Dragon 2 Chapter 3

I stepped out of the cafeteria, moving quickly to get to the edge of campus. The monolithic buildings and manicured lawns of the college campus felt less calming than they once had now that I knew Philly had an underground society of the paranormal. I couldn’t help but look at people I passed and wonder if they were something else.

“Roomie.” Frank’s familiar voice pitched as he hurried to catch up to me. “Why are we walking so fast?”

“In a rush. What’s up Frank?”

“Dude, you haven’t been home in a few days. I’m just wondering which of the girls’ houses you were bunking at, or are you hopping between them?” The way he smiled as he said it told me it was something he’d done before.

And I wasn’t surprised. Frank had always had a way with the ladies and serious commitment issues as long as I’d known him. And we’d been best friends since freshman year. But at the moment, he was breaking his pattern and focused on one woman.

Enjoying that I’d catch him off guard, I threw out. “Just one, but I have a date with a second here soon.”

Frank’s eyes nearly popped out, and he nearly missed a step before catching himself and keeping up with me again. “You’re kidding me. Like you are actually dating two of them?”

I decided to make it a little more fun. “Yep. And they are roommates and best friends.”

His face grew concerned. “Dude. That’s bad, very bad. When they find out, they are going to carve your nuts off. And they will find out. Girls talk!” Frank huffed a little as he worked to keep up with me, but he didn’t say anything. I was already at an advantage with longer legs, even without the paranormal extras.

“It gets better. They know, and they are into it.” I shot a winning smile at Frank, whose mouth had fallen fully open.

“No way.”

“Yes way.” I fired back.

“Do they have friends?”

“I thought you and Maddie were tight. You guys seem like you might go all the way and tie the knot?” There was no way I was going to offer something that would cause him and Maddie trouble. My roommate Frank had taken women as a challenge, something to win and move onto the next one. He was good at it too, until he finally scored my best friend and swore he was done with his promiscuous ways.

And I liked them together. Maddie kept him on his toes, too. The first few months of them dating, she was touch and go, and the vastly different approach kept Frank working to keep dating her.

I found myself relieved that they had lasted this long, and that Maddie seemed able to manage Frank. Unfortunately, that also happened to include plenty of wall thumping sex, which was another reason I had been out of the apartment. Listening to two of my closest friends have sex wasn’t exactly fun.

And it didn’t help that I felt like I’d been lying to Frank more and more. I couldn’t tell him about the paranormal, and so much of my life now resided in the paranormal world. There were strict rules on telling normies about the paranormal world, and breaking those rules often ended in both the para and normies deaths. The Council didn’t mess around with keeping the secret of the paranormal world.

Frank had gone quiet after my question about Maddie, and I became more worried. “Everything okay between you two, Frank?”

“Yeah.” He sounded disappointed. “It is just starting to lose that flame, you know?”

I didn’t really know. Scarlett and I had no such issue, but then again, she’d apparently been going out of her way to keep it going in bed. “Talk to her, Frank. Maddie took enough of a risk on you. Make sure she knows what you are thinking. Relationships are mostly communication. Chemistry is only a small part of all of it.”

“Look at you dropping sage advice.” He said as I crossed the border that marked the eastern edge of campus.

Almost on cue, a sporty black Ferrari spun around in traffic and screeched to a halt in front of me. The door flew open in a fluid motion, like it was a continuation of her turn.

“Get in.” Morgana’s Swedish accent demanded.

“Which one is this?” Frank asked, starting to bend down to get a look at Morgana.

“Not one of my girls.” I grabbed the roof of the car and swung myself low. The sports car was so low that it felt like I was riding only inches above the pavement. “Catch you later, Frank.”

“Bullshit. If she’s not one of your girls, work your magic, Zach. I’m rooting for you. I mean, look at that car!”

I closed the door before he could get a look at Morgana and see her blue skin and silver hair. And if that wasn’t enough, her red eyes made her clearly not human.

During the day, she relied on cars with windows illegally tinted to the point that it was almost impossible for me to see out of them at night except for the brief moments we passed by a street lamp. She’d also been known to pretend she was cosplaying to try to cover up her different appearance, but she mostly tried to avoid being seen.

“Where to?” I was rocked back into the seat as Morgana floored it and the Ferrari purred under her. She zipped through traffic like she was playing a high speed intense game of dodge the other cars. “Shit, let me get my seat belt on.” Fumbling, I put my backpack on the ground and got my seatbelt clicked in. But it only made me feel marginally safer. Despite riding with Morgana for a while, I wasn’t any more comfortable with her insane driving.

“Market East. The convention center reported a troll sighting. Good thing it is empty today.”

“Of course it is. The Order of the Magi’s conference doesn’t start until Saturday.”

Morgana did a double take, and I paused, savoring the moment of being able to surprise her. “Okay, how do you know about Magi?” She conceded.

“Detective Fox came by this morning with a job to scope the place out. They hired us because of my ability to see magic.” I confessed. “I told them I’d swing by tonight or tomorrow and check it out.”

She shrugged. “If we are going there anyway, might as well check it out now. There’s only one troll, so this should be easy.” There was the sort of cruel smile she had when she trained me on her face. “That is, of course, if you can shift at all.”

“Oh hell. You aren’t going to help, are you?” I knew the answer as soon as I said it. Her face had said it all.

“It’s broad daylight, and neither my drow ancestry or my vampiric affliction like the sunlight. Me being there will be hard enough on my reserves.”

“At least you won’t go poof like the stories.”

Morgana made a distasteful grimace. “Baby vampires made too many public mistakes. I can handle the sun, but it would still strain me to do much more activity than a normal human. Plus, drow complexion isn’t great with the sun.”

I gave her an unamused look. “Really? Skin care?”

“Do you think blue skin is so that I protect myself from UV light? No, it’s so I blend into the dark. We drow have little to no melatonin in our skin; we burn easily and it isn’t pretty.”

“I’ll make sure to pick you up some sunscreen on the way home.” I teased.

“Magic is much better and doesn’t stink up my car. You can never get that smell out.” Morgana peeled around the corner, her back tires sliding out behind her and bumping the curb before she expertly rebounded into her lane.

Yeah. A sunscreen smell in her car was too much, but hitting the car’s rims against the curb was no problem.

I closed my eyes and tried my best to enjoy the ride. It was much better with my eyes closed when I couldn’t see her nearly crash a dozen times a minute. She might have insane reflexes with her elven heritage and her vampire prowess, but it made her a terrifying driver.

When I felt her screech to a stop, I cracked open my eyes to see the large, modern convention center. It had white painted metal and a glass front, a slightly odd modern choice when the rest of the surrounding buildings were old New England style brick buildings.

The style wasn’t my favorite, but in the middle of Market East, everything was well done. While it didn’t fit, it was at least tasteful.

“Morgana, you are in the crosswalk.” I sighed.

She laughed and pulled around to the side to the first floor of the parking garage and parked across several spots. “The report was twenty minutes ago, so be careful. Go find it.”

“Roger.” I pulled a hard case from the backseat and pulled one of my hand guns from the foam padded case, along with a spare magazine. Doing a quick check, everything seemed in order. I held the gun at my side as I got out of the car.

The gun wasn’t going to be able to do much more than be a minor distraction to the swamp troll based on the regeneration I’d seen them do before, but at least it was something.

Morgana got out of the car with her twin swords strapped to her hips. They slapped her leather clad thighs as she moved. She leaned over the top of the sports car, her larger chest squishing against the top in a way that would make a car show girl jealous. “Remember, shifting is complex. You need to relax your body and tense your mind. It’s kind of like when you tense your abs and relax your butt to poop.”

I covered my face with my hand. “You did not just make that comparison.”

She shrugged. “It’s true. I don’t shift, but I’ve talked to enough of them to understand it, at least in theory. You could always go ask your little werewolf girlfriend about it.”

“Not my girlfriend.”

“Pretty sure she wants to be. She did beg you to be her alpha.” Morgana emphasized alpha with a wink.

Ignoring her, I headed for the parking garage entrance to the convention center. “Scarlett told me about the tinctures you’ve been giving her.”

Morgana froze mid-stride, pausing just before the door. “Am I in trouble?”

“I kind of wish you’d told me she was having that much trouble.” Morgana was my partner and Scarlett my girlfriend. I felt out of the loop for them to be working together like that.

“Not my place to get between the two of you.” Morgana held her hands up as I held the door for her. “Everything okay?”

I nodded, then shook my head. “She is pushing me to date right now. I have a date with Jadelyn on Saturday.”

Morgana couldn’t help but flash me a smile before she read the mood and suppressed it. “Sorry?”

“Don’t be. It’s stupid. I feel like every other dude on the planet would be hooting and hollering for this sort of opportunity. And I probably would have joined them when it was all just some sort of fantasy concept. But, shit Morgana, it’s messing with my mind trying to break from what I expected my life to look like.”

“I’ve told you before, but I’ll say it again. You need to internalize that you aren’t human.” Morgana gave me a look like somebody would give a lost puppy.

The beast banged its head against the inside of my chest, hating the pity that Morgana had just thrown my way.

“Cut it out, Morgana. I asked her on a date. Just—” I let out a sigh. “It’s difficult to adjust to not being human.”

As if drawn by our conversation, a lumbering brown swamp troll thumped around the center of the convention center as we rounded the next corner.

Poor sap. He wasn’t getting the right timing. The conversation with Morgana had really made me want to pound something’s face in. It helped that some anger had built up in me; my fire breath was churning inside of me, ready for something to burn.

Unleashing my breath as a way to vent, I cooked the stupid troll.

“Zach. That’s not going to work.” Morgana warned me even as my breath ended.

The troll was hunkered down, his skin shrunken and steaming, but as it uncurled from its crouch, its eyes fixed on me with hate.

Morgana tisked, leaning against the wall as she ever so helpfully added, “Their bodies are steeped in swamp water year round. You aren’t going to do much more than steam some of it off and help them lose water weight.”

The troll charged me, screaming as if to confirm her assessment.

I tried to draw on my beast, pulling it up toward the surface while also trying to relax my body and let the change happen.

Seconds ticked by and nothing happened. It was taking too long.

A one ton troll tackled me to the ground, smashing the cheap laminate tiles under us.

“Oof. Didn’t work. Morgana.” I wheezed.

The troll, now on top of me, stank like rotting swamp water. As it moved and I got a deeper whiff, I decided it was closer to cooked, rotten swamp water as its burn blisters healed rapidly inches from my face.

“I didn’t bring the tranqs. You are on your own. Dragon up Zach.” Morgana chuckled.

Once again, I tried to relax while simultaneously shoving myself into the shift, but once again, nothing happened and the troll pushed off of me.

“Oh, fuck.”

A meaty fist wrapped around my ankle, and the troll picked me up. I immediately flashed back to my initial encounter with trolls, when I was swung around like a limp noodle. Not this time.

I still had my handgun, so I aimed at his forearm. He was only two feet away, so aiming wasn’t the most important, but I like to think I did my best not to shoot my foot.

Unloading the magazine into the troll’s forearm, I pulped it with all eight rounds.

The troll dropped my ankle, and I rolled away, fishing in my pocket for the other magazine and reloading.

My last encounter with a troll had taught me center mass with a 9mm does jack shit to a troll. But at least this time had temporarily disabled his hand and freed me. That was more than I’d expected. But now I only had a second magazine if I needed to do that again.

As expected, the troll’s arm healed before my eyes. Its swampy green skin covered the exposed flesh in seconds. Throwing back its head, the troll screamed in rage as its hands pounded the floor shattering more of the tiles. Huffing like some sort of primate, it charged me.

Coiling the strength in my legs, I waited until he was close. At the last moment, I released the coiled strength, jumping high over its head. Even as it swung its arms up to try to snatch me, it only grazed the bottom of my boots.

Unable to stop itself quickly enough, the troll’s momentum carried it forward and into a stumbling halt as it turned around, stomping its feet, charging again.

I considered my options. My fire breath didn’t work, neither did the gun. That really only left a physical altercation. But without shifting to gain mass, it didn’t matter how strong or tough I was when fighting something almost ten times my weight. Out of most of my moves, that only left creative alternatives. I needed to find a way to use the space or something around us to shift things in my favor.

The troll came at me for another pass and I jumped, but this time my eyes landed on the high overhead light fixtures, and particularly the metal cables that supported them.

Landing, I ignored the troll running for the wall and jumped up off a corner to snag one of the lights.

“What are you doing?” Morgana asked, watching from the side.

The troll, distracted by her voice, briefly considered her, but dismissed the drow vampiress as a threat.

Normally, that would be a lethal mistake, but she seemed content to stay out of this one. I’d had enough of her tough love form of training to know that she’d decided that pushing me into a corner was a good strategy for helping me shift. I wasn’t going to get any help.

“Getting a tool.” I grunted, pulling myself up and getting a good grip on the wire before tugging. Thankfully, it gave way easily, not meant to hold much weight but more just to balance the light fixture. Unfortunately, as it gave way, I lost my support as well. I managed to land on my feet, but my knees protested the impact they took.

“Great, but how is that going to help? Maybe, and this is just an old vampire's opinion, you should shift and just kick its ass? You are a dragon.” Morgana gave me her version of a pep talk.

I worked to not roll my eyes at her and keep my focus on the troll.

The troll’s first through third charge hadn’t worked, so in its infinite wisdom, it tried again. Fourth time's the charm, right?

Looping the metal wire, I jumped once more at the charge, but this time I swung the wire down like a jump rope, catching the troll under the chin.

As it caught, it ripped me out of the air. Working to keep a firm hold on the wire, I slammed my back against the troll’s back as I held on for dear life.

“Oh, we are troll riding now?” Morgana teased. “That actually looks kind of fun.”

The troll didn’t appreciate my impromptu harness and thrashed, its big bulky arms trying to swing behind its back to grab me, but it just didn’t have that sort of flexibility.

Trading the two ends of the cord between my hands, I shifted to my front and got my knees under me. Yanking back, I attempted to strangle the troll.

We weren’t supposed to kill them, but I wasn’t even sure I could kill a swamp troll. Given their bulk and their regeneration, I had a feeling even Morgana’s grenade launcher wouldn’t take it down for long.

The troll thrashed as I pulled back with all my strength, my knees digging into its spine. I pulled until I was bending the troll backwards, its arms flailing as it failed to reach me on its back.

Even then, the metal cord only scraped the tough hide on its neck, so I pulled harder, getting one foot under me and doing one of the toughest lunges of my life.

It strained, and one of the filaments of the metal cord snapped off, curling in warning that others might be about to go soon. The troll was grabbing at its throat, trying to get a finger under the metal cord.

In my own determination, I gave one last yank and the troll’s back crackled as it fell limp under me, crashing to the floor. With its tension gone, so was the tension on my cord. I tumbled off to the side, rolling away as the troll flopped to the ground like a dead fish. Slowly leaning forward to look at it, its eyes were still very much alive.

The crackling of bones sounded as it let out an angry gurgling noise.

“I think you broke his neck. He’ll be back on his feet here shortly.” Morgana reminded me.

Grabbing a chunk of the broken floor, I walked over to the troll. “This isn’t personal. I just need you to go to sleep for a bit.” It wasn’t a tranquilizer, but rocks to the head tended to work just as well.

Looking up from the mess I made of the convention center, I glared at Morgana. “You didn’t even bring the tranquilizers?”

“Nope. I mean, we could both escape if we needed to.”

I huffed, puffing my hair a little. It was getting longer than I’d like. “At least help me with him. I have no idea how he’s going to fit in the Ferrari.”

“No need. A cleanup team from The Council is coming. I just assumed this would make a mess.”

Even as the troll shifted back into a human form, it was still a large round man. The Ferrari had almost no trunk space. “Since we are here, I guess I should check this place over for magic.” Bending down, I took the metal cord and hogtied him as best I could with the stiff metal cord. Wouldn’t want him waking up while I had my back turned.

Finished with the troll, I focused on the shifting that I could do. Sure enough, my eye shifted, and the world became far brighter and more detailed than viewing it through my human eyes. My dragon eyes allowed me to see traces of magic. “Oh, there are enchantments here. One right there.” I pointed to the center of the wide open entry hall.

Morgana stepped over and wove a minor spell. As she did it, the enchantment I could see became visible to the naked human eye. “That’s just a ward to keep away pests.”

“There are good enchantments here too?” I realized it wasn’t just going to be finding and destroying each. Someone would have to interpret them.

“Yep.”

“Fine. Let me go get the duct tape from the car. I’ll mark everything with tape, and we can just have the council come by and do the final check. They’d like that better, anyway.” I stepped over the unconscious troll with a bit of pride.

Taking down a troll had been work, but it made me far less anxious than knowing I was about to start dating multiple women at the same time.