The Return of Beaumont and Beasley: The Janus Elixir and The Hound of Duville (Beaumont and Beasley Book 4)

by Kyle Shultz

  “So, you obviously know him.” I drummed my claws on the pavement impatiently. “Now, go ahead. Find out the hard way that you can’t put a scratch on me, and then—”

  He flung his hands toward my face, and pain seared into my eyes. I roared and lashed my tail, smashing something behind me in the process. I’d probably broken through a wall, but I didn’t much care. The agony was so intense that I couldn’t focus on anything else.

  He’d hurt me. This little human worm had actually injured me while I was in dragon form. How was that possible?

  My first impulse was to blast fire at him, but I stopped myself. I was completely blind now, and might end up reducing Melody to cinders instead. I sought him out by smell and snapped my jaws at him, hoping Melody was being careful to stay well away from my fangs.

  I felt the pressure of a hand against my neck, so tiny and insignificant that I barely noticed it.

  “Be human,” I heard Hyde growl, as energy radiated through my scales from his touch. “Be weak.”

  To my astonishment, I felt my limbs shrinking and my scales receding. This was even more impossible than Hyde managing to wound my dragon self. I fought to prevent the transformation as the pain of my earlier injury returned. It was duller now, so perhaps my human body was no longer at death’s door, but it hadn’t been given enough time to fully recover. The only bright side to all this was that my vision was coming back. My human eyes were still undamaged. My dragon ones hopefully would restore themselves before too long.

  But my dragon self felt very far away now. To my horror, I found that I couldn’t picture it in my head anymore. Even my memories of being a dragon seemed to be fading. It was as if I had always been a puny human; as if soaring about the mountains as a majestic creature of legend had been nothing more than a dream. Hyde’s hand felt like ice, and his fingers dug cruelly into my shoulder as it grew smaller. I cried out, both from shock and from the pain of the wound in my side.

  “Malcolm, I’m coming!” Melody cried. “Hold on!” She sprinted toward me, holding a heavy board over her head like a samurai wielding a sword. With a wordless shout of fury, she swung her makeshift weapon at Hyde.

  “Stop,” Hyde rumbled. The glow of his eyes turned to icy blue, and sapphire streams of light stabbed at Melody. She stopped in her tracks, and to my horror, ice crystals spread all across her body.

  “Enough!” I shouted. She had distracted him, so I drew on the remainder of my strength to swing a fist into the juggernaut’s stomach. Hyde gave a grunt, but it was one of annoyance rather than pain. Still, his grip loosened enough for me to wrench my shoulder free.

  “I’ll kill you!” Hyde roared, grabbing at me again.

  Melody was frozen, unable to run, so I didn’t either. I couldn’t leave her, but I also couldn’t defeat this…thing. Whatever Hyde’s weaknesses were, I didn’t have time to figure out what they were.

  Perhaps a less direct approach, I thought, glancing at Melody and trying not to think about the fact that she might already be dead.

  I held up my hands in surrender. “All right, fine. You want to kill yourself a dragon? Go right ahead. I clearly can’t defeat you, so I won’t try. You won’t get a fight out of this. Just a stupid, tedious little murder. Is that what you want?”

  Hyde gnashed his teeth. “No! You’re not going to give up! You’re going to fight me!”

  “Why should I? I’m not your pet; I don’t have to do what you ask. Besides, you’ve somehow cut me off from my dragon form, so there’s really nothing I can do to you. Fighting is out of the question anyway.”

  “No!” Hyde grabbed a handful of my coat. “Do it, dragon! Do it!”

  “Why?” I bellowed, matching the volume of his voice. “What do you want from me?”

  “I want...” Hyde faltered, then released his grip on my coat. He staggered back and covered his face in his hands. “I want you to stop me. I just want this to stop. Please, please, make it stop. I don’t want this.” He lowered his hands and looked down at the light blazing at his fingertips. “I don’t want this!”

  I blinked in surprise. This, I had not been expecting. I watched in astonishment as Hyde sank to his knees and doubled over on the pavement, curling up like a whipped dog. “Please,” he whispered, a tear trickling down his cheek. “I don’t want to be this. Not anymore.”

  “You want to stop being a monster?” I pointed to Melody’s frozen body. “Then help her, before she dies!”

  “No!” Hyde jumped to his feet, an expression of terror on his face. “No, no! I’ll only make it worse.” His eyes darted wildly back and forth. “Have to get away. Far, far away.” He whirled and ran off, now the hunted animal instead of the hulking, angry brute.

  Never mind him, I thought. “Melody!” I put my hands on her shoulders and flinched at how cold she was. Her eyes were fixed and covered in a film of frost, and her face was locked in an expression of pain and sorrow.

  “No, no, no, no,” I murmured. “I won’t have this. I forbid this. No dying. Don’t you dare be that tiresome. I expect better from you, Miss Nightingale. I don’t take on assistants who go about the place dying.” I desperately searched her frozen eyes for any sign of life. “How do you get one of these creatures working again, anyway?”

  I couldn’t save her. I was going to lose her, just like I lost my family. There was nothing I could do. I was only a man…

  “No!” I shouted at the top of my lungs. “I am Malchazor! I am a dragon, not some pathetic, useless human!” I clutched at my hair and forced myself to focus on the image of myself as a huge, red-scaled reptile, beating my wings as I rose above the rooftops and roared at the sky.

  The Dragonflame. The fire that burned in the very soul of every dragon, older and deeper and wilder than magic itself. It could be suppressed, it could be forgotten, but it could never be denied completely. It was my birthright, and it would obey me. Speaking in the ancient tongue of my race, I commanded it to return to me.

  “KAN PA,” I intoned in a guttural hiss. “GI BIL, KAN PA. NE GEL TU, KA SHU RRA EI SA TUM, SE MU NUS KU, HAM TA!”

  Deep down, I knew my efforts were in vain. If Melody was frozen solid, she was dead. Even the fire of dragons would be unable to bring her back. I felt and saw the flames blazing around my whole body, and knew that my link to the Dragonflame had returned, but still, it was too late.

  Without thinking, I pressed my lips against hers. It was a bizarre and, truth be told, wholly improper thing to do, and I couldn’t explain why I was doing it. I knew better than to think that a magical true love’s kiss was remotely possible by any interpretation of the laws of magic. Melody was gone. It was beyond all my powers to resurrect her, and a kiss certainly wouldn’t make any difference.

  And yet, in spite of everything, she woke up.

  I could feel the ice start to melt beneath my touch, and I jerked away from her in surprise as a wave of warmth spread across her body from head to foot. The ice crystals rapidly turned to steam. Her eyes grew bright, then blinked, and her cheeks flushed with life. She wobbled on her feet, then slumped into my arms.

  “It’s all right,” I whispered into her hair. “It’s all right. I’ve got you.”

  Melody leaned on me in silence for a moment before finally speaking. “You just kissed me.”

  “Yes,” I admitted, blushing. I loosened my hold on her and allowed her to stand. “Sorry. I didn’t mean—” I broke off, not sure what to say.

  “You didn’t mean anything by the kiss?” she guessed, a flicker of mischief in her eyes. “Purely for medicinal purposes, was it?”

  “Yes,” I said stiffly, straightening my coat. “Exactly.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “That’s your problem.”

  “You’re still bleeding.”

  I looked down at my injury. “Not as much as before. I heal quickly, even in human form. I think it’ll be fine. No need to turn back into a dragon now.”

  “What happened to Hyde?” Melody’s face
turned slightly green. “You didn’t eat him, did you?”

  “Didn’t have to. He sort of shriveled up into a big ball of emotion, practically started sucking his thumb, and then ran off.” I glanced in the direction Hyde had gone. “I think he might have scared himself more than he scared us.”

  Melody gave a mirthless chuckle. “I doubt that. But at least we got the information we needed from him. Clearly, he knows Dr. Jekyll.”

  “Yes.”

  She gave me a suspicious look. “What do you mean?”

  “What do you mean, what do I mean? I just said ‘yes.’”

  “Right, but you said it in that weird, soupy tone you use when you’ve got an idea.”

  “I never speak in a soupy tone,” I protested. “What is the definition of ‘soupy’ in this context?”

  “Go on, then,” Melody urged. “Don’t let’s beat around the bush; what are you thinking?”

  “He didn’t only say he knew Dr. Jekyll,” I explained. “He said he didn’t want to be Dr. Jekyll.”

  “Yeah.” Melody nodded, frowning. “I noticed that, too. What do you suppose he meant by that?”

  “I have a theory. But I need to find out more before I can properly put it into words. I think it’s time we confronted the good doctor, don’t you?”

  “Not sure how good he is,” said Melody, “but yes. And then maybe we can find a way to track that big ugly brute down and get him off the streets.” She grinned mischievously. “If he’s Mr. Hyde, then we shall be Mr. and Mrs. Seek!”

  I stared at her in disbelief. “You should be ashamed of yourself, Miss Nightingale.”

  Melody winced. “Yeah, I actually am, a bit. Can we never talk about that pun again?”

  “My pleasure. Also, may I remind you that we are never going to be Mr. and Mrs. Anything. You’re a human, I’m a dragon. Full stop.”

  “Right. A dragon who just kissed me.”

  “As I said, that meant absolutely nothing whatsoever.”

  Melody smirked. “Of course. Whatever you say, future husband.”

  “Stop it.”

  “’Melody Blackfire’ has a rather nice ring to it.”

  “No, it doesn’t.”

  Chapter 7

  The Psychopath Will See You Now

  “The doctor will see you now.” The nurse wore a crisp white uniform, and spoke in an equally crisp, distinguished accent. She looked me up and down. My wound had almost completely healed and I had used magic to clean up the blood on my clothes, so there was no visible sign of anything I had just endured.

  “You were the one with the liver complaint, correct?” said the nurse.

  I glared at her. “I should say not. Both my livers are in excellent health, thank you very much.”

  This comment did nothing to disturb the nurse’s aplomb. “Skin condition?”

  “My skin is perfectly all right. And so are my scales.”

  “Heartburn?”

  Melody burst into a fit of juvenile laughter. I ignored her. The various medieval-looking medical instruments on display throughout Dr. Jekyll’s waiting room were making me extremely uncomfortable, and I wanted to get this over with as quickly as possible. “We’re simply here to speak with the doctor about something that has nothing to do with our health. And, quite possibly, everything to do with his.”

  The nurse gave me a condescending simper. “I’m so sorry, but Dr. Jekyll’s time is quite valuable.”

  I arched an eyebrow. “Oh, is it really?”

  “If you don’t have an urgent medical complaint, then I’ll have to arrange for you to see him when he’s not quite so booked up.”

  “If it’s an urgent medical complaint you want,” I growled, “that can easily be arranged.”

  “What he means to say,” Melody broke in, “is that you should simply tell Dr. Jekyll that we’re here to talk to him about Mr. Hyde.”

  The nurse went on simpering. “I’m afraid I can’t—”

  “That’s not too much to ask, is it?” Melody urged. “Just tell him this one little thing, and we can stop cluttering up your lovely waiting room with our irritatingly perfect health. How does that sound?”

  After losing a brief staring contest with Melody, the nurse finally relented. “I suppose I could relay the message to him,” she said reluctantly. “Though I assure you, he won’t have time to speak to you. His schedule is completely full; he’s not available for anything except emergencies.”

  “Trust me,” I said, “he’ll consider this an emergency.”

  She bustled away, no doubt hoping the doctor would give her license to tell us off properly. “Three…two…one…” I murmured.

  The nurse returned, her face red with embarrassment and irritation. “You can go right in,” she said, speaking as if she had to force the words to come out.

  The office was even more discomforting than the waiting room, given that there were additional implements of medieval torture here as well as various old parchments with gruesome diagrams of human internal anatomy. I supposed that some patients might be reassured to see these handy reference guides about the place, just in case the doctor forgot something and needed a quick refresher. Had I been in need of medical help, I would have preferred to feel that such reminders were not required. I’m far from squeamish—dragons rarely are—but all the same, the sheer barbarism of human medical procedures was enough to turn my stomach sometimes. They used leeches, for pity’s sake.

  Dr. Jekyll jumped in surprise as we entered. Hesitantly, he rose from his chair and emerged from behind his desk. He was a thin, drooping, nervous-looking man in a white coat several sizes too big for him. It hung around his shoulders like a tent and nearly came down to his ankles. His face was gaunt, and his thin, white-blonde hair was slicked back severely against his skull. His fingers were in constant motion, fidgeting and tapping against each other in time with his words as he spoke.

  “G-good day, Mr. Blackfire,” he stammered. “I’ve—I’ve heard a great deal about you.”

  I flashed him a thin smile. “Have you, now? Lovely. All terrifying, I hope.”

  “Perhaps you’ve heard of me as well.” Melody stretched out her hand. “Melody Nightingale, infamous jewel thief.”

  “Reformed,” I added.

  “Yes. Every day except alternate Thursdays. Today is Thursday, isn’t it?”

  “It’s Tuesday.”

  “Drat.” She went back to smiling at Jekyll. “You have heard of me, though, I trust?”

  He hesitated. “Er...no.”

  Melody’s smile vanished. “Right. He’s the culprit. Let’s do a citizen’s arrest right now.”

  “Hold on,” I cautioned. “You were the one who didn’t want us to get ahead of ourselves, remember?”

  “Culprit?” Jekyll’s eyes opened so wide that he looked like an emaciated barn owl. “I’m...sorry, is there something wrong?”

  “Come now,” I said sternly. “No point in being coy. You got our message; you know we’re here about Hyde.”

  “Yes,” said Jekyll slowly. “He’s one of my patients.”

  Melody guffawed. “Nice try. We know you hired him to steal the brain of Janus.”

  “Janice?” Jekyll gulped. “I’ve never heard of the woman.”

  “She’s not a woman!” I barked. “I mean, he isn’t! Also, my associate isn’t quite correct.”

  Melody gaped at me. “I beg your pardon?”

  “You didn’t hire Hyde at all, did you?” I folded my arms and took a step closer to Jekyll, causing him to squeak in alarm and lean back against the desk.

  “He didn’t?” said Melody, now thoroughly confused. “But—”

  “You didn’t employ Mr. Hyde.” I jabbed a finger into Jekyll’s chest. “You are Hyde.”

  The doctor’s Adam’s apple bobbed. “I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about.”

  “That makes two of us,” said Melody. “Is this the theory you were babbling about earlier? Because if you’d spelled it out for me, I�
��d have told you that you were doolally long before you started making a fool of yourself.”

  “Precisely why I didn’t tell you,” I said. “You humans. Even when you know magic is real, your capacity for disbelieving in unusual phenomena remains astonishing.”

  “I’m not Mr. Hyde!” Jekyll yelped. “I mean, have you seen the man? We’re completely different!”

  “All right,” said Melody, “I’ll play along. You’re saying he shapeshifted or something?”

  “It’s rather more complicated than that,” I said. “Remember what Victor was saying about his potion? The one that separates the magical natures of people from the non-magical? This must be how it works.”

  “What, it turns people into bigger, grouchier version of themselves with magical powers?”

  “It distills the magical essence,” said Jekyll, before clamping his hand over his mouth in terror.

  “Oops.” I grinned. “I had a feeling you wouldn’t be able to resist the urge to pontificate about your alchemical exploits.”

  “Quite a sentence, that was,” said Melody. “Say it three times fast.”

  “Later.” I seized the doctor by his lapels, hoisted him off the ground, and dropped him onto the desk. “Now, talk.”

  “All right, all right!” Trembling, Jekyll held up his arms to shield his face. “I’ll tell you everything.”

  I smiled triumphantly at Melody. “You see? I didn’t even make the speech this time. Of course, I’d have been happy to do it, but I thought I’d take the opportunity to prove to you that I can handle these situations without—”

  “Look out!” Melody cried, pointing at Jekyll.

  Startled, I turned to see that the doctor had grabbed a tiny phial of green liquid from the corner of the desk and was now gulping it down.

  “Oh, bother it all.” I seized him again. “What have you done, you—”

  Jekyll’s mouth quirked into a grotesque smile, and his eyes bulged. “Too late,” he laughed. “He’s coming. Mr. Hyde is coming!”

  “Malcolm, get back!” Melody slammed into me and threw me to the ground, just as Jekyll sprang into a crouching position on the desk with catlike grace. He bared his teeth and glanced briefly around the room, then sprang for the window. Glass shattered, and the alchemist was gone.