The Power and the Glory

Book 3 Chapter II: The Game Begins

So many things are possible just as long as you don't know they're impossible. -- Norton Juster, The Phantom Tollbooth

Abi stared up at her grandmother. Her grandmother glared back at her. Over her grandmother's shoulder she caught sight of her grandfather giving her a glare of his own. Abi thought of the assassin. Of Ilaran's death. Of her trip through his memories and into the Land of the Dead. Of Irímé as a dragon. She paled.

"Hello, granny and granddad!" she exclaimed with a false attempt at cheer. If she pretended she hadn't a care in the world maybe they would believe it. "I was just--"

"There's a dragon outside," her grandfather interrupted.

Abi's force smile began to slip away in spite of her attempts to keep it in place. "Oh. Er, is there? I mean, yes. Yes. Of course there is." She kept trying to smile while she internally yelled at herself to stop babbling nonsense.

"Shizuki tells us it's your fiancé."

Abi's smile completely disappeared. She searched for an explanation. How could she tell her grandparents "I raised a corpse, an assassin tried to kill me, the corpse killed Ilaran, I brought him back to life, and while all this was happening Irímé turned into a dragon"? It was impossible.

"Well?" her grandmother asked, tapping her foot against the floor. "Doesn't he know what a spectacle he's making of himself? Why is he a dragon and why hasn't he turned back yet?"

Abi looked everywhere except at them. "That's the problem. He doesn't know how."

A very uncomfortable silence fell over the room. She knew without looking that her grandparents were staring at her in horror.

"He doesn't know how?" her grandfather repeated faintly.

Luckily someone else came along at this point to take the situation out of Abi's hands. The sitting room door opened and Ilaran poked his head around it.

"It's a long story," he said, which was both an understatement of incredible proportions and suggested he must have been listening right outside. "In short, he transformed without meaning to and in a moment of panic. We've all heard of such things happening before."

The memory of that story about the lawyer turning into a rabbit popped into Abi's mind. It took a great deal of effort not to burst out laughing.

Ilaran continued, "But I think Shizuki might be able to help."

"He'd better," Raivíth said grimly. "Before everyone remembers what happened the last time a dragon was on the loose in the city."

Abi barely heard that part. She was much more preoccupied by worrying about whether or not anyone could tell what had happened to Ilaran. She stared at him intently. Was he paler than normal? He had always been so pale that it wasn't really noticeable. Was his wound visible? No, he had his hair draped over his left shoulder so it concealed his neck. All the same she waited on tenterhooks for someone to ask if something was wrong with him. No one did. She only really relaxed when her grandparents left the sitting room.

So far so good. Now they just had to worry about Irímé.

~~~~

Shizuki was not impressed when he heard he was expected to teach Irímé how to turn back into an immortal.

"But I like him as a dragon!" he complained. "I've always wanted to meet a dragon."

Siarvin did not actually close his eyes and count to ten, but it was a near thing. He kept smiling even though he wanted to groan. "Yes, but you wouldn't like to be stuck as a snake all the time. Once he learns to control his powers Irímé can turn into a dragon whenever he wants to."