Thrift Store Trolls, page 9
part #1 of Flea Market Magic Series
Nick was a good friend and I didn’t want to see him fail.
I’d failed enough times for both of us.
Mike’s Magical Cart couldn’t be missed. The plum-purple food truck leaned slightly to the right, but that didn’t stop customers from approaching on the opposite side of the street. Baskets with fairy puffs hung off the sides. A four-foot window revealed a tiny kitchen with a short wizard and witch working inside. Mike and his co-worker had to be no more than five-feet tall. The witch never stopped moving as she deftly flipped over skewers and burgers on a wood-fire grill. Then she scurried to the drink station to fill two plastic cups with what appeared to be ale. Well, my nose caught a whiff of malt and hops.
Not more than ten feet away from the cart, a peculiar tingle danced along my back.
“So the cart has a glamour,” I marveled.
“Yep, he’d never be able to operate in a public place,” Nick replied.
We stood in the line behind a set of centaurs in business suits and a warlock stood in front of them.
“What do humans see?” I asked.
“The one thing New Yorkers avoid—”
“Overpriced tourist baubles,” I finished.
“Exactly. Humans know a bargain when they see it.”
I laughed. “True, but what about the desperate folks who are on the way to the airport and will buy anything? Even if it’s the ugliest thing they’d ever seen?”
“The wards kick in and they go elsewhere.”
My mouth watered the closer we got to the front of the line. I could practically taste the blend of salt, spices, and grilled meat on my tongue. My fantasy ended when Nick spoke.
“I know what you’re facing in South Toms River. How long did your pack believe they could stand their ground against the Basilisk King?”
At the sound of the unfamiliar name, I slowly turned to him. “That question came out of nowhere.”
“Since you’ve put me on the spot, you should expect the same. Dr. Frank told me you’ve had some trouble in town and I checked things out.”
“So we’re up against a creature called the Basilisk King.” I’d never heard of that creature before. “Have you met one?”
Nick crossed his arms, and we stepped forward. “There’s only one Basilisk King, and the minute I returned to North America, I felt him. The whole magical community senses the fairy path shift, but back in northern Jersey, I couldn’t shake another feeling. It was like watching a storm far away from the shore. The darkness floated up from the ground with the morning mist.” He slowly shook his head. “This effect will increase as the fairy path draws closer.”
I nodded. She Who Always Walks the Path was behind of all these changes.
“What do you know about him?” I asked.
He took a step closer to me, his dark eyes flashing. “Even a wizard like myself knows the Basilisk King isn’t a creature to be trifled with. Long ago, when gods walked among men, the Basilisk King was a demigod with followers in ancient Greece and Mesopotamia. He was what you’d call a dictator these days. You either worshipped him or his followers made you fall to your feet.”
None of this news was good.
“And the basilisks?” I asked.
“They’re abominations he can conjure at will from another realm similar to hell.”
“Do you have any idea why he’s in South Toms River? Why does he follow…” I almost said her true name and stopped myself. “…her around?”
“She Who Always Walks the Path’s a source of true power. By following the fairy path from the beginning to the end for all eternity, she’ll always offer vitality to those who trail after her. The Basilisk King siphons off her strength. No one has had to deal with him since her path used to thread through northern Europe to the Canadian wilderness.”
“And now she’s coming here.”
“Precisely.”
We reached the end of the line, and gleeful for the distraction, I ordered not one, not two, but six skewers. Might as well get as many as possible to take home. Mike, the cart’s owner, chuckled as he handed me my change.
“Been a long time, Ms. Stravinsky,” he said with a bright smile and a heavy Brooklyn accent. “You should visit my cart more often.”
I stole a quick bite. “If I could find this place, I would’ve setup a tent.”
His head cocked to the side and the tufts of his dark brown hair flopped over. “You don’t know how, hmm? Seems like an excuse to me…”
What excuse did I have?
He looked over my head and greeted the next customer.
I shuffled to the side, wanting to ask Mike what he meant, but Nick was already leaving, munching away on a bag full of fairy puffs. Briefly, I glanced over my shoulder and considered the cart owner’s words. Did Mike mean that I could use Old Magic to find the cart? As tempting as the idea was, I couldn’t use magic to find food—no matter how perfectly seasoned I found the snacks.
I switched to a more important topic as Nick directed us to the nearest alley: the Basilisk King.
“Can we kill the big BK or do we have to play whack-a-basilisk until we can drive him away?” I asked.
“I’m still researching with some associates in the Wizards Guild. Once I learn more, we can act. For now, we need to be on the defensive until a solution is found.”
“Lovely. Whack-a-basilisk it is then.”
“You’re not alone. As long as your pack stays out of his way, you should be fine until we can strike.”
“What if I’d love to leave his dangerous ass alone, but he’s targeting me?” I reminded him about how the basilisks ran to my old house.
“Then while we’re waiting for answers from the Wizard’s Guild, we need to figure out why he’s targeting you.”
A shiver danced down my spine. The creature prowling my territory had a name, but I’d yet to face him. “What do you mean by we?”
“I mean the pack won’t have to face him alone. You’ll need the magical community—whether you want it or not.”
We reached an alley between buildings and Nick opened the portal back to The Bends.
The back office was empty and the sounds from a crowd shopping leaked through the double doors. Hopefully, Erica and the others didn’t have to deal with too many customers.
“I need to gather the necessary supplies,” he said firmly. “If you see one of those trunks, contact me. Day or night. Otherwise, you’ll see me soon.”
I walked through the gate into the store.
As the portal closed, I knew what Nick meant by soon. Time to prepare the pack for spellcasters in the area.
Chapter 12
Thursday morning arrived, and I woke up not long after the sun rose. Thorn held me close. I rested my head on his left arm while his right arm circled my waist. His steady breaths and relaxed features should’ve left me at ease, but every time I closed my eyes, they shot open again.
My heartbeat quickened. Unease tightened the muscles along my jaw. Something was wrong. I listened for sounds beyond the house. The early morning robins tweeted and crickets sang. A breeze pushed the rocking chair on the porch. Nothing else stirred.
Then I caught it.
The very faint sound of a latch clicking.
The groan of a trunk cracking open.
Get up, Nat.
My head shot up. Thorn jerked awake. I hurried to the window, pulled the curtain aside, and glanced outside. Thorn followed.
“What’s wrong?” he murmured.
My mouth dropped open. What blew me away was the line of beige trunks from the woods leading up to the house. I counted at least fifteen of them. One gray stone sat in the middle of the yard.
“No way…” I breathed.
Thorn left the room wearing the jeans he wore to bed while I threw on a T-shirt and jean shorts.
With my goblin blade in hand, I thundered down the steps to find Aggie and Will conversing with Thorn.
“Have any of them opened yet?” Will asked Thorn.
My mate peeked out the peephole on the front door.
“One of the trunks is open, but it’s empty,” he reported.
If you see one of them, contact me, Nick had said.
Ugh. I didn’t want Nick and Thorn butting heads, but with that many trunks outside, we were about to slam our faces into a doggie-door.
I shot the wizard a text message: There are trunks outside of my house leading into the woods.
A reply came a few seconds later: It’s a trap.
No shit, Admiral Ackbar! I thought.
Another message came from Nick: Stay inside. I’m on my way.
Good grief, now the Storm Troopers were coming.
Thorn clutched the doorknob. “We got movement to the right along the trees. We can’t stay here. Everyone’s leaving.”
“We can’t leave,” I said. “The guy behind all this wants us to go outside. Did anybody else see the Hansel and Gretel-style trail of breadcrumbs out there?”
“What are we gonna do if all those trunks open?” Will asked. “We’d be cornered.”
Aggie paced the hallway. I noticed she had a baseball bat ready to go. “Are reinforcements coming?”
“Yeah,” I said quietly. “Nick is back in town.”
“Not the wizard again…” Thorn grunted with a shake of his head. He still didn’t like spellcasters.
As if on cue, someone knocked on the back door. At least Nick hadn’t used the front entrance. I hurried to let him in and Aggie joined me.
“What’s up, Nick?” Aggie said. “You’re a sight for sore eyes.”
“I wish we were seeing each other under better circumstances,” he replied.
Nick wasn’t alone this time. A dark-haired girl with alluring androgynous features followed him. The early morning sun’s rays hit the top of her head as she entered the house and the reddish sheen to her ruffled chin-length brown hair caught my eye.
What really got my attention was the wrinkled, lime-green shirt she wore over a pair of jeans. What an interesting shirt. With an amused snort, I realized that was the same shirt I’d given Nick for Christmas. I almost laughed. Did that mean Nick and this new friend were shacking up together? If I survived this madness, I would definitely tease him.
“Who’s this?” Aggie asked.
“And what a cute shirt,” I added.
Nick flashed me a quick look—a not-now-please expression.
Why wait until the end of the day when I could tease him right this second?
“Yeah, you gonna introduce me to everyone?” the woman next to Nick asked with a hint of a Southern accent. A dimple formed on her right cheek as she smiled.
“Oh, sorry about that. Everyone, this is Brenna Bourbon. She’s one of the instructors at my school.”
Brenna waved at everyone. With a brief inhale, I caught the faint telltale scent of a spellcaster. As to what type, I’d learn sooner or later. Witches showed their true nature in time.
Thorn and Will joined us in the kitchen and more introductions were passed around.
“Were there any trunks in the backyard?” Thorn asked, all business now.
“I teleported to your backyard. We didn’t spot any on the way in,” Nick replied.
Will stepped forward. He was ready to kick some butt with a hockey stick. “Which means we can escape from the backyard if we want.”
Nick strode through the house until he reached the front door. Holding a staff in his left hand, he opened the front door with his right. He crept outside with Brenna bringing up the rear.
“Didn’t you tell me to stay inside?” I hissed.
“Yes,” he said as he walked up to the first open trunk. “I’m not sure what we’re up against, so I’d rather take the brunt of the attack.”
Thorn stepped out onto the porch and blocked the view from the doorway. I wanted him to move so I could see, but I knew he did that for our protection. I refused to miss out on the action and crept over to the living room to peek out the window. Aggie and Will followed.
“What’s Wizard Boy doing?” Aggie asked.
I scooted over to give them a better view. Nick used the edge of his staff to close the first trunk.
“These are all empty.” He walked to the stone and picked it up, then he strolled to the next trunk and kicked it. The trunk jostled but didn’t open.
“Did you just kick that? Seriously?” Thorn barked. “Even if they’re empty, aren’t they still dangerous?”
Brenna placed her hands on her hips. “They must be. When he passed the trunk, Nick sealed it.”
“These vessels are peculiar,” Nick murmured as he palmed the rock. “Are they doorways?”
Unable to resist, I left the house and the others joined me. By now, Nick was on the edge of the front yard.
“Are there more?” I asked.
“The next one is a hundred yards south,” Nick replied. “I can feel another even farther away.”
“What’s that in your hand?” Thorn asked.
“It’s some kind of beacon and there’s very old writing on it, but I can’t read it.” He turned away from us and headed toward the woods. “I need to see where the trunks go.”
Thorn hurried after Nick.
“What do we do?” Will asked us.
“We bury them.” Using an oak wand drew from a jean pocket, she opened a hole in the ground and the first trunk disappeared inside.
So she was an earth witch. Interesting.
Curiously, I watched the earth swallow the trunk. Something caught my eye.
“These trunks are slightly different compared to the ones that showed up at The Bends,” I said. “The markings on the sides are different.”
“What does that mean?” Aggie asked.
“I don’t know since I can’t read them, but I don’t want to find out.” The goblin blade in my hand hadn’t changed form yet. It didn’t detect a threat. Did that mean all these trunks were a decoy to lead us into the woods as Nick claimed?
Time to find out.
Our path of trunks headed south. Nick, Aggie, and Thorn took point and made sure the trunks were locked or empty before Brenna and I took turns burying them—or should I say Brenna did all the hard work. Gradually, we ventured farther and farther south through the woods until we left South Toms River and entered Jakes Branch County Park.
As we traveled deeper into the forest, I burned to know what happened to Nick. Didn’t Nick say she was an instructor at his school? I wanted to pry, but I kept my mouth shut. Asking Brenna to dish on what went down would bother the hell out of Nick, too.
Finally, the woods led to a gravel road next to a vacant lot. Something was familiar about this place. I’d been here before. The lot had a small building and toolshed for storing snowplows. We were quite off the beaten path now. At least five miles from South Toms River.
“Where are we?” Brenna asked.
“We’re inside Jake County Branch Park.” Nothing had changed since my last visit. “And we’re close to something else.”
“Something else?”
We kept following the trunks. The path ended at another toolshed of sorts, surround by haphazard piles of scrap metal, televisions, and other bits of decade-old junk. Of all the places they could have led, why the hell did the trunks end here?
My friends and I had found the zmee. The same Russian dragon that had stolen a package from me a year ago.
Chapter 13
The zmee still hadn’t cleaned up this dump. Not a single piece of trash was cleared since I’d ventured here. A year ago, after winning an online auction, I learned my glorious prize had arrived in the mail, and I raced home to retrieve the package. Only to discover my precious parcel was missing.
The culprit behind the kidnapped package lived in this rubble. He’d sent me on a mission into Philadelphia to get my belongings back. A year ago, the trip here triggered my OCD badly, but today I had other things on my mind—the trees and dirt be damned. I’d deal with shit on my shoes later in the privacy of my bathroom with a bottle of bleach.
Thorn, Will, and Nick stood at the edge of the clearing and waited for Brenna and me.
“Any more trunks?” I asked.
“I don’t detect any, but this clearing is enchanted,” Nick whispered.
“There’s no need to whisper,” I said. “I know what lives here and he can hear us. Well, they can hear us.”
“They?” Aggie asked.
While the others waited, I marched right up to the familiar shed. The unsteady shelter was composed of rusty bits and pieces of scrap metal and crumbled bricks. Over the past year, the elements had corroded more of the metal, but the oak tree jutting out of the back held true and provided ample shade over the house and shed.
As I rounded the house toward the front, I caught sight of a new structure. No more than ten feet from the door was a rocky pile. As I got closer, I realized it wasn’t only made from those peculiar pebbles I’d seen next to the trunks, but rocks and skulls.
Both human and basilisk skulls.
Had the zmee done this? Was the dragon the true Basilisk King? No way.
“Zmee, are you in there, you dirty thieves?” I belted out in Russian.
From inside, I caught the sounds of movement in the house as the dragon shifted.
“I can hear you in there,” I said in English. “You might as well come out before I come in there and set your shack on fire.”
The dented metal door shuddered. “You wouldn’t dare!” a gravelly voice screeched.
The opening swung inward with a yawn. A scaly hand with a four-fingered claw appeared as the others joined me in front. The zmee crawled their way out. When I mean crawled, I meant slow enough for Nick and Brenna to have a full conversation and count the number of basilisk skulls on the mound and discuss the markings carved on the stone.
It was as close as one would get to a History Channel show.
“Do you know the language?” she asked him casually.
“One of the ancient Mesopotamian tongues.”
“Sumerian or Akkadian?”
A grunt from the house caught everyone’s attention again as a dragon with tiny arms and legs pulled its body out section by section. Inch by inch. Three heads popped out of the hole and the one in front paused to take a breather.
