[Adventurously, Harsh]

  From the library I was headed to the barn, I needed Maz’s help for Harry, and also his advice on how to approach Draco, to ask him to ally with me. What can you offer a dragon? Clearly not virgins after my last encounter with him, Draco wanted nothing to do with virgins. It’s not like I knew any regardless. Something for his hoard? I’m a hitchhiking lesbian who carries everything I own in a duffel bag, the most expensive thing I own are my cowboy boots. I’m almost positive he doesn’t want a pair of boots he can’t wear.

  Maybe Maz can give me a good idea, or even any idea at this point. I smell something noxious wafting from the barn, I knock loudly on the barn door. Maz appeared at the door wearing a gas mask that he pulled off when he came outside.

  “Maz, are Groucho and Draco alright in there, are you making some kind of poison gas?”

  “No Jaq, I was making Kkakdugi, Radish Kimchi but I over fermented it, unfortunately the smell is the result of that over fermentation. It still tastes delicious however. Would you like to try it?”

  “Sorry Maz the tower keeps forcing me to eat peas that taste like unwashed gym socks, and smell almost as bad as your kimchi. I’m afraid I’ll have to pass. I have a couple of favors to ask you so if the only way you’ll help me is if I try your kimchi, please bring me a plateful.”

  “Of course I’ll be happy to help you Jaq”

  “I have a friend who is a master potter from Faenza, he used to live there in 1542 and made something called "Whites of Faenza ". I promised him I’d ask if you could help him set up a studio here.”

  “You really met a person from 1542 in the tower, that’s amazing Jaq, and you brought him to Tregaron, I’d love to meet them, I’ll actually be thrilled to help them.”

  “I asked Collins for an out building and he suggested the old greenhouse close to the barn. I want to take a look and see if it’s usable, if not Collins will find something else.”

  “Yeah, I know right where it is Jaq, it’s close by. I can’t believe I’m going to meet a renaissance master. My Italian isn’t very good, though.”

  “Don’t worry about that Maz, he speaks English like a native.”

  We got to the greenhouse and it was in remarkable shape for such an old and fragile building, a few panes of glass were cracked, and one pane was missing entirely but aside from that. It just needed to be cleaned out.

  “Yes Jaq, this will work perfectly, but I think an electric kiln will be installed in the back of the green house and we’ll build a shed around it to protect the kiln and the potter from the weather, it’ll be easy to run electricity from the barn. We’ll put the potter's wheel right in the center of the greenhouse. Shelving along both walls.”

  “This is starting to sound expensive, Maz, I can try and get some money from granny, but she’s pretty tight, it was granddad that opened up the mansion to the artists.”

  “Don’t you worry about anything Jaq, I’ll loan him the money. As soon as people see pottery made by a real master potter using techniques from the renaissance, he’ll be rolling in money.”

  “ Are you sure? I don’t want you to lose any money.”

  “I don’t care about the money, I just want to meet the man, he lived at the same time as Gerolamo Cardano, he was a genius and lived at the same time as your friend. They might even have met. The artists and scientists often mixed company back then, many were both scientist and artist.”

  “Alright then thanks, he’s a really nice guy and helped me out when I was in the tower. That’s the other thing I wanted to ask you about. I want to ask Draco to go into the tower with me.”

  “Why Jaqq?”

  “I got a demon kicked out of a fake heaven, he said the next person I have to face is his boss and I quote, “Unless you have an extinct dragon in your back pocket, he’ll tear you and your friends apart.”

  “You didn’t tell him you knew a dragon did you?”

  “No, not at all, but I assume from that quote that a dragon might be the only way to prevent this god or demon from tearing me from limb to limb.”

  “Jaq, I don’t know if he’ll go with you but you are free to ask him, Come on. It’d do him good getting out of that cave, get some fresh air, have a proper adventure.”

  We walked back to the barn, the smell had mostly dissipated, Groucho was yelling, “Bury that crap, I’ll never be able to unsmell that.”

  I popped my head into his room. “Hi Groucho, don’t you like kimchi.”

  “Oh, hi ya babe, what did you smell that all the way up at the mansion and thought I died, just wanted one last look at this magnificent body before they planted me in the ground.”

  “No, I came to ask Draco for a favor.”

  “What favor?”

  “I want him to come with me into the eastern tower, to help me find granddad and protect me from a demon or god I’m not sure which.”

  “What about me, I want to go?”

  “No Groucho, I couldn’t protect you.”

  “That’s right you couldn't. I'm five times as strong as a human, if I bite someone it’s ten times the force of a human, I’m way more agile then a human, I can pick a lock with my toes, even your best Harry Houdini couldn’t do that. Come on babe, it’ll give you a chance to get to know me. Maybe I can get you to switch teams, I can be a real animal.”

  I laughed, ”it’d be a lot more fun. I have no doubt about that but I’m sorry. Maz would kill me if anything happened to you.”

  “That’s not a valid excuse, I’m a person with free will. I should be allowed to go if I want to, I’m asking Maz.”

  I walked to the back of the barn, while Groucho argued with Maz. I could hear him yelling about never getting to go anywhere. The tower is the only safe place for me to go.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  By then I was walking down the concrete stairs to Draco’s cavern.

  “Hello”

  “Look who’s here, you looking for another donation, you don’t look burned, you just enjoyed rubbing it into your skin, didn’t you little devil.”

  “No and stop sexually harassing me.”

  “No, that's not my shtick, that’s the monkey's thing.”

  “Oh, I know. I have a favor to ask but I’m not even sure that it’s possible. Do you know about the Eastern tower?”

  “You mean Merlin’s tower, the tower that blinks in and out of reality. The tower that I helped to build. Yes I believe that I do.”

  “Holy crap, Merlin built that tower?”

  “Yes, with a lot of help from me, it took forever to build, that idiot moves in and a week later he blows a simple temporal spell, that I taught him and the tower blinked out of existence. I was so mad. It was a month before it came back for the first time.”

  “Is Merlin still in there?”

  “I’m sure he is still hiding in there, he knew how hard I worked on that tower, it was supposed to be my retirement lair, the top floor.”

  “So you can get inside it then?”

  “Yes of course I can, why would you think that I couldn’t?”

  “Well you are so big and the portals and doors I’ve used are tiny compared to you. There is only one giant set of doors I’ve seen in there.”

  “In a nondescript castle, by the desert, how’d you like the doorkeeper?”

  “The dragon door knocker?”

  “Door knocker, are you nuts, I worked for weeks on him, he’s a living metal dragon I magic’d up. He stares into your soul and if you are evil or plan to harm any of the castle inhabitants, he breathes fire and burns them to a crisp.”

  “So how do you get in, is there a big door, inside there is just a small golden disc.”

  “Right the golden disc is just a portal, you touch it and it transports you inside, right next to the test of courage. What’s yours, bats? I heard you tell Maz they freak you out.”

  “No luckily I’ve never seen any bats in there. When I enter, I’m standing next to a chasm, then I have to walk across a scary rope bridge. The second time I entered the bridge was in much worse shape than the first time.”

  “Every time you enter the bridge looks worse, I think the third time you don’t have any wooden slats at all. You have to just use a kind of waddle across keeping your foot on the rope on each side.”

  “Oh no, I’ll never be able to do that, I think granddad is trapped in there, I’ll never be able to get him out.” I started to cry.

  “Hey stop crying, I hate when girls do that. Damn the virgins used to that all the time. STOP CRYING, I said, there is nothing to cry about. It’s just an illusion. I created it myself. You don’t need to use the bridge at all, there’s also a secret door that takes you right to the last floor of the tower you were on.”

  I’d managed to stop crying. “Really?”

  “Yes really, I wouldn’t lie to you, I’ll tell you exactly where to find it.”

  I’m not a hugger, but I was so upset a minute ago and now I had insider knowledge, I went over and wrapped my arms around his neck and hugged him.

  “Hey, hey, what are you doing?”

  “I’m sorry I was so relieved that I’d be able to continue that I just hugged you out of reflex.”

  “It’s okay, I just didn’t know what you were doing.”

  “I’m really scared of heights, I’m not sure how long it took to cross that bridge the first time, at least an hour, slowly I tested each board before putting my weight on it then the next. Then when I got to the end, the bridge just collapsed, so I knew I couldn’t retreat and just kept going forward.”

  “That was Merlin’s idea. If an enemy got in if the bridge fell then they would assume they were trapped and would be forced to face my dragon guardian.”

  “Would you come with me? The last time I was there I tangled with either a demon or a trickster god and I bluffed and said, “Next time I come, maybe I’ll bring some friends, maybe he’s the one that should be worried.”

  “Unless you have an extinct dragon in your back pocket, he’ll tear you and your friends apart.”

  So will you come help me look for granddad, Draco.”

  “Sure but I have a condition.”

  “If it’s something I can do, I’ll do it, I promise. What’s your condition?”

  “You have to bring the monkey.”

  “But why?”

  “Because it’ll be hilarious, plus the little guy can’t go anywhere in our world and did I mention it’ll be hilarious.”

  “I’m not doing this for fun, I want to rescue my granddad.”

  “Yeah I want to rescue the old coot too, but if you won’t keep your word, how can I trust you?”

  “I’ll keep my word.”

  “No you said “If it’s something I can do, I’ll do it, I promise” and I give you one tiny condition and you refuse. Besides he might actually be able to help, and he cares about the old coot too.”

  “You’re right I’ll keep my word.”