Day One.
Took her for a walk. Scared off some overdressed guy of indeterminate age with a candle flame flickering at the tip of my finger. He looked like he was decked out for a holiday. Julietta was upset. My explanation that guys like him were after her inheritance, not her pretty eyes, didn’t convince her one bit.
Endured, though it was tough, the endless chatter of my charge with her girlfriends. The ceiling of the drawing room saved me—painted with chubby girls barely covered by clouds. They smiled down and kept quiet.
Escorted my charge to her bedroom and handed her over to the nanny. After that, I happily bolted into town to find a real-life version of those ceiling girls.
Found one, but unfortunately, she was into military types.
Day Two.
Took her for another walk. Caught her by the skirt when she tried to bolt from the café before getting the pastries she’d sent me to fetch. Outside the window, yesterday’s overdressed guy was lurking, holding a bouquet and leading a horse. Doubt he planned to feed the horse flowers.
Julietta was beyond annoyed and swore she’d die an old maid. I didn’t argue. Then yesterday’s girlfriends showed up at the café and started their chirping all over again.
I felt like banging my head on the table. The only thing keeping me sane was the friendly smile of the café owner’s daughter, who was serving coffee. She looked a bit like the ceiling girls and also stayed quiet. Then a grubby kid brought two notes. In the first, the cute owner’s daughter invited me to stop by the café anytime. Julietta clutched the second to her chest, read it, and tucked it into her corset.
She was so happy that I, without a doubt, sacrificed the tracking beacon I’d placed on her.
And overall, I started to get how this ditzy girl got herself kidnapped. Wave a bouquet in front of her, and she’d follow like a goat after cabbage.
Day Three.
The sky in the east had barely lightened when I woke up to the tracker I’d placed on Julietta moving away fast. I sat on the bed for a bit, staring sleepily at the wall, wondering how this nutcase slipped past her nanny. Did she slip her a sleeping draught? Or find some guy willing to be charmed by a homely old maid and keep her distracted?
The tracker sped up, and my head started aching from the connection to it. A little longer, and I’d have to beg a visit to the town’s senior mage. He’d surely have a map to track this beacon.
“Damn redheaded pest!” I cursed my charge and scrambled for my clothes.
I got dressed faster than the day I was late for my final retake exam.
Rushed to the door, then realized that by the time I ran through this massive house, the redheaded disaster would’ve fled the town and vanished into the woods. Plus, I didn’t have a horse. Not even a donkey. And other people’s mounts didn’t like me. Neither did stable hands or guards. They’d never believe the owner gave me permission.
“Holy frog of the kingdom! What am I supposed to ride?”
There was only one solution.
I ran back to the bed. With a reinforced punch, I broke off one of the posts holding up the canopy.
“I name you Thunderhoof!” I declared solemnly, wrapping the cord of an energy accumulator around the stick. “From now on, you’re a hoofless steed!”
The former bedpost didn’t object. Grimly, I approached the window, opened it, climbed onto the sill, wished a heap of misfortunes on the ditzy girl, and jumped.
I flew over the rooftops faster than the wind, fuming. Mostly at myself. How did I get myself into this mess? At least I got lucky with the stick. It was wide, way more comfortable than the infamous broom, and easier to steer. Side winds didn’t try to spin me around, there was no brush to get in the way, and nothing to push against. That was the only good thing about this situation. Flying on a stick, wasting energy from the accumulator like an idiot, was something only students could do without tanking their reputation.
I’d catch up to the girl, no doubt. And I’d get revenge on her cheap-bouquet-toting suitor for this humiliation. But I’d never again be thrilled about an easy job. I should’ve learned by now: what seems simple at first always brings the most trouble. Take the time I chased mice at the mill. Then the miller showed up at the school gates demanding the head of the moron who broke his grindstone.
“They don’t pay much for easy work,” I recalled one of my teachers saying. “And if they promise a lot, something’s wrong with the job.”
Why didn’t I believe him right away? Bad habit of learning everything the hard way.
For some reason, in every fairy tale, book, and even bard’s song, the maiden and suitor who sneak off to get married (at best) are heroes whose fate you’re supposed to fret over. And those chasing them? Always the villains. What a dumb tradition. I didn’t feel like a villain. I felt like an idiot for trying to save this redheaded disaster against her will.
The pair left the town quickly. Even the guards at the gate didn’t stop them—probably bribed in advance. And though I flew faster than their carriage, I didn’t catch up before they reached the gate. Or before they hit the edge of the forest. I had to dip lower and dive under the forest arch over the road, risking a crash into a tree before the sun was fully up.
Muttering curses under my breath, I chased the runaways, chased and chased, and barely stopped an arm’s length from the carriage as it suddenly emerged from the darkness.
The reason for the rickety carriage’s stop was disgustingly mundane—a wheel had fallen off. The runaways stood on the roadside, staring suspiciously at the empty axle, while the driver, or whoever he was, searched for the lost wheel in the bushes.
I wondered how this trio planned to reattach the wheel.
“Alright, that’s enough running,” I said grimly, stepping out from behind the carriage that had hidden my arrival. I tapped the stick I’d flown on against my hand for emphasis.
The suitor backed away, looking around nervously.
Julietta grabbed his elbow and smirked spitefully.
“Get lost!” she screamed, loud enough for the whole forest to hear. “You’re ruining my happiness!”
“You sure about that?” I grinned.
“Yes! You, you—” She glanced at the suitor, who clearly had no idea what to do in this situation. Realizing he couldn’t do much against a mage with just his saber, she declared in a ringing voice, “If you let us go—or better yet, help us get to Brightmeadow—I’ll sign over my grandmother’s inheritance to you.”
“Uh, uh, uh,” stammered the suitor, who apparently already considered that inheritance his. “Sweetheart, what are you—? How will we live? Your dad won’t give us anything, he told me so. I told you!”
I snorted loudly.
Julietta turned to her dream man, patted his shoulder, and said sweetly, like she was talking to a child, “But you’ll earn it.”
“What?” the suitor asked, genuinely shocked. “I’m just the youngest son of a youngest son. I won’t get a dime of my grandfather’s estate.”
“What does inheritance have to do with it?” the girl asked, confused. “You’ve got a ship and contracts with merchants!”
“Well,” the suitor smiled mysteriously.
I was enjoying this. What a moron. If you’re going to string a girl along, commit to the lie or don’t bother at all. Her dad might’ve even taken pity on them. She’s his favorite daughter, after all. Or they could’ve offered me just half the inheritance. We could’ve haggled.
“You lied to me!” Julietta screeched indignantly.
“I didn’t lie,” the suitor hedged. “I love you.”
“Fine,” I said, since I still had to deliver this nutcase back to her father. “We’ve talked, cleared things up, time to go home.”
Julietta glared at me like I was the enemy of her entire existence.
“This is all your fault!” she wailed. “You!”
“I saved you from this… guy.”
“I’ll kill you!” she howled, not specifying who, and flared up like a haystack doused with kerosene.
“Ahhh!” the suitor quickly assessed the situation and bolted into the bushes, nearly trampling the stunned man holding the wheel he’d just found.
“She’s also unregistered,” I muttered, and Julietta decided who she was going to kill.
The flames roared, forming a massive crown over her head before crashing down like a hammer. The carriage burned to ash instantly. I managed to jump onto my stick and take off, only to stop short by smacking my head into a branch. Curious, I looked down. Despite what the textbooks claimed—that using raw, untrained magic like this would knock you out—she wasn’t fainting anytime soon.
“Cowards!” Julietta screamed. “Come back!”
She stomped her foot and, for some reason, looked up.
I waved at her cheerfully.
The next blast from the unregistered, unhinged girl burned a massive hole through the tree canopy and vanished into the sky. It was a miracle the forest didn’t catch fire. Ash rained down on Julietta, along with me and my stick, since I’d miscalculated and drained the accumulator’s energy on a fireproof shield.
“I’ll kill you!” she whimpered, pinned beneath me. “I’ll kill everyone!”
“Oh, you definitely will,” I said, not wanting to disappoint her. “You’d be better off learning to control it. Maybe then you’d get better at judging people too.”
And then she started crying, which was the worst part. I had no clue how to comfort girls, especially ones with such a difficult personality and unexpected magical abilities. So I stood up, helped her sit, then sat beside her and waited, not even sure for what. For some reason, I felt like she’d cry forever.
Julietta wasn’t used to walking, especially long distances. She also had a heavy, elaborate dress that snagged on bushes and tangled around her legs. Her impractical shoes with thin heels kept sinking into the ground or getting stuck between stones on the paved road. And overall, she wasn’t dressed for the weather—all the shawls and cloaks she’d brought had burned up with the carriage.
So, the mage and the girl walked on and on, slowly and miserably.
“Sorry,” Julietta said glumly when the forest finally ended. “I didn’t mean to. I wanted to throw a rock at you, but it just… happened.”
“Changed your mind about getting married?” I asked, freezing since I’d given her my jacket.
“No. Am I stupid? I don’t want to turn into Aunt Ebil and guard other people’s daughters. I’d rather have my own.”
“Uh-huh,” I said. She wasn’t entirely wrong. “Just be careful. Youngest sons of youngest sons are almost always like this, especially if they’re talentless officers.”
“I will,” she said grimly.
I wouldn’t envy the next bouquet-wielding guy. From the look on her face, she’d get revenge on him for everyone.
“Where the heck are we?” I muttered to myself.
I looked at the landscape, then at Julietta, then back at the bright red field of poppies.
We were supposed to be at a town on a hill. That’s where I was meant to deliver the mayor’s daughter, saved from a fortune hunter.
“We’ve been going the wrong way!” I realized.
Julietta shrugged and smiled mysteriously.
“Now we’ll go the other way,” she said calmly.
I looked at her, surprised. This calm didn’t match her personality. Suspicious calm. Now I had to walk and wonder—was she tired, plotting something shady, or just testing if it’s true that guys prefer girls with sweet tempers and doe-like eyes?
“Let’s go.”
No choice anyway. Took the job, so finish it. No one pays for half-done work.
We walked on and on. And it seemed like we were still going the wrong way. Though how and where we managed to turn off, I couldn’t figure out. There was only one road. Or was there?
“Roan,” the girl whispered behind me.
She whispered it in a weird way. My spine turned to ice.
“What?” I asked, turning around cautiously.
What if a shapeshifter was following us? Or plain old bandits sneaking up. Or the half-dead suitor.
“Roan,” Julietta repeated.
I’d rather someone attack us. She didn’t look right. Her face was flushed, eyes wild, and she’d loosened the laces on her dress. And she was smiling.
“Did you drink something?” I asked, worriedly rummaging through my pockets.
Of course, there was no antidote there. But habit.
“Drink?” Julietta asked, confused.
“From that suitor’s hands.”
“Ohhh…” she moaned, and I knew she had.
“That creep! Hope you get twisted up, you jerk!” I wished on the vanished officer.
I had no idea what to do with a girl dosed with a feminine elixir. But I knew exactly what she’d do. Some students once pranked a teacher, a real ice queen. She ended up chasing guys all over the school. The poor kitchen assistant climbed onto the roof of the North Tower to escape her. Half the faculty had to get him down.
“Roan.”
Lips pursed like a bow. Eyes crazed.
Where the hell was this town?!
“Julietta, keep it together. We’ll get there soon, and I’ll—”
“Soon!” she cheered and ran toward the only man available to her.
Luckily, she stepped on her dress and fell.
I looked around. I had to do something. If she got up and started running, I couldn’t lose her in the forest. And I definitely couldn’t let her catch me—her dad would kill me, no matter my merits.
Then I remembered a winter when I was coming back from a village where I’d done some odd jobs and ran into a wild boar. I shot up a maple tree with four branches at the top like an arrow, no levitation needed. Sat there all night and part of the morning until the pig left. How was Julietta any worse than a boar? In those skirts, even dosed, she couldn’t climb. I just needed the right tree.
“Roan,” my charge said, pulling her skirt off her head, flailing a bit before starting to stand.
“Holy frog of the kingdom!”
I picked a tree and, with the last of my inner strength, hopped to the lowest branch. No time to dig for another accumulator in my pockets. Hung there for a bit, imagining falling right onto the wailing girl below, kicked my legs, and, surprising myself, climbed onto the branch.
“My love!” Julietta screamed to the whole forest, probably scaring off bandits and shapeshifters alike. “We must! I want to! I know!”
Whatever she knew, I’d rather never find out. The branch was uncomfortable, full of knots. But I tied myself to the trunk with my belt and waited. She couldn’t have taken a full dose. It’s usually diluted in a bottle of wine beforehand. So it should wear off by evening.
“Roan!” she shrieked, even the birds falling silent in shock. “We need to! I remember!”
She launched herself at the tree, comically hugging it with arms and legs. Jumping. Sliding down hilariously, then starting to wail again.
Here I’d dreamed that one day girls would jump out of their dresses at the sight of the great mage Roan the Red. But when it happens, it’s not exactly thrilling. Maybe it’s the wrong girl, or the situation, or just that I’ve never felt like such a fool before. Not even when I realized I should’ve killed that boar and sold it to a butcher instead of sitting in a tree waiting for it to leave.
And somehow, the road we’d walked so long on had vanished. It seemed the forest’s master was getting revenge on the girl for something. I didn’t think I had anything to be avenged for. Couldn’t recall doing anything wrong.
“What a pain in my neck,” I grumbled.
I’d thought everything that could cause trouble was far behind me. What’s so hard about escorting a girl to town? Even a dimwit with a sword could handle it. What could be simpler?
A lot, as it turned out.