Chapter 93

The drive to Kyle’s was morose and silent. Not for lack of effort on Gleipnir’s part. He’d tried making jokes and blinking his googly eyes at Sam in the way that she found so irritatingly endearing. It did not work. Sam just gave him a few flat stares as if she was too angry or upset, or emotional to even communicate with him.

Which he was pretty sure was somehow his fault too, yet he’d be damned if he could figure out what he’d said wrong. Gleipnir’s comment about her being fated for greatness was supposed to have been reassuring. A reminder that she was not, in fact, doing as much fighting as she could be if she had chosen a militaristically traditional path. Instead, she’d been angry about it.

“Am I supposed to be grateful for that fate?” Sam had snapped waspishly at him. “Am I supposed to have wanted it?”

“No.” He’d reassured her with very wide googly eyes. “Never. We’ve just been incredibly lucky to have lived peacefully so far. I hope it continues…” Then she’d collapsed on her pink bedsheets and sobbed into her maroon satin pillowcase while her bathroom convulsed through its death throes. Gleipnir had no words to help his warlock. He was still somewhat emotionally stunted from his centuries as a magical prison warden who accidentally developed sentience.

What he did know was that they had both seen things that were nightmare-inducing in the last few days. Things that they both needed help processing. And Sam wasn’t really thinking straight about that. She never did. If there was anything his warlock hated it was asking anyone for help. So, he cuddled up against her reassuringly and patted her awkwardly on her back while elongating his ribbon-tail to pack a few extra things into an overnight bag.

“Call your dad.” Gleipnir gently urged Sam as she sat up to take the box of tissues he offered her. “See if he’s home yet and if not, we’ll head over to Kyle’s since you’ve got a spare key and the resident parking garage is magically insulated along with the rest of the building and you won’t have to worry about maybe losing your car if the arcanes spike again.” Sam blew her nose then sniffed, tears still running down her face.

But she didn’t smile. There was something behind her eyes, yet it was definitely not a smile. The pact item knew that Sam needed help. A psychiatric intervention as soon as possible. She’d seen things in that monster. Done… it didn’t matter what she’d done. What mattered was that she couldn’t help any of them. She could save any of the people who’d been sucked into the thing that had risen from the corpse of the dragon.

Wordlessly, she pulled her phone out of a jacket pocket with bleak pain-filled eyes. Then she dialed and Gleipnir waited with bated breath as he listened to the sound of the ringing through the speaker. One. Two. Three… six. The call went to voicemail. She hung up and inhaled sharply.

“Why didn’t you leave a message?” he as with a little bit of confusion.

“Do you really think he’s going to call me back?” it was half-shout and Gleipnir felt himself recoil slightly at the venom in it.

“Well,” he stammered hesitantly, “well, you can’t be certain that he’s…”

“He’s what?” she prompted as he paused, looking for a way to phrase it delicately. “Even if he isn’t dead, Gleip, what are the odds that he will look at his phone, check his messages, and actually call me back? I’m pretty sure he doesn’t even know how to check his voicemail. Not because he’s incapable of it, but because he just doesn’t care enough about what anyone else has to say to him. You really think the man-child who never learned how to cook, asked his son to leave work and pick up his youngest daughter, and then abandoned said daughter in a life-or-death crisis, will fucking bother talking to me if it’s the least bit inconvenient for him? And considering the current state of emergency, it’s probably pretty fucking inconvenient for him even if he is completely safe. I’m sure whatever was so important he had to bail on Anna is still keeping him occupied since Mom’s not around to get his attention.”

Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

Sam was furious, scared, traumatized, and holding on to functionality by a thread. Which Gleipnir was aware of, and he was about to point out that maybe she was being a bit harsh on Dad. And then… Gleipnir thought of Sam’s parents as kind of his parents too. After all, they had raised his burgeoning sentience right alongside their four children despite the difficulties it would bring.

To him, their father had always been a bit of a loveable doofus-savant. Brilliant, but immature. Self-aware of his general incompetence with mechanisms to compensate for his shortcomings. This time, though…

“You’re right,” he sighed, hugging Sam tighter for a moment before wrapping his ribbon around her hand and tugging her to her feet. Then the ride, in mostly silence. He’d eventually given up trying to cheer Sam up and taken to sighing heavily as he stared out the window at the scenery passing by.

“There’s a lot of damage.” He hadn’t been expecting a reply to the inane comment, but it seemed that was what finally pulled her out of her funk.

“I’m sure the big companies are already putting together their bids for the government contracts.” Her mood was darkly sardonic, and it showed in her voice. Gleipnir chuckled his agreement.

“Those asshats are racing to get themselves a piece of those sweet, sweet, FEMA funds, and don’t even get me started on the war research and development companies are going to wage over all the monster parts.” He added to the griping.

“Oh, Gods. You know what that means!” Sam’s derogatory tone of voice could only be reserved for one entity, the entity abhorred by magic users and sellers throughout the country.

“Mmmmkaay.”

“Mmmmkaay.” They exclaimed simultaneously as they drove through the devastated streets and chuckled together before Sam continued.

“For realz, the Magical Materials Control Agency are going to be all over New York.” Breaking as she approached Central Park, Sam pulled onto the street leading towards the museum’s employee housing. “It’s the kind of disaster they’ve been waiting for to push for harsher restrictions on all magical materials.” Gleipnir snorted in disdain for the government agency which often tried to overstep its boundaries and whom nobody at all respected.

“Like that’s going to work. The big military contracted R and D firms will never stand for it. And big money – holy moly hot tamales!” They’d reached the driveway entrance to employee housing and had to stop when a rank of golems blocked their path. Defensive enchantments were active and…

“Sam. Hold up.” Gleipnir’s voice was stern and commanding.

“I see it Gleip. Their offensive enchantments are hot, they’ve fired off mass attacks in the last day at least. I didn’t realize that there had been that kind of manifestation so close to the museum.” The pair glanced at each other before eyeing the silent sentries between them and a nice monster-free apartment. Sam, like Gleipnir, could see the flows of magic and as a magic technician had a fairly good grasp of what the golems were actually programmed to do. “Maybe…” Sam started before Gleipnir cut her off.

“Go slowly. We should be fine. There’s nothing in the enchantments that indicates they should view us as a threat.” He added in a high tight voice as he thoughtfully examined the golems. “Let me get our F.B.I. ID cards out just in case.”

“Really? You think that will help?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I think that will help.”