Pandora’s Cookie

You may be familiar with the phrase, “I’d have to see it to believe it.” Well, in the kingdom of Jigsaw, people say, “Idiots believe in the impossible, but only fools refuse to believe in the very, very unlikely.” And impossibility has been found to be incalculably rare. For, in Jigsaw, simply refusing to believe in something increases any individual’s chance of actually encountering it. Sea monsters, dragons, vampires, ghosts, free lunches—they all exist.

The point is, most people from Jigsaw, as they say, see at least a few “impossible” things before breakfast—except, of course, for free lunches, which are notoriously elusive except around noon.

Aleric was studying in the remote northern village of Dalabiot under the elite profession of dragon mastery. While handsome and well built as the next poster child for idealistic heroism, the boy was not terribly smart and had little in the way of common sense. But he had the most important prerequisite for anyone fortunate enough to become a dragon master: a big heart. And hearts as big and passionate as Aleric’s were said to come along only once every five hundred years or so. And so, brainpower notwithstanding, he was a natural choice. And so, two years ago on his sixteenth birthday, he left his home city of Florda, traveling north to Dalabiot.

Dragon masters had the lofty, but difficult job of acting as liaison between humanoids (humans, elves, and the like) and any of the varieties of dragon not resolutely obsessed with destroying villages and the hoarding of gold and princesses. They had a deep understanding of dragons’ language, culture, anatomy and abilities. Dealing with troublesome dragons seldom led to the slaying of said creature, but just in case, dragon masters were trained exhaustively in the ways of the sword. And after a long afternoon of sword practice, studying what kinds of tea it is rude to serve a dragon should one be present at a banquet or conference, or conjugating verbs in draconic, little pleased Aleric more than sweets.

“Look at you,” Sunna sighed. “All smiles, that’s Aleric Iu Duno. And over what?”

Aleric paused as he checked the nature of the confection he was about to take a bite of, as if he’d forgotten. “Chocolate biscuit.”

Sunna nodded. “Right, a chocolate biscuit. You’re a simple man, Aleric. What exactly draws women to you is beyond me.”

Taking care to wipe crumbs from his lips first, he smiled dashingly. “Um farming,” he shrugged.

“Farming?!”

Aleric swallowed the last of his sweet. “Charming.”

A patronizing almost-smile from Sunna. Almost. “Right. I’ll see you later.” He tousled Aleric’s sunny blond hair, gathered his sword and books, and marched over the grass to the dormitory building.

Aleric sighed. When Sunna acted that way, that meant he was in a good mood. When in a poor mood, Aleric avoided him altogether. He was never quite sure if he and Sunna were friends. They were both successful students, and while Aleric got all the girls, that never seemed to concern Sunna. Aleric tapped out a rhythm on the bench with his sword for a minute, looking for dragons overhead before gathering up his own things and departing-- but not for his room. Yes, the sun had begun setting, but that was exactly the time that the academy came alive. Tonight was a special night, though Aleric knew not why. His friend Eldrey had simply given him a place and time to meet him to unveil an unusual discovery.

“By the old pilfer tree next to the falls,” Aleric murmured to himself, recalling what Eldrey had told him. Often did Eldrey rave about curiosities he’d found in the caves and ruins nearby, and seldom did he choose a normal, mundane place to unveil them. He took the trail out of the main part of the academy.

The Dalabiot Academy itself was not so much hidden as nestled into a forest at the foot of a cliff in northwestern Jigsaw. The Gharness River flowed just past the main building, first shooting over the cliffs as if in an imperative hurry to reach the sea. The river itself had magical properties that were lost if the water was taken from the riverbed. Both mundane and unusual creatures strolled over the academy grounds like it was just another part of the forest; one day, a clamprey had pounced on Aleric from a tree as he was having his lunch, and held onto his head for a good few minutes before it could be beaten away.

Old narrow cobbled paths similarly meandered about the grounds, only occasionally meeting up with a building’s front door, often in a roundabout way that made Aleric wonder if perhaps the path was older than the academy. Moss and grasses had begun to cover the trail, coloring what wasn’t exposed stone a rich, emerald green. No one replaced them; they added a certain touch of mysticism to the atmosphere of the place.

Eldrey’s meeting spot was still and quiet. The old tree hung vigilantly over a ring of bushes that were filled with the chirping, clicking and hooting of nighttime creatures. The fiery beacons of Firedragonflies danced about the thicket as Aleric approached. The place seemed to have an unusual magic about it, appearing isolated from everything else; close by, the roaring waterfall crashed down to the river at a distant whisper.

Something clasped around Aleric’s mouth. “Mmnn!” It wasn’t a hand. “Mmph!” Aleric jerked away and turned around in time to dodge a thick vine grabbing at his midsection, diving out of the range of the pilfer tree’s tendrils just in time. Pilfer trees feed on metal, and the best way to get it is by seizing passersby. It’s common for lazy thieves or toll collectors to offer pilfer trees to be replanted on heavily-trafficked roads in exchange for part of the loot. “I thought that thing was dead!” Aleric panted. It could’ve eaten his sword!

A flagitious laugh came from the shadows. “You thought wrong!”

The newcomer wore a Dalabiot Academy uniform that looked like it’d never gone a day without being dirtied and hurriedly washed the next morning. It hung lopsidedly over a gangly, tall figure whose angular features were set into sharp relief by the firedragonflies’ light. He stroked his shaggy, dusty brown hair. “You’re adorable, you know that, Aleric?”

“Eldrey!”

“Who else would it be? I revived the old pilfer tree using just a few copper coins a day for the past few weeks. It listens to me now, doesn’t take anything except copper, brass or iron. Thinks it’s on a diet.” Eldrey looked commandingly at the tree, which was at least three times his height. “Have you been munching steel again? Your trunk’s filled out a bit.”

The tree sagged its branches.

“I can tell you’re impressed. Well, the evening’s just begun, my friend.”

“Well, not to… you know, put a damper on the evening, but I hope this is better than the Toothpick of Damocles.”

Eldrey grinned dangerously. “Better even than the Cape of Three Wishes!”

Aleric sighed. “The one we used its last wish on wishing we knew what it was?”

“The very one!” Eldrey was, as usual, unfazed. “Now…” Eldrey drew in close to Aleric-- he was wearing his usual musky cologne. “Keep this on the… you know… down low, as they say. But…” He peered guardedly through the dying sunlight and conveyed his news in the tone of wind whispering over a dusky meadow. “I've found the Sylvan Tomes.”

Some speak of their hearts skipping a beat when met with something shocking. Aleric felt he missed at least two. Generally, Eldrey’s discoveries were obscure and inconsequential. If books ever mentioned the legends he uncovered, it was only for the sake of completeness. This was totally different. The Sylvan Tomes were said to be an illusory library that could house itself inside any forest, appearing only to those worthy of its knowledge. It was also said that anyone who takes anything from the Sylvan Tomes without the intention of returning it is horrifically punished. Besides the fact that no written records of its discovery existed, the fact that no one knew what the punishment was likely comprised much of its horror. An illustrious find indeed. “Th- the Sylvan Tomes?” Aleric gasped. “That’s…” He searched for eloquence. Whenever Aleric did so, he rarely found it, compensating with raw passion instead. “That’s huge! So, yeah. Did you bring anything back?”

The smile Eldrey spread across his face was full of satisfaction and excitement. It was the kind of expression that was often followed by mentions of hubris. “Only something that will ensure we are awash with affluence for the rest of our lives.” With a flourish he produced a tiny, yellowed and slightly crumpled scroll from the inside of his tunic. The sense of ceremony with which he handed it to Aleric, despite his history of overplaying his discoveries, compelled Aleric to receive it with similar reverence.

Aleric unrolled the scroll. The plain letters, scrawled on aged, brittle parchment, were barely visible under the light of the firedragonflies. "Pandora's Cookie?"

"It's--" Eldrey began with pride.

"A recipe," Aleric finished. A recipe? He continued reading. "'Start your day the Pandora way and let it all out?'" The ingredients didn’t look particularly magical. Flour, sugar, butter… everything that might be expected of a simple cookie recipe. He read on to the baking directions. It read, ‘For optimal flavor, while rolling dough, recite the incantation below…’ He stopped there. “You sure about this? And I’m not talking ‘Yes, I’m sure the potions store room guard goblin can be bribed with leftovers from the cafeteria’ sure.”

“Hey, the only reason it didn’t work was because it was ‘mystery gruel’ day.”

Upon looking back to the academy, he saw that most of the torches had been doused, and the light spells been allowed to dwindle to a soft glow. The full moon now provided most of the available light. Far off in the forest, a gryphon screeched as it brought down its dinner. “So, we sneak to the kitchen, cook up a batch, and see what the big deal is about this recipe?”

Seizing the scroll back, Eldrey replied, “Aleric, you’re sharp as ever. Now, they’ve got everything on the ingredients list in the kitchen except for one thing.”

“What’s that? I’ll go find some.”

“No need. Let’s go.”

“Guh—huh?” As he followed Eldrey back to campus, he hoped he didn’t make a habit of following people into unknown dangers.

Sneaking to the kitchen wasn’t a problem. There were no locks; who’d ever heard of breaking into a kitchen? Even so, Aleric winced as his feet clapped on the hard, cool stone floor. In the sparse light from a series of small windows near the ceiling, he could only make out the vague outline of the long wood table at the center of the room and the cupboards and pantries lining the walls.

“Yehl patra despa,” Eldrey’s voice whispered from the darkness. Aleric was no magician, but that sounded like the incantation for a spell. Then, a dim light slowly illuminated the entire room; it was almost as if the sun had risen.

Aleric whirled around, prepared to concoct a lie about wanting an evening snack. “Eldrey! We can’t have this bright a light, or—”

His friend was already spreading out the scroll on the table. He tittered. “Aleric, It’s Naylo’s Darkvision, not a light spell. This way, we can see without a light calling attention to ourselves.”

Joining Eldrey, at the table, Aleric simply replied, “Oh.” There was a time when he would try to make up for that kind of thing and act like he knew all along, but he found it to be more trouble than it was worth, and he never was good at coming up with excuses. Instead, he went to go find eggs.

“You think Sunna would like to join in on this little adventure?” Eldrey asked.

“Probably not.” He was most likely having domestic problems with his draconic politics homework right now-- the assignment Aleric should have been doing.

“Ah well. More of you for me.”

“What?”

Eldrey waved it off. “Er… ‘more for you and me.’ Anyway, it says here… the mixture needs to be exposed to the light of a full moon.” He winked. “That’s what we need that isn’t in the kitchen.”

Aleric brought everything he’d gathered over. A bit of flour was dashed over the side of the table, but at least the eggs remained intact. “Well… since there are windows, the light of a full moon kind of is—”

Not bothering to look up, Eldrey muttered, “You’re sweet, but there’s simply no poetry about you. Get a mixing bowl, won’t you?”

More often than not, Eldrey utterly puzzled Aleric. They’d become friends during sword practice. Eldrey may have had more wits than a sphinx, but Aleric was far stronger and faster, and had a combat instinct that Eldrey seemed to be able to tap into just by being with him. So, they always practiced together under the condition that Eldrey would help Aleric remember dragon mating seasons (important to remember as the worst time to have a dealing with a dragon). “Uh… right.” There was one pantry that was quite full of bowls, from a tiny size for blending herbs, to large monolithic ones… most often reserved for the aforementioned “mystery gruel” day. Aleric, as with many things, knew next to nothing about baking. He chose a middle-sized one and brought it over. “Good?”

Eldrey checked Aleric’s find. “Very.” He began measuring out ingredients in obsessively precise amounts, frowning at the measuring implements as if the fault lay in their construction, confidently dusting off a minute amount, then nodding with satisfaction. "Mix these, Aleric. You're good with your hands."

"Well, there must be a spoon near--"

"Gotta be with your hands. It's in the recipe."

The ingredients sat expectantly, invitingly in the bowl. Aleric did always like getting dirty. Upon digging his hands into the bowl, his hands felt strangely warm, almost as if the bowl were being heated from underneath. As he kneaded the mixture into dough, the tips of his fingers began to tingle. He almost jerked his hands free, but after an instant of deliberation, kept at it.

“Now…” Eldrey pored over the scroll. “You need to think about evil. Something evil. Really evil, or it won’t turn out.”

What kind of recipe was this? Aleric really wasn’t sure when it came to thinking about evil things. “Something evil… like…” A tear came to Aleric’s eye at the thought of it. “… kicking a puppy?” He grinned. “I love puppies.”

“Aleric!”

Aleric winced, thinking he felt the dough cool down a little. “Sorry. I kind of find thoughts like that unpleasant, so I avoid them.”

“And you’re sure you don’t avoid other thoughts along with them?”

“… huh?”

“Nothing. Just think of something really terrible, and infuse it into the dough. Really get it in there! Pretend you’re a playwright penning the greatest tragedy ever conceived!”

From Eldrey’s tone, it was clear that any and all conflicts involving puppies were out. For some reason, the next thing to pop into his head was Sunna. He chuckled; he was one of the more frightening people he’d met. “No, no good… what about… realizing that the world isn’t the happy place you always thought—that everything you knew was true were just lies, and your oldest friend is your deadliest enemy? Something like that.”

“Aleric, I just knew there was a kind of poetry about you.”

Thinking of this kind of thing felt awkward, like putting a left shoe on your right foot. But he must have done something right; the dough heated rapidly, and slowly began to churn on its own in the bowl, lumps of flour swirling in a spiral toward the center like a vortex.

The scroll was thrust into Aleric’s field of vision by Eldrey’s anxious hands. “The incantation, Aleric! Read it!” He had a way of making any task seem not only compellingly urgent but totally necessary by adding a nervous edge to his voice. Aleric began to read, stumbling over the longer words.

“For wretched hubris, mortals find

Evils released, and something left behind.

Innocent and tempting, make it now so,

Pray, imbue now this mass of dough.”

While speaking, Aleric felt as if something was being drawn from him as the dough churned itself. After the spell was complete, slowly the dough’s motion came to a stop and it lay still in the bowl, looking quite ordinary.

Eldrey let out his held breath. “Right. Now we have to bake it.”

The dough was separated by Eldrey into a batch of about two dozen small cookies laid out on a sheet in perfect rows, like warriors in an army. Usually a small fire dragon took care of the baking process, but even if they could be persuaded to do the job, they’d never be able to keep the secret. They were well fed and handsomely paid, so could not be bribed.

“Thankfully, the kitchen has more than one way to get baking done, just in case,” Eldrey announced. Aleric had no knowledge of how Eldrey knew this, but at the same time he was never surprised by it. “Baking over an open fire makes too much smoke, but the ash of wolfs bane plants that have been burned by a salamander can be turned red hot by a sprinkle of ordinary water. They should have a stock of it somewhere.”

A cursory glance under the cooking hearth quickly revealed a tightly-sealed bag of fine gray powder. Before long, all that remained was to wait. Aleric sighed, boosting himself up to sit on the table, leaning back on his palms.

Eldrey, on the other hand, paced around the room, fidgeting restlessly with one of the laces on his tunic. “So… what are your plans after this?”

“Well, if we don’t get caught and sent to clean the stables as punishment, I’ll probably go to bed.”

“No, silly. I mean… after the academy.”

Other than going home to Florda, Aleric really wasn’t sure. He didn’t like to plan things, finding that it only caused undue confusion when things didn’t work out the way he thought they would. Fate seemed to have a way of dealing with people who presumed to know how their life would go, and Aleric wanted no part of it. “Maybe I’ll be a knight. Maybe I won’t even use any of this and I’ll perform comedy for tourists in Juste. Who knows?” The world turned forward as Aleric lay back on the table and looked at the ceiling.

“Without a map, without a compass… that’s you. Perhaps some people are best left that way…” Aleric turned to look at him, but Eldrey quickly moved out of his field of vision to check the hearth. “At any rate, it looks like these are finished! Come have a look!”

The cookies had come out small, flat and pale with golden-brown edges. They didn’t look very magical, but they did smell pretty good, though he couldn’t quite place the scent. The moment he decided they smelled of cinnamon, they changed to chocolate, and then he swore he smelled nutmeg. Aleric thought that perhaps it was because of the crackling wolf’s bane ashes. But once the cookies were out of the oven, the effect was even more profound. He even thought he caught some scents not usually associated with cookies. They weren’t the most attractive confection he’d ever seen, but neither of them knew much about baking. It was fortunate they came out as well as they did; Eldrey was probably right to be so precise in the measurements, Aleric thought.

“Well, let’s try it!”

“Hold on!” Aleric looked too late to see Eldrey holding a crescent-moon piece of cookie, crunching thoughtfully.

Eldrey frowned. He looked up at the ceiling, then at what remained of the cookie. “Hmm… hmm.” His eyes went wide, and he began coughing. Aleric trampled the rest of the cookie, which had been dropped, on the way to slap his friend on the back a couple times.

“Eldrey! Hey, Eldrey!” There’d be no explaining this if they were caught now. After a moment, his friend’s hacking and coughing was placated, and Eldrey swallowed and took in a deep breath, bowing over the table. “Eldrey… you okay?”

“Yes… yes, Aleric… I’m quite okay. In fact…”

Eldrey turned around, his eyes a dilated void above a vacant grin. “I don’t think I’ve ever felt better!”

There comes a time when you realize you're in trouble, which is often succeeded by the fact that you're unable to handle the problem yourself. Aleric realized this not when Eldrey splashed him with water, but when, while sputtering and coughing from water drawn up into his nose, Aleric saw his friend ready the pouch of wolf's bane ashes, giggling maniacally.

As Aleric leapt away, Eldrey seemed disappointed. "Oh, Aleric. What's wrong? You'd make such a handsome charred husk of a corpse! Come here and feel the burn!"

Attempting to keep away from Eldrey and find something to interpose between them, Aleric paced around to the other end of the table. "Now, Eldrey. Hey. Hold on. This isn't about the six silver I owe you, is it?"

No good. And now, he’d been backed into a corner. No training he’d received could help him avoid being showered with wolf’s bane ashes with nowhere to run. There had to be a way to get through to him. In all the stories, no matter what evil force possessed someone, they could always break free with the right coaxing from someone close to them. “Eldrey! You don’t want to do this!”

The bag lowered along with Eldrey’s malicious grin. “Really?” He seemed puzzled.

“That’s right!” Aleric reached forward to pat his shoulder. “Come on, let’s go have a pint of Hogstrough and forget about all this!”

His old friend looked wistful, as if he were drunk already. “No, I think I really do want to do it.” The bag came back up, and Aleric jerked his hand back, where his wrist collided painfully with the cupboard he was trapped against.

“A- all right. A pint of Elfbow?” The vision of Aleric being discovered by the kitchen staff as a charred husk the next morning had him panting. There’d be no easy escape.

Steel flashed through Aleric’s field of vision, accompanied by a burst of gray powder as the bag split open and dumped its contents on the floor in a spectacular cloud. He only saw this for a moment; a figure shoved him to the ground, out of harm’s way and he escaped with little more than a crispy pant leg and a singed forearm—aside, of course, from the bump on his head that would likely result from having hit the floor.

The severity of Sunna’s frown, delivered over a sword-brandishing arm, melted away Aleric’s happiness at being alive. “Aleric, you’ll be the death of me one day!”

Practically crowing with amusement, Eldrey reached for Sunna, heedless of the obsessively-polished steel blade before him. “Well, it seems Sunna has joined our little celebration! Just in time, I should think! You’re more tightly wound than a gorgon on a bad hair day!”

For a moment Sunna’s intense glare softened in puzzlement, but returned more resolute than before. “I will not hesitate to use force to defend myself. My heart is not so tender.”

The tortuous train of logic Aleric’s mind embarked on took that statement careening along chasmy paths of increasing panic, crashing in an image of the kitchen staff finding a bloodied corpse waiting for them the next morning. He dashed for the two of them so fast he almost slammed into the wall (he was still a bit light headed from the hit to his head) and seized Eldrey under the arms. His berserk friend seemed to calm a bit. “See? We don’t have to hurt anyone.”

But with surprising force, Aleric was shoved backward to hit his head again, this time on a hanging metal pot. With a groan, he was out cold before the resounding clang of skull meeting iron had faded.

*****

“Huh. Finally. I spent far more time worrying about you than you likely deserve.”

Sunna’s voice pulled Aleric out of unconsciousness. Daylight was creeping in through their dormitory window through the stiff white curtain that Sunna almost always kept closed, and voices could be heard outside discussing the possible repercussions of new regulations on property taxes on dragons’ lairs. Everything seemed to be as it usually was—had everything been some kind of strange dream? If so, Aleric reminded himself never to eat anything he wasn’t entirely certain as to its nature, even if its name contains the word “mystery” or “surprise” on the menu. “Sunna… um… feel free to impart any amount of skepticism and strange looks on me for this, but… did I dream baking a batch of evil cookies last night?”

Whether or not Sunna looked contemplative or deeply disturbed was incomprehensible. “You’re referring to the sheet of cookies I put back in the pantry before I brought you back here. It is lucky I showed up when I did; did you two forget that today is Friday and there would have been kitchen staff showing up any minute to brew tea?”

An imposing double whammy of realizations made Aleric wish he were still unconscious. No one would ever be able to tell the calamitous confections from harmless ones. And today was Friday— the day kitchen staff arrive before the sun rises to begin making preparations for teatime the next day, when a dragon would visit the school to lecture and partake in the teatime ritual of tea and biscuits or—Aleric’s toes went numb and he broke out in a cold sweat—cookies. If a dragon were to eat one, Aleric would never be a dragon master—nor would anyone else at the academy, which would probably be reduced to one of a series of mountainous piles of detritus. “This is a disaster. I’m dead!” Aleric lamented, pressing his palms over his eyes as if the carnage had already begun. Hundreds of years later visitors would happen upon the ruins of the academy and recount the story of a blond fool who destroyed one of the most esteemed institutions in the kingdom with a tray of cookies! That wouldn’t do at all! “Sunna, we’ve got to stop it!” He quickly explained his situation as best he could.

“I don’t remember having taken any part in your reckless shenanigans. I see no reason to risk my safety and reputation any further.”

“What kind of friend are you?”

“One who wants to live.”

Shakily, Aleric rose to his feet and located his boots next to the door. As a rule, Sunna’s room was cleaner than a friar’s underclothes. “Fine! Where’s Eldrey?”

There was a touch of culpability in Sunna’s sigh. “How would I know that?”

No time to argue any further. Aleric sighed briskly; he could handle it on his own if he had to. Sunna could just sit there working out wingspan-to-flight speed ratios for all he cared. There was a tea party to stop.

*****

Pyrgyuknus had flown from the kingdom of Byrin—had departed far too early in the morning, even for a dawnscale, in order to reach the Dalabiot Dragon Master Academy in time for tea. He didn’t even particularly enjoy tea (it had always been one of those things you tried very hard to enjoy but developed a mild tolerance for it at best), but he supposed it would have been impolite to refuse the invitation, and he really had little better to do with his time. Dawnscales had no lust for treasure or maidens, and the idea of wreaking havoc on an unsuspecting village was wholly barbaric to him. Pyrgyuknus’s sole consolation was that some delectable sweets were reputed to be present at Dalabiot’s Friday teatimes, and since dragons that lack the power to turn into a human guise have difficulty operating ovens, he very much looked forward to the opportunity. However, he’d first had to perform a lecture he’d prepared on dragonriding safety (he hated carrying passengers; the lecture was prepared begrudgingly). Furthermore, the cooks had overestimated how much tea should be prepared for a dawnscale dragon. Perhaps for a colossal earthwyrm, enough blackberry tea to fill a human’s bathtub would be appropriate, but at barely four meters long, Pyrgyuknus couldn’t hope to consume so much. “This tea is delightful,” he spoke. “However…”

Professors, cooks and students waited with comical anticipation.

Pyrgyuknus set down the massive cup down as delicately as he could muster without leaving clawmarks on it. “I am a bit peckish.”

*****

Grass was trampled under Aleric’s feet, and wind whipped past his ears and he ran until his side hurt to make it in time. Ornate iron tables pocked the courtyard-- enough to seat dozens, with fresh, pristine linen covering them, waving beckoningly in the breeze. Tea had already been served, and students milled about, sitting under trees, at blankets spread across the grass, on the benches lining the cobblestone courtyard, or in the case of the more poised, at tables. It was hard to miss the dragon, even though it was just a dawnscale. Its form a slender, elegant weaving of pink, orange and purple scales with a pearly sheen, it was curled up on the lawn reticently. Its tail could barely be seen tapping the ground through a crowd of students gathered around it.

The dragon tilted his head and ran its forked tongue over its scaly lip. Aleric could just hear its bemused growl: "It's an unusual taste..."

There was little time to realize that if Aleric hadn't spent a few seconds trying to gain Sunna's help, he may have arrived in time to scream, "Honorable dragon, please don't eat that cookie!" But as it was, he was, like many heroes are, too late to prevent it but just in time to do something about it.

“Honorable dragon…” Aleric panted. “You… cookies… gah.” He failed, but made a valiant try at expressing the idea of some great catastrophe with his hands as he caught his breath. While an inopportune time for the dragon to regard him as he might a plump sheep in the middle of a field, it was clear that verbal persuasion was right out.

“Yes…” Pyrgyuknus rumbled, enunciating each syllable. “The confection, while delightful to the palate, was wholly unsatisfactory. What do you intend to do about it?”

It was not yet time for Aleric to gurgle his last words with his final breath. He simply knew it somehow. Instead, he seized one of the white tablecloths, sending a regretfully pretty tea set and an attractive table setting crashing to the ground—just as Pyrgyunus lunged forward to snap at Aleric’s throat. Somehow—it baffled him how he managed it— he caught its snout with the tablecloth and tied the scaly jaws closed. Immediately afterward, the smell of sulfur signaled that it was about to breathe fire. But all that came out was a wisp of smoke from through the folds of the cloth. A few more attempts followed but only resulted in the charring of the clothy prison. Pleased with himself, Aleric began to turn to his (hopefully) impressed audience, unaware that in an instant he’d be a hundred feet off the ground. The only warning he got was a flash of white and the flapping of scaly wings, and he, encased in a second white tablecloth that apparently had caught on the dragon’s daggerlike talons, were sailing toward the roof of the nearest building, and apparently his stomach was still trying to catch up.

The dragon was obviously not overly enthused with his cargo. It began pumping its muscular legs as if he were in a field of baneburrow bugs, attempting to crush every one. He thankfully managed to hang on to the linen, which stayed snagged on the claws with blessed tenacity, and almost failed to see the tower that was rapidly filling his field of vision. Imagining his thighs crashing through his ribs, he braced his feet to take the impact. But Pyrgyuknus swerved rapidly to the right around the tower, over the dining hall and its vaulted glass roof. Already feeling like his arms would soon become dislodged from his shoulders, Aleric jerked down on the sheet—perhaps he could force a landing.

Both the sheet and the glass roof held fast as Aleric and the dragon veered sharply downward onto it. They tumbled, slid and rolled, and the glass creaked and cracked—but did not break. Aleric panted and looked down a dizzying eighty feet into the dining hall below, where staff were already preparing the settings for that night’s dinner. When one happened to look up, all Aleric could think to do was wave awkwardly. At any rate, the glass hadn’t broken and they were safe for the moment. Aleric, not being the most sensible, didn’t realize that when he stood up, he would put too much strain on the glass and send the two of them falling through.

The sharp grating crack of the glass signaled trouble by the time Aleric had risen to his knees, and by the time he was fully upright, a spectacular crash of glass shrieked around him, and he and his combatant went through.

Aleric was beginning to think what an undignified and early death this would be for him, but something stopped him-- he was jarred violently out of the long fall-- the dragon had fallen through the broad iron chandelier hanging over the room and it now formed a band around its waist. He, in the meantime, was caught by his sword on the tablecloth, which still was stuck around the dragon. A precarious position, but a safer one than he'd just been in. He curtly waved to the terrified staff below before securing himself by taking ahold of the chandelier-- just before the chain suspending it over the room snapped, and they both took the rest of the fall onto one of the long, wooden tables.

It snapped in two and rained splinters, wooden bowls and plates and iron cups over them as the dragon struggled. This action only managed to get its flailing wings entwined in the chandelier's chains, pulling taut around the leathery appendages and finally pinning them awkwardly to the dragon's back. He'd never calm down with all that iron binding him.

Aleric had an idea. By that time, staff was flooding into the room. Even the staff who hadn't studied at the academy still knew a thing or two about handling dragons-- but wasn't this dragon important? There was no way they could kill it. "Hold on!" Aleric called. "I think I can handle this!" It wasn't a sure thing, but he had to try. That, and it would look really impressive if he pulled it off.

He scraped himself off the floor and dusted himself off as around him, claws as long as his forearm scraped at the cold stone floor and splintered pieces of table in an effort to stand erect. Paroxysms of angry snorts sprayed steam from the dragon's snout so hot Aleric thought it might warp the tables. "All right! Hey! Come this way! Hey!"

The grand oak double doors leading into the dining hall was packed tight with a throng of observers—all of them ready to run at any minute, but adhered by fascination to the threshold.

“Hey! Outta the way! Coming through!”

The crowd split, ducking into adjacent hallways and rooms and slamming the doors. Pyrgyuknus was nipping at his ankles, now, tripped up by the iron chain but still able to take long reptilian strides to Aleric’s human ones. Chairs flew easily out of the way, halfway across the room and over tables, leaving a trail of chaos. Aleric paused one moment to tip an imaginary hat to a young girl hiding under a stone outcropping.

“Clessa, looking lovely,” he grinned with a vicarious nod (Aleric was one of very few people who could make a simple gesture like a nod look sensual).

“Th- thank you.”

“Pardon me!” Sensing the dragon about to take a predatory leap at him, he dove to the side to allow the mass of scales, horns and claws to skid past. It was confused! Time to take advantage of a few free seconds. As the dragon’s tail whipped violently, Aleric leapt at it and scaled its back, traversing between its furled wings and taking a leap off its broad snout and yanking the tattered, charred remains of the tablecloth over its eyes and hitting the ground running toward the exit at the end of the grand hall. It wasn’t far now! Sure, it was a straight run with a rather large dragon chasing him. But hundreds of years later visitors would happen upon the ruins of the academy and recount the story of a blond fool who saved one of the most esteemed institutions in the kingdom with a linen tablecloth! The bewildered faces of those brave enough to stay to the side in the grand hall flew by. His boots clapped on the worn purple carpet, and his sheathed sword tapped the floor at every stride as his already loosened belt dragged, then came off, leading his weapon behind. It was all right; he wouldn’t need it, and it’d be best if he left it behind.

For a moment, the world turned forward under Aleric's feet, as he stumbled over a wrinkle in the carpet that was being torn to undignified shreds under the dragon's clawed feet. Steaming breath warmed the air behind him; Aleric rolled forward and got back to his feet, just in front of the grand double doors leading outside. No sooner than that, the massive creature behind him collided with his own body.

And kept going.

The doors snapped and splintered as easily as the carpet behind it had been shredded and both tumbled out onto the stone path. For the moment, a couple scrapes was nothing. What was important was that his right leg, which already received much of the brunt of the fall into the dining hall, now was pinned by a massive dragon’s leg tipped with claws that could puncture it like a rotten tangerine. The crazed dragon emitted an abysmal growl that made him think of a bottomless pit. Hot breath ruffled his hair and he could feel his body crushing under its hulking weight. This, if allowed to continue, would not aid in his schooling. But Aleric was almost afraid to struggle.

Nearly too late to aid Aleric, a figure crested the Pyrgyuknus’s arched back, sword brandished and glinting through the light afforded by the treetops.

“Sunna!”

“Go on! You at least ought to be entitled an opportunity to requite yourself for your stupid mistake!” His friend struggled to maintain his balance on the dragon’s back for an instant before leaping off. The motion the angry dragon took to snap at the newcomer was all the slack in the death grip Aleric was in needed to be broken. He rolled out of the way, onto his feet.

By reflex, he reached for his sword, but remembered that he’d lost it. But he didn’t want to hurt it, anyway. “Sunna, don’t actually—you know…”

Sunna looked up with the mild exasperation of someone interrupted while they were reading.

Aleric made stabbing motions with an invisible sword. “You know…”

Sunna sighed. “You’re serious about this, I see. Where are we going?”

“The waterfall!”

Aleric was leading both Sunna and the dragon through the woods. He had to weave between trees and under branches and through brush, but their pursuer plowed through all of it in a straight line, cleaving through the ground and throwing logs and rocks asunder as it came. At least, that’s what Aleric pictured. He dared not turn back to look long enough; the sounds of wood splintering satisfied him plenty. Now he’d lost track of the path entirely. Once in a while the dirt path through the woods would fly past his pounding footsteps, then disappear. It did not lead directly to his destination, and so he tore through in a straight line.

Aleric tore his tattered tunic free of a thorny branch as he reached the river. Everything was in its place, except, of course…

The dragon crashed through the brush, branches and large leaves impaled on its horns and claws, dragging vines and roots on its heels and on the chains trailing behind it. This was it; if the timing was off, or Aleric fled too far to the right or left, he’d have to double back, facing a nasty bite or tail swipe—or worse. He dove behind and shielded himself with a very special tree and silently thanked Eldrey; the vines of the pilfer tree quivered with excitement and lunged for the iron chandelier and chains the dragon still wore from the crash through the ceiling. Teeth gnashed and claws slashed, but the plant held fast. The dragon was immobilized in a wall of leafy foliage, and very unhappily so.

“There. That was the easy part,” Aleric managed.

Sunna scoffed, sheathing his blade. “The easy part?”

Aleric regarded the struggling dragon, who’d only just come that morning for tea. “I still gotta explain this to everyone.”

As it happened, Eldrey was waiting at Aleric’s room as if nothing had ever happened. Therefore, Aleric took care to explain all that had transpired before Sunna could. “And so…” he said. “I used that tree you revived to capture it. I really owe it all to you, Eldrey. I think we both saved the academy.”

Hands in his pockets, Eldrey shook his head. “No, no. Aleric, if there’s any soul at this academy who deserves full credit for all this, it’s you.”

Of course, Aleric knew that this was true. The fact that the tree was available to use was a fortunate coincidence. But he always figured that passing on credit to others was just an honorable thing to do. But then, so was refusing it. He nodded back to his friend. “Thanks.”

Sunna scoffed.

“Well…” Eldrey held up a familiar scroll. “I’d better put this back where it came from. I’m sure there are plenty more adventures where it came from.” The wild grin that spread over his face as he turned away made Aleric just a little apprehensive. “But…” he mused, “I suppose the Sylvan Tomes will have moved elsewhere by the time I visit it again. Oh, well.”

“Wait… you’re going now?”

Eldrey, very deliberately, refrained from turning back. “I plan to. Why?”

“The dean is coming up here right now, and I need to explain all this to him!”

Eldrey stepped over the threshold, the scroll clutched in his hand. “Like I said, Aleric… you deserve all the credit.”