If she stayed awhile, maybe I could talk her into teaching me a little more magic. The roots and mental defenses were nice, but what I would really like to learn was how to hurl fireballs. Wizards did that in books, and it seemed terribly useful. Freysha, with her forest magic, might not be able to create flames, but maybe she could introduce me to a helpful pyromaniac elf who owed her a favor. I would be happy to pay for tutelage, but so far, I hadn’t found the elves any more interested in currency than dragons. Maybe, like the fae queen, they could be enticed by chocolate-covered caramels.
After making sure the new toe bone had survived the trip through the portal with me, I headed around to the back of the house and down the basement steps. Usually, Sindari’s charm bounced against my chest under my collarbones when I did that, and I noticed the lack. An uncomfortable feeling washed over me as I worried that Zav’s plan wouldn’t work and I would never see Sindari again.
I knocked on the door and was answered by two muffled shouts, the words “don’t come in!” being decipherable in the mix.
“Fine, but I’m leaving another gift-wrapped piece of bone stuck to your door.”
A rustling and a startled gasp came from the yard next door. Maybe I shouldn’t have called that quite so loudly. There were so many trees and bushes, in addition to a six-foot wooden fence, between the properties that I tended to forget that we were in an urban neighborhood and that sound carried.
Oh, well. If the rumors of the house being haunted hadn’t warned the neighbors to expect oddness from this corner lot, then the dragon-shaped topiaries out front, now complete with glowing eyes, were a big clue.
One moment, please, Freysha spoke politely into my mind. Zoltan is streaming a live recording.
Do you know what that is? I hadn’t noticed Freysha on my laptop, experiencing the fascinating vagaries of the internet, in the months she’d visited. She was much more inclined to study from ancient tomes in her room, peruse goblin-approved engineering texts for her class, or grow Jurassic foliage in the conservatory. Her class was online, however, so maybe she had learned about the joys of YouTube.
I am learning as I assist him, she replied.
This isn’t something for his raving groupies, is it?
What is a groupie?
The teenage girls who send him fan mail and want to know how to turn their high-school nemeses into frogs.
Freysha digested that for a moment before replying. I believe it is for them, yes. But this is a frog-free presentation. He is instructing his followers on formulas and tinctures that can be made using manzanita bark.
I got him that bark, you know. Tell him I expect a cut of his advertising revenue from the video.
I had no idea if there was advertising revenue, but since, as far as I knew, I was Zoltan’s only recurring client, he had to make money somewhere to buy ingredients.
You may enter now. Freysha didn’t comment on the rest.
When I opened the door and walked into the dark basement, I almost crashed into another door two feet in front of it. “Dimitri found time to build the light-lock, I see.”
Red light from Zoltan’s special lamps flowed through a crack under the interior door, so it wasn’t entirely airtight—light-tight. I closed the exterior door behind me before opening the next one.
In addition to the usual lab accoutrements, the magical anvil, Zoltan’s coffin, and his various cases of books and scrolls, a recording setup had been erected on a table. In front of a laptop camera, a cauldron smoldered over a Bunsen burner, votives burned in a pair of holders made from monkey skulls, and an array of colorful liquids in vials filled almost every remaining inch of space.
“You’re burning candles in monkey skulls, and you were squeamish about the bone I left taped to your door?” I asked.
“I ordered the skull candle holders from a catalog. They didn’t appear in a mysterious package on the door.” Zoltan, clad in a white suit, his dark hair impeccably combed back from his widow’s peak, adjusted his red bow tie. He usually wore suits, but the black cape trimmed with ermine fur wasn’t his typical basement wear.
“I left a note. How mysterious could it have been?” I headed toward Freysha, intending to give her a hug and welcome her back to Earth, but I paused and pointed at the cube of special red lights she was holding. “Have you been pressed into service as his lighting assistant? Can you even record videos by red light?”
“Certainly you can,” Zoltan said. “It’s perfect. The candles and the red lights create the ideal ambiance for an alchemist occasionally giving lectures on how to dabble in the dark arts.”
“You were teaching them to make wart remover.” Freysha balanced the light contraption on a shelf and came forward to hug me.
“I said there was occasional dark-art dabbling, not frequent. Practical alchemical solutions applicable to all are much more popular. They also don’t result in my videos being de-monetized and de-listed. Instructions on how to use alchemical formulas to slay or incapacitate people can have that result.”
“Weird.” I’d known there was advertising revenue. “Got something for you.”
I fished the bone out of my pocket and offered it to him. “Will you see if this is related to the other one? Not related, exactly, since it came from a flying skeleton instead of an invisible wraith, but from the same world. Shared DNA or whatever.”
Zoltan used his forefinger and thumb to pluck up the bone and carried it over to the station that held his microscope and a variety of magnifying glasses. I didn’t think he had a DNA sequencer over there, or that they were something that could fit in a basement, but maybe he had an alchemical alternative.
“It sounds like you’ve been in interesting places lately.” Freysha tilted her head, a pointed ear poking up through her blonde hair.
“Yeah, the artifacts room under Willard’s office.”
Her elegant eyebrows rose.
“Also the dwarven home world. Zav and I were trying to research my sword but didn’t make it far before eight undead, winged creatures waylaid us.” I summed up the brief adventure for her and told her about Sindari.
“Ah, that is unfortunate. And also explains rumors that we’ve been hearing about Dun Kroth. Just two days ago, our father sent a scouting party to investigate and find out why we’ve lost contact with the dwarven king.”
“I hope they don’t run into the flying things. We only defeated four before the others fled. How is our father? Recovered from his dragon-inflicted illness?”
“Yes.” Freysha smiled. “He has been telling people that you are getting married in the human way—which is deemed to be somewhat similar to the elven way and therefore acceptable—to a dragon.”
“He tells people about me?” I touched my chest. “I’d assumed that my assassin career made me an embarrassment. Along with the fact that I’m a half-human mongrel.”
Her smile shifted to a frown. “You should not use derogatory language to describe yourself. You are a strong warrior and have promise to one day be a decent magic user.”
“Still, he didn’t tell your mother about me, did he? I’m sure your people don’t approve of dalliances with human maidens.” I trusted my mother had qualified as a maiden back then. Or something close.