Your Future Hasn't Been Written Yet
by K. Stonham
first released 1st September 2021
Gasping, Hisirdoux suddenly woke, his eyes snapping wide. His dream was already fading away, but the core of it remained, an idea hitting him with the velocity and momentum of a highway big rig.
He sat up, trying to catch his breath. The dream-thought turned over and over in his mind. It lodged solid in his chest, and would not come away.
"That's it," he whispered to himself in the dark. "This has to be it."
It was the right answer to the problem, and a greater solution than any he'd imagined, but at the same time it was so simple, so obvious...
"Arch. Archie." He nudged his sleeping familiar. "Wake up."
Archie blinked. "Douxie? What time is it?"
"Never mind that!" Douxie was out of bed now, his hand glimmering with magic light. He must look insane, he realized, but so many of his best ideas felt like this one. It felt real. Solid. Unexpected. "We can do this. I know how to win. I know how to defeat the Arcane Order!"
"What?" Archie was fully awake now, putting on his glasses and hopping down from the bed.
"Come on, I've got to tell Jim!"
Jim was rudely awakened by a wizard shaking his shoulder. "Douxie?" he asked, squinting against the blue magic-light wreathing his friend's hand.
"Jim, wake up!"
"What time is it?"
"Who cares? I know how we can defeat the Arcane Order!"
"What?" Jim sat up, still blinking the sleep from his eyes. He'd only ever seen Douxie manic once or twice, but he knew the look. "What do you mean?"
Archie jumped up on Jim's desk, sharing a glance with him while Douxie paced the room. "The best way to defeat an enemy is to turn them into an ally, right?" Douxie asked.
"Yeah," Jim said cautiously. It's what had worked with Draal and Steve, after all. But he didn't see how they could possibly get the Arcane Order on their side.
"And the best way to get the Order on our side is to give them what they want."
"I thought the Order wanted to destroy all humanity and remake the world."
"Yes. Well, no," Douxie said. "What they want is a return of the balance between magic and men. And there's only two ways to get that. There either has to be fewer men, thus the whole destroying the world bit, or-"
"Or more magic," Jim finished, his eyes widening at Douxie's insight. After a few seconds, though, his shoulders fell. "Doux, we can't. There's only a handful of us. There's no way we could shift the whole balance in time to avoid the Order."
"A handful now," Douxie agreed. "But not only a handful ever. I know more wizards than just HexTech. We can get the trolls on our side. Archie gives us an in to speak with the dragons. There are a few other folk I have connections with. And," he said, "we know where two more master wizards are sleeping. We're going to need them to pull this off."
"Douxie," said Archie, "it sounds to me like you're planning to reverse over a millenia of persecution and murder in, what, a matter of months? You know it's not possible."
Douxie grinned. "A wizard," he said, "makes unexpected possibilities."
"Wait. Two more wizards?" Jim asked. Douxie's expression let him know all he needed. "No. No way. We're not waking up Morgana."
"We'd have to get her calmed down first," Douxie allowed, "but her whole point was that mortals were wiping out magic, and she hated it. Do you really think she wouldn't be on our side?"
"I hate to side with Jim over you, Douxie," said Archie, "but this plan is, I'm afraid to say, entirely too rash."
"It's an outline," Douxie replied, waving off the criticism. "It needs refinement. But I think we can make it work."
"Boys," came a tired voice from the doorway, "it's the middle of the night. What are you..." Barbara's voice died as she stared at the magic light wreathing Douxie's hand.
Douxie froze. He swallowed. "Jim," he said, very quietly, "it's your call."
Jim swallowed too. This was not in his plans. This was not how he'd wanted his mother to find out. But...
No going back this time. No lying.
"No memory spells," Jim said aloud. "It's time she knew."
Barbara's eyes flicked back and forth between them. "Time I knew what?" she asked, voice wavering.
"If we're going to go ahead with your plan," Jim told Douxie, "then we all need to stop hiding. Now. And even if we don't... she deserves the truth."
"Jim?" His mother's voice was pleading.
Douxie nodded. "All right. It's time you knew," he told Barbara, very gently, "that there's magic in the world." He cupped his hands and raised them, magic light overflowing. Illusory blue-light vines and flowers grew and covered the walls of Jim's room. Butterflies and birds swooped through the air. A stream splashed across the floor, and two tiny deer drank from its edge. A boulder near them uncurled, revealing itself to be a river troll as the deer fled.
Compared to the magic, it might have been Jim's bed and desk that were the unreal things.
Douxie lowered his hands, drawing Barbara's Lake's wide-eyed gaze back to himself. "Magic is real. And we're in the midst of it."
Coffee. Barbara really wanted coffee. Or something stronger. But turning to alcohol to deal with two teenagers would not be the wisest of steps, and she clung with her fingernails to the thought that she needed to set a good example.
She was a mom. She needed to be able to take care of herself, and her son, and losing her grip on reality was not in line with that goal.
But she couldn't deny the evidence of her senses, either, as Douxie made tea without touching either kettle or cups, and Jim plated up slices of pie and the plates sailed themselves to the table without the aid of human hand.
She also couldn't deny jumping as Douxie's cat sat up straight in the seat next to her and said, plain as day, in a posh British accent, "I realize that finding out about all this must be distressing to you."
"The cat... talks," Barbara said, and considered revisiting whether or not she was, in fact, losing her grip.
"Talks, yes," said Douxie. "Cat, only sometimes."
"Sometimes?" Barbara couldn't help asking.
Jim laughed, like it was all great fun. Like it was something he was /used/ to. "Go ahead and show her, Archie."
"Oh, very well," said the cat, and... Barbara couldn't describe it as anything other than "poofed"... into something else. Still black with sleek fur and a recognizable feline face, still wearing glasses. But larger, like a lynx, with wings, a ridge of spikes running down his spine, and a tail that had scales and a flared fin at the end.
"What...?" Barbara asked, staring.
"I'm a dragon," the cat briskly answered her unfinished question.
"A dragon." Barbara felt faint. And slightly hysterical. "A cat that turns into a dragon?"
"A dragon that turns into a cat," Douxie replied, coming into the dining room carrying forks, which he laid out at the four places by hand. She wondered why he hadn't sent them flying the way he had the cups and plates.
She tried to keep a grip and sound reasonable. "So if magic's real, and dragons, what else? Atlantis? Camelot? Trolls?"
Douxie and Jim exchanged a look, then each sat down at the table. There was even tea and pie in front of the dragon, Barbara noticed.
"Well..." said Jim. "Two out of three?"
"Three out of three," corrected Douxie. "Though Atlantis was long, long before my time."
"Mm, and most of the residents did get out before that final tsunami," said Archie. "From what I understand, humans have been rediscovering it. I believe it's called 'Doggerland' in the modern archaeological literature."
Jim sighed and stabbed his pie with his fork. "Why am I even surprised?"
"If you give up surprise, life becomes dreadfully boring," advised the dragon.
Barbara put her fork down. Harshly. "Could you all just tell me what's really going on? Have I been slipped drugs? Is this just a really vivid dream? Because this can't be... real." Her voice cracked on the last word.
Looking concerned, Douxie lowered his cup of tea. "Jim?" he asked.
Why was Douxie, who was older and some sort of magician or something, deferring to her son?
Jim sighed and set down his fork too. "It's all real, Mom," he said. His hand covered hers, warm. Solid. Real. "Dragons and wizards and Camelot and trolls... they're all real. And I'm sorry that every time I try to tell you about it all, I mess it up."
Her son's eyes were looking into hers, and somehow he was as steady as a rock. That calmed Barbara, a little.
She forced herself to draw a breath. And then another. A third. "All right," she said, more calmly than she felt was warranted, "how about you tell me about it."
"All right," said Jim. "This story begins, for us, a little over two years ago..."
It was long past dawn before the explanation was done, with the two young men and the dragon filling in details for one another, correcting each other, and in a few cases, providing actual demonstrations.
Excalibur. Her son had magic armor and a sword, and it was the actual, real Excalibur.
Barbara had either done something very, very right or very, very wrong, and she couldn't decide which one it was.
Upstairs, Jim's alarm went off.
"Oh, shoot!" her son said, eyes flying wide. "I have to get ready for school." His armor vanished in a wisp of blue light as he ran for the stairs.
Across the table, Douxie regarded Barbara with sympathy. "I'm sorry. I know this is all a lot to wrap your head around."
She laughed, but it was hollow and draggy. "A bit much, yes. Time travel? Aliens? My son having a destiny?" She looked directly at Douxie. "Let alone an immortal wizard who's been nineteen for nearly nine hundred years?"
He smiled, but it was fragile and didn't reach his eyes. "Archie and I will move back out."
"What? No!" Barbara protested. She would not kick out a child who needed a home, regardless of how old he actually was. She buried her face in her hands. "I just need some time to take this all in."
"That's fair enough." She could hear Douxie stand up and collect the cups and plates and utensils, take them to the kitchen. He turned on the water in the sink.
Barbara just breathed.
"If it helps any," said Douxie quietly, "your son is one of the best men I've ever met, and I would die to protect him."
Barbara looked up sharply at that, but Douxie was washing dishes and his back was to her. She couldn't see his expression. Given what he and Jim and Archie had spent the last several hours explaining to her, though, she didn't think Douxie's words were an exaggeration.
"Don't," she told him. "I want both of you to be alive."
He turned a little, so they could see one another. Barbara couldn't read his face. "I wouldn't unless I had to," Douxie reassured her. "But, Barbara... some things, some people, are worth dying for."
She suddenly became aware that Archie was sat up straight in his seat, staring at his wizard. But not saying a word.
Douxie's gaze shifted to the dragon disguised as a cat. "Don't worry, Arch," he said softly. "It's not in the plans. With luck, this time we'll all get out alive. And not trapped in a foreign Trollmarket."
The dragon-cat sniffed. "I refuse to be held responsible for my actions in a future that has not yet come to pass. I was clearly out of my mind."
"You were clearly taking care of your father," Douxie replied. "Can't lie to me, I saw it in the Chronosphere."
"Douxie," Barbara interrupted, "why are you doing the dishes by hand?"
He looked at her and blinked. "Four half-settings doesn't really need the dishwasher-"
"No," she said. "I meant, why aren't you using magic for it?"
"Ah." He looked down at his hands and smiled just a little. "'Magic'," he said, sounding like he was quoting someone, "'isn't a permissible shortcut to hard work'."
"Merlin," Archie explained to Barbara.
"Magic is... well, I could," Douxie explained. "But it's not best used that way."
"So what is it for?"
"Fighting the good fight," he replied. "Keeping people safe, whether that means their lives or their hearts."
"So that display of magic earlier?" she asked.
He smiled. "To help convince you that this is all real."
She sighed, her fingers tracing the wood grain of the table. "It must be wonderful to have a... a gift like that. You can do so much good in the world."
Putting the cleaned and dried dishes back in the cabinet, Douxie shook his head. "Not so much as you might imagine."
"What do you mean?"
"Every profession has its unattainable goal," he said, sitting back down at the table. "Alchemists, for example, infamously wanted to turn lead into gold."
"Can you imagine how many economies that would have crashed?" muttered Archie.
The wizard waved a dismissal at his familiar. "The point is, the one thing magic has never been able to do? Is something you do every day."
Barbara blinked.
"Have you ever seen the first Superman movie?" Douxie asked. "The best one, the one with Christopher Reeve in it."
"Years ago," said Barbara, wondering where he was going with it.
"There was a scene in it, after his father dies from a heart attack. Clark Kent says 'All these things I can do... all these powers... and I couldn't even save him'." Douxie looked down, at the table. "That's what magic is. For everything I know, everything I can do, there are limitations. I cannot use it to heal. No one I've ever met can. A plaster and a placebo are more useful than me. There have been moments when I would have given anything-" His voice broke and he stopped. Breathed. Gathered himself.
"I can make plates float in the air," Douxie said quietly, looking back up. "I can fight arcane evils. I can do some pretty wicked stuff. But the greatest wizard the world has ever known, the man who was the closest thing I've ever had to a father, died in my arms, because I thought I had a clever enough plan when I didn't, and I could not save him." His eyes were looking past her, and Barbara turned to see Jim at the foot of the stairs, clearly listening. How long had he been standing there?
"Maybe you're right," Douxie said to Jim. "It's a stupid dream plan. And my plans have only ever gotten us into messes."
"It's not stupid," Jim said, coming into the dining room. "And my plans don't have a great track record either."
"Well," said Barbara, derailing the teenage angstfest before it could begin, "'we survived, barely' isn't great. But it's still surviving. So maybe you should both accept that you're human and fallible, and have more sets of eyes look over your plans to point out weaknesses." She suddenly saw what her life was going to become: den mother to teenagers out to save the world. Well, there are worse roles out there. "I hear average six-year-olds are good at poking holes in plans."
"We're a bit shy on six-year-olds, let alone average ones," Douxie quipped.
"But we do have a team," Jim said. He looked at Barbara. "Hopefully one you're on, Mom?"
"Couldn't keep me off it, kiddo," she said, and finally managed a real smile. "Not even if you tried."
Author's Note: And we finally hit one of my very first ideas for this story: how best to defeat an enemy that is stronger than you? Turn them into an ally. Merlin and Nari both said that the Arcane Order wanted to restore the balance between mankind and magic. The thing is, they were doing that (from our point of view) in the worst way possible. Now our intrepid heroes just need to figure out how the hell to do it the other way. And then Barbara wandered into the scene and, welp, stuff happened.