Xop smiled and perched back on Harris’s shoulder.
“How did that guy know you?” Harris said. “If you don’t mind me asking.”
“Eddie is a celebrity at the Site,” Marian said with a motherly, or rather daughterly, pride.
“Why?” Silvia asked.
“He slew a dragon back in ‘76.”
The jaws of all three new people dropped.
“A real dragon?” Patrick asked, seeming to immediately regret opening his mouth again.
“No, Killjoy, a metaphorical one. I overcame my crippling fear of ass-kissers.”
“Yes,” Marian said. “A real dragon. He doesn’t talk about it much, but our department conjured a dragon way back before even I was born. It broke through the bonding runes and wreaked havoc on the Site. It would have inflicted a lot more death and damage, but Eddie here figured out how to take it down.”
“Wow,” Harris said, imagining dragons. “You actually killed a dragon.”
“Yeah yeah. That was way back before you were even a twinkle in my eye.” Eddie held up his burned arm. “And this is all I got to show for it.” He smiled. “The current dragon, so to speak, I’d love to see slain is the monstrous fact that I have to wipe an average of seventeen times per morning constitutional. I’ve come up with an equation showing how age is directly proportional to the amount of times one has to wipe their ass. It’s—”
“Eddie.” Now Marian’s tone was a bit more motherly.
“How’d you do it?” Silvia asked.
“We really need to get you guys settled in,” Marian said. “You’ll have plenty of time to talk to Eddie later. Before long you’ll be begging me to get him to shut up, trust me.”
“Whatever. You love me.”
“I’m gonna hate to see you go. That’s for sure.”
“Later, Xop.” Eddie snapped his fingers and his cubicle began to fill with darkness again. “I’ll leave you guys with a thought-of-the-day. Don’t ever take yourself, or your job, too seriously.”
“Okay, Eddie.” Marian shot him a stern, but still playful look.
“Sorry. Just trying to Eddie-fy them a little.” Eddie grinned as the darkness enveloped him.
He began to snore.
“I’m sorry, Patrick,” Marian said as she led them to their workspace. “I should have told you about making a first impression with him. He will stick with that first impression forever. Lucky for you he’ll be retiring soon. I should have told you not to mention following Site rules right away. He really is a good guy, but he can be a grumpy-ass old man at times too.”
“That’s okay,” Patrick said in a voice that oozed with not being okay.
“I’ll make a few more quick introductions, then I need you guys to get to work on something.”
They stopped in front of another cubicle.
“This is Sarah Stormtamer. Sarah, the new people.”
“Hello,” Sarah said. “If you’re wondering about my last name, I come from a long line of Weather Makers, but my aptitude was for conjuring, much to my parents’ chagrin. I can still conjure, so to speak, a little rain cloud or two if I need ‘em. When I was a kid I used to—”
“Sorry, Sarah, but we’ve got to get them working on something.” Marian moved the group along. “She’s a talker,” she whispered to them as they snuck away.
At the next cubicle over, they found a man in his late thirties peeking over the wall.
“This is Dan,” Marian said.
“You guys haven’t seen a green-headed duck around here, have you?” Dan’s eyes darted around the room.
“No.”
“Dan is afraid that a duck is somewhere out there watching him.” Marian made the statement as if it was an everyday, normal thing.
Harris had to suppress a smile.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Dan said to the small group. “You think I’m crazy and that I have some strange, made-up phobia. Well, I don’t.”
Harris didn’t know how to respond. No one else did, either.
“I conjured an extremely intelligent, devious, and wrathful duck from an alternate Earth, and now he’s out to get me. I can feel him out there . . . watching and scheming.”
“We’ll keep an eye out for you, Dan,” Marian said as they continued walking.
Marian turned to Harris. “You see? You’re not the only one who has done an unauthorized conjuration.” Her words made Harris feel a bit better.
At the next cubicle, Marian said, “This is Susan. Susan, the new people: Silvia, Patrick, and Harris.”
“Hello,” said Susan, a middle-aged, overweight woman. “Nice to meet you.”
“Nice to meet you, too,” Silvia said, followed by nods from Patrick and Harris.
“All right, then,” Marian said, moving on. “Let’s get you guys to work.”
“What’s up with Susan?” Harris asked in a whisper.
“Nothing,” Marian said. “She’s really nice.”
“No quirks or anything?”
“Nope.”
“Oh.” Harris felt stupid for asking.
“Now, here is the area where you will work, and like I said, I need you to get started on something.” She brought them to a larger cubicle with three chairs pulled up to a single table. A thin packet of paper was set out in front of each chair. “I need you to commit the runes in these packets to memory. It’s pretty basic stuff. I’m sure you’ll have no problem with them, but it’s also very important that you get them down perfectly. We’ll need them tomorrow for the project.”
“Marian,” Silvia said. “What exactly is the project?”
“That will all be explained tomorrow. For now, I really need you guys to work on these runes.”
After a long day of rune memorization, Harris drove back to his apartment in Woodinville, a suburb of Seattle. He asked Xop to stay completely still and carried him up the stairs as if he were a stuffed animal. Once inside, he fed the imp some cereal, which he devoured ravenously.
“My brain is kinda fried right now, buddy,” Harris said to Xop. “Would you mind if I tried to send you back tomorrow?”
“That’s okay.” He shrugged his cute little shoulders.
Harris was thankful that Xop was so easygoing. He couldn’t imagine being this unflustered if someone had conjured him to a strange new world.
Exhausted, Harris went straight to bed after a dinner of ramen noodles. As he lay in bed, he thought about magic, and the Site, the strange voice in his head, and the mysterious project. But most of all, he pictured Ana. Eventually, sleep overtook him. Xop slept, curled up like a cat, on Harris’s pillow.
The Conjuring
The office was abuzz with activity when Harris came in the next morning.
“Hey, we’re heading over to the Conjuring Dome,” Marian told him. “We have a pre-job briefing there at nine.”
Harris offered a ride to Silvia and Patrick, which they accepted.
As they piled in to Harris’s car, he noticed that the sun was now a deep blazing red, like the Eye of Sauron missing the vertical pupil. Its strange appearance heightened the anxiety Harris felt about whatever this project was going to be. Staring at the sun again, he banged his head on the roof of his car as he lowered himself into the driver’s seat.
On the way to the dome, Harris heard the mysterious voice again, which did nothing to alleviate his growing anxiety.
You’re so close. You’re doing the right thing.
“Uh. . . can you guys hear that?” Silvia said sheepishly.
“Yes.”
“Okay, good. I think. But isn’t that a little weird?”
“Everything out here is a little weird,” Patrick said.
“Yeah, that’s true.”
“I hope these people know what they’re doing,” Harris said.
&nbs
p; “Me, too.” Silvia didn’t seem confident.
The three of them followed the flow of people into the Conjuring Dome. Harris was glad to see several other people with conjured imps; he wanted nothing less than to stick out. The morning sun shone through the top of the retracted dome, glinting off of the polished white marble walls and forcing Harris to narrow his eyes. But as they made their way around the edge of the circle to a large sign that read Conjuring Department, the dome closed silently above them. Harris couldn’t tell if it was being closed with normal machinery or magic.
Red handrails separated the outer walkway from the smooth marble floor in the middle of the dome.
Harris gawked at the inside of the building. The top of the dome was a shiny gold and at least a hundred and fifty feet up. This building seemed slightly newer than the others on the Site.
When he was finally able to tear his eyes away from the grandeur of the dome, Harris noticed a large sign that read:
It Has Been
13,437
Days Since a Recordable Conjuring Death
There were also several propaganda-esque posters at regular intervals all around the walls of the circle.
One read:
Another read:
So they were conjuring another dragon? Harris felt his pulse pick up speed.
Another poster had a picture of a green-headed duck and read Do NOT Conjure Ducks from Alternate Earth 1.3 Unless Granted a Q-Authorization!
Other posters were less interesting and said things like, Loose Lips Sink Ships or Timecard Fraud is Serious Business. Harris tried his best to appear calm as he passed them.
Marian greeted them and handed them new packets of papers. “This is the pre-job briefing and work package. Bill is about to start. Just try to follow along.”
Bill Gulley stood, somewhat slouched, on a small stage next to where Harris stood. There were several microphones jutting up from a marble podium in front of him. “Excuse me, everyone,” he said, his voice resonating under the dome. “The pre-job is starting now.”
It took at least a minute for the din of conversation to die down, but eventually everyone looked to Bill, each one holding a packet of papers.
“Thank you. We are gathered here today on a monumental occasion. This will be the day children in the future will be taught that America solidified itself as the leader of the world.” He paused as if waiting for applause. None came. “Magic has brought us so much.” He paused, again. “I don’t have any examples written down, but we all know the potential of magic to increase our might and make our lives better. Today, magic will show our leaders in Washington DC the true worth of the Site.”
A small, mousy woman took the stage and cleared her throat. Bill looked to her and frowned. “Oh, yes. I have been asked to cede the stage to the Prophecy Department for a quick word. Per protocol I must give them their time, but I am sure they will make if brief, as there is much we need to discuss.”
The woman took Bill’s place at the microphone. “Thank you for that warm welcome.” Her voice matched her mousy appearance. “I am here to speak the prophecy that has been foretold of this very day and to leave you with a warning so that we at the Prophecy Department can absolve ourselves from any legal action and, like our motto states, we can legitimately say that we told you so.” She pulled a small note from her pocket. “The prophecy states, and I quote, ‘The first beast slain with perfect shot, the second beast shall verily not, once men tried to tempt cruel fate, to conjure up a power so great, when they don’t learn from their first blunder, the world could soon be torn asunder.’” She tucked the note back in her pocket. “Pretty straightforward, really. I mean, if that’s not clear I don’t know what is. Our warning is this: don’t do it. Ignore the prophecy at your peril. That’s all. Have a nice shift.” And with that she shuffled off the stage.
“Riveting stuff,” Bill said. “Thank you for that. I didn’t think it sounded all that bad, really. And we all know how reliable prophecies can be. So, anyway, let’s move on. We need this conjuration for our military. We’ve had years and years of preparations to ensure everything will run smooth. We have learned from the mistakes of the past and will use that knowledge to make better mistakes in the future. Er. . . to avoid those mistakes altogether.”
Everything will be fine.
“Exactly. Everything will be fine, guys.”
Harris had heard the same voice Bill must have heard. This time it seemed to saturate his body. Its persuasive force was nigh irresistible. He scanned the room, but no one gave any outward sign that anything was amiss. Only Silvia appeared to feel the same dread that permeated Harris.
“So,” Bill continued, “I’d love to get right to it, but we have a procedure in place to avoid those mistakes of the past. First, we will follow the work package to the letter, no exceptions. Second, we will have all conjuring, bonding, and protective runes inspected by a certified rune inspector after you’ve drawn them. Third, everyone will be given the appropriate PPE before we begin. This includes a hard hat, safety glasses, and an amulet of protection.”
Several people dispersed through the crowd handing out the PPE.
“Fourth, we have a group of Casters here to perform their spells if needed. But they won’t be needed.”
Harris looked around the giant circle for Ana, but couldn’t find her.
“Fifth, we have the fire department here for any emergencies that won’t happen.”
Now Harris scanned the room for Jake. He saw Jake’s big head sticking up above the crowd across the circle.
“So, if you’ll open to the first page, we’ll begin.”
Harris opened his work package and perused the first page:
Mission: Invoking/Summoning Tremendous Assets Key to Empowerment*
*Both Invoking and Summoning are used here due to the landmark Johnson Agreement in 1987. Before then, a disagreement between Invokers and Summoners plunged the project into a years-long battle over Project naming rights. In year four of the legal battle, Gus Johnson was able to arbitrate a tentative agreement between the two by suggesting the use of “Invoking/Summoning” in the mission title language. In 1991 the Invokers and Summoners were combined under one group called Conjurers in hopes to reduce bickering, but the mission name was already in place. A committee has been assembled to determine if the bickering has, in fact, been reduced.
Funding for this mission is provided by the Site via the Dragon Upgrade Mission Budget, and appropriated by the Invoking/Summoning Committee.
Showing this work package to any unauthorized person will result in the immediate release of The Curse.
Harris tried to find Ana again as Bill droned on through the speakers. For the upwards of an hour that the pre-job went on, Harris kept an eye out for Ana. He could tell that Silvia was looking for her as well.
“Okay, everybody, this is it!” Bill’s voice crackled with excitement. “As you get into your places and begin your work steps, I’d like to introduce our Secret Name Keeper. His job has been very difficult. He has kept the true name of the dragon in his mind for all of these years. He has withstood the attempts of hostile governments to find out what it is. He has remained strong, securing this secret name alone. When all our runes are in place, he will speak the name and bring the dragon into our world.”
A fat man with thick-rimmed glasses approached the podium. “Hello.” He drew out the end of the word in an exuberant flourish. Then, in an over-the-top dramatic voice, he said, “My name. . . is Ian Dumed. . . and this is the moment we have all been waiting for. Form your runes with elegance and grace. Stand strong before and after the conjuring. Together, we can do this. We. . . can. . .make. . . history!”
Marian pulled Harris to where he needed to stand and asked him to start forming his runes. Harris complied, heart racing. He took a deep breath and focused, needing to have every movement exact. The runes
were easy enough, but he had to concentrate to keep his hand from shaking.
A man with Certified Rune Inspector on his lab coat came by and looked at Harris’s work. He made a mark on his clipboard and moved on to Silvia, who was working next to Harris.
Ian stepped off the stage, holding a wireless microphone, and sashayed down to the floor through a small opening in the handrails.
Harris’s pits and palms were wet. He watched Ian speaking on the floor, but couldn’t hear what he was saying. The microphone must not have been on. Harris rechecked the runes glowing in front of him for flaws. To his relief, they were perfect.
An ear-splitting crack reverberated through the dome. Harris cringed as a massive beast appeared in the center of the marble floor.
It didn’t look like a dragon at first. Its immense red wings were wrapped around its body, almost completely covering it.
Ian switched on the microphone from his place in front of the beast.
“Ladies and gentleman,” he said. “We have just conjured”— he stopped for a dramatic pause— “a dragon!”
The beast’s wings began to unfold. A giant, red-scaled head started to rise. It must have stood about thirty feet tall.
“It comes from the much-feared realm of Titan,” Ian continued. “Its name, which I and only I have known up until this very moment, is—”
The dragon’s head moved preternaturally fast. In one smooth motion it reached its face down and chomped Ian out of existence. It chewed a few times, lifted its head, and shook it as the man was swallowed down.
“Zoth-Avarex!” The dragon’s booming voice filled the dome like a thunderclap. It was partly the rich tone of a human voice, and partly the growl of a grizzly bear. It was, in fact, the same voice Harris had been hearing in his head, only now it punished his eardrums.
Harris stood, completely frozen with fear.
The dragon lifted a claw to its gaping maw and pulled something out.
The Conjuring of Zoth-Avarex: The Self-Proclaimed Greatest Dragon in the Multiverse Page 4
