Snuff the Magic Dragon (and other Bombay Family Bedtime Stories) (Greatest Hits Mysteries) (5 page)

The two remaining members of the entourage had finally managed to uncover Draco’s body. One of the men put his ear to Draco’s chest. The crowd seemed to sense that something was wrong and became eerily quiet. Within seconds, it had gone from a deafening roar to being able to hear a pin hit the earth below our feet.

Ria and I looked at each other. I felt her hand in mine. We held our breath and waited.

The man looked up at the other member of the entourage and slowly shook his head. Draco was dead. We’d done it! For a moment I almost high-fived my sister, but then I realized that with our job done, it was time to go. We stuffed the wigs and colored chitons in a bag we’d brought and slipped away. And yeah, it was that easy.

* * *

Draco’s death had a sobering effect on the rest of the festival. Ria and I stayed at Lydia’s with Mom, nursing our many bruises and quietly congratulating ourselves.

“That was a bit more dangerous than I thought it would be,” Mom said that first night. “Can you believe how that went down?”

Lydia shook her head. “I have to admit, it was extremely effective. The girls did their job. And it certainly looked like an accident.”

“Death by PR,” I said slowly.

Ria nodded. “That was an extremely successful hit. But the frenzy was terrifying.”

“I know, right?” I asked. “I didn’t see that coming. And I don’t think I’ll be able to wear a cloak again…ever.”

* * *

We arrived back in Athens to find Grandma Sicily waiting for us. Mom, Ria and I all exchanged glances. Grandma was not only our mother’s mom, but also the head of the Bombay Council. She was tougher than Hercules and shrewder than Hera. A visit from her wasn’t usually a good thing.

Dad ushered us into the library and wisely left, shutting the door behind him. We could hear him giving the staff orders to work on something on the other side of the house.

Grandma said nothing for a moment, and Ria and I twitched nervously.

“Mother,” Mom said calmly, “what an unexpected surprise.”

Grandma nodded and then narrowed her eyes at us before speaking. “A bit of overkill, was it not?”

I nodded. “It did get a bit out of hand.”

“And very expensive,” Grandma said with a little cough.

Ria chewed her lip, “Yes Grandmama. But we covered it out of our own pockets.”

Our grandmother looked away toward the window and sighed. It didn’t sound like a good sigh. Clearly we were in trouble.

Grandma cleared her throat. “Best damned laugh I ever had.” And then she started to laugh for real. “He was smothered,” she said between wheezing giggles, “by his own—” another cough “—self-admiration!” She started to cough so violently Mom went over and patted her on the back until she stopped.

Ria and I were frozen, not daring to say anything.

“You know,” Grandma said, “I was a twin too.”

Both of our jaws dropped open. We looked to Mom who only nodded with a small smile.

“Back then,” Grandma continued, “we weren’t allowed to work together. Not like you two. And twins run in the Bombays. Every other generation has a pair.”

“We didn’t know that, Grandmama,” I said. I wondered what happened to her twin. I’d never heard anything about it before.

Grandma rose to her feet very slowly. Mom helped her up.

“Good job girls,” she said. “The Council just wanted you to know you can continue to work together for as long as you want.” She made her way to the door and turned. “And we expect great things from you.”

As she went out the door, we heard her laughing again. “Suffocated by publicity! Hilarious!” And the door closed behind her.

“What do you
mean
, I have to kill a magic dragon?” I stared at my mother, hoping she was out of her mind—which was highly possible in this family. She ran her fingers over the elaborately embroidered tapestry.

“Just what I said, Bavaria. Honestly, you shouldn’t question me so! The Council knows what it’s doing.” Mother straightened her long, pointed hat and adjusted her veil. “Besides, we’ve already been paid. You are to leave for Northumbria tonight.” She shooed me away and called for her minstrels. I knew that I’d get nothing further from her. Mother never did anything when she listened to her afternoon “stories.”

I nodded and bowed, as was befitting for a man to do toward a woman of my mother’s stature, and left the room to ready my things. Great. A magic dragon. Why couldn’t it just be a Danish prince or something? Hamlet was driving people nuts in Elsinore. My idiot cousin, Richard, took out Hamlet’s father a few months back and the kid was a raving lunatic. It’s so much easier to kill someone who sees ghosts. I could make it look self-inflicted while he’s all, “Alas, my poor father, blah…blah…blah…” But the Bombays didn’t make the contracts—they just carried them out.

There was no point in arguing when you worked in the family business, and that business
was assassination. You took your assignment whether you liked it or not and carried it out to its usually bloody conclusion. That was that.

I kicked at a stone with my extremely soft, velvet shoe. The pain was excruciating. Wasn’t there a way to make stronger shoes? I didn’t want to wear my armor all the time. It was the eighth century, for crying out loud! The only good thing about killing a dragon would be I could use his hide to make some tougher shoes.

A dragon? I mean, sure, we’d all heard about them. There were a lot of dusty books in the library about them. Even part of the Bombay training included dragons and magical creatures. But as far as I knew no one had ever seen one, let alone slain one.

I’d had contracts to kill strange things before. I took out a witch in Wessex. Witches float you know, so if they sink, they aren’t witches. Turned out this one wasn’t, but you really can’t be too careful.

I was contracted to kill a cannibal in the Cotswolds once. He wasn’t a very good cannibal. Apparently he thought it rude if he didn’t ask permission from his intended meal first. Not surprisingly, they all said, no, so he was basically starving when I killed him, but he still made the peasants nervous, and that still counts. Then there was that giant in Godmundingham who was crushing folks who didn’t pay him
not
to crush them. I had to jump off a roof onto his back just to slit his throat. And there was that weird, dog-like thing in East Anglia who’d developed a taste for priests who didn’t wash their hands after eating mutton. But a magic dragon? Really?

Still, the tapestries that gave us our orders didn’t lie. And considering it takes the Council months and months to embroider them, they clearly have enough time to think about it and change their minds.

Judea was in my room waiting for me. He was my squire, and whether I liked it or not, my nephew. Turns out, I did like him, mostly because he didn’t talk much. We all start out as squires during our training. I’d squired for my Aunt Sicily. She was amazing in that she could kill a man with her embroidery needle, and they’d never find a mark on the bodies. I learned a lot from her. It was really too bad she was accidentally murdered by the Welsh with rakes and pitchforks. You really can be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

“We’re going to Northumbria tonight,” I said as I sat down on a bench with a sigh. “A magic dragon of all things.”

Judea (or Jude, as I preferred to call him) nodded as if he heard this every day and began to pack my clothes. I sharpened my sword because I didn’t know what else to do. What is the best way to kill a dragon? And a magic dragon at that? What kind of magic did a dragon wield? How would I kill it if I didn’t know what it did to defend itself? What if it was invisible and could sneak up on me? Or what if it could set me on fire just by looking at me? I wasn’t prepared for that. So much to think about on the road.

I was not partial to Northumbria. They did have a few fetching wenches at the various inns in town. But for the most part, the people were ignorant and cold. If they weren’t covered in pox scars, it was some other hideous disease. And they were snooty. I hated that.

Jude helped me dress, and after a quick meal, we rode out. Even the trip was dull. Nothing but a few stiles and muddy fields filled with unimaginative cows. I was tired. And old. At the ripe old age of twenty-four, I was nearing the end of my life outside the castle. My armor creaked on my back. It would need to be oiled when we arrived. I shot a glance at Jude, who ignored me. I was pretty sure he rolled his eyes heavenward—whatever that means.

“How does one kill a magic dragon, Jude?” I asked my page.

“Depends on what kind of magic it has, I guess,” Jude answered.

“I’m a little sketchy on this. What kinds of magic are there?”

Jude stared off to his right, his shoulders slouched in a surly manner. “Well, I guess there are the fire-breathers…and I think they all fly…” His gaze slowly turned on me. “I heard of one once who mates with itself to produce more dragons.” Jude scratched his nose, slowly.

“That’s it?” I asked. “Are you sure that’s all they can do?” Because if it was, this might be easier than I thought.

Jude nodded. “One of the minstrels told me there was a dragon in Cornwall who could speak the King’s English and liked to tell bawdy jokes.” And then, as quickly as his chattiness had begun it ended. And Jude slouched back into silence.

That didn’t sound too bad. Flying and fire-breathing could be a problem…if the beast was awake. I’d have to catch it asleep somehow. I wasn’t too concerned about the possibility of it mating with itself—in fact, that could be a distraction that would help me kill it. My mind wandered through all the possible positions a dragon would take to mate with itself.

As to the talking, perhaps I could reason with the beast if it did that. If not, I might die laughing listening to its dirty jokes while it fried me. That didn’t sound too bad, either.

I rather liked my job, really. There was the travel, the women that came with the travel and a great deal of variety, what with killing a giant one year and a cannibal the next. And I was good with a sword and enjoyed fighting. As Bombays, our loyalties to any one lord were off-limits, and, for the most part, the current ruler understood this. The Bombay Family provided a valuable service.

But because of this, I was unable to join up with any army and fight—something I enjoyed doing. That doesn’t mean other family members haven’t tried. There are some rather unfortunate chapters of Bombays who fled the family to fight on one side of a war. This never lasted, because Bombays are ruthless at hunting down those in the family who go rogue. Why let an army have the fun of killing us when we will do it ourselves for free?

Still, life wasn’t all that great. Marriage was a difficult process. Your intended had to agree to the Bombay ‘lifestyle’ and to have their children raised as assassins. Men marrying women Bombays had to take on the Bombay Family name. Some were very successful in this. Mother seemed happy. My father was landed gentry and couldn’t care less what she or I did. He spent all his time reading books anyway.

I had decided early on that I wasn’t going to marry. This was frowned on in the family, because you were supposed to perpetuate the line. But I was getting older and hadn’t really met anyone I could marry and introduce to the assassin business.

Or maybe it was that the women I met were so…what’s the word? Vapid? They were all giggles and grins, with nothing inside their heads. It could just be that I knew they’d have no problem as long as I left them alone to embroider unicorns. I didn’t want a wife who was just… there.

It didn’t really matter anyway. Mother was upset, but she finally stopped fixing me up with every Aelfgyth, Beornfled, and Hrothweru. How many times can you take a woman to a Fleece Fair for fun?

We arrived at our destination several hours later. Riding into Northumbria was…anticlimactic. The muddy roads, twisted and charred buildings and the smell! Why would this place even
have
a magic dragon? We rode up to the Broken Man Inn, and while Jude took care of the horses, I checked in.

“So.” The fat innkeeper scratched one of his many chins thoughtfully. “It’s Bavaria du Bombay, right?”

I sighed and shook my head. “No, it’s just Bavaria Bombay. I’m not ‘of’ Bombay.”

“Why is it ‘du Bombay’ then?” He seemed confused.

“It isn’t,” I said through clenched teeth. “You made that up. There is no place called Bombay. It’s just my name.”

His eyes grew wide with understanding. “Ah, so it’s descriptive then! Like Beald means ‘The Bald,’ right? What does Bombay mean?” For a moment I toyed with telling him that Bombay means “kills nosy innkeepers.”

“It’s not descriptive, and it’s not a place. I just have two names. It’s a weird, family thing. That’s all. Can I see my room now?”

The innkeeper didn’t look like he thought it was okay, but wisely decided against arguing with me. Being a Bombay has never been easy. We’re an assassins guild, but it includes only family. We are ruled by the Council—a gathering of our family elders who hand down the assignments to kill someone—or in this case, something. It’s lucrative, and we have our own money so that we don’t owe allegiance to anyone. 

“Utta will show you to your room.” the innkeeper said. “If she stays, well that’s extra.” He winked and nodded knowingly. Utta grunted. She looked like a six-foot-tall pig. No, I didn’t need company. And I certainly never had to pay for it in Northumbria of all places. Besides, this wasn’t the time. I had a job to do.

Jude sullenly joined me in the main room for a late repast. As we tore off chunks of bread to dip into our trenchers of stew, I took in the room. A whole lot of nothing. A few cutthroats and thieves, and I wasn’t sure if that thing in the corner was a dwarf or a dog wearing a dress. I needed information and wasn’t going to find it here. I toyed with asking Jude to get chummy with the stable boys, but that would be like asking a stack of hay to melt.

“I’m going to bed,” I announced to my squire. He nodded. Jude would sleep with the horses. A Bombay never lost sight of his exit strategy. As I drifted off to sleep, I wondered what kind of assassin Jude would make. In this family, you had no choice but to be good. Even my mother killed people back in the day. Her specialty was poison. She was quite good. I didn’t want to cross her. When I was a kid and had done something naughty, she’d always give me blood pudding, with a little wink that said
, Eat this, and next time you’ll think twice about setting fire to my favorite unicorn pillow
. And then I’d spend two days on the chamber pot.

The next morning I made my way through town. My thoughts were obsessed with the idea of finding and killing this magic dragon. First things first—I needed information. Always know what you are killing, and how to kill it. Our heralds had that put on a coat of arms once, but The Council had not been fond of it. They thought it was too obvious.

I decided it would be best to work the market. People talk if they think you’re going to spend money. I dropped a few coins on a table bearing greasy, dead chickens. The squat, filthy old woman took a break from wringing more poultry necks to talk to me.

“Oh, aye then. They’ve got a dragon up at the castle, they do.” She focused her one, cloudy blue eye on me. “That’s how they keep us all honest.” I noticed that she stuffed the coins inside one of the (what I
hoped
were dead) chickens, making sure her husband didn’t notice. Yeah. Honest.

A blacksmith farther down had a little more to offer. “The dragon’s magical. He can blow fire out his arse and control you with his mind.”

“Why would the Duke keep such a creature?” I asked, throwing down a few more coins.

The smith rubbed his nose, leaving a charred, black smear. “Well, he’d do it to make sure no one messed with his wife and daughter.”

This caught my attention. “Wife and daughter? He has a dragon to defend them?” Did whoever paid our Council for this job just want to kill the Duke, marry his wife and take over his lands? That didn’t sound like something we’d agree to. If we did that, there’d be new dukes every week, and we’d eventually kill most of them that hired us.

“That’s just what I heard,” the man said, looking left and right. “And because there’s gold up there.”

I shook my head as I walked away. That didn’t seem right. Bombays didn’t get involved in territorial spats. Was there more to this than I was led to believe? It was not like I could do anything about it. Once you unfurled a tapestry, you as good as accepted the assignment.

My mind was foggy, and I wasn’t paying any attention, which is how I ended up running into a woman.

“I beg your pardon!” I went down on one knee to apologize. “Please accept my regrets.” And then I looked up and swallowed hard.

“It’s no bother,” the dazzlingly beautiful brunette replied hastily. She looked angry. “I must be on my way, sir.”

“Shall I escort you?” I stood and walked with her. “To make sure you don’t encounter another misfortune?” This woman looked to be about my age, with icy blue eyes that speared me through the heart. Her hair fell in silken, wavy curtains around her shoulders. I’d never seen anything like her.