Light Dragons 03 - Sparks Fly

headed out that way to see what was what. We had no idea the valuable object was you. What the hell?”
    The last of his words rose almost an octave as the world spun around us, a blinding whiteness swirling around and in and through us until I realized that we were in yet another vision.
    “Cool,” I heard Brom say behind me. “Is this one of those dreams you have where you get to see stuff in the past?”
    “Yes. Stay next to me, lovey.” I reached back and grabbed him, holding him to my side as I looked around the small, dark room of the vision. It was cold, very cold, and wherever we were wasn’t particularly nice.
    “Can they see us?” he asked.
    At the same time Gareth demanded, “What is going on? What the hell have you done to me, Sullivan?”
    I turned to look where Brom was pointing. We appeared to be in some sort of a small shack, badly made, with drifts of snow coming through the gaps in the boards that made up the walls. A derelict cot was pushed up against one side of the shack, a figure huddled on it covered by what looked like a thick fur cloak.
    “I don’t understand,” the figure said, lifting her head, a confused and dazed expression on her face. It was my past self.
    “No, they can’t see or hear us.” I glanced from the present-day Gareth to the memory of his past self where he stood with Ruth in close consultation.
    “It’s simple,” the past Gareth said, going over to where Ysolde sat. “You’re with us. We saved you from bad dragons who want to kill you. We’re all going to Paris to keep them from finding you, and let your friends, the ones with lots of gold, know that you’re alive. You remember that, don’t you?”
    “Dragons?” Ysolde said, rubbing her forehead. “There’s something ... something horrible-”
    “That’s right, the dragons are horrible, and we’re trying to help you because we’re your friends. Remember?”
    Gareth put both hands on her head and muttered what sounded like an invocation.
    “What’s he doing to you?” Brom asked, pressing closer to me. “Is he hurting you?”
    “No, lovey. He was just trying to make me believe something that wasn’t true.” I looked over Brom’s head to where the present Gareth was now watching impatiently. “You really were a bastard, you know that?”
    “And you were a stupid cow who believed anything we told you,” he answered with one of his unpleasant smiles.
    “I believed because you brainwashed me,” I said with a disgusted snort, reining in my temper. Brom had seen enough dissent between Gareth and me; I didn’t want him to witness any more unpleasantness.
    “We had better be rewarded for our trouble,” the past Ruth said, coming over to jerk Gareth’s hands off Ysolde’s head.
    “We will,” he answered, giving her a sly look. “The dragons will pay well for her once they know she’s alive again.”
    “Thala won’t be pleased,” Ruth said as darkness began to fill my vision.
    “Then we simply won’t tell her. She cannot rail against us if she doesn’t know the wyvern’s mate is still alive ... .”
    The darkness washed over us in a wave of insensibility, wiping away everything that was.

Chapter Seven
    The sensation of being consumed by nothingness ebbed away to leave us standing in the exact same positions, but instead of a dim, cold shack, we were once again in a room lit now by the rosy golden glow of a sunny Spanish morning.
    “Thala won’t be pleased?” I asked Gareth as awareness returned to me. “What does she have to do with the price of tea in China?”
    “The price of what?” he asked, looking more irritated than usual.
    “It’s an expression. Why would Thala care if you and Ruth took me in after I was-” I sucked in a huge amount of oxygen as realization struck me. “She’s the one who killed me, isn’t she?”
    For a moment, I could swear I saw fear flicker in his eyes, but that emotion was soon replaced with familiar belligerence. “I don’t know anything about who killed you, and I don’t give a damn who did the job. All I care about is getting what’s owed to me, and your high-and-mighty dragon had better get his dread wyvern ass in gear and come up with the gold, or he’s going to be missing his bit of tail. And I don’t mean the one in his dragon form.”
    I glared at him, wanting to say so many things, but determined to keep as much of it from Brom as was possible. “So what happened after you brainwashed me outside of Dauva? You took me to