by J. R. Rain
I sat up on my knees, all too aware that the ceiling itself was just a few feet away. Already, I was feeling the panic settling in. This place... was just too much, even for a vampire. Especially for a vampire.
The babe was a foot or so away from me. The soft blue edges of the light nearly reached me. Correction, some of the azure wisps floated around my shoulder, and as they did... as they did... I felt the sleepiness takes over. I also heard the warning bell, buzzing louder and louder. But I ignored the buzzing, the stupid, incessant buzzing. Why wouldn’t Mom just let me sleep in this one time? Stupid alarm, stupid mom, stupid school.
I forced open my eyes, but a literal weight pushed them down again. A heavy, relaxing, beautiful weight, peaceful weight...
Yes, sleeping now felt so right, so perfect, even while my friend was fighting for her life, and while a mother waited anxiously in the tunnel beyond for any news about her kidnapped baby. Yes, a nap—a long, dark, blissful nap—wouldn’t hurt anyone, right?
SAM!! WAKE UP!!
Allie, shhh, it’s quiet time...
It’s the sleeping spell, Sam!! WAKE UP!!
Allie, please, you’ll wake the baby.
Move back, Sam!! Move back NOW!!!
Will it make me more comfortable if I move back a few inches, Allie? I sure am tired. It’s been a long day...
Sure, Sam. Whatever. Move back a few inches and then you can sleep for as long as you want.
Okay, Allie. You sure are a swell friend. Needy, but still a swell friend.
I moved back an inch or two and was preparing to sleep, perhaps forever, when my eyes popped open. I looked around, confused, wondering where the hell I was, until I saw the babe, the blue light, and the rock cage around me.
I gasped and inched back some more, hitting my head on the rock wall behind me. The pain helped to further jar me awake, and snap me back to my senses.
Welcome back, Sam, came Allison’s voice in my head. Now, please hurry. The dragon has figured out all our tricks and is advancing.
Before me, the sweet little girl, no older than a year or so, slept with an angelic expression on her face, as she would do for, perhaps, forever, unless I figured something out. What if I leaped in with guns blazing, so to speak, grabbed the girl, and teleported back before I fell asleep? Maybe, but I suspected that much exposure to the spell would instantly conk me out.
An explosion rocked the tiny cell and I heard a distant scream in my head, followed by a god-awful roar.
Think, Sam. Think.
I considered my very limited options. There was nothing in the cell to use in order to reach out to the baby, something that could be used as, say, a buffer between me and the blue light. A shepherd’s staff would have been awesome right about now.
And then I had it, and nearly squealed. I immediately took off my tee-shirt and one of my shoes. It didn’t take me long at all to tie one of the laces of my Asics to the cuff of my long-sleeved shirt.
All too aware that I was sporting only a sports bra in a magical dungeon far beneath a castle in a fantasy land created in the mind of my client, I positioned myself as close to the sleeping babe as I could without contacting the amorphous blue light.
“Here goes nothing,” I said, and tossed the shoe out and over the floating bundle. I was prepared to leap forward should, say, the babe fall like a rock, knocked out of its hovering orbit. But she didn’t fall, and the shoe passed over the sleeping girl, through the blue light, to dangle near the floor. She remained floating, and I now had a “safety line” around her, and, most important, I wasn’t feeling the very real need to take the mother of all cat naps.
Admittedly, I’d been worried that the magic spell, as evidenced by the blue glow, would snake along my shirt and envelop me, too. But it didn’t. The light merely stayed a constant, nor did the babe stir. And so, I did the only thing I could think of: I dropped back to the floor and stomach-crawled, Navy SEAL-like, on my belly until my outstretched fingers could snag my other shoe, which I did after a few swipes. Once done, I retreated and soon I was back to where I’d started: off to one side of the sleeping princess, but this time I was holding one end of my long sleeve and my tied-off shoe. The rest of my contraption was lassoed safely around the babe.
Good enough, I thought.
Sam! Sir Rory is injured! Hurry!
I gave the tee-shirt lasso a tug, and the fabric tightened around the babe. And something else happened, too: the tiny sleeping figure shifted a little in the air. Like a kite altering course in mid-air. I gave the makeshift fishing net another tug, and the little girl drifted some more, this time toward me. Most important, she drifted out of the blue haze. I had been afraid the spell would follow her, but it didn’t. In fact, it was doing the opposite. The more the babe moved, the more the blue glow dissipated.
The princess was now drifting toward me, a tiny, tethered dirigible in the sky—
And that’s when she dropped like a rock.
Luckily, my reflexes are faster than any dropping rock, and both my hands shot out and caught her before she was even halfway to the floor.
Most important, the glowing blue sleeping spell was gone. I knew this because the sweetheart opened her eyes, took one look at me, and screamed bloody murder.
Despite her wailing, I grinned and summoned the single flame.
Chapter Thirty-five
Queen Autumn screamed when I appeared, and screamed again when I handed over her wailing baby.
Next, I dashed out of the freshly blasted tunnel, splashed through puddles of what had once been solid rock, and emerged into the main tunnel system, where I saw something that would have and should have turned my bowels into water. But it didn’t. Not here, and not now.
A wingless, massive, scaled dragon, with claws the size of a Mini Cooper, was presently hovering over my witchy friend who, herself, was hovering over the fallen knight, who was bleeding profusely from a terrible head wound.
So much blood...
Allie held the knight with one arm, while her other arm was raised above her. She had created what appeared to be a very feeble, nearly invisible shield. Meanwhile, the dragon alternately blasted it with jets of fire and raked at it with claws long enough to disembowel an elephant.
Without breaking stride, I summoned the flame again—and this time, saw Talos within it. He seemed eager to come, if that was possible.
And now I was suddenly much bigger than I was before, and the roar that erupted from my mouth was deafening even to my own ears. The wingless serpent snapped its great triangular head up—and if a dragon could look startled, I was seeing it now. It took a step and cocked its head, no doubt surprised as hell at seeing me now. As I advanced, it continued stepping back.
My presence also got Allie’s attention, and now she dropped both hands around the fallen knight, summarily losing her feeble shield. She didn’t need her shield. She had me now, and, as the dragon continued retreating, I stepped carefully over my brave friend and the fallen knight.
I knew from experience that summoning fire took a little time. It wasn’t just something a dragon had, literally, at the tip of his tongue. It had to be generated from down deep, within a special furnace in his lungs. And I felt it generating now, building, building...
Hurry Talos.
Almost ready, Sam, I heard him say in my mind.
Meanwhile, the creature before me stopped its retreat altogether, reared back, and shot a super-heated jet of molten death at me. I did all I could do, and ducked behind Talos’s massive wings. I knew instinctively that his wings could only survive so many such attacks. Indeed, the burn I felt was excruciating, and I found myself apologizing profusely to the creature who’d lent me his body. And just when the dragon before us reared back to fire a second blast, an attack that might just burn Talos’s precious wings to a crisp, I heard the words I was waiting to hear:
Ready, Sam.
Breathing fire always felt a bit, well, orgasmic. And I was sure this was the case even now, except th
is time I didn’t notice. What I did notice was the welling of energy in my chest. What I did notice was that something magical—something alchemical—was happening inside of me. Air was turning to fire, much as the rock had turned to water.
The four elementals, I thought briefly.
Yes, Sam, I heard Talos say, and then I wasn’t listening to anyone or anything else, for now, something great was burning for release. And release I did, opening my mouth wide and thrusting my head forward: a great explosion of fire erupted out of me, searing Talos’s throat and mouth and tongue and lips. I knew that after each burst of fire, the big fellow had to recuperate and heal. Breathing fire wasn’t something he did every day—only when needed. And these days, it was mostly needed by me.
Luckily, my flying friend could also heal rather quickly. Maybe I had that effect on him. I didn’t know.
But for now, fire shot forth down the underground tunnel, roiling and twisting and lapping. The wingless dragon let loose with a blast of its own, but, I suspected, its own fire had mostly been spent, if that was possible.
It’s possible, Sam, came Talos’s thoughts.
Which was a good thing in this case, too, for Talos’s own blast overcame the dungeon dragon’s effort, and soon the fire—fire that was still erupting from my now-burning lips—encompassed the creature completely.
As its own flame sputtered out, the creature twisted its now-glowing head this way and that. It clawed the air, screeching. The ungodly, hideous, ear-piercing screech wasn’t of this earth. Literally. Most important, it retreated. And by retreating, it did something that seemed to defy physics: it turned in place, contorting its fluid, apparently boneless body. My last image was of its still-smoking tail as it dashed away.
Did I just have an honest-to-god dragon fight? I asked.
You did, Sam.
With the dragon gone, I thanked Talos and returned to my human form—and was as naked as the day I was born. I saw the queen running toward us. She had missed the show, I think, which was probably for the best. What couldn’t be missed was that I was now butt-naked. Luckily, the injured Rory occupied most of her attention.
Once we were together again, I took hold of the baby’s little hand in my own and placed another on Rory’s bent back. I told the others to grab one of my shoulders. The queen did, looking confused as hell. I didn’t blame her one bit.
Especially when we all reappeared in the forgotten little room with the magical wardrobe.
***
Sir Rory had met the business end of one of the dragon’s claws.
Allie had used a bit of her magic to cauterize the wound enough to keep it from bleeding out. But there was more going on here than just the open wound and resulting internal damage. The skin had turned a bit green and looked, if anything, rotten. Although the bleeding had stopped, the poison seemed to be spreading. Myself, I was covered in a sheet that now formed a shawl. I was going to miss those Asics.
With Sir Rory still propped in Allison’s lap—and her own clothing covered in blood and the queen nearby clutching her baby—I found the closest sentry and compelled him to fetch the closest healer, a number of whom, according to the queen, resided in the castle.
A short time later, I led the portly man back into the queen’s private chamber. Once there, the man’s eyes nearly bugged out of his head when he spotted the kidnapped princess returned once again to his mother. He nearly asked about the babe, until he saw the realm’s greatest knight lying injured in Allison’s arms.
The physician magician asked for a pillow, which I fetched, and soon the big knight was lying on the stone floor, just a few feet in front of the wardrobe. The healer asked for some space, and we all gave it to him, including the queen. I next watched a series of potions being produced from the folds of the man’s robe. Many of them bubbled and steamed. He mixed a number of them together into a smaller vial, stopped it with a cork, shook the hell out of it, then uncorked it and poured the contents over the knight’s wounded head. Steam hissed. Green steam, and Sir Rory spasmed and roared, and then fell silent.
Later, the physician came to us and took the queen aside. I saw him look at us as he spoke, and she shook her head sternly and he nodded. After that, a number of solemn knights appeared and took their fallen leader away, off to the castle infirmary. Word was, the big guy would probably make it, although the poison might have lasting effects. Rory, I suspected, was tough enough and big enough—and in love enough with the queen—to power through and still be damned near the greatest knight the realm had ever seen. Earlier, there had been a brief, quiet moment when the physician had stepped out to fetch the knights, when the queen found herself mostly alone with Sir Rory. Mostly, because Allie and I were standing off to the side. The queen had leaned over him and patted his great chest and kissed him softly on the cheek. The knight had smiled.
Now, we were alone with the queen and her babe, which she had, up to this point, refused to let go of. I didn’t blame her. In her world, the babe had been gone for two weeks. Far, far too long. How she hadn’t gone insane with worry, I didn’t know.
“I am forever grateful to the two of you,” said the queen, although she didn’t take her eyes off the cooing babe, which was now wide-eyed and eager. She should be; after all, she had taken a helluva long nap.
I nearly said: All in a day’s work for dark angels, Your Highness. That is, until I heard how lame it sounded in my own head.
Allie said, “All in a day’s work for dark angels, Your Highness.”
Well, I think it sounds cute. She smirked.
Oh, brother.
“Dark angels, indeed.” She looked at Allie. “I saw what you did in the tunnel. And I saw how you protected Rory. And you.” She turned to me. “You disappeared before my eyes, and reappeared holding my baby, wrapped in your shirt and, oddly, your shoe.”
I said, “Long story.”
“You needed to stay clear of the sleeping spell,” said the queen. “And use both articles of clothing as a noose.”
“Maybe not so long, after all.”
“Very ingenious, Lady Tam Tam.” She kept her eyes on me. “When I emerged out of the tunnel, I next watched something incredible.”
I waited, wondering if I should remove this memory from her mind, but decided to let it play out a little further. She said, “I watched a woman turn into a winged dragon.”
“Any chance you imagined that?” I asked.
She smiled at me warmly, which was odd. Surely, she should have been alarmed, or terrified. Then again, she did live in a magical realm, complete with dungeon dragons, wizards, ice trolls, you name it! I could only imagine the other wonders that awaited beyond the castle walls... and in Charlie’s extensive notes.
“No, Lady Tam Tam. I saw it with mine own eyes.”
I said, “We did what we had to do to save your daughter.”
She kept her gaze on me. “Will I see you again?”
“Mayhap you will,” I said.
“We’re just a prayer away,” piped in Allie.
Geez, Allie. Could you sound any lamer?
Sorry. I couldn’t help myself. But she didn’t sound sorry, even in my head. I didn’t have to be telepathic to know she liked being considered a dark angel. And that we had been grouped together as a sort of team.
Admit it, you like it too.
No, I don’t.
You could even say we’re Charlie’s Dark Angels.
Good God, I thought. You went there.
I did. And I will do it again.
The queen looked at both of us, a small smile on her face, seemingly aware of our telepathic tit-for-tat. She adjusted her hold on her mewling babe, whose little hands were reaching up through the fabric to play with the queen’s curly locks. I next did the only thing I could think of: I bowed.
Now who looks lame, thought a giggling Allison, as she bowed along with me.
Oh, shut up.
The queen hugged both of us with her free hand and didn’t try to stop the
tears from flowing. I gave the little booger in her arms a kiss as well, and then led the way into the wardrobe.
Once there, Allie took my hand, and, together, we stepped back through the wardrobe.
Chapter Thirty-six
Allie stumbled into me, and I stumbled into her.
“Is that how it feels when you teleport?” she asked, holding me.
“A bit,” I said. “Except I usually don’t have a big fat foot standing on mine.”
“Oops, sorry.”
“Welcome back you two,” said Charlie Reed, coming from around his desk, an exuberant look in his wild eyes.
I didn’t have to read his mind to know what the man had been up to. “Let me guess: your writer’s block is gone?”
“Gone, obliterated, and replaced with even more wild ideas. I can’t stop them. All thanks to you.”
“Er, how long have we been gone?” asked Allie.
“A couple hours. Maybe more. Speaking of which, how did it go in there?”
“I think you know how it went in there,” I said. “You’ve been writing ever since.”
“Yes. The moment you two disappeared. And I mean exactly that: you two literally disappeared in a blink.”
“And what happened while we were gone?” I pressed.
“The ideas flowed. And flowed and flowed. It was all I could do to keep up with them.”
“And what did you write about?”
“Of the appearance of two dark angels who rescue the kidnapped princess.”
“And did one of these dark angels turn into a dragon?” pressed Allie.
“And did Sir Rory suffer a near-fatal injury?” I added.
He looked at, then ran his fingers through his hair and stared at us. He looked, I suspected, a bit like Dr. Lichtenstein had looked when he had created his first successful monsters. “Why, yes. Is that... is that what happened in... there?” He pointed toward the hallway we had just stepped out of. Or stumbled out of.
