AN – I know the last chapter was kinda short, It will get better, and longer, don't worry. I now have, drum roll please, proofreaders! Joy! As always R&R please.
Disclaimer – Voldemort is owned by J.K. Rowling, the Enchanted Forest and everything that goes with it is owned by Patricia C. Wrede, Foamy the squirrel is owned by Jonathan Ian Mathers and you can catch his hilariousness flash cartoon at You know what that means. Yep. It means I own didly shit. Nothing at all. I'm sitting in a cardboard box right now, as a matter of fact. I don't own it either, but Wal-Mart doesn't need it. Don't sue me.
And so the story continues...
I turned to Belinda, still lying on the ground. "We made it! We're safe." I said, crawling over to where she lay on her side. "Well, as safe as anyone is inside the Enchanted Forest." I took her shoulder in my hand and rolled her over. "Did you hear me, Belinda? We made it..." words died away when I saw her face. Mouth slightly open as if in protest, eyes still wide, staring at nothing. She was dead.
Consulting with Dragons
Chapter 2
In which Gar meets a rude squirrel, a fire witch, and rescues a wizard from almost certain doom
"O.K." I thought to myself, "Now what?"
I reached a shaky hand out and closed Belinda's eyes. I'd seen death before. I'd just never seen murder. My mind threw up question after question in a whirlwind as I stared at my only clue as to what had just happened, replaying the events that had lead me here.
"Run you fool boy! I'm not important. You! Are!" she hissed into my ear.
Why was I so important? I was just a simple farmer!
"And the prophecy?" I asked
"That is why she must die." said a cold voice from behind us.
What prophecy? Why kill Belinda?
He was tall, skeletally thin wearing a billowing black cloak of some light material. His skin was bone white, giving his hairless head a skull like appearance. His eyes were red and his nose was flat as a snakes with slits for nostrils. He exuded Evil with a capital "E".
Who was that freak show? And now that I was in the Enchanted Forest, what was I supposed to do?
"We need to see King Daystar."
Right. A farm boy from outside his kingdom is just gonna walk up to the king of Enchanted Forest and start asking questions. Sure. That'll happen. I looked around for rocks I might be able to use to make a cairn. Nothing but thick moss. I sighed. Well, nothing more I can do here. Not like I brought a shovel with me. I started to get up.
"Are you just going to leave her there? What are you, fuckin' stupid?" said a high pitched, somewhat rushed voice from behind me. I spun around as I stood, sword leaping into my hands. It was instinct.
I saw a squirrel up in a tree. Only a squirrel. No one else seemed to be their. I had drawn my sword on a squirrel! What the hell!
"You better put that away, dumbass. Before you hurt yourself." the squirrel said.
I was so surprised I nearly dropped the sword. Instead I lowered it from my on guard position. "You can talk!" I said in amazement.
"Yeah! I can talk. Woop-dee-fuckin'-do. Thank you captain obvious." it said sarcastically as it rolled it's eyes. "Can you tell me somethin', moron. Where does a farmer get a sword like that from. What, didja rob someone."
I did not like the squirrel. It was rude. I glanced at the sword, and immediately did a double take. This was the first chance I'd had to inspect the sword since Belinda had thrown it at me. It was a work of art.
The blade was long and straight, edged on both sides. The flat of the blade had a fuller running most of its length, and had runes etched into it. The edge seemed incredibly sharp, and the metal gleamed too brightly to be a normal sword. The crosspiece curved slightly upward, and was made of silver. The handle was wire wound and black leather wrapped, and the silver pommel was almost an extension of the handle, ending in an obsidian stone.
"Hey jerk. You gonna stare at it all day, or you gonna put it away and drag that body off my property." the squirrel said hotly, throwing an acorn at my head.
"Knock it off squirrel!" I pointed my sword at him threateningly. That had hurt.
"Ooh, balls finally drop did they." the squirrel quipped at me. "And I have a name, dipshit."
"And what might that be, bozo." I seethed.
"Foamy. Now get that body off my lawn or I'll shove this acorn so far up your ass it'll pop out your eye socket.." it said.
I growled deep in my throat, but decided that killing one of the kings, I suppose the word "subjects" would work, was not the way to get on the kings good side. Regretfully, I sheathed my sword. I turned on my heal, adjusted my bow, and hoisted Belinda onto my shoulder again, then began trudging away from the foulmouthed Squirrel.
"Thats right jackass, get moving." the squirrel taunted, pelting my retreating back with acorns.
Today was turning into a bad day indeed.
I carried Belinda's body for most of the day, afraid to put it down in case it attracted more squirrels. I wandered around aimlessly until I came to a small hut in a clearing. It was made out of mismatching plates of various types of metal that were haphazardly bolted together to form the odd little structure. Smoke seemed to be issuing from the chimney, so I knew someone had to be home. After the squirrel earlier, I didn't really want to meet the occupant, but I couldn't just carry a corpse around all day.
I walked up to the hut, adjusted Belinda's body so that it had an arm over my shoulders and I had an arm around it's side to better balance it, and rung the doorbell. The tune was unfamiliar.
La-la-laa-laa-laa-la-la-laa-laa-laa-la
"Whoa, dude, just a minute, man." drawled a deep, rather unhurried voice from inside the hut. A second later the door opened to reveal a slim man with bright red hair. He wore a black shirt with some sort of leaf on it that read I Got Glaucoma. "Sweet, you brought a chick to the party. C'mon in man." He said, still utterly unhurried. I realized that slow way of talking must just be the way he always spoke.
"Thanks. My name is Gar." I said, offering my free hand.
"Nice to meet ya, man. My name is Leo. Want a toke of my smoke dude?" he asked, offering me a hand wrapped cigarette.
"Uh, no thanks... man. I, um, just need to find some place to put her.." I shifted Belinda's body, "and some directions."
"S'cool man." he turned his attention to Belinda's corpse, "You can sit on the couch with me babe. Where you from?"
"Um, she's dead Leo."
"Oh. S'all right. I been dead tired too, man. She can rest up on the couch. Yeah." he said, leading the way into his home.
"but, Leo.." I began.
"Nah, man. It's all good." Leo said. I decided I was dealing with a strange man indeed. The house had numerous scorch marks on it's metallic walls, and the whole place seemed filthy and sloppy.
As I lay Belinda's body on the couch, Leo pulled out what looked like a lamp, but filled with water, and started inhaling smoke from it.
"What are you doing?" I asked bewildered.
"It's the 20th day of the 4th month, dude."Leo said, offering me the smoking vessel. "Take a hit man, it's great." he finished with a lazy smile. I decided the smoke must have some sort of stupefying affect on people.
"Uh... no thanks. Why do you smoke that?"I pointed at the, thing.
"Hookah, man. It keeps me calm." he replied, taking another "hit"
"Can't you just, I don't know, play golf or something?"
"Not me, man. I'm a fire witch." he smiled lazily again. I had heard of fire witches. The Queen of the Enchanted Forest was a fire witch. They were supposed to have hair trigger tempers, and when they got angry weird things happened. I looked at the scorch marks on the walls. They were about head hight on Leo. Perhaps it was a good thing he liked to be "calm".
"Wow. I never met a fire witch before." I said, looking at Leo again.
"Yeah, man. We're kinda rare." he took another hit, and actually started giggling."We have all kinda perks."
"Like what?" I asked, looking at his shambled home. Other than the couch, everything was covered in junk. Dishes, clothes, remains of food. It was really quite a pig sty.
"Like being immune to most kinds of magic. Immune to fire,. And having our own brand of magic that no one else can do, man. The immunity to fire comes in real nice."
With that his hair burst into flames, not seeming to harm him one bit. I hadn't been prepared for this. The second it happened I had jumped over the couch in surprise. He laughed at me, and stuck a marshmallow on the end of a toothpick, putting it in his hair for a second before eating it. The hair went out as abruptly as it went up.
"Right. Well then." I said, trying to get a hold of the situation. "Look, Leo, do you have a shovel I could use?"
"Why, man. You gonna do some gardening? I already got all the plants we need, man"
"Not exactly. I need to bury Belinda."
"Dude. That's a wicked joke man." Leo started laughing. I looked at him quizzically.
"Joke?"
Yeah, man." Leo said, wiping a tear from his glassy eyes. " burying her while she's sleeping, man. Talk about a bad trip!"
"Right." I drew the word out for a second. This guy was something else. "Well, do you have a shovel, Leo?" I asked again.
"I dunno man. I got lots of stuff here. Not sure if I got a shovel." he almost seemed eager to be "in" on the joke.
I looked around the room. Digging through this mess would be a major undertaking. Belinda deserved my, at least, making an effort. She had, after all, died for me. I started rooting through the sty he called home.
"Leo, what's this?" I asked, holding up a ball with a face drawn on it.
"Thats Bob, man. He's my best friend." He smiled warmly at the ball. "What's up Bob. Where you been man."
"It's just a..."
"Oh, that's cool, man. I been hangin' here. Let me introduce you to a new friend of mine." he took the ball and walked over to the couch. "This is Belinda. Belinda, this is my best buddy, bob."
I shook my head in wonder. Deciding it was better not to dwell on this, i returned to digging around in the mess. I found a lot of stuff, none of it a shovel. There was a half a pizza, a bight purple velvet hat with a large feather, a collection of dice with many different sides instead of six, something Leo called a roach clip still stuck to the end of a finished cigarette, and more unidentifiable junk than I would have believed possible.
I groaned the third time I uncovered something sticky and unidentifiable. I 'd been at this for what felt like hours. According to the clock I'd found it had only been two. I gave up. Leo was busy holding a conversation with Bob, so I decided to just move on. Digging in this mess was getting me nowhere. I needed to find the King of the enchanted forest, but that meant finding his castle.
"I was wondering if you knew the way to the castle in the center of the forest." I continued, suddenly wanting very much to be on my way. Things seemed to have a way of spinning out of control on me today.
"Yeah. It's in the middle, man." Leo said sagely, with a nod. It was spoiled somewhat when he turned to Bob the ball and informed me that he agreed.
"Yes, Leo. In the center. Now, which way do I go to get there?" I asked, using the same voice I usually reserved for small children.
"Oh. I don't know, man. Just step outside and keep walking. Either you'll find it, or it'll find you." He looked over at Belinda. "Can the lady stay with me, man. I don't get many visitors. After she rests up, we can have a party!" He made the ball "nod" its "head".
"She'll like that Leo. Nice to meet you. Uh, both of you." I said, and quickly made my exit. Was everyone in this forest insane? With my luck, only the people I was going to meet. It couldn't be everyone... could it?
I started walking, reminiscing to myself about my situation. I'm not sure if I mentioned it or not, but the Enchanted Forest is huge. Ginormous. And it doesn't stay still. The forest constantly shifts around of it's own volition. In about the center of this frigging huge, always shifting forest is the castle of the king. I'd like to say smack dab in the middle, but the shifting won't let me.
Having said that, I had no clue where I was going. I knew I could walk strait forward away from the hut and end up walking right up to it's front door in an hour, without changing direction. That makes the whole task daunting. I just had to keep walking and hope for the...
BOOOOM!
"Holy Cow!" I shouted, looking up at the big cloud of smoke rising up from the forest to my right. The blast had knocked me to the ground. I swear it had to have had at least three exclamation points on the end of it! I leapt to my feet, running toward the blast.
Thirty feet later I was staring at a squat structure. Almost like a house that had been squashed down on itself and had needed to be stretched to fit. Sitting up dazedly was a figure covered in soot, his hair and beard standing awry. Before him was what I had to assume was another fire witch. The literally flaming hair was a huge giveaway after Leo. She looked pissed. She was pretty, with a heart shaped face, slim waist and big... balls of fire hovering over her outstretched hands.
"Come on now Gertrude, you know I only have eyes for you!" the singed figure pleaded.
"Only have eyes for you my left buttock! I saw the way your eyes traveled!" she shrieked, throwing a fireball at the unfortunate man. He let out a sound something like "eeep!" and threw himself left, rolling to his feet.
"I was staring at her hat! I'd never seen one made out of a live duck before! Besides, she was five, hundred, pounds!" he shouted in exasperation.
"Oh. Is that it then. I'm just a piece of meat to you. Some trophy to put on the mantle, am I." fire tears leaked down her cheeks. "Bastard!" she shouted, raining fireball after fireball down at the man. He dodged wildly, coming out on the right, the end of his robe aflame. He stamped at it.
"Gertrude, you almost got me!" he exclaimed in disbelief.
"The next one will, don't you worry." she said. She squinted out her right eye, tongue sticking slightly out at the edge of her mouth as she took aim with another. As amusing as it was to watch someone other than me get his for a change, I stepped forward.
"Excuse me." I said, "I was wondering if either of you could give me some directions. I seem a bit lost."
They both paused to gawk at me for a second, then Gertrude's hair abruptly went out.
"Why, of course young man." she said, suddenly every inch the pretty hostess. "Welcome to the Phoenix Inn. I'm Gertrude, the proprietor. Welcome."
"Yes. And I'm Frazz, her loving husband and business partner."said the soot covered fellow.
"Ignore him, he'll be dead by morning." Gertrude said with a vicious smile. Frazz gulped. "Come on in. night should fall soon, and you don't want to be stuck out here with the wraiths and such." she hurried me into the building. Wraiths! Yes, and inn for the night sounded lovely I decided.
The inside was very nice. Cozy even. And most importantly, it was affordable. I paid for the night, and asked for the directions I needed. Gertrude raised an eyebrow.
"Why would a Hero need to see the king?" she asked.
"I'm not a hero. Just a farmer."
"Farmers don't carry enchanted swords. You can be honest with me." she smiled. Her smile was beautiful. I never stood a chance. I found myself telling her, and the newly washed Frazz, everything that had occurred.
"Leo. I said we needed to see about having him moved to the other side of the forest. Cousin or no, he's bad for business." Frazz said, stroking his chest length brown beard.
"Leo is not the issue here." Gertrude said, "This unknown person has committed murder right on the kings doorstep, and this poor farmer has gotten mixed up in a series of rather unfortunate events." She looked over at me. "Where is the locket Belinda gave you?" she asked me.
The locket! I'd completely forgotten about it. I reached into my pocket and pulled it out. Frazz eagerly took it in hand and examined it.
"Belinda was right. It is a work of genius. Check out this spell matrix, darling." he said,handing it to Gertrude. She smiled as she took it, and whacked him on the head with a wooden mixing spoon just to let him know she was still mad at him.
"Well, that magician really knew her stuff. I could probably enhance the range a bit. Lets see..." the locket burst into flame and melted. "Oh, drat."she said looking at my startled expression. "I'm sorry about that. It would seem the she was right about the whole thing collapsing."
"How will I find the castle now?" I asked, looking at the melted remains of the location locket.
"Frazz will take you there in the morning. Least he can do, I think." Gertrude said.
"Why's that. He doesn't owe me anything."
"Yes. I do."Frazz said, "You saved me from my wife. She won't kill me if there are witnesses." he finished brightly. She stuck her tongue out at him. He winked back. They both smiled. Married people were weird.
"Get some sleep Gar. We leave bright and early tomorrow morning." Frazz told me. I left the two of them gratefully. The looks they were giving each other were making me blush.
The next morning, Frazz came flying into my room, slamming the door with enough force to wake me up. He was in a frenzy. In my half asleep haze I had to wonder why.
"Pack your stuff! Pack your stuff! It's time to fly! Hurry, hurry, hurry!" he nearly shouted.
"Frazz? Wha.." I said through my grogginess.
"FRAZZ WHEN I CATCH YOU YOUR DEAD!" Gertrude's voice echoed through the building.
"What did you do?" I asked in alarm, now fully awake and tossing my stuff on like a madman.
"Nothing."
I eyed him
"Honestly. Not a drated thing. The Right Honorable Wicked Stepmothers' Traveling, Drinking, and Debating Society just showed up for lunch and my wife is extremely jealous. You remember last night? Well the incident that sparked that happened five years ago!" He exclaimed, throwing open a window and gauging the distance down.
"Everybody is stark raving loony." I said under my breath.
"What was that?" Frazz asked, tying together bedsheets for all he was worth.
"FRAAAAAZZZ!"
"Nothing." I strapped on my sword. "Nothing at all."
"Get moving! I think she's on the stairs!" he said from outside the window, and disappeared as he rappelled to the ground. I jumped through the window, grabbing the sheets and followed in hot pursuit .
"FRAZZ! TRYING TO GET AWAY ARE YOU!"
I dropped the last few feet to the ground as the end of the sheets burst into flame.
"Run Gar, she has wicked good aim sometimes." Frazz yelled, zigging and zagging as he ran for the trees.
"I hate my life!" I shouted, as I ran after him, the ground erupting at our heels. We ran a good long time before stopping to catch our breath.
"Why... did you... marry her?" I asked between gasps for air, hand pressed tightly to my aching side.
"What's life... without... a little adventure." he panted back with a wink.
Every one I meet is a loon.
AN – There's chapter 2. R&R people. My proofreaders demand more "Foamy the squirrel". So you agree? Disagree? Click on the button on the lower left and be heard! The beauty of democracy! Seriously though, review or I'll shiv ya.