by Erin R Flynn
“Charming,” a guy drawled. I glanced around and saw another line and what looked like a park ranger booth with a Canadian Mountie. Several of them.
And there was a huge ass magic barrier not far. I could practically feel the magic thumping.
“It’s the glamour surrounding the Vogels’ castle,” Craftsman explained. “To humans this looks like any other Canadian park but the barrier does more than glamour what it’s hiding. If they try to cross it, they get a bump on the head and think they fell plus a nice dose of not wanting to come back here. It’s not even on the lists or guides to visit but to keep up appearances they have to go through steps.”
I nodded, getting the booth wasn’t really Canada wildlife guys but dragon guards. Cool.
“Names?” the guy asked when we got there.
“Dr. Julian Craftsman sponsoring Tamsin Vale, freshman Artemis University, undeclared species.”
“We don’t allow—” he started but another guard cut in.
“The king and queen gave permission. They’ve met her. It’s some stunt to say we’re all too divided.”
“I prefer it a profound statement you all tend to be hung up too much on species and a bit racist about it, but I’ll accept stunt since you didn’t call it stupid,” I said as I handed over my ID like Craftsman did.
The guard actually smiled at me. “I think most call it a stunt as you can get away with it as an unknown, where the rest of us can’t having known families. People get miffed at those who get attention and unknowns get a lot of attention already.”
“Believe me, I know. It’s not fun and it’s not about attention. I’m not getting written off by my species. People will have to get to know me to hate me.”
“Good luck with that,” he replied as he handed over my ID, sounding like he really meant it. “The portal to the right will take you to the competition. Now that you have been here, the next time you visit the portals will take you right to the guard station atop the mountains outside the castle.”
“Thanks.” I meant it. It was nice when people explained shit.
Wait, did he just say their castle was atop mountains?
I stepped through the barrier and flinched, my eyes going but wide at what I found. “This world is so fucking cool.”
“Yeah, it is,” Craftsman agreed. “Eat and gawk, we’ve got to crack on and fast.”
I nodded as I stared up and up at the mountains. It was like a picture I’d seen of the Valley of Ten Peaks but on crack. And there were only four and it was like four massive castles were built in the mountains and all joined together. They had a fucking town up there the thing was so big.
There was a huge lake at the base of it and just to make my mouth drop again, there were dozens of dragons hanging out there or flying around. Seriously, it was cool.
“Flying lessons for the young ones,” Craftsman explained, and then I noticed the much smaller dragons next to the larger ones.
I had questions coming faster than I could think to get out but then we were walking through another portal.
We came out on a huge terrace area that was set up with stadium seating. It was then I realized it wasn’t four mountains but there were several behind them, most smaller but one as huge as the ones the castle was on.
And then what Hudson had told me finally made sense. Dragons ate rocks for weapons, but we’d also learned in Intro to Supernaturals that they built their own homes.
This was how. They used the rocks to build mountains to live in. As if to show me I was right, a massive dragon flew towards one of the small mountains and coughed up molten rock?
“Dragon obsidian is some of the most breathtaking glass in the world,” Craftsman told me as I watched the dragon upchucking. I mean, it sounded crass but that was what it was doing. “Dragon basalt is some of the strongest stone and dragon iron is what they make their blades of and are some of the toughest found. Those ones you got Mel cannot be broken.”
“Wicked.” I watched in awe as I kept inhaling food. My brain started catching up and I realized the seating was facing the tallest mountain not built on. “Wait, bring down the mountain? This is some competition to take that down so they can build an extension to the castle?”
“Well done,” Mrs. Vogel said from behind me. “And you are the only freshman entering the competition. Good luck. We’ll speak after, yes?”
“Um, yes, hi, still getting caught up,” I blurted, greeting her properly and apologizing for the breakfast sandwich.
To which she burst out laughing. Hudson looked amused from where he stood behind her and I hadn’t even noticed. Once they left I gave Craftsman a look that he needed to get to talking.
“You wanted a place to try the full force of your power clap and I found you one,” he said with a smirk. “The mountain has been bespelled to pull away the chunks and breakage of each hit and weighed. The contestants not only get their pieces—potentially worth a fortune if you get a good chunk of iron—but the prize is big so there are a lot who come for these competitions.”
“So this is how all dragons roll, not just the royals?” I asked, thinking there weren’t many of the competitions given there were only four mountains the castle was on.
“Mostly the royals or Alphas with huge compound castles like this, as you’ve got to have a lot of land and magic to hide all of this,” he answered. “Maybe twelve families each continent can swing a mountain castle. Some have been found in Europe when the dragons died and the magic with them.”
Wow, that had to shock the shit out of some humans for sure if something like this suddenly appeared.
“The drawing’s starting,” he said as he pointed to what looked like a huge digital scoreboard. “All contestants are randomly chosen for the lineup to make it fair. There are different strategies, some wanting towards the top, which is newer and not as solidified, or going towards the end where the mountain could have more unknown cracks all throughout it.
“Some just sign up to get a chance at some iron even if it’s small. The obsidian goes for a high price from the remaining royals like the Vogels.
“All the mountains are built by their family. Even cousins and extended family are always welcome at the castle. The good about dragon royals is they don’t have the human history of killing each other off to usurp power.
“They share the power, wealth, and risk evenly no matter if there is only one king—or now Alpha. The Alpha’s younger brother has a huge role with a lot of power, and dragons are fiercely loyal so it helps them thrive, whereas so many other monarchies have fallen.
“But all the mountains are made by them and their dragons so the value is high. It’s why there’s such a crazy turnout.”
I nodded as I listened, watching the board. I didn’t care my position as long as I wasn’t first and I wasn’t. There were already twenty people listed and that would give me a good enough grasp on what I was doing to not look like a complete fool.
I was sort of excited—and nervous, couldn’t forget nervous—to finally get to play with my power clap on full throttle.
“Don’t start revving yourself up like you’re filling reservoirs until you know where you are and get closer to your turn,” Craftsman advised. “And no participant can have outside influence or help so you’ll have to give over your charm.”
I nodded. That was fair, and I just had to make sure not to touch anyone. I glanced around and saw the terrace we were on wrapped around the side of the castle and was much larger than I’d first thought.
Wow, this was all going to be Hudson’s one day. He was going to be the boss of all North American dragons.
I didn’t think I’d understood the full depth of that before.
Oh geeze, I was screwing the next dragon king of this continent. That was enough to make a woman flush.
I shook it off and got my head back to what was going on. My name came up ninety people in and that was closer to the front but fine by me. How long was this competition going to be if there we
re hundreds of people? I hoped it wasn’t some crazy showboating thing.
Once we were all listed, there was a buzzer sound as if to start the fun. People hurried to find seats instead of just milling around.
“Lower the drawbridge!” someone called out, and it didn’t lower so much as an extended bridge with a platform appeared.
Ah, I got it, castle sieges and mountains… Dragon humor?
“What are the official rules?” I checked before it started.
“You have to stay in human form, no outside help, and be over the age of eighteen,” he answered quickly as it was getting louder faster. “That’s it. Oh, no, if you’re still in training—like you are—you need a faculty sponsor. It keeps this from being days long with every idiot wanting one little rock and their second of glory.”
I nodded. So that explained the faculty and students we’d bumped into at the faculty portal. “Do I have to split it with you?”
“No, but if you do well it’s like another mark on my tenure or resume,” he said like it wasn’t a big deal. Yeah, he didn’t seem to care about all that kinds of stuff. “I just thought you could use some fun before midterms.”
I could, which was why he was going to get something fun from me and soon.
The first five lined up on the bridge but the first went out to a platform which I saw could be raised as it went up.
I swallowed loudly, feeling like it was that Minecraft game I’d seen people play that had no real laws of reality on building and gravity wasn’t a thing. There wasn’t a pole under the platform to raise it like in the human world. Nope, it was all magic.
“It’s perfectly safe, I promise,” Craftsman said in my ear, having seen what I was getting worried about. “It was used for supe construction long before human machines. It’s shock resistant and just about anything proof. There has been one death in a hundred years of these competitions and it was a freak accident of a random shard of obsidian slicing a throat that couldn’t be healed in time.”
“Thanks.” That helped. A lot because yeah, the cool factor of the competition was battling with reality now that I was seeing this part.
Another platform appeared off to the side—but still visible from the seating—and what looked like a truck scale was on it. I got the full picture as the first contestant went, using what looked like some sort of magical hammer-type weapon, and took a chunk out of the side.
That chunk and lots of other bits we couldn’t see from this distance didn’t even have the chance to fall, immediately appearing on the scale, and the weight registering on the display went by the guy’s name. It was a pretty nice-size boulder and from the way people cheered I got the feeling it was a good start to the fun.
No pressure.
Good thing I loved pressure.
One of the first five did a power clap and they moved the platform towards the side of the mountain and shot it out on an angle to get chunks off on the surface. Not a bad idea and it put him to the top by a lot.
I thought of how I sliced that tree vertically and how I could angle that, but I wasn’t here to win or get the most goods with that sort of strategy.
No, this was a chance to push the gas hard on my magic and power and not risk hurting anyone or doing unwanted damage. I wasn’t going to miss the chance for that.
People took this seriously though, changing plans after hits did damage or if there looked to be a crack to exploit. But they didn’t dick around either, as if realizing they couldn’t drag the competition out.
It was nice because I’d seen golfers on TV take ten minutes with one damn putt, not caring for anyone else but them.
And then miss the putt, which seemed to serve them right for showboating.
The range of what people were doing was awesome. Sure, some came with crazy huge hammers like out of a Resident Evil movie, but others used battle-axes as a way to focus their power. One tall and buff woman wrote a rune on her hand and used that.
I shot Craftsman a look that I wanted to know what that was later and he nodded.
It was then that I noticed she was the first woman of twenty-five competitors. The scoreboard had our last names but what seemed to be the line for their turn was mostly men.
Meh, I’d faced that before and wasn’t worried. It just seemed odd to me that a world that made it clear they were better than humans seemed to still pick up their bad habits.
Like sexism.
“Tamsin Vale?” a woman asked. She smiled when I nodded. “Prince Hudson said I couldn’t miss your red hair. It is gorgeous.”
“Thank you.”
“He said you’d feel the need for speed.”
Again, people needed to explain this stuff better. “I’m sorry, I don’t do drugs.”
Craftsman snorted. “Speed is dragon coffee because if you drink it, you gonna fly.”
Her eyes danced with amusement as she nodded, handing me a rather large to-go cup. Like comically large. Then again, dragons were rather large so it made sense.
She also handed me a sack that smelled heavenly. “Best of luck to you.”
“Thanks.”
“That was sweet of him,” Craftsman muttered. “Best not to start chugging it until you get in line with how you react to coffee. Did you finish the breakfast sandwiches?” He snorted when I gave him a look not to be silly. “Eat up what she gave you then, they just made it through the first forty.”
Damn, they weren’t fucking around. Ninety didn’t seem so far away anymore.
The sack was full of heaven-filled buns. Sort of like fruit-stuffed huge donuts instead of just jelly-filled normal ones.
“Once you get in line, I want you to start revving up,” Craftsman told me once they were past contestant sixty. “Think of it like when you took shit from Holly. But it’s not to filter into reservoirs.
“This time I want you to think of filling every cell of your body with power until you’re brimming. Your body can handle it and fill that full as long as it’s not for long and you know how.”
“Give me a visual,” I said as I handed him my bag, before taking off my necklace.
“You’ve seen blood cells in pictures or movies explaining things?” He waited until I nodded. “Picture those but filling up like water balloons. You want your cells brimming with power. Load the ones up in your toes and work from limbs to your core.”
“Got it. Thanks.”
“Do me proud, love,” he said under his breath as people started cheering again.
I nodded and headed over to the line as he went to find a better spot to watch. I checked with the last in line and was actually two up from him.
“What’s she going to do, bat her eyelashes at the mountain?” someone jeered.
Lots of guys in the line chuckled or agreed. I glanced around to see who they were talking about.
Me. I realized it was me.
I slowly turned and raised my eyebrow at him. “Stupid isn’t sexy. I would think size doesn’t always matter if you don’t know how to use what you got.” I glanced at his groin pointedly and smirked at him before I turned around.
The hazing got worse as he was not happy with what I implied.
Awesome, more power for me as I got annoyed. I finished the last donut heaven—making a mental note to find out how to get more of them later—and started on the coffee. Luckily it wasn’t too hot and loaded with sugar and cream but it was like drinking… Something.
Whatever it was, it was like sticking my finger in the socket but in liquid form.
Yeah, dragon coffee was something all right. Holy fuck me.
The comments and jeering kept up as the line progressed and not just from those around me. When people saw little me standing among guys over a foot taller, lots of people had comments about how silly it was I entered.
Yeah, sure, the other women who had gone were all buff and hulking but really, magic didn’t care what I could bench press and even I knew that already.
I chugged my coffee and let all the anger f
ill every cell to the brim with magic like he’d said. If nothing else, I was going to make some fuckers eat their words.
Sounded like a great Saturday to me, right?
16
When it was only five people before me I was done with the coffee and about to fly without those dragon wings. Every ounce of me was vibrating with caffeine, excitement, nerves, and anger at not being able to punch any of the array of people talking shit about me.
I started playing Nickelback’s “This Means War” in my head as I adjusted my neck and shook out my arms. I needed more than that and found where I could toss the cup and sack, jogging to give Craftsman my jacket.
I was third in line when I got back, pushing up the sleeves of my sweater as I stretched. The cold was blistering, but it was giving me a rush as I knew it wasn’t going to be long.
Second in line and ready to go as I stretched out my back.
“Beat that, little girl,” the guy sneered at me after he went.
I didn’t even respond, not letting him break my focus as I used that anger to fuel my magic. I went for bold and kept the platform right where it was.
I wanted an untouched area and to get a real feel without other cracks or a Jenga situation of more coming down because of leaning or gravity.
Rubbing my hands together, I let out some quick breaths to pump myself up and then brought all that magic to the surface. I called on every everything in me and mentally pictured flooring the gas on my bike and just letting it all out.
I shouted as I focused it into my hands, clapping with all I had.
And nothing happened.
I had a second to blink at my hands and wonder where all that power had gone before it exploded out of me. Hell, I went flying off the platform and back into the next contestant, sending the whole line to the ground like dominoes.
I muttered a half-hearted apology as I pushed to stand—thinking it was pretty fair to knock them on their asses after what they’d been saying—only to find nothing happened to the mountain. Well, that was disappointing.
