Page 22 of Wickedly Ever After
—The Sorcerer’s Star
The Golden Dragon was the nicest hotel in Kingsmanor. Towers crowned with silver shimmered in the afternoon sunlight, bright as stars. A thousand crystal windows glittered like a goblin’s fever dream. The doors were gold-plated. Hector had seen it too many times to be awed.
But Tinbit shrank in his seat. “It’s like a mountain—a shiny, bright mountain.”
“It wasn’t always this high-rise,” Hector said. “This used to be farmland once upon a time.”
“Sometimes I forget how old you really are,” Tinbit said.
Sometimes Hector forgot too. Remembering made him feel old in a way his bones and joints didn’t quite feel, not yet, even on the coldest of winter mornings.
Once upon a time, farms came right up to the bailey. Back then, the castle itself was a wooden building with fine buttressed ceilings made of rough-hewn fir with a thatched roof. The Hall of Witches was the only stone building in Kingsmanor. He’d been appointed Wicked Witch of the West there, an honor he still felt he didn’t deserve. All he’d done was enchant dragons to make them harder for knights to kill. He’d long felt that the knights had too much of an advantage over people who could only breathe fire to protect themselves. He’d turned their scales into proper armor to give them a fighting chance.
Of course, that didn’t last long. Ida Moonshadow became the Good Witch of the North on the strength of her magic that gave an ordinary sword magical powers against dragon armor, a feat of metallurgy he could have appreciated if it hadn’t left him gnashing his teeth and scrambling for a new solution.
A hundred years later, they’d knocked down the old hall and paved the lot with cobblestones so a new, improved building could be raised. A hundred years after that, they tore it down and built the new hall adjacent to the castle—largely because the king at the time wanted to make sure the enchanted sword went to his son, the crown prince. No more sticking it in a stone to see which of the noblest knights were the worthiest ofa Happily-Ever-After. Despite Hector’s best efforts, he’d never managed to beat Ida’s enchantment on that damned sword. He agreed; the sword stayed in the royal treasury in exchange for the promise that no more dragons would die. The Hall of Witches had remained next to the castle ever since. So much for the separation of magic and state.
He shrugged off the irritating memories like an old coat. “Are you meeting your young man tonight?”
Tinbit, still goggling at the building, shook his head. “No, tomorrow. He said his witch needed him tonight—something about a dinner she had to go to.”
Hector winced. “That will be Tara’s shindig. I hope she likes butter.”
Tinbit grunted. “Hector, do you think he’ll make me choose the wine? Shit, I don’t know anything about that.”
“A good pinot noir is never a bad choice,” Hector said. “Unless he orders fish.”
“He won’t. He’s allergic to fish.”
“Well then.”
“I didn’t realize it would be so grand,” Tinbit said in an awed whisper as the skeletal horses pulled up under the golden fabric canopy with a loud clatter of coffin bones.
“Wait until you see the inside.”
The skeleton coachman opened the door, and Hector stepped out onto the slick cobblestones. He eyed the liveried doormen with the kind of scorn he usually reserved for overdressed royalty.
“Is that unicorn horn?” Tinbit asked as they walked through the doors inlaid with a shimmering material giving off the faint glow of moonlight.
“No, it’s narwhal,” he said. The last of the unicorns had been rounded up centuries ago and put in a magical preserve to prevent their extinction. The last mare still lived there. Her horn had been removed to save her life. All the wild ones had been killed by the royal family on their magical game hunts. The ones in captivity committed suicide. It kept him awake some nights, thinking dragons might have gone the same way had he not protected them. Unicorn Jubilee indeed. A thousand years and nothing had ever really changed when it came to the upper class. Maybe princes no longer killed dragons, but the royal family was still the royal family—grabbing swords, power, and constantly making sure they kept witches and monsters in their places.
A footman with rough hands, dressed as splendidly as a duke that belied a farm boy come to town to make his fortune, carried their bags into the glass elevator.
“Where’s the dining room?” Tinbit asked, voice quavering.
The farm boy gave him a dismissive look. “Which one?”
“There’s more than one?”
“Yes. Where are you from, Westfale or something?”
Hector stepped in. “I’m Hector, the Wicked Witch of the West. My butler was inquiring about the Golden Dragon’s Claw. I have a hankering for frog legs tonight,” he added with a menacing glare.
The farm boy turned the color of buttermilk. “Third floor, down the hall, first door on your left. Would you like me to reserve you a table by the balcony or the fish tank?”
“Neither,” Hector said. “I’ll send foryouwhen I’m ready to eat.”
The footman unlocked their door and bolted.
