Hugh Cook - The Wishstone and the Wonderworkers

A wonder it was indeed; such a wonder that one is tempted to suspect that Xter was supporting his activities through exercise of magic.

‘Hepatitis,’ said Chegory yet again, still unsure whether to believe Justina.

‘Dear Cheggy!’ said Justina. ‘Are you after employment as my parrot?’

‘No, no,’ said Chegory, glancing at the conjuror Odolo. ‘It’s just that — oh, look at Odolo!’

The conjuror had clapped his hands to his mouth, as if horror-struck by something he had just said. But he had said nothing!

‘I think he’s ill,’ said Chegory, alarmed and concerned for the health of the man who had that day befriended him.

Meanwhile, Xter was grimly marching forward. Why? Because of something Odolo had done? Or what? Aquitaine Varazchavardan was getting to his feet. Varazchavardan and Xter confronted each other, as if for battle.

Then the conjuror Odolo screamed like a virgin molested in her chamber by an incubus.

‘Odolo!’ said Chegory frantically, rising from the table as he said it. ‘He’s sick, he-’

‘It’s all right,’ said Justina, calmly abandoning her own seat. ‘We’ll take him somewhere quiet then-’

But whatever intervention of mercy she had contemplated came to nothing. For, before she could say another word, it happened. Great gouts of smoke and magniloquent flame burst from Odolo’s mouth. He vanished behind this incendiary confusion.

‘Good grief!’ said the Empress Justina. ‘Spontaneous combustion! The poor man’s caught fire! No, Cheggy! Stay back! You’ll get burnt as well!’

Chegory kicked and struggled but his Empress had him in a grip of iron. He could not get free.

‘He’s burning, he’s burning!’ sobbed Chegory.

‘I can see that,’ said Justina. ‘But what are we to do? Get burnt along with him?’

Every person who was even halfway sober was staring at the incendiary cloud which had replaced the conjuror. Even Xter and Varazchavardan were transfixed by the sight. Already huge gouts of smoke were beginning to agglomerate to form Something huge and writhing.

Then forth from the smoke and flames it burst. A dragon! A pellucid beast the size of an ox. An ethereal monster still wreathed in the slatternly smoke of its creation, its inner organs transparent, its diaphanous wings shimmering with rainbow. It flew heavenwards, crashed into a chandelier, lost its grip on the air and fell to the floor with a thump. It got to its feet. Shook itself. Raked the floor with claws fast-hardening to jacinth.

‘Well I never!’ said Justina, glorious with wine. ‘Odolo’s a weredragon! This is a new one on me! I’ve heard of werewolves and werepigs — even weremice and were-hampsters, come to that — but never a weredragon!’

‘Um, um,’ said Chegory, hunting desperately for words, ‘um, ah, why don’t we run?’

‘Odolo wouldn’t hurt us,’ said Justina calmly. ‘Not even as a dragon. He’s far too much of a personal friend.’ Chegory had too much pride to beg therefore did not beg to differ. Yet thought the fast-transforming dragon was making the voisinage decidedly unhealthy. Others thought likewise, for the Grand Hall was filled with wails of terror as guests and waiters alike fled screaming. Even Aquitaine Varazchavardan was retreating at the fastest pace which could be remotely conceived to be consonant with dignity, though Dolglin Chin Xter stood his ground.

The dragon was strengthening. Hardening. Its rainbow wings armouring themselves with opal. Its visionary body taking on mass, weight and obstinance. Its water-clear inner organs pulsed with red blood, assumed the hues of intestinal blue and kidney brown, and then a moment later were lost to sight beneath sheathing muscle, the muscle itself disappearing an eyeblink later as the imbricated transparency of scales became dull, obliviating ash. This ash hardened to the colours of flame which rippled as the dragon flexed its strength then roared.

Chegory and Justina were by then virtually alone in the Grand Hall. Justina cooed with wonder as she gazed upon the dragon. A magnifical beast it was, its body gleaming with a high lustre, its polished eyes flaring with flame and rainbow mixed. Then it roared. Gymnic firebursts cavalcaded from its mouth in a prodigious display of incendiarism. This was going too far.

‘Guards!’ shouted Chegory, meaning to command Justina’s men into battle.

But there were no guards left. All had fled, even the scimitarists appointed to watch over the Empress during the meal. A couple of discarded cork blocks was all that remained of their presence.

‘Oh my god!’ said Justina abruptly, reality displacing wonder from her voice. ‘There’s Odolo!’

There he was indeed. Odolo was cowering on the floor aneath a table. So he was not a weredragon after all! Instead, conjuror and dragon were two separate entities.

‘You!’ yelled the eldest of the pirates in the starvation cage. ‘Let us out, let us out!’

Chegory needed no further urging — for he was seized by inspiration. He wrested the key to the starvation cage from the imperial ape, slammed the key into the lock, wrenched it round and threw the door open. The pirates bolted instantly. The dragon outbreathed its fury as they fled, but its flamethrowing efforts fell short. Meanwhile Chegory grabbed the Empress Justina and dragged her into the cage closing the door behind them.

We see from this that young Chegory Guy was not destined to fight with dragons in the time-honoured heroic tradition, to win blood-bought glory or to slay a nightmare with but sword alone. No, his first thought was to seek shelter lest he and his lady be eaten. Unfortunately an over-consumption of alcohol had fuddled his wits, and he had yet to realise that iron bars will not protect against the dangers of incineration.

‘Vazzy!’ cried Justina. ‘He’ll be eaten!’

The imperial ape doubtless shared his mistress’s concern, for the animal was struggling against its bonds. Its specially weighted chair rocked as it threw itself to right then left. Then its leather ankle cuffs burst asunder and it was off, screaming in rage and fury as it fled through the nearest door.

‘Be very still,’ said Chegory to his Empress. ‘Be — be a rock.’

This was good advice. Nevertheless, it is to be regretted that in his panic young Chegory again was guilty of a lapse in etiquette, for he spoke his words not in Janjuladoola or even in Toxteth but in his native Dub. Whether the Empress Justina understood — or even heard what he said — is a moot point. For his words were virtually obliterated by the ear-shattering roar of a dragon in anger.

The fell monster was advancing on Dolglin Chin Xter, sorcerer of Yestron, the sole occupant of the Grand Hall who had refused to run from danger. Xter stood his ground. He was too sure of his skill and too experienced in disaster to be dismayed or agazed by a mere monster.

With bombastic wing-claps the fabricant of fire advanced upon the wonderworker. They clashed in a swirl of smoke, a cascade of colours. Chegory expected to see Chin Xter reduced in an instant to a smoking cinder or a blood-boltered raggage of trampled jelly. But when smoke and colour cleared away, there stood the wonderworker in triumph with the dragon, mortally wounded, writhing at his feet.

Xter’s triumph was short-lived, for, a moment later, the heroic slayer of dragons swayed on his feet then quietly fainted. The dying monster began to drag itself toward the comatose wonderworker. Chegory flung open the door of the starvation cage and hurled himself across the hall. He swooped on Xter, grabbed the sorcerer by the hair and hauled him clear of the scrabbling firebrute.

‘Bravo!’ cried the Empress Justina.

Chegory smiled in triumph then looked for a weapon with which he could finish off the dragon. But there was no such implement to hand. Never mind. Already someone had gone back into the Grand Hall. Who? The corpse master Uckermark — who dared venture close to the dragon even though indigo flames were outbreathing from its mouth. Chegory — and Chegory alone — saw the corpse master feed something to the dragon.