he didn’t feel he could spare either with a mad witch on the loose.

  “The name we’re looking for here is Jacqueline Whidby, eighteen ninety-three.”

  “Is she significant in any way?” Tariel asked. “Long-lost relative or famous person?”

  “The name seems familiar, I suppose, but not that I know of.” Justin sighed. “Given the date, head for the Soldiers Monument.” Though few graves in that section corresponded to that year, Corwin’s stone happened to be a short distance away. The moment they’d ridden through the gates, he felt certain the one they sought had to be near it. Life worked like that.