Light Dragons 03 - Sparks Fly

it.”
    Holland looked confused. “I thought dragons could not use arcane magic?”
    Nico gave him a wry grin. “They’re not supposed to. But Baltic and Ysolde seem to be the exceptions to the rule.”
    “Baltic doesn’t use magic very often,” I explained. “I was trained by the head of the Otherworld himself, Dr. Kostich, but my magic is ... well, as I said, it’s not very reliable. Still, it’s worth a shot. If nothing else, it’ll be another distraction, and that can only be good for Baltic.”
    “I think we’d better get out of the way.” Nico hurried over to a large wooden chest that lurked in the corner, big enough to hide a body in, turning it on one end, and moving so that the chest blocked sight of him.
    Holland watched closely as I placed both hands on the door, trying to get a feel for its composition, and for any magic that might have been placed on it to keep us on one side of it.
    “No wards or anything,” I said, shaking out my hands and taking a deep breath. “All right, I’m going to give an unlocking spell a try. Holland, given what happened to Aisling’s demon Jim when he stood next to me the last time I cast a spell, you may want to go hide behind the chest with Nico.”
    “What happened to the demon?” Holland asked.
    “It lost its preferred form. Took Dr. Kostich to fix the problem, and I died during the process. Baltic was furious .”
    Saying nothing, Holland just ran for the chest as I drew a circle on the floor and called the quarters, beginning with the east. “Heart of storms, I call upon you to aid me now. Heart of fire,” I said, turning to the south, “I call upon you to give me strength. Heart of tears, I call upon you to give me wisdom.” Finally, I turned to the north. “Heart of iron, I call upon you to bend all to my will.”
    “You might want to duck down,” Nico said as Holland peeked over the top of the chest. “You wouldn’t want anything to happen to your head.”
    “Erp.” Holland disappeared.
    “I wish May were here,” I said, taking another deep breath, trying to put all thoughts of worry and fear and anger from my mind. “She does this so much better. Here goes.”
    My dragon fire, normally banked, grew in intensity as I pulled on it, but that alone didn’t give me the force I needed to form my will into action. I knew the quiet place in my mind where I used to access arcane magic was gone, driven out, I suspected, by the dragon that was waking within me. Rather than fight that loss, I simply pulled hard on Baltic’s fire, reveling in the power it brought with it as it roared through me and joined with my own lesser fire, merging into a force that lit up my mind. I cast wide my arms and spoke the words, channeling our merged fire as I did so:
    Threefold and one,
    Elements come unto me.
    Iron-bound, and oak-hewn,
    Portal of strength and denial.
    Turn to my hand and let me see,
    All that lies beyond.
    The air within the room gathered itself, silence lying heavily over us for the count of four, then with a soft whump , the air exploded outward in a brilliant flash of white-blue light, knocking me backward a good two yards into the wall.
    “I’m all right,” I said, shaking the stars from my head as Nico rushed toward me, helping me up. “I’m fine; just had the breath knocked out of-by the love of the saints!” I stared at the door, wanting to simultaneously scream and throw large, heavy objects around the room in a temper tantrum to end all temper tantrums. “Why can’t any of my spells go right?”
    Holland had moved to the door and was considering it with his head tipped to one side. He reached out to touch it. “It’s ... it’s glass.”
    Mentally, I ran over the spell. “Turn to my hand and let me see, all that goes beyond. Oh, very funny, magic! Ha-ha-ha. Let me see , indeed.” I marched over to the door, which was indeed now made of glass, thick, wavery glass approximately three inches thick, and bound with the same iron bands as the wooden version.
    “At least you didn’t change any of us,” Nico offered with a little grin before picking up a wooden chair. “Shall we try to break it?”
    “You can try, but I doubt if even dragon strength will take down that door. It looks like awfully solid glass.”
    And so it was. It might have the appearance of glass, but it evidently retained the properties of the oak door, because we didn’t even scratch the glass.
    Nico, Holland, and I were taking turns whaling on the