Lawrence Watt-Evans - The Spriggan Mirror

“That’s probably it,” the dragon said. “Because I definitely defeated the Seething Death, and it’s definitely powerful enough to destroy the World-but its very nature is that it’s a contagious lack of thingness. Interesting.” He glared down at Gresh. “And very fortunate for us all.”

That made sense to Gresh; after all, it sounded as if this Seething Death was a spell, rather than an object or entity, and despite its name, the Spell of the Revealed Power never revealed anything intangible or evanescent, but only solid things.

But even if it had somehow turned Tobas into the Seething Death, that might not have been so very dreadful. “I still think Javan’s Restorative would have worked,” Gresh said.

“I don’t,” Tobas the dragon replied. “But it should turn me back from this shape readily enough.”

“When we’re safely done with the mirror, yes.”

“Oh. Yes. But you should get on with it. I suspect that the longer I stay in this form the more dragonlike I’ll become, and that could be unfortunate if it goes too far. I can feel it already, I think. You look more and more like food every minute.”

“Yes, of course, I’ll hurry, but if you don’t mind, I must ask-what does it feel like, being a dragon?”

Tobas snorted another shower of sparks. “Tell me, Gresh, have you ever asked a woman what it felt like to be female?”

In fact he had, more or less, and the answers had never been any use. He saw what Tobas meant about the impossibility of conveying such an experience. Still, he could not resist pointing out, “She had never not been female; you haven’t always been a dragon.”

“That’s true, but about all I can tell you is that I feel big and strong and impatient. I believe I can fly if I try, and breathe flame, but I can’t begin to explain how I would do it.”

Gresh grimaced. “Big-yes, indeed! I’ve never seen a dragon so large! I wasn’t expecting it, even after what Karanissa told me. I’d thought she was exaggerating.”

Tobas snorted a little smoke. “Never saw one so large? How many wild dragons have you seen, then?”

“Wild ones? Well, I…” Gresh hesitated, on the verge of giving away one of his trade secrets, then just said, “None, really.”

“Well, no one lets them get this large in captivity, of course.” The dragon looked down at himself, then turned his head to look over his wings and tail. He cocked his head to one side, trying to judge his own dimensions against the trees and flowers. “This does look about the size of the one I killed.”

“It could talk?”

“What? No, it couldn’t. It hadn’t had anyone around to teach it, I suppose, but I’ve always heard that big dragons can learn to talk.”

“Who taught you, then?”

“Oh, don’t be stupid,” Tobas roared. “My father did, of course. I may have the shape of the dragon I slew, but I’m still Tobas of Telven. Now, can we get the mirror?”

“Right, right,” Gresh said, taking a final look up at the dragon before turning his attention back to the cave. “If you can chase away the spriggans, Karanissa and I ought to be able to get the mirror out.” He started walking and called back over his shoulder, “Don’t touch the carpet, you might tear it.”

“Good point,” the dragon said, detouring around the carpet and Alorria and Alris as he followed Gresh. Karanissa, too, marched after Gresh, back toward the cave.

The spriggans had gradually quieted during Gresh’s conversation with the dragon, many of them fleeing the area, but now that the dragon was moving they began to squeal and babble.

“Tobas!” Alorria called, as the dragon circled around the carpet. “Are you really in there?”

“I’m fine, Ali,” Tobas replied. “We’ll turn me back as soon as we have the mirror.”

That elicited a fresh chorus of yelps and shrieks from the spriggans still scattered across the meadow. “No take mirror!”

“Dragon no take mirror!”

“Not break mirror!

“Not eat mirror!”

“Oh, shut up, all of you,” Tobas growled, a wisp of smoke emerging with his words as he stalked across the meadow. “It’s my mirror, after all-you spriggans stole it from me, and I’ll take it back if I want to!”

That evoked wails and lamentations.

“Tobas?” Alorria called.

The dragon turned his head.

“Shall I get your clothes and try to repair them?” she asked.

Gresh and the dragon exchanged glances.

“That would be helpful, yes,” Tobas called.

“We can use Lirrim’s Rectification on them if she can’t fix them,” Gresh murmured.

“Just get on with it,” the dragon rumbled in reply.

Gresh hurried on across the meadow. About halfway he glanced back over his shoulder, and up, at the dragon. The size of the beast was astonishing. Equally astonishing was the fact that many of the spriggans still hadn’t fled. Oh, they were hurrying to stay out of the dragon’s path and giving it a respectful berth, but they were not all abandoning the area completely, as Gresh had hoped they would. The annoying little creatures were braver-or stupider-than he had expected.

Then he reached the rocks and waited for Karanissa to join him.

“Gresh,” she said, as she stepped up beside him. “I don’t really see how Tobas being a dragon is going to help us. Yes, he’s scared away some of the spriggans, but he can’t very well scare them out of the cave, and that’s where the mirror is. If anything, more of them will hide in there to get away from the dragon. They’ll still weigh the mirror down so that I can’t levitate it.”

Gresh did not answer her immediately. He had hoped the mere presence of a dragon would send every spriggan in the vicinity fleeing over the horizon, but now that that had failed to happen she had a point.

Gresh was not about to let that stop him, though. He had a dragon helping him, and in the present situation that was almost certainly an improvement over a wizard. “Tobas,” he called, “can you breathe a little fire into that cave there? Not too much-I don’t think we want to melt the mirror at this point, not until we’ve had a look at it.”

“I don’t know if I can melt it,” Tobas said, as he lowered his head until his scaled cheek was just inches from Gresh’s own. He had to crane his eight-foot neck awkwardly to bring his eyes down that far. “Dragonfire isn’t really as hot as you might think.” He looked at the rocks, then asked, “What cave?”

“Here,” Gresh said, pointing. “It’s too small for a human-that’s why I can’t just climb in and get the mirror. Spriggans pop in and out easily, but we can’t.”

“I can barely…” Tobas began, but he didn’t finish the sentence. Instead he cocked one eye toward the opening. “Oh, I see it.” He lifted his head a little. “Stand back.”

Gresh and Karanissa quickly stepped back.

The dragon spat a gout of flame into the crack in the rocks. Spriggans screamed wildly from the cave. Gresh shied away from the heat, but tried to see into the opening before the glow faded.

Bits of dried grass and other debris had caught fire. He bent down to the opening and shaded his eyes, peering in.

The mirror still lay unharmed on the cave floor, and dozens of spriggans were still scattered about, many of them staring back at him. A few were sooty, but none appeared to have been harmed by the flames.

Well, after all, they were reportedly invulnerable; why would dragonfire hurt them?

“It didn’t work,” Gresh reported.

“Well, here,” Tobas said. “If the problem is that you can’t get into that little cave, I can fix that!” He stalked forward again, but this time kept his head up and raised a foreclaw, and curled it into a fist the size of a boulder. Then he flexed it and formed the claws into a flat plane.