Trampolining with Dragons

by S. W. Clarke

  After Ariadne had left, Percy and I walked down a path side by side in Central Park. His tail swung back and forth in that contented way. “So,” he began.

  “Oh boy.”

  “What? I didn’t even say anything.”

  “It was the tone with which you said it.”

  He looked over at me. “Tone?”

  “You sounded smug.”

  “Now that I’ve saved the world,” he went on smugly, “the way I see it, you’ve got two choices.”

  “Uh-huh. And they are?”

  “One, we go to a trampolining park together. And if we go, you must trampoline.”

  I made a face. Back in the circus, I’d never been fond of trampolines. It wasn’t for any good reason; the truth was, I hated being barefoot. I’d always found my toes ugly. “And the other option?”

  He smirked over at me, nose ring glinting. “You tell me where I got my name from.”

  I sighed long and deep. Now he really had me in a bind. “All right, Perce. I’ll tell you.”

  “You hate trampolining that much?”

  I shrugged. “What can I say? I don’t like the feel of that mesh under my bare feetsies.”

  “Fine by me.”

  “Well, here’s how it happened,” I began. And then my phone rang. I flashed Percy an apologetic grin and pulled it out of my jacket pocket, glancing at the screen before I answered. “Ferris, don’t give me trouble.”

  He chuckled. “When don’t I?”

  “True. So what’s on the docket today?”

  In the background, I heard a familiar shriek followed by a gnome talking in a soothing voice. One of Yaroz’s brood was obviously hangry. “I’ve got an idea for your show. But you aren’t going to like it.”

  “Way to sell it, Ferris.”

  “So picture this: not just Tara and her Dragon, but Tara and her Dragons. A once-in-a-lifetime show. Five half-grown dragons performing together.”

  My eyebrow arched. “And you got Yaroz to agree to this?”

  “On one condition.”

  “And that is?”

  “The show has to be in Italy.”

  I instantly understood. “Near Mt. Vesuvius, right?”

  “Bingo.”

  I paused. “Now this wouldn’t happen to be some sort of attempt to reclaim their territory, would it? Because Yaroz is a bit of a …”

  “Yes and no,” Ferris said. “She’s a cunning killer and always will be. But after Percy imprinted on you, something changed in her. She’s willing to accept the world she lives in. A world without the gods.”

  Ferris would know. Since defeating Lust, he and the other gnomes had gone to work with Yaroz and her brood. Not as stablehands, but as partners in fighting Other trafficking. After rescuing the gnomelings, the gnomes had chosen to protect vulnerable Others around the world.

  And Yaroz? Maybe she really had devoted her life to peace.

  “It’s not just that,” I said. “Tell me the real reason.”

  He sighed. “You need to trust people more, Tara.”

  “I do trust you, Ferris wheel. I trust that you’ve always got a deeper, more altruistic reason under that gruff manager’s facade.”

  “Fine.” He huffed. “We’ve gotten intel about a group of brownies being trafficked in Italy.”

  “And you want to use Percy and me as cover.”

  “That’s the long and short of it.”

  Percy, with his extra-sensory hearing, just nodded at me as we walked. He’d agreed to it that quickly.

  I smiled at him. My dragon was noble, nose ring and all. “We’ll do it.” When I hung up the phone a few minutes later, I elbowed Percy. “Looks like we’re going to the land of love, Perce. I told you I’d show you the world.”

  He eyed me. “Don’t think you’re getting out of your promise.”

  “What promise?”

  He groaned. “You said you’d tell me where I got my name from!”

  I chuckled. “You know, Perce, today’s your lucky day.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Because I’ve decided to give you everything you wish for.”

  He stopped. “All the mutton I can eat?”

  I stopped with him. “Well, that’ll take some time, but I’m giving you everything you’ve asked for today.”

  “You’re going to tell me about my name and go trampolining?”

  “Yep.” I came around, climbed onto his back. “You know where this abomination of a playplace is?”

  His wings spread. “Sure do.”

  When we’d taken off from Central Park and swung around over the treetops, headed toward the outskirts of the city, I leaned close to his ear. I closed my eyes, seeing the pizza parlor again. Seeing the stars in the nighttime, and feeling the egg in my hands.

  I’d been fifteen and terrified. I had no idea what beauty awaited me.

  “It all began in Amarillo, Texas,” I whispered. “In a place called 900 Degrees …”

  ***

  *********

  ***

  11 YEARS LATER …

  I leveraged myself to the edge of the air vent, staring through a slatted screen into a polished, low-light hallway. Empty. I leaned my mouth toward my shoulder, whispered, “I’m in, Perce.”

  “I should be in there with you,” his baritone voice said into my ear.

  “And what, crawl through these vents behind me? You’re a dragon—you’re meant to fly.”

  “And you’re a human made of soft, squishy parts.”

  “Percy, don’t talk about my soft squishy parts.”

  A noise of disgust came through the earbud. “Gross. I don’t mean the parts that Erik likes to touch.”

  I smirked, reached into my belt for my multitool. When I’d found the right one, I set it to the edge of the screen and ignited the tiny soldering flame. This was going to take forever. One of many reasons I preferred dragon fire.

  When I’d cut through the top two screws, I slipped my gloved fingers through the slats, lowered the screen enough to poke my head out and angle it left and right.

  A long, empty hallway of polished marble. Silent and safe. That was a deception, of course; in this place, nothing was empty. Nothing was safe.

  I swapped the multitool to the UV flashlight. When I cast the beam out into the semi-dark hallway, I shone it over the floor and walls and everything in between. No prints, no marks. Nothing.

  “I’m moving into Hallway D,” I whispered, lowering the screen until it rested against the wall.

  “You’re supposed to be in Hallway C by now.”

  “Yeah, well tell that to my multitool.” I shimmied my way to the end of the vent, gripped the edges. In one motion, I dropped head-first, tucking my face and landing in a forward roll in the hallway.

  When I came up to a crouch, fingers tented, I waited. I’d only lived this long by learning patience, by tamping down my impulsiveness again and again.

  Erik couldn’t even joke about the irony of real my name anymore.

  Behind me, a barred window cast a square of soft moonlight onto the floor. Outside, what used to be Indianapolis spread flat and desolate away from the shrine.

  Now, I was the only human within a hundred miles.

  Somewhere, distantly, I heard a soft repetition of noise. It sounded like someone sweeping the floor with a broom, and I listened with half-closed eyes. If Percy were in here, he would have known exactly what it was.

  But Percy would never have fit in this hallway.

  The sweeping noise didn’t come closer or move farther away. It sounded mechanical, and it was coming from a hallway far up and to the left.

  Hallway C. Where I needed to go.

  “Are there any other routes besides Hallway C?” I whispered.

  “None.”

  I cursed. Hallway C it was, then.

  “What?” Percy said.

  “Nothing, Perce.” I rose, moving to the wall. I took soft, slow steps along it, both hands seated on the grips of my whips, rea
dy for action. Around me, the shrine smelled of jasmine and citrus, the walls and floors sparkling with polish and care.

  If I wasn’t careful, I’d never see the outside again.

  When Percy and I had flown in, the shrine had risen from the earth before us like a place of legend, ancient spires spearing the sky. It was one of the largest buildings I’d ever seen, all soft marble angles and a set of doors so large ten ogres could have passed shoulder-to-shoulder through them.

  “It’s beautiful,” Percy murmured, shifting his wings to bring us to a halt a mile away. “But there’s something …”

  “Creepy about it?” I offered.

  “Yeah. That’s the word.”

  The shrine looked holy. But all around, the land spoke of death. What had once been Indianapolis was now a long swath of barren earth, without even grass to speak of.

  Certainly no more corn.

  I crossed to the other side of the hallway as I neared the doorway to Hallway C. I pressed myself up against the wall as I reached it, lifting out my small mirror from my belt.

  As I angled it around the corner, I hissed out air.

  “OK, tell me what’s going on,” Percy said.

  “Lasers.” I replaced the mirror on my belt. “Lasers are what’s going on.”

  When I turned into the doorway, I set eyes on the source of the mechanical noise. It was a device set into the ceiling that shifted in a square on a railing, projecting at least ten lasers in a completely patternless way through the space.

  This was the third trap I’d had to deal with in this place. The first one had involved a log with nails that came swinging through the air on chains, and the second one had been twenty feet of floor-to-ceiling superglue. Pretty sure that second one was a pixie’s idea—what’s scarier to a creature with fragile wings then glue?

  “Tara …”

  “You know, Perce,” I said, tracking the lasers with my eyes, “I can’t decide if they were going for Indiana Jones or Resident Evil with this place.”

  “That’s what happens when you give ancient Others access to modern technology. You get some weird shit.”

  “Hey, don’t curse in front of your mom.” I was already securing my braid to my head in a tight bun. “But you’re right. It is some weird shit.”

  “You aren’t thinking about trying to get past the lasers, are you?”

  “I’m already past them.” As my eyes followed, I was starting to see a pattern. “In my head, at least. Just need to get the corporeal bits through.”

  Percy was saying something else, but I didn’t hear him. If I was going to avoid being diced, I couldn’t let myself hear him.

  All my focus went into one sense: my sight.

  The lasers shot out in a 3-2-4-5 pattern. Three beams, shift to the next section of railing, two beams. Shift to the next section of railing, four beams. Shift to the last section, five beams. Leave it to a bunch of cultish Others to set a laser trap.

  I cracked my neck. Time to be Tara Drake.

  I took two steps forward, eyes flicking to follow the lasers as they appeared in red, buzzing lines and disappeared a second later.

  I could do this. For Tara Drake, former carnie and dragon rider, this was child’s play.

  And right now, the world didn’t need Patience Schweinsteiger. It needed Tara Drake. It needed Percival.

  The world needed bravery. Courage. Heroes.

  The laser directly in front of me disappeared, and I stepped into the empty space. Ducked as another shot through the space where my head had just been, slanting toward the ground behind me.

  “Don’t get sliced,” I whispered as I took a quick step left, “or diced, Tara.”

  Not now. At least, not until we had defeated them.

  Not until I could provide a safe, predictable world for my dragon.

  The world had changed. When they appeared six months ago, everything went to hell.

  Percy believed they were gods, along with half the world’s Others. And whenever he called them that, I snapped, “Don’t even say it. We don’t know what those things in the sky are.”

  “But they called themselves gods,” Percy snapped back.

  “They say they are,” I’d told him, “but we don’t know what those things are.”

  And six months later, we still didn’t. At least, I didn’t.

  If they were gods, then damn them to their respective hells. They were a curse on this world.

  I jerked my upper body back, limboing under the next laser. Swinging under it, high-stepping over the one slanting where my feet would go.

  “Tara,” Percy said into my ear, “why are you breathing so hard?”

  “That happens”—my eyes followed the lasers; I would need to drop in a second—“when you’re trying not to get cantalouped.”

  “Cantalouped?”

  “Sliced.” I dropped, hitting the ground. Crawled forward like barbed wire hung above me, except this was worse. Way worse. “Diced. Chopped.”

  I was almost there. I could see the clear hallway beyond, the corner I would turn to pass into Hallway B.

  And then I would almost be there.

  “Tara—”

  “Not now, Perce.” I thrust myself up to my knees, then my feet. A laser appeared a moment sooner than I’d expected, blasting through the flap of my jacket. A sizzling hole appeared in it before I jerked away. “We’ve got burning leather.”

  He just groaned in my ear.

  I took a quick breath, staring ahead. This was the hardest part.

  With a one-two step, I threw myself overtop a laser and somersaulted, coming up from my roll and stepping right into a front handspring.

  As my feet touched laser-free marble, I took a moment to thank the GoneGods—or maybe the ReturnedGods, if Percy was right—for the acrobatics my mother had taught me so long ago.

  You never know when you’re going to need to front handspring your way through a laser trap.

  “OK, Perce.” I started forward. “I’m on the other side. Heading to Hallway—”

  I stopped hard.

  “Tara?” Percy said.

  I didn’t answer.

  From around the corner, a gogmagog had just appeared. And as we met eyes, I knew he’d been waiting for me.

  My first encounter with a gogmagog was six years ago. The ninjas, Percy and I were ferreting out the ringleaders of a pixie trafficking ring in Prague, and I’d ended up alone, separated. I’d run into a nearby forest to catch my breath, to wait for Percy.

  There, I’d met him. The gogmagog.

  They were a particular kind of giant. Over fourteen feet tall—this one must have been eighteen—and said to have descended from demons. They wanted to be intimidating, unpleasant, repulsive, and so the first I’d encountered had draped himself in the improperly cleaned skins of the animals he’d eaten.

  And just like the one standing before me, he smelled rank.

  At the end of the hallway, the gogmagog stared at me for a moment, his head tilting a degree. Corded muscle pressed from his neck and shoulders. Black eyes sized me up, a bulbous nose twitching to scent me. His dark hair hung in strings from his head, the skin of a dear with its meatless head still attached draped over one shoulder.

  And in one hand he held the end of an unsanded club longer than I was tall. It was little more than a tree branch, the bark still on in places. But the grip had been worn smooth, as had the end of it.

  That happened to a tree branch when you bashed things with it enough times.

  I took a deep breath in. Set my hands to Thelma and Louise at my belt. “You should really just let me pass, you know.”

  The gogmagog’s chest rumbled, a strange sound I realized, as his lips parted, was a laugh. One thick eyebrow rose, as though to say, And why should I do that?

  Just like the one in Prague, he was nonverbal.

  My grip solidified on my whips. My chin lowered. “I need what’s in that room, and while I don’t want to step on your very masculine, shoeless to
es, not you or ten thousand lasers are going to stop me. So you’re better off stepping aside.”

  He shook his head, thumb pressing along the handle of his club.

  No.

  He was itching for a fight. I didn’t blame the guy; he’d probably been waiting for an intruder to flatten for too long.

  “As you wish, ugly,” I whispered, taking one step forward and left, eyes never leaving his club.

  Gogmagogs loved their clubs, and swinging them. Unfortunately for me, the hallways of this shrine were wide enough to give him a massive swinging berth.

  His head moved, watching me. He growled, fingers tightening on his club the moment before it scraped across the ground.

  As it lifted, I yanked out my whips and fell into a run toward him. I shot Louise out, tenterhooks extended, straight at the club. They lodged, caught in the side of it.

  Up it went over his shoulder, and as Louise went taut, I yanked myself forward, using the momentum he’d given me to drop to my knees and slide over the marble floor toward him. I let her go as I approached his legs.

  The club whistled through the air, went crashing into the floor behind me with Louise still attached. The marble cracked, a small meteor-sized dent in the floor.

  He’d missed. By a lot.

  But gogmagogs didn’t need precision. They just needed strength and stubbornness—which I suspected this one had in spades. If I let the fight go on too long, this one would eventually get in a good hit.

  He was already lifting the club, bits of marble falling off it, as I pressed myself into a forward roll between his legs. As I rolled, I yanked one of my knives out of my boot.

  If I stayed out of his line of sight, I could survive.

  As long as he couldn’t see me, he couldn’t hit me.

  When I came up into a crouch, I spun on my toes, scanning his backside. A great pastiche of animal furs adorned his shoulders, that straggly hair … and then he was arcing the club around like a shot-putter, clipping the walls as he growled. Marble broke and crashed onto the floor, and he even took out a window on his way around.

  OK, so he was faster than the first gogmagog I’d met.

  And angrier.

  The club sailed toward me, and I threw myself toward his legs. I needed to keep close to him, behind him. He had the range in this fight.