The Villain Keeper

by Laurie McKay

  As he stepped behind the cafeteria, he felt his steps lighten. There, nosing in the Dumpster and crunching on apple cores, was Sir Horace. His mane was brighter than the falling snow. The hair on his bare back was a shade darker and looked recently groomed. Tito and Brynne were huddled nearby, taking what shelter they could by the building’s wall. Tito was layered in dark clothing. The sparring broom was strapped to his back with a belt. His backpack was swung over his shoulder and stuffed so full that the zippers pulled.

  Brynne was still dressed in her fuzzy white sweater and gray coat. She also wore sleek black gloves and a black knit cap. She’d brought only herself, but she was her best weapon.

  While Sir Horace nuzzled Caden’s ear, Caden shared his information. “She’s near the river.” He showed them his crude notepaper map. He pointed out the stick figure ice dragons while the gaping hole from the blood dagger collected snowflakes.

  Tito opened his pack. Inside it, Caden saw matches, twine, first aid supplies, a spare blanket, and a flashlight. From the bottom, Tito pulled out a detailed map. “This one’s official.”

  They held Tito’s official map and Caden’s bleeding, gaping sketch of a map side by side against the building’s wall. It was easy to match landmarks, fit together bends in the river. Caden reached into his other pocket and pulled out his compass. Within minutes, they plotted a route to Jane.

  Normally, Caden would have swung his leg up and pulled onto Sir Horace’s back. Tito, however, looked nervous, and Sir Horace might buck Brynne off if she tried to mount. Caden patted Sir Horace twice and commanded him to kneel. “He can carry us all,” Caden said.

  “Well, yeah, he’s the size of an elephant.”

  In obvious contempt, Sir Horace snorted. His billowing breath was like smoke. He looked like he breathed fire.

  Tito glanced at Caden. “Right, no offense.”

  “It is to Sir Horace you owe the apology,” Caden said.

  Tito looked down and folded the maps so he would have easy access to them on the ride. “You do need therapy,” he mumbled.

  The snow was beginning to fall thicker and faster. Caden felt icy flakes stick to his eyelashes; he felt his hands numbing. “We must hurry.” He motioned for them to get on Sir Horace’s back. “Hold tightly,” he said, and gave Sir Horace a swift kick.

  Caden sat in front where he could direct Sir Horace. Tito, due to his lack of riding experience and his navigational duties, sat in the middle. Brynne rode in the back to protect them.

  Sir Horace sprinted toward the River District. He tore down the mountain like he was a flake in the blizzard—a Galvanian snow stallion riding the winds. They had until moonrise. With Sir Horace’s power, they’d make it.

  They sped to the river, followed it, slowing twice to cross icy overpasses, and once to trot down a slick sidewalk. When his hooves hit unpaved earth again, Sir Horace ran flat out.

  “Just a little farther!” Tito said as they passed the city limits. He pointed toward the river bend. “There! That’s where she is. She’s got to be there.”

  Visibility was poor, but Caden made out a square metal structure in the distance. He directed Sir Horace toward it, still following what he thought was the river, but when the structure was no more than ten bounds away, Sir Horace planted his hooves into the snow and stopped.

  Caden held on, his numb hands tangled in Sir Horace’s mane. He felt Tito crush into him, and Brynne crush into them both. Sir Horace put his head down, his nose out, and his ears back. He looked from left to right and pawed at the snow.

  “The dragons,” Brynne said from behind him.

  Caden glanced in each direction, but the snow blinded him. He wished to fight dragons, but not in conditions as these, and not with his underprepared friends at his back. Best they sprint for the structure. He gave Sir Horace the charge signal, but Sir Horace inched backward and loosed a mighty whinny.

  From the left, Caden heard an ice dragon’s wail. From the right came an answering one. The metal structure was close but was fading in and out of view in the snowstorm.

  Only Sir Horace sensed the first attack. He went from a snow sculpture to a blur of speed, charging forward as the dragons attacked from each flank. Sir Horace moved so fast, turned so quickly, that the dragons crashed into each other.

  Caden strained to keep astride. Brynne and Tito flew off in opposite directions. Once Sir Horace stopped, Caden could feel him breathing short fast breaths; he could feel the tightness in his steed’s back.

  Caden eased off and his boots sank into the snow. He needed to find the others, but he saw neither of them. Beside him, Sir Horace sniffed to the right, and Caden peered in that direction. Within the white wall of snow, something large moved. If not for the motion, it would have been invisible.

  Tito stumbled from the snow. His broom was in hand. He stopped at Caden’s side. “What’s that?”

  Then Caden realized two things. One, he’d brought no weapon, not even that poorly weighted sparring mop. Two, Brynne’s silence might truly mean she was smarter than him and Tito. From the impenetrable white, the moving form shifted toward them. From the mountain road, car lights passed over the form and an ice dragon’s blue eyes blazed.

  “It’s an ice dragon.” Caden readied to dodge. “And it sees us.”

  Tito grappled in his pack and pulled out the matches. With trembling hands, he lit a match. It went out. He tried again. “Fire melts ice. They don’t like it, right?”

  Tito was quite smart. “No, they don’t,” Caden said, keeping very still. “Light the broom quickly.”

  The ice dragon moved closer, or at least its eyes did. The rest of it was a white haze, but Caden knew that its body stalked forward with its gaze. Tito was shielding his match with the broom bristles. It lit. Tito thrust it into the heart of the broom head and pointed the bristly end at the dragon.

  “So how do we slay these things?”

  Dragons were slain with swords forged by the great steelworkers and smiths of Razzon. A sword such as the one Officer Levine was currently keeping safe for him. As all they had was a smoking broom, that seemed an important discussion better suited for another time. If the broom started blazing, perhaps they’d have a chance. The dragon closed its eyes and disappeared into the snow. Then out of the white, the dragon charged.

  It stampeded between them like thunder made whole. Caden scrambled left. He felt a rush of wind, felt his hair blow with the force. The dragon skidded, turned, and raised its snout. Caden stepped back, slowly, carefully.

  No longer could he see Tito, but Caden heard him curse and he saw him wave his broom. It smoldered now, a spot of red embers waving in the storm. Even aflame, though, it would not penetrate dragon hide.

  Whether the dragon saw the broom or smelled the smoke, Caden didn’t know, but it angled toward it and prowled low, its frozen breath turning the hard snow to sudden ice. Its eyes and snout were the only weak points a broom—even one on fire—might pierce. “You must aim for its eyes!” Caden yelled.

  The ice dragon cocked its head in Caden’s direction. Again headlights from the road passed across the hill. The dragon blinked its ice blue eyes and turned back. It seemed Tito was its prey of choice.

  From behind Caden, Brynne emerged and touched his arm. He hadn’t noticed her approach, but that was typical. She held her hat in her hand. Her cheek was bruised and her coat torn. Her hair was white with frost. She watched the right with what he imagined was the same careful and frightened gaze he cast to the left and to the ice dragon stalking Tito.

  “Twin dragons,” she whispered. “One a by-product of the magic that trapped Jane Chan, one a by-product of the magic that still holds her. Dark spells cast by dark souls.” She nodded to the dragon in Caden’s sight, the dragon that prowled toward the waving broom. “As this one hunts Tito, the other hunts us.”

  He shifted so he and Brynne were back to back. Their dragon-fighting weapons were few and the whitewashed world seemed to be dimming. Behind the darkening sky and t
he thick clouds, the new moon would rise, invisible and unstoppable. Jane Chan’s time was short.

  “We must get inside,” Caden said.

  The dragon to the right, the one Caden couldn’t see, roared. The dragon in his vision, the dragon to the left, answered with a yowl that felt as if it sliced the sky.

  The ice dragons might not think, feel, or talk like the Elderdragon Ms. Primrose, but they were not without instinct. On the mountainside, ankle-deep in building snow, Caden had no doubts they hunted him and his friends.

  “I can’t see them!” Brynne hissed.

  The leftward ice dragon blended into the blizzard, moving closer and closer to the red glow in the snow, going in and out of view. Sight was of little use in this battle. For a second, Caden closed his eyes.

  His hands were numb, as were his feet and his face. The wind howled, a high screeching that matched the pelting snow, and the ground rumbled with a pounding of feet. The rightward dragon attacked.

  Caden spun and pushed Brynne from its path. “Move!” he said. The ground was slick, and he slipped on a patch of hard snow. The dragon did not wait for him to regain his balance. It rammed him. He sailed backward into a snowdrift, his breath knocked from him.

  “Caden!” Brynne called.

  Mouth gaping, teeth sharp with ice, the dragon bounded after him. Caden had no chance to move; he was too far sunken into the snow. He pulled his numb fingers into a tight fist. He would die fighting.

  But ice dragons weren’t the only creatures that blended with snow and reveled in the blizzard. The ground thundered with hoofbeats. A mighty snort rang on the winds.

  Sir Horace rammed the ice dragon in midair. While it was true Sir Horace was smaller than an ice dragon, he was, as Tito said, big as an elephant—a snow-dwelling, brilliant, brave, dragon-hunting elephant. If an ice dragon could look surprised, the one trying to eat Caden and getting rammed by the eighth finest Galvanian snow stallion in the Greater Realm did. It tumbled out of sight, into the white, and loosed a terrible roar.

  Sir Horace stood over Caden, teeth bared, and stomped at the snow. The darkness was falling fast. Caden couldn’t see Tito, Brynne, or the dragons, but he saw a red glow dancing in the distance—Tito’s broom. Then, a few bounds from it, a second fire ignited. Brynne’s face was illuminated. She held her hat by one edge. The rest of it was alight.

  Caden struggled to his feet. There were larger, more sinister blurs moving in the twilight. The ice dragons were going toward the small fires. He yelled to Tito and Brynne to tell them where he was, to distract the dragons. “I’m here!”

  “Get to Jane!” That was Tito, his voice emanating from the direction of the dancing, fiery broom.

  Caden hesitated, his hand against Sir Horace’s warm coat. He was closest to the shed. With Sir Horace as his mount, and the others engaging the dragons, he could break for the structure. But could he leave his friends?

  In the snow, the two spots of fire dodged and dived. One went out, only to light once more.

  Caden’s father always said not to hesitate in times like these. During battle, trust one’s training, trust one’s men. Caden could do that. He would rescue Jane Chan and while he did, he’d trust Brynne and Tito to stay alive. He swung up onto Sir Horace’s back with one smooth movement. In seconds, they were at the shed.

  Caden ignored the roars and curses behind as they trotted around it. He ran his hand against the metal. It felt like ice, like a tomb of dark and cold.

  He found the metal door frozen shut and locked tight. He neither dismounted nor hesitated. He gave Sir Horace the command to go through it. Sir Horace kicked the door with the same force he’d rammed the dragon. The door fell into the building. Yellow light rushed out. Sir Horace and Caden galloped in.

  The inside was one large room, the floor covered with sand. Signs like those for the Ashevillian shops were stacked against the wall. Paints and brushes sat in the corner. Above, lanterns and animal carcasses hung from exposed metal beams. Heaters lit and warmed the room. Caden felt the cold snow blowing in from behind them, felt his face go prickly as feeling returned to it.

  Then he saw them. In the exact middle of the room stood Ms. Aggie, bundled up in a shawl and hat. Mr. Andre was bent over with a cane and staring at them. Ms. Jackson was nowhere to be seen, but she was already young and beautiful. She’d no need to drain a half elf.

  Mr. Andre brandished his cane. “Get out!” he wheezed.

  Sir Horace reared up and kicked at the ground. Snow and sand blew up. The lunch people lurched back and watched Sir Horace like he was a snow demon.

  As Caden and Sir Horace trotted into the room, he saw her. He saw Jane Chan. She was covered in sand like a sculpture. Her fine hair and delicate face were completely encased. Her eyes were closed. The only break in the sand and sign she lived were the tears that ran down her cheeks.

  The hot, dry room, the sand covering Jane Chan and the floor, the poor gutted animals hanging from above—all made sudden sense. This cursed structure was a second place where the ritual magic had been cast. The dead animals were the poor beasts snagged by the trap and now sacrificed. This sand was kindred to the sand he and Tito had deactivated on the mountain. The paint and signs a remnant of the structure’s Ashevillian purpose.

  Caden felt his anger heat to boil. He cantered toward Ms. Aggie and Mr. Andre. “This is dark magic,” he said.

  They stared at Caden and Sir Horace with twin expressions of horror and surprise, and hovered near Jane Chan like she was a trunk of elvish gold.

  “Move away from her,” Caden said with all the authority of his title and all the power of his anger.

  They shrank back, but before they’d moved an entire pace, the sand began to glow. It was not, however, the soft golden glow as when deactivated. Jane Chan, the floor, and the sand glowed a sickly red.

  The same sickly red color as the magic that had stranded Caden in Asheville.

  Ms. Aggie and Mr. Andre hobbled toward Jane and reached for her. “You’re too late,” Ms. Aggie said.

  The new moon had risen.

  Caden jumped down from Sir Horace. His boots kicked up glowing red sand and snow. Ms. Aggie and Mr. Andre were still old, Jane Chan still a sand statue, so he wasn’t too late. Besides, he knew something of this magic. He’d counteracted it at the trap. “Chase them away from her,” he told Sir Horace.

  Sir Horace put his head down and moved toward them. Ms. Aggie tried to shoo him away like some sort of insect. Sir Horace bared his teeth and nipped. Mr. Andre swung his cane in attack, but Sir Horace bit it in half.

  Caden ran to the doorway, dropped down, and filled his arms with snow. The room was warm and the snow would melt fast inside it. He dashed across the room and tossed it on sand-covered Jane Chan. She would be saved this night. She wouldn’t die like Chadwin. He ran out and repeated the process. He had to save her.

  On his third run for snow, he heard a terrible, inhuman screech from the dark mountainside. A huge flash of fire exploded in the storm, lit the sky, and went out. Caden felt his stomach flip, his jaw tighten. His friends still battled in the snow, and now the mountain was a wall of night. He had to hurry.

  By the fourth armful, the snow on Jane was melting, the sand beginning to fall away. She would not die alone and with tears on her cheeks like Chadwin. The glow from the sand began to change. From bloodred it turned to shining gold. The sand flaked off her body like petals on a wind. Her pale skin felt warm and she was breathing. Her dark hair fanned out around her shoulders. But she didn’t wake.

  Satisfied she was at least alive, Caden dragged her to the relative safety of the far corner.

  Sir Horace had Ms. Aggie and Mr. Andre cowering in the back. “She’ll get you,” Mr. Andre said, but Caden did not fear little old lunch people.

  “Keep them there,” Caden told Sir Horace. Sir Horace put his ears back, bared his teeth, and neighed. Caden turned and ran out to the mountain, into the snow and darkness, into the battle.

  Two steps out t
he door, though, he stopped. Tito stood uphill with his broom. Brynne’s hat was draped on the charred bristles and it burned like a sun. One of the ice-dragons came into sight. It attacked with open mouth and ferocious speed.

  Caden yelled to Tito and ran to help him, but the snow was thick. His boots sank deep with each step. His intended dash was slow and difficult. “It attacks!” he said.

  If Tito heard him, he showed no sign. He stood motionless. Caden scrambled up the slope, but the dragon was closer to Tito and faster than Caden. Just as its muzzle made contact, Tito jammed the flaming broom right between its teeth.

  Caden sank down almost knee-deep in the snow.

  The dragon swallowed the fire. It lit up from inside, and blew up like a fireball. The wail was earsplitting, the flash blinding. Then all went dark and quiet. He didn’t see Tito anywhere.

  Caden feared for Tito’s life. He sprinted uphill as best he could and called out in alarm. “Sir Tito! Sir Tito!”

  The mountain was black and slick. Caden could hear coughing. He tracked Tito’s voice and found him moments later, lying in the snow. “Are you well, friend?” he said, and patted Tito’s arms. Tito still had two, so that was something.

  “Yeah,” Tito said.

  He seemed dazed, but he recovered quickly and pushed Caden’s helpful royal hands away. “Get off me.”

  As Caden’s panic for his friend dimmed, something occurred to him. While he’d been threatening the elderly, Sir Tito, the Elite Paladin in training of Asheville, had slain a dragon.

  Caden heard Tito rummaging in his backpack. A second later, the bright light of Tito’s flashlight shone in Caden’s face.

  “Extinguish the light,” Caden said. “The other dragon—”

  “Your girl set her coat on fire and took out the other one with her bare hands. She’s crazy, bro.”

  It was horrible. It was unfair. It couldn’t be. Caden grabbed Tito’s flashlight and shone it on him as he struggled to his feet. “Each of you has slain a dragon?”