Good Luck, Bad Luck

by Jenni Ward

  “Quinn, Quinn, look at me.”

  “Sorceress, I won’t ask you again to make good on the deal we made.”

  “Prater, what did you do to my brother?”

  “Complete the agreement and perhaps you can save him,” Prater stated.

  “I can’t undo what you have done!” Cecilia’s eyes narrowed on Prater; without turning around she ordered, “Binding man: leave.”

  “But you said...I haven’t...”

  The binding man saw Prater raise the knife in his direction. He gulped and turned to see the unmoving man at the back of the room. When Prater stepped closer again, the binding man turned and headed towards the room he had emerged from.

  “Cecilia you should have told me. How could you keep something that important from me?” Michael let go of her and stepped away, careful not to get any closer to Prater. “What have you done?”

  “You stupid fool! We could have had more power than you could ever dream of!” Cecilia waved her hand at Michael and he shifted backwards into the room once again. The door slammed shut and glowed.

  “Just leaves us to settle things then.” Prater sheathed the knife into his boot. “You will pay, sorceress.”

  “I will not, you fool – why did you harm my brother?” Cecilia sneered and raised her hand.

  “He betrayed me – must run in the family. The Academy has rules about not keeping your end of a bargain. Hope you remember what the consequence is for breaking a deal with a mortal.”

  With the blood not stopping, Mary turned back towards the drapes. Perhaps the dragon can help with this. Before she could move, the drapes shifted to the sides. One side caught on a nail above the doorway and Mary closed her eyes in disappointment – the dragon no longer sat crouched to the side. The space was empty.

  Mary heard Prater chanting and when she looked his way she saw him reading from the paper he’d produced earlier. Prater continued and the noise stirred Quinn, his eyes opening slightly.

  “What’s that? That’s not like the chants or spells that we learnt,” Quinn whispered.

  “Shh. We need to worry about you at the moment.”

  Quinn stared past Mary and she turned to see Cecilia looking pale as Prater continued to chant.

  “No, wait, Prater,” Cecilia called out and lowered her hand.

  Prater didn’t stop reading, and Cecilia closed her eyes. Mustering the magic she possessed, she sent a spray of blue light towards Prater as he finished speaking, before she collapsed to the ground in a heap.

  The room seemed motionless for several heartbeats. Cecilia lay on the ground, though not dead because her body rose and fell as she breathed. Where Prater once stood, the cries of a baby rang out.

  A door opened and the binding man emerged once again. He looked around the room before running towards the entrance. Rounding the drapes, he skidded to a stop as a dragon padded inside.

  “Don’t eat me!” The binder’s plea drew Mary’s attention and she smiled at seeing the dragon. She watched the dragon raise his eye ridge in response before nodding towards Mary.

  “Bind them.”

  The binder looked confused. The dragon puffed grey smoke creating enough of a breeze for the binder’s hair to become messy.

  “Bind who?” the binder growled in frustration and rubbed his weary eyes.

  “Bind them,” the dragon repeated and looked into the Gathering Room. The binder followed the dragon’s gaze to Quinn and Mary.

  “Us?” Mary whispered as the dragon nudged the binder from behind making him move closer. With Quinn’s eyes closed again, Mary shook her head. “Please dragon, I just need help, a little good luck. Please...”

  “I can’t, I need both to give permission. I’m not about to break the rules in order to satisfy a whim.” The binder stared back stubbornly at the dragon.

  “Bind them...or I’ll eat you.” The dragon moved his eyes closer to the binder who gulped several times.

  “Eat me?”

  “Eat you...starting with your feet.”

  “Fine, but I’m doing this under protest!”

  The dragon puffed smoke in reply and nodded. Settling down, his eyes followed the binding man as he approached Mary and Quinn.

  “You have both agreed to be bound together in both love and commitment. What is bound let no one divide,” the binder murmured.

  “Quinn, you must open your eyes.”

  Mary looked down at her hands to see the blood running between her fingers and down to the skirt of her dress. She felt a strange but familiar sensation on her hand and watched as a binding mark faded in on her left hand; a corresponding one on Quinn’s.

  The binder nodded at the dragon as he walked back towards him. “That man needs help and you’ve delayed me to bind them? If he dies it will be on your conscious.” He skirted around the dragon and out the entrance door. The dragon remained.

  Mary bit her lip and held Quinn’s hand tightly. “Quinn, please. It’s not your time to go. It can’t be your time to go.”

  “Mary, you’ll have the best school,” Quinn whispered hoarsely. His eyes opened as he reached up and pulled Mary closer to him, lightly kissing her on her lips. “Don’t ever forget me. I love you...”

  “No, you can’t die.” Quinn’s eyelids closed once again. Mary turned in desperation, “Cecilia, please – please Cecilia.”

  Using her hands, Cecilia pushed herself up from the floor. She turned, looked across the room to Mary and her brother, and glanced away; her hair in disarray, her dress torn and stained, and her magic gone.

  “There’s nothing I can do.” Cecilia shook her head. The cries of the nearby baby captured her attention. He sat on the floor surrounded by familiar black clothing. Wrapping the baby in the shirt, she picked him up and begun walking towards her brother.

  “But you’re a sorceress!”

  “I was a sorceress.”

  “Quinn.” Mary relaxed the pressure on the wound as tears welled in her eyes. Desperately she grabbed Quinn’s hand tightly in hers. His other hand slipped in the blood and fell to the floor. Closing her eyes tightly she asked for one piece of good luck. “It was sixteen, lucky sixteen. Quinn, I want you there with me whether that’s Tiani, or somewhere else. Please don’t leave me.”

  A cough. Mary’s eyes flew open as a blue glow dissipated from around Quinn. When she looked, she saw no trace of the wound except for the blood stains.

  “How?” Cecilia sat on the other side of her brother. Her hand reached out and pulled back on the cut fabric of his shirt, his skin flawless of marks despite the blood stains. Quinn’s eyes slowly opened.

  “Huh, guess Prater was right after all, he did break the binding otherwise you would be magicless,” Cecilia half-smiled at her comment, but added: “You’re bloody lucky, little brother, you know that, don’t you?”

  “Our transaction is over, sorcerer,” the sound of the dragon’s voice drew the attention of all in the group.

  “Jharobi, I don’t understand. Why do I have my magic back?”

  “You never relinquished your magic, sorcerer,” Jharobi paused and inclined his head to the side as he watched Quinn. “Prater broke the binding, only a moment or two before you agreed to release your powers.”

  “But...why didn’t you tell me that?” Quinn stammered and unsuccessfully attempted to push himself up. “Why wasn’t I affected by the gold in Tiani?”

  Jharobi mustered a smile, “Sorcerer, you no longer had the heart of a sorcerer. You may as well have had no magic at all; if you’d read the book on the subject you would know that a sorcerer’s magic is linked with his desire to perform it. You had made up your mind, and I simply played along.”

  “People possess power,” Mary muttered, remembering the words on the paper.

  “That’s right, you accessed his power. Just like the humans once did a long time ago.”

  “What’s with the baby then?” Quinn watched as his sister held the now quiet infant in her arms.

  “I kept my end of the b
argain with Prater,” Cecilia replied with a shrug of her shoulders and smiled.

  Quinn laughed at the expression on his sister’s face, “So, he wanted to be younger, then?”

  “I made him what he wanted.”

  “So that’s Prater?” Mary questioned unsure if she had understood. Cecilia confirmed it with a smile.

  “But what about the Golden Law, Jharobi? What you did breaks the treaty, doesn’t it?” Quinn asked.

  “Not to mention makes dragons a bit hypocritical since, you know, given what just happened,” Cecilia added, watching Jharobi.

  “Another technicality – I asked for you to be bound, you both had little choice in the matter...plus, technically you were almost mortal when you were bound. Quinn we dragons saw that you were willing to lose everything in order to prevent history being repeated, that carried a lot of weight with us. The Dragon Council decided to consult with the Sorcery Council on this matter...for a change we actually agreed,” Jharobi smiled and spread his wings. “That’s my work done; keep to your promise, Quinn. You have born a great deal in your short life, but nothing will weigh more than the responsibility you and Mary now have to humans, sorcerers, and dragons; don’t ever abuse that trust we have in you or exploit the power you have.”

  “That’s all well and good, but where does that leave me? I did keep my end of the bargain!” Cecilia shouted but Jharobi didn’t turn back once as he left the room.

  Quinn and Mary both smiled. “Now what?”

  The thundering of boots on the steps drew their attention to the door. Delwyn and six men from Tiani stood ready with weapons drawn.

  “Where’s Master Prater?” he demanded.

  Cecilia pushed herself up from the floor before picking up the crying baby.

  “That’s Prater’s shirt.” Delwyn looked again at the baby; at length, he leaned forward. His eyes glanced at Cecilia who smiled before she held the baby out to him. He awkwardly took the baby.

  “That’s his shirt alright,” Cecila replied.

  “What’s it doing on the baby?”

  “Well, it’s like this...earlier today, that wasn’t a baby. In fact, this morning that was a rather arrogant man who needed to learn to treat people better; a lesson it seems I also have to learn.”

  “Wait, so what you’re saying...No, that can’t be. Are you saying that this isn’t just Prater’s shirt? This...baby...it’s Prater?”

  “Yes, and he is all yours now.” Cecilia turned and started walking back towards Mary and Quinn.

  “Mine? What am I meant to do with a baby? What am I going to tell everyone back in Tiani?” Delwyn turned to his men who backed off slightly. “Great, you know, my mother always told me to never mess with anything I didn’t understand completely. I guess she’ll be pleased when I tell her she’s correct. Ah Master, this is why humans are not meant to mess with magic.”

  “We could leave him here,” one of the men suggested.

  “We’ll find someone to help here in the city before we head back to Tiani. I don’t want to be the one responsible for making that decision. Imagine having to grow up a second time. Do you think he’ll remember the first time?”

  Delwyn and his men continued their conversation as they walked out of the Gathering Room. The atmosphere in the room now lighter than it had been.

  Cecilia held out her hand to Quinn; he took it and she helped pull him up to his feet. “Steady now. I guess I should be pleased that you finally took my advice, baby brother.”

  “How so?”

  “You finally got a life.”

  Quinn smiled as Mary stood up beside him and took his hand in hers and squeezed it.

  “Don’t get used to it sister, this was a one-off occasion”

  “How does it feel?”

  “Feel, how do you think I feel Cecilia? I feel like someone slammed me into a wall.”

  “You’ll get over it, but that’s not what I meant. You were human for a while there.”

  Mary turned to look at Quinn as he nodded and smiled. “You won’t hate me if I say that I’m really happy to have my magic back, will you?”

  “No, I think I can overlook that.”

  Quinn turned back to his sister as they neared the front entrance. “What will you do now?”

  Cecilia brushed down her dress. “I’m not really sure, Quinn. The last thing I expected today was to walk away as a human - I was supposed to be some all-powerful sorceress. How you managed to get what I wanted...Well, that’s still hypocritical in my books.”

  Mary smiled back at her new sister. “I’m sure you’ll do fine as a human.”

  Cecilia half-smiled. “You know, Mary, you had already broken the spell I cast over you. I’m guessing you found some determination and stopped waiting for someone else to fix everything.”

  “But I can’t read as well as I used to.”

  “You will, it will take time to come back, but it will.” Cecilia reached out and hugged Quinn. He reached out his free hand and returned the gesture. “I love you, Quinn, even if you have managed to destroy my plans.”

  “You’re not as angry as I thought you’d be.”

  “What would the point be? I’ll probably find a pillow to hurt later on in private, but I knew the consequences I might have to face.”

  “Then why do all this?”

  Cecilia looked away to the floor for a moment before she sighed. “There are some things I never told you. Things that the The Academy did. Things to do with our parents.”

  “Our parents?”

  “Not today, brother, today you need to rest, and I need to go and vent, maybe try this human thing of drowning my sorrows. Tomorrow I’ll think about facing everything else.”

  “Will you be okay?”

  Cecilia hugged Quinn before she pulled away. “You know me Quinn; I always land on my feet, even when the ground below them is gone. I know that there’s one thing about me that will never change.”

  “What’s that?” Quinn asked.

  “No matter what happens in my life now, I will still live it to the full with no regrets.”

  “As shall I.”

  “As shall we, Quinn, together,” Mary said and leaned her head on his shoulder, dreaming of the possibilities her future now held. “We will make our own future and our own luck.”

  About the Author

  Jenni lives in Australia and loves all things magical.

  Reviews of her work are welcome on any platform.

  You can find information about all her books on her website.

  Read more at Jenni Ward’s site.

  About the Publisher

  Based in Mount Gambier, South Australia, Miraworth Books is dedicated to publishing MG and YA books. We specialise in clean reads.