Barf of the Bedazzler Read online

  “The shiny kid knows her stuff,” says Kevin, nodding with approval.

  Pan and I slowly roam among the still figures, taking them in. “What is this?” asks Pan, stopping before a skeletal figure.

  Moxie thumbs through her book. “That’s a lich,” she says.

  “Gross.” I gulp at the thought of bumping into a lich in a dark alley.

  “Don’t worry,” says Kevin. “I didn’t call you here to talk about minotaurs or liches.”

  He leads us over to a dark alcove. Something stands in the shadows, covered with a silk cloth. I shiver in anticipation. Whatever is under there is going to be bad news.

  “I called you here for this,” he says, whipping off the cloth.

  Gulp. Double gulp. There are lots of horrible monsters in this room. But this one’s the worst.

  “I think I like the lich better,” I whimper.

  “Smart kid,” says Kevin. “Do you know what this is?”

  “It’s a bedazzler,” says Moxie.

  “Exactly!” says Kevin, looking impressed. “You’re pretty bright for a warrior. What can you tell me about bedazzlers?”

  Moxie pulls her gaze away from the statue and flips her book to the B section. She begins to read aloud.

  “Nicely done, Bright-and-Shiny,” says Kevin. He turns his gaze to each of us in turn. “Information on bedazzlers is a little sketchy. Most people who encounter them don’t continue breathing long enough to share the gory details.”

  “Oookay…” I turn nervously back to the statue. “So these bedazzlers are super bad and horrible.”

  “You got that right,” says Kevin. “You would not want to get anywhere close to one of these dudes.”

  “So,” says Pan, crossing her arms, “what does this have to do with us?”

  Kevin pulls back his hood. “I need you to get really close to one of these dudes,” he says. “I need you to find me a bedazzler.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  “Have you lost your great and powerful mind?” I cry.

  “You dweebs wanted a quest!” says Kevin. “This is a quest!”

  “No!” cries TickTock, pulling on Kevin’s robes. “Bedazzler statue once make TickTock accidentally pee himself while dusting. Kevin cannot be sending them to be fighting a real one! Too dangerous!”

  Moxie squeezes the handle of her war hammer. “This is one major-league baddie. Check out all those teeth.”

  “This is quite unexpected,” says Pan. “Trying to slay this creature would spell certain doom for even seasoned heroes. And while we have accomplished some admirable tasks, we are fairly unseasoned.”

  Kevin shakes his head. “You noobs need to turn on your listening ears. Did I say anything about slaying a bedazzler?”

  Pan quirks an eyebrow at Kevin. “I believe you asked us to find you a bedazzler.”

  “Yeah,” says Kevin. “Find! Not slay. You’d never survive a battle against a bedazzler! You guys are barely out of preschool!”

  “Then please explain,” says Pan. “What is it you want us to do?

  “Find a bedazzler!” says Kevin. “And bring me something back.”

  I’m afraid to ask. “Bring back what?”

  Kevin turns away from us and mumbles something. It sounds like brf.

  “We can’t understand you,” I say.

  “Barf!” cries Kevin, turning around. “Okay? GOSH!”

  “What in the name of the Fourteen Realms do you need with bedazzler barf?” asks Moxie.

  “Don’t worry about it,” says Kevin. “You kids wouldn’t understand it even if I told you. All you need to know is that I require bedazzler barf for some very cool magical stuff I’m doing.”

  I grab a fistful of my robes. “And how are we supposed to get bedazzler barf without slaying one?” I ask.

  “Don’t ask me!” Kevin cries. “You dudes are the heroes! I imagine you’re going to have to put on your thinking caps and come up with a plan.”

  “Yes,” Pan says, nodding in agreement. “A foolproof plan will be critical.”

  “But don’t try to slay it,” Kevin reminds us. “Because then you’ll be dead. And I’ll have to find some other heroes to run my errands. And that would be incredibly inconvenient for me.”

  “Let’s burn that bridge when we get to it,” says Moxie. “But we still have a problem.”

  “You’re a bunch of gutless fraidy-cats?”

  “No.”

  “What, then?”

  Moxie looks thoughtfully over the page of her book. “It says here that bedazzlers are very rare.” She turns her gaze on Kevin. “Where are we going to find one?”

  “Now that’s something I can help you with,” Kevin says, a smarmy grin spreading across his face. “Rumor has it there’s one man alive who knows the whereabouts of a living, breathing bedazzler.”

  I clap my hands together. “Easy-peasy,” I say. “We find this guy. Smack him around. Get him to tell us where the bedazzler is.”

  Kevin shakes his shaggy head. “Not so easy. And not so peasy. This guy isn’t just a guy. He’s Diremaw the Dread. The pirate.”

  “Diremaw the Dread?” Moxie gasps in awe.

  “You know of this man?” asks Pan.

  Moxie gulps. “When I was an orphan on the streets of Sludgebottom, kids used to tell scary stories about him. They say he can hypnotize you just by looking at you. They say he can peer directly into your soul and read your every thought!”

  “Well, I don’t know about all that stuff,” says Kevin. “But Diremaw the Dread is definitely one bad dude.”

  “He takes no prisoners. Leaves nobody alive. If he attacks your ship on the high seas, you’re pretty much toast.”

  “So what does he look like?” I ask.

  “Dunno,” Kevin says with a shrug. “Nobody but his crew has ever seen him.”

  “So,” says Pan. “If you’ve never seen this pirate captain, where are we supposed to find him?”

  Kevin pulls a parchment from the sleeve of his robe and unfurls it.

  “This”—he points to the map—“is the harbor city of Wetwater. It is filthy. Crime-ridden. And dangerous. You’ll love it.”

  Pan covers her face and groans.

  “Rumor has it that Diremaw’s ship, the Death Knell, always makes harbor there this time of year,” Kevin says, grinning behind his goatee. “He’ll need to resupply. Maybe take on more crew. So he can do one more round of pirating before winter sets in.”

  “Awesome,” I say. “Go to Wetwater. Find a pirate nobody has ever seen. Who leaves nobody alive. Get him to tell us about a horrifying deadly creature. Go find that horrifying deadly creature. Hang out with it long enough to make it upchuck. And live to tell the tale.”

  “See?” says Kevin, smacking me on the back. “You totally get it!” He turns to TickTock. “You were right, TickTock. He’s not as doofy as he looks.”

  I feel queasy.

  “You guys will figure it out!” says Kevin. “When you get to Wetwater, look up an old pal of mine. Magda Rumrunner. She owns an inn called the Fried Phoenix.”

  “Well, that at least sounds promising,” I say.

  Pan shakes her head doubtfully. “I am not convinced. This quest is quite dangerous and complicated.” She eyeballs Kevin skeptically. “Why should we take this on?”

  “Because you will be amply rewarded,” says Kevin. He tosses a small sack into my hands. “With a bonus up front.”

  I feel the weight in my hands. I hear the clink-clink of gold coins. At least five hundred of them.

  “So what do you say?” asks Kevin. “Will you dweebs take on my quest?”

  “Are you kidding?” says Moxie. “Go get some weird bodily function from some horrific creature with little to no hope of returning alive?” Her face splits into a wide grin. “Sounds amazing!”

  She turns to me.

  I grit my teeth. “It makes me nervous. But if we’re going to be heroes, I guess we’re going to have to keep doing heroic things.”

  M
oxie and I both turn to Pan. Her face is set like stone.

  Kevin huffs impatiently. He leans over to me. “Whatcha think?” he hisses. “Should I slap a Mind Control spell on her so we can move things along here?”

  “Mind Control?” I shake my head at him. “I’ve never heard of that spell.”

  “Of course not, little magic dude. You’re still a baby.”

  I grit my teeth in aggravation. I’m really starting to hate that word.

  “What’s it gonna be, sister?” Kevin asks Pan.

  She lets out a long sigh. “There was a time when my life was neat and orderly,” she says softly. “I miss those days.”

  She looks to us. She takes a deep breath. And she finally turns to Kevin. “We’ll do it,” she says. “On one condition.”

  Kevin’s face splits into a grin. “Name it.”

  “You send TickTock along with us.”

  TickTock’s mouth drops open and stays there. “You want TickTock to go?”

  “Heck yeah!” cries Moxie.

  Pan raises an eyebrow at Kevin. “TickTock has proven himself talented, loyal, and resourceful. But more than that, he is our friend.”

  The phibling sputters something in Phibish, but I can’t make it out because he’s starting to blubber.

  “Whoa,” says Kevin. “Hold on there, Nelly. TickTock is my number one helper-dude. If he goes with you, who’s going to build my gadgets? Who’s going to assist me in my experiments? And, most important, who’s going to make my breakfast? That phibling knows exactly how I like my eggs.”

  Pan crosses her arms. “How badly do you want your barf?”

  Kevin lets out a loud groan. “Fine,” he says. “I guess I can have toast for breakfast until you get back.”

  Pan plucks the map from Kevin’s hands with a smirk.

  “Pack your bags, everyone,” she says, cocking a long, pointy eyebrow at us. “It looks like we’re going to Wetwater.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The quickest way to Wetwater is straight through a smelly, disgusting swamp.

  So, of course, that’s where we are. Staring out at Blight Bog Funk.

  “Yuck,” says TickTock.

  “Yuck?” asks Moxie. “You’re a phibling. Aren’t you supposed to like swamps and mud and stuff?”

  “TickTock is liking things that go click and clack and tick and tock. Why are you thinking TickTock’s clan is making him leave phibling village?”

  Huh. I guess I’m not the only one who got kicked out of his family.

  Bizzy flutters nervously at my side. I don’t blame her. A nasty swamp sprawls before us. A deadly quest lies beyond that. But I’m too distracted to be nervous. Because one word just keeps rolling through my mind.

  Baby.

  I am sick and tired of hearing that word!

  Trouble is … Kevin and TickTock are right. Ever since our last adventure, Moxie is walloping six baddies at a time and Pan is leaping higher and flying farther than I ever knew she could.

  Me? Still doing baby spells.

  I reach for the fat spellbook hanging at my side. I thumb through the well-worn pages at the beginning of the book. The place where all the starter spells live.

  Master Elmore always said that the key to building power was one little step at a time. Start with the basics and work up to the hard stuff. But it’s time to seriously up my game. My finger moves to the smoother, less-used pages at the back of the book. The place where the advanced magic is. Maybe it’s time to skip over a few chapters and show everybody that I’m not the infant they think I am.

  KER-SQUISH!

  My thoughts fade away like a fog. Because Moxie has just plunged waist-deep into the sludge, splattering me with muck in the process. I tuck my spellbook under my robes to protect it from swamp slime.

  “We’ll never get across this!” Moxie cries, tugging herself out of the muck.

  “I agree,” Pan says, nose wrinkled in distaste. “This is going to be one very messy journey.”

  “Not if you listen to TickTock!” says the phibling.

  “Nicely done, TickTock,” says Pan approvingly, following in his footsteps. “I thought you hated swamps.”

  “TickTock does,” says the phibling thoughtfully. “But TickTock guesses he is still being a phibling. Some things are being part of you always.”

  The deeper we go, the murkier it gets. Deformed trees reach out of the sludge like skeleton fingers, grasping at us. Wet slimy things ripple in the water nearby. Thankfully nothing ventures too close, except the bugs, which are eating us alive.

  The minutes turn to hours, and still we tromp through the sludge. I’m cold. I’m wet. I think I have the sniffles.

  “Look at that,” says Moxie, pointing.

  Hanging from a nearby tree is a carving.

  Pan looks closely at the symbol. “This is a carving of a stank frond. It’s some sort of territorial marker. Something has claimed this area as its domain.”

  “Probably something horribly evil,” says Moxie. “With ten legs and lots of teeth.”

  “We must move cautiously from here,” whispers Pan. We slip past the marker and keep trudging into the mist.

  Pan says we’re still heading in roughly the right direction. I have no idea how she knows this, but since elves are all in touch with nature and directions and the moon and junk, I’ll take her word for it.

  Then, just when I’m about to go completely insane from boredom and wet socks, we see it.

  A little ball of light. Blinking. Dancing in the distance.

  Then another little light winks into view.

  Then a third. They hover tauntingly. Beckoning us.

  To safety.

  Or to a grisly doom.

  CHAPTER SIX

  An eerie chill runs through me that has nothing to do with gooey socks. “Somebody tell me you see those lights,” I say.

  “I see them,” says Pan, squinting through the mist. “Put out the torch.”

  I drop the flame into the muck, and it sputters out with a hiss. But still, the balls of light blink and bob in the distance, like creepy eyes playing peekaboo.

  “Oh crud,” says Moxie. “I know what these are.”

  “Friendly helpful people with lanterns?” says TickTock. “Is that what Hammer-girl is going to be saying?”

  “Nope,” she says grimly. “That’s what they want you to think. But they’re really wisp wraiths.”

  I’m wet. I’m slimy. I’m lost in a bog. And now evil balls of light are waving at us. Cool.

  “TickTock,” says Pan. “See if you can find a path that leads away from the lights.”

  “Going away from the creepy death lights.” I nod. “I like this new plan very much.”

  TickTock veers right. I hold tightly to Pan’s robes, Bizzy buzzing anxiously at my side.

  “They’re getting closer,” says Moxie.

  She’s right. The bobbing lights are blinking furiously, closing in on their prey. And when I say “prey,” I mean my plump and highly edible self.

  I feel the hysteria taking over inside me. “We need a new plan,” I say.

  “I am open to suggestions,” says Pan.

  “Good, ’cause I’ve got one,” I cry. “RUN!”

  It’s like saying it aloud trips off the panic button in all of us. We dart forward, slopping furiously through the sludge. I don’t care how muddy I get. I just want to get away from the diabolical light balls of doom.

  Suddenly I’m yanked into the air, feetfirst. I reach out to grab something. Anything. My hands find Moxie’s shield. Pan’s nose. But it’s not the wisp wraiths that have us.

  We’ve all been snatched up by a giant net.

  “Gotta get out!” I scream in panic. “Gotta get out!”

  Only nothing devours us. Instead we hear a sound. The first sound I’ve heard all day. Besides the bugs. And my own screaming.

  It’s the unmistakable sound of bowstrings being drawn.

  “Now that there’s a fine idea,” says a vo
ice. “Git out while the gittin’s good. Only exceptin’ you is on our land. So you ain’t gittin’ nowhere.”

  As the net slowly spins, I see … a dozen dark figures surrounding us.

  “Cut ’em down, Jethro,” says the voice from the shadows.

  SHWICK!

  We clatter to the muck in a jumble of legs and robes and weapons. Moxie is on her feet instantly, hammer in hand.

  The bobbing lights shine in our eyes. But they suddenly seem a lot less ghostly.

  “Moxie,” I hiss. “I don’t think these are wisp wraiths!”

  I hear whoops of laughter from all around us.

  “Jethro, I do declare!” says the voice. “That wisp wraith trick is the finest idea you ever had. Next time I find me a stank frond, I’m fixin’ to give you the whole thing. You earned it!”

  “Thank ye kindly, Peat Blossom!” says Jethro.

  I turn to Moxie. “Trick?”

  “Yes, indeedy,” hoots the one called Peat Blossom. “A right fine one too! Now y’all best be dropping them weapons. Lest ya wanna get pincushioned full of arrows!”

  Moxie grips and ungrips her hammer. I know the look on her face. She has no plans to drop her hammer. She’s about to charge into battle like a rampaging hippo.

  “Why don’t you lower those lights?” she shouts. “So we can get a good look at your cowardly faces!”

  Peat Blossom snaps her fingers. At her signal, the dark figures lower their lanterns, revealing the faces that circle us. Their upturned eyes. Their long eyebrows.

  And their delicate pointy ears.

  We are completely surrounded.

  By elves.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  “Last warning,” says Peat Blossom. “You got to the count of three to drop ’em.”

  Moxie raises her shield, ready to attack. But, unexpectedly, Pan steps forward and lays her bo staff on the ground.

  Moxie whirls on her. “What are you doing?”

  “One!”

  Pan reaches over and puts a hand on Moxie arm. “Do it,” she says.