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Eaglethorpe Buxton and the Elven Princess – Chapter 17

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I must admit that I slept well, notwithstanding the fact that I was using a rock for my pillow, and I had no mattress but the bare ground, and I hadn’t even my own blanket to keep warm. I slept well. I slept well until just before dawn, when suddenly, which is to say all of a sudden and without warning, I felt the weight of several bodies fall upon me. I struggled and threw one or two punches that found their targets, but having been attacked in my sleep and no doubt lulled into a state of drowsiness by elven magic, it was inevitable that I was overpowered. They took me captive, which is to say they tied my hands behind my back, gagged me, and put a sack over my head. Then they hobbled my legs with a piece of rope so that I could take only the most mincing of steps.

I heard some shouting and I thought I recognized Jholiera’s voice, but with the bag over my head it was impossible to make out what was being said. Once I thought I heard her demand my release, but I wasn’t released. I wasn’t sure who had attacked me, but I was relatively sure that it wasn’t goblins. Oh to be sure, goblins are thick in those parts. But had goblins come upon a sleeping man, they would have sliced his throat rather than taken him captive.

The point of something sharp jabbed me in the back. I didn’t know if it was a dagger or a sword or a pike or a javelin or a sharp stick, but the meaning behind it seemed clear enough to me. I was to go in the direction opposite from the side in which I was being jabbed, which is to say the back of me, so I should go forward. I did, but I didn’t go very fast, being hobbled as I was. Despite the fact that it had been my captors who had hobbled me, they didn’t seem to want to take that into consideration, for they kept jabbing me to hurry me up.

It is hard to judge time when your senses are deprived, which is to say your head is in a sack. But as I was marched along, enough light came in through the weave of the cloth that I could tell when dawn arrived and could more or less make out in which direction the sun was to be found as it move up and across the sky. We didn’t stop to break our fast, and we didn’t stop for elevenses, and we didn’t stop for lunch. When we didn’t stop for tea, I tried to protest by planting my feet on the ground and refusing to go on. The only effect that my protest had was an even fiercer jab with a dagger or a sword or a pike or a javelin or a sharp stick right below my left shoulder blade—fierce enough to draw blood. This, as you can imagine, didn’t make the walk any more fun at all.

Fortunately it was only a few more hours after that fierce jab when we arrived at our destination. I was jerked and pulled around until they had me right where they wanted me. Then my hood was pulled off, revealing to me three of my abductors. They were warriors, wearing shining armor. Their long golden hair and long pointed ears, as well as their stature, gave evidence to their obvious relation to my little half-orphan friend, who was at that moment nowhere to be found. The warriors removed my gag and hobble but kept my hands tied. Then they left me.

I looked around to find that I was in a small cave that had been turned into a prison with metal bars across its entrance. From the mouth of the cave I could see nothing but trees and forest. Inside the cave there was nothing but a ratty old blanket on the rough stone ground. You may think that it would be impossible to sleep under the circumstances, and ordinarily I might agree with you. But as I had been awakened in the middle of the night and cruelly marched almost an entire day, I was very tired and very sore and the wound in my back was beginning to sting. I suspected that without being cleaned it might gather an infection, especially in such a place as I now found myself in, full of noxious cave vapors.

When I woke, there was a small bowl of mush sitting just inside the bars. It was mildly humiliating to have to eat like a dog, since my hands were still tied behind my back, but I did it. I have learned on the few occasions that I have found myself behind bars that one should keep up one’s strength if possible. So if you are behind bars and you are given food, you should eat it. In the jails of Theen, I was lucky when I got a maggot-filled potato. In the prisons in Aerithraine I have eaten curds and stale bread. Food in Lyrrian prisons are a mixed bag, depending upon which city-state you find yourself. And woe be to him who is imprisoned in Thulla-Zor. I was once thrown in a tomb-like cell there and had to hunt for my own food—and you don’t want to know what it was. Imagine my surprise when I ate this bowl of mush then to find a delicious mix of unborn grains and dried fruits. So I ate. I sat down against the wall. I waited to see what would come.

The Two Dragons – Chapter 7 Excerpt

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As soon as Senta and the other three members of her group had approached the far left side of the courtyard, they had seen the small passage leading down into the darkness. It was about the same width as the typical human doorway, though only about five feet tall, which meant that all of them would have to stoop to enter. Senta would have gone right on in, had Bratihn not stopped her with a wave of his hand. He then stepped in the doorway first, bending down, and following the downward slope. Senta and then Vever and then Brown followed. They had gone no more than thirty feet from the doorway, when Bratihn stopped.

“We need a torch,” he said to Senta.

She reached into her tiny bag and pulled out an oil lantern. As she handed it to Bratihn, the cloth wick inside ignited, bathing the corridor in light. Bratihn took the lantern and continued on. He slid a bit on the sand that dusted the stone floor. Forty feet beyond, the narrow little corridor joined a much wider and higher one, which ran perpendicular to the first.

“I think our entryway here was a ventilation shaft. It probably had some kind of grating over it long ago.” Bratihn held up the lantern and looked left and right down the larger hallway. “This looks more like something someone would walk in. See those holes in the wall on either side? They’re evenly spaced. I’ll bet there was some kind of lighting there—oil lamps or sconces for wooden torches.”

“So which way do we go?” asked Senta.

“Left should take us out toward the front, so right should take us further back.”

“Right it is then.”

No longer needing to crouch, the four explorers were free to move more quickly. Only the darkness and their unfamiliarity with the oppressive passageway kept them to a slower pace. The air in the corridor was cool, dry, and odorless. After about one hundred twenty feet, the passage intersected another forming a tee. Bratihn held the lantern high over his head and looked down each of the three open passageways, but there seemed to be nothing to distinguish one from the others.

“Which way now?” asked Brown, peering over Vever’s shoulder.

“Right,” replied Bratihn.

“Why?”

“Orientation. When we leave, we can simply follow the left wall and it will take us right out.”

“Isn’t it time we headed back?” offered Brown.

Bratihn took out his pocket watch and held it in the lantern light. “We’ve only been gone ten minutes.”

“Come on. We’re wasting time,” said Senta.

“You heard the lady,” said Bratihn, turning to the right and stepping quickly but cautiously down the hall.

This hallway went about another hundred feet and then took a ninety-degree turn to the left. Sixty feet beyond the turn, it ended with an open doorway into a much larger chamber. The four of them examined the sides of the door. Here, like on the great gate in front of the fortress, were indications that there had once been hinges and some sort of lock, but whatever door had once barred the way was now long gone. The light spilling from the lantern spread out as they entered the room beyond the doorway, but it was a tiny drop in an ocean of darkness. The room was huge.

Twenty feet past the doorway, there was a large step downward. Twenty feet beyond that, there was another. Then another. To either side, stretching out into the distance, cut into the stone floor, were benches. Their surfaces had been worn smooth by years, maybe centuries, of use.

“This is an amphitheater,” said Bratihn.

Senta, who had never seen an amphitheater before, strained to make out what she could in the darkness.

“But why build an amphitheater underground?” wondered Vever. “Wouldn’t it be better outside, where you can see?”

“They must have had lighting—like in the corridor,” replied Bratihn. “Maybe whatever they were watching was better underground—some kind of secret rites.”

“Or perhaps they could see in the dark,” muttered Brown.

“How big do you suppose it is?” wondered Senta, still peering around.

“We can go down to the bottom and get an idea. We have to be careful not to get turned around though. We need to find our way back up this particular walkway.”

“When we get near the bottom, we can scratch a mark on the floor,” suggested Vever. “If no one else has anything, I have a pliers in my backpack that should do the trick.”

Senta put her arm over the shoulder of the little man and walked side by side with him, behind Bratihn, while Brown brought up the rear. They walked and then stepped down and walked and stepped down. The amphitheater seemed impossibly huge, and by the time they had reached the bottom, they had passed more than four hundred rows of seats. Vever set down his backpack and pulled out his pliers, using them to scrape an arrow, pointing back the direction in which they had come, on the floor. Senta meanwhile jumped down the last step into a vast expanse of sand that made up the floor of what must have been a mighty coliseum.

“What do you think? Gladiator fights, like in the time of Magnus the Great?”

“Could be,” said Bratihn. “I’m sure it wasn’t dinner theater.”

Suddenly a horrible cry rent the subterranean air. It echoed through the great chamber from somewhere across the darkness. It was impossible to tell from which direction, but it seemed clear that it was at their level and not along the top.

“Kafira Kristos!” said Vever. “What is that?”

The cry rang out again.

“I don’t know, but it can see us,” said Bratihn. “Get over here, girl.”

Eaglethorpe Buxton and the Elven Princess – Chapter 16 Excerpt

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Jholeira curled up in my blanket next to the fire and went to sleep without another word. I didn’t think this strange, but when she did not deign to speak to me the following morning I began to feel a little put off. I decided that if she wasn’t going to speak to me, then I wouldn’t speak to her either. We packed up and left our campsite in complete silence. By elevenses I was getting rather tired of the quiet. Over a brief meal of raisins and cheese I tried first to coax her and then to trick her into speaking. She would have none of it however and I eventually stopped trying.

The little path that we followed wound down through a series of small valleys, eventually coming to the stream. The trees grew thick on both sides of the stream and indeed on the far side there was a vast expanse of forest that is Elven Wood. The stream itself was no more than twenty feet wide and its broadest expanse and in those places where it widened out thus, it was only a few inches deep. Though the banks were icy, the water was clear and free flowing. Upon reaching it in late afternoon, we followed it southeast until, finding a narrow spot where the water deepened to several feet, I stopped to drink and look for fish.

The greatest skill I ever learned, with the single possible exception of story telling which is more of an art form than a skill, is that of guddling fish. Fish that have swum up the shallow part of a stream, will often take shelter under a rock or a ledge when they come to a deeper and slower moving part of a river. When they do, they become prey for the guddler. He reaches his hand under the ledge, knowing where a fish ought to be, and carefully locates the fish’s tail. Then he begins tickling the fish with his finger, tickling its tail, then tickling its belly, and finally tickling right under the gills. Then with a quick grasp, he pulls the fish from the water and tosses it up onto the shore, ready to be cleaned, cooked, and eaten. If the temperature of the water made the fish sluggish, you couldn’t tell it by the ones I found, though it didn’t do me any good sticking my arm in. I caught two lovely river trout that day, one which I cleaned and cooked over the fire for our supper, and the other which I kept captive by running a string through its gill, and tying one end to a sapling, and tossing the other end, attached to the fish, back in the water. This second fish we ate for breakfast.

It was late the following afternoon before we reached the intersection of the stream with the East Road. By this time I had resolved myself to the fact that my little orphan boy/girl was never going to speak to me again, but as we crossed the small bridge, which spanned the juxtaposition of the road and the stream, as bridges are wont to do, she at last broke her silence.

“We should spend the night on this side of the stream.”

“Why?”

“The forest is dangerous, especially at night.”

“I don’t care,” said I. “I’m not talking to you.”

“Yes you are,” she replied.

“No. I am not.”

“I was not talking to you, but now I am. But you are definitively talking to me.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Yes you are.”

“I’m not talking to you. I’m just telling you that I’m not talking to you.”

“That means that you are talking to me, because in order to tell a person something you have to talk to them.”

“No you don’t.”

“Now you are just being contrary,” said she.

“No I’m not.”

“Fine,” said she. “I don’t care whether you are talking to me or not…”

“Yes you do.”

“I don’t care whether you are talking to me or not and I don’t care whether you are being contrary or not. In either case we should spend the night on this side of the stream.”

“No we shouldn’t,” said I.

“No?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Because,” I explained.

“Well as long as your reasoning is sound,” said she.

“No it isn’t.”

We spent the night on the west side of the bridge, just at the edge of the trees on that side of the stream. By the time we made camp, it was too late for me to find any fish to guddle, so we ate dried beef and drank coffee for our supper. Jholeira curled up in the only blanket while I snuggled up in my coat and set my head upon a large flat rock to use as a pillow.

“Are you cold?” she asked.

“No.”

“I’m sorry I stopped talking to you. You have been a very great help to me and you didn’t have to and here I am wrapped up in your only blanket while you have nothing but your coat to keep you warm.”

“I have the fire. Besides, it is only fitting that you have the blanket, being an orphan or a girl or a princess or some combination of the three.”

I stayed awake quite late watching the stars and listening to Hysteria complain about her lack of oats. She should have been happy, as in that particular spot by the bridge there grew not only an abundance of grass but some early flowering szigimon, which any stable master can tell you is the very best horse feed in the world. Many times she has had to make due with busy grass, which is the least best horse feed in the world—not that it is bad for horses, but it does nothing more than give them something to chew on and doesn’t provide any real nourishment. You would think by now she would know when she had it good.

“What are you doing?” asked a small voice from the other side of the campfire.

“I’m pondering horse feed,” said I.

“Well, go to sleep.” It must have been some kind of elf magic, because no sooner had she said this than my eyes closed, seemingly of their own volition.

The Two Dragons – Chapter 6 Excerpt

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The landscape had changed as the altitude increased. Thick forests of redwood, maple, and aspens had given way to stunted cedar trees and large bushes sticking out from between massive and strangely square boulders stacked in odd piles here and there as though a giant had set them up like blocks and then kicked them over. The twelve members of the expedition moved easily enough on foot through the uneven terrain. Unlike the plains they had passed through the day before, which had been filled with great herds of horned triceratops, giant sauropods, and packs of vicious dinosaur predators, here there seemed to be little animal life. A single telmatosaurus, full grown but only fifteen feet long, wandered between bushes munching on conifer needles. Several long-nosed white-furred opossums were startled from their hiding places as the column of men and women passed by. A squat-bodied furry creature halfway between a bear and a dog barked at them from the top of a rock and then ran over the hill and out of site.

Radley Staff stopped to look back at the line of people following him and make sure that there were no stragglers. The formation remained tight, which was a miracle considering the diversity of the party members. Behind Staff was Amoz Croffut, a veteran soldier only recently retired from the militia, or the Colonial Guard as it was now officially known. He had already proven more than once on this trip that he could spot danger. Third was Senta, the tall, thin, blond, seventeen year old sorceress. Next came Taddeus Vever, sweating and puffing as he marched along on his short legs. Vever was a jeweler by trade, a sedentary job that gave him little time to exercise, so he was horribly out of shape. He didn’t complain though. Unlike Paxton Brown, who followed closely behind Vever and whose constant protests had long since worn thin. The man was supposed to be a scholar of lizzie behavior, and Staff had chosen him over several other naturalists for that reason. Now he was beginning to regret his decision. Behind him was the husband and wife duo of engineers, Ivo and Femke Kane. They looked at each other and smiled, apparently enjoying Brown’s discomfort. They were followed by Isaak Wissinger, the writer. Arriving from Freedonia two years before to join relatives, Wissinger had already published several well-known works of fiction and non-fiction. He was on this journey for his keen ear and understanding of language, though he spoke the hissing tongue of the lizzies less well than some of the others. He was followed by Lawrence Bratihn, the head of trade for Birmisia Colony, as well as the only person in Port Dechantagne besides Senta who had been in a lizzie city before. Occupying the tenth spot in line was Edin Buttermore. Buttermore was in much better shape than he had been when he arrived in Mallon. Now though, he was struggling under a pack filled with a good seventy pounds of photographic equipment. Pulling up the rear were Bertrand Werthimer and Woodrow Manring. Both were accomplished soldiers, though they like Croffut and Bratihn for that matter, no longer wore uniforms. All members of the party, excepting only Senta, wore khaki shirt and khaki trousers tucked into high boots. Senta wore black leather pants and a black and red leather corset that left her shoulders covered only by her long blond hair.

Staff let Croffut pass him and took up a spot beside the girl.

“I should have had you change into your khakis.”

“I didn’t bring any. Zurfina packed for me.”

“Black is too hot for a journey.”

“Do I look hot?”

“No. You look remarkably comfortable. But there is the question of camouflage. You stand out.”

“I’m supposed to stand out.”

“All right. Are your spells ready?”

She grinned at him. “You’ve worked with wizards in the navy, eh?”

“Yes.”

“I’m not a wizard. My spells are always ready.”

“Potent too, from what I understand. It’s been a couple of years since I’ve actually seen you do magic.”

“How is married life?” she asked, changing the subject. “I would think it would be hard being married to the governor.”

“It’s good. It’s a bit like being in the navy. If you don’t mind taking orders, it’s a good life.”

“Say there, Senta,” said Vever catching up to the other two. “Is it magic that you’re not exhausted like I am?”

“Yes, it’s magic,” replied Staff. “It’s the magic of youth. She has twice the energy that either of us has and half as much idea what to do with it.”

“It’s a shame,” said Vever, though he didn’t complete the proverb. “That youth is wasted on the young.”

“Would you like me to carry your pack for a while, Mr. Vever?” asked Senta.

“I would never allow a young lady…”

She patted Vever, who was a foot shorter than she was, twice on the top of his head and then grabbed the pack by one of the loops on the back and lifted it off his shoulders. Pointing downward and swirling around her index finger, she said “Uuthanum izesic.” She tossed the backpack into the air just above where she had pointed, and it plopped onto an invisible surface, three feet above the ground. Senta smiled and continued on, following Croffut who was none the wiser. The backpack and whatever transparent thing supported it followed five feet behind her.

Staff and Vever stopped walking and wondered at the hovering object. As they stood thus amazed, Paxton Brown rushed past them. Catching up with the invisible transport, he flung his own pack on top of Vever’s. Now both haversacks followed along in the air behind the girl.

“Do you think I could..?” asked Buttermore, puffing up beside them.

Eaglethorpe Buxton and the Elven Princess – Chapter 15

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The following morning found both Jholeira and me awake and refreshed. So we made an early start. It was not as early as Ellwood Cyrene who had left at the crack of dawn. However when I went down to the common room that morning, not only did I find that my friend had paid for breakfast for my elf girl and myself, but he had left a package for me as well. Wrapped in a large oiled cloth, were several pounds of dried beef, a wheel of yellow cheese, two or three pounds of raisins and a small cloth sack with a half dozen coins in it.

Ellwood Cyrene never seemed to be in need of money, despite the fact that he seldom took payment for his many acts of manly heroism. I have seen a bucket of gold coins gathered together by a town to pay the hero that saved them from the threat of a raging monster, only to have it politely refused by a smiling Ellwood Cyrene. I have seen him pass out coppers to every orphan in a six block radius of the inn in which he was staying. To be fair I have seen him plunder more than one baggage train, and on numerous occasions he has rifled through the pockets of a man he has just stabbed—but who hasn’t done that, when you get right down to it.

I was not able to procure any oats for my poor steed, which is to say Hysteria, but I did get a small bundle of dried hay to supplement the small amount of forage we were likely to find in that country in winter.

We set off on the East Road, but following the advice I had been given, we soon turned off to the north, following a cattle path that wandered over the hills and down into the valley. Our new path veered off from our previous course, but not enough that I thought we would lose our way. In fact at teatime, we stopped among a small copse of trees at the top of a hill. From this point we were able to look down to the south across a vast valley. True to Ellwood’s warning, a great battle was being fought. It was impossible to tell who the two sides were, as their banners at this distance were too difficult to read. All that was certain was that both sides were humans. I took some small pains to make sure that we weren’t spotted, but considering the distance and the chaos on the battlefield, I judged that there was little chance of it.

After journeying the remainder of the day, we made camp just off the path in a little hollow which had been formed by three massive boulders piled one atop of the other two. I can only imagine that some giant piled them up thus as there was no nearby mountain down which they might have slid to come to rest in such a fortuitous configuration, which is to say a pretty good shape.

“We should reach the edge of Elven Wood tomorrow,” I told my companion.

“Really? I don’t seem to recognize any landmarks.”

“Maybe when we get closer,” I offered. “How long since you’ve been home?”

“Six or seven years I would suppose.”

“That must be tough, being without your family for so long.”

“Yes.” She sighed. “And what about you? You’ve been without your family for quite a while now too.”

“What?”

“How long has it been?”

“How long has what been?”

“How long has it been since your family disappeared?”

“Oh. That. I really can’t say.”

“You know, I’ve been thinking.” Jholeira stood up and began to pace back and forth beside the campfire. “The purple drops on the floor, as I’ve already said, could be from the blueberry pie you were expecting.”

“Fiends!” said I.

“As far as Gervil’s knife being stuck in his bed is concerned, that could be an indicator of foul play or of nothing at all.”

“I see.”

“The floorboards being pried up however tells us something. Whoever the culprit or culprits were, they were looking for something hidden under the floor. Money maybe? Family jewels?”

“The unpublished manuscripts by the world famous Eaglethorpe Buxton,” I offered.

“I suppose that is conceivable,” said she. “What I don’t understand is the onions in the rafters. The only thing I can think of is that they were trying to ward off vampires.”

“Monsters!” said I. “But wait. Isn’t that supposed to be garlic?”

“Maybe they couldn’t find any. Or maybe they didn’t know the difference. Garlic looks a lot like an onion.”

“Oh, my family would know the difference,” said I. “My poor old father was a fine onion farmer. In fact one variety, the Winter Margram onion was named for him. My cousin Gervil wrote an epic poem about onions, though I was never able to memorize more than the first five hundred twelve lines.”

“Is that all?” she wondered.

“Tuki was Onion Queen three years running.”

“So it is possible that your family would have had onions around? Say, hanging from the rafters?”

“Only at harvest time.”

“Was it harvest time?”

“Was what harvest time?”

“Was it harvest time when your family disappeared?”

“It could have been.”

“So there really are no clues at all,” postulated the half-orphan.

“What about the tracks?” I asked. “What about the tracks that ended mysteriously after only fifty feet?”

“You said it was a stormy night. The rain probably washed the tracks away.”

“You’re right,” said I. “The next time it will be morning.”

“What do you mean next time?”

“Um, nothing.”

“You mean the next time your family gets kidnapped or the next time you tell about it?”

“Well…”

“Your family never was stolen at all!” She stood up with back straight and finger pointed accusingly. She looked quite intimidating. “You lied!”

“It’s wasn’t a lie,” I explained. “It was a story. Well, it was a first draft.”

The Two Dragons – Chapter 5 Excerpt

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Governor Staff’s office was huge. The ceiling was more than twenty feet high and the entire south wall was made up of large windows that looked out over the burgeoning city. The opposite wall was filled with two large world maps. One featured Sumir and the western hemisphere, while the other featured Mallon and the rest of the east. More than a few citizens of Port Dechantagne who had never seen it, referred to it as “the throne room”. It did not however have a throne. It had an oak desk the size of a small battleship, and next to that a globe so large that it took two people to turn it on its axis. Those who had been there knew better than to refer to it as a throne room. This was not the domain of a queen. This was the room of an empress.

The black leather clad wingback chair behind the desk was not just a nod to comfort. It was designed with comfort, the comfort of a woman wearing a fashionably large bustle, in mind. Iolanthe Staff seldom sat in it however, and almost never when she was interviewing anyone in her office, as she was now. She paced back and forth behind her desk, with her arms folded across her chest. The two men, seated in equally black, equally leather, and equally comfortable chairs across the desk from her, watched her uncomfortably. One wore the uniform of a merchant seaman.

“There is no doubt about it, Lieutenant Burke?” Iolanthe asked.

“None what-so-ever, I’m afraid. The Mistress of Brechbay was hit by a torpedo.”

“It looks as though you were correct, Wizard Bassington,” she said to the second man.

Smedley Bassington was dressed in a stiffly starched black suit. His froglike mouth smiled without any pleasure and his beady eyes stared back.

“The torpedo was launched from a submersible boat.”

“Whose?”

“You know whose. Freedonia has more than a hundred of them, and I would be surprised if a tenth of that number wasn’t prowling the shipping lanes between Mallontah and Birmisia.”

“Then what are we to do about it?”

“We must utilize the great equalizer—magic. Ships making the voyage from Greater Brechalon must have a protective ward to hide them from the Freedonians, and anyone else seeking to do them harm.” He paused and licked his wide lips. “Fortunately we have the world’s foremost expert at concealment magic.”

“Zurfina?”

He nodded.

“Shall I leave it to you to arrange it with her?”

He nodded again.

“Lieutenant Burke,” said Iolanthe, finally stopping her pacing. “Do you have a place to stay until your company’s next ship arrives?”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

“Then I’ll bid you good day.”

The officer stood up, bowed, and then exited the room. Bassington stood up as well. Iolanthe walked around the desk to stand face to face with him.

“Wizard Bassington, do you still feel that the Freedonians have a hold in Tsahloose?”

“I know they do.”

“Is my trade expedition in any serious danger?”

“I’ve given you my opinion on this matter before,” said the wizard. “Sending a dozen Brech citizens, however accomplished and resourceful they may be, hundreds of miles across uncharted territory and into the capital of a primitive, inhuman, and bloodthirsty empire was always, how did you put it—speculative. I call it bloody unsafe.”

“So you think I should call them back?”

“Absolutely not. There is a great deal of intelligence to be learned from such a trip. We both have high confidences in who we have sent into harm’s way, don’t we?” A smirk crossed his face from left to right. “You do have the fullest confidence in your latest bedmate, do you not?”

“Neither my husband’s abilities, nor his acumen are in question. I likewise have faith that those he has chosen for his team will all dutifully fill the roles to which they have been assigned. Can you say the same?”

“You mean my sorceress?”

“I mean your little girl.”

“Senta is practically a grown woman. She had already proven herself a steady soul when she helped rescue your brother years ago. She showed her power on her last trip to Mallontah. She can handle anything that should turn up. Besides, General Staff has indicated that he would take no other practitioners of the arts with him besides Senta, or possibly the steel dragon.

Iolanthe pinched the top of her nose.

“I ask a great deal of those I delegate any of my authority to,” she said. “I shall be asking the same of you. I need you to get that infernal machine running again.”

“As a matter of fact, I have a man coming in on the train from St. Ulixes who may be just whom I need to set the great machine to rights.”

“Can’t you just use your magic?”

Eaglethorpe Buxton and the Elven Princess – Chapter 14

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Ellwood had just returned when the husky innkeeper appeared in the common room and made an announcement. His announcement wasn’t loud and it needn’t have been. The room wasn’t that large and there weren’t that many people in it. I counted sixteen, ourselves included. There were the three of us, the innkeeper and serving wench, six men and two women who were obviously locals—farmers no doubt, a traveling tinker; a sell-sword, which is to say a mercenary, who from the looks of things had not been doing too well; and a darkly cloaked figure in the corner. Now one might expect a darkly cloaked figure in the corner to be the cause of potential mischief, but the truth is that I have hardly ever been in an inn or a pub or a taproom or a tavern or a bar or a saloon that didn’t have a darkly cloaked figure in the corner. Most of the time, they do nothing more than mind their own business. It’s only those few who end up in stories causing trouble, that the name of darkly cloaked corner lurkers everywhere becomes tarnished.

“We are privileged to have in our presence today,” said the innkeeper, “the world famous storyteller Eaglethorn Beltbuckle.”

Ellwood snorted into his recently filled cup. Was it his twelfth or thirteenth refill? I stood up.

“Eaglethorpe Buxton at your service.” I casually moved around the room to find the best spot for story telling, eventually settling on a stool near the fireplace. “And this is the story of the Queen of Aerithraine.”

“Oh God! Not her again!” shouted Ellwood. “Don’t you have any new material?”

The sellsword at the bar began to get up, whether in defense of the Queen or of my story-telling or just to make for the outhouse I don’t know, but a single steely look from Ellwood put him in his seat again. Apparently neither of them had any doubt whom was top dog.

“I shall recount the tale of how I sold my sword to get a poor but beautiful farm girl out of prison and then slew a werewolf using only this fork!” I triumphantly pulled the fork from my fork pocket.

Suddenly the darkly cloaked figure in the corner jumped to his feet. He swept aside his cloak to reveal black armor and a dozen long thin knifes on a bandolier across his chest. He began plucking the knives and launching them directly at Ellwood Cyrene, so quickly that seven were in flight at one time before the first met its destination. That destination was not, as had been intended, the torso of my friend, for Ellwood had jumped up at almost the same instant. With a quick flick of his wrist, he deflected the first two knives toward the wooden bar, where they stuck with loud thunks. He ducked to the side of the third and fourth knife, and then grabbed the fifth, sixth, and seventh right out of the air and sent them back at the cloaked figure. By this time the assailant had thrown two more knives, but Ellwood easily dodged them. One of them hit the wall just near my head. The other went into the fireplace causing a cloud of embers to float up into the air like fireflies. And then it was all over, for the three knives that my friend had returned to the would-be assassin had all found their marks—one in the man’s right hand, one in his chest, and one in his throat.

Everything was quiet for one moment, and then chaos erupted as the townsfolk and the traveling tinker rushed this way and that to get out of the way of a battle that was already over. In thirty seconds, the three of us, and the darkly cloaked dead body, were the only ones left in the room. Even the sellsword had fled.

“That’s better,” said Ellwood. “Everyone likes a werewolf story.”

I recounted my story of the farm girl and the werewolf, at least so far as I had revised it up to that time, to my friend and my half-orphan companion. I’m not going to tell it now, because I want to make some final editing before it sees print. You should always get a true story just right before you print it.

Afterwards we made our way up to our rooms and I have to say that they were quite nice. I would have half a mind to write up a review for a travel company and give that particular inn three stars if only I could remember what the name of the little town was. In any case the rooms were very nice, all the more so since they were free to me. I made sure that my little elf princess was settled in and had the door locked before preparing for bed myself, and was just about to lie down when there was a knock at my door.

I pulled the portal open a crack to find Ellwood Cyrene. He leaned in very close to me. I could smell the ale on his breath.

“I have something to tell you,” he said.

“Yes?” I leaned closer only to better hear him.

“I’ll be gone when you wake Eaglethorpe,” said he. “Don’t continue on the East Road. There will be a battle fifteen miles east of here tomorrow. You will have to make a detour.”

“All right.”

“And Eaglethorpe?”

“Yes?”

“Be careful, won’t you?” He reached up his hand and brushed aside a strand of hair from my forehead. Then he turned and walked down the hallway to his room.

The Two Dragons- Chapter 4 Excerpt

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The S.S. Arrow left port only hours after the captain learned of the wrecked ship. The Ebon Forest unloaded its passengers and the shipwreck survivors that it had rescued, then refilled its coal hoppers and set out again the following morning to aid in the search. On board was an emergency team consisting of a doctor, several clerics, and two dozen volunteers. Mr. Radley Staff, who had planned and organized the team for just such an emergency, was in overall command of the rescue efforts. As the massive black ship slid across the calm waters of the bay, he could be seen standing on the deck. Next to him, dwarfing him, was the steel dragon, with gleaming scales reflecting the early summer morning sun.

Senta unhappily watched the ship going. Bessemer had only arrived home the day before and now he was already leaving. Though they had stayed up the entire night talking, the dragon had not had time enough to relay all of his adventures. The girl had certainly not had time enough to tell him about hers. It had been an unhappy few months, as it always was when she was separated from her steel-colored friend. She would have been on the ship with him if not for the fact that Zurfina, who seldom seemed to care what she did, had expressly forbidden her from doing so. Senta wondered about this as she idly rubbed her lower back where the dragon tattoo had appeared. Bessemer had agreed that it looked like him, though not as he was now. It was an image of him when he was not much bigger than a cat.

Senta heard her name called and turned to see Hero and her twin brother Hertzel running toward her.

“What are you guys doing here?”

“We’re with Honor, helping out at the governor’s warehouse,” said Hero. “We saw you over here and Hertzel wanted to say hello.”

Hertzel, who had never spoken a word as long as Senta had known him, raised his hand in a friendly wave.

“Hey Hertzel. You’re not working today?”

Hertzel shrugged, which Senta translated in her head to, “I was going to, but the ship I was to work on went back out to sea.”

“So what’s going on in the governor’s warehouse then?”

“That’s where they have the people from the shipwreck. They’re getting everyone identified and finding places for them. That’s not easy when they arrived at the same time as four thousand people from Freedonia.”

“I suspect they’re getting special treatment because they’re Kafirites, don’t you?” Senta said, voicing an opinion that would never have come out of the mouths of the twins, regardless of whether it had residence in their heads.

“They’ve been through an awful hardship,” said Hero. “Honor brought tea and cakes for them.”

“Your sister is pretty special,” said Senta. “You would think that Aalwijn Finkler would have brought some tea and cakes. He owns three cafes.”

The twins turned to look behind them and watched as Aalwijn Finkler in a fine new grey suit walked into the warehouse. He carried nothing with him. The three young people looked at each other and then walked down the short block to enter the building after the restaurateur. The large warehouse was filled with cots, though none were at present occupied by people. Rather, people wandered around the room in groups and pairs, those obviously from the ship making connection with those obviously from the colony. Aalwijn was speaking to a handsome man of middle height with a slight paunch in his stomach not quite covered up by a nice black pinstriped suit, now that it was wrinkled from long exposure to seawater. He had thinning blond hair and a happy though tired face.

“Here come some of your future diners now,” said Aalwijn. “This is my new chef come all the way from Greater Brechalon.”

“How do you do?” The man held out his left hand to Hertzel, and both girls could see that this was because he had no right arm below the elbow.

“Kafira’s tit!” shouted Senta, causing dozens of people around her to stare, open-mouthed. “I know you! You used to work at Café Carlo.”

“Yes. I did.”

“You’re Gyula. You were a line cook.”

“That’s right, Gyula Kearn. Do I know you?”

“I’m Senta.”

Gyula looked no more enlightened than he had been a moment before.

“I used to sweep the sidewalk and polish the brass dragon.”

“Oh yes, Carlo always had the local children doing odd jobs. It was his way of helping out, Kafira bless him. We had quite a few kids in and out of the café over the course of the years. I’m afraid I don’t remember any of them very well. They just sort of blend together in my memory.”

“You used to make me a sandwich, when Carlo said it was okay.” Senta’s voice sounded abnormally high in her own ears.

“That I did. Carlo had a soft spot for children, though he didn’t let it show. He would always have me load them up with food. I suppose that’s why he had me working there too. Who else would have hired a one-handed line cook?”

“Well, I hired a one-handed chef, and I expect great things from him,” said Aalwijn. “And I dare say if you don’t remember Senta now, you will soon not be able to forget her.”

Eaglethorpe Buxton and the Elven Princess – Chapter 13

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Princess Jholeira and I, and of course Hysteria, made our way east, following the road which is called the East Road, which is only appropriate, as it goes east… and it is a road. I had pretty much accepted that the girl thought she was a princess. She was convincing enough as she told me of life growing up among the royalty of the elven wood. I listened to her descriptions, because you can never have too much local color to throw into a story, but I didn’t commit much to memory as far as the events of her life were concerned. There just wasn’t much of a plot there. But to return to the point, generally speaking, if someone thinks they are a princess, I have found that it doesn’t much matter whether anyone else thinks they are or not.

At teatime we stopped and I made a fire, brewing some coffee and whipping up a pan full of biscuits. These were not like biscuits in Aerithraine. There biscuits are crunchy little sweet things—what my poor old father called “cookies” though you bake them instead of cooking them. These were what they call biscuits in Lyrria—something in the sort of a soft scone made with flour, salt, and animal lard. If we had only had a bit of honey they would have been quite good, but alas I had no honey. They filled us up though and both Jholeira and I were glad for them. Hysteria didn’t think very much of them though and she was mopey again for the rest of the day.

We traveled until dark was starting to settle. I had just decided that it was time to look for a campsite when my little orphan princess spotted the lights of houses some distance away. We continued and arrived at a thorpe, which is to say a hamlet or a small village. It was very small too, having only a single inn and half a dozen farmhouses. The inside of the inn was warm and inviting. We were greeted at a large counter just inside, by a husky innkeeper with arms like tree trunks and hands like hams. He had thick whiskers on either side of his face and when he smiled he revealed that both front teeth were gone.

“What can I do for you?” he asked.

“We would like a room.”

“Two rooms,” said the girl. “And stabling for our horse.”

“Ixnay on the ootay oomsray,” said I. “I don’t have the money to pay for the one. I was hoping I might pay for it with my storytelling…”

“Is that the good-for-nothing no-count Eaglethorpe Buxton I see?” called a voice from the doorway beyond.

While the proprietor squinted at me as if to see if it truly were the good-for-nothing no-count Eaglethorpe Buxton in front of him and not a good-for-something mathematically fluent version, I turned to see my accuser. There in the doorway was my oldest and dearest friend—Ellwood Cyrene. He had a mug of ale in his hand and a smile on his face. He looked quite at home having left his armor and swords off as he relaxed, though I could see the two daggers he kept in his belt, the one he kept up his right sleeve, and the one inside his back collar, as well as his knife in his right boot and the throwing stars in his left.

“That cannot be Ellwood Cyrene,” said I, “walking around defenseless and drunk.”

He stepped forward and we embraced. It was a manly embrace. He held onto me a bit too long, but what of that? He was a bit tipsy no doubt. No one could ever doubt the manliness of Ellwood Cyrene.

“This is for two rooms and stabling,” said Ellwood, tossing the innkeeper a big gold coin. “No doubt Eaglethorpe will want to pay for his supper with story-telling.”

The proprietor’s face lit up. “It has been a long while since we’ve had a storyteller.”

“And it will continue to be a long while,” said Ellwood, punching me in a very manly way on the shoulder. “I said Eaglethorpe wanted to pay for his supper with story-telling. I didn’t say that he could. Come my friend, let me buy you a mug of the muddy liquid that passes for ale in these parts.”

And throwing his arm around my shoulder, in a very manly way, he led me into the common room of the inn. The orphan princess followed. We sat at a rough-hewn table and Ellwood waved for the serving wench. She was attractive, though not as plump as I like, and she didn’t have any of the buttons on her blouse undone, and it didn’t matter anyway because she had eyes only for Ellwood, who gave her a wink in return.

“Ale for my good friend,” he said. “And… when did you get a pet boy?”

“She’s a girl and an elf,” I whispered to him. “But I want to keep it quiet. You know how much trouble women can cause.”

He nodded sagely, and then smiled at the wench. “A glass of milk for this poor pathetic ragamuffin.”

Jholeira playfully stuck out her tongue at him and the serving wench let loose with a peel of musical laughter as she went to get our order. Ellwood bought round after round as we sat talking of our service in the Great Goblin War and about our many adventures together. At some point, when neither of us was paying attention, the wench brought us a loaf of bread and a joint of beef and we ate like kings.

We had almost finished our supper, when Ellwood left to answer nature’s call. I had gotten up several times by that point, but Ellwood is renowned for his large bladder. As he walked away, my little elf girl leaned over to me.

“Have you ever noticed what a pretty man your friend Ellwood is?”

“Yes. I mean no,” I answered. “Absolutely not. How, why, how would I notice something like that?”

The Dragon’s Choice – Preorder now at Barnes and Noble

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The Dragon’s Choice (Senta and the Steel Dragon Book 9) is available for preorder at Barnes and Noble for the nook.  It’s just $2.99

The dragons seemingly have returned to the world and are once again in vying for power. Bessemer the steel dragon is worshipped by the reptilian lizzies, while the evil Voindrazius tries to put together a pantheon that he will control. Zoantheria, the coral dragon, feels pulled in all directions. Wanted both by Bessemer and Voindrazius, she is called to a world she has never known, her mistress, the sorceress Senta Bly encouraging her to take up the mantle of goddess. Her heart, however, is pulling her in a different direction, toward the young viscount Augustus Dechantagne. Which will prove stronger– love or destiny? Both Senta and Augie have their own problems, hers with teaching her wayward eponymous daughter the ways of magic, and him dealing with the yoke of leadership and a headstrong mother. Meanwhile, far across the ocean, the Dechantagne girls are taking Brech City by storm. Will one of them land a prince?