Page 117 of Dragon Fires Everywhere
Emerson magicks the big comfy chair over and pushes him into it. Ellowyn magicks him a tea and keeps shoving the mug at himuntil he drinks.
But he smiles at Emerson. “I’m not supposed to see you before the wedding.”
“That’s a human tradition, and we arenothuman,” she says to him sternly. Then she kind of crumples into a kneeling position next to him and presses her foreheadto his knee. “You have to stop giving so much of yourself, Jacob.”
“You first.” He runs a hand over her hair, careful not to mess with any of the pins. “I’ll be okay. Promise. But, Em...”
She looks up. We all look at Jacob because of the grimness in his voice. “It was Evie.”
It’s a blow. Evie North is a Healer, and attacks on Healers are the lowest of the low. And Evie is also Jacob’ssister.
I can see Emerson’s grip on Jacob tighten. “She’s okay,” Emerson says firmly, like if she says it, it will make it true.
“Mom’s with her. She wouldn’t even stay put. Said she had to come to the wedding. She’s okay, but...” Jacob trails off,as if he can’t finish.
“But it’s worse. It keeps getting worse,” Emerson finishes for him.
Jacob’s expression is grim. “She said the attacker was almost familiar. That the face of her attacker looked like some grotesquemix of Felicia and Maeve.”
But before we can deal with this—really deal with these attackers who resemble missing Joywood members—someone clears theirthroat over a loudspeaker. A magical loudspeaker that treats each of us like we’re our own sound system, like what comes throughis directlyin our faces.
We set it up ourselves.
“Good afternoon, St. Cyprian.”
It’s Carol’s voice. We all move to the door to see Carol on the little stage in the middle of Main Street, with the perfectlight dusting of snow framing her. Right where Jacob and Emerson are going to say their vows.
“I have received themostdisturbing news that I’d like to share with you all while we...wait,” she says, and she draws out the wordwaitlike the wedding isn’t on time because Emerson has set out to insult us all.
I’m outside before I know I mean to move. I can hear Emerson tell Jacob to stay put, but when I look back, he’s followed herout of the shop too.
Zander is still behind him, no doubt trying to be a very conspicuous wingman while downplaying Jacob’s injuries to Emerson.
“I have had news of a terrible attack done to one of our own.” She surveys the crowd. “Poor Evie North, aHealer, was clawed, burned, and nearlymurdered.”
An echo of surprise and concern moves through the crowd. Carol’s gaze finds the little knot of us in the crowd. She smiles.It isn’t kind.
“I’m so glad Emerson can engage in aweddingwhile we’re all being terrorized by a dragon,” she says, making sure it echoesthrough that speaker so she’s saying it to every single magical being alive.
“That attack was not done by a dragon, Carol,” Jacob says in a dark, if tired, voice, but he also uses the same magical speaker.And Healers aren’t known for lies.
Unlike her.
But she is unfazed, as ever.
“Oh?” she returns, with a raised eyebrow and fake surprise all over her freakishly younger face. “That’s funny, becauseIheard that it was done inside the cemetery. Where, you might have heard, a dragon is imprisoned.”
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There’s a murmur in the crowd. The kind of murmur Carol loves to stir up, especially when it comes to us. Fearful looks passlike a long, slow, insistently dark ripple across water. We can see it happen from where we stand.
On some level I get it. The problem is that Azrael and other magical creatures are the unknown. We’ve been taught not to believein them, so any sign of their existence can easily feel threatening. No one needs to trust what Carol says to worry that adragon might be a problem—a sign of something bad and scary that might also eat them.
She made sure to put on a show and build a scary statue.
And she’s still entirely too good at what she does.
I worry the votes will turn back, and we’ll have to imprison him again. I worry that’sexactlywhy Carol is doing this.
