The Last Dragon - Chapter 24
A guest is like a fish - Nice when fresh foul after three days.
“Mother, you are suffocating me!”
“Sangre, as you well know, the vampiric kind do not need to breathe!” Lady Cruella squeezed her eldest son once more. “And I simply do not know when you will grace us with your presence again, so I am getting in as many cuddles as I possibly can.” Lady Cruella nestled once more into her vigorous goodbye hug.
Sangre took a deep breath even though he didn’t need it. “I …. I am sor…”
“Yes, Sangre?” The Lady of the house looked into her son’s warm brown eyes, waiting with pent-up anticipation for an apology to blossom onto his lips. “Your… what Sangre, your… go ahead, say what you want to my dear son.”
Sangre looked up to the stars for strength, sighed and looked over to his father, the original Italian Stallion, who smiled back at him ensconced in his fluffy pink bathrobe and green slippers. The viral but rather cold and inconvenienced head of the De Ventosa dynasty normally enjoyed his bubble bath at this time of night and was rather desperate to warm his knees. “Go on, old lad, give the old girl what she wants. It’ll be better for all of us in the long run!”
“Mother, I am sorry you think my life choices make me only one step above pond scum in the acceptability rankings of this family. I am sorry I am a constant and total disappointment to you, which bars you from really rubbing in my successes to the rest of the wider family’s faces. I am sorry you are forced to acknowledge my existence to… well, everyone, but I am a man of my word and of my beliefs. I love who I choose to love; I eat what I choose to eat, and I do what I choose to do. That I cannot and will not change.” Sangre softened and quickly hugged his mother back.
Lady Cruella kissed her son on his cheek, stepped back and smiled. “Sangre, my dear darling son. I have waited a very long time for you to realise the awful impact you have on my life by being a queer and rather uptight blood avoider.”
Sangre gagged a little but forced his throat to relax.
“But, Sangre, “Lady Cruella said, holding her eldest son’s hand to her breast. I just want you to know your father and I have talked a lot about you and your strange little ways, and I have come to realise that as a mother, I need to support you in your oddities so that you may blossom into the very best version of yourself. Might I just draw your attention to…” Her Ladyship pointed to the top of one of the castle’s battlements, where a recently unfurled flag flew.
“Oh, no, you didn’t!”
“What is wrong, Sangre? Why are you grasping your chest like someone has just stabbed you with a sharpened chair leg?”
“Zorro, my mother,” Sangre jabbed at the distant flag with his pointed finger, “has put up the temperance flag above the castle. The actual temperance flag.” Everyone turned to look at the green-based flag, which had a lady’s neck baring a vein and a whopping great big cross over it.
“Oh look, it’s the temperance flag.”
“Yes, Torren, I can see that better than the rest of you!” sneered Sangre.
“Well,” questioned Torren, quite bewildered at the vampire’s reaction, “Isn’t that… a good thing that your mum is flying it above the castle?”
After a quick eye roll, Sangre directed his mood towards the appropriate recipient. “Mother, what do you want?” Sangre became as stiff as a sharpened wooden stake in his mother’s grasping arms.
“Nothing, darling. Why would you ask such a thing?” Her ladyship hung on to her son’s chest as she continued to cuddle him awkwardly.
“You never do anything nice unless there’s a price attached!”
Her ladyship stood back aghast. “Sangre, I am your mother! Can’t a mother do something for her child, her little odd fellow, her queer little duck, her eccentric little starfish, my darling little hemophobia touting sausage? Hmm, darling? Can’t I? Without being accused of having ulterior motives?” Her ladyship slid a silk hanky from her long lace sleeve and dabbed it at her eyes.
“I am not riding in the back with the dog. My antihistamine will only last so long in proximity to that fleabag.”
Two loud thumps rang out in the background behind Sangre’s back.
“Bugga!” Her ladyship slipped her silk handkerchief back into her sleeve as Sangre turned to see what caused the noise and then bellowed out.
“I told you, mother, I am not taking my siblings with me. They are unsuitable to travel away from the castle and into polite society. They have the accumulated social niceties of an in-bred mountain troll, who spent its entire life with its mouth open wide, living at the bottom of a dunnykin pit.” Sangre raked his fingers through his dark and lustrous hair. “Don’t you realise they will be in some of the most dangerous forests, caverns, and mountain passes ever experienced by a living being? You are genuinely putting Demonta and Nigel’s lives at risk.”
“It’s Maledictus Goreyth Vane, as you well know, Sangre! Mother, tell him!”
“Oh please, Nigel, not now, dear child!” Her Ladyship’s tone indicated she had fought this battle on many occasions, and it had now worn her last nerve very, very thin.
Maledictus widened his smokey-eyeliner-encased eyes wide with disbelief, causing him to take on the appearance of an insulted panda. “You always favour Sangre. He always gets his way. It’s not fair that Demonta and I have to go on holiday with him and bond. I don’t want to bond with him. I want to stay in my room and listen to my music and not have to talk to anyone! Including you and Father, because neither of you understands anything my generation thinks is important!”
“That’s right, Maledictus, I second your heartfelt plea for respect!” Demonta snarled at the baffled and wide-eyed troupe who had never before encountered teenage vampires.
“Mother tried to make me wear pink the other day. Can you believe it, Pink!” The dreadful named colour echoed around the castle’s carriage yard as Demonta looked around for a reaction from the crowd worthing of her mother’s insult. “I mean dark purple maybe or dried caked blood possibly, but my choice of colour palate should be respected. I’m trying to show the world my soul, bare my inner emotional state, my true self as an artist, and I’m told,” Demota’s voice rose in venom if not in pitch in her attempt to mimic her mother, “Demonta my darling, why don’t you wear a bright a cheery colour for a change. You never know, it might brighten your mood!”
“What ho girly, I always find that bright colours change my mood when I’m feeling a bit down, what ho! Yes, many a day after battle training, I’ve limped back to my room and ordered new peonies in a bright and cheery shade.” Sir Richard may have faced the hot end of a dragon, but his suit of armour had somewhat muffled the reptile’s attitude if not flame. He now no longer had such armour to protect him from the burning eye-roll of both Nigel and Demonta.
“Whatever, you bedraggled old obsolete moaning erroneous repugnant sloth!” Demonta folded her arms and sulked at full teenage force. “You’re all so old and boring!”
“Yeah, that’s right, Demonta, you’re all B.O.O.M.E.R.S.!”
“No darling, that’s Mummy and Daddy’s generation; your brother and his friends are Generation X.” As soon as she had finished, her ladyship knew she’d made a mistake as Nigel… Maledictus Goreyth Vane turned his withering panda gaze to her.
“What, Generation Waa, Waaa? I’m so tough ‘cause my parents don’t love me, and I had to grow up under a bridge ‘cause I was locked out of my own home? Go and shove a stake in my heart. Here, let me draw an X over it so you don’t miss it! I don’t care about anything you say about me or do to me because I used to play with real-life people face-to-face and punch them in their real-life faces if they annoyed me! I wasn’t allowed to come home until the sun started to come up! What do you mean you’ve never drunk water out of a garden hose? That Generation X who think they’re so cool because X is a cool letter!” Nigel folded his arms and stood petulantly by his sister. “Wow, I’m soooo jealous!”
Her ladyship looked over at her husband, who rolled his eyes back at his wife. “I’m sorry, Cruella, but their penchant for whining acronyms annoys the living hell out of me. If they had to go through what we went through at their age, the starvation, the poverty, the war, the vampire hunters, the garlic-infused foods, those people who wore black suits and were always trying to wave with one hand and tell us about their cult leader who couldn’t even grow a proper moustache always give us pamphlets to read and go join their cult of onion worshipers… It was hell! I tell you, though, having a vampire hunter jump out on you and try and stake you whilst you were having a quiet personal contemplative moment on the lav, it damn well toughened us up! I’m ready for anything at any moment now. Someone knocking on the front door for a visit without first sending a written letter a week before asking permission doesn’t freak me out and make me seek solace under my bed. And as far as I’m concerned, they both need a good kick up the backsides till they learn which side of their bread is buttered, so to speak!”
“Oh, bloody hell’s them lil bugga’s aren’t com’n wiv’ us is they? I don’t thinks I can remains me polite and thoughtsful self around ‘em for very long.”
“Don’t worry, Mr Geezer, I’m sure, once we get to know them, it will be fine!” Torren smiled nervously as the weight of the three coffins and the already accompanying cart riders made Sally snort in anticipation of hard work.
“I’m not riding in that shoddy little cart with that shoddy little horse and that smelly human! Mother, tell the staff to get my coffin back in my room right now!”
“No, Demonta, your father is right.”
“Mother, take both their coffins and shove them back into their rooms right now.”
“No, Sangre, you must take them with you. You must bond with your siblings!”
“They’re going to take us into the dark forest!”
“Oh Nigel… I mean, Maledictus, you love dark places.”
“And then they’re going into the dark caverns of death, Mother!”
“Maledictus, you love death.” Her ladyship smiled brightly as her husband joined their arms regally together in a bond of parental defiance.
“And then into the Mountains of Terror!” The teen was almost to the point of crying but wouldn’t let anyone know.
“But Maledictus, you love terrorising the peasants. You might learn some new tricks.” A pleading tone had entered Lady Cruella’s desperate tone.
The three Siblings began arguing with each other, their parents, and the world in general before a loud and ringing “That is ENOUGH!” silenced them all.
All eyes turned to Beatrix, whose temper was clear and easily read on her face. “Get in the bloody cart and shut your gobs, if I hear one peep out of either of you, I’ll stake you to a tree at dawn and use your glitter on my birthday cards. We’ve got a lot to do.” Beatrix then turned her boiling attention to the horse witch, “Hurry up, Regina, get your saddle on. We’re moving.”
“I’m not carrying you one more step. I don’t care what you do to me or try to torture me with, I won’t, I won’t, I won’t!” The young witch even stomped her foot at Beatrix, which everyone, including Mr Geezer, knew was exactly the wrong thing to do, especially as it was also noticed that Lucy smiled her smile, which sent a shiver up Lord Santosers spine as it brought back the feelings of the good old bad old days.
Beatrix held her ground and raised an eyebrow at the defiant and pouting Regina, who in turn stared defiantly back and announced, “I won’t!” with the same amount of conviction that any teenager possesses who has just been told to pick up all the wet towels from their bedroom floor.
Beatrix’s eyebrow was joined with folded arms and a knowing evil snigger from Lucy. “If you haven’t turned by your own free will, by the time I count to five, I’ll make you!”
Dark and foreboding clouds covered the moon, casting an eerie shadow across the castle’s courtyard as Beatrix’s low murmur rang out loud and clear. “One, Two…
“I think I’ll just lay in my coffin for the time being, so I don’t have to talk to any of you,” mumbled Demonta quickly.
“Yeah, good idea, me too!” commented Nigel, who had kissed both his parents goodbye and was up on the cart, shutting the lid of his coffin before his sister had finished hugging their father.
“Three.”
“Oh, look at that evil eye; she’s learnt tha’ at the knee of Mother Harper. I can tell tha’ without even trying! I’d recognise that withering death stare anywhere.” Mrs Tipsy, who sat up the front and next to Mr Geezer in Sally’s cart, tightened her bright pink blanket around her head and nodded to Mr Geezer, who was also covering his knees with an eiderdown he’d borrowed from the castle without asking. “Do yous know, right now we’res in a balance moment! The future is uncertain ‘ere, an evens people who are extremely talented like me can’t sees the outcome. If little Ms Windy Knickers don’t change, three things could happen.”
“Was tha’ then?” asked Mr Geezer, who was now so tightly wrapped in his eiderdown he looked like a cocooned pensioner butterfly about to go to sleep and morph.
One, if she changes and behaves herself, Beatrix will lets her live an’s won’t turn her into Mother Heggerty to be chargrilled.
Two, she don’t change, and our Beatrix forces Regina, a fancy name if ever I’ve heard one, to change. This sadly, will result in Regina pooping herself and then losing her mind. Thens, for the rest of her short life, she thinks she’s an award-winning member of the local pony club.
Three, and this is the nasty one, she changes, and then when no one is looking, Regina contacts Mother Heggerty’s spiteful little secretary Constance and tells ‘er all of our Beatrix’s news. Which, in the long run, seals Miss Windy Knickers fate into a glass jar.
“What does that mean?” mumbled Mr Geezer through goose feathers.
“It means that Constance is currently having whopping great bloody big pickling glass jars made up for all of us right now, including Ms Regina Windy Knickers.
With the same amount of sarcasm both Demonta and Maledictus could create together if innocently questioned by an adult over thirty-five who politely asked them how their day was, the young witch spat out, “Why would Constance do that? She’s Mother Heggerty’s secretary and does as she is told!” It didn’t pass by the horse witch’s attention, though the way everyone in the group didn’t seem so confident in Constance’s ability to kowtow to her employer.
Mrs Tipsy smiled and smuggled a flask of fuming alcohol up from her blanket, took a swig, and passed it over to Mr Geezer, who commented on her kindness and somehow managed to grab it whilst still remaining fully ensconced by eiderdown.
The soothsayer sighed, “Because, you silly gel, Constance has a very windy lifeline, and she intends on winding it around Mother Heggerty’s neck before all this is done. So please, entertain us all with your decision.”
“What kind of awards would I win at Pony Club?”
“The kind they put on your headstone in the cemetery!”
“Oh. I don’t like those kinds.” The young witch stood and thought for a little while. “I will change, and I witches promise that I won’t tell Mother Heggerty or Constance what’s going on, but you must witch promise me a few things in return for my loyalty.”
Beatrix took in a deep sigh as the clouds parted ways, letting the silver moonlight once more shine freely upon the world.
“You must promise me that you’ll be kind and not pull hard on the reigns. You simply have to talk to me and tell me where you want to go. I don’t like the bit.”
“Fine.”
“You must promise me you’ll protect me against Mother Heggerty and Constance’s wrath.”
Beatrix thought for a moment before sighing, “Fine”
“You must allow me to change back into my human form at the end of each day and eat and sleep like a human.”
“Fine. Whatever floats your boat.”
“If you do this and bind our witch’s promise with a gift of your own, which I will name, you will have my unwavering loyalty.”
“Okay… what gift?”
“A kiss.”
Beatrix scrunched up her face, “I… don’t like you that way.”
The face scrunching was returned by Regina, “No. Eww… Not from you. From your boyfriend!”
Zorro’s joy-filled little “Oh shit!” echoed and bounced off numerous cobblestones before it took its leave and left the building.
“No!”
Dark storm clouds began to gather once more, blotting the stars from the night sky.
“Then kill me now, Beatrix, because I won’t be put into a pickling jar.”
“It’s only a kiss, Beatrix!” Joe tried to sound as logical as he could but knew it wouldn’t work, so in desperation, he pulled out the sympathy card. “I want to get going as fast as we can. I’m so worried about my little girl. I can’t go back to my wife and say I lost our only child. Please, Beatrix, can we please get going?”
The troupe watched as Beatrix clenched and unclenched her fists. “Fine! Any tongue, though, and I’ll give you a rectal examination with a turnip when you least expect it!”
The young horse witch smiled a ‘cats got the cream’ smile, which wasn’t missed in the slightest by Beatrix.
“Excuse me, but don’t I have a say in it?” Torren was rather annoyed that his virtue and his rights were being ignored.
The young horse witch swaggered over to Torren who held tightly onto Sally’s head.
“No, you don’t because your girlfriend has agreed to my terms, and if she wants my witches’ promise to be binding, she has to let me kiss you.”
Torren blushed a deep dark red as the witch wrapped her arms around him and kissed him as Beatrix watched on.
Stepping back, Regina smiled, “And now the deed has been done, you have my loyalty, Beatrix.”
It seemed to everyone else that Beatrix would prefer Regina’s head on a chopping block.
Before she was finished, the equine witch turned and held Torren’s chin in her hand, “Any time you want to brush my coat or wash me down after a long hot ride, I won’t say no.” then swaggered to her saddle where she began, to the pure delight and howls of encouragement from Zorro, undress.
With terrified guilt rampaging through his gut, Torren stammered to the onlooking crowd, “Um, well, I was brushing her and washing her down before because that’s what you do with a horse, so they don’t get overheated and…”
Torren would have finished his sentence, but Beatrix had already purposefully strode up to him, smooched him really, really hard, and then eyeballed the now displeased horse witch. Due to the effort Beatrix put into her smooch, Torren turned a bright blazing red, lost control of his legs, slumped to the floor, giggled like an excited schoolgirl, and when everyone thought the effect of the kiss was over, they were all very surprised when Torren jumped up onto the cart’s driver’s seat, pulled out his own borrowed eiderdown, and scrunched it on top of his lap as he broke out into a red-hot flushed sweat.
“Are you okay, Torren, my friend?” enquired Zorro from the cart’s tray as he looked over Torren’s hunched shoulder.
“Mmmmhmm!” ferociously nodded Torren with raised eyebrows and pencil-thin lips.
“Are you sure? Because you seem to be in pain, my friend? Are you in pain? Did you hit yourself when you fell? Do you need me to rub it better?”
“Immh’ shook Torren’s head in the negative as he broke out in a now torrential sweat, scrunching the eiderdown even harder against his lap.
Mr Tipsy sniggered as Mr Geezer, as loudly as his own muffling eiderdown allowed him, called out. “Beats that, Miss Windy Knickers!”
“That’s a double-sealed witch’s promise right there, so if you know what’s good for you, you’ll flip yourself and prepare for a long, hard ride, and I promise not to pull too hard on your reigns!” Beatrix smiled like a dieting lioness with a baby gazelle in her sight.
“My humans are very complicated, aren’t they, dear!”
“Yes, my darling Curella.” Responded her faithful (mostly) husband.
“Yes, I mean, we all love humans, that cannot be denied, but I couldn’t eat a whole one.” Her Ladyship laughed at her own joke.
“No, dear!” His Lordship waved to his son, who waved back as the small and strange troupe rolled out of his castle. “I must say, though, darling, a bloody awesome plan to get rid of all the kids in one fell swoop.”
“Yes, my love, it’s time the twins were introduced to the real world, and it is high time Sangre spent more time with his own kind to see the error in his ways.” Her ladyship smiled lovingly at her life’s partner. “Are you off to have a bath, dear?”
“What? Oh yes, I can’t seem to get the smell of wet dog out of my nose.”
“Oh, can’t you, dear?”
“No darling, I can’t. And please don’t take offence, but you reek of wet dog!”
“Do I, darling, do I?” her ladyship patted her drying curls into place. “Really, I have no idea how that came to be. Maybe it’s because that darned werewolf scent gets into everything.”
“Yes, possibly my beloved, but maybe it has something to do with you sticking your tongue down his throat when you kissed him goodbye.”
Without missing a beat, her Ladyship clarified patiently, “Well, dear, one is always trying to forge new bonds of friendship between the species! I was merely trying in my own way to make him feel more at home. I know I upset you because I did hear you when you tried to tell me it was something I shouldn’t do. So, I am sorry, beloved.”
“All is forgiven, darling, but I would use a little mouthwash before I did anything else. I was trying to tell you before you passionately kissed him goodbye that this evening, when I walked into my bathroom, I saw the werewolf… how do I say this… taking care of his own nether region’s hygiene in a ‘lick it yourself’ kind of way.” His Lordship’s tone seemed a little too jolly for her Ladyship’s liking. “Apparently, he’d used up all the towels in his room and mine and so had decided to do it the old-fashioned way.”
Her ladyship’s smile became brittle whilst she quite successfully squashed down a gag.
“Duly noted, darling, duly noted. From now on, more towels in the guest rooms.”
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This part is funny and kind of sweet—Sangre’s mom just won’t let go, and he’s clearly torn between love and needing space. His dad in the bathrobe adds the perfect touch.