fantasy crack!
Yeah, it took ages. and the ending was rushed, written on no sleep for about twenty-four hours. But I actually like it. Wtf.
Title: Here There Be Dragons
Wordcount: 4,099
A/N: This one was a monster. Is a monster. I absolutely love Shell, too.
--
Prince Rex the Reasonable knocked hir knuckles against the very solid stone of the tower. "You say that the princess is definitely in here?" ze asked of the sorcerer nearby, who nodded emphatically.
"Definitely," the Dread Sorcerer Sarah replied in a voice that did not sound definite at all.
"It's only that you said that about all the others."
Sarah winced. Truth be told, she was not the right sort of sorcerer for the job. She knew nothing at all about quests and princesses and such beyond the fact that other people went on and saved them, not necessarily respectively. But her forte was in biology and genetics, two subjects which unfortunately were rather difficult to research at this point in time. She would have told Rex, really she would have - after all, ze could hardly be faulted for coming to the wrong source, for most hermits had exactly the kind of help available that ze needed - but, well, there was just something about the prince that made her want to try. Maybe it was the fact that Prince Rex was the only person in the whole world who actually made sense or stopped to think about things. But none of this helped Sarah to be any use at all to the quest.
The worst part was that the prince didn't even seem to care. Ze would shrug and say that at least Sarah made for good conversation, which was little consolation to the sorcerer in question. Rex was not exactly the most conventional of princes, when it came down to one. Gender notwithstanding (and that had been a rather humbling conversation for Sarah), there was the matter of attitude and bearing. Most princes, having found a tower like this which should contain a princess, would have spouted something brave or romantic to address the inhabitants.
"Excuse me," Rex called politely, "but is anyone there?"
As far as Sarah knew, princes as a rule didn't politely inquire within.
There was no reply, and after a few minutes Rex sighed and turned back to Sarah. "Not that I don't appreciate your help," ze began, "but maybe we should try another method. Once that doesn't involve magic. Maybe the people of the nearby town will know something." Ze looked back up at the tower again, apparently deep in thought. Sarah, crestfallen, but unsurprised, sighed and took a few steps in the direction of the town.
All of a sudden she heard a great rushing of air, as if something very big had just launched itself into the air and winged it nearby. She could feel hot breath on the back of her neck. "Your Highness…" she began hesitantly, but then there was a great shaking of the ground, and she turned to see a dragon.
The dragon was huge, and easily could have wrapped his long torso and tail around the tower five or six times. He was a burnished dark brown, which struck the sorcerer odd - weren't dragons green? - and his eyes burned furious gold, though the shape put Sarah in mind of a cat. So did his way of moving as he crouched and lowered his head, obvious preparing to deliver a searing blast of flame and incinerate them both.
He spared not a glance for Sarah, who felt vaguely affronted. "Prince, I'm going to fucking destroy you!" the dragon roared.
Rex blinked. "Can we talk this over?" ze inquired, backing up until there was stone at hir back.
Confusion was apparent in the dragon's feline features. "You're not here to fight me?" he asked bemusedly, losing the ferocious act and seeming much less threatening all of a sudden. "But all the other royal bastards that turned up wanted to fight me and claim the princess."
"Princess?" asked Sarah.
"We're looking for a princess," Rex added. "But I really don't want to fight anyone. So can we maybe come to an agreement of some sort?"
The dragon appeared to think this over. "That's not how they told me to do it," he finally muttered. "But fuck them. I'm sick of working for that bastard, anyway. He comes over and mocks me. Me! And he's always drinking that damn -” The dragon's mouth worked, but no words emerged. "Eaaaarguh. Fuckall," he eventually managed. "That disgusting shit. That no one in the kingdom drinks anymore. He's got it all. He can have it, if you ask me. Annoying bastard. I hate his guts."
"So you'll let us have the princess?" Rex inquired hopefully.
With a fiery snort, the dragon shook his head. "No way in hell. I'm not letting her loose. I happen to like this kingdom intact. But I'll take her with me, and I guess I could take you two wherever you need to go. I could use a knight around." He stamped a decisive claw over a patch of burning grass, sending up a brief plume of smoke.
"Prince," Sarah corrected irritably. "And sorcerer."
"I hate magic," the dragon snarled with more anger than before.
"I don't like you much either," Sarah told him testily. "Live with it."
The dragon glared a smouldering glare, and then looked back up at the tower. "Princess!" he called with obvious trepidation, pushing a small section of wall out of the tower's base.
There was a crash within, and then a figure in blinding shades of blue and pink (dyes that shouldn't even exist, Sarah thought) came hurtling through the hole the dragon had created. "Daaaaaaarling, you did it!" she cried exuberantly, to Sarah's utter bemusement. The sorcerer glanced at the dragon, who grimaced with air of one who had suffered for far too long.
He could be human, she thought with surprise.
"Allow me to introduce myself?" asked Rex, displaying once again hir skill in making courteousness of gallantry. "Please." Ze glanced back at Sarah and the dragon, and set hir face. "I am Prince - ish - Rex of Eloria. I'm here with the Dread Sorcerer Sarah of Rocksfall, and we have just made an agreement with the dragon, er…"
"Shell," the dragon supplied. "Of none-of-your-damn-business."
"To travel together."
"They're gonna help us thrash that bastard who rules over Cynicide Valley," Shell added with no small amount of glee.
Sarah snapped to attention at that. "That wasn't part of the plan!" she yelled. "You said that you'd take us wherever we wanted to go!"
The dragon smiled cruelly. "Yes. And unless you enjoy being charbroiled, you want to go help to defeat the bastard. Plus, he's got all the whatsit, and your prince looks like the kind of person who drinks that shit."
Rex suddenly looked stricken, but didn't say anything, and the focus of the group quickly moved on.
"Oh, that's not nice at all!" exclaimed the princess, whacking Shell upside the head - an impressive feat, considering how much bigger his head was than her hand. "I am glad you talked dear Shell around, though," she told Sarah in a stage whisper. "He was so unhappy, being a guard."
Sarah decided that with the princess around, scathing remarks were slightly less likely to result in roast sorcerer. "What kind of a dragon is named Shell?" she asked.
"The kind about to set your fucking head on fire," Shell grumbled.
Rex, perhaps smelling actual danger behind the threat, intervened. "It is a strange name - for a dragon," ze commented. "Are you under a curse, or did your parents just have a strange taste in baby names?"
"Under a curse - sort of," muttered the dragon. "Not like it's any of your damn business."
"Is he ever!" added the princess. "And he's being ever so ridiculous about it, too. Some nonsense about his true love breaking the curse. I told him, he's not about to find a true love as he is. I mean, love is unconditional, sure, but he's not exactly going to pick up chicks looking like that!"
The dragon was blushing. Sarah hadn't known until just then that dragons could blush. "Shut it, Candy," growled Shell.
"I think technic'ly all it would take is a kiss!" the princess - Candy? - exclaimed. "And I, the Princess of Free Love, was more than willing to oblige. But no. He's got an aversion to me."
"You’re not kissing me," the dragon snapped. "Not you either," he told Sarah. Then there was a long, awkward pause as he and Rex surveyed each other uncomfortably.
"If it's all the same to you, I'd rather not," said the prince eventually. "No offense or anything."
"Good fucking thing," Shell replied. "None taken. Plus, then you lot would be out of a free ride." He directed a pointed glare toward the two females that said something along the lines of look, at least this fucker's a reasonable and polite guy! "Let's go, then. I don't wanna be here when the bastard finds out we're gone."
After some debate, they all clambered up onto Shell's back and the dragon took off into the afternoon sky, grumbling curses to passing zephyrs as he did so. Sarah was discovering a latent acrophobia, and buried her face in Princess Candy's back. The princess very kindly did not comment.
"What was your name again?" Rex asked her.
"Princess Candy of Cynicide Valley," the princess replied cheerfully. "Adopted princess, that is." She snickered for some reason unbeknownst to both prince and sorcerer. "You know, it's funny how these things work out. You're the first people to know that I existed ahead of time. Normally knights and princes come to fight the dragon and just hoped for the best."
Sarah winced - they hadn't exactly known about Candy.
"You know, I don't think you were the princess I was supposed to rescue," Rex said apologetically. "I suppose it's a moot point now, anyway. But it was a Princess… Starling?" Ze looked to the left, where a small flock was coasting. "Named after some sort of bird."
The dragon pulled up very abruptly; Sarah bit back a shriek and clutched at Candy's waist. "Robin?!" Shell demanded. "Were you looking for a Robin?!"
Rex nodded, as Sarah observed cautiously through one cracked eyelid. “That’s it. Not Starling. Robin.”
“That bastard?!” The dragon spat out an angry ball of flame. The scales beneath his passengers began to warm. “You’re damned lucky you got Candy instead. Especially if you’re supposed to marry the princess. Because he’s definitely not a princess.”
“I wasn’t,” Rex replied calmly. “There was a reward being offered for her - his - release.” The same dreamy expression crossed hir face as had when ze first explained the quest to Sarah. “I’m going to have a new type of musical instrument created with it. And everything left I’m going to spend importing more - of that stuff you don’t like.”
The dragon snorted again, though in apparent amusement. “Smart man,” he hissed.
“I’m not,” Rex told him. “I’m a very princely it.”
“You’re no prince,” Shell objected. “Way too bloody smart for that. I bet you could be a dragon if you wanted to.” He turned in the air, veering westward to follow some invisible air current. “But I meant, smart not to want to get married and own half of some kingdom. Especially if it meant marrying ‘Princess’ Robin. You’d be a damned idiot to do that.”
“Wasn’t he the one who -” began Candy.
“We’re here,” the dragon interrupted, descending rather more rapidly than was absolutely necessary. Sarah clenched both her eyes shut and held on ever more tightly to Candy’s waist. The princess patted he hand sympathetically. Fortunately, the speed of descent also ensured that very soon they were standing once more on the ground. Rex wrapped an arm around her on one side and Candy supported the other until Sarah could stand up properly again.
“I hate heights,” she muttered, not meeting anyone’s eyes.
“Oh, so do I,” replied Candy good-naturedly. “The first few days in the tower were terrible! But you get used to it.”
“I liked it,” Rex commented. Sarah for some strange could not find it in her to resent hir for this. It was difficult to resent hir for anything, really. Even if ze had a disgustingly blithe attitude about fatal altitudes. Rex probably would make a good dragon - and no one would be able to bring themselves to slay hir. Ze’d probably invite would-be attackers into hir cave and make them a cup of that drink.
It was at that point that Sarah was finally able to take in her surroundings. They were situated in a very green valley, surrounded on all sides by steep, rocky cliffs that tore at the sky above. Fog was beginning to collect on one side of the valley, snaking through the air little by little to claim the land beneath. Barely visible in the mist was a huge castle, situated over what looked to be a small lake.
“This valley is a volcanic crater,” Shell said with an almost wistful voice. “If not for the damn fog, you could see Eriksen Peak. It still erupts sometimes.” He didn’t appear to notice Candy’s look of distaste or Sarah’s sudden interest.
“We have a quest,” Rex reminded them.
They crossed the valley on foot, and then Shell swam them across the lake, swearing continuously under his breath at the temperature of the water. The castle was actually on a peninsula that reached in from an otherwise inaccessible side of the valley like a giant, earthen icicle. Dripping and shivering, the group of four stepped onto the grass at its tip and crept up to the castle itself.
“Now what?” Rex asked.
“You’re the ‘prince’,” Shell replied. “Go challenge him to single combat or something. Distract him. Then we can get behind him with a fucking chandelier, and then-”
“Wait,” cut in Candy. “What about Robin?”
Shell glared at her. “What about him?”
“Prince Rex needs to free him to get the reward,” Sarah said. “So we’ve got to let him out. You can probably roast him a bit after we collect the reward. I don’t think anyone would really mind, except maybe Robin. But, um, until then…”
The dragon sighed. “Gotcha,” he said. “Fine then. You can let him out. But be careful. He’s a tricky fucktard. He’ll mess with your head.”
Sarah was beginning to get an idea of what must have transpired at some point between the dragon and this Robin, and so she merely nodded, feeling a little more sympathetic than before. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
Much to the sorcerer’s surprise, Shell blew a blast of hot air at her. For a moment she thought she was on fire, and then it passed and she was unharmed. Shell eyed her warily, as if expecting her to explode or something.
“What did you do?” inquired Rex.
“She’s gotta have some sort of protection if she’s going up against that bastard,” Shell explained, lashing his tail a little. “Even if she’s just trying to get him out. It’s not much, because I’m only a fucking dragon after all, but it’ll get you through a few trouble spots. Your magic shit should do the rest.”
“Thank you,” Sarah said, surprised.
“Don’t fucking mention it,” growled the dragon. “Seriously, don’t.”
“Let’s go, then,” suggested Candy excitedly. “The culinmation of our quest is nearly at hand!”
“It’s culmination,” Sarah muttered under her breath.
The two females climbed over the wall instead of knocking at the door with Rex. Shell disappeared into the mist above, presumably to descend at the opportune moment - or so Sarah hoped. As she climbed, the sorcerer could hear Rex calling out a challenge in hir most formal tone - even refraining from adding a ‘please’ at the end. Ze’s learning, she thought with considerable relief.
The interior of the castle was well-lit and airy, lined with all sorts of interesting artifacts that any normal sorcerer would have been drawn to like a magnet. Sarah found no appeal in them whatsoever, and continued down the halls in search of a clue as to where she might discover an imprisoned ‘princess’.
Turning through an archway, she found herself on a balcony overlooking the main courtyard, where Rex was standing opposite a tall, dark, crowned man. “You see,” he was saying, “you don’t want to fight me at all.”
“You took all the - the leaf brew!” the prince retorted, a more fierce tone that Sarah had ever expected to hear from hir lips. It was almost effective.
But the almost was key. The king - he had to be the king - smiled mockingly. “Tea,” he replied. “I have taken the tea. I have all the tea in the world - I even have sole command of the word itself. And you would be more than welcome to partake in it, if you left off this mad quest of yours.”
Caught between addiction and anticipation, the prince faltered for a moment. The king took this chance to strike, whipping his sword through the air and slashing a hole in Rex’s shirt. A thin spray of blood dotted the floor; Rex had been a little too late in leaping back.
Sarah was not a conventional sorcerer. She didn’t know any real war spells, or any of those that could turn a man into a pig or boil his blood or even give him awful stomach troubles. But she found herself growing angry at this man who dared to hurt her friend - and an angry sorcerer is dangerous, no matter how unconventional they may be.
She lashed out mentally, sending both Rex and the king to their knees. Rex managed to recover first, darting out of the way and obviously searching for a more effective weapon than the fencing blade ze carried. Hir eyes fell on a bookshelf at the same time as Sarah’s, as the king returned to his feet.
“Where are you going now?” the king asked, chuckling. The chuckle died as Rex flung a heavy tome with surprising accuracy, narrowly missing as the king sidestepped.
Where are Candy and Shell? Sarah wondered, forgetting entirely that she had been meant to go find the ‘princess’. Noticing the king had been advancing upon Rex once more, Sarah tried her attack again. Once again, both prince and king were sent to the floor.
This time, the king looked up. “Ah, there you are,” he commented, and suddenly Sarah found herself suspended above the room. It wasn’t an uncomfortable sensation, aside from the fact that she was high up again and this was really not all right with her. The king smiled as if he knew exactly what he had just done. “Don’t try casting any more of your magic, sorcerer,” he advised. “It may distract me, and you would not appreciate that.”
Rex glanced up, and froze. “Sarah, are you -” ze began.
“Pay attention!” cried Candy, rushing in from another side. “Don’t let a minor defeat get you down! We can take this man!”
This was the first time Sarah had seen the king look fazed at all. He whirled to face the oncoming princess. “Candy, what are you doing here?”
Candy grinned. “Beating your sorry ass,” she replied, cheerful as ever. “I was getting tired of that tower. It was so drab! Seriously, you’ve got to get some colour in there, Jamal. Damp stone doesn’t go well with anything!”
The king lazily stepped forward, and a tongue of fire licked where he had been standing. “And Shell as well, I should have known.”
“I’ll roast you like a pig!” Shell roared, rearing to deliver a fiery blast.
“Watch out!” called Rex, but it was too late. A short, trim man darted through the back door that everyone had so far ignored, pulled himself Shell’s neck, and kissed the dragon on the side of his mouth.
“Did he just -” began Rex.
“I think that must be Robin,” Sarah murmured.
Jamal stood his ground, gazing up at the doubly enraged dragon. “You bastard!” Shell roared louder than ever, and Sarah wondered for a moment why he had not yet roasted the king where he stood, grinning smugly at the world. And then she saw that the dragon was shrinking, pulling in on himself. The scales slowly merged, grew flesh-coloured, and before much time at all had passed Shell was completely human - and somehow, miraculously, clothed.
He swung at Robin, who had not been ready and took the full blow to the side of the head, going down. “Don’t kill him yet!” Rex protested, but ze needn’t have bothered; the enraged ex-dragon was now advancing on the king.
Circled by three potential attackers, Jamal did not bat an eyelid. “Must it all end in violence?” he asked.
“It could end in surrender,” Rex offered.
“Yours or mine?” King Jamal asked with a smile.
“There’s no way you can beat us all,” snarled Shell, sounding for all as if he still had scales and wings. Sarah, watching from her vantage point above, wouldn’t have been surprised if he could still breathe fire after all.
But Jamal continued to smile. “Care to find out?” he offered. There was a tense moment of no motion, and then Jamal crumpled. Behind him, Rex held out the book ze’d thrown earlier.
“Give back my tea, you bastard,” ze hissed, well on the way to sounding at least a little like Shell.
They tied up the two unconscious villains, and Sarah and Shell guarded them as Rex and Candy ventured deeper into the castle to find what had become of the stolen tea, as well as a few other things that Candy hinted she might need. Sarah wisely didn’t ask.
“So what’s the deal with ‘Princess’ Robin anyway?” the sorcerer asked after a while. Shell didn’t seem too angry at this point - victory will turn even the sourest of dispositions at least temporarily milder.
He snorted again. “Jamal had this guy up in drag in case someone decided to kidnap Candy. As if anyone would want to kidnap that psycho bitch. But he neglected to mention that to me.”
“So you thought Robin was a girl…” Sarah began.
“Hell no,” Shell snapped. “I don’t do women. I thought he was fucking gay. Big shocker there, really. And so then when Jamal decided to lock Candy up to keep her from inferring with his evil plans or whatever, he has Robin exercise his ‘feminine wiles’ to trap me and put me in a better form to guard an imprisoned princess.” He spat on the ground next to the unconscious Robin. “I called him on his bullshit, though. Told him I knew he was a man from the start. That didn’t work like I thought it would.”
“Masculine wiles?” Sarah asked sympathetically.
“Yeah. Sneaky bastard.”
“I’ll slap him for you, when he wakes up,” she offered. “He deserves it.”
“Damn right he deserves it,” Shell agreed. “I’d appreciate that, since I’m apparently going to have to wait to kill him until after Rex gets the prize money.”
Sarah considered this. “When you say ‘kill’, do you actually mean you’re going to kill him?” she asked. “Because, I mean, it doesn’t sound like you want to kill him. It sounds more like you want to want to kill him.”
“You magic people make no sense,” Shell told her evasively.
In the end, Rex got hir reward for ‘saving the princess’ - apparently offered by some lady named Esperanza who had an interest in seeing Robin humiliated. The prince, now having restocked hir tea collection and purchased the kingdom’s first hammer dulcimer, invited the now slightly homeless Shell and Candy live with hir in the horrendously messy castle ze called home. Candy had it spruced up in three seconds flat.
The Dread Sorcerer Sarah took up residence in the city, and eventually was given the position of Royal Biologist, which she preferred immensely to Dread Sorcerer. Often she could be found carefully explaining things like genetics and evolution to a fascinated crowd of people who didn’t understand a thing she was saying. But she was still technically a sorcerer, so that was all right.
Robin never actually ended up being released - he and Shell apparently came to some agreement or another, and after a while they stopped trying to kill each other daily. Even so, Rex eventually followed through on hir threats to lock the two of them up until the learned to get along. Unfortunately for Sarah, who had a room nearby, it worked.
But more or less, they all lived happily ever after. Even Jamal, bastard extraordinaire, carried out a gleeful existence mocking Robin from his dungeon cell.
The End.
Title: Here There Be Dragons
Wordcount: 4,099
A/N: This one was a monster. Is a monster. I absolutely love Shell, too.
--
Prince Rex the Reasonable knocked hir knuckles against the very solid stone of the tower. "You say that the princess is definitely in here?" ze asked of the sorcerer nearby, who nodded emphatically.
"Definitely," the Dread Sorcerer Sarah replied in a voice that did not sound definite at all.
"It's only that you said that about all the others."
Sarah winced. Truth be told, she was not the right sort of sorcerer for the job. She knew nothing at all about quests and princesses and such beyond the fact that other people went on and saved them, not necessarily respectively. But her forte was in biology and genetics, two subjects which unfortunately were rather difficult to research at this point in time. She would have told Rex, really she would have - after all, ze could hardly be faulted for coming to the wrong source, for most hermits had exactly the kind of help available that ze needed - but, well, there was just something about the prince that made her want to try. Maybe it was the fact that Prince Rex was the only person in the whole world who actually made sense or stopped to think about things. But none of this helped Sarah to be any use at all to the quest.
The worst part was that the prince didn't even seem to care. Ze would shrug and say that at least Sarah made for good conversation, which was little consolation to the sorcerer in question. Rex was not exactly the most conventional of princes, when it came down to one. Gender notwithstanding (and that had been a rather humbling conversation for Sarah), there was the matter of attitude and bearing. Most princes, having found a tower like this which should contain a princess, would have spouted something brave or romantic to address the inhabitants.
"Excuse me," Rex called politely, "but is anyone there?"
As far as Sarah knew, princes as a rule didn't politely inquire within.
There was no reply, and after a few minutes Rex sighed and turned back to Sarah. "Not that I don't appreciate your help," ze began, "but maybe we should try another method. Once that doesn't involve magic. Maybe the people of the nearby town will know something." Ze looked back up at the tower again, apparently deep in thought. Sarah, crestfallen, but unsurprised, sighed and took a few steps in the direction of the town.
All of a sudden she heard a great rushing of air, as if something very big had just launched itself into the air and winged it nearby. She could feel hot breath on the back of her neck. "Your Highness…" she began hesitantly, but then there was a great shaking of the ground, and she turned to see a dragon.
The dragon was huge, and easily could have wrapped his long torso and tail around the tower five or six times. He was a burnished dark brown, which struck the sorcerer odd - weren't dragons green? - and his eyes burned furious gold, though the shape put Sarah in mind of a cat. So did his way of moving as he crouched and lowered his head, obvious preparing to deliver a searing blast of flame and incinerate them both.
He spared not a glance for Sarah, who felt vaguely affronted. "Prince, I'm going to fucking destroy you!" the dragon roared.
Rex blinked. "Can we talk this over?" ze inquired, backing up until there was stone at hir back.
Confusion was apparent in the dragon's feline features. "You're not here to fight me?" he asked bemusedly, losing the ferocious act and seeming much less threatening all of a sudden. "But all the other royal bastards that turned up wanted to fight me and claim the princess."
"Princess?" asked Sarah.
"We're looking for a princess," Rex added. "But I really don't want to fight anyone. So can we maybe come to an agreement of some sort?"
The dragon appeared to think this over. "That's not how they told me to do it," he finally muttered. "But fuck them. I'm sick of working for that bastard, anyway. He comes over and mocks me. Me! And he's always drinking that damn -” The dragon's mouth worked, but no words emerged. "Eaaaarguh. Fuckall," he eventually managed. "That disgusting shit. That no one in the kingdom drinks anymore. He's got it all. He can have it, if you ask me. Annoying bastard. I hate his guts."
"So you'll let us have the princess?" Rex inquired hopefully.
With a fiery snort, the dragon shook his head. "No way in hell. I'm not letting her loose. I happen to like this kingdom intact. But I'll take her with me, and I guess I could take you two wherever you need to go. I could use a knight around." He stamped a decisive claw over a patch of burning grass, sending up a brief plume of smoke.
"Prince," Sarah corrected irritably. "And sorcerer."
"I hate magic," the dragon snarled with more anger than before.
"I don't like you much either," Sarah told him testily. "Live with it."
The dragon glared a smouldering glare, and then looked back up at the tower. "Princess!" he called with obvious trepidation, pushing a small section of wall out of the tower's base.
There was a crash within, and then a figure in blinding shades of blue and pink (dyes that shouldn't even exist, Sarah thought) came hurtling through the hole the dragon had created. "Daaaaaaarling, you did it!" she cried exuberantly, to Sarah's utter bemusement. The sorcerer glanced at the dragon, who grimaced with air of one who had suffered for far too long.
He could be human, she thought with surprise.
"Allow me to introduce myself?" asked Rex, displaying once again hir skill in making courteousness of gallantry. "Please." Ze glanced back at Sarah and the dragon, and set hir face. "I am Prince - ish - Rex of Eloria. I'm here with the Dread Sorcerer Sarah of Rocksfall, and we have just made an agreement with the dragon, er…"
"Shell," the dragon supplied. "Of none-of-your-damn-business."
"To travel together."
"They're gonna help us thrash that bastard who rules over Cynicide Valley," Shell added with no small amount of glee.
Sarah snapped to attention at that. "That wasn't part of the plan!" she yelled. "You said that you'd take us wherever we wanted to go!"
The dragon smiled cruelly. "Yes. And unless you enjoy being charbroiled, you want to go help to defeat the bastard. Plus, he's got all the whatsit, and your prince looks like the kind of person who drinks that shit."
Rex suddenly looked stricken, but didn't say anything, and the focus of the group quickly moved on.
"Oh, that's not nice at all!" exclaimed the princess, whacking Shell upside the head - an impressive feat, considering how much bigger his head was than her hand. "I am glad you talked dear Shell around, though," she told Sarah in a stage whisper. "He was so unhappy, being a guard."
Sarah decided that with the princess around, scathing remarks were slightly less likely to result in roast sorcerer. "What kind of a dragon is named Shell?" she asked.
"The kind about to set your fucking head on fire," Shell grumbled.
Rex, perhaps smelling actual danger behind the threat, intervened. "It is a strange name - for a dragon," ze commented. "Are you under a curse, or did your parents just have a strange taste in baby names?"
"Under a curse - sort of," muttered the dragon. "Not like it's any of your damn business."
"Is he ever!" added the princess. "And he's being ever so ridiculous about it, too. Some nonsense about his true love breaking the curse. I told him, he's not about to find a true love as he is. I mean, love is unconditional, sure, but he's not exactly going to pick up chicks looking like that!"
The dragon was blushing. Sarah hadn't known until just then that dragons could blush. "Shut it, Candy," growled Shell.
"I think technic'ly all it would take is a kiss!" the princess - Candy? - exclaimed. "And I, the Princess of Free Love, was more than willing to oblige. But no. He's got an aversion to me."
"You’re not kissing me," the dragon snapped. "Not you either," he told Sarah. Then there was a long, awkward pause as he and Rex surveyed each other uncomfortably.
"If it's all the same to you, I'd rather not," said the prince eventually. "No offense or anything."
"Good fucking thing," Shell replied. "None taken. Plus, then you lot would be out of a free ride." He directed a pointed glare toward the two females that said something along the lines of look, at least this fucker's a reasonable and polite guy! "Let's go, then. I don't wanna be here when the bastard finds out we're gone."
After some debate, they all clambered up onto Shell's back and the dragon took off into the afternoon sky, grumbling curses to passing zephyrs as he did so. Sarah was discovering a latent acrophobia, and buried her face in Princess Candy's back. The princess very kindly did not comment.
"What was your name again?" Rex asked her.
"Princess Candy of Cynicide Valley," the princess replied cheerfully. "Adopted princess, that is." She snickered for some reason unbeknownst to both prince and sorcerer. "You know, it's funny how these things work out. You're the first people to know that I existed ahead of time. Normally knights and princes come to fight the dragon and just hoped for the best."
Sarah winced - they hadn't exactly known about Candy.
"You know, I don't think you were the princess I was supposed to rescue," Rex said apologetically. "I suppose it's a moot point now, anyway. But it was a Princess… Starling?" Ze looked to the left, where a small flock was coasting. "Named after some sort of bird."
The dragon pulled up very abruptly; Sarah bit back a shriek and clutched at Candy's waist. "Robin?!" Shell demanded. "Were you looking for a Robin?!"
Rex nodded, as Sarah observed cautiously through one cracked eyelid. “That’s it. Not Starling. Robin.”
“That bastard?!” The dragon spat out an angry ball of flame. The scales beneath his passengers began to warm. “You’re damned lucky you got Candy instead. Especially if you’re supposed to marry the princess. Because he’s definitely not a princess.”
“I wasn’t,” Rex replied calmly. “There was a reward being offered for her - his - release.” The same dreamy expression crossed hir face as had when ze first explained the quest to Sarah. “I’m going to have a new type of musical instrument created with it. And everything left I’m going to spend importing more - of that stuff you don’t like.”
The dragon snorted again, though in apparent amusement. “Smart man,” he hissed.
“I’m not,” Rex told him. “I’m a very princely it.”
“You’re no prince,” Shell objected. “Way too bloody smart for that. I bet you could be a dragon if you wanted to.” He turned in the air, veering westward to follow some invisible air current. “But I meant, smart not to want to get married and own half of some kingdom. Especially if it meant marrying ‘Princess’ Robin. You’d be a damned idiot to do that.”
“Wasn’t he the one who -” began Candy.
“We’re here,” the dragon interrupted, descending rather more rapidly than was absolutely necessary. Sarah clenched both her eyes shut and held on ever more tightly to Candy’s waist. The princess patted he hand sympathetically. Fortunately, the speed of descent also ensured that very soon they were standing once more on the ground. Rex wrapped an arm around her on one side and Candy supported the other until Sarah could stand up properly again.
“I hate heights,” she muttered, not meeting anyone’s eyes.
“Oh, so do I,” replied Candy good-naturedly. “The first few days in the tower were terrible! But you get used to it.”
“I liked it,” Rex commented. Sarah for some strange could not find it in her to resent hir for this. It was difficult to resent hir for anything, really. Even if ze had a disgustingly blithe attitude about fatal altitudes. Rex probably would make a good dragon - and no one would be able to bring themselves to slay hir. Ze’d probably invite would-be attackers into hir cave and make them a cup of that drink.
It was at that point that Sarah was finally able to take in her surroundings. They were situated in a very green valley, surrounded on all sides by steep, rocky cliffs that tore at the sky above. Fog was beginning to collect on one side of the valley, snaking through the air little by little to claim the land beneath. Barely visible in the mist was a huge castle, situated over what looked to be a small lake.
“This valley is a volcanic crater,” Shell said with an almost wistful voice. “If not for the damn fog, you could see Eriksen Peak. It still erupts sometimes.” He didn’t appear to notice Candy’s look of distaste or Sarah’s sudden interest.
“We have a quest,” Rex reminded them.
They crossed the valley on foot, and then Shell swam them across the lake, swearing continuously under his breath at the temperature of the water. The castle was actually on a peninsula that reached in from an otherwise inaccessible side of the valley like a giant, earthen icicle. Dripping and shivering, the group of four stepped onto the grass at its tip and crept up to the castle itself.
“Now what?” Rex asked.
“You’re the ‘prince’,” Shell replied. “Go challenge him to single combat or something. Distract him. Then we can get behind him with a fucking chandelier, and then-”
“Wait,” cut in Candy. “What about Robin?”
Shell glared at her. “What about him?”
“Prince Rex needs to free him to get the reward,” Sarah said. “So we’ve got to let him out. You can probably roast him a bit after we collect the reward. I don’t think anyone would really mind, except maybe Robin. But, um, until then…”
The dragon sighed. “Gotcha,” he said. “Fine then. You can let him out. But be careful. He’s a tricky fucktard. He’ll mess with your head.”
Sarah was beginning to get an idea of what must have transpired at some point between the dragon and this Robin, and so she merely nodded, feeling a little more sympathetic than before. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
Much to the sorcerer’s surprise, Shell blew a blast of hot air at her. For a moment she thought she was on fire, and then it passed and she was unharmed. Shell eyed her warily, as if expecting her to explode or something.
“What did you do?” inquired Rex.
“She’s gotta have some sort of protection if she’s going up against that bastard,” Shell explained, lashing his tail a little. “Even if she’s just trying to get him out. It’s not much, because I’m only a fucking dragon after all, but it’ll get you through a few trouble spots. Your magic shit should do the rest.”
“Thank you,” Sarah said, surprised.
“Don’t fucking mention it,” growled the dragon. “Seriously, don’t.”
“Let’s go, then,” suggested Candy excitedly. “The culinmation of our quest is nearly at hand!”
“It’s culmination,” Sarah muttered under her breath.
The two females climbed over the wall instead of knocking at the door with Rex. Shell disappeared into the mist above, presumably to descend at the opportune moment - or so Sarah hoped. As she climbed, the sorcerer could hear Rex calling out a challenge in hir most formal tone - even refraining from adding a ‘please’ at the end. Ze’s learning, she thought with considerable relief.
The interior of the castle was well-lit and airy, lined with all sorts of interesting artifacts that any normal sorcerer would have been drawn to like a magnet. Sarah found no appeal in them whatsoever, and continued down the halls in search of a clue as to where she might discover an imprisoned ‘princess’.
Turning through an archway, she found herself on a balcony overlooking the main courtyard, where Rex was standing opposite a tall, dark, crowned man. “You see,” he was saying, “you don’t want to fight me at all.”
“You took all the - the leaf brew!” the prince retorted, a more fierce tone that Sarah had ever expected to hear from hir lips. It was almost effective.
But the almost was key. The king - he had to be the king - smiled mockingly. “Tea,” he replied. “I have taken the tea. I have all the tea in the world - I even have sole command of the word itself. And you would be more than welcome to partake in it, if you left off this mad quest of yours.”
Caught between addiction and anticipation, the prince faltered for a moment. The king took this chance to strike, whipping his sword through the air and slashing a hole in Rex’s shirt. A thin spray of blood dotted the floor; Rex had been a little too late in leaping back.
Sarah was not a conventional sorcerer. She didn’t know any real war spells, or any of those that could turn a man into a pig or boil his blood or even give him awful stomach troubles. But she found herself growing angry at this man who dared to hurt her friend - and an angry sorcerer is dangerous, no matter how unconventional they may be.
She lashed out mentally, sending both Rex and the king to their knees. Rex managed to recover first, darting out of the way and obviously searching for a more effective weapon than the fencing blade ze carried. Hir eyes fell on a bookshelf at the same time as Sarah’s, as the king returned to his feet.
“Where are you going now?” the king asked, chuckling. The chuckle died as Rex flung a heavy tome with surprising accuracy, narrowly missing as the king sidestepped.
Where are Candy and Shell? Sarah wondered, forgetting entirely that she had been meant to go find the ‘princess’. Noticing the king had been advancing upon Rex once more, Sarah tried her attack again. Once again, both prince and king were sent to the floor.
This time, the king looked up. “Ah, there you are,” he commented, and suddenly Sarah found herself suspended above the room. It wasn’t an uncomfortable sensation, aside from the fact that she was high up again and this was really not all right with her. The king smiled as if he knew exactly what he had just done. “Don’t try casting any more of your magic, sorcerer,” he advised. “It may distract me, and you would not appreciate that.”
Rex glanced up, and froze. “Sarah, are you -” ze began.
“Pay attention!” cried Candy, rushing in from another side. “Don’t let a minor defeat get you down! We can take this man!”
This was the first time Sarah had seen the king look fazed at all. He whirled to face the oncoming princess. “Candy, what are you doing here?”
Candy grinned. “Beating your sorry ass,” she replied, cheerful as ever. “I was getting tired of that tower. It was so drab! Seriously, you’ve got to get some colour in there, Jamal. Damp stone doesn’t go well with anything!”
The king lazily stepped forward, and a tongue of fire licked where he had been standing. “And Shell as well, I should have known.”
“I’ll roast you like a pig!” Shell roared, rearing to deliver a fiery blast.
“Watch out!” called Rex, but it was too late. A short, trim man darted through the back door that everyone had so far ignored, pulled himself Shell’s neck, and kissed the dragon on the side of his mouth.
“Did he just -” began Rex.
“I think that must be Robin,” Sarah murmured.
Jamal stood his ground, gazing up at the doubly enraged dragon. “You bastard!” Shell roared louder than ever, and Sarah wondered for a moment why he had not yet roasted the king where he stood, grinning smugly at the world. And then she saw that the dragon was shrinking, pulling in on himself. The scales slowly merged, grew flesh-coloured, and before much time at all had passed Shell was completely human - and somehow, miraculously, clothed.
He swung at Robin, who had not been ready and took the full blow to the side of the head, going down. “Don’t kill him yet!” Rex protested, but ze needn’t have bothered; the enraged ex-dragon was now advancing on the king.
Circled by three potential attackers, Jamal did not bat an eyelid. “Must it all end in violence?” he asked.
“It could end in surrender,” Rex offered.
“Yours or mine?” King Jamal asked with a smile.
“There’s no way you can beat us all,” snarled Shell, sounding for all as if he still had scales and wings. Sarah, watching from her vantage point above, wouldn’t have been surprised if he could still breathe fire after all.
But Jamal continued to smile. “Care to find out?” he offered. There was a tense moment of no motion, and then Jamal crumpled. Behind him, Rex held out the book ze’d thrown earlier.
“Give back my tea, you bastard,” ze hissed, well on the way to sounding at least a little like Shell.
They tied up the two unconscious villains, and Sarah and Shell guarded them as Rex and Candy ventured deeper into the castle to find what had become of the stolen tea, as well as a few other things that Candy hinted she might need. Sarah wisely didn’t ask.
“So what’s the deal with ‘Princess’ Robin anyway?” the sorcerer asked after a while. Shell didn’t seem too angry at this point - victory will turn even the sourest of dispositions at least temporarily milder.
He snorted again. “Jamal had this guy up in drag in case someone decided to kidnap Candy. As if anyone would want to kidnap that psycho bitch. But he neglected to mention that to me.”
“So you thought Robin was a girl…” Sarah began.
“Hell no,” Shell snapped. “I don’t do women. I thought he was fucking gay. Big shocker there, really. And so then when Jamal decided to lock Candy up to keep her from inferring with his evil plans or whatever, he has Robin exercise his ‘feminine wiles’ to trap me and put me in a better form to guard an imprisoned princess.” He spat on the ground next to the unconscious Robin. “I called him on his bullshit, though. Told him I knew he was a man from the start. That didn’t work like I thought it would.”
“Masculine wiles?” Sarah asked sympathetically.
“Yeah. Sneaky bastard.”
“I’ll slap him for you, when he wakes up,” she offered. “He deserves it.”
“Damn right he deserves it,” Shell agreed. “I’d appreciate that, since I’m apparently going to have to wait to kill him until after Rex gets the prize money.”
Sarah considered this. “When you say ‘kill’, do you actually mean you’re going to kill him?” she asked. “Because, I mean, it doesn’t sound like you want to kill him. It sounds more like you want to want to kill him.”
“You magic people make no sense,” Shell told her evasively.
In the end, Rex got hir reward for ‘saving the princess’ - apparently offered by some lady named Esperanza who had an interest in seeing Robin humiliated. The prince, now having restocked hir tea collection and purchased the kingdom’s first hammer dulcimer, invited the now slightly homeless Shell and Candy live with hir in the horrendously messy castle ze called home. Candy had it spruced up in three seconds flat.
The Dread Sorcerer Sarah took up residence in the city, and eventually was given the position of Royal Biologist, which she preferred immensely to Dread Sorcerer. Often she could be found carefully explaining things like genetics and evolution to a fascinated crowd of people who didn’t understand a thing she was saying. But she was still technically a sorcerer, so that was all right.
Robin never actually ended up being released - he and Shell apparently came to some agreement or another, and after a while they stopped trying to kill each other daily. Even so, Rex eventually followed through on hir threats to lock the two of them up until the learned to get along. Unfortunately for Sarah, who had a room nearby, it worked.
But more or less, they all lived happily ever after. Even Jamal, bastard extraordinaire, carried out a gleeful existence mocking Robin from his dungeon cell.
The End.